Here we go again, when anything goes wrong in the world Obama, our politicians, and now Wall Street, blame China. As I have written several times, maybe we should not rush to judgement until the facts have arrived. In the meantime there are some truths that might suggest our economic experts continue to be wrong. For example, ever since the second greatest stock market crash in history when President Obama took office, America has been struggling to regain an economic foothold. In the past six years we have had one of the slowest recoveries in history and many people wonder if anything really did recover.
Well everyone on Wall Street certainly recovered including those nasty banks who manipulated the market and nearly destroyed the nation. The greatest beneficiary was Goldman Sachs who also happened to be the largest contributor to the Obama campaign.
So great was their influence that Rahm Emanuel of Goldman became the first Obama White House Chief of Staff. A CBS News analysis of the revolving door between Goldman
and government reveals at least four dozen former employees, lobbyists or
advisers at the highest reaches of power both in Washington and around the world.
One would think after the loss of trillions of dollars of middle class wealth, home values, retirement funds, etc., Obama would have us prepared to manage another financial crisis. Yet in the most current economic crisis there is silence from the White House. Come to think of it, after all these years since the last crisis, there has been virtually no prosecutions, no fat cats in jail, no banks dissolved, nothing considering the degree of the crime.
So here we are, six years later blaming China for our stock woes. What happened to all the financial reforms? Here is a list of government agencies and congressional committees and subcommittees, the executive and legislative branch resources, to maintain our economy.
U.S. Government
Executive Branch Financial Regulators
Bank and Market
Financial Regulators
US Department of Treasury
US Department of Justice
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency
Office of Thrift Supervision
Securities and Exchange Commission
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
Commodities Futures Trading Commission
National Credit Union Administration
Non-Bank Financial
Regulators
Federal Housing Finance Agency
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Regulatory Umbrella
Groups
Financial Stability Oversight Council
Federal Financial Institution Examinations Council
President’s Working Group on Financial Markets
Non-Bank Capital Requirements
Federal Housing Finance Agency
The SEC’s Net Capital Rule
CFTC Capital Requirements
Foreign Exchange Markets
Treasury Securities
Private Securities Markets
Federal Reserve
System
CFTC Is Next Agency
To Consider Regulating Algorithmic Trading
So far no word from any of these groups as to what they are going to do regarding market manipulations from the kings of Wall Street.
Ironically, when it comes to the Chinese, they are all over the news with their crackdown on corruption, unfair business practices, and market manipulations. Why is it the Chinese are going after the American companies who are introducing American crooked business practices to the Chinese market, assuming the Chinese will never figure out what went wrong. Of course it is a safe assumption since the dozens and dozens of American regulators seem to have no interest in stopping the practices here. Look at the headlines the Chinese have generated around the world while we sit on our butts and cast stones.
Leadership is the first requirement for fixing things and Chinese President Xi Jinping has launched one of the largest and most aggressive anti-corruption campaigns in the world. First he took on those throughout the government and now he is focusing on those who have undermined the Chinese efforts to improve the quality of life for the people. As for the stock market, in China,
it only takes one agency to do what the dozens of US agencies cannot do and
that is the China Securities Regulatory Commission. Once again President Jinping has attacked the problem where it is needed. Maybe they
can come here and show us what to do.
These are the headlines around the world concerning the Chinese effort to drive the crooks out of the financial markets.
Authorities to step up crackdown on those ‘destabilising’ market
China says 197 punished in crackdown on online rumors
China stocks slide as crackdown on
speculators spreads, lose 11 percent in August
SHANGHAI
China warns
securities industry as crackdown on stock market irregularities expected to intensify
Securities regulator orders industry to step up supervision after brokerage
staff, officials and journalist are detained over unethical trading
China arrests nearly 200 in
stock market crackdown
Shadow lending crackdown looms over China’s stock market
China stock exchanges step up
crackdown on short-selling
China’s (Renewed) Crackdown on Insider Trading
Avic Units Targeted In China's Crackdown On Sell-Offs
China
accuses brokers of manipulating share prices during stock market crisis
Beijing’s police ministry said it has launched a criminal investigation into
unlicensed companies that financed speculative trading
China
accuses trading firms of manipulating stocks
Wall Street Breakfast: China Heightens Curbs In Market
Crackdown
Aug. 4, 2015 7:06 AM ET China
has unveiled more rules that make it harder for speculators to profit from
hourly changes in stock prices. Under the new guidelines, short sellers must
wait at least one day to cover their positions and repay loans used to buy
shares.
