Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

[don]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

from the UK Telegraph:

"Dominique Strauss-Kahn, managing director of the International Monetary Fund, has called for a new world currency that would challenge the dominance of the dollar and protect against future financial instability.....

He suggested adding emerging market countries' currencies, such as the yuan, to a basket of currencies that the IMF administers could add stability to the global system....Strauss-Kahn saw a greater role for the IMF's Special Drawing Rights, (SDRs) which is currently composed of the dollar, sterling, euro and yen, over time but said it will take a great deal of international cooperation to make that work." ("International Monetary Fund director Dominique Strauss-Kahn calls for new world currency", UK Telegraph)

Never, ever, consider context. Everything occurs in a vacuum, fresh and unexpected . . . . (I believe EJ addressed this MSM phenomenon long ago and far away.)

[c1ue]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

Options:

1. He did it. His arrest was a triumph of the rule of law over the arbitrary abuse of power by a prominent man.

2. He didn't do it. He is the victim of a crazy accusation.

3. He didn't do it, and is the victim of a massive conspiracy aimed at taking control of the IMF/ France by perverting the course of justice.

4. He did it, but #3 still applies.

Take your pick, I'm all in favor of presumption of innocence and I didn't think badly of DSK but I'm hoping for #1. I'll take #2 in a pinch. I'm still an optimist. Anything but more of #3/#4.

You forgot #5:

He's been doing it for years, but until now hadn't come up against a bankster with superior connections (Geithner) who also wanted a piece of DSK.

[don]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

The police and the prostitute media have made it impossible for Dominique Strauss-Kahn to get a fair trial. From the moment of the announcement that he had been arrested on suspicion of sexually assaulting a hotel maid, and before he was ever indicted, the accounts given by the police were designed to create the impression that the director of the International Monetary Fund was guilty. For example, the police told the media, which duly regurgitated to the public, that Strauss-Kahn was in such a hurry to flee the scene of the crime that he left behind his cell phone. The police also put out the story that by calling airlines and demanding passenger lists, they managed to catch the fleeing rapist just as his plane was departing for France.

A New York judge denied Strauss-Kahn bail on the basis of police misrepresentation that he was apprehended fleeing the country.

Once he was imprisoned, the police announced that Strauss-Kahn was on suicide watch, which is a way of suggesting to the public that the accused rapist might take his own life in order to avoid the public humiliation of a guilty verdict from a jury.

But what really happened, assuming one can learn anything from press reports, is that Strauss-Kahn, upon arriving at JFK airport for his scheduled flight, discovered that he did not have his cell phone and telephoned the hotel, the scene of the alleged crime. It boggles the mind that anyone could possibly think that a person fleeing from his crime would call the scene of the crime, ask about his left behind cell phone, and tell them where he was.

Then in rapid succession, reeking of orchestration, a French woman steps forward and declares that a decade ago she was nearly raped by Strauss-Kahn. This was followed by Kristin Davis, the Manhattan Madam of the prostitute who did in Eliot Spitzer before he could get the banksters on Wall Street, stepping forward to announce that one of her call girls refused to service Strauss-Kahn a second time because he was too rough in the act.

With hunting season opened, any woman whose career would benefit from publicity, or whose bank account would bless a damage award, can now step forward and claim to have been a victim or near victim of Strauss-Kahn.

This is not to deny that Strauss-Kahn might have an inordinate appetite for sex that did him in. It is to say that long before a jury hears from the maid, or from a prosecutor speaking for the maid “who is too traumatized to appear in court,” the jury has been programmed with the verdict that he is guilty.

Why would he run away if he didn’t do it?

Look at all the women he has accosted!

You get the picture.

I have written about the anomalies of the case. One of the most striking is the confirmed reports in the French and British press that a political activist for French President Sarkozy, Jonathan Pinet, tweeted the news of Strauss-Kahn’s arrest to Arnaud Dassier, a spin doctor for Sarkozy, before the news was announced by the New York police.

