From "13 Reasons Goldman’s Quitting Exec May Have a Point"
by Cora Currier
ProPublica
http://www.propublica.org/article/13-reasons-goldmans-quitting-exec-may-have-a-point
[...]
April 2003: SEC charges Goldman Sachs over conflicts of interest among its research analysts. The company eventually settled for $110 million in fines and disgorgements.
November 2003: Former Goldman economist John Youngdahl pleads guilty to insider trading. The firm had to pay the SEC $4.2 million over profits it gained from the illegal dealings.
July 2004: Goldman settles with the SEC for $10 million over charges it improperly promoted a stock sale involving PetroChina.
January 2005: Goldman settles with the SEC for $40 million over charges that it violated securities law in promoting initial public offerings.
April 2006: Two former Goldman employees are charged with running an international insider-trading ring while they were at the firm. Eugene Plotkin and David Pajcin, both in their 20s, paid off insiders at other firms and stole early copies of Business Week to get an edge. They also tried (unsuccessfully) to use strippers to get information. Both eventually served jail time.
March 2007: A Goldman subsidiary, Goldman Execution and Clearing, settles with the SEC for $2 million over allegations that faulty oversight that allowed customers to make illegal trades.
March 2009: Goldman Execution and Clearing settles with the SEC for $1.2 million over improper proprietary trading by employees.
July 2009: The SEC charges a former Goldman Sachs trader Anthony Perez and his brother with insider trading based on information Anthony Perez obtained through his job at Goldman Sachs. He was fined $25,000 and his brother more than $150,000.
May 2010: The SEC hits Goldman Execution and Clearing with a $225,000 fine for violating a rule aimed at regulating short selling.
July 2010: Goldman settles with the SEC for $553 million over allegations that it misled investors about the collateralized debt obligation ABACUS 2007-AC1 by not disclosing the involvement of a hedge fund in its creation, or the fact that the hedge fund stood to benefit if the CDO failed. Goldman executive Fabrice Tourre was also charged.
March 2011: The SEC charges Goldman board member Rajat Gupta with insider trading. Gupta allegedly passed on information he learned as a board member to the hedge fund Galleon Group. In October, 2011, he was arrested and hit with criminal charges by the FBI. The case is pending.
September 2011: The SEC charges a Goldman employee, Spencer Midlin, and his father for insider trading based on information Spencer Midlin gained from his position at Goldman Sachs. The two men were ordered to pay $92,000.
February 2012: Goldman Sachs receives notice from the SEC that the agency may bring charges related to mortgage backed-securities.
Friday, March 16, 2012
Decade of the Living Dead
By Nomi Prins
“Zombie Banks: How Broken Banks and Debtor Nations Are Crippling the Global Economy”
A book by Yalman Onaran
http://www.truthdig.com/arts_culture/print/decade_of_the_living_dead_20120315/
[...]
After reading “Zombie Banks,” I interviewed Onaran. His responses underscore the importance of his book and the ongoing fallout of the widespread governmental subsidizing of zombie banks.
Nomi Prins: How would you rank the top U.S. banks from worst to least in terms of “zombieness”?
Yalman Onaran: No. 1 Bank of America, 2 Citigroup, 3 Morgan Stanley, 4 Goldman Sachs, 5 JPMorgan.
Prins: How does their zombie status hurt ordinary Americans?
Onaran: The zombieness of some of the largest banks hurts our economy because the zombies cannot fulfill their most important role of lending to consumers and companies. They try to use the money they get from the government to patch up their consistently bleeding wounds. They also make riskier bets with their money—such as writing complicated derivatives connected to the debt of troubled countries in Europe—which increases the likelihood that their final blowup will be even costlier to society than if they were stopped right now. That’s what happened in the past when zombie banks weren’t stopped in time. Taxpayers end up paying for the final mess every time and they will this time too.
Prins: Do you see us getting to a point where the zombie status is turned around?
