The Strauss Kahn Frame-Up: The Amerikan Police State Strides Forward

[Brocke]

 

Strauss-Kahn simply had to be eliminated.


The Amerikan Police State Strides Forward


By Paul Craig Roberts

[...]
 
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article28122.htm

On May 16 the British Daily Mail reported that prior to Strauss-Kahn’s fateful departure for New York, the French newspaper, Liberation, published comments he made while discussing his plans to challenge Sarkozy for the presidency of France. Strauss-Kahn said that as he was the clear favorite to beat Sarkozy, he would be subjected to a smear campaign by Sarkozy and his interior minister, Glaude Gueant.  Strauss-Kahn predicted that a woman would be offered between 500,000 and 1,000,000 euros (more than $1,000,000) to make up a story that he raped her.
 
The Daily Mail reports that Strauss-Kahn’s suspicions are supported by the fact that the first person to break the news of Strauss-Kahn’s arrest was an activist in Mr Sarkozy’s UMP party – who apparently knew about the scandal before it happened.
Jonathan Pinet, a politics student, tweeted the news just before the New York Police Department made it public, although he said that he simply had a ‘friend’ working at the Sofitel where the attack was said to have happened. 

Well, well, well!

[Brocke]

The Huffpost smears Strauss-Kahn defenders Bernard-Henri Levy And Ben Stein and sets the stage for a suicide.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn Defended Witlessly By Bernard-Henri Levy And Ben Stein

First Posted: 05/18/11 01:28 PM ET Updated: 05/18/11 01:55 PM ET
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/18/dominique-strauss-kahn-bernard-henri-levy-ben-stein_n_863633.html?ir=World


Dominique Strauss Kahn: IMF Chief On Suicide Watch In New York Jail

First Posted: 05/18/11 08:29 AM ET Updated: 05/18/11 02:25 PM ET

NEW YORK -- The maid came from one of the world's poorest countries to the U.S., working to support the teen daughter she raised alone. The penthouse suite at the Sofitel Hotel was just another room. She says she had no idea the man was a famous French politician. She says he tried to rape her.

Corrections spokesman Stephen Morello said Strauss-Kahn has been placed in a wing with about 14 cells, all of them empty except for his.

Norman Seabrook, president of the correction officers union, said Strauss-Kahn did or said something during a mental health evaluation that concerned doctors, and he is being monitored day and night.

A law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of prisoner medical information, said Strauss-Kahn had not tried to harm himself.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/18/dominique-strauss-kahn-suicide-watch-jail_n_863452.html


There will be no witnesses if he is suicided...

"Corrections spokesman Stephen Morello said Strauss-Kahn has been placed in a wing with about 14 cells, all of them empty except for his".

[Brocke]

Ben Steins article in the Spectator

Presumed Innocent, Anyone?

By Ben Stein on 5.17.11 @ 8:07AM

Now for a few humble thoughts about Dominique Strauss-Kahn and his recent brush with law and journalism, bearing in mind that it's possible indeed, maybe even likely, that he is guilty as the prosecutors charge:

1.) If he is such a womanizer and violent guy with women, why didn't he ever get charged until now? If he has a long history of sexual abuse, how can it have remained no more than gossip this long? France is a nation of vicious political rivalries. Why didn't his opponents get him years ago?

2.) In life, events tend to follow patterns. People who commit crimes tend to be criminals, for example. Can anyone tell me any economists who have been convicted of violent sex crimes? Can anyone tell me of any heads of nonprofit international economic entities who have ever been charged and convicted of violent sexual crimes? Is it likely that just by chance this hotel maid found the only one in this category? Maybe Mr. Strauss-Kahn is guilty but if so, he is one of a kind, and criminals are not usually one of a kind.

3.) The prosecutors say that Mr. Strauss-Kahn "forced" the complainant to have oral and other sex with him. How? Did he have a gun? Did he have a knife? He's a short fat old man. They were in a hotel with people passing by the room constantly, if it's anything like the many hotels I am in. How did he intimidate her in that situation? And if he was so intimidating, why did she immediately feel un-intimidated enough to alert the authorities as to her story?

4.) Did the prosecutors really convince a judge that he was a flight risk when he was getting on a flight he had booked long beforehand? What kind of high-pressure escape plan is that? How is it a sudden flight move to get on a flight booked maybe months ago?

5.) Mr. Strauss-Kahn had surrendered his passport. He had offered to stay in New York City. He is one of the most recognizable people on the planet. Did he really have to be put in Riker's Island? Couldn't he have been given home detention with a guard? This is a man with a lifetime of public service, on a distinguished level, to put it mildly. Was Riker's Island really the place to put him on the allegations of one human being? Hadn't he earned slightly better treatment than that? Any why compare him with a certain pedophile from France long ago? That man had confessed to his crime. Mr. Strauss-Kahn has not confessed to anything.

6.) People accuse other people of crimes all of the time. What do we know about the complainant besides that she is a hotel maid? I love and admire hotel maids. They have incredibly hard jobs and they do them uncomplainingly. I am sure she is a fine woman. On the other hand, I have had hotel maids that were complete lunatics, stealing airline tickets from me, stealing money from me, throwing away important papers, stealing medications from me. How do we know that this woman's word was good enough to put Mr. Strauss-Kahn straight into a horrific jail? Putting a man in Riker's is serious business. Maybe more than a few minutes of investigation is merited before it's done.

7.) In this country, we have the presumption of innocence for the accused. Yet there's my old pal from the Ron Ziegler/ Richard Nixon days, Diane Sawyer, anchor of the ABC Nightly News, assuming that Mr. Strauss-Kahn is guilty. Right off the bat she leads the Monday news by saying that Mr. Strauss-Kahn is in Riker's... "because one woman stood her ground..." That assumes she's telling the truth and he's guilty. No such thing has been proved and it's unfortunate for ABC to simply assume that an accusation is the same as a conviction. Maybe he's in jail because one person didn't tell the truth. I don't know one way or the other, but I sure know that there has been no conviction yet.

8.) In what possible way is the price of the hotel room relevant except in every way: this is a case about the hatred of the have-nots for the haves, and that's what it's all about. A man pays $3,000 a night for a hotel room? He's got to be guilty of something. Bring out the guillotine.

I don't know Mr. Strauss-Kahn. I have never laid eyes on him in person. He may well, in the future, be found guilty of atrocious conduct towards the complainant and maybe towards others. But, so far, he's innocent, and he's being treated shamefully. If he's found guilty, there will be plenty of time to criticize him and imprison him. But nothing has been proved yet except that the way this case has been handled so far is an embarrassment to this country.
http://spectator.org/archives/2011/05/17/presumed-innocent-anyone

[lamourlady]

 

She says he tried to rape her.

