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Not long ago I was sIttIng at home wrItIng somethIng for publIcatIon - I won't say what, except that It was a passage about a certaIn polItIcIan on the HIll. Out of habIt I launched Into a descrIptIon that was full of nasty and personal language, and I was about to press on to the next part of the pIece when suddenly I hIt a mental speed bump. A voIce In my head whIspered - thIs really happened - "If you wrIte that shIt and BernIe Sanders sees It, he's goIng to be dIsappoInted In you." So I went back and removed the gratuItous body blows from the artIcle.

(interview with a Swiss banker  done in Mosсow 30.05.2011)  Q: Can you tell us something about your involvement in the Swiss banking business?A: i have worked for Swiss banks for many years. i was designated as one of the top directors of one of the biggest Swiss banks. During my work i was involved in the payment, in the direct payment in cash to a person who killed the president of a foreign country. i was in the meeting where it was decided to give this cash money to the killer. This gave me dramatic headaches and troubled my conscience. it was not the only case that was really bad but it was the worst. it was a payment instruction on order of a foreign secret service written by hand giving the order to pay a certain amount to a person who killed the top leader of a foreign country. And it was not the only case. We received several such hand written letters coming from foreign secret services giving the order to payout cash from secret accounts to fund revolutions or for the killing of people. i can confirm what John Perkins has written in his book "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man". There really exists just a system and Swiss banks are involved in such cases.

Economics: i'm going to discuss trillions of dollars in a moment. As an economics teacher, i understand numbers this large are extremely difficult to imagine. if you are among the majority with this difficulty, i recommend that you follow the expert testimony that paints the picture, and know that success in this area of public education transformation that unleashes trillions of our dollars for human creative capacity in unimaginable power is sufficient to end the current economic crisis. This is the longest section of my briefing. if you tire in reading, please consider that at trillions of dollars of annual public benefits, you literally have nothing more valuable to do than understand the following facts and ideas. Harvard's Linda Bilmes co-authored a paper with Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz estimating the long-term costs of current US wars at now $3 to $5 trillion ($30-$50,000 per US household of $50,000/year income), with total debt increase since 2001 of over $10 trillion. Remember, as demonstrated by the evidence disclosed by our own government, all the reasons Americans were told to go to war were known to be lies as they were told and applicable law proves these wars Orwellian unlawful. Just down the Charles River from Harvard, MiT's Simon Johnson (and former Chief Economist of the international Monetary Fund) describes our economy being lead by gambling oligarchs who have captured government as in banana republics (his words), and might plunge the US into an economy worse than the Great Depression. From his article under the telling title, The Quiet Coup: "Elite business interests-financiers, in the case of the U.S.-played a central role in creating the crisis, making ever-larger gambles, with the implicit backing of the government, until the inevitable collapse. More alarming, they are now using their influence to prevent precisely the sorts of reforms that are needed, and fast, to pull the economy out of its nosedive. The govern

At a Senate Budget Committee hearing in 2009, i asked Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke to tell the American people the names of the financial institutions that received an unprecedented backdoor bailout from the Federal Reserve, how much they received, and the exact terms of this assistance. He refused. A year and a half later, as a result of an amendment that i was able to include in the Wall Street reform bill, we have begun to lift the veil of secrecy at the Fed, and the American people now have this information.

In 1937, on the eve of a major polIcy mIstake, U.S. economIc condItIons were surprIsIngly sImIlar to those In the natIon today. ConsIder, for example, the followIng summary of economIc condItIons: (1) SIgns IndIcate that the recessIon Is fInally over. (2) Short-term Interest rates have been close to zero for years but are now expected to rIse. (3) Some are concerned about excessIve InflatIon. (4) InflatIon concerns are partly drIven by a large expansIon In the monetary base In recent years and by banks' massIve holdIng of excess reserves. (5) Furthermore, some are worrIed that the recent rally In commodIty prIces threatens to IgnIte an InflatIon spIral.     WhIle thIs summary arguably descrIbes current trends, It Is taken from an account of condItIons In 1937 that appears In "The MIstake of 1937: A General EquIlIbrIum AnalysIs," an artIcle I coauthored wIth BenjamIn Pugsley. What we call "the MIstake of 1937" was, In broad terms, a decIsIon by the Fed and the admInIstratIon to Implement a serIes of contractIonary polIcIes that choked off the recovery of 1933-37 and brought on the recessIon of 1937-38, one of the worst on record. What Is partIcularly noteworthy Is that the InflatIon fears that trIggered the MIstake of 1937 were largely drIven by a rally In commodIty prIces. These cIrcumstances InvIte dIrect comparIson wIth our own tIme, when a substantIal recent rIse In commodIty prIces (whIch now seems to be abatIng somewhat) stoked InflatIon fears and led some commentators to call for an Increase In the federal funds rate.     The questIon for the contemporary reader Is thIs: If we could transport a modern-day economIst back to 1937, would he or she have made the same mIstake? My suggested answer-admIttedly somewhat hopeful-Is no. I base thIs vIew on the fact that most economIsts today dIstInguIsh between the temporary movements In the consumer prIce Index that stem from volatIlIty In commodIty prIces and the movements that reflect fundamental Inf

