bits and pieces

I got diverted and did not comment on it before. But it is a scandal that proposition 8 which banned gay marriage was passed in California. The Mormon church and the rest of the churches were the main forces whipping up support for the ban. The Mormon church has some neck with its history of polygamy and racism. And also sexism. When they carried out polygamy only the men were allowed to have more than one partner. And they thought they were morally justified in leading the charge to ban gay marriage. The Catholic Church was of course not far behind. It with its history of child abuse and rape. And the cover up of these crimes. They Cardinals and Bishops were instructed to cover up these crimes by the pope as "priests were god's gift to the church." What a bunch of hypocrites. The prisons should be full of popes and cardinals and priests. Who do these people think they are anyway. I hope it will the vote in California will be reversed.

And talking about sexism I see that Obama has appointed to be his main economic adviser Larry Sumners. This is the man who was drummed out of Harvard for saying that women were inherently  incapable of becoming leaders in science and math. Him and his buddies did not do so good in science and maths when it came to the economy. They brought the world financial system crashing down around them. 

Sumners is joined in the Obama team by former Citigroup head Rubin. This is the man who pushed through the change in the policy of this bank between 2002 to 2005 so that it would take greater risks even though he was warned publicly that this was wrong. Now he whines that nobody knew this crisis was going to happen. This is a lie. Those of us who based ourselves on the method of Marx knew that this collapse was inevitable. Rubin won't take responsibility for his mistakes. But he took $115 million in pay since 1999 and stock options on top of that. Over this time the bank got a hand out of $45 billion of our taxes and a government guarantee of protection against most losses on $306 billion of its assets. William Smith a New York money manager and frequent critic of Citigroup's current management and board had this to say: "He has overseen the entire meltdown...." Citigroup's shares are down 86% from their peak two years and since Rubin came on board. And this is the creature  that is supposed to take the country out of its financial crisis, the creature that Obama has picked. 

Listen to to his lying excuses. The Wall Street Journal asked him if he had any regrets about his catastrophic times at Citigroup and he said: "I guess I don't think of it quite that way!" Yes i wonder why. And in the same article when the Wall Street Journal asked what he thought he accomplished at Citigroup he replied: "It's a funny way to think about it. I think I have been a very constructive part of the Citigroup environment. That has been particularly manifest since August 2007. I have been very involved." This is the period the bank's shares fell by around 80%. 

Obama is surrounding himself with a bunch of swindlers and thieves and robbers of big capitalism to take charge of the economy. Working class must get ready to fight or we will pay the price. 

Sean.