Onaran: If the politicians wanted to kill the zombies, they could. The U.S. and many other countries have passed laws that allow them to wind down troubled banks. Even before the last crisis though, they could have done it. Politicians typically choose to muddle through though, which means letting the zombies live. If Obama finally decided to replace Geithner with a Treasury secretary more independent of the big banks, he could use Dodd-Frank reform’s resolution powers to take over and shut down the worst zombies. As presidential elections get closer and the economy refuses to improve, Obama might be tempted to go that route. Alternatively, if he loses the elections and the incoming Republican president decides to get tough on the banks, it could be done. I’m not very hopeful on either possibility though. Unfortunately, we’ll probably keep muddling through.
Prins: The OWS movement has demonstrated understandable, palpable anger toward the big banks—how can reading your book help them?
Onaran: OWS is reflecting the widespread anger throughout society toward the big banks because as unemployment lingers around 9 percent, the economy is stuck in an almost no growth zone, and bankers are back to paying themselves big bonuses and taking big risks while taking comfort from the government’s implicit guarantee to save them if their bets go sour, like in 2008. My book will give the OWS supporters a much better understanding of all the forces in finance and politics that play into this dirty game, help connect the dots between what’s happening here and in Europe. It will also help the OWS movement formulate concrete demands from our politicians so we can fix this mess. I lay out various steps the government can take to end the zombieness of the system, so the economy can move on.
* * *
If our leaders don’t adopt any of Onaran’s suggestions, the resulting blowup will be more horrific the next time around. Patching financial injuries by printing money doesn’t make the bleeding wounds go away. Onaran tells us we have to fix the problems or suffer the devastating consequences of zombie banks eating our economic flesh for years to come.
“Zombie Banks: How Broken Banks and Debtor Nations Are Crippling the Global Economy”
A book by Yalman Onaran
http://www.truthdig.com/arts_culture/print/decade_of_the_living_dead_20120315/
[...]
After reading “Zombie Banks,” I interviewed Onaran. His responses underscore the importance of his book and the ongoing fallout of the widespread governmental subsidizing of zombie banks.
Nomi Prins: How would you rank the top U.S. banks from worst to least in terms of “zombieness”?
Yalman Onaran: No. 1 Bank of America, 2 Citigroup, 3 Morgan Stanley, 4 Goldman Sachs, 5 JPMorgan.
Prins: How does their zombie status hurt ordinary Americans?
Onaran: The zombieness of some of the largest banks hurts our economy because the zombies cannot fulfill their most important role of lending to consumers and companies. They try to use the money they get from the government to patch up their consistently bleeding wounds. They also make riskier bets with their money—such as writing complicated derivatives connected to the debt of troubled countries in Europe—which increases the likelihood that their final blowup will be even costlier to society than if they were stopped right now. That’s what happened in the past when zombie banks weren’t stopped in time. Taxpayers end up paying for the final mess every time and they will this time too.
Prins: Do you see us getting to a point where the zombie status is turned around?
Onaran: If the politicians wanted to kill the zombies, they could. The U.S. and many other countries have passed laws that allow them to wind down troubled banks. Even before the last crisis though, they could have done it. Politicians typically choose to muddle through though, which means letting the zombies live. If Obama finally decided to replace Geithner with a Treasury secretary more independent of the big banks, he could use Dodd-Frank reform’s resolution powers to take over and shut down the worst zombies. As presidential elections get closer and the economy refuses to improve, Obama might be tempted to go that route. Alternatively, if he loses the elections and the incoming Republican president decides to get tough on the banks, it could be done. I’m not very hopeful on either possibility though. Unfortunately, we’ll probably keep muddling through.
Prins: The OWS movement has demonstrated understandable, palpable anger toward the big banks—how can reading your book help them?
