As in California, the potential number of passengers for such a project is decreasing, not increasing. In Europe and the US, Goldman Sachs and government are the same thing. Voters are obsolete.
4/9/12, "High speed Alpine rail link causes deep Italian rift," BBC
"High in the valleys that wind up from Turin towards the French border, a small army of police and paramilitary carabinieri are dug in, braced for the next round in a 22-year-old battle that pits local traditionalists, grass roots activists and global environmentalists against big business,
- the European Commission and the Italian government.
At stake is the future of a new high speed railway, or Tav (Treno Alta Velocita), across the Alps between Turin and Lyon.
It is the final link in a pan-European network stretching from Barcelona to Bulgaria and beyond. ...
The last time troops and protesters clashed here, a few weeks ago, one long-time activist fell 15 metres from an electricity pylon he had attached himself to. He survived, badly burned, but lucky to be alive.
Ms Tassotti says others, too, are prepared to pay with their health - or their liberty - for their commitment.
The No Tavs argue that the technical case against the project is clear.
"All the data shows that it's sheer madness to build this line," says Ms Tassotti.
"It's simply not necessary because the existing railway works perfectly fine. The number of passengers and the quantity of goods being carried on it is falling. And if you really want to travel to Paris these days it's cheaper to fly anyway."
Campaigners also worry about the environmental impact of such a massive construction project on a delicate mountain ecosystem, as well as the possible health effects of drilling through rock that contains uranium and asbestos - and the dangers of corruption if the Mafia is attracted to the lucrative construction contracts on offer if it goes ahead.
But the big guns lined up in favour of the Tav show no sign of changing tune.
Prime Minister Monti says that any uncertainty about Italy's commitment would send a message that Italy was drifting away from the heart of Europe.
The European Commission considers it a strategic imperative."
===================
Nov. 18, 2011, "What price the new democracy? Goldman Sachs conquers Europe," UK Independent, Stephen Foley
"The ascension of Mario Monti to the Italian prime ministership is remarkable for more reasons than it is possible to count. By replacing the scandal-surfing Silvio Berlusconi, Italy has dislodged the undislodgeable. By imposing rule by unelected technocrats, it has suspended the normal rules of democracy, and maybe democracy itself. And by putting a senior adviser at Goldman Sachs in charge of a Western nation, it has taken to new heights the political power of an investment bank that you might have thought was prohibitively politically toxic.
This is the most remarkable thing of all: a giant leap forward for, or perhaps even the successful culmination of, the Goldman Sachs Project.
It is not just Mr Monti. The European Central Bank, another crucial player in the sovereign debt drama, is under ex-Goldman management, and the investment bank's alumni hold sway in the corridors of power in almost every European nation, as they have done in the US throughout the financial crisis. Until Wednesday, the International Monetary Fund's European division was also run by a Goldman man, Antonio Borges, who just resigned for personal reasons.
Even before the upheaval in Italy, there was no sign of Goldman Sachs living down its nickname as "the Vampire Squid", and now that its tentacles reach to the top of the eurozone, sceptical voices are raising questions over its influence. The political decisions taken in the coming weeks will determine if the eurozone can and will pay its debts – and Goldman's interests are intricately tied up with the answer to that question.
Simon Johnson, the former International Monetary Fund economist, in his book 13 Bankers, argued that Goldman Sachs and the other large banks had become so close to government in the run-up to the financial crisis that the US was effectively an oligarchy. At least European politicians aren't "bought and paid for" by corporations, as in the US, he says. "Instead what you have in Europe is a shared world-view among the policy elite and the bankers, a shared set of goals and mutual reinforcement of illusions."
This is The Goldman Sachs Project. Put simply, it is to hug governments close. Every business wants to advance its interests with the regulators that can stymie them and the politicians who can give them a tax break, but this is no mere lobbying effort. Goldman is there to provide advice for governments and to provide financing, to send its people into public service and to dangle lucrative jobs in front of people coming out of government. The Project is to create such a deep exchange of people and ideas and money that it is impossible to tell the difference between the public interest and the Goldman Sachs interest."...
===================
More Goldman Sachs. I copied the article at the link below. Last I checked it was in an archive for pay at Rolling Stone.
12/10/2009, "Obama's Big Sellout," Rolling Stone by Matt Taibbi
Image of Obama and bankers accompanied the Rolling Stone article from Dec. 2009 posted on the blog InfiniteUnknown.net. I'm guessing it came from Rolling Stone.
"...While packing the key economic positions in his (Obama's) White House with the very people who caused the crisis in the first place. This new team of bubble-fattened ex-bankers and laissez-faire intellectuals then proceeded to sell us all out, instituting a massive,
- trickle-up bailout and systematically
- gutting regulatory reform from the inside."
====================
3/8/12, "A collision of visions on bullet train," LA Times,
.
No comments:
Post a Comment