Greenspan's confession

The financial crisis has happened at the worse time in the political calendar for the people of this country. While politicians and the media are vexing themselves about who's going to cut what and by how much after the coming General Election, it diverts the peoples attention away from, in my opinion, the most important debating point, ie:- who's going to stop the bankers doing it again?

Neither Gord, Dave or Nick have mentioned it as far as I can see. All three of them are running scared of the bankers. Well I ain't!

I know I'm a nobody from nowhere, but I will not let this moment go by without trying to get the debate on to the real issue of the day, namely, how can we stop the greedy bankers doing it all over again?

I watched with interest and growing anger a recording of last weeks BBC documentary The Love of Money.

The most telling comment came from the man who was culpable to a large degree for the whole thing, and in some respects was the architect of the frame work that invited this kind of disaster.

Alan Greenspan the retired chief of the Federal Reserve, the US equivalent of the Bank of England in the UK, was interviewed about his involvement in the run up to the collapse last year. He was asked for his considered opinion on what happened and why.

One of his comments stood out above them all. He said, "There will be another disaster and there always will be, it's human nature and you can't change that".

I agree with him. But this very same man who says, “It's human nature to be a greedy, lying and thieving son of *****”. Who when asked to put controls and tighter regulations on the derivatives market back in the nineties, refused. Presumably he thought human nature would self regulate.

He displayed what many of the bankers are showing us right now, arrogance and a complete lack of contrition for his part in the financial collapse.

He has obviously changed his mind or not, who knows. The point is if he had heeded the warnings he was given about these bundled investments and the way they were marketed. He could have put regulation in place to keep an eye on what was happening. It may have saved the world from this mess we're in.

Now what the people of the world should be screaming for is a tighter regulation of the banks and the financial markets. The bankers won’t like it, but who cares what they think? They were, and still are, totally motivated by self interest and greed (this is the human nature Greenspan referred to).

Even after the tax payers of the world have saved their skins, they want to continue to give themselves massive pay, bonuses and pensions. While the rest of the economy contracts and people loose their jobs and businesses, these arrogant modern day robber Barons want to ignore, what we the people have done for them, and continue as if nothing happened.

Well I say enough is enough. If we can’t change human nature (and we can’t) then regulation is the only answer. This is what every Government of the world should be seeking to implement.

Otherwise the suffering that we are going to endure by way of unemployment and cuts to public services will be for nothing. And we will, as Greenspan said, “see it all again”, in the not too distant future probably.

I listened with increasing concern and anger last night to the BBC's investigation into the Banking system one year on from the collapse of Lehman Brothers, and near total meltdown of the worlds financial markets.

It appears that their investigations only confirm my suspicions that nothing has changed for the bankers. They are still being paid a fortune for making money for themselves.

They did a vox pop in the City of London financial district. They asked some investment bankers if they had changed the way they do business and to my surprise these people actually had no compunction in admitting nothing had changed in the way they did what they do.

This is a scandal of unbelievable proportions.

I read with interest yesterday about Charlie Sheens fixation with a consiracy theory about the 9/11 distaster.

Well Charlie, I hate to tell you this, but the real conspiritors in your country and around the world are in the financial disrticts and the political arena. Instead of celebs getting vexed about a disaster that was quite clearly caused by fanatical Islamists and affected thousands. The real conspiracy and disater that should be vexing him is the greed and lack of control on the worlds financial banks and investment institutions that lead to a disaster that has, and will continue to affect Billions of people for generations to come.

People of the world unite!

One year on from Lehman Brothers and the near collapse of the world financial system, have the bankers greedy ways changed?

My answer to my own question is no!

While the governments of the world have taken tax payers money in hundreds of billions(without I may add, asking the tax payer if it's happy for his/her money to be spent in this way) and saved the Bankers businesses and jobs, the bankers have said, thanks very much now we will pay ourselves a big bonus, and carry on where we left off.

It seems to me that governments are incapable, inept or in collusion with the bankers and the way they do business.

If manufacturing businesses can go to the wall and any other type of business for that matter, and all that governments can do is wring their hands and say, well that's market forces. Why are the banks treated so differently? Why are they allowed to keep the money they have leached from their businesses over the years? Why are they allowed to pay themselves massive bonuses out of the money the tax payers has given them in order to survive? Why are they allowed to give themselves enormous pensions. Why are they allowed to pay themselves so excessively for massive failure due to greed and incompetence?

Am I alone in thinking like this?

Why haven't governments stepped in to stop the excessive pay and bonuses?

They stepped in quick enough (with our money) when it all went pair shaped a year ago. They gave our money to these people. People who had ripped us off blind for years they appear to have been told to, "carry on boys and have some more cake and eat it, till it comes out of your ears".

Are we the general public to be used and abused in this way for ever? If our Governments won't stand up for us against these modern day robber Barron's, then we the people of the world must unite to say, "enough is enough, we will not stand by while our money is used in this way". "We will not stand by while bankers, gorge themselves at our expense". "They need to be told that they are lucky to have a job, let alone a bonus of millions".

I don't know how we can stop them, but stop them we must.

Our public services are going to be decimated by the debt our government has go us into, in order to save the banks. Swinging cuts are going to be the order of the day. Unemployment is going to rise to levels we haven't seen for decades. The Labour, Conservative or any other party seem happy to make us (the people) pay for the bankers greed.

Well, I for one, am not happy to pay for the bankers unjustified enormous salary and pension.

They need to be humbled, and the arrogance and contempt they show needs to stop. The public who are suffering and are going to suffer as a s result of their actions need to be assured that the banks appreciate what we have done for them, and they need to show some gratitude and contrition for the mess they got the world into.

I am not a communist but I want to use a phrase form that era. Not workers, but "people of the world unite" and lets change what's happening, before we have to do it all again. Don't let the pain and suffering they have caused pass by without using this moment to change what, and how they do their business.