Behind enemy lines - foreign hedge
funds thrive in China
China stock exchanges are
stepping up a crackdown on short-selling
.
As the media of the world has finally recognized, President Xi Jinping of China has a great partner in his wife of 25 years Peng Liyuan. More than anything else, she has helped President Xi Jinping bring the Chinese into the modern era and to address the many problems facing nations aspiring to be the best in the world.
China
is one of the largest nations in the world and has a deep, rich history. Some
of the things that make China
so popular are its ancient traditions, rich culture, and medicinal practices. China's alternative and traditional
medicines are adapted in western countries and are supported and practiced by
western health care professionals throughout the world.
The country's ancient and historical structures are also
renowned around the world. The Great Wall of China
is considered one of the wonders of the world and attracts tourists from all
over the globe. China
also holds the largest and most famous snow festivals.
Aside from tourist attractions, the country is
also famous for its inventions. The Chinese invented gunpowder during the ninth
century, and China
is the producer of many famous and potent teas. China remains as the largest
exporter and producer of green tea in the world.
Then there is the remarkable rise to power by President Xi Jinping and his success in guiding China into a role as an emerging world superpower and responsible member of the world community. His wife is a powerful companion comfortable in the role she can fulfill for her husband and her country.
Remember, China has a written record back 4,000 years, and then a couple of mystical cultures and civilization dating back 7,000 - 8,000 years ago. That is pretty old.
Chinese philosophy, religion, medicine, herbs, and other attributes have withstood the test of time and once again are gaining worldwide acceptance.
Here she is in a video to help victims of AIDs.
Here are excerpts from a story about the First Lady by The Daily Telegraph in the UK that offers great insight into her rise in China.
After decades of stiff and
inscrutable leaders, whose wives have been obediently invisible, China's
Communist party has finally revealed a softer side: the gracious and elegant
Peng Liyuan. But while the new first lady was
almost unknown in the West until she emerged on Xi Jinping's first presidential
tour, in her homeland she has been a superstar for three decades. Well before she met Mr Xi, Mrs
Peng was arguably the most famous singer in China. Even today, an old joke
still does the rounds in Beijing:
"Who is Xi Jinping? He is Peng Liyuan's husband."
"It is a mission impossible
to find someone more appropriate to represent the image of Chinese women than
Peng Liyuan," gushed the Southern People Weekly magazine in 2005. "She has a face like a full
moon, shining eyes and white teeth, and she is upright and straightforward,
frank and friendly".
Her dazzling appearance in Moscow last month, in a
well-tailored coat and sky-blue scarf, was merely the latest act in a drama
that has been meticulously scripted by the Party since she was just
15-years-old. "I felt very excited when I
saw her get off the plane. I think she deserved it after all these years of
hard work. I even cried a little bit," said Wen Sui, a singer who shared a
dorm with Mrs Peng for five years at the China Conservatory of Music. China remains a country where loose talk about
the president's wife can land you in serious trouble, so the handful of people
who were willing to talk about Mrs Peng were effusive in their praise. Nor is there a biography of Mrs
Peng. The Communist party firmly believes that the less the public knows about
its leaders, the better, and has spent years carefully deleting information
about Mrs Peng and crafting a narrative so exemplary it is, at times, hard to
believe.
Born in Peng village in 1962, in
the eastern province of Shandong, Mrs Peng comes from a poor family and the
very opposite end of the Communist party to her princeling husband, whose
father was a vice-premier of China.