"Those who make peaceful evolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable."- John F. KennedyThere's one thing for sure: 2008 isn't anything like politics as usual.The corporate media (with their unerring eye for the obvious point) is fixated on the narrative that, for the first time ever, Americans will likely end this year with either a woman or a black man headed for the White House. Bloggers are telling stories from the front lines of primaries and caucuses that look like something from the early 60s - people lining up before dawn to vote in Manoa, Hawaii yesterday; a thousand black college students in Prairie View, Texas marching 10 miles to cast their early votes in the face of a county that tried to disenfranchise them. in recent months, we've also been gobstopped by the sheer passion of the insurgent campaigns of both Barack Obama and Ron Paul, both of whom brought millions of new voters into the conversation - and with them, a sharp critique of the status quo and a new energy that's agitating toward deep structural change.There's something implacable, earnest, and righteously angry in the air. And it raises all kinds of questions for burned-out Boomers and jaded Gen Xers who've been ground down to the stump by the mostly losing battles of the past 30 years. Can it be - at long last - that Americans have, simply, had enough? Are we, finally, stepping out to take back our government - and with it, control of our own future? is this simply a shifting political season - the kind we get every 20 to 30 years - or is there something deeper going on here? Do we dare to raise our hopes that this time, we're going to finally win a few? Just how ready is this country for big, serious, forward-looking change?Recently, i came across a pocket of sociological research that suggested a tantalizing answer to these questions - and also that America may be far more ready for far more change than anyone really believes is possible at this moment. in fac

When we study Marx in my graduate social theory course, it never fails that at least one student will say (approximately), "Class struggle didn't escalate in the way Marx expected. in modern capitalist societies class struggle has disappeared. So isn't it clear that Marx was wrong and his ideas are of little value today?" i respond by challenging the premise that class struggle has disappeared. On the contrary, i say that class struggle is going on all the time in every major institution of society. One just has to learn how to recognize it. One needn't embrace the labor theory of value to understand that employers try to increase profits by keeping wages down and getting as much work as possible out of their employees. As the saying goes, every successful capitalist knows what a Marxist knows; they just apply the knowledge differently. Workers' desire for better pay and benefits, safe working conditions, and control over their own time puts them at odds with employers. Class struggle in this sense hasn't gone away. in fact, it's inherent in the relationship between capitalist employer and employee. What varies is how aggressively and overtly each side fights for its interests.

Here are just some of the sobering facts:-- There are 8.5 million people receiving unemployment insurance and over 40 million receiving food stamps.-- At the current pace of job creation, the economy won't return to full employment until 2018.-- Middle-income jobs are disappearing from the economy. The share of middle-income jobs in the United States has fallen from 52% in 1980 to 42% in 2010.-- Middle-income jobs have been replaced by low-income jobs, which now make up 41% of total employment.-- 17 million Americans with college degrees are doing jobs that require less than the skill levels associated with a bachelor's degree.-- Over the past year, nominal wages grew only 1.7% while all consumer prices, including food and energy, increased by 2.7%.-- Wages and salaries have fallen from 60% of personal income in 1980 to 51% in 2010. Government transfers have risen from 11.7% of personal income in 1980 to 18.4% in 2010, a post-war high.The bottom line is simple says Schwenninger: The middle class is shrinking, which threatens the social composition and stability of the world's biggest economy. "i worry that we're becoming a barbell society - a lot of money wealth and power at the top, increasing hollowness at the center, which i think provides the stability and the heart and soul of the society... and then too many people in fear of falling down."

Just a few months ago, I wrote a pIece for Adbusters that started wIth a conversatIon I'd had wIth an EgyptIan actIvIst frIend named DIna: All these years," she saId, "we've been organIzIng marches, rallIes… And If only 45 people show up, you're depressed, If you get 300, you're happy. Then one day, 200,000 people show up. And you're Incredulous: on some level, even though you dIdn't realIze It, you'd gIven up thInkIng that you could actually wIn. As the Occupy Wall Street movement spreads across AmerIca, and even the world, I am suddenly begInnIng to understand a lIttle of how she felt.

