Mapping The People's Republic of Goldman Sachs

Lisa Stansfield
All Around The World

Hat Tip: Comrade Amanda

From Muckety.com:
Goldman Sachs’ network extends around the world

After U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson named protege Neel Kashkari to head the $700-billion bailout, some commentators grumbled that the entire U.S. financial system seemed to be under the stewardship of Goldman Sachs alumni.

In fact, Goldman’s reach through a network of former officials extends worldwide - a fact that could help foster global cooperation as Paulson and other U.S. officials reach out to foreign powers to calm financial markets, but which could also foster conflicts.

Former Goldman Sachs execs now in top positions in key world institutions include:

* Mark J. Carney, former managing director in Goldman’s Toronto office, who is governor of the Bank of Canada after having served as a senior official in Canada’s Finance Ministry.

* Michael Cohrs, former head of Goldman’s equity capital markets, now the head of global banking for Deutche Bank.

* Former Managing Director Mario Draghi, governor of the Bank of Italy.

* Former vice chairman Robert B. Zoellick, now the head of the World Bank.

Executives at Goldman Sachs say it has so many alumni in government posts and central banks around the world because the firm tends to push partners out after they’ve made a lot of money but while they’re still young. The average tenure for a partner is only eight to 10 years, which means high-powered people are leaving while still in their 40s and looking for second careers.

“Goldman Sachs cares passionately about the intersection of Wall Street and public policy,” a former Treasury Department official told Politico. “They place a huge premium on engagement in both domestic and international policy circles.”

Others, however, are less sanguine about the implications of a globe-girdling Goldman network.

As far back as two years ago, Bloomberg News columnist Matthew Lynn argued the concentration of so much power in a group of people who shared similar backgrounds and training was unhealthy:

A clan of former senior Goldman staffers is now in a position to help steer the dollar, the euro and the pound. There needn’t be anything sinister about that - though financial conspiracy theorists could have a field day with some of the connections. The issue is that they are likely to have a uniform set of preconceptions and prejudices. In any area of endeavor, it is healthy to have a wide diversity of views. Global monetary policy is no exception.

All that clout does breed discomfort and jealousy - especially when Goldman is one of the only major Wall Street investment firms left standing in this country, besides Morgan Stanley.

“Even before Mr. Kashkari’s appointment, there were a lot of Goldman people involved,” complained the editorial board of the New York Times:

Mr. Paulson, after all, was urged to join the Bush administration by Joshua Bolten, President Bush’s chief of staff and a former Goldman executive director of legal and government affairs.

In October of 2006, Mr. Paulson recruited Robert Steel, a former vice chairman at Goldman to be his right hand man as Under Secretary of the Treasury for domestic finance. Mr. Steel left the Treasury in July to become the boss at Wachovia, then one of the nation’s biggest banks.

Earlier this year, Fortune magazine aired a complaint from an anonymous Wall Street money manager who complained that Goldman’s connections enabled it to weather the economic storm by getting information that others didn’t have.

Other questions are bound to surface when so many of the banks who stand to benefit from infusions of government cash are headed by Goldman alumni, among them Citigroup, where former co-chairman Robert E. Rubin is a director; Bank of America, where former Goldman president John Thain will head global banking, securities, and wealth management after the acquisition of Merrill Lynch; and of course Goldman itself, headed by Paulson’s successor, Lloyd Blankfein.

See Muckety’s earlier post on the Goldman Sachs network.

Missing Links vs the Glow Ball Ists

The Temptations
Ball of Confusion

Czar Paulson nationalized the banks late last night

Naturally, Obama likes it!

A Serious Global Solution for the Serious Good of the Unserious Global Collective!

"All of us recognize this is a serious global crisis that requires a serious global response for the good of our people."
~ GWB

Czar Paulson: AGGRESSIVE GLOBAL EFFORT PLANNED

Czar Paulson expects G20 to endorse G7 action plan
Gee Whiz.