So, did he sodomize her, if she states he only 'tried' to rape her? 

[Brocke]

'I Like Women'
By Joseph A. Harriss on 5.18.11 @ 6:09AM

THE FACT IS, DSK has been through something like this before, only without the grave legal consequences that he may now face. His extramarital affairs have long been the stuff of Paris gossip and newsroom banter, where he was dubbed "the great seducer." In broad-minded France where politicians' private lives are off-limits to reporters (think François Mitterrand's love child hidden for years in broad daylight and financed with public monies), a dash of expected promiscuity only adds to a public figure's luster. This after all is the country where the medieval tradition of cuissage gave nobles the inalienable right to sleep with a peasant's bride on her wedding night. Thus few eyebrows were raised when DSK gave an interview to a Paris paper two weeks ago in which he addressed his womanizing. "Yes, I like women," he declared with all due chutzpah. "So what?"

Sometimes he went too far. Like three years ago, early in his stint as IMF chief, when a furious Argentine economist publicly blamed DSK for seducing his Hungarian wife, who was then an IMF employee, at the Davos international business forum. Both admitted the affair (she has since left for another job). The IMF glossed over the case, contenting itself with noting that he had not actually used his hierarchical position to abuse an underling. Strauss-Kahn issued an apology, saying, "I accept that this incident represents a serious error of judgment. I am committed, going forward, to uphold the high standards" expected of an IMF managing director. Case closed. But it is clear now that the IMF was seriously remiss in not dismissing him at the time, however embarrassing that would have been.

http://spectator.org/archives/2011/05/18/i-like-women

[Brocke]

So, did he sodomize her, if she states he only 'tried' to rape her?  

Sodomize sounds evil and depraved. It's a much better headline than..."oral sexual conduct and anal sexual conduct with another person by forcible compulsion"

They booked him on charges of a criminal sex act, attempted rape and unlawful imprisonment (or as the official complaint nicely puts it, "oral sexual conduct and anal sexual conduct with another person by forcible compulsion").

http://spectator.org/archives/2011/05/18/i-like-women

ref.

forcible compulsion

Forcible compulsion in relation to sexual offences means to compel by use of physical force or by threat. Forcible compulsion places a person in fear of immediate or future death, or physical injury to one's self or another person or in fear that the person or another person will immediately or in future be kidnapped.

Example of a state statute on Forcible Compulsion

ORS § 163.305 [Title 16, Crimes and Punishments; Chapter 163. Offences against persons; sexual offences]

163.305. Definitions.

As used in chapter 743, Oregon Laws 1971, unless the context requires otherwise:

(2) "Forcible compulsion" means to compel by:

(a) Physical force; or

(b) A threat, express or implied, that places a person in fear of immediate or future death or physical injury to self or another person, or in fear that the person or another person will immediately or in the future be kidnapped.

ORS § 163.375 defines rape in first degree as follows:

Rape in the first degree.

(1) A person who has sexual intercourse with another person commits the crime of rape in the first degree if:

(a) The victim is subjected to forcible compulsion by the person;

(b) The victim is under 12 years of age;

(c) The victim is under 16 years of age and is the person's sibling, of the whole or half blood, the person's child or the person's spouse's child; or

(d) The victim is incapable of consent by reason of mental defect, mental incapacitation or physical helplessness.

(2) Rape in the first degree is a Class A felony.

http://definitions.uslegal.com/f/forcible-compulsion/

[lamourlady]

Sodomize sounds evil and depraved. It's a much better headline than..."oral sexual conduct and anal sexual conduct with another person by forcible compulsion"


ref.

forcible compulsion

http://definitions.uslegal.com/f/forcible-compulsion/

Sorry, I was referring to the article you quoted:

Quote
NEW YORK -- The maid came from one of the world's poorest countries to the U.S., working to support the teen daughter she raised alone. The penthouse suite at the Sofitel Hotel was just another room. She says she had no idea the man was a famous French politician. She says he tried to rape her.

[Brocke]

Sorry, I was referring to the article you quoted:

I think they are using any and as many accusations as possible. There is still a chance that he is actually guilty but it is interesting how the media tide is so much against him.

[lamourlady]

I think they are using any and as many accusations as possible. There is still a chance that he is actually guilty but it is interesting how the media tide is so much against him.

Yes, very interesting. 

[chris jones]

 The wars, Afhgnaistan, Iraq, rage on, the genocide continues, Lybia is now included, how long before the Pakys get their upcomings, or the Iranains, or Syrians.
  Ya, sure I know this is a subject of the rape  is not only complex, but hits on us emotionaly.
Will we one day get all the facts, when have we ever been privy to the moves of the big dogs.
  Hate to rant, though I have a feeling this will run overtime, a true sideshow taking presidence over what the WTF is realy going on.
 

[shipgeek]

I think they are using any and as many accusations as possible. There is still a chance that he is actually guilty but it is interesting how the media tide is so much against him.

The US media may be against him but the French media are standing on his side.

[shipgeek]

Maid at centre of Kahn case ‘feels alone in the world’

By Jennifer Peltz, New York
Wednesday, May 18, 2011

THE lawyer for a maid who accused IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn of sexual abuse says she feels "alone in the world" and is telling the truth.



Jeffrey Shapiro says the maid is from the African nation of Guinea with a 15-year-old daughter.

He says she had no idea who Strauss-Kahn was until a day or two after she was attacked on Saturday.

Shapiro says his client’s story of being attacked by Strauss-Kahn in his Sofitel Hotel suite is "consistent" because she is telling the truth.

Strauss-Kahn, 62, is jailed in New York on charges including attempted rape after being denied bail on Monday. His lawyer has said that he is innocent.

The maid has not been identified.

"There is no way in which there is any aspect of this event which could be construed consensual in any manner," Shapiro said. "This is nothing other than a physical, sexual assault by this man on this young woman."

He continued: "It’s not just my opinion that this woman is honest. The New York City Police Department reached the same conclusion." He added, "This is a woman with no agenda."

She arrived in the US seven years ago from Guinea under "very difficult circumstances," Shapiro said.

"She did not know who this man was until a day or two after this took place," Shapiro said. "She had no idea who the man was."

Other allegations of sexual misbehaviour by Strauss-Kahn have begun to circulate since his arrest.

A person close to an IMF employee who had a brief affair with Strauss-Kahn said the woman warned the organisation about his behaviour toward women in a letter sent three years ago.