Onaran: OWS is reflecting the widespread anger throughout society toward the big banks because as unemployment lingers around 9 percent, the economy is stuck in an almost no growth zone, and bankers are back to paying themselves big bonuses and taking big risks while taking comfort from the government’s implicit guarantee to save them if their bets go sour, like in 2008. My book will give the OWS supporters a much better understanding of all the forces in finance and politics that play into this dirty game, help connect the dots between what’s happening here and in Europe. It will also help the OWS movement formulate concrete demands from our politicians so we can fix this mess. I lay out various steps the government can take to end the zombieness of the system, so the economy can move on.
* * *
If our leaders don’t adopt any of Onaran’s suggestions, the resulting blowup will be more horrific the next time around. Patching financial injuries by printing money doesn’t make the bleeding wounds go away. Onaran tells us we have to fix the problems or suffer the devastating consequences of zombie banks eating our economic flesh for years to come.
Choosing our Fate (2)
Slavoj Žižek
http://www.lacan.com/thesymptom/?page_id=1934
[...] we put the blame on fate when we miss an opportunity – which opportunity? The opportunity not simply to act freely and use given possibilities, but the opportunity to change what we perceive as our fate, to choose a different fate.
This insight is of special importance today, when the crises humanity is facing cannot but appear as part of an inexorable fate pushing us closer and closer to an apocalyptic point: ecological breakdown, biogenetic reduction of humans to manipulable machines, total digital control over our lives… At all these levels, things are approaching a zero-point, “the end of time is near”. Here is Ed Ayres’s description: “We are being confronted by something so completely outside our collective experience that we don’t really see it, even when the evidence is overwhelming … that ‘something’ is a blitz of enormous biological and physical alterations in the world that has been sustaining us.” At the geological and biological level, Ayres enumerates four “spikes” (accelerated developments) asymptotically approaching a zero-point at which the quantitative expansion will reach its point of exhaustion and will have to change into a different quality: (1) population growth, (2) consumption of resources, (3) carbon gas emissions, (4) the mass extinction of species. In order to cope with this threat, our collective ideology is mobilizing mechanisms of dissimulation and self-deception amounting to as direct will to ignorance: “a general pattern of behavior among threatened human societies is to become more blinkered, rather than more focused on the crisis, as they fail.”
What, then, can we do in such a predicament? Recall the Arab story about the appointment in Samara: a servant on an errand in the busy market of Baghdad meets Death ther. Terrified by Death’s gaze, he runs home to his master and asks for a horse he can ride to Samara where Death will not find him. The good master not only provides the servant with a horse, but goes himself to the market, looks for Death and reproaches him for scaring his servant. Death replies: “But I didn’t want to scare your servant. I was just surprised that he was here when I have an appointment with him in Samara tonight…” What if the message of this story is not that a man’s demise is impossible to avoid, that trying to twist free of it will only tighten its grip, but rather its exact opposite: that if one accepts fate as inevitable one can break its grasp? Imagine that upon encountering Death in the market the servant had said: “What’s your problem? If you have something to do with me, do it, otherwise beat it!” Perplexed, Death would have mumbled something like: ”But… we were supposed to meet in Samara, I cannot kill you here!”
[...]
http://www.lacan.com/thesymptom/?page_id=1934
[...] we put the blame on fate when we miss an opportunity – which opportunity? The opportunity not simply to act freely and use given possibilities, but the opportunity to change what we perceive as our fate, to choose a different fate.
This insight is of special importance today, when the crises humanity is facing cannot but appear as part of an inexorable fate pushing us closer and closer to an apocalyptic point: ecological breakdown, biogenetic reduction of humans to manipulable machines, total digital control over our lives… At all these levels, things are approaching a zero-point, “the end of time is near”. Here is Ed Ayres’s description: “We are being confronted by something so completely outside our collective experience that we don’t really see it, even when the evidence is overwhelming … that ‘something’ is a blitz of enormous biological and physical alterations in the world that has been sustaining us.” At the geological and biological level, Ayres enumerates four “spikes” (accelerated developments) asymptotically approaching a zero-point at which the quantitative expansion will reach its point of exhaustion and will have to change into a different quality: (1) population growth, (2) consumption of resources, (3) carbon gas emissions, (4) the mass extinction of species. In order to cope with this threat, our collective ideology is mobilizing mechanisms of dissimulation and self-deception amounting to as direct will to ignorance: “a general pattern of behavior among threatened human societies is to become more blinkered, rather than more focused on the crisis, as they fail.”
