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Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis has sparked controversy in his recent testimony to regulators. Lewis has revealed that he was threatened, by then-Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Chairman of the Fed Ben Bernanke, to buy Merrill Lynch, a company drowning in financial losses of billions of dollars. Lewis explained that Paulson and Bernanke presented him with an ultimatum: if he did not buy the ailing corporation, they would fire him and his Board of Directors. Recognizing that Bank of America, a company with its own financial problems, would not be capable of assuming Merrill Lynch’s financial woes, Paulson and Bernanke assured Lewis that Bank of America would receive TARP funds to compensate. Moreover, Lewis was forced to keep all this information hidden from his shareholders.

Paulson and Bernanke’s stated goal in preventing Lewis from revealing the developments of the company to its own shareholders was to “restore financial confidence.” Now that their role has been disclosed (which was bound to happen), the exact opposite will occur. Indeed, this story is receiving so much press today precisely because of the complete lack of financial confidence it inspires.

How is financial confidence to be restored when the government is engaging in such shady deals? How can an investor trust that he is receiving the information he is legally obligated to receive when he knows the government itself may be scheming in the back room to keep this information from him? How can the market stabilize in an environment in which insider trading, considered a crime when private individuals do it, is actively done by public officials under the pretense of “public good?” Why would people feel confident in the economy when their wealth might slip away at any moment because the decisions they made were based on information deliberately distorted by the government?

Paulson and Bernanke have not only failed to restore any confidence in the American economy, they have actively worsened the lives of many, such as those of the stockholders of Bank of America who made purchases and investments under the false premise that Bank of America’s finances were much stronger than they really were.

As with all government projects wrapped in the veneer of good intentions, Paulson and Bernanke did not hesitate to exploit the individual American to achieve their allegedly noble ends. Consider the choice they presented to Lewis: to either face the wrath of these politicians or commit fraud. It is abhorrent that our nation has come to the state in which thugs, masked as our political leaders, have no problem threatening to ruin people’s lives unless they agree to be complicit in a crime. Furthermore, they then later throw that same individual under a bus, evidenced by their silent endorsement of the intense criticism Lewis is receiving for deceiving his shareholders.

Our government today is not a protector of our rights, like it was at the inception of this nation. Instead, Ken Lewis’ testimony makes it quite clear that these days the government unashamedly sacrifices our rights to meet its own agenda.

Photo by Kati Driscoll on Flickr.

As people assemble on the National Mall to celebrate Earth Day today, the idea that man-made global warming is threatening our future seems a foregone conclusion.  But even the left-leaning New York Times recently featured an opposing view from famous physicist Freeman Dyson.  Keith Lockitch, a fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute, has been campaigning against environmentalism for a while now, and I encourage you to look back today at his 2007 article discussing the roots of the “green” movement.  Lockitch writes:

It isn't news that environmentalism has gone mainstream in a big way--with organic food in every grocery store, hybrid cars on every freeway, and every mass-market magazine declaring green the "new black." More than ever before, consumers are buying into environmentalist ideology--and buying products that purport to impact nature less, in order to impact nature less.

One would think that serious environmentalists would be thrilled about this trend--thrilled that the public seems willing to take ecological marching orders and do its duty to the planet. But they aren't: A backlash against "buying green" has arisen in environmentalist circles, with critics disparaging the new eco-consumers as "light greens," and condemning the "Cosmo-izing of the green movement."

Surprising? Not really. Not if one grasps the deeper meaning of environmentalism.

Read the rest here.

Photo by Katherine.

Would you like to write for The Undercurrent but aren’t sure how to get started? If so, consider attending our first blog writing meeting on Sunday, April 19th!

For those of you who attended our blog information session in February and are interested in writing for us, this meeting will help you develop your first topic. Perhaps you already have some great ideas in mind but do not know how to delimit them into something manageable. Just come to our meeting prepared to discuss your article ideas. Our editors will work through as many potential topics as we can so that you can leave the meeting with an article plan in hand.

If you don’t yet have an article idea, don’t worry – we also plan to brainstorm about possible topics and offer suggestions for new TU blog pieces.

In addition, we will briefly address questions about how writing for TU works – such as what the editing process is like and how to submit article ideas.

This meeting is meant for both newer TU writers and for anyone who might be interested in writing for us, whether on a regular basis or just as an occasional guest writer. Note that you need not be a student to write for us, but of course all TU articles are written with a university student’s context in mind.

The meeting will be by teleconference, so if you are interested in attending, please email us at contact [at] the-undercurrent [dot] com to get call-in information.

Last week at the G-20 summit, President Obama came under much scrutiny when he bowed to the king of Saudi Arabia. Earlier last week, Obama traveled the Middle East, pronouncing to its people that Americans should be “respectful [of the Islamic religion], even when we do not agree” and communicated his “deep appreciation of the Islamic faith.” Presumably, his bow to King Abdullah was a demonstration of such appreciation and respect.

But what exactly was Obama bowing to? What is he saying we should respect even when we disagree?

A recent legal ruling in Saudi Arabia illustrates the answer. A father forced his 8-year-old daughter to marry his 47-year-old friend to settle a debt. The mother then filed a petition seeking divorce for her daughter. The judge ruled that the divorce would not be granted because the mother did not have the legal authority to represent her daughter. The judge further stated that the girl could file a petition herself once she reaches puberty.

Hearing the facts alone is enough to send chills down anyone’s spine. The actual details of the brutality this child endures every day are likely unfathomable to most of us. Unfortunately, the situation is not unique to this little girl. Such transactions are made frequently in Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Iran, and other Muslim nations. They are upheld by Islamic law, which recognizes that a woman’s only purpose is to serve and obey her husband.

It is difficult to imagine living in such a society because such practices are so diametrically opposed to everything we as Americans believe about how a proper, civilized society should function. Yet this is the kind of nation over which King Abdullah presides. It is a nation of people who permit fathers to sell their daughters into slavery to repay financial debts; a nation of people willing to regard men who accept little girls as a form of payment as noble and moral; a nation of women who, even if they silently abhor the practice, do not have the cultural clout to ostracize and seek prosecution of those engaged in such perversion; a nation of judges that makes a mockery of justice by subordinating the rights of a little girl to the backwards edict of medieval doctrine; and a nation of royalty that is not ashamed but fiercely proud of such backwards cultural customs.

The United States of America is the greatest nation on earth because at its inception, it recognized that individuals had an inalienable right to dictate the course of their own lives and not be forced by anyone to do something against their will. Indeed, it is this very principle which, in due course, eliminated slavery and other systematic injustices from our nation. This is the opposite of Islamic law, which holds that your life belongs to tyrants and masters who can demand anything of you in the ostensible name of religion.

This is what Obama asks Americans to appreciate and respect. But there can be no shred of respect for a nation that endorses such violent crimes that so vehemently oppose our fundamental values. It is improper for Obama, the leader of the free world, to bow in deference to King Abdullah, who is the leader of a theocracy that openly permits its young girls to be enslaved by authoritarian patriarchs.

As the head of the state, President Obama necessarily has to deal with such individuals, and at times may legitimately have to focus on a narrower issue and forgo expressing outright disgust towards backwards practices of a backwards nation. However, in such cases, a curt nod would suffice. No American president has any excuse for showing any gesture of respect for King Abdullah and other tyrants like him. As Americans, we should not be afraid to acknowledge our own moral superiority to any society that engages in such savage practices as legally permitting a grown man to marry a child. Far from a bow of respect, these nations and the men who rule them deserve nothing but our most severe contempt.

Photo by London Summit on Flickr.