Who Does Wall Street Own In Congress?

The Grayson Takano No Cuts letter is the gold standard

The House doesn't usually stay in sessions Fridays, let alone take serious votes, but this past Friday, as we mentioned yesterday, Boehner and Cantor kept the Members in town to repay a promise they had made to their Wall Street masters to further weaken the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill. A bill Wall Street lobbyists wrote with one of their most pathetic congressional shills, Scott Garrett (R-NJ)-- and co-sponsored by 23 other bankster asswipes (20 of them members of the House Financial Services Committee who brazenly take large legalistic bribes from Wall Street firms they're supposed to oversee on behalf of the American people) came up for a vote. The bill to weaken Dodd-Frank passed 235-161.

Here's a list of the House Financial Services Committee members who co-sponsored the bill (+ Boehner and Cantor) with the bribes they took from Wall Street banksters last cycle, strongly pointing to an illegal quid pro quo:

• John Boehner (R-OH)- $1,415,075
• Eric Cantor (R-VA)- $902,400
• Scott Garrett (R-NJ)- $537,020
• Michele Bachmann (R-MN)- $79,024
• Spencer Bachus (R-AL)- $286,677
• Andy Barr (R-KY)- 0
• John Campbell (R-CA)- $79,750
• Tom Cotton (R-AR)- 0
• Stephen Fincher (R-TN)- $55,650
• Michael "Mikey Suits" Grimm (R-Mafia)- $209,732
• Bill Huizenga (R-MI)- $51,800
• Randy Hultgren (R-IL)- $136,500
• Robert Hurt (R-VA)- $127,000
• Peter King (R-NY)- $128,950
• Patrick McHenry (R-NC)- $80,000
• Gary Miller (R-CA)- $32,750
• Mick Mulvaney (R-SC)- $500
• Randy Neugebauer (R-TX)- $125,500
• Stevan Pearce (R-NM)- $19,950
• Robert Pittenger (R-NC)- 0
• Dennis Ross (R-FL)- $18,200
• Marlin Stutzman (R-IN)- $15,250
• Ann Wagner (R-MO)- 0

Don't worry about the 4 Republicans with zero dollars from Wall Street. They're freshmen and weren't doing errands for the banksters in 2012, the way they are now. Next year, each will get thousands of dollars from Wall Street. As economist Dean Baker explained last week in Cutting Social Security and Not Taxing Wall Street, "Wall Street bankers have a lot more political power than old and disabled people who depend on Social Security." Like many of us, Baker is frustrated that Obama isn't fighting the Wall Street/GOP approach... and perhaps even embracing it.

As we move toward the fifth anniversary of the great financial crisis of 2008, people should be outraged that cutting Social Security is now on the national agenda, while taxing Wall Street is not. After all, if we take at face value the claims made back in 2008 by Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and former Treasury Secretaries Henry Paulson and Timothy Geithner, Wall Street excesses brought the economy to the brink of collapse.

But now the Wall Street behemoths are bigger than ever and President Obama is looking to cut the Social Security benefits of retirees. That will teach the Wall Street boys to be more responsible in the future.

Most people are now familiar with President's Obama's proposal to cut Social Security by reducing the annual cost-of-living adjustment (COLA). While the final formula is somewhat convoluted, the net effect is to reduce benefits by an average of roughly 3.0 percent.

Since Social Security benefits account for more than 70 percent of the income of a typical retiree, this cut is more than a 2.0 percent reduction in income. By comparison, a wealthy couple earning $500,000 a year would see a hit to their after-tax income of just 0.6 percent from the tax increase that President Obama put in place last year.

While President Obama is willing to make seniors pay a price for the economic crisis, his administration is unwilling to impose any burdens on Wall Street. Specifically, it has consistently opposed a Wall Street speculation tax: effectively a sales tax on trades of stock and derivatives. The Obama administration has even used its power to try to block efforts by European countries to impose their own taxes on financial speculation.

If the idea of taxing stock trades sounds strange, it shouldn't. The United States used to impose a tax of 0.04 percent until Wall Street lobbied to eliminate it in the mid-1960s. Many countries, including the United Kingdom, Switzerland, China, and India already impose taxes on stock trades.

The tax in the UK is 0.5 percent on stock trades (0.25 percent for both the buyer and the seller). It dates back more than three centuries. The country raises more than 0.2 percent of GDP ($32 billion in the United States) from the tax each year. The tax has not prevented the London stock exchange from being one of the largest in the world.

There are currently two bills in Congress for a similar tax in the United States. A bill by Minnesota Representative Keith Ellison would impose the same tax as the UK on stock trades and would apply a scaled rate to options, futures, credit default swaps and other derivative instruments. It could raise more than $150 billion annually or more than $2 trillion over the ten year budget window.

A second bill has been put forward by Iowa Senator Tom Harkin and Oregon Representative Peter DeFazio. This bill would apply a 0.03 percent tax to trades of stock and a wide range of other financial assets. According to the Joint Tax Committee, the bill would raise close to $40 billion a year or over $400 billion over a ten-year budget window once it is implemented.