The woman, Hungarian-born economist Piroska Nagy, voiced "doubts about Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s suitability for running an international institution," according to the person, who was familiar with the letter’s content but declined to be identified, citing the sensitivity of the matter.

Nagy, who had worked at the IMF for decades, left the organisation after the affair with Strauss-Kahn in 2008. Although the relationship has long been public knowledge, and an IMF-commissioned investigation cleared Strauss-Kahn of wrongdoing, it is back in the news after the 62-year-old Frenchman’s incarceration.

The New York Times published an excerpt of the letter, along with an account that alleged Nagy had been aggressively pursued by her boss, who sent her sexually explicit messages and at one point even had her summoned from the bathroom to speak to him.

In France, a lawyer for a 31-year-old novelist said she is likely to file a criminal complaint accusing him of sexually assaulting her nine years ago.

Prosecutors in New York said they are working to verify reports of at least one other case, which they suggested was overseas.

Meanwhile, Strauss-Kahn has come under pressure to resign from the IMF.

He spent an uneventful night at the infamous Rikers Island after being denied bail. Prosecutors had warned the wealthy banker might flee to France and put himself beyond the reach of US law like the filmmaker Roman Polanski.

Strauss-Kahn, a member of France’s Socialist Party, was widely considered the strongest potential challenger next year to President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Austria’s finance minister has suggested that Strauss- Kahn consider stepping down to avoid damaging the IMF.

"Considering the situation, that bail was denied, he has to figure out for himself that he is hurting the institution," Maria Fekter said as she arrived at a meeting of European finance ministers in Brussels yesterday.

Elena Salgado, Fekter’s Spanish counterpart, said Strauss-Kahn had to decide for himself whether he wanted to step down, considering the nature of the charges.

In France, defenders of Strauss-Kahn said they suspected he was the victim of a smear campaign. Others expressed sympathy.

"I didn’t like the pictures I’ve seen on television," Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker said, referring to footage that showed Strauss-Kahn in handcuffs being escorted by police outside a New York precinct house.

Showing a suspect in handcuffs is illegal in France since a 2000 law aimed at the preserving the presumption of innocence.

Strauss-Kahn was arrested on Saturday at Kennedy Airport after the allegations at the Sofitel Hotel near Times Square.

Due to his high profile, Strauss-Kahn will be held in protective custody on Rikers Island, away from most detainees, said city Correction Department spokesman Stephen Morello.

Unlike most prisoners who share 50-bed barracks, he will have a single-bed cell and will eat all of his meals alone there. He’ll have a prison guard escort when he is outside his cell.

Strauss-Kahn was ordered into custody at least until a court proceeding on Friday.

He cannot claim diplomatic immunity because he was in New York on personal business and paid his own way, the IMF said.

 

This appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Wednesday, May 18, 2011

© Examiner Publications (Cork) Limited, City Quarter, Lapps Quay, Cork. Registered in Ireland: 73385.


Read more: http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/maid-at-centre-of-kahn-case-feels-alone-in-the-world-154975.html#ixzz1MkKgvnZ3

[Brocke]

The wars, Afhgnaistan, Iraq, rage on, the genocide continues, Lybia is now included, how long before the Pakys get their upcomings, or the Iranains, or Syrians.
  Ya, sure I know this is a subject of the rape  is not only complex, but hits on us emotionaly.
Will we one day get all the facts, when have we ever been privy to the moves of the big dogs.
  Hate to rant, though I have a feeling this will run overtime, a true sideshow taking presidence over what the WTF is realy going on.
 

Don't miss the forest for the trees. The whole Strauss Kahn arrested is about a power shift to continue the War on Sovereign Wealth (the world financial crisis). They are brushing him aside to make way for a new, more cooperative, minion. This story is a piece of the puzzle not a distraction.


Dominique Strauss-Kahn's replacement at IMF should be non-European, says South Africa finance minister Pravin Gordhan
By Richard Blackden 8:36PM BST 18 May 2011

South Africah has led calls for the next head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to be drawn from outside Europe, breaking a tradition that dates back more than half a century.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/dominique-strauss-kahn/8522262/Dominique-Strauss-Kahns-replacement-at-IMF-should-be-non-European-says-South-Africa-finance-minister-Pravin-Gordhan.html


Euro Falls on Continuing Problems in Greece
By Emily Austin | May 18, 2011 13:34 GMT

The IMF stressed that Greece needs to speed up its reforms on Wednesday. The IMF mission warned the Greek government it is in threat of missing its budget deficit targets if it does not implement further reforms. Greece must cut its budget deficit to 7.6% of GDP this year to meet the terms of its EU and IMF bail-out.

Read more: http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/147683/20110518/euro-falls-on-continuing-problems-in-greece.htm#ixzz1MkJI3oQv


THE DISTILLERY: Debt disquiet
Glenn Dyer

Published 7:11 AM, 17 May 2011

On the arrest of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the Financial Times' Wolfgang Munchau says the next head of the IMF has to be European, not for any reason other than that's where the threats to the global financial system and economy lie: "The IMF’s most important programs are currently European. The eurozone’s contagious financial crisis constitutes the biggest threat to global financial stability today. The IMF is a partner in the multilateral loan program for Greece, and a structural partner in the eurozone’s financial rescue mechanism. The size of these programs dwarfs whatever else the IMF is doing at the moment." Overnight eurozone finance ministers agreed to the $US104 billion bailout of Portugal. Greece received $US147 billion already committed and Ireland got $US115 billion. All up, more than $US350 billion, so far. Greece is looking for more money - $US60 billion has been reported.

http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/THE-DISTILLERY-ASIC-Leighton-IMF-US-debt-Treasury--pd20110517-GWS74?OpenDocument&src=sph

[Brocke]

Mr. Strauss-Kahn regrets . . .
By Al Kamen, Published: May 18

Meanwhile, the arrest may complicate things a bit for the administration. We had heard the White House had already planned — yes, this can happen — to replace Lipsky with David Lipton, managing director at Citigroup and former undersecretary of the Treasury for international affairs, serving under Robert Rubin. (In addition to being an expert on these matters, Lipton could use Lipsky’s leftover business cards by changing just three letters.)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/dominique-strauss-kahn-regrets-/2011/05/17/AFMSd55G_story.html

White House Aide Lipton Seen As Possible Successor To Lipsky At IMF -Sources
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20110517-714510.html


David Lipton



Managing Director and Head of Global Country Risk Management, Citigroup
David A. Lipton is Managing Director and Head of Global Country Risk Management at Citigroup, and is based in New York City.

He served as Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs at the Treasury Department from 1993 to 1998, and before that as Assistant Secretary.

