Free Republic

For some the spectacle of Goldman Sachs' profits triggers awe; for others, many others, it's triggering an intense spate of ire. On Comedy Central's Daily Show, Jon Stewart asked Rep. Barney Frank, "What are these Goldman Sachs guys going to do next, dip their [private parts] in gold?" Rolling Stone charges that Goldman Sachs created the dot-com, housing and commodity bubbles. Other headlines scream "Government Sachs" about the high posts in government held formerly by ex-Goldman Sachs bigwigs Hank Paulson and Bob Rubin, and currently by New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine and New York Federal Reserve Bank President William Dudley....

The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it's everywhere. The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money. In fact, the history of the recent financial crisis, which doubles as a history of the rapid decline and fall of the suddenly swindled dry American empire, reads like a Who's Who of Goldman Sachs graduates.

THE MONEY MACHINE THAT IS GOLDMAN SACHS is humming again just a few quarters after the firm's existence was briefly in doubt following Lehman Brothers' collapse. Goldman last week reported $3.4 billion in net income for the second quarter, its strongest showing ever. Stripping out a one-time preferred dividend related to the firm's repayment of its $10 billion government TARP investment, Goldman earned $5.71 a share, up from $4.58 in the second quarter of 2008. -snip - Goldman isn't the bargain it was then when the stock traded under 100, but it could rise to $175 to $200 in -snip-...

In yet another move to make a mockery of so-called market transparency, and again with mad props to Zerohedge, we have this: The Exchange has filed with the SEC to implement the decommissioning of the DPTRrequirement following the July 10, 2009 trade date. Accordingly, the last required submission of the DPTR will be on July 14, 2009, which is the second business day after the last trade date for which the DPTR is required. Go read the entire Zerohedge article; what this means, in short, is that the ability of people (like you and I) to see the fact that...

SEATTLE (AP) — The Association of Trial Lawyers of America voted during its convention this week to change its name to the American Association for Justice. Spokeswoman Chris Mather said there was overwhelming support for the change, and that the new name "reflects whose side we're on in the fight for justice." The U.S. Chamber Institute for Legal Reform, a critic of the trial lawyers group, called it "an astounding admission of the unpopularity of trial lawyers in America." The 60-year-old association has 65,000 members.

Greedy American Trial Lawyers to Increase South African Poverty Through Apartheid Lawsuits That Will Only Make Them Rich America's 34-million African-Americans should be outraged by the campaign of economic blackmail that a handful of profit-driven personal injury lawyers are waging against the financially beleaguered Republic of South Africa. Against the expressed wishes of the revered Nelson Mandela and President Thabo Mbeki, the lawyers are filing class-action lawsuits in courts against U.S. corporations who did business in South Africa during apartheid - unjustly claiming that their mere presence in the country aided and abetted that nation's racist government. In fact, the...