Al Capone, Leonard Cohen and Everybody Knows

While the decision to audit the Fed is a glimmer of light in an American Darkness, I am not holding my breath. A country driven by mindless consumption and fear now only has fear. Meanwhile Al explained it 80 years ago:

"The world has been capitalized on paper. Every time a fellow had a new idea, they'd increase the capital stock-give themselves so much cash and their stockholders so much paper. The rich got richer; the stockholders speculated with paper. Someone found out it paid to keep a rumor factory going.....

"Why , down in Florida, the year I lived there, a shady newspaper publisher's friend was running a bank. He had unloaded a lot of worthless securities upon unsuspecting people. One day his bank went flooey. I was just thanking the powers that be that he'd got what was coming to him when I learned another business trick that would make safe-cracking look like miniature golf.

"The crooked publisher and the banker were urging bankrupt depositors who were being paid 30 cents on the dollar to put their money in another friend's bank. Many did so: and just about 60 days later that bank collapsed like a house of cards too.

"Do you think those bankers went to jail? No sir. They're among Florida's most representative citizens.They're just as bad as the crooked politicians!I ought to know about them. I've been feeding and clothing them long enough. I never knew until I got into this racket how many crooks were dressed in expensive clothes and talking with affected accents."

From "The Wicked City".