Bankrupt Detroit receives less U.S. aid than Colombia

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Bloomberg

Bankrupt Detroit receives less U.S. aid than Colombia
August 01, 2013 12:20 AM
By Chris Christoff, John McCormick

President Barack Obama proposed giving Colombia about $323 million in aid next year, mostly to combat drug trafficking and violence. Detroit, with an 81 percent higher homicide rate, will get $108.2 million. As Michigan’s largest city entered a record $18 billion municipal bankruptcy on July 18, the message from Congress and the White House was that no new money would be forthcoming.

Detroit’s implosion has rekindled debate over how and whether a federal government that managed to provide more than $700 billion in aid to banks and automakers in 2008 and 2009 should help cities with unsustainable retirement debt, hollowed-out tax bases and diminished services that endanger the public. From 1990 to 2010, the percentage of the U.S. population that lives in urban areas grew to 81 percent from 75 percent, according to Census Bureau figures.

“The consequences for the failure of a whole set of great American cities is not limited to the people who live in those places,” said U.S. Representative Dan Kildee, a 54-year-old Democrat from nearby Flint, another former auto-industry center.

The federal government didn’t rescue the predecessors of General Motors Co., Chrysler Group LLC or failing banks until it was apparent their demise could sink the economy. Debt-ridden cities pose a similar threat, Kildee said.


Read more: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/Business/International/2013/Aug-01/225834-bankrupt-detroit-receives-less-us-aid-than-colombia.ashx#ixzz2af918dlg

[navarth]

1. I must add

Dan Kildee is right.

[Octafish]

2. Thank you for an oustanding article.

Washington's interests:

Columbia has resources to extract, like petroleum and cocaine.

Detroit still has cars, but the robots are filling those openings.

Voters, like people in general, don't count.

[dipsydoodle]

3. What a perverse situation.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

4. Don't you get sick of articles pleading to the 1% to consider the effect on their bottom line?

[KansDem]

5. Well, we can combat drug trafficking without going to Columbia...

...mostly to combat drug trafficking...

Go after the Big Banks!

HSBC's 'Stunning Failures Of Oversight' Allowed Colombian Drug Traffickers To Launder Money

Drug cartels used complex scheme to launder money

* Smuggled dollars to Mexico, put them in HSBC accounts
* Ring bought U.S. consumer goods and exported to Colombia
* Colombian businessman Chaparro emerged as key player

By Carrick Mollenkamp and Brett Wolf

Dec 31 (Reuters) - When several Colombian men were indicted in January 2010 on money-laundering charges, the case in Brooklyn federal court drew little attention.

It looked like a bust of another nexus of drug traffickers and money launderers, with mainly small-time operatives paying the price for their crimes.

One of the men was Julio Chaparro, a 48-year-old father of four who owned three factories that made children's clothing in Colombia.

But to U.S. authorities the case was anything but ordinary. Chaparro, prosecutors alleged, helped run a money-laundering ring for drug traffickers that took advantage of lax controls at UK-based international banking group HSBC Holdings Plc. It was one of the most important leads for U.S. investigators pursuing a case against the bank that eventually led to a $1.9 billion settlement on Dec. 11.

--more--
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/02/hsbc-money-laundering-colombian-drug-traffickers_n_2395167.html

Seize the assets under forfeiture and seizure laws, then arrest the CEOs and put them in prison...

No need to truck the money down to Columbia (probably disappear in several pockets on the way, kind of like the $10 billion that disappeared from pallets sitting on an Iraq airfield).

[jtuck004]

6. Incredible. More afraid of people hauling coca leaves around on their burros in the jungle, and

of pot-smoking cancer patients in Tacoma, than they are of the consequences of an entire American city going belly up. And it won't be the last one.

So a future with resources tilted towards a silly war they can't win, and not enough toward one that could turn around and improve the lives of millions of people without a single drone.

Screw the hungry kids and people without self-respect or jobs, as long as we can fly around in helicopters and harass brown people and the infirm...

The flag - it's not for waving any more. Maybe better to just huddle under the damn thing, or hand them out as blankets to the homeless.

