Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan
speaking to employees in North Carolina, spoke about how “incensed” he feels about public criticism about his company:
“I, like you, get a little incensed when you think about how much good all of you do, whether it’s volunteer hours, charitable giving we do, serving clients and customers well.” His reaction to critics: “You ought to think a little about that before you start yelling at us.”
A simple but powerful animated video explaining how corporations have hijacked American democracy, and what can be done to restore it.
My parents taught me that when you make a mistake that hurts other people, you should apologize for it.
We owe a Big Apology when it comes to Iraq.
Now that President Obama has announced all America troops will be out of Iraq by the end of this year (we don’t count the thousands of diplomats, private contractors, mercenaries and covert operatives left behind ) perhaps that final troop withdrawal might be the proper time for our government to apologize for our horrifically tragic nine-year error.
We should start with a meaningful apology to the people of Iraq for our ill-conceived, illegal and immoral invasion of a sovereign country that never hurt or threatened us. We certainly owe an apology to the hundreds of thousands of dead, injured and permanently maimed Iraqis and their families, as well as the 2.5 million who fled their country. In a fair world, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and their cohorts would go to prison for fabricating and manipulating intelligence data to make a case for their war of choice. In the real world we live in now, an apology would be a good start.
The retreat from another unnecessary war, Vietnam
Next we should apologize to the nearly 4500 American soldiers killed there and to their families, as well as to the tens of thousands of injured and permanently maimed troops for sending them into this unnecessary and worthless occupation. We know we will be paying for their medical, psychiatric, and related care for decades to come, but we can at least say “I’m sorry.”
We certainly owe an apology to countries like Germany and France (remember “freedom fries” and boycotting French wine) who we criticized for not supporting our rush to war. We need to apologize to the United Nations for defying Security Council opposition to the invasion. And we should offer a “mea culpa” to the millions of protesters here and abroad who took to the streets in 2003 in a vain attempt to convince us not to invade Iraq.
We surely need to apologize to the people of Afghanistan who have had to endure a poorly run American invasion and occupation put on the back burner in the rush to invade and occupy Iraq. Because of the diversion of attention and resources in Iraq, the Afghani people have suffered a more prolonged and mismanaged occupation with no end in sight.
While we’re at it, our government should apologize to the tens of millions of Americans who, because of the one trillion (and probably much more) dollars spent thus far in Iraq, have had to do with less education, health care, and other underfunded government services, not to mention a tanking economy and massive public debt.
There are many more apologies our government should offer, and an apology isn’t nearly enough for the damage we’ve caused. And realistically, apologies aren’t likely even to be offered. Politically it wouldn’t sit well with the right-wing “American exceptionalism” crowd, who would attack such an idea as weak and deferential.
Our country screwed up big time in Iraq, and caused a massive amount of unnecessary death and destruction in the process. Let’s hope at some point we will be grown up enough to acknowledge our mistake and tell the world, “We, the United States of America, are truly sorry.”
Excellent video (4:25) sums up the reasons to Occupy Wall Street and everywhere else.
qwoter.comVery interesting data points via Absolute Return:
American hedge funds reported a healthy increase in assets in this year’s first half and now manage a combined $1.399 trillion. That’s $102 billion, or nearly 8%, more than they managed at the beginning of the year, according to the latest Billion Dollar Club, AR Magazine’s survey of American hedge funds managing $1 billion or more.
Bridgewater took the top spot again, followed by J.P. Morgan Asset Management and Paulson & Co.
Globally, hedge fund assets amount to $2.16 trillion, up slightly from the $1.82 trillion managed at the beginning of the year. Full results are available online at www.absolutereturn-alpha.com.
Q3, there were 241 American hedge fund firms managing assets of $1 billion or more, according to the survey, which appears in the October issue of AR. That’s an increase since January 2011, when there were 225 such funds holding a combined total of $1.297 trillion, according to the survey.
The industry’s growth comes at a time when overall hedge fund performance has been lackluster, indicating that most of the increase is due to new inflows from investors.
Bridgewater Associates emerges as this year’s biggest winner. With $70.3 billion as of July 1, Bridgewater not only remains the largest American hedge fund firm but also notched the biggest gain in assets, adding $11.4 billion — or 19.35% — since January. The rapid growth of Bridgewater’s new Pure Alpha Major Markets Fund, which the firm launched last year as a way to cap its original Pure Alpha fund, accounted for much of these gains.”
article above from The Big Picture
For further enlightenment, take a look at the Highest Paid Hedge Fund Managers/The Richest People (John Paulson “earned” $4.9 billion in 2010, more than double his 2009 earnings).
Michael Moore is not welcome in the NY Stock Exchange:
“To cooperate passively with an unjust system makes the oppressed as evil as the oppressor.”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
from one of his sermons written in a Georgia jail “Shattered Dreams,” in 1963.
, October 24, 2011
LONDON — Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, said on Monday that his controversial Web site could be forced to shut down by the end of the year because a 10-month-old “financial blockade” had sharply reduced the donations on which it depends.
Calling the blockade a “dangerous, oppressive and undemocratic” attack led by the United States, Mr. Assange said at a news conference here that it had deprived his organization of “tens of millions of dollars,” and warned, “If WikiLeaks does not find a way to remove this blockade, we will not be able to continue by the turn of the new year.”
Since the end of 2010, financial intermediaries, including Visa, MasterCard, PayPal and Western Union, have refused to allow donations to WikiLeaks to flow through their systems, he said, blocking “95 percent” of the Web site’s revenue and leaving it to operate on its cash reserves for the past 10 months. An aide said that WikiLeaks was now receiving less than $10,000 a month in donations.
Mr. Assange said that WikiLeaks had been forced to halt work on the processing of tens of thousands of secret documents that it has received, and to turn its attention instead to lawsuits it has filed in the United States, Australia, Scandinavian countries and elsewhere, as well as to a formal petition to the European Commission to try to restore donors’ ability to send it money through normal channels.
WikiLeaks receives and publishes confidential documents from whistle-blowers and leakers, who are eager to see the site continue with the publishing sensations that drew worldwide attention last year. WikiLeaks released and passed to news organizations huge quantities of secret United States military and diplomatic cables on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and other subjects. Among the organizations the group worked with were The New York Times; Der Spiegel, the German newsmagazine; and The Guardian, a British newspaper.
Mr. Assange held the news conference while on a brief break from his effective house arrest on a country estate 100 miles outside London. Limits on his movements are part of the bail conditions imposed on him last year while British courts decide whether to extradite him to Sweden. The authorities there want him to answer questions related to accusations that he sexually abused two women during a visit to Stockholm in the summer of 2010. A British appeals court ruling on the extradition, pending for months, is expected at any time.
At the news conference on Monday, Mr. Assange said that he and WikiLeaks were victims of a “conspiracy to smear and destroy” them, led by the United States Treasury, American intelligence agencies and “right-wing” forces in the United States, including powerful corporations led by Bank of America and the Visa credit card company. He said the attack had also included “high-level calls” to assassinate him and other WikiLeaks associates, but offered no specifics to support the allegation.
Read the entire article here: WikiLeaks Problems/NY Times
Fun (yet serious) Video:
