Charles H. Keating Jr., one of the most notorious fraudsters in American history, died yesterday at the age of 90. Although his status as financial criminal number one has slipped a bit in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, Keating was for many years the guy many Americans thought off when they thought off bankster rip-off artists, and his story reminds us that historically governments have had a very specific response to bad behavior by banks and banksters.

 

From FDR to Reagan, from Sweden to Iceland, when banks have broken the rules or even engaged in dangerous behavior that might technically be legal but crashes an economy, the investors in those banks have lost their investments, the banks themselves have been taken over by the government (at least for a short time) and the banksters that caused the crisis have gone to jail.

 

Case and point: After Reagan deregulated the savings and loans in the early 1980s, Charles Keating made millions of dollars through risky investments that ripped off the people who invested in two of the companies he ran, American Continental Corporation and Lincoln Savings and Loan. Tens of thousands of everyday Americans, many of them senior citizens, lost millions of dollars on the junk bonds Keating sold to them.

 

Keating was protected from federal regulators for a while by a group of senators, including John McCain, but by 1989 the gig was up. American Continental went bankrupt and Lincoln Continental was seized by the government. This was the largest bank failure of the savings and loan (S&L) crisis of the 1980s and 1990s.

 

Read more here.

 

-Thom

  

Tonight on The Big Picture on RT TV at 7pm and 9pm... McCutcheon...billionaires win again< (check your local listings for stations or stream at RT or Free Speech TV, and catch past shows on Youtube)

 

Get your copy of Thom's new book, The Crash of 2016, today and click here for tour dates & events!

 

Watch the video 'Last Hours' narrated by Thom Hartmann about the "time bomb" that is ticking underground, underwater and under ice... frozen methane that is now escaping and could trigger runaway climate change. www.lasthours.org

 

Have a question or comment for Thom? Grab your phone, hit record and send your video to YourTakeMyTake@gmail.com and we may air it on "The Big Picture."

 

Need to Know: McCutcheon...billionaires win again
- Congressman Peter DeFazio (D-OR, 4th District) 

 

Lone Liberal Rumble:
- Adam Bitely, William J. McCarthy & Associates  
- Dan Bongino, Candidate for Congress (R-MD, 6th District) / Life Inside the Bubble  

 

 

Cesar Chavez legacy and immigration
- President Arturo Rodriguez, United Farm Workers    

 

       

Community Square  

 "The surprising story of medical marijuana and pediatric epilepsy; Josh Stanley at TEDxBoulder"  

 

Tuesday's Daily Stack 

Hour One: A call to action
- former President Jimmy Carter, A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence and Power 

Book: A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence, and Power by Jimmy Carter.

Clip: Phone conversation between President Lyndon Johnson and Sen. Everett Dirksen (R) Illinois, November 2, 1968.

Article: "'Argo' helps Iran's dictatorship, harms democracy " by Abolhassan Bani-Sadr.

Case: "Bush v. Gore", 2000.

Book: "The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight: Revised and Updated: The Fate of the World and What We Can Do Before It's Too Late" by Thom Hartmann.

Law: "Violence Against Women Act", 1994 (VAWA).

Law: "The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)",1979 by the UN General Assembly.

Law: "International Violence Against Women Act" (I-VAWA) (not passed into law).

 

Book: Magic in "The City": A San Francisco Story by Jim Riva.

Article: "Carl in the Morning - Scalia Steps Down! Cheney Indicted! Issa Goes Nuts!" by Carl Wolfson.

Article: "Paul Ryan's budget makes big Medicare changes" by Lauren French.

Video: President Jimmy Carter's call to Action....

 

The Big Picture
- Nate Sweet, The Big Picture producer

Article: "BREAKING: More Than 7 Million People Have Now Enrolled In Obamacare" by Tara Culp-Ressler.

Article: "Major Flight 370 Discovery: Our Oceans are Filled With Trash!" by Alex Kane.

Article: "Oceans Filled with Plastic Trash - Changing Marine Ecology" by Stephen Leahy.

Article: "Debbie Wasserman-Schultz Can't Name A Single Problem with Obamacare".

Article: "CIA misled on interrogation program, Senate report says" by Greg Miller, Adam Goldman and Ellen Nakashima.

Article: "The Sheldon Adelson primary: Kissing the mogul's ring" by Dick Polman.

Article: "CHARTS: The Amazing Wealth Surge For The Top 0.1 Percent" by Sahil Kapur.

 

Article: "The Changing Face of Global Risk" by Nouriel Roubini.

Article: "60 Minutes Sanitizes Its Report on High Frequency Trading" by Pam Martens.

Article: "Dianne Feinstein set to move on CIA report" by Burgess Everett and Josh Gerstein.