Unfortunately the administration has consistently opposed both bills. It claims that it is concerned about the incidence of these taxes-- that ordinary investors would see large burdens from the tax. It also claims to be worried that the taxes will disrupt financial markets by making trading more costly.

Neither of these stories passes the laugh test. Ordinary investors don't trade much, and therefore are not going to feel much impact from the tax. If someone with $100,000 in a 401(k) (this is much larger than the typical 401(k)) turns it over at the rate of 50 percent annually, they would pay $15.00 each year as a result of the Harkin-DeFazio tax.

Furthermore research shows that investors reduce their trading as costs increase. This means that if the tax increases trading costs by 20 percent, then investors will reduce their trading by roughly the same amount (in this example, turnover would fall to 40 percent annually). That means that the net cost of turnover in a 401(k) will barely change for a typical investor as a result of the tax. Wall Street would just see much less business.

So the Obama administration wants us to believe that it is willing to cut the Social Security benefits of retiree living on $15,000 a year in Social Security by $450 but it opposes a Wall Street speculation tax because it is concerned that investors with $100,000 in a 401(k) may pay a few dollars a year in additional trading costs. Only a reporter with the Washington Post would believe a story like that.

The other part of the Obama administration's story is equally laughable. The cost of financial transactions has plummeted in the last four decades because of computers. Even the Ellison tax rate would just raise costs back to their mid-'80s level. The Harkin-DeFazio tax rate would probably still leave costs lower than they were in 2000.

The country certainly had a vibrant capital market and stock exchange in the 1980s, taking costs part of the way back to this level will not prevent Wall Street from serving its proper role of transferring capital from savers to borrowers. It will just clamp down on speculation.

The basic story is very simple. Wall Street bankers have a lot more political power than old and disabled people who depend on Social Security. That is why President Obama is working to protect the former and cut benefits for the latter.

David Cicilline, a co-signer of the Grayson Takano No Cuts letter to Obama, proposed a congressional resolution that isn't as strong and definitive, and (therefore) has attracted more support in the House:

Expressing the sense of the Congress that the Chained Consumer Price Index should not be used to calculate cost-of-living-adjustments for Social Security Benefits

Whereas the Social Security program was established more than 77 years ago and has provided economic security to generations of Americans through benefits earned based on contributions made over a worker's lifetime;

Whereas the Social Security program continues to provide modest benefits - averaging approximately $14,000 per year-- to more than 53,000,000 individuals, including 37,000,000 retired workers in February 2013;

Whereas the Social Security program has no borrowing authority, has accumulated assets of $2,700,000,000,000, and, therefore, does not contribute to the Federal budget deficit;

Whereas the Board of Trustees of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund projects that such Trust Fund an pay full benefits through 2032;

Whereas the Social Security program is designed to ensure that benefits keep pace with inflation through cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) that are based upon the measured changes in prices of goods and services purchased by consumers, currently the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics;

Whereas the Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes a supplemental measure of inflation, the Chained Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers (C-CPI-U), or "Chained CPI," which adjusts for projected changes in consumer behavior resulting from price fluctuations known as the "substitution effect," which occurs when consumers buy more goods and services whose prices are rising slower than average and less of those rising faster than average;

Whereas studies indicate typical Social Security beneficiaries spend significantly greater shares of their budget than consumers generally on health care, prices for which have increased at higher than average rates, and health care may not easily be substituted by consumers such as seniors;

Whereas the Congressional Budget Office has estimated that using the Chained CPI to calculate Social Security COLAs would reduce Social Security benefits by .25 percent per year as compared to current policy, resulting in a reduction in outlays of $112,000,000,000 over the first decade;

Whereas reductions in Social Security benefits from using the Chained CPI to calculate Social Security COLAs would continue to compound over time, and the AARP Public Policy Institute estimates that such reductions would grow to 3 percent after 10 years and 8.5 percent after 30 years;

Whereas Social Security Works estimates that using the Chained CPI to calculate Social Security COLAs would reduce annual Social Security benefits of the average earner - who is making $43,518-- by $658 at age 75, $1,147 at age 85, and $1,622 at age 95; and

Whereas reductions in Social Security benefits would harm some of our most vulnerable populations: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That it is the sense of the Congress that the Chained Consumer Price Index should not be used to calculate cost of living adjustments for Social Security benefits.