Pinet’s explanation for how he was the first to know is that a “friend” in the Sofitel Hotel, where the alleged crime took place, told him. Is it merely a coincidence that the men assigned the task of removing the Strauss-Kahn threat to French President Sarkozy’s re-election had a clued-in friend in the Sofitel Hotel? Did the police clue-in the “friend” before they made the public announcement? If so, why?

What bothers me about the Strauss-Kahn affair is that if the police have evidence that supports their insistence on his guilt, it is pointless for the police to set Strauss-Kahn up in the media. Generally, set-ups like this occur only when there is no evidence or when the evidence has to be fabricated and cannot withstand examination.

As a person who had a Washington career, I find other aspects of the case disturbing. Strauss-Kahn had emerged as a threat to the establishment. Polls showed that as the socialist candidate, he was the odds-on favorite to defeat the American candidate, Sarkozy, in the upcoming French presidential election. Perhaps it was only electoral posturing to help defeat Sarkozy, but Strauss-Kahn indicated that he intended to move the International Monetary Fund away from its past policy of making the poor pay for the mistakes of the rich. He spoke of strengthening collective bargaining, and of restructuring mortgages, tax and spending policies in order that the economy would serve ordinary people in addition to the banksters. Strauss-Kahn said that regulation needed to be restored to financial markets and implied that a more even distribution of income was required.

These remarks, together with a likely win over Sarkozy in the French election, made Strauss-Kahn a double-barreled challenge to the establishment. The third strike against him was the recent IMF report that said China would surpass the US as the world’s first economy within five years. http://www.marketwatch.com/story/imf...end-2011-04-25

People who haven’t spent their professional life in Washington may not understand the threat to Washington that is in the IMF report. Whether deserved or not, the IMF has a lot of credibility. By placing China as the number one economic power by the end of the next US presidential term, the IMF thrust a dagger through the heart of American hegemony. Washington’s power is based on America’s economic supremacy. The IMF report said that this supremacy was at its end.

This kind of announcement tells the political world that, as the headline read, “the age of America is over.” For the first time in decades, other countries can see the prospect of escaping from US domination. They don’t have to be puppet states, part of the hegemonic empire. They see the prospect of serving their own people and their own interests instead of those of Washington. European countries, for example, forced to fight for Washington in Afghanistan and Libya, see light at the end of the tunnel. They can now think about refusing.

Although rich and a member of the establishment, and independently of his behavior toward women, Strauss-Kahn made the mistake of revealing that he might have a social conscience. Either this social conscience or the hubris of power led him to challenge American supremacy. This is an unforgivable crime for which he is being punished.

My friend, Alexander Cockburn, an intelligent and civilized person who is derided by right-wingers as a communist, lacks my experience of Washington. Consequently, he thinks that the facts will come out, although he seems to prefer that they come out on the side of the maid and not Strauss-Kahn.

If Alex were the Bolshevik he is said to be, he would know that no high-ranking figure who was serving the establishment would be destroyed on the basis of the word of an immigrant maid living in a sub-let apartment in a building for aids victims.
The very notion that the US establishment craves justice to this extent is a total absurdity. Americans are so indifferent to injustice that the American public shrugs off the hundreds of thousands and millions of women, children, and village elders who are murdered, maimed, dispossessed, and displaced by the US military in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Libya, Somalia, and wherever Washington and the military/security complex, while feeding on power and profit, can claim to be protecting Americans from “terrorists” or bringing democracy to the heathen.

The American criminal justice system is riddled with wrongful convictions and stinks of injustice. The US has a much higher rate of incarceration than alleged authoritarian regimes, such as China, and routinely destroys the lives of young people, and even mothers of small children, for using drugs.