Site: callcongress.org.

Article: "Treaty of Versailles" by Wikipedia (28 June 1919, at the end of World War I.).

Article: "Obama signs 'Monsanto Protection Act' written by Monsanto-sponsored senator" by RT, March 28, 2013.

Article: "The Powell Memo or Powell Manifesto".

Case: "Buckley v. Valeo", 1976.

Case: "First National Bank Of Boston V. Bellotti", 1978.

Site: Move to Amend

Petition: "Encourage Senator Bernie Sanders to Run for President in 2016 as a Democrat" by Progressive Democrats of America.

Article: "Chris Christie Apologizes For 'Occupied Territories' Remark, Says He 'Misspoke'" by Mollie Reilly.

Hour Two: What's a little voter fraud?
- Horace Cooper, National Center for Public Policy Research 

Article: "Ballot Protection Law in North Carolina Increases Minority, Liberal Voter Registration" by David W. Almasi.

Article: "What's a Little Vote Fraud?" by Robert Knight.

Article: "Vote fraud as 'payback time'" by Robert Knight

Article: "Victims of Voter Fraud: Poor and Disadvantaged are Most Likely to Have Their Vote Stolen" by Horace Cooper.

Article: "8th Amendment" (cruel and unusual punishment).

---

Wednesday on The Thom Hartmann Program, 3-6pm ET 

Hour One: Backer vs. Hartmann: money is NOT speech
- Dan Backer, Attorney for McCutcheon 

 

The Hobby Lobby hypocrisy...they have sinned
- Stephen Ally, The Timothy Plan 

 

Hour Two: The war on women's paychecks
- Phyllis Schlafly, Eagle Forum   

 

Hour Three: McCutcheon...billionaires win again - David Cobb, Move to Amend
- David Cobb, Move to Amend 

 

Marianne Williamson reacts to McCutcheon
- Marianne Williamson, Marianne for Congress 

 

And, the best of the rest of the news and your calls right here on...

 

The Thom Hartmann Program...your media support group for "we the people"...

Thursday on The Thom Hartmann Program, 3-6pm ET 

We'll have the best of the rest of the news...all the latest news & information you won't be hearing from the corporate owned news media...

 

Plus, a new Pew Research study says the Christian right is responsible for the decline of religion in America...I'll be challenging Bryan Fischer of the American Family Assocation...

 

And, my favorite segment of the week...Geeky Science...together with your calls right here on...

 

The Thom Hartmann Program, Occupying The Media 3 hours a day 5 days a week" for "we the people"

 

And remember...Democracy is NOT a spectator sport...it begins with you...

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Thank you for being part of our ever growing community for News, Debate and Opinion on the Thom Hartmann Program.

 

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Sincerely,

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"Crash of 2016" website

Watch Thom on: - MSNBC's The Cycle
- CNN's Crossfire
- Democracy Now!

Are you surprised by the SCOTUS McCutcheon case ruling?

Vote here!

Marianne for Congress - My Campaign, In My Own Words

Time for a Second Bill of Rights...

The Good - The Bad and the Very Very Macromasticly Ugly!

Shocker...Banksters Buy & Sell stocks in Mere Milliseconds

The Flight 370 Discovery Is A Risk To Us All

Politics Panel - Ryan's budget is as extreme as it gets

Politics Panel - Whether you love - hate - distrust Obamacare - it's clearly working

Full Show 4/1/14: Obamacare: 7.1 Million and Counting

Thom discusses how the missing Malaysia flight has shown us how badly our oceans are polluted with the Ocean Conservancy's Nicholas Mallos and another reason why we need the Robin Hood tax with the Campaign for America's Future Richard Eskow. Tonight's "Politics Panel" discusses the latest Obamacare numbers, Paul Ryan's "Path to Prosperity" budget and how the wealth controlled by the richest 0.1 percent has skyrocketed. In tonight's "Daily Take" Thom discusses how it's become easier to get into Harvard than it is to get into a low-paying job at Wal-Mart.

The Thom Hartmann Program - April 1, 2014

Voter Fraud...A Little Like Drunk Driving?

Earth will Cross the Climate Danger Threshold...

President Jimmy Carter's call to Action...

President Jimmy Carter: Bush Didn't Win in 2000

Thom Hartmann on Economic and Labor News - March 31, 2014

Are Unions Coming To College Football?

Caller: Time to Discuss Geo-engineering?

Time to Consider Ecocide a Crime?

Global Food Security Threatened By Warming World?

Do Veterans Support Keystone XL?

The Thom Hartmann Program - March 31, 2014

Economic Boost for Millions? Raise the Minimum Wage...