Posted
Jun 30 2008, 07:30 AM
by
Shannara Johnson
And they are sure to find a skeleton there. Heck, they'll probably find a mass grave.
Last Thursday, the German magazine Der Spiegel broke the news that the times of U.S. exceptionism are over.
"Officials with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have informed Bernanke about a plan that would have been unheard-of in the past: a general examination of the US financial system. The IMF's board of directors has ruled that a so-called Financial Sector Assessment Program (FSAP) is to be carried out in the United States.
"As part of the assessment, the Fed, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the major investment banks, mortgage banks and hedge funds will be asked to hand over confidential documents to the IMF team. They will be required to answer the questions they are asked during interviews. Their databases will be subjected to so-called stress tests -- worst-case scenarios designed to simulate the broader effects of failures of other major financial institutions or a continuing decline of the dollar."
Der Spiegel called the IMF's action "nothing less than an X-ray of the entire US financial system."
Bush has thus far stalled the FSAP, which one-third of IMF member countries have already undergone, says Der Spiegel. "For seven years, US President George W. Bush refused to allow the IMF to conduct its assessment. Even now, he has only given the IMF board his consent under one important condition. The review can begin in Bush's last year in office, but it may not be completed until he has left the White House."
Good for him. And he'd better be far away on his rumored Paraguayan estate when that happens. Otherwise - with the undoubtedly abysmal picture that's going to result from the IMF's examination - he could find his domicile surrounded by an angry lynch mob.
Bernanke, though, will still be in office by the time the IMF is finished with the U.S., in ca. 2010. He must be sweating at the thought already, maybe hoping for a way out by an act of God... a heart attack, a stroke, anything.
Amazing, by the way, that a German magazine broke the story. It's going to be interesting to see how long the American lame-stream media, which for months have insisted that everything is A-OK in this country and better times are just around the corner, will take to pick up on this breaking news. Watch your news web sites, but don't hold your breath.
[By the way, if you recently read anything by our Casey Research visionaries Doug Casey, Bud Conrad or David Galland, you already know what the IMF will find and the potential extent of the calamity that's brewing on the horizon.
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[Add-on 7/2/08: I just heard that we're extending the two-for-one another month as a special introductory offer -- so you have until July 31 to "git 'er done."]