Strauss-Kahn’s indictment serves emotional needs of conservatives, left-wingers, and feminists as well as establishment agendas. Conservatives don’t like the French, because they did not support the US invasion of Iraq. The left-wing doesn’t like rich white guys and IMF officials, and feminists don’t like womanizers. But even if the government’s case falls apart in the courtroom, Strauss-Kahn has been removed from the French presidential race and from the IMF. This, not justice for an immigrant, is what the case is all about.

Many Americans are unable to comprehend that authorities would remove a threat with a frame-up. But far worst has occurred. Francesco Cossiga, a former President of Italy, revealed that many of the bombings in Europe during the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, which were blamed on communists, were in fact “false flag” operations carried out by the CIA and Italian intelligence in order to scare voters away from the communist party. Cossiga’s revelations resulted in a parliamentary investigation in which intelligence operative Vincenzo Vinciguerra stated: “You had to attack civilians, the people, women, children, innocent people, unknown people far removed from any political game. The reason was quite simple: to force the public to turn to the state to ask for greater security.”

If democratic governments will murder innocents for political reasons, why wouldn’t they frame someone? Whether innocent or guilty, Strauss-Kahn has been framed in advance of his trial.

Paul Craig Roberts

Intense sexual appetites are an extension of the “culture” of an avaricious financial world. Illegal sex and Wall Street (or in La Defense, France’s financial district) has long been linked, writes Heidi Moore:

“This is all a reminder that the financial district hasn’t always been gleaming skyscrapers and Starbucks.

Consider this passage from City of Eros: New York City, Prostitution, and the Commercialization of Sex, 1790-1920: “Adjacent to the Wall Street business district, prostitutes worked in saloons along Greenwich Street, taking men upstairs. In addition, immediately south of Wall Street was the Battery Tender- loin, on Whitehall Street. The Water Street area, however, remained the most significant and poorest waterfront zone of prostitution. Amid the rookeries, rat pits and dance halls, prostitutes exposed in each window to the public view plied their trade.”

In the modern era, many of the street’s most macho traders are, according to David Russell who worked in the industry for two decades, known as “swinging dicks.” It is well known that the big money in Wall Street has kept a vibrant, upscale sex industry alive and well.

Loretta Napoleoni, an Italian author, who worked on Wall Street for years, offers a provocative thesis for how the need for paid sex “on the wild side” became part of the culture of irresponsibility.

“I can tell you that this is absolutely true because being a woman, having worked in finance 20 years ago I could tell you that even at that time – when the market was not going up so much – these guys, all they talk is sex.”

She complemented her personal experience by citing a study by researchers from Oxford University.

“The study discovered, that an excessive production of testosterone, in a period of fantastic financial exuberance, creates a sort of confusion. It is what people in sports call ‘being in the zone,’ which means you get in a certain situation where you feel that you will always win. That you are infallible.”

“They feel entitled to take part in risky behavior?” I pressed.

“High-risk behavior. It’s similar to what they do on a daily basis. They invest millions and millions of dollars and there is a great risk involved with that. The same is true with using the services of a prostitute. Obviously there are great health risks; their relationship is in great danger if they are using the services of a prostitute.

“A lot of people skate on the excitement, on that euphoric rush.” The culture of risk on Wall Street was intoxicating to many in the same way that gamblers become addicted or report a rush when they are winning.

The euphoria of life in the fast lane often implodes when one’s luck runs out leading to depression and family breakups.

Some of Dr. Albert’s clients coped with the pressures on them to perform in kinkier ways.

“.... they just want to let loose, relax and take a very passive role in their sexual practice. So they may seek out the services of a dominatrix, where they are at the mercy of this sex worker. I’ve had clients who seek out services where they get whipped, cuffed, put on a leash like a dog.”

Beating others can also be part of this culture. There is violence lurking to the surface that can easily erupt when desires are denied.

When people are highly stressed, they are prone to making mistakes. The agencies shadowing them know that, and from time to time encourage it or just wait for the opportunity to help them bring themselves down.

