"Words that make actions speak louder."
GOP candidates are making a point of running against “bailouts” this year. Yet even as they rail about rescuing big banks, they’re working on a plan that would slip those same banks an estimated $90 billion in taxpayer money … and that’s just in the first ten years. “Fiscal conservatism,” anyone? It was always hypocritical […]
At the center of the foreclosure fraud crisis lies something called “MERS,” which is usually described in news reports as a computer system and database. But a thorough review of the company’s publicly available documents show it’s much more than that. We reviewed hundreds of pages of bulletins, newsletters, and manuals, along with PowerPoint presentations, […]
Jamie Dimon and the other mega-bankers who derailed the economy have a new PR campaign to sell you. They’re saying that families who can’t pay their mortgages must bear the blame – all the blame – for the foreclosure crisis. That means the public should just ignore banks’ widespread lawbreaking in the registering and transfer […]
Heard the one about the Social Security Trust Fund that holds nothing but “IOUs”? That phony claim goes back to at least 1939, when a rabidly anti-Roosevelt journalist named John T. Flynn used a colorful analogy about a tin box in a drawer in order to argue that Social Security was a “monstrosity.” But where […]
Appeared on the Jaco Report on Fox News in St. Louis. We had a good talk about foreclosure fraud, the “automated greed factories,” and the dead soul of modern banking: Richard Eskow Jaco St Louis Fox 10-13-10
The foreclosure fraud scandal is a big deal (or a big “effin’” deal, as Joe Biden might say). But its real significance is an even bigger deal. Foreclosure fraud is one domino, and if it falls others will follow. The result could be an end to the “invisible bailout” – the one you never hear […]
Two seemingly unrelated stories from the past week illustrate a fundamental problem with today’s financial system. While this problem may seem “philosophical” or abstract, it’s very real, and we won’t put our economy back on a sound footing until we get a handle on it. The problem is this: Banking institutions no longer want to […]
Federal Reserve chair Ben Bernanke took another swing at Social Security and Medicare today, saying yet again that they’ll need to be cut to protect our nation’s financial health. Based on his record, any roadmap Bernanke lays out for the future is worth following … as long as you hold it up to a mirror […]
Remember 2003, when so many Americans hated France for refusing to participate in the Iraq invasion? The airwaves were filled with insults about “effete” and “cowardly” Frenchmen, the phrase “cheese eating surrender monkeys” was on lips across the nation, and rich patriots were boycotting Rhône wine in the spirit of national sacrifice. Well, munch on […]
All the major banking institutions say the right things about race and equality. They all have diversity programs. A few financial industry leaders, like Robert Rubin and Jamie Dimon, even support socially liberal causes. Yet the banking industry covertly uses payday lenders as a “front,” a way to prey on minority neighborhoods without getting their […]