What, then, can we do in such a predicament? Recall the Arab story about the appointment in Samara: a servant on an errand in the busy market of Baghdad meets Death ther. Terrified by Death’s gaze, he runs home to his master and asks for a horse he can ride to Samara where Death will not find him. The good master not only provides the servant with a horse, but goes himself to the market, looks for Death and reproaches him for scaring his servant. Death replies: “But I didn’t want to scare your servant. I was just surprised that he was here when I have an appointment with him in Samara tonight…” What if the message of this story is not that a man’s demise is impossible to avoid, that trying to twist free of it will only tighten its grip, but rather its exact opposite: that if one accepts fate as inevitable one can break its grasp? Imagine that upon encountering Death in the market the servant had said: “What’s your problem? If you have something to do with me, do it, otherwise beat it!” Perplexed, Death would have mumbled something like: ”But… we were supposed to meet in Samara, I cannot kill you here!”
[...]
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Choosing our Fate
Slavoj Žižek
http://www.lacan.com/thesymptom/?page_id=1934
[...]
If we are effectively to counteract the drift towards catastrophe, it is not enough just to submit to a critical analysis the standard notion of historical progress; one should also deploy the limitation of the ordinary «historical» notion of time: at each moment of time, there are multiple possibilities waiting to be realized; once one of them actualizes itself, others are cancelled. We need to break out of the ”historical” notion of temporality which runs from the past to the future, and to introduce a new mode of time, the ”time of a project“(Jean-Pierre Dupuy), of a closed circuit between the past and the future: the future is causally produced by our acts in the past, while the way we act is determined by our anticipation of the future and our reaction to this anticipation. This, then, is how Dupuy proposes to confront the catastrophe: we should first perceive it as our fate, as unavoidable, and then, projecting ourselves into it, adopting its standpoint, we should retroactively insert into its past (the past of the future) counterfactual possibilities (“If we had done that and that, the catastrophe we are in now would not have occurred!”) upon which we then act today. Therein resides Dupuy’s paradoxical formula: we have to accept that, at the level of possibilities, our future is doomed, the catastrophe will take place, it is our fate – and, then, on the background of this acceptance, we should mobilize ourselves to perform the act which will change fate itself. Instead of saying “the future is still open, we still have the time to act and prevent the worst,” one should accept the catastrophe as inevitable, and then act to retroactively undo what is already “written in the stars” as our fate.
[...]
http://www.lacan.com/thesymptom/?page_id=1934
[...]
If we are effectively to counteract the drift towards catastrophe, it is not enough just to submit to a critical analysis the standard notion of historical progress; one should also deploy the limitation of the ordinary «historical» notion of time: at each moment of time, there are multiple possibilities waiting to be realized; once one of them actualizes itself, others are cancelled. We need to break out of the ”historical” notion of temporality which runs from the past to the future, and to introduce a new mode of time, the ”time of a project“(Jean-Pierre Dupuy), of a closed circuit between the past and the future: the future is causally produced by our acts in the past, while the way we act is determined by our anticipation of the future and our reaction to this anticipation. This, then, is how Dupuy proposes to confront the catastrophe: we should first perceive it as our fate, as unavoidable, and then, projecting ourselves into it, adopting its standpoint, we should retroactively insert into its past (the past of the future) counterfactual possibilities (“If we had done that and that, the catastrophe we are in now would not have occurred!”) upon which we then act today. Therein resides Dupuy’s paradoxical formula: we have to accept that, at the level of possibilities, our future is doomed, the catastrophe will take place, it is our fate – and, then, on the background of this acceptance, we should mobilize ourselves to perform the act which will change fate itself. Instead of saying “the future is still open, we still have the time to act and prevent the worst,” one should accept the catastrophe as inevitable, and then act to retroactively undo what is already “written in the stars” as our fate.
