Republicans, Democrats, please search for “Ron Paul”. Mike Gravel could have been mentioned, too.

Journalists, please search for “held my tongue” , “conspiracy theorists” and “unpatriotic” and “license for discussion”.

Feminists, please search for “Hillary”.

From http://elainemeinelsupkis.typepad.com/money_matters/2007/10/index.html :

Always, the laissize faire system turns out to be anything but laissize and more, a matter of who has a liasson with whom. Namely, the rich control the levers of power and use this to bail themselves out of messes they created. At everyone else's expense. This is why government controls are necessary. The government sponsors these people.

From Market Watch:

Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson -- yes, the same gentleman who assured us in the spring that subprime issues were contained -- led the charge. He's gathered the biggest players on the street, from Citigroup Inc. to J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. to Bank of America Corp. as part of his posse to curtail contagion.

We're all in this together, he argued, so now is the time to stand together in unity.
For better. Or for worse.

This is an interesting article by the guys at Minyanville up on Market Watch. It amuses me because these obviously very smart and talented young people there suddenly figured out the obvious: there really is a 'plunge protection team'. This is code for 'politically connected powerful people who have huge financial stakes in keeping bubbles going no matter what.' They often fail in their mission but they try, oh, do they ever try. Always, the goal is to keep bubbles inflated, not preventing bubbles in the first place.

If we look at the news stories about who is meeting with Paulson, the head honcho of this gang, the biggest financial octopus house in America being Goldman Sachs, it is obvious who the members of this PPT are. Many of these people have been around a long, long time. We even know from history, they ran around the collapsing stock market in October, 1929, trying to prop it up. We know that after the 1913 panic, they ran off to Jekyll Island to start the Federal Reserve which is a private banking consortium.

Minyanville:

We used to huddle in hushed tones and talk about "the invisible hand" or the "plunge protection team." We did so for fear of being called conspiracy theorists or, worse, unpatriotic. The thought that there was a hidden force seemed bizarre. I was taught that nobody was bigger than the market. Most certainly, if there were games being played, it would eventually come out.
Still, some of my most trusted and widely respected sources confided in me that they saw it as well. They did so in confidence, as Wall Street is a small place where credibility is the gateway of continuity. I, too, held my tongue for fear of retribution or consequence. Even still, to this day, there are folks that will view this column as financial sacrilege.

In school, many are taught that there is no such thing as a PPT. The fiction is, the markets are King. Of course, the teachers point out that the PPT fails regularly to stop plunges but this doesn't mean they dont' exist. It merely means, they can't stop full-scale panics. We are in the middle of one such panic right now. And the PPT is working day and night including making money appear like magic in order to bail themselves out of quite a few fixes. But now it is obvious, they must bite some bullets or this will get much worse.

So...each time they are finally forced to admit to losses, they have Plan B: a most cunning plan, as Baldrick often assures Blackadder. This plan involves the PPT telling everyone, these loses are FINAL. There are no more losses. This obvious lie is then disseminated throughout the media just as they did this same trick in November, 1929. The second and even more important lie is to tell investors to hang on and not panic or sell. This is not only 'fraud' but also part of Plan C: dumping lousy investments so the PPT participants can sail off, intact, while less connected people drown.

Always, after the stock market begins a big decline leading to a 30%-75% loss, we see a second hump, a second, brief peak. This is where the PPT tells everyone, 'Stocks are a bargain! Now is the time to buy!' But then, when it becomes obvious that a recession/depression is now here, everyone gives up and begins selling starting with the marginal investors who use loans to bet on stocks.

Insulated from this mess, the biggest houses will hunker down and wait out the clock, hoping their connections and reserves will carry them through the storm.

Minyanville:

So what now gives this topic license for discussion? Paulson, who recently said, matter-of-factly, that there is indeed a Working Group on Financial Markets in force and at play. Further, he has openly held discussions with Wall Street firms and hedge fund managers in an attempt to gain leverage in the financial equation.

And I hope Minyanville figures out what they are plotting: to save their own skins at the expense of EVERYONE ELSE. And I do mean 'everyone' here. If the dollar dies, if the US government goes bankrupt, if millions are homeless or lose medical care or jobs or starve to death or if this causes WWIII, they don't care. So long as they are protected. They hated Roosevelt as he, a member of the uppermost echalons of the ruling class, struggled to keep the lower classes from rioting, revolution and terrorism, they hated him sharing any wealth with the laboring classes. They felt, he should heed only their delicate needs and dainty tastes.

Many of these people openly admired Hitler. Bush's grandpa was one of Hitler's bankers well into WWII. Some of the PPT wanted to get rid of Roosevelt entirely via military coup. But the Republican move to drive out WWI vets camping in DC, demanding their bonus pay so they could survive due to loss of jobs, made this impossible. The military didn't consider the GOP to be their best buddy or rather, the lower ranks were very sour on the idea of keeping the GOP in power via military fiat.

Right now, the biggest financial houses are now banking on Hillary Clinton and are hoping she will talk like a Democrat but rule like a Republican like her husband before her. If there is any candidate they dislike the most, it is Ron Paul. He is a libertarian who knows of their existence and talks about them, to their tremendous irritation.