Nov 29th, 2011
Showing posts with label matt taibbi. Show all posts
Showing posts with label matt taibbi. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Monday, October 31, 2011
Quote Of The Day - Defending The Occupation Edition, cont..
Oct 31st, 2011
"When you take into consideration all the theft and fraud and market manipulation and other evil shit Wall Street bankers have been guilty of in the last ten-fifteen years, you have to have balls like church bells to trot out a propaganda line that says the protesters are just jealous of their hard-earned money."
-- Matt Taibbi, once again confronting the chin high levels of manure that anti-Occupation critics are shoveling.
-- Matt Taibbi, once again confronting the chin high levels of manure that anti-Occupation critics are shoveling.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Taibbi Likens Wall Street To Russian Oligarchy
Jan 7th, 2011
Pretty amazing stuff:
"Question: How did your work in Moscow help you uncover hypocrisy in America?
Matt Taibbi: One of the reasons I was so attracted to this Wall Street story was when I first started looking at it in the summer of 2008, I was continually struck by how much it reminded me of a lot of the dynamic that I had seen covering the Russian government and the Russian state where there was this oligarchical system that they had over there. There were a very tiny collection of super-connected industrial figures, these oligarchs. They were bankers mostly. And there was this circular process of government gives tons of money to banker; banker then scams the public and returns money to politicians who in turn keep giving money back to the bankers. And that whole circular process is very similar to what is going on here in the States now where we have a small group of very, very politically connected banks who give massive campaign contributions to both parties and they’re rewarded with selective regulation and bailouts and then the money comes back again. I think if I hadn’t seen that in the more crude form that you see in Russia where—stuff is just right out in the open in Russia sometimes; they don’t even really hide it—if I hadn’t seen that it would have been harder for me to see this story.
Pretty amazing stuff:
"Question: How did your work in Moscow help you uncover hypocrisy in America?
Matt Taibbi: One of the reasons I was so attracted to this Wall Street story was when I first started looking at it in the summer of 2008, I was continually struck by how much it reminded me of a lot of the dynamic that I had seen covering the Russian government and the Russian state where there was this oligarchical system that they had over there. There were a very tiny collection of super-connected industrial figures, these oligarchs. They were bankers mostly. And there was this circular process of government gives tons of money to banker; banker then scams the public and returns money to politicians who in turn keep giving money back to the bankers. And that whole circular process is very similar to what is going on here in the States now where we have a small group of very, very politically connected banks who give massive campaign contributions to both parties and they’re rewarded with selective regulation and bailouts and then the money comes back again. I think if I hadn’t seen that in the more crude form that you see in Russia where—stuff is just right out in the open in Russia sometimes; they don’t even really hide it—if I hadn’t seen that it would have been harder for me to see this story.
Recorded on November 22, 2010
Interviewed by Andrew Dermont
Directed by Jonathan Fowler
Produced by Elizabeth Rodd"
Interviewed by Andrew Dermont
Directed by Jonathan Fowler
Produced by Elizabeth Rodd"
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Real Redistribution
Nov 16th, 2010
If there has been one truly spurious charge leveled against President Obama, it is the repeated assertion that his policies are a threat to middle class net worth through socialist redistribution. The fact that Reaganomics essentially entrenched a system that has redistributed wealth upward without pause for thirty years was lost on the electorate. Also lost is that this version of a "free market," so slavishly supported by many Americans, is their real enemy. Matt Taibbi has noted an interesting figure in his book, Griftopia.
"The top 1 percent has seen its share of the nation’s overall wealth jump from 34.6 percent before the crisis, in 2007, to over 37.1 percent in 2009. Moreover, the standard of living for the average American has plummeted during the crisis -- the median American household net worth was $102,500 in 2007, and went down to $65,400 in 2009"
"The top 1 percent has seen its share of the nation’s overall wealth jump from 34.6 percent before the crisis, in 2007, to over 37.1 percent in 2009. Moreover, the standard of living for the average American has plummeted during the crisis -- the median American household net worth was $102,500 in 2007, and went down to $65,400 in 2009"
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