Revolutionary economic solutions from Russia, without much love at all

Rocket scientist/beard of a bag man Comrade Kneel Cash Carry to speak Monday

Wachovia to close Wells Fargo deal without shareholders' OK

Australia's Four Big Banks May Need Support, Australian Says

EU governments compromise on energy deregulation

Gazprom Extends Network In Deal With Ireland

Russia's Gazprom signs MoU on Kyrgyzgaz stake sale

Russia's Jerusalem land claim worries Israelis
That's good. For a minute there I thought it only worried me & Ezekiel

Look no further than the World Bank to see how many economic, social and environmental problems so-smarts can use billions to make even worse

McCain: Citizen Obama is a decent family man & a Christian, so STFU!
Thus sayeth the man the Republican party ran for president. Matter of fact he will even shut you the fuck up to say it. Maverick!:

Republican presidential candidate John McCain interrupted boos from his supporters and tried to curb their anger toward his Democratic opponent Friday during a town hall meeting in Minnesota.

McCain has let angry shouts against Sen. Barack Obama pass unchecked at previous rallies. This time he stepped in, while many in a crowd of about 2,000 booed when McCain said he admired Obama and his accomplishments.

"First of all I want to be president of the United States -- obviously I do not want Senator Obama to," McCain said at one point. "But I have to tell you -- I have to tell you he is a decent person and a person that you do not have to be scared of as president of the United States."

The crowd booed again.
The event in the Twin Cities suburb of Lakeville was part campaign rally, part town hall meeting -- and many of the questions focused on Obama. "I can't trust Obama," said Gayle Quinnell, 75, of Shakopee. "I have read about him and he's not, he's not -- he's an Arab."

McCain shook his head and cut her off: "No, no. He's a decent family man, citizen, that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues, and that's what this campaign is all about."

Obama is a Christian whose campaign and others have debunked persistent rumors about his faith. ....

The answer McCain should have given (without cutting the woman off):

I don't know if he is a Muslim or not. I do know that he is a Marxist and that he is not a Christian regardless of how many times he calls himself one.
He appears to subscribe to a sort of "black liberation theology" which is a mixture of co-opted Christian mouthings, straight up Marxism and a black power philosophies which originate with a man named James Cone, who used the Gramscian model of politicizing the personal, in this case, race, and using it as a weapon against your enemy, ETC.....

Now - the fact that he does not answer in this manner and furthermore shuts this person up in order to not answer in this manner telegraphs lots of uncomfortable information about WTF really goes on here. Add that thought to the fact that he did not bring any truth regarding who Obama is to his face in that so called debate. No, instead he avoided it entirely.

And people insist to me that they are doing some preventative, righteous thing by voting for this guy, and that I am a terrible citizen for refusing to sign my name to this "lesser" evil?
Yeah well... understand this: it does not look lesser to me, Feralmanity, it just looks DIFFERENT
~ The Spleen

Marcel says: AMEN

Missing US Journalists show up in Syria

The Somali Jihad Pirates are now threatening to blow up the Ukranian mystery weapons ship

UN passes buck on Kosovo to "International World Court"

Serbia Expels Macedonian Ambassador after Kosovo Recognition

GATES: US forces in Kosovo through 2009

GATES: US supports "peace talks" with the Taliban

NATO to Target Opium Network Funding Taliban
Naturally, they have to get their cut just like in the Balkans

Petraeus: "Serious Ethnic Challenges, Upticks"
Global Solutions ! Never fear, third world ex transportation ministers will tell us how to solve it:

Mac Maharaj, South Africa's former minister of transport, told a key U.S. House committee he saw that Iraqis want to be included in a peace process similiar to the Helsinki meetings. "I see the importance of it as a platform so that Iraqis can now begin to articulate their grievances so that even those who have taken to violence can come to the table and tell us and tell themselves why they want to resort to violence," Maharaj said. The Helsinki participants told the committee a new U.S. administration, after the election, must be convinced to continue such talks. They say this is the only way for the U.S. to get out of Iraq without leaving behind more ethnic violence.

Turkey bombs PKK in Iraq

Tony Blair "hopeful of Turkey's Unique Role in the ME"

Beirut ostensibly accepts Syrian explanation for troop moves, but I don't

NYT ~ Canada: Terrorists are "not so sinister", even when they plan on beheading your PM

Gay marriage now law in CT

THE GATTACA TRIANGLE
Gov. Jim Doyle unveiled an initiative Friday to make Wisconsin a worldwide leader in personalized medicine, a fledgling science that would treat patients based on their DNA

Czar Bloomberg to spend 80 Million to stay Czar in contravention of established law

AUSTRIAN CRYPTO-FASCIST HAIDER DEAD IN CAR CRASH

REM
The End of the World as We Know it

WFRL: Now is time in global crisis when we dance!

