From the excellent blog Cryptogon:
Goldman’s Chief Executive Visited the White House at Least Four Times
While Goldman Sachs’ lawyers negotiated with the Securities and Exchange Commission over potentially explosive civil fraud charges, Goldman’s chief executive visited the White House at least four times.
Continue reading...
I have to say I would be absolutely flabbergasted if this were not the case. Goldman Sachs was a top contributor to the Obama Campaign, along with a number of other banks. Why does it come as no surprise at all? So pathetically sad. The banks own Washington, and all talk of "financial reform" is just a whitewash.
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That's not "change we can believe in."
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Obama Campaign Top Contributors
Open Secrets publishes a list of Barac Obama's largest presidential campaign contributors.
This table lists the top donors to this candidate in the 2008 election cycle. The organizations themselves did not donate , rather the money came from the organization's PAC, its individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals' immediate families. Organization totals include subsidiaries and affiliates.
Because of contribution limits, organizations that bundle together many individual contributions are often among the top donors to presidential candidates. These contributions can come from the organization's members or employees (and their families). The organization may support one candidate, or hedge its bets by supporting multiple candidates. Groups with national networks of donors - like EMILY's List and Club for Growth - make for particularly big bundlers.
University of California $1,591,395
Goldman Sachs $994,795
Harvard University $854,747
Microsoft Corp $833,617
Google Inc $803,436
Citigroup Inc $701,290
JPMorgan Chase & Co $695,132
Time Warner $590,084
Sidley Austin LLP $588,598
Stanford University $586,557
National Amusements Inc $551,683
UBS AG $543,219
Wilmerhale Llp $542,618
Skadden, Arps et al $530,839
IBM Corp $528,822
Columbia University $528,302
Morgan Stanley $514,881
General Electric $499,130
US Government $494,820
Latham & Watkins $493,835
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That's not "change we can believe in."
This table lists the top donors to this candidate in the 2008 election cycle. The organizations themselves did not donate , rather the money came from the organization's PAC, its individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals' immediate families. Organization totals include subsidiaries and affiliates.
Because of contribution limits, organizations that bundle together many individual contributions are often among the top donors to presidential candidates. These contributions can come from the organization's members or employees (and their families). The organization may support one candidate, or hedge its bets by supporting multiple candidates. Groups with national networks of donors - like EMILY's List and Club for Growth - make for particularly big bundlers.
University of California $1,591,395
Goldman Sachs $994,795
Harvard University $854,747
Microsoft Corp $833,617
Google Inc $803,436
Citigroup Inc $701,290
JPMorgan Chase & Co $695,132
Time Warner $590,084
Sidley Austin LLP $588,598
Stanford University $586,557
National Amusements Inc $551,683
UBS AG $543,219
Wilmerhale Llp $542,618
Skadden, Arps et al $530,839
IBM Corp $528,822
Columbia University $528,302
Morgan Stanley $514,881
General Electric $499,130
US Government $494,820
Latham & Watkins $493,835
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That's not "change we can believe in."
Monday, April 5, 2010
U.S. Troops Killing Innocent Afghans
From: allgov.com (emphasis mine)
McChrystal Admits U.S. Troops are Killing Innocent Afghans at Checkpoints
Monday, April 05, 2010
America’s top commander in Afghanistan, Army General Stanley McChrystal, ... told his audience: “We have shot an amazing number of people, but to my knowledge, none has ever proven to be a threat.”
McChrystal added that during the nine-plus months he has been in charge, in none of the cases in which a civilian was hurt “has it turned out that the vehicle had a suicide bomb or weapons in it and, in many cases, had families in it."
read more...
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That's not "change we can believe in."
McChrystal Admits U.S. Troops are Killing Innocent Afghans at Checkpoints
Monday, April 05, 2010
America’s top commander in Afghanistan, Army General Stanley McChrystal, ... told his audience: “We have shot an amazing number of people, but to my knowledge, none has ever proven to be a threat.”
