Episode 315 – Meet Goldman Sachs, the Vampire Squid
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We all know Goldman Sachs is the very embodiment of evil…or do we? What is Goldman Sachs? What does it do? Where did it come from and where is it going, and is there anything that can be done to stop it? Buckle in for this edition of The Corbett Report where James dares to take on the vampire squid itself.
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SHOW NOTES
| “Goldman Sachs Is Just Plain Evil” by Joe Crow Ryan | |
| Time Reference: | 00:01 |
| Max Keiser takes offense to Goldman Sachs story | |
| Time Reference: | 01:01 |
| Douglas Valentine on Guns and Butter March 1, 2017 | |
| Time Reference: | 01:30 |
| William Engdahl on Guns and Butter March 8, 2017 | |
| Time Reference: | 01:54 |
| Evil Empire: Goldman Sachs | |
| Time Reference: | 02:12 |
| Wall Street – evil in our time | |
| Time Reference: | 02:21 |
| The Great American Bubble Machine | |
| Time Reference: | 03:09 |
| Did Goldman Sachs caused [sic] both the 1929 and 2008 depressions? | |
| Time Reference: | 04:24 |
| The Great Crash, 1929 by John Kenneth Galbraith | |
| Time Reference: | 06:53 |
| Is Goldman responsible for Greek crisis? | |
| Time Reference: | 08:41 |
| Goldman Sachs Helped Greece Mask Real Debt | |
| Time Reference: | 10:03 |
| Goldman Sachs Agrees to Pay More than $5 Billion in Connection with Its Sale of Residential Mortgage Backed Securities | |
| Time Reference: | 11:34 |
| Goldman Sachs CNBC Documentary | |
| Time Reference: | 11:36 |
| Goldman Sachs v. Occupy Wall Street: A Greg Palast Investigation | |
| Time Reference: | 16:01 |
| How Goldman Sachs killed Penn Central | |
| Time Reference: | 19:22 |
| A Top Trader at Goldman, Sachs Pleads Guilty to Insider Charges | |
| Time Reference: | 19:27 |
| How Goldman gambled on starvation | |
| Time Reference: | 19:34 |
| Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World | |
| Time Reference: | 21:17 |
| Episode 232 – AIG Exposed | |
| Time Reference: | 29:45 |
| The Secret (Insurance) Agent Men | |
| Time Reference: | 29:52 |
| Chasing Goldman Sachs: How the Masters of the Universe Melted Wall Street Down . . . And Why They’ll Take Us to the Brink Again | |
| Time Reference: | 30:58 |
| Blankfein Says He’s Just Doing ‘God’s Work’ | |
| Time Reference: | 32:54 |
| How Does Goldman Sachs Make Its Profits? | |
| Time Reference: | 33:35 |
| Obama Appoints Goldman Sachs Lobbyist to Top Treasury | |
| Time Reference: | 38:31 |
| Geithner Grilled on Goldman Sachs | |
| Time Reference: | 38:47 |
| Politics Sachs: How Wall Street’s biggest bank has both Bush and Clinton on the hook | |
| Time Reference: | 39:03 |
| Obama Working for Goldman Sachs | |
| Time Reference: | 39:42 |
| The revolving door between politics and private sector | |
| Time Reference: | 41:05 |
| Prodi, Monti, Draghi et Barroso à Goldman Sachs… Stop aux conflits d’intérêt des commissaires | |
| Time Reference: | 41:43 |
| Goldman Sachs rules the world – Trader Interview BBC | |
| Time Reference: | 42:07 |
| The Fall of Long-Term Capital Management | |
| Time Reference: | 43:21 |
| Panel calls out Donald Trump’s hypocrisy surrounding himself with Goldman Sachs people | |
| Time Reference: | 45:15 |
| Trump Hits Cruz With Goldman Sachs | |
| Time Reference: | 45:23 |
| Trump #MakesGoldmanSachsGreatAgain | |
| Time Reference: | 45:53 |
| Trump announces 5th high profile hire from Goldman Sachs | |
| Time Reference: | 46:10 |
| Crowd At Donald Trump’s Rally Chant DRAIN THE SWAMP! | |
| Time Reference: | 46:27 |
| Trump announces 5th high profile hire from Goldman Sachs | |
| Time Reference: | 46:57 |
| Interview 1252 – Nomi Prins Exposes Government Sachs | |
| Time Reference: | 47:29 |
| Interview 1249 – Carey Wedler on How Government $ach$ Won The (s)Election | |
| Time Reference: | 48:29 |
| Gary Cohn: “The Fed Is Doing A Good Job”; Trump “Respects The Powers Of The Fed” | |
| Time Reference: | 50:20 |
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Hey James,
Thanks for the work here on Goldman Succs. Always enlightening, thoughtful and well spoken. Cheers!
