What do you think this kind of crappy inbreeding results in?

(Bloomberg) -- American International Group Inc.
named Peter Hancock, described by a former employer as an
“architect” of the derivatives business, to oversee finance
and risk, including the insurer’s money-losing credit-default
swap unit.

Hancock spent 20 years at a predecessor to JPMorgan Chase &
Co., where he established the derivatives group and served as
chief financial officer, New York-based AIG said in a statement
today. Hancock, who most recently was vice chairman at KeyCorp
responsible for national banking, will report to AIG Chief
Executive Officer Robert Benmosche.

Hancock “is one of the people that basically developed the
credit-default swaps market at JPMorgan in the mid-1990s,” said
Ed Grebeck, CEO of Stamford, Connecticut-based debt-consulting
firm Tempus Advisors and an instructor at New York University on
derivatives. “Given that he was one of the pioneers, it’s
probably the first good appointment that any one of these
bailed-out firms has made.”

Those prankster shadow bank CEOs... They sure know where to put the right people to bury their body of crimes. What? You're not laughing??? You little people have no sense of humor. Maybe you'll like this joke a little more?

Bank of America Looks Like  First of Many

Michael Collins

"This merger (Bank of America and Merrill Lynch) is a classic
example of how the actions of our nation’s largest financial
institutions led to the near-collapse of our financial system," said
Attorney General Cuomo. "Bank of America, through its top management,
engaged in a concerted effort to deceive shareholders and American
taxpayers at large. This was an arrogant scheme hatched by the bank’s
top executives who believed they could play by their own set of rules.
In the end, they committed an enormous fraud and American taxpayers
ended up paying billions for Bank of America’s misdeeds." (Image)

New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo

Andrew Cuomo's complaint filed in the New York Supreme Court, County
of New York against the Bank of America and two former top executives
has the potential to push that too big to fail entity off the edge of a very steep cliff. The charges of massive fraud are based on a compelling and exhaustive filing on February 4.

A trial will likely involve testimony by the current Bank of America CEO and President Brian Moynihan against defendants Kenneth Lewis, the bank's former CEO and board chairman, former chief financial officer (CFO) Joseph L. Price, and the bank itself. Price is currently in charge of BofA's credit card division.

The complaint charges fraud before, during and after the bank's
merger with struggling brokerage firm Merrill Lynch in late 2008. The
fraud cost bank shareholders and citizens billions of dollars. This is
the first major case brought against our nation's largest financial institutions. These are the same financial institutions and executives that nearly destroyed the economy.

From Bloomberg, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Co. and UBS AG have assets frozen by Italy:

Italy’s financial police are seizing 73.3 million euros ($102
million) of assets from Bank of America Corp. and a unit of Dexia SA as
part of a probe into an alleged derivatives fraud in the region of
Apulia.

Police are investigating losses on derivatives linked to the sale of
870 million euros of bonds sold by the regional government in 2003 and
2004, according to an e-mail from the prosecutor’s office in Bari
today. The banks misled the municipality, located in the heel of Italy,
on the economic advantages of the transaction and concealed their fees,
the prosecutor said.

The region, also known as Puglia, joins more than 519 Italian
municipalities that face 990 million euros in derivatives losses,
according to data compiled by the Bank of Italy. In Milan,
prosecutors seized assets from four banks including JPMorgan Chase
& Co. and UBS AG in April and requested they stand trial for
alleged fraud. Hearings started this month.

And BoA owned Merril Lynch is in deep doodoo too.

If our American politicians have sold their souls to the financial sectors (As has our SCROTUS) it doesn't mean the rest of the world will turn a blind eye to theft on a trillion dollar scale.

From StevenD at Booman Tribune we get this interesting observation:

What part of my citation from this story is dripping with irony? Take your time, but it should be easy to spot without too much hard work.

The president will announce a series of measures to cut
down on excessive risk-taking as part of a revamp of the country's
financial regulatory system, a senior Obama official said on Wednesday.

The move could also help the White House tap into public rage over Wall
Street excess after Obama's Democratic Party was rebuffed by voters in
Massachusetts, who elected Republican Scott Brown to the U.S. senate.

"The proposal will include size and complexity limits specifically on
proprietary trading and the White House will work closely with the
House and Senate to work this into legislation," the official said.

Did you see it? I'm sure you did, but being the incurable know-it-all that I am, let me point it out for you anyway:

"[T]he White House will work closely with the House and Senate to work this into legislation."

I hope this doesn't mean that they will go about this the same way they
"worked closely with the House and Senate" to get a workable health
care reform bill passed. Because if that's the case all I can see is
another looming failure where certain Senators and Blue Dog Democrats
hijack the process and turn the financial reforms the administration
proposes into the same bowl of thin gruel that health care reform ended
up as, thanks to people like Bart Stupak, Joe Lieberman, Olympia Snowe
and Ben Nelson.

In what is completely and totally unrelated news that will never, NEVER EVER, have any impact on the information StevenD is talking about:

Hat-tip Consumerist.

For some, the slogan "practice makes perfect" is a motto of encouragement to try again, try harder and achieve perfection. For Bank of America, it should be taken as a strong hint to try and do the right thing the first time, not to try and find a better way to seize the wrong house and then attempt to abstain from any recognizable responsibility.

It should be, but it's not.

BoA has apparently attempted to foreclose on the wrong house once again, according to an article by Laura Elder in the Galveston County Daily News:

Last week ago, Institutional Risk Analytics interviewed Josh Rosner of Graham Fisher & Co and David Kotok of Cumberland Advisors, and the discussion is one of the most direct and revealing of the true political nature of the financial collapse I have yet seen.

What happened at that Chicago manufacturing plant brought back alot of memories of how extremely talented workers fought for what they knew were their rights, decent wages for their labor, on the job safety, trading wages for benefits like health and welfare directly and much much more. Fights that shouldn't have really happened in a real model of capitalism where all should share directly in the quality and growth of their work and the companies they work for.

We need to return to that pride in company and product, quality products and customer service, correcting the defaults, and growth for all, owners, workers, and investors.

<Originially posted 2008-12-08 08:20:18 -0500. Bumped by carol to feature letter being circulated in support of workers.>

This letter is being circulated by True Majority action.:

Hundreds of laid-off workers at Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago have occupied their factory and are refusing to leave without receiving the benefits they rightly deserve -- they're staying in the office day and night in their quest for justice.