McChrystal added that during the nine-plus months he has been in charge, in none of the cases in which a civilian was hurt “has it turned out that the vehicle had a suicide bomb or weapons in it and, in many cases, had families in it."
read more...
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That's not "change we can believe in."
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Obama gives key agriculture post to Monsanto man
from Green Change:
Obama gives key agriculture post to Monsanto man
Gary Ruskin | Green Change | 03.27.2010
Today, President Obama announced that he will recess appoint Islam A. Siddiqui to the position of Chief Agricultural Negotiator, Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.
Siddiqui is a pesticide lobbyist and Vice President for Science and Regulatory Affairs at CropLife America, an agribusiness lobbying group that represents Monsanto.
Following is a letter sent by 98 organizations to U.S. Senators in opposition to Siddiqui's appointment, and a fact sheet about him.
Read more...
Ed note: Had George Bush made this appointment, the democrats would be howling. But Obama supporters don't know, or don't care, or (likely) both.
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That's not "change we can believe in."
Obama gives key agriculture post to Monsanto man
Gary Ruskin | Green Change | 03.27.2010
Today, President Obama announced that he will recess appoint Islam A. Siddiqui to the position of Chief Agricultural Negotiator, Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.
Siddiqui is a pesticide lobbyist and Vice President for Science and Regulatory Affairs at CropLife America, an agribusiness lobbying group that represents Monsanto.
Following is a letter sent by 98 organizations to U.S. Senators in opposition to Siddiqui's appointment, and a fact sheet about him.
Read more...
Ed note: Had George Bush made this appointment, the democrats would be howling. But Obama supporters don't know, or don't care, or (likely) both.
--------------------
That's not "change we can believe in."
Friday, April 2, 2010
Obama Vows to Keep ‘Turning Up’ Pressure on Iran
April 2 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama said he’d “keep on turning up the pressure” on Iran to prevent the country from developing the capacity to build nuclear weapons.
“The regime has become more isolated since I came into office,” Obama said in an interview with CBS’s “Early Show.”
read more...
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That's not "change we can believe in"
“The regime has become more isolated since I came into office,” Obama said in an interview with CBS’s “Early Show.”
read more...
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That's not "change we can believe in"
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Obama adopts Bush view on the powers of the presidency.
from the Wall Street Journal
Obama Channels Cheney
The Obama Administration this week released its predecessor's post-9/11 legal memoranda in the name of "transparency," producing another round of feel-good Bush criticism. Anyone interested in President Obama's actual executive-power policies, however, should look at his position on warrantless wiretapping. Dick Cheney must be smiling.
In a federal lawsuit, the Obama legal team is arguing that judges lack the authority to enforce their own rulings in classified matters of national security. The standoff concerns the Oregon chapter of the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, a Saudi Arabian charity that was shut down in 2004 on evidence that it was financing al Qaeda. Al-Haramain sued the Bush Administration in 2005, claiming it had been illegally wiretapped.
read more...
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update: Judge ruled Bush wiretapping was unconstitutional and illegal.
Obama Channels Cheney
The Obama Administration this week released its predecessor's post-9/11 legal memoranda in the name of "transparency," producing another round of feel-good Bush criticism. Anyone interested in President Obama's actual executive-power policies, however, should look at his position on warrantless wiretapping. Dick Cheney must be smiling.
In a federal lawsuit, the Obama legal team is arguing that judges lack the authority to enforce their own rulings in classified matters of national security. The standoff concerns the Oregon chapter of the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, a Saudi Arabian charity that was shut down in 2004 on evidence that it was financing al Qaeda. Al-Haramain sued the Bush Administration in 2005, claiming it had been illegally wiretapped.
read more...
-----
update: Judge ruled Bush wiretapping was unconstitutional and illegal.
Obama Starting to Sound Like Bush
From: Mother Jones
He donned a leather bomber's jacket with an Air Force One logo on it, got up in front of a boisterous crowd of about 2,000 military personnel in a hangar at Bagram Air Base, and gave a tub-thumping, "support the troops" campaign speech. I'm talking about Barack Obama on his six-hour visit to "Afghanistan."
read more...
