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Originally posted by helltick
at least if you invest in crack...you get the crack, now can we say the same for your 401k?
Government and Organized Crime, A History of Co-existence
Throughout history, there has been constant struggle, but also connection
between governments and organized crime. In addition, many world famous
political and military leaders have been accused of running their countries
like criminal organizations, for instance: Joseph Stalin,* *Adolf Hitler, Mao
Zedong, Nicolae Ceausescu, Idi Amin Dada, Manuel Antonio Noriega Moreno,
Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte, among others. Top government
politicians are believed to grow enormous wealth by running a kleptrocracy, a
government that extends the personal wealth and political power of
government officials and the ruling class at the expense of the population.
Organized Crime, The CIA and the Savings and Loan Scandal
The savings and loan scandal of the 1980s has been depicted in a myriad of ways. To some, it is "the greatest ... scandal in American history" (Thomas, 1991: 30). To others it is the single greatest case of fraud in the history of crime (Seattle Times, June 11, 1991). Some analysts see it as the natural result of the ethos of greed promulgated by the Reagan administration (Simon and Eitzen, 1993: 50). And to some it was a premeditated conspiracy to move covert funds out of the country for use by the U.S. Intelligence Agency (Bainerman, 1992: 275). All of these depictions of the S & L scandal contain elements of truth. But to a large degree, the savings and loan scandal was simply business as usual. What was unusual about it was not that it happened, or who was involved, but that it was so blatant and coarse a criminal act that exposure became inevitable. But with its exposure, three basic but usually ignored "truths" about organized crime were once again demonstrated with startlingly clarity:
a veteran of CIA counter-espionage activities, was instructed to offer the Mafia $150,000 to kill Fidel Castro. The advantage of employing the Mafia for this work is that it provided CIA with a credible cover story. The Mafia were known to be angry with Castro for closing down their profitable brothels and casinos in Cuba. If the assassins were killed or captured the media would accept that the Mafia were working on their own.