So far over 90 Democrats have signed on, spanning the ideological divide inside the congressional caucus from extreme right-wingers like Ron Barber (AZ) and Kirkpatrick (AZ), who are always looking for opportunities to tell their constituents they're against Obama, to normal liberal Democrats like Jan Schakowsky (IL), Judy Chu (CA) and Donna Edwards (MD) who prefer to support Obama. Here's the list of Democrats urging Obama to untangle himself from another Republican assault on American working families:

Ron Barber (New Dem-AZ)
Karen Bass (D-CA)
Joyce Beatty (D-OH)
Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR)
Robert Brady (D-PA)
Bruce Braley (D-IA)
Corrine Brown (D-FL)
Cheri Bustos (D-IL)
Tony Cardenas (D-CA)
Matt Cartwright (D-PA)
Judy Chu (D-CA)
Yvette Clarke (D-NY)
Lacy Clay (D-MO)
John Conyers (D-MI)
Joe Courtney (New Dem-CT)
Elijah Cummings (D-MD)
Danny Davis (D-IL)
Pete DeFazio (D-OR)
Rosa DeLauro (D-CT)
Ted Deutch (D-FL)
Mike Doyle (D-PA)
Donna Edwards (D-MD)
Keith Ellison (D-MN)
Bill Enyart (D-IL)
Lois Frankel (D-FL)
Marcia Fudge (D-OH)
John Garamendi (D-CA)
Alan Grayson (D-FL)
Gene Green (D-TX)
Raul Grijalva (D-AZ)
Luis Gutierrez (D-IL)
Janice Hahn (D-CA)
Colleen Hanabusa (New Dem-HI)
Alcee Hastings (D-FL)
Brian Higgins (D-NY)
Rush Holt (New Dem-NJ)
Mike Honda (D-CA)
Jared Huffman (D-CA)
Shiela Jackson Lee (D-TX)
Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX)
Hank Johnson (D-GA)
Marcy Kaptur (D-OH)
Bill Keating (D-MA)
Dan Kildee (D-MI)
Ann Kirpatrick (AZ)
Jim Langevin (D-RI)
Barbara Lee (D-CA)
John Lewis (D-GA)
Dave Loebsack (D-IA)
Alan Lowenthal (D-CA)
Stephen Lynch (D-MA)
Dan Maffei (New Dem-NY)
Ed Markey (D-MA) Doris Matsui (D-CA)
Jim McDermott (D-WA)
Jim McGovern (D-MA)
Mike Michaud (Blue Dog-ME)
Gwen Moore (D-WI)
Jerry Nadler (D-NY)
Grace Napolitano (D-CA)
Richard Nolan (D-MN)
Ed Pastor (D-AZ)
Donald Payne (D-NJ)
Gary Peters (New Dem-MI)
Chellie Pingree (D-ME)
Mark Pocan (D-WI)
Charlie Rangel (D-NY)
Nick Rahall (D-WV)
Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-CA)
Raul Ruiz (D-CA)
Bobby Rush (D-IL)
Tim Ryan (D-OH)
John Sarbanes (D-MD)
Jan Schakowsky (D-IL)
Bobby Scott (D-VA)
José Serrano (D-NY)
Carol Shea Porter (D-NH)
Albio Sires (D-NJ)
Jackie Speier (D-CA)
Mark Takano (D-CA)
BennieThompson (D-MS)
Dina Titus (D-NV)
Paul Tonko (D-NY)
Juan Vargas (New Dem-CA)
Mark Veasey (D-TX)
Filemon Vela (New Dem-TX)
Nydia Velazquez (D-NY)
Maxine Waters (D-CA)
Peter Welch (D-VT)
Frederica Wilson (D-FL)

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Wall Street Shill Maria Bartiromo Exposes A "Continued Assault On The Banks" (No, Really)

Watch CNBC's Maria Bartiromo (above) further ingratiating herself with the banksters on Thursday: "While the banks have done wrong, it is time to ask the question, 'what more does the public want from the banks and why are we trying to destroy this vital industry?' Federal Reserve official Dan Tarullo's recent speech on the banks, creating another alternative to break up the mega banks, he is proposing linking liquidity and capital, meaning the more a financial firm relies on wholesale funding, the more capital it must carry. This is one way to target the big supermarket banks like J.P. Morgan, Citi, Deutsche Bank, Bank of America, and others. Those all have large broker/dealer operations and tend to rely more on wholesale funding than traditional banks. My question is 'how come we never hear about the changes that have already been put in place in the last few years?' Debt: it's been cut by institutions. Capital: it is soaring; has been raised by hundreds of billions of dollars across the industry. Compensation has come down, has been cut across the world, in particular severely in Europe. Money in reserve: the highest levels many of these companies have ever seen. That's why some of them are not lending the way you would want. Yet it is probably inevitable that regulators will adopt more measures that go beyond what they are proposing in Europe, the Basel Three, to ensure that the biggest banks have huge piles of cash in the event of another financial Armageddon. While I do not believe the push for this kind of capital, stockpile and other regulations will in fact result in the major banks splitting up right now, it is having a major impact nonetheless. The uncertainty, the confusion-- we don't even know which companies will be deemed systemically important to the economy, which would totally change the terms for those banks and how they would need to operate-- all of these open questions are causing the banks to sit on money, reluctant to hire, reluctant to lend, unable to invest in the future, and hire workers. I would love to hear some of the positives from regulators as opposed to the constant drumbeat of attacks. Banks are not angels, but they are not the devils they are being made out to be. They remain a vital part of what makes capitalism the best system in the history of the world."

