“Someday, it will go down in history as the first trial of the modern American mafia,” wrote Matt Taibbi in June 2012 in Rolling Stone’s The Scam Wall Street Learned From the Mafia – How America’s biggest banks took part in a nationwide bid-rigging conspiracy – until they were caught on tape.  Add that to Neil Barofsky’s new book BAILOUT where he discusses how this behavior stems from the fact that the Wall Street banks control and manipulate the U.S. Treasury…

And we begin to understand why this seems to be a never-ending nightmare.

The U. S. Treasury, who is supposed to be looking out for the public and protect their tax dollars, is doing just the opposite – it has become a partner with the big banks while Main Street America is in peril. We know the economy sucks, we know the government is not perfect and we are all tired of the oppression and depression; but as long as we, the people, remain silent – like a heart attack – these thieves will destroy America.

Neil Barofsky spent much of his tenure as Special Inspector General for TARP warning Timothy Geithner (Secretary of the Treasury under the Obama administration) that his policies were far from transparent and angering the public. To this, Geithner responds,  “I have been the most fucking transparent secretary of the Treasury in this country’s entire fucking history!” Geithner, a man that Barofsky earlier in the day argued was pushing certain policies in a shallow attempt at “political posturing,” reports the Huffington Post.

In his new book BAILOUT, Neil Barofsky exposes how the Treasury was responsible for allowing the banks to foam the runway for a softer landing as the economy crashed due to the fraud Wall Street committed in mortgage securitization resulting in a foreclosure fiasco to the detriment of Main Street and American homeowners.

If you haven’t read BAILOUT yet – it is a must read – especially if you are a politician trying to legislate for your constituents… And frankly, the best question to ask any politician this year – before you vote for them is, “What do you think about Neil Barofsky’s book BAILOUT and if I vote for you how will YOU protect us and our tax dollars?”  If they can’t answer or obviously haven’t read the book – don’t vote for them until they can get back to you with precise answers.

The tail end of BAILOUT is just as compelling as the entire well-written work, ending with a grand finale that deserves to be shouted through the streets of America to wake us up at the very core of our ideals and liberty and justice for all that we vow to protect.

Neil writes: “Ironically, I repeatedly warned Geithner and his Treasury team of the anger and disillusionment that would follow their bank-centric policies, and publicly stated when I stepped down that the resulting loss of faith might make it politically impossible for the government to take the necessary step to shore up our financial system when the next crisis strikes.  I now realize, though, that Treasury’s dismissal of our warnings has produced a valuable byproduct, the widespread anger that many contain the only hope for meaningful reform of our system.

– I now realize that the American people should lose faith in their government.

– They should deplore the captured politicians and regulators who took their taxpayer dollars and distributed them to the banks without insisting that they be accountable for how the bailout money was spent.

– They should be revolted by a financial system that rewards failure and protects the fortunes of those who drove the system to the point of collapse and will undoubtedly do so again.

– They should be enraged by the broken promises to Main Street and the unending protection of Wall Street.

Because only with this appropriate and justified rage can we sow the seeds for the types of reform that will one day break our system free from the corrupting grasp of the megabanks.  It is my own anger that compelled me to write this book, and I hope that in some small way it can help put us on that path.”

May 2012

Thank you Neil Barofsky.

And thank you Matt Taibbi for keeping the spotlight shinning.