Heard you made the list of “Fake News” from Harvard. You’re definitely hitting some high level rings of awareness. Keep it up friend!
T
tyler,
James is aware. He is pretty sharp. He cut the links to the enemy camp so we don’t “feed them”.
https://www.corbettreport.com/the-most-untrustworthy-source-in-the-media/#comment-36928
I’m only getting this report in audio. No video? Or am I missing something?
Watch it on You Tube here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHNAZMIcFNg
Great work, James! Keep the info coming.
There seems to be someone on facebook using your name and website. Is that just a random fan? You should consider going on facebook to advertise your website and content. You’re already on YouTube
Thanks again, James
Bgree
Good exposé of “Government Sachs!â€
Only 10% of GS’s profits come from traditional banking – bankrolling “real†products to market!
Three quarters of profits come from hedge fund-type investments – money games predicated on fiat debt (an onion structure, one abstracted value encapsulating the next – magic tricks, con games).
“It is the legal activities that it engages in that constitute the real threat here.†– BINGO!
Precisely why we should always pursue a multi-front opposition to this descent to hell – the only place these banksters could lead us.
Sec. of the Treasury, Robert Ruben (later co-Chair at Citibank) led the Clinton administration to repeal the Glass-Steagall Act. Could all that effort have been for nothing (other than their “freeing markets†bullshit alibi)?
We can’t change things overnight (that could be a bloody revolution), but how these crooks are regulated does in fact have a real impact on real lives right now.
We need Glass-Steagall. That isn’t going to change The Fed (which also needs changing), or the basic flaws in fiat money (another more fundamental problem), but it would take away some of the leverage these bankster-crooks have over our society. It would limit their repertoire of magic tricks.
Robot evictions: another example of needed regulations within reach that could alleviate pain and suffering right now of people and families made homeless from the last criminally constructed real estate collapse.
Another important point you made: Goldman Sachs was not a household name not too long ago. And nobody dissed GS like Trump during his campaign. Now his administration looks like a GS alumni party! – ?
Oh – who’s the new Secretary of State? Rex Tillerson, ex-CEO of ExxonMobil! What corporation could better represent America’s foreign policy for the last hundred years?
“These people†are not just brilliant – they have a great sense of humor. Like Penn & Teller, they present a multifaceted magic show: with fictional back stories (like the official 911 story); hat-tricks complete with “rabbit-derivatives,†plus; and a marvelously subtle wit (if you’re a ghoul).
But still, isn’t something even stranger here? They’ve moved all these “empty†figures into the limelight. Trump. Goldman Sachs – that’s what GS is, right? Only 10% real substance.
Looks like sleight-of-hand to me? “These people†are consummate choreographers.
Which bankster-brands have substantially cornered the “real†markets…pork bellies… pharmaceuticals…the military industries…real estate (of course)…oil…renewable energies?
In 2016 Saudi Arabia decided to divest 5% of Aramco. (As a start? – history will tell.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Aramco
Street-drugs? Distributing 80% of the world’s heroin requires a formidable infrastructure.
The Prison Industrial Complex (P.I.C.)? Why is a prison class necessary?
Abstracted values markets are mechanisms for shifting wealth to the .001%. Fiat money is key.
First deregulate: new (abstracted) streams are designed to flow into elite coiffures.
Simultaneously create more units.
The theft is invisible: units aren’t shifted;
old/new units are deflated;
while streams of new units are specifically directed, creating a new societal ratio.
Looks like “new†wealth was created by elite activities.
Tiny correction around the 30 second mark. It is March not November, but hardly noticeable. …well, unless the economy tanks this coming November, then this video will become famous.
Haha. Got ahead of myself, didn’t I? Well, maybe I can re-release this in November and it’ll be good as new!