He donned a leather bomber's jacket with an Air Force One logo on it, got up in front of a boisterous crowd of about 2,000 military personnel in a hangar at Bagram Air Base, and gave a tub-thumping, "support the troops" campaign speech. I'm talking about Barack Obama on his six-hour visit to "Afghanistan."
read more...
Obama continuation of Bush policies.
Obama ran as the "anti-Bush," promising to rectfy the harm done by his predecessor - this is why he got elected, because the public wanted change, and Obama promised it.
More than a year into his term, lets step back now and ask ourselves what has actually changed? Obama has continued virtually each and every one of Bush's major policies:
In his article "Change we can't believe in," Mehdi Hasan makes the following points:
Obama promised a sharp break from the Bush era, yet he has stepped right into Bush's shoes.
While campaigning, Obama "repeatedly criticised the Bush administration's treatment of detainees, its rendition policy and the use of the "state secrets" privilege to prevent classified information from being discussed in court." Now that he is in office, all of these policies are unchanged.
In 2007, Obama described Bush's warrantless wiretapping programme as "unlawful and unconstitutional", but two years later the Obama justice department again followed in the footsteps of Bush and tried to have a court case dismissed on grounds of national security and protecting "state secrets".
“Obama has stepped into the shoes of President Bush," said Jon Eisenberg, a lawyer for the plaintiffs. "He continues to assert the state secrets privilege to resist holdover lawsuits from the Bush era . . . in an attempt to prevent the judiciary from adjudicating on the legality of the warrantless wiretapping programme, and addressing the larger presidential power issues that the case presents."
Health --> promised reform, but quickly backed away from "public plan" option
Climate Change --> recopgnised the problem, yet failed to persuade congress to take substantive action
Financial Reform --> multibillion-dollar bank bailout, approved by Bush, has simply been continued by Obama in the same vein. Failed to rein in bank bonuses.
Taxes --> pledged not to raise "any form" of taxes on families making less than $250,000 a year, however his tax plans have done little to advance even modest social-democratic goals. The administration's primary policy proposals make permanent a number of the [Bush] tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003. Almost all of the tax policy proposed in the Obama budget is just a continuation of the Bush tax policy
Torture/Guantanamo Bay --> praised for announcing, in his first week in office, that the world's most notorious prison camp would be closed within a year and that torture - including the Bush-approved technique of "waterboarding" - would be outlawed. Now more than a year later, there is still no confirmation that Guantanamo Bay will be closed. Force-feeding operations have continued at the camp, and are apparently administered with "such violence and brutality" that one prisoner has died.
Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, the US is increasing its capacity to imprison people by expanding facilities at bases such as Bagram, where human rights groups have documented many incidents of torture and several unexplained deaths in custody. In February the new administration told a federal judge that military detainees there have no legal right to challenge their captivity.
Also on torture --> Obama has refused to release the shocking photographs of the Bush administration's "enhanced interrogation" techniques, as well as CIA documents describing those interrogations. He has criticised Senator Patrick Leahy's proposal for a "truth commission" to investigate the Bush administration's national security policies, and backed immunity for senior Bush officials implicated in torture. In effect, he is covering up the torture he decried as a presidential candidate.
War on Terror --> This was where Obama was expected to make the biggest break with the Bush regime. Early on, he announced that he would begin winding down the war in Iraq - but only, it seems, in order to divert US troops, spies and diplomats to the war in Afghanistan and operations across the border in Pakistan. He has approved air strikes there that have killed more civilians in nine months than died in US bombings in the final year of the previous administration.
Defense --> In a staggering continuation of Bush policy, retained Bush's Secretary of Defence, Robert Gates. "Defense" was the lynch pin of many Bush policies.
Afganistan--> Obama has doubled troop levels in Afganistan, where troop levels will eclipse Iraq by mid 2010.
---------------
This is not "change we can believe in."