David Lipton advised and assisted Secretary Rubin on many key aspects of international economic policy. Before joining the government, he was an economic advisor to the governments of Russia, Poland, and Slovenia, and served on the staff of International Monetary Fund.

[Brocke]

He's been Spitzered.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn: IMF head 'hired prostitutes from Manhattan madam'
Dominique Strauss-Kahn hired prostitutes from the "Manhattan Madam" who infamously also served Eliot Spitzer, the disgraced former Governor of New York, she claimed on Wednesday night.



http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/dominique-strauss-kahn/8522586/Dominique-Strauss-Kahn-IMF-head-hired-prostitutes-from-Manhattan-madam.html

[iks83]

Yeah definately a setup. And he will get no mercy from no side even if he is innocent. The public hates him cause he is a rich banker and IMF head. No one trusts him even if he goes against the establishment. But it is strange that he didnt take any precautions. Or are those people really that stupid? The only way he can get out of this is start naming names. Exposing some real crimes he knows about before they quietly get rid of him. I mean he is locked in a block with 14 cells and he is the only one there? Looks like they dont want any witnesses or people that he might spill his gutts to.

But lol at his derp face and the hidiously deformed Manhatten Madam.

[Nailer]

KARMA  has acted as there are reports that the maid  has AIDS.

The hotel maid, a West African immigrant, has occupied the fourth-floor High Bridge pad in the Bronx with her 15-year-old daughter since January -- and before that, lived in another Bronx apartment set aside by Harlem Community AIDS United strictly for adults with the virus and their families.



http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/05/18/maid-allegedly-assaulted-imf-chief-reportedly-lives-apartment-hiv-patients/#ixzz1Mi6fWv1g

[iks83]

Well I thought he tried to rape her but it was unsuccessful so how does the AIDS thing come into play?

Also those URL generators they have are really something... so now the maid assaulted the IMF chief.

[bigron]

May 18, 2011
http://counterpunch.com/wolf05182011.html

Au Revoir, Monsieur Pig


Le Rapist is a Socialist? Non!

By SHERRY WOLF

When the NY Daily News headline writers have to take a break from bashing Muslims to ravage your party's key political hope as "Le Perv" on its front page, it's time to reassess. Dominique Strauss-Kahn is accused of, let's just call it by its proper name, RAPING a Manhattan hotel maid in his $3,000-a-night room, thus traumatizing a woman in the middle of her workday, obliterating his political career and shaking up French politics.

First of all, if I read one more f**king quote about "Anglo-moralism" regarding the Strauss-Kahn assaults, I'm going to smack the nearest smirking asshole to the portals of hell. He was a serial misogynist who raped a maid in a hotel, he's not in jail for an affair. Assuming that every female subordinate he's ever come in contact with is not a liar, Strauss-Kahn is an arrogant pig with enormous power who has gotten away with the sort of crimes that can get you 25 to life in most states.

The fact that he's in jail and has been denied bail is most likely because his political opponents, who currently control the French government, have given the go-ahead to do him in.

Tant pis, as the French say; tough shit, is my rough translation.

Second of all, that one of the most powerful figures in international finance and politics has assaulted a journalist trying to interview him for a book, manipulated an IMF economist who was his subordinate into sleeping with him at a conference and now raped a maid trying to clean his room tells us another thing about him—and the people and institutions that have covered for him all these years. Strauss-Kahn, and by extension, the French Non-Socialist Party and IMF, all appear to have a curious hostility to working women.

None of the incidents we've read about so far in the press took place in social settings, but at the women's place of work, where they were earning a living and being full human beings. Not to psycho-babbleize Strauss-Kahn, but he's a caveman—no offense to Neanderthals intended.

Third of all, $3,000 a night?! That's a lot of mints on your pillow. Strauss-Khan calls himself a socialist (exceedingly small "s") and heads an organization, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which pretends to help the poor, but, pardon the parallel, rapes them. The exposure that he is a career misogynist tells us a fair amount about the two institutions Strauss-Kahn led until his arrest this past weekend. In brief, they suck.

From its birth, the French Socialist Party (FSP) brought to life the political concept that—again, pardon the parallel—you can't end prostitution by bringing virgins into brothels. In other words, all attempts at changing the French capitalist system from within the framework of a party that accepts the inevitability of class society, imperialism and competition has been a colossal failure.

From its bloody defense of French power in North Africa, particularly throughout the brutal Algerian war from 1954–62 and its extensive privatization of public services to its racist attacks on immigrants for being insufficiently "French," the FSP has proven that it is to socialism what Donald Trump is to refined discourse.

As for the IMF, ostensibly an institution made up of 182 member countries, even the New York Times admits that it is "the lapdog of the U.S. Treasury." The Economist explained that the IMF's purpose in providing loans was "to open doors for American business."

Its loans to poor and downwardly mobile countries are tied to "structural adjustment programs" that require privatization, deregulation and labor "flexibility," neocon-speak for smashing unions that exist or preventing any from organizing. As many leftists have noted, it operates as a global loan shark.

We rarely, if ever, see such a powerful man fall, and never for the rape of a Black immigrant woman. I can only assume that he's pissed off people much higher up who decided to cut the cord.

In coming weeks we'll see the institutions he represents and his former hangers-on scurry about to cover their asses, but for now we can take a bit of pleasure in the political, social and personal collapse of such a man. Let's use his fall to shine a light on the organizations that have protected him all these years.

Au revoir, Monsieur Pig! FSP and IMF, j'accuse!

Sherry Wolf is the author of Sexuality and Socialism. She blogs at Sherry Talks Back.


http://counterpunch.com/wolf05182011.html

[Satyagraha]

Dominique Strauss-Kahn resigns as head of IMF
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/imf-board-fight-could-undermine-agencys-effectiveness/2011/05/18/AFEm3i6G_story.html?wpisrc=al_national
By Howard Schneider and Zachary A. Goldfarb, Published: May 18 |
Updated: Thursday, May 19, 12:43 AM

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, who is facing attempted rape charges in New York, announced his resignation late Wednesday night.

===========================

A Favorite Emerges for Helm of IMF
http://www.cnbc.com/id/43087955

The French finance minister, Christine Lagarde, was on a panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos this January when her usual smile turned into a frown. Next to her, Robert E. Diamond Jr., chief executive of Barclays and one of the most powerful bankers in the world, thanked regulators and finance ministers for their role in shaping a better environment after the financial crisis.

[Krateros]

World Bank, May 2007
Source

"Sounding more like a cast member of the Sopranos than an international leader, in testimony by one key witness Mr [Paul] Wolfowitz declares: "If they f**k with me or Shaha [his resident girlfriend who was given pay raises and promotions], I have enough on them to f**k them too.""