Tovarich Dimitri Eremeev (violin)
"Czardas" (traditional)

Rewriting the rules of international finance, one failed plan at a time

Brian Auger & Trinity featuring Julie Driscoll
This Wheel's On Fire ~ 1968

If your memory serves you well,
You'll remember you're the one
That called on me
to call on them
To get you your favors done.
And after every plan had failed
And there was nothing more to tell,
You knew that we would meet again,
If your memory served you well.

~ The Prophet Zimmy



Berlusconi Says Leaders May Close World's Markets

Oct. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said political leaders are discussing the idea of closing the world's financial markets while they ``rewrite the rules of international finance.''

``The idea of suspending the markets for the time it takes to rewrite the rules is being discussed,'' Berlusconi said today after a Cabinet meeting in Naples, Italy. A solution to the financial crisis ``can't just be for one country, or even just for Europe, but global.''

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell as much 8.1 percent in early trading and pared most of those losses after Berlusconi's remarks. The Dow was down 0.5 percent to 8540.52 at 10:10 in New York.

Group of Seven finance ministers and central bankers are meeting in Washington today, and will stay in town for the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings this weekend. European Union leaders may gather in Paris on Oct. 12, three days before a scheduled summit in Brussels, Berlusconi said today, while Group of Eight leaders may hold a meeting on the crisis ``in coming days,'' he said.

Berlusconi didn't give any details about what kind of rules leaders were looking to change, except to say that leaders are ``talking about a new Bretton Woods.''

The Bretton Woods Agreements were adopted to rebuild the international economic system after World War II in a hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. The aim of the agreements was to establish a monetary management system, initially by pegging currencies to gold. The IMF was set up later to help manage the international financial system.

Your merchants were the magnates of the earth, and all nations were deceived by your sorcery. And in you was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all who have been slaughtered on earth.
~ Revelation 18

Missing Links: When Black Friday Falls...

Steely Dan ~ Black Friday

When Black Friday falls
you know it's got to be.
Don't let it fall on me.

I know that after I am dead you will all utterly corrupt yourselves, and turn aside from the ways in which I have commanded you - Thus evil will befall you in the last days; because you will do everything evil thing in the sight of the LORD - You will provoke him to grief & indignant rage through the work of your own hands.
~Moshe, Chief Unhinged Loon, as recorded in Deuteronomy 31:29

Putin gets rare exotic pussy for his 56th birthday

Nyet... no Nobel Peace Prize for Bad Vlad this year

Russia pushes new alternative to NATO

Russia blasts "secretive" UN-NATO deal

Russia denies nuclear weapons on ships bound for Venezuela

EUROPE: Energy deregulation compromise in jeopardy

The EU as a whole gets a quarter of its gas from Gazprom. This is to rise significantly in the years ahead as German, French and Italian gas companies have signed long-term delivery contracts with Gazprom.

France's CNR holding energy talks with Gazprom

Italy confirms planned investments in Russia

Israel fears Russia sending advanced arms to Iran

Iran Uses Price Power in $2 Billion Gas Deal

Iraq must rid itself of US troops, Iran says

US blamed for killing of prominent Shia MP

Officials deny report that US jet was forced to land in Iran

Iranian foreign minister to visit Pakistan on gas pipeline project

Turkey to push Iranian gas deal

US Military: Tense Encounters With Iran Occur Almost Daily

Russian Scientist May Have Aided Iranian Nuclear Program

Iran's ambassador in Iraq has harsh words for US

Iran, Journalists, and Responsibility

OIC Secretary General: No 'Islamism', only 'Islam'

OIC Secretary General Meets President of Finland

OIC members urged to build debt relief solidarity

2009 proclaimed a year of innovation in the Islamic world
[Insert your own joke here]

Durban II – a new battlefront opens

New my ass. Durban II's "battlefront" is the same as it ever was: Destroy Israel

NATO to deploy anti-piracy fleet to Somali coast

Millennium Development Grotesquery:
Incredibly, the regime committing genocide in Darfur is now meant to be in charge of a critical U.N. poverty- and disease-eradication program

Norks may be developing small nuclear warhead

AUSTRALIA: Victorian vote decriminalises abortion

Third Frog Rising

Dark Tales from the Vienna Woods

UK pub to become Islamic Center

US: Cyber, nuclear missions shift in Air Force

Air Force leaders opted to implement some but not all recommendations of a Defense Department task force that suggested setting up a Air Force Strategic Command to oversee strategic nuclear forces.

