Peter Schweitzer, author of the book, Throw Them All Out, was interviewed by 60 Minutes, where he discussed the rampant corruption involving insider trading, blocking legislation while making profits, trading on non-public TARP information, and of course, Obama’s eco-scam payoffs to campaign contributors.
Via Big Government:
U.S. Representative Spencer Bachus (R-AL) had access to highly sensitive financial information during the 2008 bailout debates that may have helped him earn tens of thousands of dollars by trading stock options, even as most Americans’ portfolios took a beating.
Current Minority Leader–Nancy Pelosi apparently bought $1 million to $5 million of Visa stock in one of the most sought-after and profitable initial public offerings (IPO) in American history, thwarted serious credit card reform for two years, and then watched her investment skyrocket 203%.
The Daily Beast:
The so-called 1705 Loan Guarantee Program and the 1603 Grant Program channeled billions of dollars to all sorts of energy companies. The grants were earmarked for alternative-fuel and green-power projects, so it would not be a surprise to learn that those industries were led by liberals. Furthermore, these were highly competitive grant and loan programs—not usually a hallmark of cronyism. Often fewer than 10 percent of applicants were deemed worthy.
Nevertheless, a large proportion of the winners were companies with Obama-campaign connections.
More from the Daily Beast:
While examining trades made around the time of the 2003 Medicare overhaul, Schweizer experienced what he calls his “Holy crap!” moment. The legislation, which created a new prescription-drug entitlement, promised to be a huge boon to the pharmaceutical industry—and to savvy investors in the Capitol. Among those with special insight on the issue was Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, chairman of the health subcommittee of the Senate’s powerful Finance Committee. Kerry is one of the wealthiest members of the Senate and heavily invested in the stock market. As the final version of the drug program neared approval—one that didn’t include limits on the price of drugs—brokers for Kerry and his wife were busy trading in Big Pharma. Schweizer found that they completed 111 stock transactions of pharmaceutical companies in 2003, 103 of which were buys.
“They were all great picks,” Schweizer notes. The Kerrys’ capital gains on the transactions were at least $500,000, and as high as $2 million (such information is necessarily imprecise, as the disclosure rules allow members to report their gains in wide ranges). It was instructive to Schweizer that Kerry didn’t try to shape legislation to benefit his portfolio; the apparent key to success was the shaping of trades that anticipated the effect of government policy.
Quotes from Schweizer’s book, which details what happened after a 16 September 2008 meeting between Hank Paulson, Ben Bernanke, and members of Congress:
“September 17, 2008, was by far [Rep. Jim] Moran’s most active trading day of the year.” “He dumped shares in Goldman Sachs, General Dynamics, Franklin Resources, Flowserve Corporation, Ecolabs, Edison International, Electronic Arts, DirecTV, Conoco, Procter & Gamble, AT&T, Apple, CVS, Cisco, Chubb, and a dozen more companies.”
In all, Moran dumped over 90 companies to avoid big losses.
Rep. Shelley Capito: “She and her husband dumped between $100,000 and $250,000 in Citigroup stock the day after the briefing.”Dick Durbin “sold off $73,715 in stock funds” after the September 16 briefing. “Following the next terrifying closed-door briefing, on September 18, he dumped another $42,000 in stock.
Rahm Emmanuel did the same:
Former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel is the latest lawmaker to get caught up in allegations of insider trading while a member of Congress.Then-Rep. Emanuel reportedly sold up to $250,000 in Freddie Mac stock on February 21, 2003 days before it dropped by 10 percent — and weeks before it was publicly revealed that the entity was under criminal investigation for inflating earnings.
……Emanuel served on the board of the Government-backed lender before his election to Congress in 2003, and later held a seat on the House Financial Services’ Committee’s Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government-Sponsored Enterprises — the very committee charged with regulating the Freddie Mac.
Conflict of interest, anyone?
From the Washington Times:
Obama’s Fabian Socialist pal George Soros cashed in on the stimulus:
According to Schweizer’s book, George Soros made his way into the Obama White House by becoming one of candidate Obama’s “first big catches.”
Soros donated more than $60,000 to Obama’s 2004 Senate campaign and helped build the Obama 2008 war chest substantially. Soros gained amazing access to the president and the president’s economic agenda immediately after the 2008 election, according to Schweizer, who writes in his book:
“Days after President Obama was elected, Soros was helping to set the agenda. Soros had regular meetings with senior White House officials. He met with Obama’s top economist, Larry Summers,on February 25, 2009. He also had meetings in the Old Executive Office Building with senior officials on March 24 and 25 asthe stimulus was being forged. He was later involved in private discussions concerning widespread financial reform.”
“Soros was also a financial backer of the Center for American Progress, which functioned as Obama’s think tank. John Podesta,who headed CAP, was Obama’s transition director. Several CAP policy ideas became part of Obama’s agenda. Soros said at the time, ‘I think we need a large stimulus package, which will provide funds for state and local government to maintain their budgets, because they are not allowed by the constitution to run a deficit. For such a program to be successful, the federal government would need to provide hundreds of billions of dollars. In addition, another infrastructure program is necessary. In total, the cost would be in the 300 to 600 billion dollar range.’”
Schweizer found that after “tens of billions” of tax payer dollars were invested in the Democrat backed 2009 stimulus package, in the first quarter of 2009, Soros made a financial windfall by investing in stimulus winners like: Hologic, a maker of diagnostic equipment, which gained from federal funding of medical systems, Emulex, a government contractor that designs fiber channels and software products, and EMC, a data storage company.
The average white collar CEO would be investigated and indicted by the SEC. Politicians are the only group not held to the same standards for inside trading. That needs to change.
Related articles
- Congressional Insider Trading: The Pelosi Loophole (atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com)
- Forget Pelosi, Here’s The Most Stunning Detail From The Congressional Insider Trading Report (businessinsider.com)
- http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1111/68297.html
- http://www.rollcall.com/news/lawmakers_deny_insider_trading_60_minutes_report-210276-1.html
- http://thevictorysessions.com/2011/11/14/peter-schweizers-new-book-blasts-congressional-corruption/