[...]
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Family of Florida boy killed by Neighborhood Watch seeks arrest
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/08/us-crime-florida-neighborhoodwatch-idUSBRE82709M20120308
By Barbara Liston
ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters) - The family of a 17-year-old African-American boy shot to death last month in his gated Florida community by a white Neighborhood Watch captain wants to see the captain arrested, the family's lawyer said on Wednesday.
Trayvon Martin was shot dead after he took a break from watching NBA All-Star game television coverage to walk 10 minutes to a convenience store to buy snacks including Skittles candy requested by his 13-year-old brother, Chad, the family's lawyer Ben Crump said.
"He was a good kid," Crump said in an interview, adding that the family would issue a call for the Watch captain's arrest at a news conference on Thursday. "On his way home, a Neighborhood Watch loose cannon shot and killed him."
Trayvon, who lived in Miami with his mother, had been visiting his father and stepmother in a gated townhome community called The Retreat at Twin Lakes in Sanford, 20 miles north of Orlando.
As Trayvon returned to the townhome, Sanford police received a 911 call reporting a suspicious person.
Although names are blacked out on the police report, Crump and media reports at the time of the shooting identified the caller as George Zimmerman who is listed in the community's newsletter as the Neighborhood Watch captain.
Without waiting for police to arrive, Crump said, Zimmerman confronted Trayvon, who was on the sidewalk near his home. By the time police got there, Trayvon was dead of a single gunshot to the chest.
"What do the police find in his pocket? Skittles," Crump said. "A can of Arizona ice tea in his jacket pocket and Skittles in his front pocket for his brother Chad."
Zimmerman could not be reached for comment on Wednesday evening at a phone number listed for him on the community's newsletter.
Crump said the family was concerned that police might decide to consider the shooting as self defense, and that police have ignored the family's request for a copy of the original 911 call, which they think will shed light on the incidents.
"If the 911 protocol across the country held to form here, they told him not to get involved. He disobeyed that order," said Ryan Julison, a spokesman for the family.
"He (Zimmerman) didn't have to get out of his car," said Crump, who has prepared a public records lawsuit to file on Thursday if the family doesn't get the 911 tape. "If he never gets out of his car, there is no reason for self-defense. Trayvon only has skittles. He has the gun."
Since Trayvon, a high school junior who wanted to be a pilot, was black and Zimmerman is white, Crump said race is "the 600 pound elephant in the room."
"Why is this kid suspicious in the first place? I think a stereotype must have been placed on the kid," Crump said.
(Editing By Cynthia Johnston and Peter Bohan)
By Barbara Liston
ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters) - The family of a 17-year-old African-American boy shot to death last month in his gated Florida community by a white Neighborhood Watch captain wants to see the captain arrested, the family's lawyer said on Wednesday.
Trayvon Martin was shot dead after he took a break from watching NBA All-Star game television coverage to walk 10 minutes to a convenience store to buy snacks including Skittles candy requested by his 13-year-old brother, Chad, the family's lawyer Ben Crump said.
"He was a good kid," Crump said in an interview, adding that the family would issue a call for the Watch captain's arrest at a news conference on Thursday. "On his way home, a Neighborhood Watch loose cannon shot and killed him."
Trayvon, who lived in Miami with his mother, had been visiting his father and stepmother in a gated townhome community called The Retreat at Twin Lakes in Sanford, 20 miles north of Orlando.
As Trayvon returned to the townhome, Sanford police received a 911 call reporting a suspicious person.
Although names are blacked out on the police report, Crump and media reports at the time of the shooting identified the caller as George Zimmerman who is listed in the community's newsletter as the Neighborhood Watch captain.
Without waiting for police to arrive, Crump said, Zimmerman confronted Trayvon, who was on the sidewalk near his home. By the time police got there, Trayvon was dead of a single gunshot to the chest.
