(Cross-posted from The Free Speech Zone)

Government allegations that financial giant Goldman Sachs defrauded investors are creating a political storm, with some lawmakers hoping that the civil lawsuit filed Friday by the Securities and Exchange Commission is just the beginning.

As the heat increases on the investment bank, which has denied all wrongdoing, Politico reports that they have hired Greg Craig for legal help. Craig formerly worked as the top lawyer for President Barack Obama and left the White House earlier this year to join the law firm Skadden, Arps.

The executive order Obama signed the day after he was inaugurated bars high-level executive branch appointees who leave the administration, like Craig, from communicating with their former employers. That executive order also prohibits such officials from lobbying the federal government during the remainder of the Obama administration.

The Politico article notes that since the SEC is an independent government agency, it would not coordinate with the White House on enforcement matters, such as the pending lawsuit targeting Goldman Sachs.

The article goes on to quote a source familiar with Goldman Sachs as saying Craig was hired for his ability to give advice and his “deep understanding of the legal process and the world of Washington.”



The U.S. government is not the only authority interested in further probing Goldman Sachs.

The British and German government have also raised the possibility of investigations. And on Capitol Hill, Democrats in the House and Senate are calling for more answers.

http://www.opensecrets.org/new…

Of all the articles I read on this, this Capital Eye Blog article has to be the best one.

Well, the one that gave me the biggest fucking hard-on in my life that is…..

The MPAA and RIAA have submitted their master plan for enforcing copyright to the new Office of Intellectual Property Enforcement. As the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Richard Esguerra points out, it’s a startlingly distopian work of science fiction. The entertainment industry calls for:

   * spyware on your computer that detects and deletes infringing materials;

   * mandatory censorware on all Internet connections to interdict transfers of infringing material;

   * border searches of personal media players, laptops and thumb-drives;

   * international bullying to force other countries to implement the same policies;

   * and free copyright enforcement provided by Fed cops and agencies (including the Department of Homeland Security!).

http://www.boingboing.net/2010…

(Cross-posted from The Free Speech Zone)

The apathy is astonishing.  

Americans would rather “sit back and wait” than “stand-up and fight”. It’s hard, I know, you need to take off a day from work or something to demonstrate your point in the streets and even then you leave the protest with nothing changing and nothing happening.

But…what if?

What if instead of an orderly demonstration, a pro-democracy movement were to form that demanded the Capitol back from the corrupted representatives that inhabited it and refused to leave until they were given entrance?

It could happen, if you wanted it to.

(Cross-posted from The Free Speech Zone)

The lack of a comprehensive PUBLIC OPTION makes this bill a fucking joke.

It’s not over yet since the Senate still has to vote on it for it to be finalized.

Here are the final touches to the bill that were passed as well.

Does it matter though?

(Cross-posted from The Free Speech Zone)

Tea partiers and other anti-health care activists are known to get rowdy, but today’s protest on Capitol Hill–the day before the House is set to vote on historic health care legislation–went beyond the usual chanting and controversial signs, and veered into ugly bigotry and intimidation.

Civil rights hero Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) and fellow Congressional Black Caucus member Andre Carson (D-IN) related a particularly jarring encounter with a large crowd of protesters screaming “kill the bill”… and punctuating their chants with the word “nigger.”

Standing next to Lewis, emerging from a Democratic caucus meeting with President Obama, Carson said people in the crowd yelled, “kill the bill and then the N-word” several times, while he and Lewis were exiting the Cannon House office building.

“People have been just downright mean,” Lewis added.

And that wasn’t an isolated incident. Early this afternoon, standing outside a Democratic whip meeting in the Longworth House office building, I watched Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) make his way out the door, en route to the neighboring Rayburn building. As he rounded the corner toward the exit, wading through a huge crowd of tea partiers and other health care protesters, an elderly white man screamed “Barney, you faggot”–a line that caused dozens of his confederates to erupt in laughter.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo…

(Cross-posted from The Free Speech Zone)

The Sting, The Heist, and The New Push To Rob Us All.

(Cross-posted from The Free Speech Zone)

In the hopes that someone here has kids or grand-kids, those rugrats either know about what i’m going to let you in on or it hasn’t hit their school/campus yet to the point they can’t socially exist without it.

Twitter will be a thing of the past soon as a new twitter-esque social network/microblogging service has emerged to a more mainstream prominence lately.

It’s called Tumblr

It’s been around for a couple of years but 2009 is when it started coming into it’s own.  Check it out and play around with it.

I made mine and it’s in the blogroll as “American Pirate”.  It’s a more personal touch if you actually give a shit about what shennanigans i’m getting into next.  I say that only because today is a day of “student activities” in NYC being run by SDS (tee hee!) so stay tuned….

But, mark my words, 2010 is gonna be a big year for Tumblr.  

Think Iran’s Twitter Revolt was impressive?  Imagine if they had unlimited characters to text, ability to post photos and video on the fly, and even “geotag” where it was happening for those keeping an eye on developments…..or, I dunno, Human Rights groups needing evidence to collect about abuses….ahhh technology 🙂

(Cross-posted from The Free Speech Zone)

February 16th:

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Worried about a tax audit? Maybe you should be. More Americans than ever may be subject to unwanted attention from the Internal Revenue Service this season as the government pumps billions of dollars into tax collection.

More than 1.4 million Americans were audited last year, the most in a decade. Even more audits are expected as the Obama administration plans to spend $8.2 billion in tax enforcement initiatives in 2011, a nearly 10% increase over last year.

http://money.cnn.com/2010/02/1…

Hmm, why they doing that?

February 18th:

Republicans have complained that Mr. Obama is trying to make it appear in an election year that he is doing something about high annual deficits, which have become a big issue for independent voters especially. Yet whether or not the commission succeeds in sending proposals to Congress after Dec. 1, its deliberations will force both parties to address whether to raise more revenues and make long-range reductions in Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security – the tough steps many economists say are essential to controlling a debt growing larger than the economy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02…

Translation?: Obama wants both parties to take the blame for having to fuck us out of money for revenue with tax hikes because, well, what do you want them to do?  Tax the rich?!

ROTFLMFAO!!!!

That same day….