Free Republic

The recent series of multi-billion dollar acquisitions of chunks of major financial institutions like Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Blackstone Group and Bear Stearns by foreign governments, many of them authoritarian, nontransparent and unfriendly to the West--a buyout of America’s prime symbols of economic prowess--symbolizes not only our economic decline but also the emergence of sovereign wealth funds as power brokers in international relations. These government-owned investment funds, some controlled by oil rich autocrats and some by Asian powers like China and Singapore, are pouring billions into hedge funds, private equity funds, real estate, natural resources, media conglomerates and other...

SACRAMENTO - Despite state laws that require government officials to seek competitive bids on large purchases, internal documents reveal that state officials held a series of private meetings with General Motors during which they agreed to buy "flex-fuel" vehicles from the automaker - a month before a bid for such vehicles was ever issued. --snip-- Soon after, the state solicited bids to buy an entire fleet of flex-fuel vehicles designed to run on high-grade ethanol. General Motors dealerships won all of the contracts for ... 1,300 cars and trucks and $17 million in sales, because they were the only automaker...