[Taitertots]

7. The most disgusting part about it is that aid to Detroit is being held up by...

People like Rand Paul, whose State gets 10 BILLION every year from the Federal Government. Enough per capita that Detroit would have a budget surplus next year if it received the same treatment.

[Wilms]

8. ^

[bvar22]

9. Priorities, Judi Lynn. PRIORITIES!!!

Now you KNOW that the Right Wing Death Squad Police State of Colombia
is one of the FEW remaining US Puppet Governments holding the line against
all those Transparent Democracies breaking out in Latin America.

[font size=3]My GOD girl,[/font]
these emerging popular Democracies have successfully taken their governments BACK from the hands of the Global 1%,
and are using sacred Corporate Profits to help their poor, ignorant, sick, hungry, and homeless!!!!
Something like THAT could Catch On,
and THEN where would we be?????

Fuck Saving Detroit!
We need to SAVE South America from the "Anti-Free Market" infidels!
We are about to lose an entire CONTINENT!!!
Colombia is the last remaining barricade protecting the Global Ownership Class in South America!!!.
Thank gawd the Obama Administration just awarded government of Colombia and their 1% a Brand new FREE TRADE deal to keep the sacred NeoLiberal dogma of "Free Markets" ALIVE in South America.


Priorities, Judi Lynn. PRIORITIES!!!
We don't have the "save" Detroit.
The [font size=3]Giant Invisible Hand[/font] will do that just as soon as we get all those "Job Strangling Regulations off the backs of the Job Creators".
We need to SAVE [font size=3]Global Predatory Capitalism[/font]
BEFORE this Democracy shit catches on in the REST of the World.

[valerievb]

10. Setting a dangerous precedent

If the federal government bails out Detroit, then which city will be next? This city kept voting corrupt leaders into office and these leaders abused their positions. Corrupt leadership, overzealous union leaders, corporations overbuying bonds and never balancing a budget. Now after DECADES of neglect, exodus of businesses, citizens and a decay of the basic services; we, the rest of the nation, should come to the rescue? How do we know that if we do, that the bailout will not be squandered just like it was by the banks; rewarding poor leadership and continuing on the same course that brought them to bankruptcy? Let them file bankruptcy, remove the so-called leadership and replace it with someone who actually cares and will make the tough decisions. Maybe the benefits need to be cut; if these citizens love their city so much then they need to sacrifice to help save it BEFORE the rest of us come running to their rescue. It was partly their greed that helped to put Detroit in bankruptcy so they need to make changes from within to fix it. Everyone is hollering about entitlements and the government just giving handouts; now when the government doesn't want to do that they are criticized. WTH?! We also need to cut foreign aid but not so we can set up a fund for bailing out bankrupt cities. Detroit will just be the first one. Then what happens when a STATE becomes bankrupt?? How close has California come over the years? If we bail out Detroit today, it will be another city tomorrow and then a state down the road. I for one do not want to shoulder that burden.

[The Magistrate]

11. You A Funny Little Lady, Ma'am, Yes You Are

"Bless his heart, but his brain could roll around on a pin-head like a pea on a four lane highway."

[SunSeeker]

12. LOL!

[Judi Lynn]

13. Accurate image, no doubt about it! Will have a hard time forgetting it. n/t

[Wednesdays]

14. I'm really glad you are doing just fine.

And the 700,000 or so Detroiters can just burn in hell, right down to the tiniest infant, since they all asked for it.

There are plenty of prisons and workhouses to take care of those vermin, yup. Rush and Beck tell us so.

[Electric Monk]

16. Yeah, that's it. Detroit's problem was the people were just too greedy.

http://billmoyers.com/2013/07/31/on-vultures-and-red-wings-billionaire-gets-new-sports-arena-in-bankrupt-detroit/

The headline juxtaposition boggles the mind. You have, on one day, “Detroit Files Largest Municipal Bankruptcy in History.” Then on the next, you have “Detroit Plans to Pay For New Red Wings Hockey Arena Despite Bankruptcy.”