Blue America doesn't endorse candidates who aren't 100% pro-Choice and pro-equality. But that isn't to say that we endorse every pro-Choice/pro-equality candidate. We look for courageous men and women of good character who have fully embraced economic and well as social justice. Right now there is a concerted-- and quite successful-- effort to roll back the modest achievements of Dodd-Frank reforming a few aspects of the giant Wall Street rip-off. Despite Bartiromo's wailing, none of the criminal banksters-- not one-- was sent to prison. Not one was arrested or tried or forced to pay back the millions they looted from the economy. I haven't heard a single politician demanding that banksters should be rounded up en masse and put in front of firing squads before their estates are confiscated. If that happened, I might not agree with Bartiromo, but I could at least understand her pathetic caterwauling on behalf of the horribly beset .001%.

Lately we've seen sleazy New Dems make common cause with the Republicans and the banksters to undermine Dodd Frank. EVERY New Dem on the House Financial Services Committee was pimping the Wall Street agenda last week. Fighting valiantly for working families and ordinary bank customers were Maxine Waters (D-CA), Al Green (D-TX), Nydia Velázquez (D-NY), Mike Capuano (D-MA), and Keith Ellison (D-MN). The worst culprits and bank whores on the committee were Jim Himes (New Dem-CT), Patrick Murphy (New Dem-FL), Kyrsten Sinema (New Dem-AZ), John Delaney (New Dem-MD), John Carney (New Dem-DE), Denny Heck (New Dem-WA), Terri Sewell (New Dem-AL) and David Scott (New Dem-GA). Maria Bartiromo and her CNBC colleagues are part of the captive media pumping those efforts up to the public. ALL of the Blue America candidates want to strengthen financial reform, not weaken it. We asked a couple of them to take a look at what Bartiromo had to say about the banks.

Massachusetts state Rep. Carl Sciortino is running for the congressional seat that Ed Markey is giving up. He faces a gaggle of middle-of-the-road, garden variety Democrats. That's not something anyone will ever label Carl, who helped organize the Massachusetts legislature progressive caucus and takes on the cutting edge issues that everyone else is afraid of. "The worst economic collapse in three generations was created when big Wall Street banks exploited policies of severe under-regulation. Does anyone just assume that banks left to their own devises would protect the interests of the economy and middle class? History would clearly tell us otherwise.

"We have seen far too many predatory loans resulting in foreclosures, a barely-avoided systemic collapse of our financial system, and blatantly illegal practices by some of our largest institutions. When private institutions have so much power over the economic security of our citizens, it is the federal government’s role to make sure they operate on a level playing field and everyday peoples' interests are protected.

"It’s true that banks are a vital part of the economy. But appropriate regulations ensure banks continue to function and support our economy-- instead of being a part of breaking it.

'What more does the public want from banks,' she asks? We should demand full accountability for past illegal and predatory practices, and less whining about how big banks are somehow the victim."

Daylin Leach is also a progressive icon in his state legislature, the Pennsylvania Senate. He's running for the seat Allyson Schwartz is abandoning in northeast Philly/Montgomery County and he sees Bartiromo's outburst a lot like Carl did. "Nobody is assigning religious attributes to banks," he began. "It's not a question of them being 'angels' or 'devils.' Mitt Romney's musing aside, they are not even people. They are financial institutions created to serve us. When they do so honestly, fairly and transparently, they should be applauded. When they cheat, lie, rig the system or violate the law they should be punished and reformed.

"Maria's apologia glosses over the very real damage that some banking practices have wrought on our country. She dedicates precisely one sentence to 'banks have done wrong.' Really? Have they?? The rest of her speech makes the case for not enacting the very changes that will ensure we never have the sort of economic collapse we've recently seen again. If I could distill her speech down to its essence, it would be 'move along, nothing to see here.' The truth is, that consumers are going to need a lot more than that to ever again feel the system works for them."

And Nick Ruiz, a young father and professor, is taking on grotesque and longtime bankster apologist, John Mica in the Orlando area. As always, he sees the problem through the eyes of a typical American family. "The public wants the banks to work for everyone, not just the mega-account holders, and those receiving mega-compensation and mega-bonuses."

Banks are vital, and should be treated as such. But what that means, is that they must function to sustain adequate levels of capital circulation, rather than function to exact austerity and sequestration. Their job is to help people and society through the 'miracle' of reasonable capital security and credit-- not cause people and society enormous pain and suffering. But that is what they have done.

And so now, we have to process that history and decide what to do. It's clear that left to their own devices, too many financial institutions will hoard and speculate, but that does not in itself produce a greater society with a better standard of living. Left to their own devices, too many have acted in such a way as to concentrate their wealth and political power, sequestering the lion's share of the gains to themselves and their most intimate beneficiaries. Their behavior has a wide-ranging effect: it is devastating our society and we must act to alter this historical course now.

