Bottom: Gang activity, Pete Peterson with Ted Turner and Warren Buffet
Previous posts this week have commented on the extravagant cost of Chelsea Clinton's wedding to her moneylender/ speculator boyfriend. Imagine these people, they are so confident that they can steal and plunder all they can from society and nothing will be done about it. Religion plays a big role in the apathy that exists as it offers this warped explanation of the events that happen in society as the struggle between good and evil, and gods and demons and all sorts of rubbish. This comes to mind because, as I write, I see two people at a table across the room praying. All these distractions to rational thinking will be brushed aside at some point but it serves to delay any mass movement in opposition to the war that the capitalist class is waging on working people throughout the world. Given the complete capitulation to this offensive on the part of the leaders of the workers' organizations, most people see nowhere to go and the capitalist class exudes confidence.
John Paulson is a thief extraordinaire. He is what they call a "hedge fund wizard". He is not a good wizard like some, he is a bad wizard who robs from workers; not liking productive Labor himself, he avoids it by stealing from others. The serious journals of capitalism frequently referred to the likes of John Paulson as "Masters of the Universe". This was because of the vast sums of money they accumulated without working. Accumulating money without working, in other words, off the backs of those that do work, is success in the eyes of the capitalist class. People that do this are "smart", "successful", intelligent", all the above. They don't throw this term around so much anymore such is the animosity and hatred for the "Masters of the Universe" these days.
Every ruling class does this of course, justifies their position in life to some form of higher intelligence. Slave owners had to ensure that the slave was demonized as less than human. The Lord had to do the same with regards to the serf. How else can good Christian folk subjugate and exploit others and still get in to heaven if it were not for the fact that the exploited are exploited because they are weaker, dumber, at best meek and passive and inherently lazy, at worst no better than animals.
Business Week calls John Paulson a "profit seeker pure and simple". Paulson has a rosy view of the economy, "We're in the middle of a sustained recovery in the US" he tells the magazine. The housing market is "an attractive buying opportunity" he adds, "It's the best time to buy a house in America." Paulson doesn't need actually need a house to live in, he already has one or two. He is not looking for shelter, he is a speculator. Human shelter is a commodity like any other for him, he could be buying pork bellies or wheat futures or the debt of some poor worker trying desperately to keep real shelter over their heads; this is how he made a lot of money.
Paulson has no shame, he doesn't even need the market, he likes socialism for the rich. When the banks were begging for money and some capitalist economists like Paul Krugman were calling for their nationalization, Paulson began using some of the money he stole from workers to invest in them. He was "smart" you see. He recognized that the taxpayer was going to bail them out and salivated at the thought of it. "With the American taxpayer covering his downside," Business Week writes, "financial institutions was easy pickings."
Paulson holds $3 billion of Bank of America stock and $2 billion of Citi. He is buying casino stock now and vacant residential land in Florida. He is also "heavily invested" in gold. The good thing about being a member of the ruling class, connected to the likes of Goldman Sachs the moneylending firm that has its tentacles deeply embracing the US government, especially the treasury, is that they make the laws. As a private hedge fund manager, he is "not obliged to provide a complete picture of his investments" says BW * It's good to be king.
Another crook extraordinaire is Pete Peterson. Peterson is one of the co-founders of Blackstone group, another cancer on society, a coupon clipping outfit that played a major role bringing us the present crisis. Peterson, walked away with $1.8 billion in Blackstone's 2007 IPO and is using $1 billion of the fortune he made screwing the US taxpayer in a personal crusade to drive workers deeper in to a hole. He is concerned about the deficits, as we should also, after all, it is us that will have to pay the pound of flesh to the moneylenders. But his concern is that high deficits make profit taking more difficult.
Peterson has used the money he stole to found a think tank, basically a bunch of guys who spend all day long figuring out how best to continue the plunder of society in the most secure and stable way. His institution organizes conference that so called "experts" like Bill Clinton and others can speak at. Peterson opposes extending unemployment benefits because, like most of his kind, he figures workers won't get a job, and wants to cut entitlement programs and raise taxes. The groups he has bankrolled with the money he stole from the likes of the US homeowner, are "front groups" used to "stampede" "lawmakers into cutting Social Security and Medicare" says one critic.**
I listen to the news and firefighters in San Jose are being asked to take wage concessions for less layoffs. Transit workers are facing cuts across the nation as bus routes are eliminated, you all know about all this. This is all that is on the table when it comes to working people, job losses or cuts in pay. Increased taxes or eliminating programs. Cuts in education/transportation or a more taxes on the ballot. The Union leadership who have the resources to mount an offensive of our own, refuse to do so, going on the offensive can only lead to chaos from their point of view as they have the same world view as the employers. They support the same choices, cuts in one area against cuts in another; the working class must pay.
As we feel the effects of the crisis in a real way, we should reflect on what Business Week says of Paulson, because the taxpayer rescued the banks (and capitalism) from collapse, "investing in US financial institutions was easy pickings".
The other day a friend of mine took me up for not supporting flags. I am not fooled by the "United We stand Mantra" I told him. They fooled me once, not again. Paulson might be an American and we have some minor cultural similarities, but we are class enemies, he is not my American. An Iraqi worker, Japanese worker, Peruvian worker, these are my class allies and if there's to be any "Uniting" it is with them, against the likes of the Paulsons and Peterson's of this world that I will be doing it.
* Who Would Bet Against John Paulson: BW 7-05-10
** Spending Big to Stop Big Spending: BW 7-1-10
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