It could be that he started working on this podcast way back in November
I like the idea of “re-release” later this year. Revisiting such profound information (and “what do we do about it?”) in a different time context can offer further insight. With the Fed rate hikes finally taking their toll, the inflated real estate market, the climate change war, and this manufactured contention between left & right…the context will certainly be different.
Stellar! This is a classic mini-documentary!
This is sooo good, so deep, so profound… I am lost for words.
Three months into office, in March 2009, when Obama could of taken care of the mess Wall Street had made, this is what he told the bankers:
Obama called a meeting of the nation’s top thirteen financial executives at the White House. The banking titans came into the meeting full of dread only to leave pleased to learn that the new president was in their camp. For instead of standing up for those who had been harmed most by the crisis – workers, minorities, and the poor – Obama sided unequivocally with those who had caused the meltdown.
“My administration is the only thing between you and the pitchforks,†Obama said. “You guys have an acute public relations problem that’s turning into a political problem. And I want to help…I’m not here to go after you. I’m protecting you…I’m going to shield you from congressional and public anger.†For the banking elite, who had destroyed untold millions of jobs, there was, as Suskind puts it, “Nothing to worry about. Whereas [President Franklin Delano] Roosevelt had [during the Great Depression] pushed for tough, viciously opposed reforms of Wall Street and famously said ‘I welcome their hate,’ Obama was saying ‘How can I help?’†As one leading banker told Suskind, “The sense of everyone after the meeting was relief. The president had us at a moment of real vulnerability. At that point, he could have ordered us to do just about anything and we would have rolled over. But he didn’t – he mostly wanted to help us out, to quell the mob.â€
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/06/19/progressive-obama-hes-melting-hes-melting/
GS gets plenty of help staying in business so they can keep looting American 401k accounts and pension funds.
Galbraith, a socialist impersonating an economist, wants lay sole blame on the ’29 crash on Wall St. and Goldman Sachs. The Shenandoah/Blue Ridge stock scheme is a *derivative* of the crash, not a *primary.”
The Federal Reserve was the *primary.” It created an unsustainable boom in the 1920s by lowering interest rates. It’s estimated that the money supply had increased by 61.8 percent between 1921 and 1929. The inevitable stock market crash was a symptom of the inflationary boom.
As for Galbraith, for much of his academic life, Galbraith was considered to be a “dissident,” yet few people moved in government circles more comfortably than he did. From his semi-dictatorial position with OPA during World War II to his ambassadorships during the John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson administrations, he was revered by the movers and shakers of the state. While it is true that his institutionalism had a whiff of being “out of the mainstream,” it was because of his insistence that government coercion plus government propaganda somehow could cure any social ill.
During the 1960s, Galbraith proclaimed that all of New York City’s problems could be “fixed” if only the authorities there “would spend enough money.” That advice led to the city’s financial collapse in 1975, but even then Galbraith was insisting that everything would be fine in NYC as long as the federal government would pay for all of the city’s welfare schemes.
As an economics undergrad, I was taken in by Galbraith’s image as a “Washington outsider,” but a tincture of time and a ton of non-statist economics books later, I see that he was a socialist in a suit-and-tie. I’m not letting Government Sachs off the hook, just making sure Galbraith’s hagiography stays on the hook.
November 17th? Did this video come from the future?
Haha. Got ahead of myself, didn’t I? Well, maybe I can re-release this in November and it’ll be good as new!
JC’s makes a key point when he notes that the most problematic things Goldman Sachs gets away with are technically legal. I want to emphasize that even more than he does. To show a contrasting case, the recent Libor rigging scandal was clearly illegal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libor_scandal GS, if it participated was not caught up in that scandal.
Examples of technically legal, problematic GS actions that JC gives include – The Great Crash of 1929 was triggered by widespread use of the then legal Pyramid/Ponzi schemes, by many Stock market participants, including the ancestor of GS. Those schemes *should* have been illegal then, and they are illegal now. That is a kind of a template for the problems with Goldman Sachs and other Wall Street firms – they are effective and clever at finding loopholes which should be illegal at the time, but are not. They are effective at government capture with campaign donations, and other influence peddling. Glass-Steagall was one measure instituted in response to the Crash of 1929, and it should never have been repealed. Exploiting the repeal of Glass-Steagall by becoming a bank in time of need is another example of GS exploiting loopholes. Trading on the “insider” (but not technically, insider info) information they gained by putting together CDOs is another good example JC gives. Taxpayer bailout of AIG to help firms like GS without their taking a big haircut is another JC didn’t mention.
