Free Republic

As you start to read all this, you'll laugh at how incestuous it all gets. Let's start with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which as I've noted in the past is tied in with the Soros foundation. Together, the two worked on something called The Project on Death in America.(PDIA) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2341083/posts And speaking of Mr Soros, he himself(his foundations) have given directly to NPR. Compared to some of the other numbers I'm seeing, it's a small amount of $250,000. But it doesn't matter. Soros money is soros money in my book. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2396058/posts Additional information about RWJF can be found here....

Here is interesting video of Democrat Rep. Maxine Waters trying to help constituents with calling their banks to work out "loan modifications." The video is from an ABC News report, and shows Waters calling Bank of America among others, where she got into a two-hour ordeal of automated messages and eventually getting cut off. In the three cases featured in this piece, she was unable to get anything done for them. I almost never agree with Maxine Waters, but this report does show how difficult it can be to get anything done over the phone with virtually any business entity...

The main reason Bank of America paid back the money was to get out from under the onerous pay caps that makes it harder to keep its people and attract a new CEO. To make the payment, Bank of America had to take huge dilution at what a year ago would have been considered an appalling price. Bank of America may be healthier than it was 9 months ago (maybe), but shareholders certainly didn't consider selling $19 billion of equity at $15 a share cause for celebration. But aren't taxpayers better off now that Bank of America has paid us...

Bank of America said late Wednesday that it would repay the entire $45 billion in bailout money that it received from the government before the end of the year. The move should help the bank recruit a new chief executive by freeing it from government restrictions on executive pay. “We appreciate the critical role that the U.S. government played last fall in helping to stabilize financial markets, and we are pleased to be able to fully repay the investment, with interest,” Kenneth D. Lewis, the bank’s current chief executive, said in a statement. Mr. Lewis is scheduled to retire at...

As the Bank of America (BofA) CEO, one of the first phone calls that Jon Corzine might receive could come from Service Employees International Union (SEIU) President and White House frequent guest Andy Stern asking Corzine to forgive SEIU’s $88 million debt or at least to renegotiate the BofA terms. As former head of the Democrat Senatorial Campaign Committee and a Democrat governor from New jersey, Corzine knows all too well how much the Democrat party owes SEIU bosses. Corzine as head of Bank of America could create interesting opportunities for Stern. Debts are increasing at every level of the...

Check this out ... the SEIU is the sympathetic, comforting, understanding shoulder on which the oppressed bank employees (the ones with jobs!) can lean.

Pay Czar Feinberg, Not Obama, Behind Decision to Slash Executive Pay White House pay czar Kenneth Feinberg did not seek President Obama's approval to order steep pay cuts from bailed-out executives. Thursday, October 22, 2009 White House pay czar Kenneth Feinberg was the driving force behind the move to order steep pay cuts from bailed-out executives, and did not even seek the president's approval before making his decision. The Treasury Department is expected to formally announce in the next few days a plan to slash annual salaries by about 90 percent from last year for the 25 highest-paid executives at...

Government regulators threatened to remove top Bank of America executives in December if they didn't acquire Merrill Lynch, but also agreed to provide taxpayer funds to compensate for Merrill's poor performance, according to company records obtained by The Washington Times. The documents -- e-mails between bank executives and their outside lawyers as well as board-meeting talking points prepared for then-Chief Executive Ken Lewis -- indicate that former Treasury Secretary Henry Mr. Paulson Jr. and Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben S. Bernanke promised to give the bank taxpayer bailout funds to compensate them for Merrill's poor performance. Summaries written by the...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Bank of America suffered a $2.2 billion dollar loss in the latest quarter, the company said Friday. The nation's biggest bank blamed the third-quarter performance on credit losses, particularly within some of its consumer-related businesses. The results were worse than Wall Street analysts had expected

As we try to shake off the financial crisis, here's a bright idea. Take a law that has led to the writing of an enormous amount of bad mortgages and expand it. Then take enforcement away from bank examiners and give it to housing activists. Sound like a poisonous cocktail? Well, it is what the Obama administration and Democrats are currently stirring up on Capitol Hill.

Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis was the classic American success story. But he had a weakness for big deals—and his resignation was inevitable from the second he agreed to take on Merrill Lynch. On Wall Street, one man’s exit strategy is another man’s demise. In a world where enough is never enough, nabbing that last career-capping acquisition can kill you. Bank of America’s soon to be former CEO, Ken Lewis, knows that all too well. He was ruined by his personal nemesis—the drive to bigness. And bad timing. As the old gambling song says, “You got to know when...

WASHINGTON - Mitt Romney had already sent out invitations for his Phoenix fund-raiser, offering supporters the chance to meet him in a Chase Field luxury box over a $300-per-person lunch or a $3,000 VIP reception. But when former rival John McCain called with an offer to be listed as host for the event in his hometown, Romney happily went back to the printer for a new invitation with McCain’s name emblazoned on it. Yesterday, McCain’s gesture helped Romney’s political action committee raise about $80,000. It also consummated an 18-month rapprochement between two competitors who battled for the 2008 GOP presidential...

Bank of America Corp. announced today that embattled chief executive Ken Lewis has notified the board of directors of his decision to retire effective Dec. 31. The bank said the board will continue ongoing planning to ensure his successor is selected by that date. Lewis will retire as CEO and as a director.

Guillermo Loaiza, a loan officer for a unit of J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. in Phoenix, has resigned from the board of Acorn Housing, a spokesman for J.P. Morgan said. Acorn Housing is an affiliate of the community-organizing group Acorn, the full name of which is the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. Both Acorn and Acorn Housing have been under fire since the recent release of secretly recorded videos that depicted Acorn employees offering advice on evading taxes, setting up brothels and smuggling illegal immigrants. J.P. Morgan has said it doesn't have a regular working relationship with Acorn...

This broke earlier this morning. Bank of America Corp. is suspending its work with the housing affiliate of embattled community organizing group ACORN. The decision comes as three Republicans in Congress ask Bank of America and 13 other financial institutions to give Congress a complete accounting of their dealings with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now or its affiliates.

Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, discusses the markets, politics and the economy.

Bank of America has suspended its current commitments to ACORN Housing, an affiliate of Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), a scandal-hit U.S. liberal grassroots group, the Wall Street Journal said on Monday. The banking company "will not enter into any further agreements with ACORN or any of its affiliates," pending assessments of the organization's operations, the paper quoted a Bank of America spokesman as saying.

Already facing the loss of federal government funding, the community-organizing group Acorn also has run afoul of one of its big corporate partners, Bank of America Corp. In response to questions from The Wall Street Journal, a spokesman for the banking company said it has "suspended current commitments" to Acorn Housing, an affiliated group, and "will not enter into any further agreements with Acorn or any of its affiliates," pending assessments by the bank of the organization's operations. Acorn, officially the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, has been under fire since the recent release of secretly recorded videos...

Corporations that have given ACORN millions of dollars over the years are now cancelling their donations in the wake of videotape revelations of employees of the infamous community organizing giving advice on mortgage fraud, tax evasion, prostitution, and child sex slavery. Bank of America is reviewing its grant program, while Citigroup is waiting for the results of on-going investigations. JP Morgan Chase had previously ended its relationship with ACORN. Bank of America donated 28 grants totaling almost $3 million to ACORN Housing Corporation (AHC), since 2005, financial records show. A company spokesman said the activity exposed on videotape prompted the...

Bank Of America Sued for: '$1,784 billion trillion dollars' That's how much Dalton Chiscolm wants. (Is that a real number?) "Incomprehensible " - is what U.S. District Judge Denny Chin said about the litigation.

Many of the fake documents used by a leading Democratic Party fund-raiser to defraud HSBC and Citigroup Inc were made by his brother-in-law, U.S. prosecutors said on Friday. Authorities arrested and charged Shahin Kashanchi, brother-in-law of indicted fund-raiser Hassan Nemazee, who donated to the presidential campaigns of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and other leading Democrats over the years. Nemazee pleaded not guilty on Wednesday in Manhattan federal court to defrauding a total of three banks -- Bank of America was the other -- out of $292 million in loan proceeds. "Based on e-mail traffic between Kashanchi and Nemazee, Kashanchi was...

When a South Carolina woman tried to honor her next door neighbor, a Marine who was recently in Afghanistan, by planting flags along the route the casket would follow, a Bank of America branch manager pulled the flags from the bank's property, citing "corporate policy." With a name like Bank of America, it was particularly surprising when a branch manager in South Carolina ordered the removal of a U.S. flag honoring a fallen soldier from the bank's property. Brenda Earls of Gaffney, S.C., tried to honor her next-door neighbor, Marine Lance Cpl. Christopher Fowlkes, who was recently killed by a...