Yes, the very week Michigan Governor Rick Snyder granted a state-appointed emergency manager’s request to declare the Motor City bankrupt, the Tea Party governor gave a big thumbs-up to a plan for a new $650 million Detroit Red Wings hockey arena. Almost half of that $650 million will be paid with public funds.

This is actually happening.

[JDPriestly]

18. Detroit is failing because the management of our auto industry did not build small cars like those

built in Japan and Europe. They just did not build cars that got good gas mileage until very, very late.

And then, we allowed cars to be imported from countries like Japan, Korea and Germany with no or very low import taxes.

So, lack of good management in the auto industry and a free trade philosophy that killed our industry did in Detroit.

If we want to improve our American economy, we need to end our trade agreements and impose taxes on imports.

We in California have a surplus in our budget now. Why? Because we voted to increase our taxes. And what has happened? More jobs, and a better state. But before we could vote to increase our taxes, we had to elect a Democratic governor and Democratic majorities in both houses.

California got into trouble thanks to a series of Republican governors who refused to raise taxes and instead borrowed and borrowed and borrowed. We now have a governor and legislature that work to balance our budget. And the people of California are willing to pay higher taxes because we know that the Democrats leading our state will spend our money wisely.

As for the foreign aid to Columbia and with much if not almost all of our foreign aid, it is mostly in the form of military and police equipment. It isn't helpful to ordinary people. Our foreign aid is a joke. Even when it is supposedly intended to help people in other countries, it is often a poor fit, and just used to reward corrupt companies that buy influence here and abroad.

By the way, rural areas get huge farm subsidies that help keep their economies afloat. Why shouldn't urban areas in real need?

[Union Scribe]

19. "Everyone is hollering about entitlements and the government just giving handouts"

I think you wandered onto the wrong board madam.

[MichiganVote]

21. And Columbia and all the other places on earth we bail out are virtuous?

[The Wizard]

22. As I vaguely recall

crooked banks got bailed out and upper management was rewarded with bonuses for failure, all paid for with taxpayer dollars. But that was mostly pure white people.

[Peace Patriot]

15. "$323 million in aid"??? Hell, we gave Colombia $7 BILLION to kill trade unionists and...

...other advocates of the poor and to brutally displace FIVE MILLION peasant farmers from their lands--all prep for U.S. "free trade for the rich"!

And that's the money that we KNOW ABOUT.

We're not talking this stinking pittance that could bail out ten U.S. cities or a hundred school systems--a mere $323 million. We're talking BILLIONS for this payoff: U.S. "free trade for the rich" in the blood-soaked, CLEARED field of Colombia.

This is so corrupt as to be beyond belief--that the U.S. government is giving hundreds of millions MORE to Colombia--where, in fact, the murders of labor leaders and others are still occurring, still with impunity, and the chief perpetrator of all this horror, Alvaro Uribe, is still running around free, lecturing students at Harvard and Georgetown, though over a hundred of his closest associates are under investigation or already in jail for ties to the death squads, for drug trafficking, for vast illegal domestic spying and other crimes, with the chief perps HERE--Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld--still running around free as well and, from time to time, spewing garbage out of their mouths for our edification.

We need to understand this FOR WHAT IT IS--a Democratic/Republican one-two, where the Pukes get away with murder, many MANY murders, and mindboggling theft and corruption, then our Democrats clean up after them--cover it all up, immunize them all--and proceed with the corporate/1%-er STAGE-TWO PROFITEERING, as now, in Colombia, with the labor unions decapitated, on our "dime," and hundreds of other advocates of the poor murdered, and five million peasant farmers cleared off the lands, NOW we get--and they get--U.S. "free trade for the rich."

To Hell with the people of Detroit! That's what this $323 million following AT LEAST $7 BILLION in visible money to Colombia MEANS. Our transglobal corporate rulers and war profiteers have abandoned the country and the people who spawned them--who made it possible for them to become transglobal corporations and war looters--with our labor, with the infrastructure WE paid for, with the educational systems WE created, with the political, legal and economic stability that we established with our blood, sweat and tears, with our children as their cannon fodder, with our pensions, and Social Security, and our HOMES, and our small savings, and everything we have paid into as THEIR SPECULATIVE CAPITAL, and with the tax breaks and legal breaks and advantages of every kind that we--lamentably--permitted our bastard politicians to give them.