The truth of the matter is, a change in this financial aspect of our society will require far more than shoring up capital requirements and the size of different financial institutions-- rather, it will require a progressive change in the ideology of finance and banking itself, along with the redefinition of what banks exist to do. There is a new measure of corporate social responsibility that banks have come to be recognized as worthy of, and it's up to us to be sure that responsibility materializes in our body of laws. In reality, the collective activity of these financial institutions comes to bear upon all sectors of society; from employment, basic scientific research and industry-- to the arts, childhood education, the military, the social safety net and more-- their reach is foundational and constitutive of our entire socioeconomic circulatory system. If they fail-- all of society fails with them. It is this level of understanding, collective reciprocity and solidarity that must come to be expected and managed between Wall Street and Main Street. It is all of this that we must work toward.

Again, if you'd like to help bring about a different world that folks like John Mica, Maria Bartiromo, Ayn Rand and Paul Ryan envision, you can help Carl, Daylin and Nick here.

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Monday Bits-- Colbert's Sister Going To Congress? Will Nestlé And Wall Street Ever Be Held To Account?

PPP shows Elizabeth Colbert Busch opening a more significant lead (16% as of this afternoon) over disgraced ex-Governor Mark Sanford in the first district congressional special election. Voting is on May 7th in the carefully gerrymandered red district, who's voters gave Obama 40.2% in November, while right next door in the 6th district-- into which the state's racist legislature dumped every African-American voter they could find-- Obama won 70.9%. Although John Boehner endorsed Sanford on April 9, less than a week later the NRCC, which he controls, announced that due to Sanford's on-going behavior issues, it would no longer support him or invest in his race, despite the hundreds of thousands of dollars being poured into the district by the DCCC and their House Majority PAC. The new DCCC as:



I don't know if Colbert Busch will wind up voting with Republicans half the time. but it's what I suspect from watching the campaign. Still, that's better than voting with Republicans 100% of the time, which is what we can expect from Sanford. She's already come out in favor of marriage equality and her approach to Chained CPI was pretty good as well: “Not only does President Obama’s plan fail to put our finances back in order, it would cut benefits for our seniors, which is wrong. I believe that our seniors earned their Social Security by putting money away every single paycheck for a lifetime-- knowing that they could count on Social Security when they retired... Simply put, Social Security doesn’t contribute to the deficit, and politicians should keep their hands off the trust fund."

Our Contest Ended Today

Nick Ruiz (FL) wound up with 50 donors so he won the $1,000 PAC check from Blue America. Daylin Leach (PA) had 40 donors, Carl Sciortino (MA) had 38 donors, Andy Hounshell (OH) 31 donors and Ken Sanders (TX) 29. The average donor contributed approximately $53. And the Saving Social Security page now has $9,140 on it. We randomly selected one contributor to thank with the 311 platinum award disc. And that winner is Joyce Bullock from Glenside, PA, who contributed $12.


Wall Street And It's DC Allies Will Enslave Us All... If We let Them

Jeffrey Sachs isn't a radical. He's a kind of mainstream economics professor at Columbia University. The audio on this video was shot April 17 at a conference, "Fixing the Banking System for Good." It sounds like he's almost come around to a less corporate/establishment point of view about how corrupt and criminal Wall Street is, even to the point of advocating out loud the need for "separating the politicians from the (Wall Street) crooks, but maybe that's so close together that they can't actually be separated; maybe it's just the same community." Maybe?

I meet a lot of these people on Wall Street on a regular basis right now. I’m going to put it very bluntly. I regard the moral environment as pathological. And I’m talking about the human interactions that I have. I’ve not seen anything like this, not felt it so palpably. These people are out to make billions of dollars and nothing should stop them from that They have no responsibility to pay taxes, they have no responsibility to their clients, they have no responsibility to people… counterparties in transactions. They are tough, greedy, aggressive, and feel absolutely out of control, in a quite literal sense. And they have gamed the system to a remarkable extent and they have a docile president, a docile White House and a docile regulatory system that absolutely can’t find its voice. It’s terrified of these companies.

...[T]he financial markets are the number one campaign contributors in the U.S. system now. We have a corrupt politics to the core, I’m afraid to say… and both parties are up to their necks in this. This has nothing to do with Democrats or Republicans. It really doesn’t have anything to do with right wing or left wing, by the way. The corruption, as far as I can see, [is] everywhere...

And Speaking Of Antisocial, Nihilistic Greed... Nestlé

Nestlé has been claiming for some time that it invented the medical uses of herbs that have been used medicinally for centuries. And they want patents.

The world’s largest food company, Nestlé, is seeking a patent on the use of Nigella sativa to prevent food allergies, claiming the plant seed and extract when they are used as a food ingredient or drug. Commonly known as habbat al-barakah in Arabic, and frequently called “black seed,” “black cumin” or “fennel flower” in English, Nigella sativa is an ancient food and medicinal crop.