What needs to be examined is how the crimes of the rich and powerful are treated. Bush’s bombing or Geithner’s tax maneuvers were ignored.

But when sex is involved, all bets are off.

Sex scandals have become a staple of media exploitation with personal morality plays trumping political morality confrontations every time.

They are both great distractions and effective tools of character assassination which are often more effective than more violent ways to neutralize people considered dangerous..

That’s why the FBI was so hot to discredit Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. with leaks of so-called wiretapped sex tapes.

In some cases both tactics are deployed as in the physical assassination of Bin Laden and then the character-killing aimed at his supporters through the release of porn allegedly found in his “lair.”

Danny Schechter

[Shakespear]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

Then in rapid succession, reeking of orchestration, a French woman steps forward and declares that a decade ago she was nearly raped by Strauss-Kahn. This was followed by Kristin Davis, the Manhattan Madam of the prostitute who did in Eliot Spitzer before he could get the banksters on Wall Street, stepping forward to announce that one of her call girls refused to service Strauss-Kahn a second time because he was too rough in the act.

Someone on Broadway must be writing these "plays". I bet this will be a movie in no time, but who will star Khan?

[jk]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

Someone on Broadway must be writing these "plays". I bet this will be a movie in no time, but who will star Khan?

dustin hoffman.

[Shakespear]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

Good choice !!!

[don]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

Excellent choice! Dustin was one of the original "ugly" leading men. Now he's just an older actor.

[jk]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

[llanlad2]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

German insurer Munich Re held orgy for salesmen

Right on cue.

One of the biggest insurance companies in the world held a party for salesmen where they were rewarded with the services of prostitutes.

'Whatever they liked'

There were about 100 guests and 20 prostitutes were hired.

A German business newspaper said the prostitutes had worn colour-coded arm-bands designating their availability, and the women had their arms stamped after each service rendered.

According to Handelsblatt, quoting an unnamed participant, guests were able to take the women to four-poster beds at the spa "and do whatever they liked".


"After each such encounter the women were stamped on the lower arm in order to keep track of how often each woman was frequented," the paper quoted the man as saying.

[seanm123]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

My choice would be De Niro. He can play the sinister charter traits that Hoffman never could.

[don]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

Dustin's screen forte is bumbling.

[jk]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

i can picture dustin playing a bit of a satyr.

[BigBagel]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

I highly doubt you are retired NYPD. I'm sorry, but unless the man had a gun to her head, there is no way anyone can be forced to perform fellatio.

But of course, there is the one issue that should clearly stick out to any police officer of this city. How many times in the past century has a white man raped a black woman within the city limits? Once? Twice?

That should make you take pause.

Now, the man is awful, and I'm thrilled that his arrest will pave the way for Le Front National to gain an even stronger voice - particularly as Khan is probably the most vocal figure for further dispossessing the French people of their homeland while protecting his own - but the story is simply bizarre as recounted.

I think this web site is going off the rails. Good luck everyone.

[jk]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

I think this web site is going off the rails. Good luck everyone.

don't let a couple of commenters who get on your nerves dissuade you from coming here. i've actually used the ignore feature twice in the 5 years i've been here, both in the last year. there have been many commenters whom i haven't especially respected, and whose posts i don't bother to read. but first one and then another member continually said things that i found so irritating that i felt almost compelled to respond. putting them on ignore was very soothing.

[swgprop]

Re: Head of IMF, DSK, pulled off plane, held by NYPD

don't let a couple of commenters who get on your nerves dissuade you from coming here. i've actually used the ignore feature twice in the 5 years i've been here, both in the last year. there have been many commenters whom i haven't especially respected, and whose posts i don't bother to read. but first one and then another member continually said things that i found so irritating that i felt almost compelled to respond. putting them on ignore was very soothing.

Seconded. Good for your blood pressure. Click on the offensive user's name, select "view profile", then "add to ignore list".