Yes, The Ticker is formally calling for a national bank boycott on Bank of America. I'm serious. And this has nothing to do with the fact that I believe they're hiding losses, that they're under investigation 7 ways from Sunday regarding the Merrill merger, or that BofA likes to bang you in the backside with usurious "overdraft fees", even though any of those standing alone is more than enough reason to run this bank into the ground. Nope. It is about this: A South Carolina Bank of America branch is drawing criticism Thursday after an employee reportedly ordered the removal...

Bank of America is even still referring people to the ACORN offices caught on tape. A sample from the banks' website: Local Home Ownership Programs We work with local and national organizations to bring potential homebuyers education and financial resources to obtain a mortgage. Phoenix * ACORN. Bank of America works with Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) Housing to provide special mortgage products to potential homeowners in Phoenix. For more information, call ACORN's Phoenix office at 1.602.253.1111 or visit the website at www.acornhousing.org. * NCLR. Bank of America works with National Council of La Raza (NCLR) to...

Greenville, South Carolina saw the arrival of a Marine who perished in Afghanistan, and Gaffney, S.C. was his ultimate resting place. Only the faint sound of lightly marching feet could be heard as hundreds stood silent on the Greenville-Spartanburg International tarmac Wednesday while fully adorned Marines carried Lance Cpl. Chris Fowlkes’ flag-draped coffin. The solemn arrival began an afternoon-long procession that ultimately wound through the streets of the 20-year-old Marine’s hometown of Gaffney, where businesses shut down and mourners lined the streets. The homecoming came six days after the former Gaffney High School football player died in a military hospital...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Hassan Nemazee, a fund-raiser for Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and other Democrats, has been indicted for defrauding Bank of America, HSBC and Citigroup Inc out of more than $290 million in loan proceeds, U.S. prosecutors said on Monday. The announcement follows last month's indictment of Nemazee, head of a private equity firm and an Iranian American Political Action Committee board member, on one count of defrauding Citigroup's Citibank. The new indictment adds allegations that he defrauded two other banks, Bank of America and HSBC Bank USA, in a similar fashion by falsifying documents and signatures to...

Bank of America has received $45 billion in taxpayer TARP funds, and has slashed its dividend to a penny. Yet it is one of ACORN and its affiliates' biggest funders.Our review of annual tax returns for the Bank of America Charitable Foundation, Inc. for the last three years (2006, 2007, 2008) found more than $3.6 million in grants to ACORN and its affiliates. Those grants include a grant of $2 million to ACORN Housing, Inc. last year, and direct grants to ACORN Housing, Inc. offices in Baltimore, Maryland and San Bernardino, California, the locations of undercover video stings.On its...

JP Morgan Chase has been challenged to sever its financial support for ACORN. As more video tapes are released of ACORN workers discussing illicit financial schemes, the bank has been called out for funding activities in violation of its own polices. Peter Flaherty, president of the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC), in a letter addressed to JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, warns that continued support could jeopardize the institution’s credibility. “Continued identification with ACORN harms the company’s brand name and reputation, and carries special risks for this company, a recipient of taxpayer TARP funds,” he wrote. “The New...

Regulators today won't define 'systemic risk,' unlike 25 years ago. With Congress back in session and the anniversary of the Lehman Brothers failure upon us, the Obama Administration is resuming its quest for greatly expanded authority to bail out American businesses. Under the Treasury reform blueprint, any financial company, whether a regulated bank or not, could be rescued or seized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation if regulators believe it poses a systemic risk. If recent history is any guide, when the feds stage their next intervention, they will not define "systemic risk" and they will refuse to release the...

A Florida man was unable to cash a Bank of America check because the bank required a thumbprint, and he had no arms. WTSP has the story of Steve Valdez, who tried to cash a Bank of America check written by his wife to him. He took the check to a BoA branch, presented two forms of picture ID, and was prevented from cashing the check because he couldn't provide a thumbprint. The manager refused to accommodate Valdez, suggesting that he open an account if he wanted to cash the check. We've written before about consumers' discomfort about having to...