The Air Force will align its nuclear missions under a new nuclear command, and has modified plans to stand up a separate Cyber Command, instead concentrating existing cyber units under a numbered air force.

Banks borrow record amount from Fed

Dallas attorney wins $1 million arbitration award from Goldman Sachs

It's A Goldman Sachs World After All

BREAKING: WORLD BANK UNDER CYBER SEIGE

Federal RICO complaint filed againt George Soros: MONEY LAUNDERING, BANKRUPTCY, FRAUD & CONSPIRACY

The UK & Czar Paulson are "Receptive" to Soros despite his troubles!

In a twist, the billionaire financier George Soros, who in 1992 was called “the man who broke the Bank of England,” for his multibillion-dollar bet against the British pound, could in 2008 end up helping the ailing British banking system get back on its feet with his ideas.

And the United States Treasury may now be receptive to those ideas as well.

More One World Globalist Econobabble:

The head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, said today that European Union countries should work together and avoid unilateral steps to fight a global financial crisis.

'Cooperation and coordination in actions is the price of success. All kinds of cooperation have to be recommended,' Strauss-Kahn said at a news conference ahead of the annual meetings this weekend of the IMF and World Bank.

Unilateral action 'has to be avoided, if not condemned,' he said.

INDIVIDUALISM & SOVERIEGNTY ARE MORTAL SINS IN YOUR BRAVE NEW GLOBAL WORLD, CITIZENS!

Bush to Hosting G7 Finance Ministers TODAY at White House

Please read all the EU quotes in this post for your exigent edification

Gay porn king is Obama "bundler"

City officials have agreed to return hundreds of LEGALLY OWNED firearms that police officers confiscated in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina:

The settlement agreement filed Tuesday in federal court calls for the National Rifle Association and Second Amendment Foundation to drop their case if the city follows a plan for returning guns to owners who had them seized by police after the Aug. 29, 2005, hurricane

Steely Dan ~ Caves of Altamira

Before the fall
when they wrote it on the wall
when there wasn't even any Hollywood...
They heard the call,
and they wrote it on the wall ~
for you and me,
we understood.

WFRL: Prophet Zimmy Time

The Prophet Zimmy ~ Desolation Row

Praise be to Nero's Neptune
The titanic sails at dawn ~
And everybodys shouting
Which side are you on?

The Maladjusted Jester

Danny Kaye ~ The Maladjusted Jester
From "The Court Jester" ~ 1956

Your majesty - I have a confession
my secret I must now betray
I was not a born fool - it took work to get me this way
When I was a lad I was gloomy and sad
And I was from the day I was born

When other lads giggled and gurgled and wiggled
I proudly was loudly forlorn
My friends and my family looked at me clammily
Thought there was something amiss
When others found various antics hilarious
All I could manage was this –hoo hoo
Or this – hoo waahhh

My father he shouted he needs to be clouted
His teeth on a wreath I’ll hand him
My mother she cried as she rushed to my side
You’re a brute and you don’t understand him
So they send for a witch with a terrible twitch
To ask how my future impressed her

She took one look at me and cried hehehehehe, he?
What else could he be but a jester?
A jester a jester, a funny idea a jester
No butcher no baker no candlestick maker
And me with the look of a fine undertaker
Impressed her as a jester?

Now where could I learn any comical turn
That was not in a book on the shelf
No teacher to take me and mold me and make me
A merryman fool or an elf
But I’m proud to recall that in no time at all
With no other recourses but my own resources
With firm application and determination
I made a fool of myself!
I bought a little gun and I learned to shoot
I bought a little a horn and I learned to toot
Now I can shoot and toot ain’t that cute?