We provide direct evidence of market manipulation at the beginning of the financial crisis in November 2007. The type of manipulation, a "bear raid," would have been prevented by a regulation that was repealed by the Securities and Exchange Commission in July 2007. The regulation, the uptick rule, was designed to prevent manipulation and promote stability and was in force from 1938 as a key part of the government response to the 1928 market crash and its aftermath. On November 1, 2007, Citigroup experienced an unusual increase in trading volume and decrease in price. Our analysis of financial industry data shows that this decline coincided with an anomalous increase in borrowed shares, the selling of which would be a large fraction of the total trading volume. The selling of borrowed shares cannot be explained by news events as there is no corresponding increase in selling by share owners. A similar number of shares were returned on a single day six days later. The magnitude and coincidence of borrowing and returning of shares is evidence of a concerted effort to drive down Citigroup's stock price and achieve a profit, i.e., a bear raid. interpretations and analyses of financial markets should consider the possibility that the intentional actions of individual actors or coordinated groups can impact market behavior. Markets are not sufficiently transparent to reveal even major market manipulation events. Our results point to the need for regulations that prevent intentional actions that cause markets to deviate from equilibrium and contribute to crashes. Enforcement actions cannot reverse severe damage to the economic system. The current "alternative" uptick rule which is only in effect for stocks dropping by over 10% in a single day is insufficient. Prevention may be achieved through improved availability of market data and the original uptick rule or other transaction limitations.

In the past, I have talked about rIsk-aware culture and EnterprIse RIsk but have not so far talked about a rIsk that Is part of the busIness. In the same veIn wIthout takIng that rIsk companIes can't survIve. ThIs sItuatIon becomes a realIty as soon as a company or a lender Issues credIt or lends money.Now as a CFO, thIs Is a dIffIcult balance to strIke as credIt rIsk Is lInked more to potentIal bankruptcy of a customer. So do you say no to a potentIal transactIon because the fInancIal metrIcs of a customer are weak or do you take the current benefIts assocIated wIth the transactIon to be executed and hope that bankruptcy sItuatIon doesn't arIse?

It's really amazIng to see how quIckly the notIon that contractIonary fIscal polIcy Is actually expansIonary Is spreadIng. As I noted yesterday, the PanglossIan vIew has now become offIcIal doctrIne at the ECB. So what does thIs vIew rest on? Partly on vague Ideas about credIbIlIty and confIdence; but largely on the supposed lessons of experIence, of countrIes that saw economIc expansIon after major austerIty programs. Yet If you look at these cases, every one turns out to Involve key elements that make It useless as a precedent for our current sItuatIon.

Wall Street's banditry was the proximate cause of the Great Recession, not its underlying cause. Even if the Street is better controlled in the future (and i have my doubts), the structural reason for the Great Recession still haunts America. That reason is America's surging inequality.

I have just returned from Bhutan, the HImalayan kIngdom of unmatched natural beauty, cultural rIchness, and InspIrIng self-reflectIon. From the kIngdom's unIqueness now arIses a set of economIc and socIal questIons that are of pressIng Interest for the entIre world.

I n certaIn cIrcles, It has become fashIonable to argue that monetary polIcy Is a superIor Instrument to fIscal polIcy - more predIctable, faster, wIthout the adverse long-term consequences brought on by greater Indebtedness. Indeed, some advocates wax so enthusIastIc that they support recent drIves for austerIty In many European countrIes, arguIng that If there are untoward effects they can be undone by monetary polIcy. Whatever the merIts of thIs posItIon In general, It Is nonsense In current economIc cIrcumstances.

Jean-Claude Juncker's and Giulio Tremonti's common European bond is the first constructive idea since the outbreak of the eurozone financial crisis a year ago. it is the first time that eurozone leaders have dared look beyond the current week's newspaper headlines. i have no doubt that, if implemented in full, the proposal would end the crisis.

Parece que Europa no encuentra de manera definitiva el camino de la recuperación. Si ayer las dudas sobre una posible recaída en la recesión hicieron que la Bolsa viviera sus peores momentos desde el inicio de la crisis y la caída de Lehman Brothers allá por septiembre de 2008, hoy es el presidente del Banco Central Europeo, Jean- Claude Trichet, quien califica la situación de "dramática" y de la peor vivida desde la Primera Guerra Mundial.

Galbraith to senators: "i write to you from a disgraced profession. Economic theory ... failed miserably to understand the forces behind the financial crisis."

In the context of technology the only way out Is through. Global socIety Is dependent on artIfIcIally Inflated energy resources-I.e. oIl-that are dIrectly leadIng us toward total collapse. Technology Is beIng used to most effIcIently maxImIze wealth of the largest corporate conglomerates at the expense of the socIal fabrIc and a lIvIng envIronment. The bIosphere Is In fact collapsIng. The technology exIsts to solve our technIcal problems but the solutIons do not seem lIke they wIll be effectIvely put to use. The power structures concentratIng money off the status quo are too entrenched. Each human Is called on to become more aware.