International Money Fund, May 2011
Source

“The IMF chief [Dominique Strauss-Kahn] outlined the three biggest personal hurdles in his relentless campaign to become president of France: "Money, women and being a Jew."  He started with women. "Yes I like women, so what?" he asked.”

[Brocke]

Strauss-Kahn victim of 'dollar lobby'?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSV27b_87nQ

The International Monetary Fund chief has resigned while in custody in New York, over accusations of sexual assault that he strongly denies. Before Dominique Strauss-Kahn quit, crowds gathered in Washington to join the growing global calls for him to go. Let's look at what this all means for world banking with Adrian Salbuchi, who's an economics and geopolitics author in Buenos Aires.

[Brocke]

Was IMF Head Dominique Strauss Kahn arrested over SDR Bonds?

May 16, 2011

Clearly Dominique Strauss-Kahn is becoming a hot topic as it is shaping up to be the conspiracy theory of the century. Even now on Ebay you’ll find his name listed.

STRAUSSKAHN.NET, STRAUSSKAHN.ORG are all for sale as a package for 950 bucks (current bid, most likely it will go higher.. much higher due to the traffic they are currently getting.

Regardless it appears that people are profiting and it’s spurring a mini-industry on who can type faster. The supporters or detractors of his arrest.

This can honestly be the conspiracy theory of the century. The IMF under Dominique Strauss Kahn has been over the past 3 years been planning it’s own currency of reserve. Calling on a currency called an SDR (special drawing rights) in focus the point that could be the major issue is the SDR bond that allows the IMF to issue bonds that could (and most likely would) compete with US treasuries.

The moment the SDR BOND becomes popular is the exact moment the US dollar loses it’s currency reserve status.

But alas, the guy that was pushing this through finds himself behind bars on what some say are bogus charges.

You could imagine what is at stake. The US dollar itself.

If Dominique Strauss Kahn was able to pull this off and use the IMF to draw SDR Bonds you will see a dramatic drop in the value of the US debt. Countries and investors would be buying SDR bonds rather than US treasuries. It will effectively end the USA’s ability to print off the debt.

Instead however we find the leader of the IMF behind bars. Was he setup? Was this engineered to keep the US Dollar as the currency of reserve?

http://www.tribbleagency.com/?p=8026

[Brocke]

IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn Calls for Strengthening the International Monetary System

Press Release No. 11/36
February 10, 2011

Mr. Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), warned today that lack of action to reform the international monetary system could sow the seeds of the next crisis, and he called for renewed international cooperation for a better and stronger global recovery.

“Global imbalances are back, and issues that worried us before the crisis—large and volatile capital flows, exchange rate pressures, rapidly growing excess reserves—are on the front burner once again,” Mr. Strauss-Kahn said during a panel discussion on the international monetary system held at the IMF in Washington, DC. He said that “reforms to the international monetary system could both bolster the recovery and strengthen the system’s ability to prevent future crises.”

Mr. Strauss-Kahn emphasized three areas of reform in particular:

• Strengthening policy cooperation. Just as cooperation helped pull the global economy out of the crisis, Mr. Strauss-Kahn said further cooperation can now lay the foundations for more stable global growth. He pointed to the G-20’s Mutual Assessment Process (MAP)—as as an important first step toward creating more permanent frameworks for global policy cooperation—and to the IMF’s Financial Sector Assessment Programs and new reports on the spillover effects of countries’ policies on one another, as measures in train to strengthen surveillance.

• Reducing capital flow and exchange rate volatility. Countries’ policy responses to inflows of capital have an impact on other countries, Mr. Strauss-Kahn noted. He said that the Fund is looking at these issues including whether there was a need for globally agreed “rules of the road” for managing capital flows.

• Enhancing liquidity provision in times of extreme volatility. The global financial safety net has been strengthened in the wake of the crisis. Mr. Strauss-Kahn noted, for example, the introduction of the Flexible Credit Line and Precautionary Credit Line by the IMF. Another avenue worth exploring, he said, is how to “strengthen partnerships with regional financing arrangements.”

Potential Role of the SDR in strengthening the international monetary system. Over time, Mr. Strauss-Kahn said that there may be a greater role for the IMF’s international reserve asset, called the Special Drawing Right, or SDR, to contribute to a more stable monetary system. Although a number of obstacles remain in the way, increasing the global stock of SDRs could help alleviate global imbalances by reducing the need for an excessive buildup of reserves, he said. He added that issuing SDR-denominated bonds could create a potentially new class of reserve assets, and that use of the SDR to price global trade and denominate financial assets would provide a buffer from exchange rate volatility.

Mr. Strauss Kahn concluded that the reform of the international monetary system is not something academic or abstract—“It is linked to achieving the kind of well-balanced and sustainable recovery that the world needs and it is linked to preventing the next crisis.”

http://www.imf.org/external/np/sec/pr/2011/pr1136.htm

[Brocke]

FEBRUARY 19, 2011, 2:15 P.M. ET

UPDATE: IMF's Strauss-Kahn Wants The Yuan In SDR

  By Nicolas Winning and William Horobin
  Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
 
PARIS (Dow Jones)--The head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, said Saturday he wants China's yuan to be included in the basket of currencies that make up the fund's alternative reserve currency--but it would have to be at least partly convertible first.

Finance officials from the Group of 20 industrialized and emerging countries agreed Saturday to look at whether the role of the Special Drawing Rights, or SDR, in the global monetary system should be expanded.

"I will be personally very in favor of having the renminbi in the SDR as soon as possible, but in one way or other it means that the renminbi has to be, if not totally freely convertible, at least partly convertible for the part which will be in the SDR," he told reporters after the G20 meeting.

The French--who hold the rotating presidency of the G20--have been using the inclusion of the yuan in the SDR as a way of approaching the t**** issue of China's currency.

U.S. and other developed markets want China to let the yuan--also known as the renminbi--appreciate faster because they feel its relative weakness crimps the export power of their economies. But China says too quick an appreciation of the yuan could damage the Chinese economy.

French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde said Monday the yuan would be included in that expansion as soon as China has fulfilled the required conditions on the convertibility of its currency

Strauss-Kahn said the yuan is clearly a big enough currency to satisfy the size criteria to be included in the SDR, which includes the dollar, the yen, the euro and the U.K. pound.

"The problem is there's another one [criteria], which is that it has to be a currency that is freely valued by the market and it's not," he said.

The IMF head said he has had many opportunities to talk with Chinese government and central bank officials and those discussions have been "very open."

"I think that would be good for China because it would lead to a more open economy and clearly that is what China aims to do," he said.