The Swiss giant’s claims appear invalid, as traditional uses of Nigella sativa clearly anticipate Nestlé’s patent application, and developing country scholarship has already validated these traditional uses and further described, in contemporary scientific terms, the very medicinal properties of black seed that Nestlé seeks to claim as its own “invention."

It was already being used in King Tut's time, when the Swiss were still sheltering and shivering around open fires in Alpine caves, gnawing on bones.

In claiming use of Nigella sativa against food allergies, Nestlé’s scientists have not innovated beyond what was already known in traditional medicine from Egypt to India and beyond. Moreover, prior to Nestlé’s claim, researchers in those countries used formal scientific methods to demonstrate the efficacy of traditional use of black seed to treat allergy symptoms.

Those simple facts, however, have not deterred Nestlé from advancing its claim. In November 2011, Nestlé’s patent application in Europe was published. Other national (or regional) applications may exist but have yet to be published. Recently, the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) released a search of scientific literature related to the application, and found problems with Nestlé’s claim to have made an invention, citing some of the same research that is noted in this report. The PCT opinion, however, is not binding on national patent offices, and Nestlé may submit modified claims. Thus, while the opinion is a blow to Nestlé’s application, it doesn’t mean that the claims are dead.

Like well-known biopiracy cases before it, such as patents on uses of neem, Nestlé’s unashamed attempt to appropriate traditional knowledge reflects an ethical lapse and shows profound problems with the company’s intellectual property practices. It can be hoped that Nestlé’s claim will be turned down by patent authorities, but the fact that patent claims over traditional knowledge that preceded it have result in patents shows that intellectual property offices sometime share industry’s disrespect for traditional knowledge. Indeed the fact that a corporation with the resources of Nestlé would pursue a patent on such an obviously pilfered “invention” at all is indicative of the need to improve patent review standards so that such applications are not worth filing in the first place.

Fighting for people over profits is how the blog SumOfUs introduced Nestlé’s ambitious claims.

In a paper published last year, Nestlé scientists claimed to “discover” what much of the world has known for millennia: that nigella sativa extract could be used for “nutritional interventions in humans with food allergy."

But instead of creating an artificial substitute, or fighting to make sure the remedy was widely available, Nestlé is attempting to create a nigella sativa monopoly and gain the ability to sue anyone using it without Nestlé’s permission. Nestlé has filed patent applications-- which are currently pending-- around the world.

Prior to Nestlé's outlandish patent claim, researchers in developing nations such as Egypt and Pakistan had already published studies on the same curative powers Nestlé is claiming as its own. And Nestlé has done this before-- in 2011, it tried to claim credit for using cow’s milk as a laxative, despite the fact that such knowledge had been in Indian medical texts for a thousand years.

Don’t let Nestlé turn a traditional cure into a corporate cash cow.

We know Nestlé doesn’t care about ethics. After all, this is the corporation that poisoned its milk with melamine, purchases cocoa from plantations that use child slave labor, and launched a breast milk substitute campaign in the 1970s that contributed to the suffering and deaths of thousands of babies from poor communities.

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Wall Street Was Right About Elizabeth Warren-- She's Holding Their Feet To The Fire

Wall Street financed the Republican campaign against Elizabeth Warren's run for the Senate. After she won (54-46%), Wall Street went bonkers when there was talk she might be put on the Senate Banking Committee. Wall Street has spent billions (literally-- with a "b") making "friends: on Capitol Hill, lobbying and giving legalistic bribes to Members of Congress (and not just to Republicans, not by a long shot). Just since 1990 the finance/insurance/real estate sector has given powerful Democratic senator Chuck Schumer $18,946,291. Do you think they have some pull with him? In her much shorter tenure, Kirsten Gillibrand, who desperately wants to run for president, got $7,155,437. Bob Menendez got $6,738,847, Harry Reid got $5,815,835, Max Baucus took in $5,715,734 and Banking Committee chairman Tim Johnson got $4,106,218. Nearly $50 million for just those half dozen senators! Do you think the banksters begged them to put Elizabeth Warren on any committee other than Banking?

This week she showed why they were worried when she questioned (above) banking regulators, Daniel Stipano, Deputy Chief Counsel for the U.S. Comptroller, and Richard Ashton, Deputy General Counsel of the Federal Reserve. Apart from the substance of her line of questioning-- that our government has made a decision to protect the predatory big banks but not to even alert the families who have been the victims of illegal foreclosures-- we see a picture forming of why Elizabeth Warren is special, and not just another grubby senator climbing the ladder-- like Gillibrand, for instance.

Joshua Green warned in Businessweek last month that the banksters were right to fear Warren and that she would disrupt their business as usual criminal world.

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) made a big splash at her first hearing of the Senate Banking Committee recently when she went after regulators for failing to be more aggressive with such big banks as HSBC, which had just paid a $1.9 billion fine for money laundering. I used the occasion for a column speculating that, despite her freshman status and a Senate culture that frowns on new members speaking out, Warren could be more effective (and be so much sooner) than many people realize.