"What do the police find in his pocket? Skittles," Crump said. "A can of Arizona ice tea in his jacket pocket and Skittles in his front pocket for his brother Chad."
Zimmerman could not be reached for comment on Wednesday evening at a phone number listed for him on the community's newsletter.
Crump said the family was concerned that police might decide to consider the shooting as self defense, and that police have ignored the family's request for a copy of the original 911 call, which they think will shed light on the incidents.
"If the 911 protocol across the country held to form here, they told him not to get involved. He disobeyed that order," said Ryan Julison, a spokesman for the family.
"He (Zimmerman) didn't have to get out of his car," said Crump, who has prepared a public records lawsuit to file on Thursday if the family doesn't get the 911 tape. "If he never gets out of his car, there is no reason for self-defense. Trayvon only has skittles. He has the gun."
Since Trayvon, a high school junior who wanted to be a pilot, was black and Zimmerman is white, Crump said race is "the 600 pound elephant in the room."
"Why is this kid suspicious in the first place? I think a stereotype must have been placed on the kid," Crump said.
(Editing By Cynthia Johnston and Peter Bohan)
Treated like a criminal for speaking up
http://socialistworker.org/2012/03/14/treated-like-a-criminal
William Brown, a former Navy SEAL and Iraq war veteran, attended a town hall meeting on March 8 to raise his concerns about a takeover of the Rutgers-Camden law school by Rowan University--and for his troubles, he got called an "idiot" by Gov. Chris Christie, a rising star in the Republican Party establishment. Christie grew intolerant of Brown's questions and had state troopers "escort" him from the meeting. Brown spoke with fellow antiwar veteran Rory Fanning about his eviction.
Interview with William Brown:
WHY DID you come out to the town hall meeting with Gov. Christie last Thursday?
LAW STUDENTS at Rutgers are upset about the Rowan University takeover. Some 4,000 signatures have been collected in opposition to the plan. Not once did the governor consult students about this decision. He was insistent that the takeover was going to happen whether we liked it or not.
MEDIA REPORTS say you "calmly" raised your first point about your law degree being watered down as a result of the move. The governor responded, and then things escalated. When Christie lost his cool, he yelled, "Let me tell you something--after you graduate from law school, you conduct yourself like that in a courtroom, your rear end is going to be thrown in jail, idiot."
HE WASN'T giving a real answer or telling the truth. The governor disrespectfully referred to me as "pal" after my first question. Christie also said, "You don't represent the students." I said, "Have you read the newspapers?" Besides the papers, he hasn't talked to any of us, so how would he know what the students think?
ABC News called me after the event. Of course I wanted to talk about the Rowan takeover of Rutgers, but there are other issues that need to be addressed here.
Not only were the voices of the governor's constituents completely ignored on this issue, but I was also treated like a criminal in front of the entire country for speaking up. CNN, ABC and Fox News broadcast the governor having me escorted out of the room by police. It was humiliating. The whole thing is disturbing.
DID YOU see what happened when people peacefully protesting the Virginia bill mandating that a woman undergo an ultrasound before an abortion tried to march in front of Gov. Bob McDonnell's mansion? He called out the riot police and SWAT team.
I AGREE this is all part of a bigger narrative. It was extremely intimidating when I was taken out of that room. The state troopers wanted to lead me down some alley. I insisted on staying by the cameras.
Two of the troopers were grabbing my shoulders, then they had me backed up against the wall, and another had his hand pointed inches from my nose. I asked, "Why are your hands on me? Let go of me." The troopers said, "Why did you say you were a Navy SEAL?" I said, "Because I wanted to share a bit about my background." I had no idea what they were going to do. I can't imagine what would have happened if the cameras weren't there.
THE SAME day you were kicked out of that meeting, H.R. 347 was signed into law by Barack Obama. The law expands an existing federal statute to make it a felony to cause a disturbance at any event that has the Secret Service in attendance, whether you know the Secret Service is there or not.
