Where's RICO when we REALLY need it?

Response to: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2010/02/03/the_perils_of_prosperity_the_story_behind_the_economic_crisis_100149.html Robert J. Samuelson

To suggest that the bubble was created by the free market is absurd.

The federal government extorted bankers to lend to borrowers who lacked the ability to repay the loans on threat to their charter and/or growth plans. Thank Mr. Dodd and Barney Frank. The brokers took their money and ran.

Fanny Mae immediately bought the suspect mortgages relieving the local mortgage company/bank of any liability for bad mortgages. Congress failed their oversight responsibilities even as many members personally benefited either through investments or especially cheap mortgages for themselves ("friends of Angelo mortgages). What about that Chris Dodd?

When investors balked at buying suspect mortgages Freddie started bundling good and bad, getting them rated as good, collected crazy profits. They protected their exposure with insurance from AIG. Congress failed in the oversight responsibilities and denied there was any potential problem even when it was brought to their attention. Thank you Barney Frank and Chris Dodd.

To add another level of commission generation Goldman Sachs et al created mortgage based derivatives, also insured by AIG to provide high profit, low risk (to the investment bankers). The Fed, tasked with oversight of precisely such activity, did nothing.

Unsaid in all this is the common thread of Goldman Sachs alumni: at Fanny and Freddie and the Fed and Treasury and the Congress (via generous campaign contributions to key members like Dodd and Frank and Obama)

What any rational person can see is not some happenstance, but an orchestrated fraud, designed and implemented for unjustified profit; funded by the taxpayer, insured by the taxpayer, guaranteed by the taxpayer and manipulated and managed by the Goldman Sachs alumni club. Oh, and policed by the Fed, Treasury, and Congress (Goldman Sachs alumni or beneficiaries) all co-opted by complicity in the scheme for personal reward. The true Coup de Grace is the complicity of Goldman Sachs in the decision-making process for driving their competitors into bankruptcy and dissolution. John Gotti was never so slick.

RICO was designed for just this type of fraud, but there is no mention of it at all in the aftermath of the collapse of the US, and subsequently the global economies. The current Congressional investigation is designed to assure that no one of importance takes the blame for this fraud or is held accountable for their complicity in this fraud: it has nothing to do with actually finding the cause and implementing corrective action. It has everything to do with covering the tracks of the guilty and providing cover for the enablers.

We continue to rely on the foxes to guard the henhouses. Articles such as this by Mr. Samuelson are nothing more than part of the track-covering, blame the innocent; hide the guilty cleanup operations in the guise of explanations.

God help America.