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Health & Fitness

JP Morgan Chase has a history of corruption, so why should Evanston support them? Why should you?

This little piece of JP Morgan Chase history is only the tip of the iceberg.

JP Morgan Chase, along with Bank of America, Wachovia, and UBS has been involved in multiple schemes involving other banks, municipal officials and corrupt bid managers.  Currently poor people in Jefferson County Alabama have to choose whether to pay their heat bill or their water bill after Chase used auction-rate securities (ARS's are the kind of complex products Wall Street uses to get rich off the great unwashed) to restructure the county's debt incurred by a sewer project. Auction-rate securities cost many cities dearly during the 2008 melt down, along with other variable-rate bonds.  The ARS's and interest-rate swaps generated huge fees for the bank, many multiples of a normal fee environment.  Chase even paid Goldman and Rice Financial to withdraw from the competition in Jefferson County.  Criminal banks like Chase and Goldman get fined here and there for these outrageous fiascos, maybe a "wayward" trader gets trotted out into the media to give us a sense of justice being done, but never do we see the real criminals prosecuted or jailed, because they are politically powerful.  Many people were perplexed when Obama brought in the same Wall Street crowd Bush had on board.  Is it really a surprise that the guys holding the money are in charge people?

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