I started to travel to try to unravel
My mind and to find a new chance
When I got to Spain it was suddenly plain
That the field that appealed was the dance
The Spanish were clannish but I wouldn’t vanish
I learned every step they had planned
The first step of all isn’t hard to recall
Cause the first step of all is to stand
And stand And stand, and stand, and stand, and stand, and....
They sometimes stand this way for days
Then they get very mad at the floor and start to stomp on it
After all of my practice the terrible fact is
I made a fool of myself

I sadly decided that dancing as I did
To sing was a thing that was sure
I found me a teacher a crotchety creature
Who used to sing coloratura
She twisted my chin pushed my diaphragm in
With a poker she vocalized me
When she said it was best that I threw out my chest
You may gather that rather surprised me
I was on solid ground till I suddenly found
That in Venice I was to appear
The gala locale was a choppy canal
And me, a high sea gondolier
I nervously perched as the gondola lurched
Before the King’s palazzo
As I started my song my voice it was strong
But my stomach I fear was not so
Oh solo mio, ooohhhhhhhh
Oh solo mio, ooohhhhhhhh
When I fell overboard how his majesty roared
And before a siesta he made me his jester

And I found out soon that to be a buffoon
Was a serious thing as a rule
For a jester’s chief employment
Is to kill himself for your enjoyment
And a jester unemployed is nobody’s fool

The Wacky Worm

The Wacky Worm
Merrie Melodies ~ 1941

Missing Links : Alive & Dangerous

Thin Lizzy ~ Massacre
From the album "Live & Dangerous"

If God is in the heavens
How can this happen here?
In His name, they used the weapons
For the massacre

Pakistan seeks nuclear cooperation with France

Spokesman: Iran has no reason to stop enrichment

US-Russia divide allows the Middle East arms race to flourish

Egypt briefs Hamas on plan to end Palestinian split

US issues updated warning for Israel, Gaza Strip, West Bank

Syrian troops gather on Lebanese border

2 US Journalists in Syrian Custody

Bad Vlad takes the Ukraine without a shot fired: Ukraine leader dissolves parliament

Pirated Ukrainian mystery weapons ship still in standoff with US, Russian & multinational forces

Foreign Minister Moses Wetangula said yesterday after a meeting with Somali Foreign Minister Ali Jama Jangeli: “We have been consulting with other forces at sea and we have agreed that we are going to invoke resolution 1816 of the United Nations Security Council that empowers the use of force.”

Resolution 1816 was adopted in June 2008 and allows states co- operating with Somalia’s transitional federal government to enter territorial waters and use “all necessary means” to repress acts of piracy.

Unusual AND Exigent ! 'Suicidal' pirates defiant as Russia, US close in

OPEC Freaking Out

China's Communists meet amid global economic turmoil

China hopes "right person" wins Nobel Peace Prize

China Demands Repatriation of Uighur Detainees Held at Guantanamo



Japan's Amano makes case to succeed IAEA's ElBaradei

Bush Signs India Measure Promoting Nuclear Energy

Gates Asks Europe to Send Troops to Afghanistan

Russian warships to visit Libya

Russia Accuses Georgia of Terror, Provoking Conflict

Gazprom says Nyet to Gas-OPEC

Russia Promises More Cash to Its Banks

Russia demands Britain hand over "fugitive" oil boss

Russia is a no-show in its suit against the Bank of New York

A weird case got weirder this morning, when the Russian Federal Customs Service failed to send any representative at all to appear in a Moscow court for the resumption of pretrial hearings in its $22.5 billion suit against the Bank of New York Mellon (BK), according to a lawyer for the bank.

Putin: “confidence to THE USA is blown up forever”

Do not let Russia ‘Finlandise’ western Europe

Democracy, Russia, and Vladimir Putin

POST SOVIET DOES NOT MEAN ANTI-SOVIET

Bribes paid for Corsi to escape from Kenya
Naturally! The entire African continent operates openly on force & bribes. So doe the entire Islamic world - but at the highest levels those bribes are called AID

Freedom of Expression and the advocacy of religious hatred:

Jahangir: We must not use religion to put fear into other people’s hearts and minds. [7] We have not discussed the Internet. It is there we find hate speech; a huge challenge for governments.

OK. Since HATE is in the eye of the beholder in this koom bah kaboom Commislamist global cesspit (which does NOT make any moves based on Judeo-Christian moral absolutes) this means me and you, Ferals, NOT the jihadists or the eugenicists.