“Being effective” is not the same thing as “passing legislation.” The latter is difficult for any freshman-- heck, in today’s broken Senate, passing legislation is difficult, period. My point was that Warren appeared to grasp that there were other ways besides legislation to influence the government and the banking system. She was using the spectacle of a Senate hearing to do this.

Now we can see the first evidence that this strategy is having an effect. From this week’s American Banker:

“Bankers are bracing for the start of more severe anti-money laundering exams as regulators rework their standards and prepare to issue another round of guidance tackling the issue.

“The agencies, notably the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, are feeling the heat as lawmakers blame them for not doing enough to ensure institutions are following anti-laundering standards.

“Regulators are likely to make exams tougher for banks of all sizes, though officials have noted the most serious problems have arisen at the largest banks. Some of the biggest institutions including HSBC, Citigroup, and JPMorgan Chase-- have recently drawn the toughest enforcement actions related to Bank Secrecy Act violations.”

Not many politicians take seriously the idea that they are tribunes of working families and not servants of the rich and powerful. Elizabeth Warren is one of them (along with Bernie Sanders, Jeff Merkley and a pitiful few others in the Senate). The debate over the Obama-Boehner Chained CPI scheme to reduce benefits for the elderly and veterans is separating the wheat from the chaff. As soon as Obama released the budget that included the Chained CPI deal Boehner had demanded, Warren spoke up loudly against it:

My brother David has always had the special spark in our family.

Like our two older brothers, David served in the military. When he got out, he started a small business -z- and when that one didn't work out, he started another one. He couldn't imagine an America where he wasn't living by his wits every single day.

Year after year, my brother paid into Social Security. He never questioned it. He figured he was paying so that he-- and a lot of other people-- could have a secure retirement.

Today my brother lives on his Social Security. That's about $1,100 a month. $13,200 a year.

I'm telling you my brother's story not because it's unusual, but because it's like the story of so many other people. I can almost guarantee that you know someone-- a family member, friend, or neighbor-- who counts on Social Security checks to get by. That's why I was shocked to hear that the President's newest budget proposal would cut $100 billion in Social Security benefits. Our Social Security system is critical to protecting middle class families, and we cannot allow it to be dismantled inch by inch.

The President's policy proposal, known as "chained CPI," would re-calculate the cost of living for Social Security beneficiaries. That new number won't keep up with inflation on things like food and health care -- the basics that we need to live.

In short, "chained CPI" is just a fancy way to say "cut benefits for seniors, the permanently disabled, and orphans."

Two-thirds of seniors rely on Social Security for most of their income; one-third rely on it for at least 90% of their income. These people aren't stashing their Social Security checks in the Cayman Islands and buying vacation homes in Aruba-- they are hanging on by their fingernails to their place in the middle class.

My brothers and I grew up in an America that invested in its kids and built a strong middle class. An America that allowed millions of children to rise from poverty and establish secure lives. An America that created Social Security and Medicare so that seniors could live with dignity.

We can't chip away at America's middle class and break the promise we made to our seniors.

I've read similar statements from Bernie Sanders (daily) and from Tom Harkin and from Jeff Merkley. In the House, progressive leaders like Alan Grayson, Barbara Lee, Raul Grijalva, and Keith Ellison have been leading the battle against the whole notion of Austerity and balancing the budget on the backs of the most vulnerable. What about Hillary Clinton? Where does she stand? She wants to be the next president? Cat's got her tongue? Too politically dangerous to speak out until the chips fall? Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH) is in a tough district and is being heavily targeted by the GOP for 2014. But that didn't make her hedge and haw over Chained CPI. She is absolutely clear where she stands: "I will not vote for a budget that supports chained CPI and cuts benefits that seniors have earned through a lifetime of hard work."

“Together with Medicare and Medicaid, Social Security embodies the moral fabric of our country. These programs are the foundation of economic security for America’s seniors and the most vulnerable. And while I am open to proposals that make Social Security stronger and extend its solvency, I will not accept a plan that takes from Social Security beneficiaries without first asking America’s millionaires and multi-billion-dollar corporations to pay their fair share.

“I am proud to support legislation to ensure the long-term viability of Social Security. The Protecting and Preserving Social Security Act, which I cosponsored, would create long-range solvency and improve benefits, and it would ensure greater economic security for America’s seniors.

“I urge the President to consider the approach taken in the Van Hollen budget, legislation that would reduce our deficit in a balanced way, invest in programs that help our economy grow, and maintain our commitment to seniors."

Blue America has been asking candidates for Congress to tell us how they see Chained CPI. Their statements are on this Saving Social Security page. The latest addition is Martha Robertson, the Democrat running against Social Security foe Tom Reed in western New York state. "Seniors," Robertson told us this week, "have paid into Social Security all their working lives and they depend on the benefits they've earned. Chained CPI and other cuts to benefits are the wrong choice. Seniors shouldn't bear the burden of these cuts when corporations and the billionaires aren't paying their fair share." That's the minimum we should expect from people asking for our votes for public office.

