Just 12 days before the 2008 economic meltdown, several members of Congress pulled their money out of the stock market.

[link to www.newsforage.com]


In 2011, a CBS investigation blew the lid off of one of Washington’s most poorly-kept secrets: members of Congress were routinely exploiting legal loopholes to engage in insider trading and line their own pockets — a criminal offense for regular citizens. In the ensuing public outrage, Congress passed a law called the STOCK Act, and took a loud victory lap for supposedly putting an end to their own unscrupulous behavior.
Now that they think nobody’s watching, Congress has gutted a key disclosure provision of the STOCK Act. Worse still, the House Counsel’s Office, led by Speaker John Boehner’s handpicked lawyer, is actively stonewalling the first ever investigation into Congressional insider trading by claiming “immunity” from the very law they bragged about passing just a few years earlier.
The only reason the STOCK Act passed in the first place was due to a massive public outcry. Unless there’s another wave of public outrage, Congress will continue to flaunt the rules and make it near-impossible to enforce the laws that are already in place.
This isn’t a scandal yet, but we can make it one — will you add your name to demand that John Boehner’s handpicked lawyer stops stonewalling
Insider Trading and the Stock Market Crash
Just 12 days before the 2008 economic meltdown, several members of Congress pulled their money out of the stock market. Congress had been forewarned about the impending economic bombshell in secret meetings with the Treasury Department and the Fed, and they used that information to move their personal funds out of the market at lightening speed. Meanwhile, millions of Americans lost their homes and their life savings.
The day after the meeting with the Treasury, at least 10 senators made trades to protect their financial interests, while Americans remained in the dark. Senator Shelley Capito (R-WV) and her husband dumped between $100,000 and $250,000 of Citigroup stock on the 18th of November 2008 at $83 per share. The next day Citi stock fell to $64 per share. Congressman Jim Moran jumped ship too, frantically trading stock in 90 different companies — his biggest trading day of the year.

Representative Spencer Bachus publicly tried to prevent the American economy from crashing — while privately betting it would. He cleverly arranged his portfolio so that if the American people lost, he would make a profit.
It’s appalling. Insider trading is a criminal offense for most Americans, but these trades were 100% legal for the members of Congress who used positions as “public servants” to turn a handsome profit for themselves...

Edited to 50%

Last Edited by Saddletramp on 10/27/2015 01:58 PM