Note: The following text is a quote: Bryan Resident Sentenced to Prison for Bank Fraud HOUSTON—Mohammad Ghafrullah Choudhry, aka Muhammad Ullah, a Pakistani national and resident of Bryan, Texas, was sentenced to 10 months' imprisonment for bank fraud, United States Attorney Tim Johnson and FBI Special Agent in Charge Richard C. Powers announced today. Convicted in June 2009 after pleading guilty to bank fraud, Choudhry, 46, was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Melinda Harmon. In June, Choudhry admitted to using the name Muhammad Ullah and a fraudulently acquired Social Security number to open credit card accounts with five banks—JP...

That's the supposition from this WAPO article. Today, the biggest of those banks are even bigger. The crisis may be turning out very well for many of the behemoths that dominate U.S. finance. A series of federally arranged mergers safely landed troubled banks on the decks of more stable firms. And it allowed the survivors to emerge from the turmoil with strengthened market positions, giving them even greater control over consumer lending and more potential to profit.

Last September, as Wall Street turned to rubble and panic threatened to come unleashed, Ken Lewis, the CEO of Bank of America, agreed to swallow one of the country’s most toxic investment houses. The deal was not altogether voluntary; as details have slowly emerged, the coercive role of the Fed and Treasury has loomed larger. What exactly happened in the weeks leading up to the merger? Did the deal save us all from economic apocalypse? And what does the government’s unprecedented role in it portend for the future of our economy? It’s been almost a year since Bank of America...

The Securities and Exchange Commission accused Bank of America on Monday of misleading investors about plans to pay billions of dollars in bonuses at Merrill Lynch, the troubled brokerage giant it bought last year. The development once again turns an uncomfortable spotlight on a defining moment of the financial crisis — the ill-starred merger of Bank of America and Merrill — and on Bank of America’s embattled chief executive, Kenneth D. Lewis. The $50 billion merger, completed at the behest of federal officials, has been the subject of heated hearings in Congress, as has the question of who knew what,...

As a columnist for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the newspaper of record for Broward County, Michael Mayo is a fairly astute fellow. But that hasn’t made him immune to credit card issuers pulling the rug from under him. This past April he posted the following tale of personal woe: “I got a letter from Bank of America the other day. The fine folks at Bank of America wanted to let me know that they were raising my credit card interest rates. Currently, the card has an 8.9 percent fixed annual rate on purchases. I have a credit line of...

WILMETTE | Home on auction block carries hefty back-tax burden A property tax bill of more than $200,000. That's the added cost that awaits whoever comes out on top in next month's auction of the foreclosed Wilmette mansion of convicted influence-peddler Tony Rezko. Records show Rezko stopped paying real estate taxes on the 8,400-square-foot mansion more than four years ago. He owes a total of $140,409.86 in back property taxes, plus $69,402.24 in interest. The new owner will have to pay that, says Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas. Rezko stopped paying the taxes around the same time he stopped paying...

n prepared remarks for a Congressional hearing obtained today by ABC News, former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson admits telling Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis that the Federal Reserve could remove the bank's board members if they backed out of their proposed merger with Merrill Lynch last December. In prepared remarks for a Congressional hearing obtained Wednesday by ABC News, former Treasury... (AP Graphics) On Thursday morning, Paulson will defend his actions before the House Oversight Committee in the last of three hearings that the panel has conducted on the controversial merger. When Bank of America considered scuttling the merger...

The Federal Reserve sought to hide its extensive involvement and concerns about Bank of America's acquisition of Merrill Lynch amid the latter's worsening financial condition, a top Republican congressman said on Wednesday. "The committee has already learned that Ben Bernanke and the Federal Reserve made inappropriate threats to fire Bank of America management unless they went ahead with the 'shotgun wedding' that was the Merrill Lynch acquisition," Rep. Darrell Issa of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said in a statement released to Reuters. "The Federal Reserve also engaged in a cover-up and deliberately hid concerns and pertinent details...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Bank of America, Verizon, Chipotle and other companies have pulled advertising from a Sacramento radio station after talk show hosts referred to transgender people as "freaks" with mental disorders. During a May 28 show, one of the three hosts on KRXQ's "Rob, Arnie & Dawn" show said he would hit his son with his shoe if he put on high heels. Another said he would tell a boy he was "a little idiot" if he asked to wear a dress. Officials with Bank of America Corp. and Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. said Friday their companies pulled...