Fuckin' exigent, nu?

New York came to a halt on 25th September as world leaders gathered in a special session for a high-level event, convened by the UN Secretary-General and the President of the UN General Assembly to renew commitments to achieving the Millennium Development Goals by 2015 and to set out concrete plans and practical steps for action.

BTW the USA signed us up for the Millenium Declaration in 2000

US debt clock runs out of digits

Goldman Sachs closes $10.5bn debut senior debt fund

Goldman Sachs Cuts US Steel, Steel Dynamics, AK Steel

Czar Paulson: The New Republic of Goldman Sachs to Nationalize Banks

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said on Wednesday a recently approved financial bailout bill gives him wide authority to inject capital into the banking system and would not rule out having Treasury take an ownership position in banks if necessary.

"We will use all of the tools we've been given to maximum effectiveness, including strengthening the capitalization of financial institutions of every size," he told a news conference ahead of a Friday meeting of Group of Seven finance ministers.

EXIGENT!

Remember this? Kommie Koom Bah Moolah Meet Up Fall Down Go Boom

....now I start to understand why it fell apart

These types of attacks on sovereignty will allow frog #3 of the nationalist stripe to grab power all over the world

Thin Lizzy ~ Angel of Death

WFRL: DJ Mikael Spins...

Ivo Papazov and his Wedding Band


Attention Citizens of the New Republic of Goldman Sachs:

Russian President Vladimir Putin has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. The International Center for Research on Biofuels and Patents in Zurich has chosen Putin for his alternative fuel initiatives in Russia.

The Swiss organisation says its main goal is to prevent future wars over oil.

The centre proposed Putin for his ideas on developing energies based on nanotechnology. It also praised the President for his efforts to reduce Russia’s reliance on fossil fuels.

He Must Break You.

The Mercy Seat is Waiting....

Johnny Cash
Nick Cave's "Mercy Seat"

It is time for Teshuvah like it has never been time for Teshuvah before
Time to get righteous before HE flicks yer lightswitch

And the Mercy Seat is waiting
And I think my head is burning
And in a way I'm yearning
To be done with all this weighing of the truth
An eye for an eye
A tooth for a tooth
And anyway I told the truth
And I'm not afraid to die

Avinu Malkenu, " Our Father, Our King " is among the most moving and well-known prayers of the Jewish High Holidays. Sung several times throughout Yom Kippur, this plea for compassion from a merciful God toward an undeserving people sums up the theme of the Day of Atonement, while its haunting melody sets the tone for this solemn day.

Lyrics translated:

Our Father, our King,
Be gracious unto us and answer us
For we are unworthy.
Deal with us in charity and loving-kindness
And save us.

Lyrics tranlisterated:

Avinu malkeinu
khaneinu va'aneynu
sh'ayn banu ma'asim
Ase imanu tzedakah
va'khesed v'hoshe'eynu

Yom Kippur 2008 falls on Thursday, the 9th of October

...In the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you shall afflict your souls, and you shall not do any work ... For on that day he shall provide atonement for you to cleanse you from all your sins before the L-RD.
~Leviticus 16:29-30

Yom Kippur is probably the most important holiday of the Jewish year. Many Jews who do not observe any other Jewish custom will refrain from work, fast and/or attend synagogue services on this day. Yom Kippur occurs on the 10th day of Tishri. The holiday is instituted at Leviticus 23:26 et seq.

The name "Yom Kippur" means "Day of Atonement," and that pretty much explains what the holiday is. It is a day set aside to "afflict the soul," to atone for the sins of the past year. In Days of Awe, I mentioned the "books" in which G-d inscribes all of our names. On Yom Kippur, the judgment entered in these books is sealed. This day is, essentially, your last appeal, your last chance to change the judgment, to demonstrate your repentance and make amends.

As I noted in Days of Awe, Yom Kippur atones only for sins between man and G-d, not for sins against another person. To atone for sins against another person, you must first seek reconciliation with that person, righting the wrongs you committed against them if possible. That must all be done before Yom Kippur.