THERE IS a reason the right to free speech is the First Amendment to the Constitution. We're in trouble when we don't have the ability to peacefully express our dissatisfaction with our government.
CHRISTIE WAS courted by big money in the hopes that he would run for president. The Koch brothers, Charles Schwab and Kenneth Langone, the founder of Home Depot, were all ready to get behind Christie. Christie has a lot of influence and very well could be president one day.
EXACTLY. THERE is still a good chance this guy could be vice president this election cycle. Do we want someone with a temper like his negotiating with Iran?
FOLLOWING THE financial meltdown of 2008, we were witness to history's largest transfer of wealth from working people to the rich. Trillions were spent bailing out the banks, and now they want us to shut up and accept the austerity measures, the housing crisis, the trillion-dollar wars, the prison industrial complex, etc. If you peacefully stand up against these measures, they try to publicly humiliate you or throw you in jail.
I AGREE with you. Anyone who tries to speak up risks what happened to me, or worse. It causes people to think twice about saying what is on their mind. Our elected "representatives" don't want to address the real problems in this county.
WHAT DO you plan on doing next?
THE GOVERNOR'S response to my questions speaks volumes about the current reality in this country. I am not the only concerned citizen. I will continue to speak up when I see an injustice. I will take things day by day, and we'll see what happens.
William Brown, a former Navy SEAL and Iraq war veteran, attended a town hall meeting on March 8 to raise his concerns about a takeover of the Rutgers-Camden law school by Rowan University--and for his troubles, he got called an "idiot" by Gov. Chris Christie, a rising star in the Republican Party establishment. Christie grew intolerant of Brown's questions and had state troopers "escort" him from the meeting. Brown spoke with fellow antiwar veteran Rory Fanning about his eviction.
Interview with William Brown:
WHY DID you come out to the town hall meeting with Gov. Christie last Thursday?
LAW STUDENTS at Rutgers are upset about the Rowan University takeover. Some 4,000 signatures have been collected in opposition to the plan. Not once did the governor consult students about this decision. He was insistent that the takeover was going to happen whether we liked it or not.
MEDIA REPORTS say you "calmly" raised your first point about your law degree being watered down as a result of the move. The governor responded, and then things escalated. When Christie lost his cool, he yelled, "Let me tell you something--after you graduate from law school, you conduct yourself like that in a courtroom, your rear end is going to be thrown in jail, idiot."
HE WASN'T giving a real answer or telling the truth. The governor disrespectfully referred to me as "pal" after my first question. Christie also said, "You don't represent the students." I said, "Have you read the newspapers?" Besides the papers, he hasn't talked to any of us, so how would he know what the students think?
ABC News called me after the event. Of course I wanted to talk about the Rowan takeover of Rutgers, but there are other issues that need to be addressed here.
Not only were the voices of the governor's constituents completely ignored on this issue, but I was also treated like a criminal in front of the entire country for speaking up. CNN, ABC and Fox News broadcast the governor having me escorted out of the room by police. It was humiliating. The whole thing is disturbing.
DID YOU see what happened when people peacefully protesting the Virginia bill mandating that a woman undergo an ultrasound before an abortion tried to march in front of Gov. Bob McDonnell's mansion? He called out the riot police and SWAT team.
I AGREE this is all part of a bigger narrative. It was extremely intimidating when I was taken out of that room. The state troopers wanted to lead me down some alley. I insisted on staying by the cameras.
Two of the troopers were grabbing my shoulders, then they had me backed up against the wall, and another had his hand pointed inches from my nose. I asked, "Why are your hands on me? Let go of me." The troopers said, "Why did you say you were a Navy SEAL?" I said, "Because I wanted to share a bit about my background." I had no idea what they were going to do. I can't imagine what would have happened if the cameras weren't there.
THE SAME day you were kicked out of that meeting, H.R. 347 was signed into law by Barack Obama. The law expands an existing federal statute to make it a felony to cause a disturbance at any event that has the Secret Service in attendance, whether you know the Secret Service is there or not.