NEW YORK (AP) -- Bank of America Corp. stock rose in premarket trading after an initial decline, amid reports that it needs $34 billion in new capital.

The financial world seems upside down to me. On the day it was leaked that Wells Fargo, Citigroup, and Bank of America had failed their stress tests each of their stocks was up. The market was up nearly three percent. That day, the leak said that six banks had failed their stress tests. Today, that number rose to ten and the market was down just slightly.

CNBC's Steve Liesman has always gone after tea party inspiration and network floor reporter Rick Santelli for his views, but this time it was Santelli playing offense. The CNBC "Power Lunch" crew was discussing Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) CEO Ken Lewis and disclosure of details surrounding his bank's acquisition of Merrill Lynch May 5. Santelli accused Liesman, CNBC's senior economics reporter of saying "dumb things" and acting like Nixon, when he suggested there could be a compelling reason for Lewis was not forthcoming about the acquisition. "Ask the question in a more compelling way which is - I want you...

Listening to Rep. Barney Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, we get a sense of the "new capitalism" our new Democratic leadership tells us America needs. Frank recently praised Bank of America chairman (now ex-chairman) Ken Lewis for acting in "the public interest" for caving in to bribes and threats from former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke regarding B of A's takeover of Merrill Lynch. Lewis wanted to back out the deal last year when he discovered the massive scope of Merrill's losses. But Paulson and Bernanke decided that Merrill shouldn't fail, so...

The cavalier use of brute government force has become routine, but the emerging story of how Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke forced CEO Ken Lewis to blow up Bank of America is still shocking. It's a case study in the ways that panicky regulators have so often botched the bailout and made the financial crisis worse.

No one at the Federal Reserve advised Bank of America chief Kenneth Lewis on any disclosure issues, Fed spokeswoman Michelle Smith said on Thursday. "No one at the Federal Reserve advised Ken Lewis or Bank of America on any questions of disclosure," Smith said in an e-mail responding to a question. "It has long been the Federal Reserve's view that questions of this nature are best addressed by individual institutions and their legal counsel, as they are in a position to understand clearly their obligations and responsibilities." New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said on Thursday that Lewis was pressured...

The integrity of the government's bailout actions are called into question by a new report. There's a lot at stake. A new report by the New York Attorney General says that government officials bullied Bank of America Chief Ken Lewis into accepting a merger with Merrill Lynch--then ordered him to keep mum about losses at Merrill. What's at stake? The integrity of the government's bailout actions, for one. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's reputation, for another. And of course Lewis' job. Thursday, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo released documents charging that in December former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson pressured...

Bank of America Chairman and CEO Kenneth Lewis testified under oath in New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's investigation in February. During the testimony, Mr. Lewis told prosecutors that then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke instructed him to keep silent about deepening financial difficulties at Merrill Lynch. In a letter today to members of Congress and the head of Securities and Exchange Commission, Mr. Cuomo called into question the transparency of the decision making in the process. Here are highlights from the transcript. Here, Mr. Lewis testifies about when he learned of Merrill's deepening losses: Mr....

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and then-Treasury Department chief Henry Paulson pressured Bank of America Corp. to not discuss its increasingly troubled plan to buy Merrill Lynch & Co. -- a deal that later triggered a government bailout of BofA -- according to testimony by Kenneth Lewis, the bank's chief executive.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Banks nationwide hold $41 billion in loans to directors, top executives and other insiders, a portfolio that experts say should be stripped of secrecy. Insider lending to directors is particularly troublesome because it could cloud the judgment of people charged with protecting shareholders and overseeing bank management, the experts say. At Charlotte-based Bank of America, those loans more than doubled last year, to $624.2 million — the biggest dollar jump in the country. The largest of them likely went to three directors or their companies. The surge came during the third quarter as credit markets froze, the...

AT a flail-and-wail House hearing last month, California Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters melted down in front of big banking CEOs. "Raise your hand! Raise your hand!" she shrieked as she harangued the executives on their business practices and management of federal bailout money. Sneering at the "captains of the universe," whom she refused to address by name ("You, Bank of America!"), Waters excoriated the corporate heads for their greed. "All of my political life," she bragged, "I have been in disagreement with the banking and mostly financial-services community because of practices that I have believed to be not in the...