Yom Kippur is a complete Sabbath; no work can be performed on that day. It is well-known that you are supposed to refrain from eating and drinking (even water) on Yom Kippur. It is a complete, 25-hour fast beginning before sunset on the evening before Yom Kippur and ending after nightfall on the day of Yom Kippur. The Talmud also specifies additional restrictions that are less well-known: washing and bathing, anointing one's body (with cosmetics, deodorants, etc.), wearing leather shoes (Orthodox Jews routinely wear canvas sneakers under their dress clothes on Yom Kippur), and engaging in sexual relations are all prohibited on Yom Kippur.

As always, any of these restrictions can be lifted where a threat to life or health is involved. In fact, children under the age of nine and women in childbirth (from the time labor begins until three days after birth) are not permitted to fast, even if they want to. Older children and women from the third to the seventh day after childbirth are permitted to fast, but are permitted to break the fast if they feel the need to do so. People with other illnesses should consult a physician and a rabbi for advice.

Most of the holiday is spent in the synagogue, in prayer. In Orthodox synagogues, services begin early in the morning (8 or 9 AM) and continue until about 3 PM. People then usually go home for an afternoon nap and return around 5 or 6 PM for the afternoon and evening services, which continue until nightfall. The services end at nightfall, with the blowing of the tekiah gedolah, a long blast on the shofar. See Rosh Hashanah for more about the shofar and its characteristic blasts.

It is customary to wear white on the holiday, which symbolizes purity and calls to mind the promise that our sins shall be made as white as snow (Is. 1:18). Some people wear a kittel, the white robe in which the dead are buried.

Yom Kippur Liturgy

See also Jewish Liturgy generally.

The liturgy for Yom Kippur is much more extensive than for any other day of the year. Liturgical changes are so far-reaching that a separate, special prayer book for Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah. This prayer book is called the machzor.

The evening service that begins Yom Kippur is commonly known as Kol Nidre, named for the prayer that begins the service. "Kol nidre" means "all vows," and in this prayer, we ask G-d to annul all personal vows we may make in the next year. It refers only to vows between the person making them and G-d, such as "If I pass this test, I'll pray every day for the next 6 months!" Click the musical notes to hear a portion of the traditional tune for this prayer.

This prayer has often been held up by anti-Semites as proof that Jews are untrustworthy (we do not keep our vows), and for this reason the Reform movement removed it from the liturgy for a while. In fact, the reverse is true: we make this prayer because we take vows so seriously that we consider ourselves bound even if we make the vows under duress or in times of stress when we are not thinking straight. This prayer gave comfort to those who were converted to Christianity by torture in various inquisitions, yet felt unable to break their vow to follow Christianity. In recognition of this history, the Reform movement restored this prayer to its liturgy.

There are many additions to the regular liturgy (there would have to be, to get such a long service ). Perhaps the most important addition is the confession of the sins of the community, which is inserted into the Shemoneh Esrei (Amidah) prayer. Note that all sins are confessed in the plural (we have done this, we have done that), emphasizing communal responsibility for sins.

There are two basic parts of this confession: Ashamnu, a shorter, more general list (we have been treasonable, we have been aggressive, we have been slanderous...), and Al Cheit, a longer and more specific list (for the sin we sinned before you forcibly or willingly, and for the sin we sinned before you by acting callously...) Frequent petitions for forgiveness are interspersed in these prayers. There's also a catch-all confession: "Forgive us the breach of positive commands and negative commands, whether or not they involve an act, whether or not they are known to us."

It is interesting to note that these confessions do not specifically address the kinds of ritual sins that some people think are the be-all-and-end-all of Judaism. There is no "for the sin we have sinned before you by eating pork, and for the sin we have sinned against you by driving on Shabbat" (though obviously these are implicitly included in the catch-all). The vast majority of the sins enumerated involve mistreatment of other people, most of them by speech (offensive speech, scoffing, slander, talebearing, and swearing falsely, to name a few). These all come into the category of sin known as "lashon ha-ra" (lit: the evil tongue), which is considered a very serious sin in Judaism.

The concluding service of Yom Kippur, known as Ne'ilah, is one unique to the day. It usually runs about 1 hour long. The ark (a cabinet where the scrolls of the Torah are kept) is kept open throughout this service, thus you must stand throughout the service. There is a tone of desperation in the prayers of this service. The service is sometimes referred to as the closing of the gates; think of it as the "last chance" to get in a good word before the holiday ends. The service ends with a very long blast of the shofar. See Rosh Hashanah for more about the shofar and its characteristic blasts.