It is abominable. They are saying to hell with all of us and it's difficult to even know who "they" are because they are an OCTOPUS, with an oily head and venomous killing tentacles EVERYWHERE, in every aspect of our lives and in every government agency and every political body. They even control the voting machines in our deeply, deeply corrupted and privatized voting system, so they can parade total assholes before us and claim that we voted for them!

That's where I think we should start, Detroit and America: the 'TRADE SECRET' voting machines, now 75% controlled by ONE, PRIVATE, FAR RIGHTWING-CONNECTED corporation (ES&S, which bought out Diebold). Can't have a democracy without vote counting in the PUBLIC VENUE. Can't even begin baby step reforms. It's all blockaded.

[DeSwiss]

17. This is how Police States operate.....

...when they favor only those who have something of value to the State.

- And more importantly, those who they see with a future......

K&R

[center][/center]

[madrchsod]

20. if the feds gave money to detroit the overseers would steal it.

unless the federal government sets up shop in detroit and handles the money i would`t give any of those thieves a penny.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

28. ... as opposed to Colombia?

... where, I'm sure, all the money goes for "good".

edit to add: but yes, there should be Federal control and oversight, whether in Colombia or Detroit or Afghanistan or ...

[ctsnowman]

23. K & R

[daleo]

24. They want to stiff Detroit's pension holders

As a precedent for other pension thefts. That's the major scam for the future.

[indypaul]

25. Which is the biggest problem for Detroit?

The $19 to $30 thousand dollar a year pensioner or the $1.4 billion reportedly
lost dealing in highly speculative interest-rate swap derivatives? Which of these
really caused the problems facing Detroit today and in years ahead? I realize
these are different times,however, recall the New York City situation in the 70's.
No one wanted to help them at that time either. There is just as much at stake
here and the solution wont be easy. However the state and federal governments
should bring forth a solution be that direct aid or loan guarantees but it must be done.

[Octafish]

32. +1

Thank you, indypaul. NYC didn't have to sell its art collection, either.

[soryang]

26. 18 billion is a BS number

it's the same kind of number used to say social security is in trouble. they call it an "unfunded obligation." these are payments that don't have to be paid for multiple years into the future and they're acting as if they are past due. Also the emergency manager has been running up the city's deficit by a factor of 2 to line his cronies pockets. I don't consider Bloomberg, the banksters' buddy, a reliable source on Detroit's budget problem.

[Pterodactyl]

27. Yeah! We should stop sending money to OTHER countries while we have economic problems right here!

[pampango]

29. And since we will always have economic problems, we should never send any help to others?

Pew: Tea Partyers are more likely than all other Americans to support reductions in foreign aid and the budget of the State Department (but not the Defense Department)

Americans who identify with the Tea Party movement are more likely than all other Americans to support reductions in foreign aid and the budget of the U.S. State Department. But they are less likely to back trimming military spending and anti-terrorism efforts. This may be because Tea Party sympathizers are generally more hawkish than their fellow countrymen.

About three-quarters of Americans believe that Washington should reduce the government’s budget deficit through a combination of spending cuts and tax increases, with the greater share coming from belt tightening, according to a mid-February Pew Research Center survey. But 57 percent of Tea Party leaning Republicans think all deficit reduction should come from spending cuts.

In particular, Tea Party sympathizers would like to see a cut back in aspects of American soft power. More than eight-in-ten would decrease aid to the world’s needy, compared with 43 percent of all other Americans who support such economizing. And 41 percent of Tea Party adherents would reduce the State Department’s budget.

But U.S. hard power continues to receive Tea Partyers’ backing. Only 15 percent want to cut the Pentagon’s budget (compared with 27 percent of all other Americans who favor such action) and just 13 percent support reducing spending on anti-terrorism defenses.

http://www.pewglobal.org/2013/03/04/will-budget-cuts-isolationism/

[Pterodactyl]

31. Only after we bail out all the troubled municipalities.

And after we solve racism.

[kelliekat44]

30. Yes, we love drug cartels more than poor minorities. nt