THERE IS a reason the right to free speech is the First Amendment to the Constitution. We're in trouble when we don't have the ability to peacefully express our dissatisfaction with our government.
CHRISTIE WAS courted by big money in the hopes that he would run for president. The Koch brothers, Charles Schwab and Kenneth Langone, the founder of Home Depot, were all ready to get behind Christie. Christie has a lot of influence and very well could be president one day.
EXACTLY. THERE is still a good chance this guy could be vice president this election cycle. Do we want someone with a temper like his negotiating with Iran?
FOLLOWING THE financial meltdown of 2008, we were witness to history's largest transfer of wealth from working people to the rich. Trillions were spent bailing out the banks, and now they want us to shut up and accept the austerity measures, the housing crisis, the trillion-dollar wars, the prison industrial complex, etc. If you peacefully stand up against these measures, they try to publicly humiliate you or throw you in jail.
I AGREE with you. Anyone who tries to speak up risks what happened to me, or worse. It causes people to think twice about saying what is on their mind. Our elected "representatives" don't want to address the real problems in this county.
WHAT DO you plan on doing next?
THE GOVERNOR'S response to my questions speaks volumes about the current reality in this country. I am not the only concerned citizen. I will continue to speak up when I see an injustice. I will take things day by day, and we'll see what happens.
Monday, March 12, 2012
Udi Aloni with Slavoj Žižek
http://tickets.joespub.com/production/?perf=17942
Joe's Pub Reserved
ORDER TICKETS
What Does a Jew Want? is a remarkable series of visual Midrash presenting philosophy, video art, story-telling, and performance. The event portrays theological political fragments of a “split Jew” through the eyes of an outrageous philosopher and an obscure artist.
"Slavoj Žižek is the most dangerous philosopher in the West."
-Adam Kirsch of The New Republic
“Aloni’s secular theology is definitely one of the most fascinating innovations of our time. So if you want to dwell in your blessed secular ignorance...then do not come to this event – at your own risk”
-Slavoj Žižek
Slavoj Žižek is a Slovenian philosopher and cultural critic. His is one of the most original and influential figures in contemporary thinking. His books include "First as Tragedy, Then as Farce;" "In Defense of Lost Causes;" "Living in the End Times;" and many more. His recent book is Less Than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism, (Verso 2012).
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Udi Aloni is a writer, artist and filmmaker whose work explores the discourse between art, theory, and action. Among his films are Kashmir: Journey to Freedom (2009), Forgiveness (2006), and Local Angel (2003). His recent book: What does a Jew want? On Binationalism and Other Specters (2011 Columbia University Press)
Last fall The Public Theater presented his Arabic adaptation of Waiting for Godot.
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What Does a Jew Want? is a remarkable series of visual Midrash presenting philosophy, video art, story-telling, and performance. The event portrays theological political fragments of a “split Jew” through the eyes of an outrageous philosopher and an obscure artist.
"Slavoj Žižek is the most dangerous philosopher in the West."
-Adam Kirsch of The New Republic
“Aloni’s secular theology is definitely one of the most fascinating innovations of our time. So if you want to dwell in your blessed secular ignorance...then do not come to this event – at your own risk”
-Slavoj Žižek
Slavoj Žižek is a Slovenian philosopher and cultural critic. His is one of the most original and influential figures in contemporary thinking. His books include "First as Tragedy, Then as Farce;" "In Defense of Lost Causes;" "Living in the End Times;" and many more. His recent book is Less Than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism, (Verso 2012).
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Udi Aloni is a writer, artist and filmmaker whose work explores the discourse between art, theory, and action. Among his films are Kashmir: Journey to Freedom (2009), Forgiveness (2006), and Local Angel (2003). His recent book: What does a Jew want? On Binationalism and Other Specters (2011 Columbia University Press)
Last fall The Public Theater presented his Arabic adaptation of Waiting for Godot.
More Info at Joe's Pub
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