Mrs Peng's father was a lowly
official, a schoolmaster who was put in charge of the countyCulture
bureau. He earned 40 yuan (£4) a month. Her mother, who has been nearly
entirely erased from the record, was 25 when she was born and a member of a
small touring opera company. "She spent most of her
childhood on the ox cart of the county's playhouse," remembered Wei
Zhongping, her father's deputy at the culture bureau. "I was a born singer,"
said Mrs Peng on a visit to Singapore
in the 1990s. By the age of five, she said, she
could sing a complete folk song. "As a singer, I have won the highest
honours in China.
Actually I am like the panda: we are both national treasures," she added.
What she shares with Mr Xi,
however, are memories of the evils of the Cultural Revolution. When she was
four, Red guards arrived at her house to denounce her family. Her mother was called a spy for
having relatives in Taiwan.
Her father was made to clean public lavatories for promoting culture that was
suddenly considered "feudal", a vestige of old China. Both Mrs Peng and Mr Xi saw their
fathers imprisoned. Both of them were sent into exile in the countryside. Mrs
Peng was denied an education. But she had a golden gift to fall
back on: her voice. She quickly learned to sing patriotic songs and, as a
skinny 15-year-old teenager, she beat competition from 10,000 other applicants
to land a place at her provincial art school. From there, her career has
progressed upwards in one straight line. First she was picked for the elite
performance troupe of the local People's Liberation Army.
Then she attended the
Conservatory of Music in Beijing.
According to the state media, she was a "three points and one line"
student. In other words, the daily arc of her life only had three points on it
– the music room, the canteen and the dorm. "She was very tough on
herself. I used to ask her why she studied so hard," said Wen Sui, her
dorm mate and fellow singer. "She would also help out her poorer
classmates, buying them food coupons. Her father, who I met, taught her a lot.
He used to tell her: 'I do not care how famous you are, or how much money you
have, you have to be a good person above all'. "I said to him he did not
need to keep ramming it in because she was already a good person, but he said
when you get high and comfortable in life, you can forget these lessons." Each month in Beijing she received 52 yuan from the army
and sent 40 yuan of it home to help her parents and younger brother and sister.
When she graduated, she was
headhunted by the most prestigious arts company of all, the General Political
Department of the PLA, which essentially laid the path for her to become China's top propaganda
singer.
Here is another beautiful performance by the First Lady.
"Even there," said Mrs
Wen, "She put herself in charge of organising the housing for the workers
there. She is a perfect leader". Indeed, her career is utterly
blemish-free. She had no boyfriends until she met Mr Xi. She never took money
for sponsorship or advertisements. The only deception on record is that she
wears five-inch platform shoes underneath her costumes on stage to seem taller.
The only critic who has ever
given her a negative review, Jiang Li, said she had sought him out after he
wrote that the constant and effusive stream of floral tributes to her on stage
as she sang was a distraction. "She was a little angry when
she spoke to me at first. She asked what was wrong with people applauding her
and giving her flowers. So then she arranged for me to come and meet her. Her
brother picked me up and drove me to her teacher's house, where she was cooking
dinner," he remembered.
"We became friends. She is
an outstanding singer. The difference between her and others is that she does
not have any pretension to her singing, or artificiality or techniques. And she
does not compromise for the audience or the market." "I used to see her walking
on the street sometimes, even after she got married to her husband. He could
easily have arranged a car for her, but she always took the bus and carried her
own shopping," he added. Her place at the top table of the
Chinese establishment was cemented in 1985 when she spent 20 days on the front
line entertaining troops as they fought a border conflict with Vietnam.
The following year she was
accepted into the Communist party and made her first appearance on the flagship
Spring Festival gala show. Her Prince and the Showgirl
relationship with Mr Xi was also carefully scripted, the work of a meticulous,
but unknown, matchmaker. The marriage of a famous army singer was of course a
highly political matter. They were introduced in Beijing in the winter of
1986. It was bitterly cold and Mrs Peng wore her green army uniform. She later
told the state media that she had dismissed Mr Xi as a "xiang ba
lao", a coarse country bumpkin. Mr Xi was rising fast in the
Party, and had an impeccable background, but was scandalously a divorcee. He
had married the daughter of China's
ambassador to the UK but the
couple broke up when his wife wanted to return to England to study. In the end, the courtship was
brief. On September 1, 1987, a few colleagues were invited to the Red Lady
French restaurant in the five-star Yeohwa hotel in Xiamen, where Mr Xi was the deputy mayor. The
dinner was a wedding banquet.
