Will the Real Warren Buffett Stand Up?

I woke at 3:00 am and could not sleep so I skimmed over some articles, one about Wells Fargo's CEO and the circus produced by "lawmakers" to make it look like they were doing something about one of the largest frauds committed by a FDIC insured bank in US history, the largest bank in the world by market capitalization.

And I had this thought: Why was the largest shareholder, Warren Buffett, a virtual Demigod among his Rabid Republican Guard like shareholders and championed by the inbred, corrupt political establishment, not insisting the CEO, John Stumph, walk and those in charge of the divisions responsible for 5 YEARS of fraudulent activity be fired and criminally charged, and say all this publicly?  I will tell you why, because Buffett is nothing but a 21st Century Robber Barron with a very good PR team and, as I said, a rabid army of wealthy shareholders with big mouths, hence his Republican Guard, who will defend him as if he were deity.  I don't believe any Capitalist in history has ever been so revered.  This is the same guy who owns the largest legacy electric company in Nevada that managed to get the government in that state to decimate all laws that made solar power economical.  IN NEVADA!, one of the best states in the nation to use Solar Power.  Oh wait, but Buffett has a tremendous amount of his investments in industries that benefit from legacy power ruling as long as possible.  So this is natural behavior of an industrialist with deep pockets.  Be dammed those "citizens" in Nevada who remain slaves to fossil fuels and the wishes of industrialists who are determined to keep them there... But I digress.  You can look up the many other ways our Devine Buffett has acted exactly as he should being one of the largest pariahs of our extraordinarily dysfunctional, if not downright broken, "Capitalist" system.

Back to the point at hand here, Wells Fargo is a publicly traded bank that not only has a duty to make money for it's shareholders, but as a FDIC (Federally Insured) institution, responsible for maintaining the bank accounts ie; having a fiduciary duty, to protect the deposits of millions of CITIZENS of the United States and not act recklessly with their money. 

Anyone who has grown up here in the United States knows very well through direct experience or by watching the slow train wreck that has been orchestrated by the financial industry over the last 30+ years that all financial institutions in the US put the customer first for one reason, because you, the customer, is where they will steal as much money as possible, as many ways possible from you until you are down to a nickel, then they will take that to.  Financial institutions in the US are run by legal gangsters that not only get away with every kind of fraud their accountants and lawyers and bankers can dream up, but they are backstopped and insured by the American Public in so doing.  This is shown to be true over and over again, with huge losses and crashes and bailouts and fraud schemes dreamed up and orchestrated to the point of collapse about every 8 to 10 years. 

What Wells Fargo has done for a period of at least 5 years is reprehensible in any book.  Their actions from management down to the lowly sales / customer service employees on the front line who were under extreme pressure to "produce results" are criminal, no doubt.  It is criminal for an institution insured by the FDIC to commit fraud on it's customers accounts.  Period.  If you write a bad check or present a fraudulent bank statement in trying to get a loan, you can go to jail.  The flip side is no different.  If the any person, let alone the actual bank employees "creates" accounts without permission using the information of real people, this fraud is punishable by jail.  For the bank to have simply fired people over a 5 year period for actions that were criminal, and at the same time continued to act in a way that resulted in their employees, the people on the front line, and their supervisors, continuing this activity, those in charge at higher levels are just as guilty as those who committed the actual fraudulent acts.  They are more then an accessory, they are instigators of the crimes.

I don't know why lawmakers don't immediately call upon the Justice Department, the FBI and the SEC (knowing about this level of fraud, while painting a pristine image of your bank in your annual report is also fraud) and the Attorney General of the State of California, Wells Fargo's home state, to bring charges and prosecute this bank and those involved in these crimes... Immediately!

The squeamish, weak, corrupt legislators and leaders we have at nearly every level of our government are completely incapable of taking on large institutions when basically they all forget one thing:  If the services being provided by an institution are needed, then putting that institution out of business by prosecuting their leaders simply means other institutions will provide those services or new ones will rise up and assume the provision of services quite quickly in a dynamic capitalist system.  Look at what happened to Author Anderson back in 2002.  The fact that our government has become so corrupt and inbred they are incapable of doing anything to contain the abuse of the financial industry is an atrocity of magnanimous proportion in the US.  As I write this we, the United States, have lost nearly all credibility on the political front.  We have one of the most blatantly corrupt people to ever seek the highest office doing so with ease, a person who over two separate careers, a short 14 years, has managed to use her position to "raise" over $2 BILLION and fund a $250 million a year enterprise that produces nothing.  Irrespective of what her family does with this money, it is hard for a person of this level of corruption to turn around and have anything to say about the prime minister of Malaysia suddenly having $700 MILLION appear in his bank account or any other mass corruption / theft from public coffers that happens regularly around the world in nearly every deprived nation on the planet.

And so here we are.  No word from the largest shareholder, no surprise, we all know what Buffett really is.  No action by our government, no surprise, we know how corrupt and inbred they really are.  Nobody goes to jail, just some fines get paid, yea, the cost orchestrating another get rich scheme by the PIGS that run financial institutions in the US.  It's all good.

If I were you, I would write a letter to your legislator and senator and the Attorney General of California and the SEC and the FDIC and insist that action be taken now against this bank and prepare for a complete overthrow of it's leadership if not revoking it's banking charter and or breaking up the bank and offloading it to investors or just doing as was done with AT&T and making half a dozen smaller banks around the nation and an international division and letting the market work to do what it wishes with what's left.  Meanwhile the folks who oversaw the criminal activity should all be criminally charged.


Make them take a copy of "The Vision & Values of Wells Fargo" and read it daily until they are released.

If you have in excess of $250,000 in a Wells Fargo account, move the money to another bank so your money is insured.  I don't have money with Wells Fargo or I would just flat out close my accounts, I suggest you do the same.  Vote with your feet!