After Yom Kippur, one should begin preparing for the next holiday, Sukkot, which begins five days later.

Unusual & Exigent Missing Links

I'm Against It & I Always Get My Man
Grouch Marx in "Horsefeathers" ~ 1932

OCTOBER 1:

Leaders and economists from Western Europe to East Asia Tuesday urged the United States to go beyond reviving a failed domestic bailout and start working on a new global financial system. Associated Press Traders at MICEX, the Moscow Interbank Currency Exchange, watch and wait during a tense session in Moscow on Tuesday when stock indexes sank despite a two-hour trading halt.

"The Americans don't have a choice — they must absolutely have a global plan," Christian Noyer, head of the French central bank, said in Paris.

David Smick, a global strategist and author of "The World Is Curved: Hidden Dangers of the Global Economy," said the next U.S. president should immediately call for a second "Bretton Woods" conference to devise a new doctrine of international finance.

Preparing to rebuild the international economic system as World War II was still raging, 730 delegates from all 44 Allied nations gathered at the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, United States, for the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference. The delegates deliberated upon and signed the Bretton Woods Agreements during the first three weeks of July 1944.

Setting up a system of rules, institutions, and procedures to regulate the international monetary system, the planners at Bretton Woods established the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) (now one of five institutions in the World Bank Group) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). These organizations became operational in 1945 after a sufficient number of countries had ratified the agreement.

All your pie are belong to them

TODAY: Bush calls International Emergency Finance Summit

Towards a new economic world order

We will look back on the banking crisis of September 2008 as a defining moment for economic globalization

Peter Mandelson, European Union Commissioner for Trade, wrote the above linked article. Here are some edfying recent quotes of his:

We are seeing a huge reordering of the global economy and politics. Rising powers are reshaping the post war world and existing institutions like the WTO, like multilateral negotiations have to adapt to these new realities. We must all adapt

It would be better while operating on a country by country basis, we did so in a coordinated way and we brought a collective European view. We are all interlocked. We are in this together

And it's an international system in which not just the G7 or G8 and the OECD will be reaching out and inviting the so-called emerging economies in for a cup of tea

China is keeping a level head as a trusted partner

[globalisation] is the biggest eliminator of poverty and creator of opportunity the world has ever seen

We have nothing to gain by shutting down financial globalisation. But the networks that make up globalisation will keep transmitting the shocks along with the benefits unless we take a tougher line with excessive risk and strengthen the multilateral instruments that govern the global financial system

China has always acted in an objective and responsible way through the use of its sovereign wealth

The globalization demands a new regulatory paradigm

In this difficult economic and political climate, it is transparency, openness, and cooperation that will help us weather the storm. The EU and China need to resist protectionism and forge a positive trade and investment agenda

Note: The picture at left comes from the World Bank site

UNESCO regional meeting opens in Isfahan

WTF is "World Evolutionary Humanism" & Why Should You Care?

Council of Europe and Alliance of Civilizations agree on future co-operation

Goldman Sachs Made More Than $100 Million on Fewer Days in Quarter

Goldman Sachs raises $10.5 billion for new fund

Neel Kashkari, the $700 Billion Man

Goldman Sachs Leads $12 Million Investment in Nimsoft

Nimsoft is a "network monitoring"company.....

Giant bank Goldman Sachs invests in ATS red-light camera operator

OK. I want you to stop a moment and ponder why GS obviously considers these things safe, good money making investments....

Goldman Sachs Downgrades Major Solar Stocks To "Sell"

Dick Fuld’s Vendetta Against Short-Sellers and Goldman Sachs

US financial bailout: It is rocket science

PUTIN: DUMP THE DOLLAR, TRADE IN RUBLES

Obama interviewed by Brokaw at private Goldman Sachs dinner last year

Obama's Brand of socialism was clearly telegraphed in that "debate"

The center of his economic universe is the budget of the federal government

Obama received endorsement of Marxist coalition

Naturally!

FATAH milks Iran and USA simultaneously

In a message to the State Department, President Bush declared, "I hereby certify that it is important to the national security interests of the United States to waive" the restrictions

Der Beatles ~ Komm Gib Mir Deine Hand

GRAMMY CRACKER: OBITUARY FOR A REPUBLIC