Strauss-Kahn said the SDR has a number of advantages, notably that it less volatile than other currencies. It can also be used to price commodities and issue bonds, he added.

Strauss-Kahn said it was also urgent for Europe to pursue further economic coordination. Some countries needed to carry out aggressive fiscal adjustment while others could pursue a more medium-term adjustment, he said without naming any specific countries.

"Europe can't function with deficits that bring debt to around 100% [of gross domestic product]. Simply, they will no longer be able to borrow as lenders won't lend anymore."

"European growth can strengthen quicker...if necessary economic policies are implemented," Strauss-Kahn said.

http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20110219-702023.html

[chris jones]

Brock,
I see your point and appreciate the posts, very informative.
 My cynicism dominates me, I can't help it at this point in my life.
IMF, is a pile of shitbags, they are owned and have a mission, a finger of the elites.
 Maby they are ramrodding this slob, maby not, but my take is one way or another , with or without him at the helm they will go forward with their plans.
Can't help it Brock, its just how I see things.
IMF. An organization set up in 1944 to lower trade barriers between countries and to stabilize currencies by monitoring the foreign exchange systems of member countries, and lending money to developing nations.
  The lending aspect, realy get to me. A loanshark is what he is, he makes no bones about it. He doesn't hide behind the flag or act like he is doing a favor. The IMF and all its glory, saving the world, well, I just don't smoke their shiiite. Set up or not, this guy has problems, can you imagine the power he weilded, themoney, some say his yearly pay was only 420,0000, I don't smoke that either, on the books maby,money is power and visa versa. Sorry to go off the map, Ive been doing that of late.

[Brocke]

Brock,
I see your point and appreciate the posts, very informative.
 My cynicism dominates me, I can't help it at this point in my life.
IMF, is a pile of shitbags, they are owned and have a mission, a finger of the elites.
 Maby they are ramrodding this slob, maby not, but my take is one way or another , with or without him at the helm they will go forward with their plans.
Can't help it Brock, its just how I see things.
IMF. An organization set up in 1944 to lower trade barriers between countries and to stabilize currencies by monitoring the foreign exchange systems of member countries, and lending money to developing nations.
  The lending aspect, realy get to me. A loan shark is what he is, he makes no bones about it. He doesn't hide behind the flag or act like he is doing a favor. The IMF and all its glory, saving the world, well, I just don't smoke their shiiite. Set up or not, this guy has problems, can you imagine the power he wielded, the money, some say his yearly pay was only 420,0000, I don't smoke that either, on the books maby,money is power and visa versa. Sorry to go off the map, Ive been doing that of late.

Of course it could be as simple as the US globalists wanting to put their man in the IMF so they can gain some control over the economic blood-letting of the EU. Eliot Spitzer is a good example of the way the US Financial Kingpins roll. He was writing articles in the Washington Post about Predatory Lenders in 2008 prior to his scandal.


Former high-ranking U.S. treasury bureaucrat questions official story on Dominique Strauss-Kahn

Dominique Strauss-Kahn's reputation is in the sewer after he was charged with rape, but not everyone believes what's being reported in North American newspapers.

By Charlie Smith, May 19, 2011

North American newspapers have not been kind to International Monetary Fund director Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who's facing rape and unlawful-imprisonment charges in New York.

This came after a hotel maid—a single mother from West Africa—filed a police complaint that he attacked her.

But a former U.S. assistant secretary of the Treasury and iconoclastic writer, Paul Craig Roberts, has a different view.

In an article called "The Amerikan Police State Strides Forward" in the online Foreign Policy Journal, Roberts suggests that Strauss-Kahn might have been framed—because the U.S. government did not want him replacing Nicolas Sarkozy as president of France.

"President Bill Clinton survived his sexual escapades because he was a servant to the system, not a threat," Roberts writes. "But Strauss-Kahn, like former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, was a threat to the system, and, like Eliot Spitzer, Strass-Kahn has been deleted from the power ranks."

Roberts also notes that "Strauss-Kahn was the first IMF director in my lifetime, if memory serves, who disavowed the traditional IMF policy of imposing on the poor and ordinary people the cost of bailing out Wall Street and the Western banks."

Roberts, a former Wall Street Journal columnist, doesn't discount the possibility that the complainant was bribed. He also compares what's happening to Strauss-Kahn to the allegations against WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange, who is also a threat to U.S. hegemony.

In a postcript to the column, Roberts adds: "In the several hours since I wrote this article, authorities have announced that Strauss-Kahn, who was refused bail on specious grounds, has been put on suicide watch. Why announce it unless it serves an agenda? From the beginning, every statement and action of the authorities is designed to convey the impression of guilt. Is putting Strauss-Kahn on suicide watch a way to paint a picture of a person who can’t face the public humiliation of his crime? Is it a way to use the humiliation of constant interruption to break down his character and resolve? Or might it be to plant the idea that should he expire in prison, suicide is the explanation?"

http://www.straight.com/article-394125/vancouver/former-highranking-us-treasury-bureaucrat-questions-official-story-dominique-strausskahn

[chris jones]

Brock..
         Thanks, it adds up.

[bigron]

Regime Change at the IMF: The Frame-Up of Dominique Strauss-Kahn?

By Prof. Michel Chossudovsky


Global Research, May 19, 2011


READ HERE

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=24866

[carlee]

http://gizadeathstar.com/2011/05/reflections-on-the-alleged-rapist-imf-bankster-part-ii/

[shipgeek]

I hope this guy never gets out after what he has done.
I would lock him up for a good 25 years and no special cell.
And then he denies it...   

[shipgeek]

Some interesting new developments here.


World
New details of investigation of a hotel maid's charge that she was sexually assaulted by IMF chief

The hotel maid who alleged she was sexually assaulted by the former head of the International Monetary Fund was found by a supervisor in a hallway after she escaped from his luxury suite, according to two people familiar with the investigation. Three members of the Sofitel hotel staff heard her story and then took her to the hotel’s security office.

They described her as traumatized, having difficulty speaking and concerned about losing her job if she pressed charges. The hotel security chief found her story credible and called police.

The maid also repeatedly spit on the walls and floor — witnessed by hotel colleagues — as she described being forced to commit oral sexual acts on Strauss-Kahn. Her saliva is being tested for DNA and could become crucial evidence in the case, the sources said.

These sources, who spoke only condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation, provided the first detailed account of the hour-long window between the alleged attack and when police were summoned. What transpired in that hour is certain to be questioned by Strauss-Kahn’s lawyers as criminal charges move forward.