These sorts of loopholes/govt. capture things are not impossible to spot and outlaw ahead of time. They are not as tricky or complex as, say, preventing computer software exploits. But they require govt. will and cooperation – which is not there. Another point – very high leverage can be very problematic, even if a trading firm is not a bank. The 1998 crash involving LTCM showed that, and the 2008 events with Bear Stearns and Lehman repeated it. That angle wasn’t hard to predict – they already had a recent example. It’s still a potential problem today.
Yes, some loopholes in laws could be spotted on time. Probably some were, but corruption closed someone’s eyes.
However, I think laws have an inherent hidden failure and we should not expect that they will ever become complete and without contradictions.
According to Goedel’s incompleteness theorems it is not possible that a formal system can be complete and non-contradictory at the same time. If the system is non-contradictory then there are statements that cannot be proven true nor false (loopholes).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_incompleteness_theorems
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-is-godels-theorem/
Theorems are talking about formal axiomatic systems containing basic arithmetic and it is possible to argue that my conclusion is far fetched. But I think it is possible to prove that laws (axiomatic formal system) are more complex then axiomatic systems containing basic arithmetic, therefore theorems can be applied.
But even today there is a way to handle loopholes in laws, retroactively effective laws. They represent a moral hazard. Fighting moral hazard with other moral hazard? Hard question.
But we do have the right for self-defense. Also to use violence, although it is otherwise unacceptable.
The kind of loophole exploitation that we really care aboout – where there are big profit opportunities – can usually be noticed spotted by outsiders. It involves lots of people and money flows, with winners and victimized losers, It happens over a period of time. The ones that matter are often suspected and apparent to outside sources if they invested in looking. They are relatively easier to spot than software flaws. The SEC is a federal agency charged with looking for *illegal* schemes. They don’t always look that hard, but at least when someone blows the whistle, there can be a prosecution: http://www.accounting-degree.org/scandals/
Key point of my comment is that there is no organized group invested with looking for schemes that are not illegal but should be, or with informing Congress & financial regulators about how to change the laws to prevent the victimization.
Example: one scheme I got personally burned with was US listings of stock/equity in PRC-based companies. It turns out that stock in a PRC-based company doesn’t really have any legal meaning because the shareholders have no legal way to take control of the publicly listed companies assets – not just because it is in a foreign country with different courts, but because the Chinese govt. explictly does not recognize that control or allow transfer of the assets. So the entire premise of foreign ownership is fatally flawed and the US listing is analogous to a pyramid scheme – you the undersigned, have a theoretical “share” of only a theoretical thing with no independent, fungible value. The Wall Street firms who brought the listing of these shares public in the US realized this and deliberately failed to publicize it. In some cases, they didn’t even have a real IPO, but instead worked by buying the SEC registrations (legal title, CUSIP, etc) of failed US companies, and then changing the name, so a new, formal registration process was not required, and there was less vetting. As far as I know, there is no law today that prevents listing of shares where the group of shareholders do not actually control the underlying corporate assets in any legal sense.
As I wrote in my note, the scam of “Too Big To Fail” because of leverage was already shown to be bad/important in the 1998 case of Long Term Capital, which required a Fed bailout to end a market crash that it caused. It didn’t take any genius to see the need of preventing that for highly interconnected Wall Street firms like Bear Stearns, Lehman, AIG, etc. Even Goldman Sachs had to be rescued by a deal with Buffett in 2008 because it was leveraged and connected to other failing firms.
Josh,
Do you know of any type of community “shorting endeavor” towards stocks like Monsanto or Merck?
Corbett talks about it here (30 seconds) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NuLWCHvkc8&feature=youtu.be&t=2m48s
I feel like Big Pharma might be in trouble if the Vaccine issue and CDC corruption are exposed. http://www.dogsagainstfluoridation.com/vaxxed-movie
Great work! I apreciate your approach as always. Thank you.
How/why is Goldman Sachs so openly and blatantly disgusting?
I’ve been watching Mnuchin’s confirmation hearing and I almost could not believe what was going on. Ghastly beyond belief for most of the people I guess.
