Demonstrators Demand End of Impunity for Banks | Black Agenda Report

Demonstrators Demand End of Impunity for Banks

22 May 2013

🖨️ Print Article

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by executive editor Glen Ford

Hundreds of protesters massed at the Department of Justice to demand that banks be held accountable for their multitudinous crimes. That’s like asking the Pope to convert to Islam. “If the Obama administration has been consistent on any one issue, it is the untouchability of the biggest banks.”

Demonstrators Demand End of Impunity for Banks

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by executive editor Glen Ford

“Banks have failed to pay more than half of $5.7 billion owed to homeowners from over 30 settlements since 2008.”

Attorney General Eric Holder won’t lay a hand on the cabal of banks that are “too big to fail” and far too politically powerful to jail, but DC police seemed eager to use their tasers on homeowners and anti-foreclosure demonstrators at Holder’s Justice Department, this week. Five hundred protesters from organizations around the country, including Occupy Minnesota, the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, the Home Defenders League, and Occupy Our Homes gathered to demand that banks be held accountable for the massive frauds they’ve committed against homeowners and society at large. Several dozen protesters were arrested, including a number of elderly persons, but Eric Holder and his top lieutenants didn’t even bother to acknowledge their presence.

If the Obama administration has been consistent on any one issue, it is the untouchability of the biggest banks. Attorney General Holder has acted more as the bankers’ bail bondsman than the nation’s top law enforcement official. When confronted with two Scandals of the Century – the massive robo-signing bank fraud and the Libor interest rate fixing scheme – Holder moved to protect the banks. He used the powers of his office to block state criminal prosecutions in favor of financial settlements and fines. Holder, who is relentless in his determination to enforce the letter of the law on marijuana, claims he is helpless to bring criminal charges against banking corporations and their top executives, because it might cause an economic crisis. The real economic catastrophe that Holder and his boss, President Obama, fear is that Wall Street might withdraw its campaign contributions to the Democratic Party.

“He used the powers of his office to block state criminal prosecutions.”

Not only does the Attorney General refuse to consider putting bankers in jail, whatever the crime, he allows them to defy the terms of agreed upon financial settlements. According to the Washington Post, banks have failed to pay more than half of $5.7 billion owed to homeowners from over 30 settlements since 2008. These include robo-signing frauds, subprime mortgage entrapments, discrimination in lending to the disabled – a whole universe of criminality for which, in a just world, the offending banks would be dismantled and their top executives imprisoned. Instead, they are allowed to renege on payments to their victims with impunity.

As it has turned out, many of the banksters’ victims have received only a few thousand, or even just a few hundred dollars after years of struggle.

Even as his administration fails to live up to its Constitutional responsibilities to enforce the law, as it applies to Wall Street, Obama preached personal responsibility to the graduating class of Morehouse College, in Atlanta. The President spoke of the importance of “men who refuse to be afraid.” But he and his Attorney General are scared stiff of the power of the banks, to which they are beholden as servants. If there is no law that the banks cannot break with impunity, then this is not a nation of laws.

So, let’s stop pretending.

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.

listen

http://traffic.libsyn.com/blackagendareport/20130522_gf_DOJDemo.mp3

More Stories

Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Repression of Palestine Solidarity at Massachusetts Institute of Technology - Part 1
17 May 2024
Austin Cole joins us to discuss his suspension from MIT for his activity with the Palestine Solidarity Encampment and the attacks by the state. This is the first part of a two-part…
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
IntegrateNYC Lawsuit Seeks to End Segregation in New York City Schools
17 May 2024
Omari Soulfinger and Avery from IntegrateNYC join us from New York City to discuss a first-of-its-kind lawsuit asserting a right to an antiracist education under the New York State Constitution.
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Political and Humanitarian Crisis in Sudan
17 May 2024
Abayomi Azikiwe is the editor of the Pan-African News Wire. He joins us from Detroit to discuss Sudan, where a military struggle for power has created a political and humanitarian crisis.
Jemima Pierre, BAR Editor and Columnist
The Real Reason the US is Invading Haiti w/ Dr. Jemima Pierre
15 May 2024
Dr. Jemima Pierre, BAR Editor and Columnist, discusses Haiti’s newest puppet leaders and why foreign intervention is not the solution to the deepening crisis in the country.
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Morehouse Men Must Protest Against Biden
15 May 2024
The Morehouse College class of 2024 has a historic opportunity to tell Joe Biden and the world that millions of Black people are outraged by the Israeli/U.S. genocide in Gaza. The only thing they…