‘BREAK UP THE BANKS ‘ RALLY

i will be on the street corner to join others who have had it with more of the same, as we fall further into the cancerous phase of laissez-faire crony casino capitalism on steroids.

wake up america!!!!!!

PRESS RELEASE May 27, 2009

‘BREAK UP THE BANKS ‘ RALLY
On Wednesday, June 10th , 4-6:30pm at the Federal Building, Magnolia and Cornwall, “A New Way Forward” will present a streetcorner forum on the subject of bank bailouts and the failed economy, and what we the people can do to break up the financial oligarchy. Special guest speaker will be Kristi Laguzza Boosman of ANWF and KLB Community Consulting in Twisp, Washington on her “Plan B”, a discussion of real structural change of Wall Street.

We are a grassroots organization of volunteer local leaders, begun in March ’09 primarily over anger about the financial crisis provoked by the large deregulated banks and their Wall St. partners, who then gamed the system to profit even more off the crisis they caused. The bailouts are widening the gap between rich and poor. Our government has spent trillions to prop up a banking system that has failed the
country. We demand that Treasury Department break up the insolvent banks and
never again let them get so big that they distort our politics and corrupt the economy.

The Bellingham chapter leader is Dianne Foster, RN and Democratic PCO, but ANWF is nonpartisan, appealing to all of us affected by the economic collapse. Our position is that the “zombie banks” are draining public dollars indefinitely, only a few having passed the low-bar “stress tests”. Because “a crisis is a terrible thing to waste”, we need to move on this opportunity to restructure the banks and put the public well-being above that of the financial elite. This move is supported by economists like Paul Krugman, Princeton professor and ’08 Nobel Laureate in economics, Joseph Stiglitz,
Columbia professor of economics, ‘01 Nobel Laureate in economics and former director of the World Bank, Simon Johnson, professor at the Sloan School of Finance and former chief economist of the IMF, William Grieder, former editor of the “Nation”, economics journalist for the Washington Post, David Sirota, Dean Baker, and many others.

We demand the following:

1. Nationalize the big banks - experts agree on the means - the FDIC has the power to do this – insolvent banks that are “too big to fail” must incur a temporary FDIC intervention - no more blank check taxpayer handouts. (See Krugman on
nationalization).
2. Reorganize – current CEO’s and board members must be removed and bonuses wiped out. (see Simon Johnson on reorganizing). Johnson interview here
3. Decentralize - banks must be broken up and sold back to the private market with strong new regulations and antitrust rules in place - new banks, managed by new people. Any bank that’s “too big to fail means it’s too big for a free market to function (see Mike Lux on de-centralization). It’s not enough to patch up the current system; we need serious reform that fixes root problems in our political and economic system: excessive influence of banks, dangerous compensation systems, massive consolidation , and usury.

Petitions will be available to sign to our representatives and the President. 94% of Americans don’t agree with the bailouts, more than 50% support bank nationalization. Join us in communicating to our leaders!
Contact: http://www.anewwayforward.org/, Dianne Foster: vefoster@earthlink.net.

see Portland rally here