The-Asterisk

Tuesday's agreement by mega-bank, HSBC, to pay a record $1.9 Billion in fines has inadvertently revealed a secret Obama administration scheme to quietly reduce the national debt and allow more social spending which, according to one unnamed administration official is "the funnest part of getting that mandate from the American people." In light of the HSBC $1.9 Billion, the Standard Charter $327 Million, the $619 ING Million, and previous penalties assessed against Barclays, UBS and Citi, today's page one article in the Wall Street Journal about UBS's near settlement of yet another penalty due to interest-rate rigging, it appears that Washington has fallen upon a win-win situation. Because these violations never result in prosecution of any individual ( I guess corporations are people after all ) due to a newly revealed trick called deferred prosecution, several beneficial benefits occur. First and foremost, the number of attorneys both on the financial si...

This morning I was ranting on Twitter and I tried to make my point through several consecutive tweets. 140 characters is not a lot of room to relay a big thought and one follower, @dogwalkblog took me to task on this point. He is a great blogger, but he has a history of media experience behind him. I have passion, this blog and 8000 tweets behind me, and I think I have become a better blogger for having gotten "out there" and expressed myself. So, with that said, I will make my point about how I disagree with the President in what is fair. President Obama opined in his State of the Union address earlier this week that he wants to make things fair so that all people have a fair shake at whatever it is they want a fair shake at. Jobs? Income? Health? Free throws? 4 minute mile? Marriage? I don't know... Let me start out by saying LIFE IS NOT FAIR and thank God for that fact. If it was fair, virtually no one would push to exceed and succeed, because there would be no...