On April 25, 2010, a day before a vote that would decide whether the Senate would debate financial reform, Senator Bernie Sanders spoke of the oft-stated belief, some enormous economic engines are to "Too Big To Fail."
The great Wall Street Bail Out, TARP and the various programs associated with it, continues to breed deep levels of resentment and cynicism in the American public who footed the bill for rescuing the financial sector in America. The resentment is easy to understand. The fact that there really were no good options left by the time Obama was elected President helps to explain his Administration's actions in that crisis, all taken under duress and incredible pressure with virtually no time for full contemplation let alone careful detailed planning. Those facts do almost nothing though to deal with the publics anger, which repeatedly flares up like a California wild fire facing El Nino winds. Huge Goldman Sachs bonuses and Wells Fargo record profits are merely the latest gale wind gusts. All the while cynicism keeps growing that our government is in bed with giant financial interests writing sweetheart legislation as Valentine Day presents for corporate Sugar Daddies in a ritual that repeats as often and predictably as Groundhog Day in Hollywood.
Wells Fargo is a roadblock to economic recovery. That's what members of the United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers (UE) are claiming, as they literally blocked a busy Rock Island, Illinois intersection late last week to protest Wells Fargo's decision to cut off credit to the Quad City Die Casting factory.
100 Quad City factory employees risk losing their jobs if Wells Fargo doesn't extend tens of thousands of dollars in credit to continue day-to-day operating costs. So why won't Wells Fargo use some of its $25 billion in bailout funds to keep this factory afloat, particularly when the Illinois-Iowa Quad Cities region is losing $6.1 million in wages and tax revenue annually? According to UE organizer Leah Fried, "[Wells Fargo] want[s] to get out from under the TARP money because they want to get out from the scrutiny. They're hoarding." Wells Fargo has even gone so far as to prevent the company from paying the wages and benefits owed to its employees, which prompted UE to file charges with the National Labor Relations Board last week.
Across the country, we're seeing more and more protests this one. As journalist/labor activist Mike Elk recently noted, these public demonstrations are highly effective ways of bringing national attention to the bailed out banks that are cutting off credit and have done pathetically little to jump-start our ailing economy. We saw this last December, when laid-off UE workers held sit-ins at Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago because Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase wouldn't fork over credit for the company to pay severance.
by Zach Carter, Media Consortium MediaWire Blogger
Progressive media is sounding the alarm on the AIG bonus scandal, demanding that policymakers stop repeating Bush administration mistakes and offering concrete solutions to the dire economic situation those missteps have created.
Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich describes the bonus insanity in a blog distributed by AlterNet. "Had AIG gone into chapter 11 bankruptcy or been liquidated, as it would have without government aid, no bonuses would ever be paid," Reich writes, noting that institutions like AIG "are no longer within the capitalist system because they are no longer accountable to the market." If AIG is not accountable to the Treasury Secretary of the country that owns an 80% stake in AIG, then the company has unlimited access to taxpayer coffers without being accountable to anyone at all.
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