Can we draw some parallels with Snowjob, Vault7….?
I think at the end of the day GS is no worse then any of the big corporations. “Behind every great fortune lies a great crime” (Balsac).
Particularly, they are not Vampire Squid, they are in fact just one tentacle of it. Scientifically proven. Swiss scientists took Orbis database and study relations between 43.060 transnational corporations.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21228354.500-revealed–the-capitalist-network-that-runs-the-world#.Ud5_NvmL3nj
They found out super-entity of 147 corporations (Big Boys Club), that effectively own themselves(!!!!), control 40% of the entire network in question.
Last paragraph from the article:
“So, the super-entity may not result from conspiracy. The real question, says the Zurich team, is whether it can exert concerted political power. Driffill feels 147 is too many to sustain collusion. Braha suspects they will compete in the market but act together on common interests. Resisting changes to the network structure may be one such common interest.”
Is there any doubt that Big Boys club will not try to self-preserve itself? There are not just banks and financial institutions there. It’s not fake money that gives them power. They could live with real money, no problem. States gives them power. And disoriented people believing in all kinds of rubbish, among others also in so called Social Contract, the “ultimate achievement” of civilization, the foundation of State.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_contract
Probably (if at all) they know just Rousseau’s take on the subject.
Excellent information, thanks James. For anybody familiar with the ‘Vampire Squid’ though the headline unfortunately does not carry the intended message. I get that the analogy was coined by RS and the projection is perfect, BUT, for the record, it’s a deep sea creature of about a foot in size with extremely depressed metabolism that eats small prey and, well, does not engage in vampirism. It propells itself with cute little flippers and the name relates to the black colour of its mantle. All in all a far cry from being a beastly match for GS. I could think of a few spiders though…….
Nice job Mr. Corbett! These parasites hate having their faces shown to the world. There must be more of these faces hidden in the shadows… *sniff* I can smell em. I must admit I was a little flustered when I thought I heard you say regulation is not the solution. I guess because I was waiting for you to talk about that Brettonwoods system and it’s dismantling which set this pilfering into high gear. This in no way devalues your work here and frankly I know nothing about making these highly informative videos so factor in my ignorance before judging my critique.
Showtime’s “Billions”
“Billions” features Bobby “Axe” Axelrod, a billionaire hedge fund owner who often uses insider trading and bribery to grow his firm’s enormous wealth. He made a fortune on 9/11/2001 during which most of his employees were killed in the World Trade Center.
YouTube Channel – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCv3umfEWPkjHMzbGZGfn_sw/videos
It is often interesting to note: When Axelrod gains a windfall profit with Wall Street trading, there are always the big losers who take the fall. (i.e. The money comes from those who lost it.)
Season 2 Episode 5 “Currency” http://www.fanfunwithdamianlewis.com/?p=17841
Axelrod collaborates with other billionaires to manipulate and profit on Nigeria’s currency devaluation.
MINDSET as demonstrated in one scene…
While at the stables of a Mafia race horse owner by the race track.
~~ Mafia guy talking to Axelrod’s young son: “You know, I owe everything to your dad. You know that? We were getting killed out here, couldn’t make a dime. And then your dad figures out how we could come away with $50k a race on the triple. You see you…”
~~ Axelrod cuts off the communication: “All right, all right, we’ll give him the full education another time. He already knows the most important part.”
*~~* Mafia guy to Axelrod’s son: “Who makes a bet if they don’t know how it’s gonna turn out?”
*~~* Axelrod’s son: “SUCKERS.”
— Everyone laughs. —
More on BILLIONS and other shows https://www.corbettreport.com/how-the-cia-plants-news-stories-in-the-media/#comment-37110
James, can you(or someone else) please explain what you mean when you said at time 54:00 that taxation is not needed to pay for government services; rather it is needed to validate the monetary system itself. It sounds like a seminal point, but I don’t quite get it. Thanks.
Fewer and fewer own a larger chunk of the world. Let’s re-frame inequality of wealth more appropriately as inequality of power. The correct wording for this development is then: power grab. Who is involved in this power grab? Is this a competition for world emperor? Who takes part in this competition? What can be said about those “top achievers”? Is it true that they are constantly changing? Or is there a rather constant circle just below the visible surface? A little bit more systematic analysis of that would be useful. Or do you have any good books about that topic?