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The Big Banks Are Still Getting A Pass

According to a widely distributed post last week by Ellen Brown at the Web of Debt Blog, It Can Happen Here: The Confiscation Scheme Planned for US and UK Depositors, the FDIC and Bank of England have plans on the books to deal with a bank meltdown the same way Cyprus has-- seizing deposits in return for worthless bank stock. [Note: I experienced something akin to this personally. As Steve Case and Jerry Levin were looting TimeWarner, they forced executives to take partial payment in stock options. I had approximately $10 million worth. When stock options go underwater, the value doesn't gradually decrease; it disappears. $10 million is worth zero dollars in one day. You don't want to be forced into taking bank stocks to make up for your deposits and savings.]

Another taxpayer bailout is not going to happen. So who will bailout the big banks that are still taking unacceptable (and unregulated) risks in garbage like derivatives that, as we've noted before, Congress seems willing to further deregulate (thanks Annie Kuster and Jim Himes)? The FDIC-Bank of England report says the depositors will-- "by exchanging or converting a sufficient amount of the unsecured debt from the original creditors of the failed company [meaning the depositors] into equity [or stock]. In the U.S., the new equity would become capital in one or more newly formed operating entities. In the U.K., the same approach could be used, or the equity could be used to recapitalize the failing financial company itself-- thus, the highest layer of surviving bailed-in creditors would become the owners of the resolved firm. In either country, the new equity holders would take on the corresponding risk of being shareholders in a financial institution." And that seems to include even insured accounts under $250,000. Nationalizing failed banks-- as Sweden had done in similar circumstances (and quite successfully)-- was rejected by President Obama in 2009. Unless we plan to elected Bernie Sanders, Sherrod Brown or Elizabeth Warren president, I don't see anyone else on the political horizon who would entertain such a notion. Instead... Cyprus:

An FDIC confiscation of deposits to recapitalize the banks is far different from a simple tax on taxpayers to pay government expenses. The government’s debt is at least arguably the people’s debt, since the government is there to provide services for the people. But when the banks get into trouble with their derivative schemes, they are not serving depositors, who are not getting a cut of the profits. Taking depositor funds is simply theft.

What should be done is to raise FDIC insurance premiums and make the banks pay to keep their depositors whole, but premiums are already high; and the FDIC, like other government regulatory agencies, is subject to regulatory capture.  Deposit insurance has failed, and so has the private banking system that has depended on it for the trust that makes banking work.

The Cyprus haircut on depositors was called a “wealth tax” and was written off by commentators as “deserved,” because much of the money in Cypriot accounts belongs to foreign oligarchs, tax dodgers and money launderers. But if that template is applied in the US, it will be a tax on the poor and middle class. Wealthy Americans don’t keep most of their money in bank accounts.  They keep it in the stock market, in real estate, in over-the-counter derivatives, in gold and silver, and so forth.

Are you safe, then, if your money is in gold and silver? Apparently not-- if it’s stored in a safety deposit box in the bank.  Homeland Security has reportedly told banks that it has authority to seize the contents of safety deposit boxes without a warrant when it’s a matter of “national security,” which a major bank crisis no doubt will be.

And speaking of Bernie Sanders... he's offering a bill that would lead to breaking up banks that are literally too big to fail. The situation hasn't gotten any better since the TARP bailout; it's gotten worse, much worse. "U.S. banks have become so big that the six largest financial institutions in this country (J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley) today have assets of nearly $9.6 trillion, a figure equal to about two-thirds of the nation's gross domestic product. These six financial institutions issue more than two-thirds of all credit cards, over half of all mortgages, control 95 percent of all derivatives held in financial institutions and hold more than 40 percent of all bank deposits in the United States." What Sanders' legislation proposes to do about this mess is to give Wall Street shill and Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew "90 days to compile a list of commercial banks, investment banks, hedge funds and insurance companies that he deems too big to fail. The affected financial institutions would include 'any entity that has grown so large that its failure would have a catastrophic effect on the stability of either the financial system or the United States economy without substantial government assistance.' Within one year after the legislation became law, the Treasury Department would be required to break up those banks, insurance companies and other financial institutions." Bernie:

If an institution is too big to fail, it is too big to exist. No single financial institution should be so large that its failure would cause catastrophic risk to millions of American jobs or to our nation's economic wellbeing. No single financial institution should have holdings so extensive that its failure could send the world economy into crisis. We need to break up these institutions because they have done of the tremendous damage they have done to our economy.

I'm really happy that Hillary Clinton, Kay Hagan, Mark Warner, Rob Portman, John Tester, and Mark Begich now agree that it's none of the government's business if two adults of the same gender want to marry each other. Hip, hip hooray! You can't be considered a "progressive" unless you feel that way-- but feeling that way doesn't make you a progressive. Backing economic justice plans like Bernie's does. Hillary Clinton for president? Do we never learn?

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