The sources asserted that the steps taken during that hour helped make the criminal case and apprehend the suspect before he fled the country. In that hour, Sofitel hotel staff calmed the maid, got her to overcome her difficulty describing what happened, did a thorough interview, and got police on the scene for forensic testing.

The sources said the maid, described as a West African immigrant in her 30s, had normally been assigned to clean a different floor in the hotel but recently volunteered to take the floor of Strauss-Kahn's luxury suite after a colleague went on leave.

The maid reported she entered Strauss-Kahn's room shortly before noon on Saturday, May 14, after a room-service employee assured her the suite was empty. She left the door open as she began cleaning.

She said she was startled when Strauss-Kahn emerged naked from a bathroom. She said she apologized to him and turned away from him, but the ex-IMF chief grabbed her from behind and touched her breasts, remarking she was beautiful.

The woman alleged Strauss-Kahn slammed the door to the suite and engaged the indoor latch to lock it, trapping her inside. She alleged that he dragged her deeper inside the suite, and when she slipped trying to get away, he forced her head down to perform oral sex acts.

The woman eventually escaped the room and hid in a hallway just outside his $3,000-a-night VIP suite, as Strauss-Kahn hurriedly left the suite and went downstairs to check out.

A cleaning supervisor for the floor found the traumatized maid shortly before 12:30 p.m. as she stood near a closet outside the suite. The maid said she hid in a hallway until Strauss-Kahn left, and the supervisor emerged from a service elevator a few moments later for a normal floor check.

The supervisor tried to calm the maid and ascertain what happened, taking her back to Strauss-Kahn's suite where she became visibly upset. The maid expressed concern during at least one of the conversations with her supervisors that she'd lose her job because she had walked in on a hotel guest, the sources said.

The floor supervisor reported the maid had nausea and was trembling. As soon as the supervisor ascertained an attack had occurred, she called one of her bosses in housecleaning, who responded to an in-house call and came to the floor, the sources said.

When the more senior housekeeping supervisor got enough details from the maid to believe a crime had been committed, she called a hotel security officer to the room.

The security officer interrogated the maid, getting extensive details of what had happened in the suite. Throughout the questioning, the maid appeared traumatized and several times spit on the floor and walls. At one point she went to a bathroom to try to vomit. Her saliva was later removed from carpet and walls as evidence.

The hotel security officer then alerted the chief of hotel security, a former law enforcement officer, who conducted another interview that was halting at times because the woman had become increasingly traumatized and sick, the sources said.

The maid repeated her concerns about being fired and inquired whether she should even press charges.

The security chief made the decision to call New York police and an ambulance once he had ascertained there was enough evidence of a crime and that the maid's story had been consistent during all four conversations she had with hotel employees, the sources said.

The four interviews and repeated efforts to calm the woman took about an hour. Police were summoned around 1:30 p.m.

Shortly after police arrived, Strauss-Kahn called the hotel to report he had left his cell phone behind and his call was immediately routed to the Sofitel security chief, the sources said.

Working with detectives who were in the room, the hotel security chief falsely told Strauss-Kahn the cell phone had been located and he would drive it to the IMF chief. The security chief got Strauss-Kahn to tell him that he was already at the Air France lounge at New York's John F. Kennedy airport and planning to fly to Paris, the sources said.

Using the information from the security chief's call, police detectives called Port Authority police and apprehended Strauss-Kahn on the jetliner about 10 minutes before the flight was to depart.

The Sofitel has fully cooperated with law enforcement, making employees available for voluntary interviews, reviewing security tapes, and turning over records of phone calls, check-ins and check-outs, and door card readers. Some of these employees were also brought before a grand jury before Strauss-Kahn was formally indicted and released on $1 million bail this week.

http://www.iwatchnews.org/2011/05/21/4702/new-details-investigation-hotel-maids-charge-she-was-sexually-assaulted-imf-chief-0

[Polaris]

shipgeek, well thats what the elite want you to think.

[shipgeek]

shipgeek, well thats what the elite want you to think.

So what do you think???

Strauss-Kahn is innocent?
Sofitel maid invented the whole story?
All was arranged in advance by DSK and his bankster friends with a big $$$$$$$$$$ check for the maid?

[Dig]

So what do you think???

Strauss-Kahn is innocent?
Sofitel maid invented the whole story?
All was arranged in advance by DSK and his bankster friends with a big $$$$$$$$$$ check for the maid?

The guy has a known problem with attacking women. He has done it in the past. This is a known flaw in his character. Usually, the NWO covers shit like this up, but this time they let it ride. I do not see how this guy has went against the NWO as his work has led to the destabilization of North Africa and he was actively trying to scapegoat the IMF from the current global planned financial depression. I believe he has been served up to the masses as a sacrifice offering, a lightning rod for us to vent our anger while allowing the same system to go on.

IMO, I think 2 things are exposed from this operation:

1] The Fabians are still fighting the Fascists

2] This has to be a lesson to all who have been promised a seat in the capstone. The NWO will spit you sub-elites out like bad milk if it is more helpful for them to do so. You will get no quarter with the New World Order, but come over to the right side of history and you will have full constitutional quarter with the people seeking to protect the republic from the planned "Spring Uprising" controlled by DARPA, Kissinger, and other Nazi/Stasi elements within our country.

[Polaris]

So what do you think???

Strauss-Kahn is innocent?
Sofitel maid invented the whole story?
All was arranged in advance by DSK and his bankster friends with a big $$$$$$$$$$ check for the maid?

If they convict him, the elite win. Pure and simple. Which side are you on.

[Dig]

If they convict him, the elite win. Pure and simple. Which side are you on.

The elite lost no matter what. The elite only win if they can maintain a false narrative. The false narrative is that the IMF can solve the world's financial issues because the people that run it are of the highest caliber and cannot be extorted. That narrative is proven false by this arrest. The guy likely will be convicted given just the leaked info. And unlike a fully BS operation, the story has not changed since the first report. And all of the new evidence supports the original story.

[shipgeek]

The elite lost no matter what. The elite only win if they can maintain a false narrative. The false narrative is that the IMF can solve the world's financial issues because the people that run it are of the highest caliber and cannot be extorted. That narrative is proven false by this arrest. The guy likely will be convicted given just the leaked info. And unlike a fully BS operation, the story has not changed since the first report. And all of the new evidence supports the original story.

My feelings exactly.

[Overcast]

If they convict him, the elite win. Pure and simple. Which side are you on.

But who's to say any of this was planned? Maybe this is a story of one person who got away from a spoiled little elite who is used to getting his way?

No matter what - if the guy tried to rape the maid - he's guilty and deserves time. He was in control of his own actions. If, for some reason, he wasn't in control of his own actions I would say the whole situation would be different.


