Political Cortex: Brain Food for the Body Politic

This is typical of the modus operandi that occurred years ago in Nevada when Seventh Day Adventists were conned in a scheme in which fellow Adventists were obtaining investors' money in California and Nevada churches through a few unethical members involved in this crooked money making scheme.

The scheme promised big returns on investing in a bank in the Marshall Islands.  Sadly, this was a total fantasy.  The reason that the Marshall Islands was chosen to establish the bank was that, unlike rules that existed elsewhere, it was not necessary to place any funds in it.  

Hence, the bank existed as part of a grand scheme to appear that the fraud perpetrators were operating in a professionally responsible way.  The funds collected were going into the pockets of the fraud perpetrators and not into any bank in the Marshall Islands for safekeeping.

As for what was being collected by the fraud perpetrators, they hit the jackpot as around $80 million was invested by individuals expecting the consistently high returns being promised.  

Seventh Day Adventist officials had no connection whatsoever with this shocking scam.  When the perpetrators were sent to jail, any bearing titles such as "Elder" within the church were stripped of them.

A somewhat similar scam took place with some thoroughly unethical Mormons.  Sadly, they preyed upon honest, upstanding Mormons, conning them into believing that their investments would pay big dividends.  

Mormon leaders had nothing to do with this fraudulent scheme.  Once these fraudsters were exposed they were promptly stripped of any rank they held within the Church of the Latter Day Saints.

When Alan Greenspan set the interest rate at a 40-year low, with certificates of deposit sometimes as low as 2 percent, he opened the door wide to con artists promising much higher returns to investors.

Over 100 Ponzi schemes are now under investigation.  Obviously Bernard Madoff was not alone in his $65 billion fraud.  

The Wall Street Journal on June 26 told of another top U.S.A. investment scam thief.  The article told of Danny Pang, who removed a cool $83 million from the firm where he was riding high on his ill gotten gains.

Mark Maremont explained how Danny Pang skyrocket to fame as one of the U.S.A.'s top fraud operators:

"The court appointed temporary receiver over Mr. Pang's company Private Equity Management Group Inc. also revised his estimate of potential losses for investors, saying they could range from $282 million to $654 million.  The latter figure would represent a loss of nearly 80 percent of the $825 million owed to investors."

This gigantic loss for investors with Private Equity Management Group Inc. is what is becoming all too tragically normal in U.S. investment firms.  But what both shocked and angered me perhaps the most was what Kerry Killinger, who was the chief executive officer of Washington Mutual, and who oversaw its tragic collapse, had done to destroy this bank.

The Seattle Times Sunday December 28, 2008, reported how this much respected financial institution collapsed after 119 years of proud service to the state of Washington:

"During Killinger's tenure, Washington Mutual pressed sales agents to pump out loans while disregarding borrowers' incomes and assets, according to former employees.  The bank set up what insiders described as a system that enabled real estate agents to collect fees of more than $10,000 for bringing in borrowers, sometimes making the agents more beholden to Washington Mutual than they were to their clients."

How did people who all their lives had trusted this Washington state institution react when it collapsed?

As the Seattle Times article stated:

"For those who placed their faith and money in Washington Mutual, the bank's implosion came as a shock."

The question now being asked is "Why hasn't Kerry Killinger been held accountable for the destruction of Washington Mutual?"