What a sight! Words fail to describe the feelings that rushed upon us when the inside team was escorted outside where we were face to face with the power of the people cheering us!
On Monday, our group grew and began the day by hearing from FDIC Chair Sheila Bair. I left early once again to prepare for our actions at Goldman Sachs and Wells Fargo. GS recently announced huge bonuses for their top executives after we bailed them out. Enough is Enough! Wells Fargo has a lawsuit pending against them by the IL Attorney General's Office for discrimination and leading African American borrows regardless of credit qualifications into high cost loans including sub-prime and adjustable rate mortgages! The stagecoach wasn't robbed this time - the stagecoach was full of bankers robbing us! It is time to hold these institutions accountable and demand that they stop fleecing us!
The action on Wells Fargo's office was a surprise. It was during this action that I met a Deputy Chief of the Chicago Police Department, who helped us deliver a letter to the CEO's of GS and WFB with our reasonable demands. Afterwards we returned to the American Bankers Association convention with a few hundred more folks to let them know that we demand accountability. ABA CEO Edward Yingling said that the community bankers meeting in Chicago were not responsible for the crisis. And, while it may be true that most smaller community banks did not play high risk roulette with their capital by playing the sub-prime and ARM games, the ABA is funded overwhelmingly by large banks that did! Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, Citi Group, and Bank of America hold the lion's share of control and capital and they bully the smaller banks as they hunt them down like prey for the taking. The ABA also uses millions of dollars from their TARP funding (bailout) to lobby congressional officials, by contributing to their campaign funds, to vote against financial industry regulatory reform such as the Consumer Financial Protection Agency proposed by the President to oversee the banking and non-bank financial industry. Basically, the Banks got bailed out, we got sold out! The CFPA would not be comprised of bankers like the Federal Reserve is or Wall Street Execs like the SEC. The CFPA would have community influence and with new disclosure rules would be able to closely monitor for unjust lending practices. Time to Reclaim America and our Democracy! On Tuesday, alongside thousands of friends from labor and other justice coalitions, The Showdown carried a message through the streets to Congress as well...
Time to choose a side Congress! The people or profit? Big Bonuses or Jobs and Saved Homes? Greed or Democracy? During the rally, I presented a PAST DUE invoice for trillions of dollars to a representative of the ABA who was called out of the convention for me by my new Chicago Police Department friend.
Back home today, I had the opportunity to do a live interview with David Shuster on MSNBC to invite everyone to call their congressional reps and tell them to put the people first! I've been on local TV several times and this was my first time on national television - it was a blast!
So what does the gospel or faith have to do with all of this? Everything!!! Jesus said, Love God and your neighbor. That is the gospel - plain and simple! He took action in the courts of the temple when a corrupt financial system was preying upon his neighbors and he praised the widow's mite for she was giving more than most. And, he calls those who would follow to do likewise. Jesus' kingdom ranks ones neighbor before oneself - does not destroy the neighbor by preying on them with high cost, bad loans, foreclosing on them and leaving them jobless while you party like it is the roaring twenties! Faith leads me to do justice, to bring good news to the poor, to support the weak, to return no one evil for evil, and to honor all people - to love the Lord God and my neighbor, the banker and the homeless foreclosed.
What a week this has been!
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