For years, their union was a
secret from all but a handful of top Party officials. But Mrs Peng later
revealed she had eaten so many snails that night she had made herself ill. Four days later, she went on a
singing tour with the PLA, and the couple lived largely separate lives for two
decades. Mr Xi was in the south of China
and Mrs Peng was in Beijing
or on the road, singing as many as 350 shows a year. It is not uncommon in China for
husbands and wives to live apart, and Mr Xi and Mrs Peng pragmatically pursued
their own careers. "I have never done anything
for her work and life, and I am not able to do anything. Therefore how could I
demand her to do this or that? If everything is fine with her, I am
happy," said a surprisingly tolerant Mr Xi, in 2007, to the Youth Express
newspaper.
Mrs Peng battled through severe
morning sickness and dehydration to perform on the Chinese Spring Festival
Gala, perhaps the most watched television show on earth. "In a way, she was Kate
Middleton before Kate Middleton was Kate Middleton," wrote Martin
Macmillan in his biography of the couple Together They Hold Up the Sky. Mr Xi, meanwhile, missed the
birth of their daughter, Mingze, because he was busy fighting floods. For some, the script was too
perfect. A cable from the US Consulate in Shanghai
from 2007, noted that High Court judges from Zhejiang province, where Mr Xi had been
based "reported rumours that Xi was preparing to divorce his wife". There were enough rumours that Mr
Xi was having an affair that the Chinese media issued articles stressing the
couple's enduring love and that their "feelings for each other
stabilised" after Mingze's birth. Those articles, of course, raised more
questions than they answered.
For her part, Mrs Peng described
her husband as a "safe harbour" that she longed to return to, and
told folksy tales about carrying a special quilt for him all around China while she
was on tour. When asked about her hobbies, she
said she liked being at home, sitting on the sofa, watching television with her
husband and cooking. Mr Xi likes watching football and playing the Chinese game
Go. China's
first family is just like any other, according to the state media.
"She can relate to people,
but what is unique here in China
for a first lady is the people can connect to her. She has been well known for
30 plus years. An entire generation has grown up with her." said James
Chau, one of the few journalists who has interviewed Mrs Peng. "She is a
tangible face they can hang their hopes and dreams on". In 2007, as Mr Xi was anointed as
China's
next leader, she began cutting back her singing appearances and instead took on
more charity work. Ruby Yang, a film director who
shot a series of public service advertisements with Mrs Peng remembered how,
stranded in tiny Aids-ridden village in Henan
province, Mrs Peng had met a young boy, infected with HIV, who had been forced
to live in a pigsty. "She was obviously deeply affected," she said.
"As a Chinese American, I had no idea she was such a star. I made her do
her make-up by the side of the road. But she was professional about it".
But while Mrs Peng's emergence on
the world stage has been greeted with delight in China, there are already signs that
the Party is uncomfortable at the enormous buzz around her. While the Chinese media has been
giddily comparing Mrs Peng to Jackie Kennedy, Michelle Obama and Carla Bruni
this week, the censors have been wiping her name from the internet. Copies of
her clothes that were selling on Taobao, an online marketplace, have been
removed.
While her glamour may
counterbalance her husband's often gruff appearance, and lend him plenty of
popular support, there is a fear that a curious public may question why her
official biography is so neat and tidy. "After this trip, the Party
will analyse how best to use her going forward, and how to make sure she does
not outshine her husband," said Cheng Xiaohe, a professor of International
Relations at Renmin university. "She is probably more influential than
Michelle Obama since she will be around for ten years and was famous before her
husband came into office," he added.
For Chinese viewers in particular here is a video of her life story.
