Last night I was watching a PBS showing of Ken Burns' The Roosevelts-- An Intimate History, when J.P. Morgan's ugly mug popped up on the screen. A social parasite who our political elites failed to protect society from, Morgan blurted out, "I owe the public nothing" ... which is pretty much the way Wall Street still feels. Today's Republicans are not Teddy Roosevelt and they are not going to hold to fire to the feet of predators like Morgan. Alas, neither are most Beltway Democrats. Sure, you have a few good guys-- like Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Sherrod Brown, Jeff Merkley, Brian Schatz in the Senate, and Alan Grayson, Donna Edwards, Raul Grijalva, Mark Pocan, Ted Lieu, Judy Chu, Keith Ellison, Jan Schakowsky in the House. But power in Congress is in the hands of Wall Street-owned shills like Chuck Schumer and Steve Israel who will never take the side of their own constituents over the interests of the big Wall Street banksters.That helps explain why Schumer hand-picks Wall Street-owned hacks like Patrick Murphy (FL) and Ted Strickland (OH) to run for Senate seats and why Israel is always finding opportunistic Republicans to "switch" parties and run as though they were Democrats (the way Murphy did and they way Michael Derrick is trying to do in New York's North Country). Schumer and Israel are responsible for bringing in cash from the crooked banksters, and the crooked banksters are freaking out over Elizabeth Warren, Sherrod Brown and Bernie Sanders and warning the Beltway power brokers that they're going to cut the DSCC and DCCC off. Yesterday, for example, Bernie sent this message to his supporters about this era's JP Morgan, which is to say Goldman Sachs. It was clear and straightforward-- and exactly what the banksters come crying about to their allies Schumer and Israel.(Keep in mind, Wall Street has given Schumer bigger bribes than anyone else in the history of Congress who hasn't run for Congress-- $21,052,681-- and given Israel $4,068,416.) The banksters are demanding they make stuff like this go away. But here's Bernie:
It's time to break up the banks.The greed, recklessness, and illegal behavior on Wall Street drove this country into the worst recession since the Great Depression. Their casino-style gambling has helped divert 99 percent of all new income to the top one percent. And it has contributed to the most unequal level of wealth and income distribution of any major country on earth.In the midst of all of this grotesque inequality sits a handful of financial institutions that are still so large, the failure of any one would cause catastrophic risk to millions of Americans and send the world economy into crisis.If it's too big to fail, it's too big to exist. That's the bottom line.I introduced legislation in Congress that would break up banks that are too big to fail... Banking should be boring. It shouldn't be about making as much profit as possible by gambling on esoteric financial products. The goal of banking should be to provide affordable loans to small and medium-sized businesses in the productive economy, and to Americans who need to purchase homes and cars.That is not what these financial institutions are doing. They're instead creating an economy which is not sustainable from a moral, economic, or political perspective. It's a rigged economy that must be changed in fundamental ways.Let's be clear who we're talking about: JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, Morgan Stanley, and other institutions; they're all too big to fail. So they must be broken up.Wall Street can't be an island unto itself separate from the rest of the productive economy whose only goal is to make as much money as possible. I fear very much that the financial system is even more fragile than many people may perceive.Millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages, while virtually all new income goes to the people who need it the least. In fact, the top 14 wealthiest people saw their wealth grow more last year than the bottom 130 million have in total....I'm running for President of the United States because I believe that it is incumbent on us to try to take back our country from the billionaires and make it thrive again for the working and middle class. Breaking up the banks is a critical part to making that a reality.Thank you for all of your support.Senator Bernie Sanders
If you'd like to see Bernie in the White House, rather than another Wall Street-financed Bush or Clinton-- you can contribute whatever you feel you can afford here via ActBlue. And if you want to help congressional candidates who will put working families before banksters, here are the Senate candidates and here are the House candidates.
