The $9 Billion Witness: Meet JPMorgan Chase’s Worst Nightmare
November 7th, 2014Via: Rolling Stone:
She tried to stay quiet, she really did. But after eight years of keeping a heavy secret, the day came when Alayne Fleischmann couldn’t take it anymore.
“It was like watching an old lady get mugged on the street,” she says. “I thought, ‘I can’t sit by any longer.'”
Fleischmann is a tall, thin, quick-witted securities lawyer in her late thirties, with long blond hair, pale-blue eyes and an infectious sense of humor that has survived some very tough times. She’s had to struggle to find work despite some striking skills and qualifications, a common symptom of a not-so-common condition called being a whistle-blower.
Fleischmann is the central witness in one of the biggest cases of white-collar crime in American history, possessing secrets that JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon late last year paid $9 billion (not $13 billion as regularly reported – more on that later) to keep the public from hearing.
Back in 2006, as a deal manager at the gigantic bank, Fleischmann first witnessed, then tried to stop, what she describes as “massive criminal securities fraud” in the bank’s mortgage operations.
Thanks to a confidentiality agreement, she’s kept her mouth shut since then. “My closest family and friends don’t know what I’ve been living with,” she says. “Even my brother will only find out for the first time when he sees this interview.”
Six years after the crisis that cratered the global economy, it’s not exactly news that the country’s biggest banks stole on a grand scale. That’s why the more important part of Fleischmann’s story is in the pains Chase and the Justice Department took to silence her.
She was blocked at every turn: by asleep-on-the-job regulators like the Securities and Exchange Commission, by a court system that allowed Chase to use its billions to bury her evidence, and, finally, by officials like outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder, the chief architect of the crazily elaborate government policy of surrender, secrecy and cover-up. “Every time I had a chance to talk, something always got in the way,” Fleischmann says.
This past year she watched as Holder’s Justice Department struck a series of historic settlement deals with Chase, Citigroup and Bank of America. The root bargain in these deals was cash for secrecy. The banks paid big fines, without trials or even judges – only secret negotiations that typically ended with the public shown nothing but vague, quasi-official papers called “statements of facts,” which were conveniently devoid of anything like actual facts.
And now, with Holder about to leave office and his Justice Department reportedly wrapping up its final settlements, the state is effectively putting the finishing touches on what will amount to a sweeping, industrywide effort to bury the facts of a whole generation of Wall Street corruption. “I could be sued into bankruptcy,” she says. “I could lose my license to practice law. I could lose everything. But if we don’t start speaking up, then this really is all we’re going to get: the biggest financial cover-up in history.”
Research Credit: CP
Russian Tanks and Artillery Enter Ukraine
November 7th, 2014Via: Reuters:
A column of 32 tanks, 16 howitzer artillery systems and trucks carrying ammunition and fighters has crossed into eastern Ukraine from Russia, the Kiev military said on Friday.
“The deployment continues of military equipment and Russian mercenaries to the front lines,” spokesman Andriy Lysenko said in a televised briefing referring to Thursday’s cross-border incursion.
$7 Billion U.S. Eradication Effort Delivers Record High Poppy Crop in Afghanistan
November 5th, 2014Via: Common Dreams:
Opium poppy cultivation levels in Afghanistan are at a record high, though the U.S. government has spent over $7 billion to stop it, a federal watchdog states in a new report.
In a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, Attorney General Eric Holder and US AID head Rajiv Shah, Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) John F. Sopko writes: “Despite spending over $7 billion to combat opium poppy cultivation and to develop the Afghan government’s counternarcotics capacity, opium poppy cultivation levels in Afghanistan hit an all-time high in 2013.”
“As of June 30, 2014, the United States has spent approximately $7.6 billion on counternarcotics efforts in Afghanistan,” the letter states.
“Despite the significant financial expenditure, opium poppy cultivation has far exceeded previous records,” he writes, adding that this “calls into question the long-term effectiveness and sustainability of those prior efforts.”
The value of opium and opium-made products in Afghanistan—the world’s largest producer of opium—rose 50 percent from 2012 to 2013, the report states, citing United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) figures.
Research Credit: JB
Inside America’s Solitary Confinement For Kids
November 5th, 2014Via: Journeyman Pictures:
Research Credit: JB
The Secret Retrofit of the Citibank Tower in 1978
November 5th, 2014I occasionally look to see if any new information has come out about the crew that rigged the World Trade Center towers before 9/11.
This old video about the Citibank Tower was new to me, and very interesting considering what happened before 9/11.
Via: YouTube:
Open Thread: Midterm U.S. Elections
November 5th, 2014Does anyone have any comments on this?
Via: CNN:
A Republican tide ripped the Senate away from Democrats Tuesday, giving the GOP full control of Congress and the power to pin down President Barack Obama during his last two years in office.
The thumping win upends the balance of power between the White House and Capitol Hill only six years after Obama’s Democrats swept to power and marginalized Republicans in a rush to reform health care, Wall Street and pass a huge stimulus package.
Any Questions?
November 5th, 2014I saw this on SMA’s (English Language) Facebook page:
Dr. Toni Bark on Pediatric Health and Vaccination Status: The Kids with Chronic Illnesses Have All Been Vaccinated
November 4th, 2014Via: Age of Autism:
Malls Fill Vacant Stores With Server Rooms
November 3rd, 2014Via: Wall Street Journal:
The Internet is moving to a shopping center near you.
In Fort Wayne, Ind., a vacated Target store is about to be home to rows of computer servers, network routers and Ethernet cables courtesy of a local data-center operator. In Jackson, Miss., a former McRae’s department store will get the same treatment next year. And one quadrant of the Marley Station Mall south of Baltimore is already occupied by a data-center company that last year offered to buy out the rest of the building.
As America’s retailers struggle to keep up with online shopping, the Internet is starting to settle into some of the very spaces where brick-and-mortar customers used to shop. The shift brings welcome tenants to some abandoned stretches of the suburban landscape, though it doesn’t replace all the jobs and sales-tax revenue that local communities lost when stores left the building.
Flesh-and-Blood Advisers Face Threats from Robots
November 3rd, 2014
Via: Reuters:
Fidelity and Charles Schwab will be offering automated financial advice that’s low-cost or even free, pushing other advisers to be tech-savvy to compete.
Last month, both Charles Schwab Corp and Fidelity Investments unveiled so-called “robo” advice programs that offer free or very cheap algorithm-driven portfolio management to investors.
More
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That strikes fear into the hearts of many financial advisers who typically charge 1% or more of assets under management to offer personalized advice to investors.