More than a year into his term, lets step back now and ask ourselves what has actually changed? Obama has continued virtually each and every one of Bush's major policies:
- Obama continues Bush's Iran Policy
- Obama Continues Bush Foreign Policy on Europe, Iran and Russia
- Obama Continues Bush Policy On State Secrets
- Obama education policies: a lot like Bush policies
- Obama immigration policies contain little new, embraces Bush's programs.
- Obama continues Bush’s border fence policies
- Obama continues Bush's Wiretapping of Americans policy
- Obama administration continues Bush policy on land mines
- Obama continue's Bush's terrorism policy
- Obama Continues Bush/Cheney's Persecution of Abu Zubaydah
- Obama continues Bush's policy of detainees/habeas corpus. (and here)
- Obama continues Bush policy on weapons to Georgia.
- Obama continues Bush's policy on "extraordinary rendition" (and here and here)
- Obama Continues Bush Policy of Deadly Air Strikes in Pakistan
In his article "Change we can't believe in," Mehdi Hasan makes the following points:
Obama promised a sharp break from the Bush era, yet he has stepped right into Bush's shoes.
While campaigning, Obama "repeatedly criticised the Bush administration's treatment of detainees, its rendition policy and the use of the "state secrets" privilege to prevent classified information from being discussed in court." Now that he is in office, all of these policies are unchanged.
In 2007, Obama described Bush's warrantless wiretapping programme as "unlawful and unconstitutional", but two years later the Obama justice department again followed in the footsteps of Bush and tried to have a court case dismissed on grounds of national security and protecting "state secrets".
“Obama has stepped into the shoes of President Bush," said Jon Eisenberg, a lawyer for the plaintiffs. "He continues to assert the state secrets privilege to resist holdover lawsuits from the Bush era . . . in an attempt to prevent the judiciary from adjudicating on the legality of the warrantless wiretapping programme, and addressing the larger presidential power issues that the case presents."
Health --> promised reform, but quickly backed away from "public plan" option
Climate Change --> recopgnised the problem, yet failed to persuade congress to take substantive action
Financial Reform --> multibillion-dollar bank bailout, approved by Bush, has simply been continued by Obama in the same vein. Failed to rein in bank bonuses.
Taxes --> pledged not to raise "any form" of taxes on families making less than $250,000 a year, however his tax plans have done little to advance even modest social-democratic goals. The administration's primary policy proposals make permanent a number of the [Bush] tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003. Almost all of the tax policy proposed in the Obama budget is just a continuation of the Bush tax policy
Torture/Guantanamo Bay --> praised for announcing, in his first week in office, that the world's most notorious prison camp would be closed within a year and that torture - including the Bush-approved technique of "waterboarding" - would be outlawed. Now more than a year later, there is still no confirmation that Guantanamo Bay will be closed. Force-feeding operations have continued at the camp, and are apparently administered with "such violence and brutality" that one prisoner has died.
Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, the US is increasing its capacity to imprison people by expanding facilities at bases such as Bagram, where human rights groups have documented many incidents of torture and several unexplained deaths in custody. In February the new administration told a federal judge that military detainees there have no legal right to challenge their captivity.
Also on torture --> Obama has refused to release the shocking photographs of the Bush administration's "enhanced interrogation" techniques, as well as CIA documents describing those interrogations. He has criticised Senator Patrick Leahy's proposal for a "truth commission" to investigate the Bush administration's national security policies, and backed immunity for senior Bush officials implicated in torture. In effect, he is covering up the torture he decried as a presidential candidate.
War on Terror --> This was where Obama was expected to make the biggest break with the Bush regime. Early on, he announced that he would begin winding down the war in Iraq - but only, it seems, in order to divert US troops, spies and diplomats to the war in Afghanistan and operations across the border in Pakistan. He has approved air strikes there that have killed more civilians in nine months than died in US bombings in the final year of the previous administration.
Defense --> In a staggering continuation of Bush policy, retained Bush's Secretary of Defence, Robert Gates. "Defense" was the lynch pin of many Bush policies.
Afganistan--> Obama has doubled troop levels in Afganistan, where troop levels will eclipse Iraq by mid 2010.
---------------
This is not "change we can believe in."
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