If he was framed and it's due to his associations - he still is getting what's coming to him, assuming the allegations are true. Of course, it's possible this maid is lying, but I have my doubts since it seemed he was trying to GTFO in a big hurry.

But I highly suspect he was in fact in control of his own actions. If the maid was a 'plant' - it really doesn't matter, in the end, at some point I do believe we'll answer for our own actions. It's just that his time, for this incident is now.

But this brings us again back to the WORST problem - we can't trust any of the news media or government, at all. That's the core problem we have - and it may well be by design. Although, the results may not be what those who create this environment want ultimately, they are of course, playing with fire.

[bigron]

   
 

Dominique Strauss-Kahn: The Colonial Predator Legacy

By James Petras

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article28175.htm

May 23, 2011 "Information Clearing House" -- The attempted rape and sexual abuse of an African cleaning woman by the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn (DSK) embodies, in microcosm, the entire historical and contemporary legacy of colonial neo-colonial relations. Efforts to portray this criminal act as an individual obsession or a personal failing or a “Latin idiosyncrasy” fail to take account of the ‘deep history’ in which these psychological pathologies are embedded.

The first clue is evident on the very surface – skin deep – of the antagonists: On the one-hand, a powerful white European politician representing the collective will of an organization representing the global capitalist class, one with the financial resources to severely punish poor and indebted countries that disobey its prejudicial economic fiats; on the other, a single mother, a black working woman from a former French colony in West Africa (Guinea), which was ‘stripped clean’ by the departing French colonial officials for daring to assert its independence and subsequently forced to submit to endless ‘neo-colonial’ economic impositions ensuring its stagnation and subordination.

Was it “lunacy”, as Martin Wolf of the Financial Times would claim, that DSK would throw over a powerful, prestigious post and likely the Presidency of France, for a moment of violent sex? Or was it the playing out, and living through, the historical roles, deeply embedded in the psyche and cultural mores of a descendant and practioner of colonial realities: imposing his sexual demands on a ‘black servant’. No doubt the fact that the cleaning woman spoke French and came from a former French colony, one which had suffered numerous subsequent ‘French’ and IMF impositions, gave the powerful predator the sense of ‘entitlement’ to prey on black flesh, just as so many of his compatriot predecessor officials had done to ‘their’ servants in the course of administrating the colony. No doubt, in more recent times , it is common for top officials from international financial institutions visiting Africa to pad their expense accounts by hiring hookers to “service them,” while they impose austerity policies impoverishing countries and forcing millions to flee overseas in search of menial labor … as cleaning workers in luxury hotels. “Colonial familiarity”, the ‘shared’ language of oppressor and victim – perhaps excited the perverse sexual obsession.

The Colonial Legacy: The Social Psychology of Rape

The history of the European, and later US, colonial conquests, imperial wars and military occupations is a story of plunder, enslavement, exploitation and, above all, assertion of supremacy and power. Profits and pleasure accrue to the big mining and banking executives as well as colonial officials, especially among those in the upwardly mobile middle class who see in their new found power a chance to satisfy the whims and fancies denied them in their ‘home’ cities and among their domestic families and friends.

The absolute power of the colonial administrators allows them to secure total submission from those who are powerless – the single African women isolated from family, friends – before the Courts of Justice and denied equality .The latter is subject to firing, blacklisting, unemployment, intimidation, humiliation and insults for daring to denounce their colonial superiors. These circumstances and relations are reproduced today in all the countries subject to the dictate of the IMF, the Central Bank of Europe and the US Treasury.

Contemporary Neocolonialism: They Come, They Plunder, They Rape

The IMF and their imperial financial accomplices take advantage of the debts and crises of corrupt and complicit rulers to dictate terms for loans. The top officials seize sovereignty and impose economic policies, which privatize and de-nationalize the entire economy, reduce wages and pensions, worsen working conditions and retain a veto on all local economic appointees. The IMF and Central Banks re-colonize the debtor country: All earnings from trade and investment are primarily directed outward and upward. The neo-colonial division of labor involves imperial capital and black labor.

Embedded in this world-historic system of power, the powerful officials of international organizations have the financial and military backing of the US and the EU: the Directors are appointed by Euro-Americans and they enforce the rules of the game by which they prosper. As close collaborators and past and future partners of the private corporate wealthy, and likely political leaders in imperial regimes, the ‘international officials’ live and share the power, wealth, luxury and perks of the very wealth. They fly first class and they stay at the most luxurious suites in 5-star hotels. They are treated by their debtor ‘hosts’ as royalty. Above all, they are used to being obeyed: They expect submission. They believe their whims and perversions are ‘natural outgrowths’ of their ‘healthy appetites’ stimulated by their high-energy travels, frequent meetings and forcible dictates. If the top local officials of a debtor nation submit, who are the cleaning women to object? They should be honored to be chosen “to serve” the makers and breakers of entire economies and the livelihoods of millions.

The Resistance

DSK, the imposing ruler over the major global financial institution, did not expect his sexual advances to be resisted by an immigrant, a former French colonial subject. Initially denied submission, DSK relied on force and violence. Just as when workers and the unemployed launch general strikes and mass protests against IMF-dictated austerity programs, the regimes order the police and armed forces to impose subjection through violence. The black cleaning worker did not struggle and then submit, as too often is the case with workers’ movements. She made her outrage a public issue – she un-masked the violent criminal behavior that lay behind the respectable, affluent facade. She confronted the ruler before the larger democratic public. The public face of international finance capital, the head of the same predatory institution that rapes entire working populations in the name of vacuous euphemisms (“financial stabilization”) is nothing less than a crude crotch grabber – a sleazy lecher.

How many millions of Indo-Chinese and Algerian working-class and peasant women and their descendants, who suffered similar indignities during the French colonial administrations, must now feel vindicated by the simple act of denunciation by the Guinean cleaning woman, so far from Africa, but so close to the hearts of rebellion against the universal injustices inflicted daily by the IMF and its local accomplices!

The Reactions of the Left: the French Socialists)

Not surprisingly, the majority of French “Socialist” opinion has defended DSK and accused his victim, the black African working woman, of being part of a sinister capitalist conspiracy against the principle chosen mouthpiece and enforcer of international capital.

The French Socialist Party has a long and sordid history of supporting bloody colonial wars: Indo-China, Algeria and dozens of military interventions in Africa. Today they support the wars against Libya, Iraq and Afghanistan. As always, there are “dissidents”, left-wingers, “critical” intellectuals and “Trotskyist” factions who speak for the “rights” of the accused, as well the victim, but who looked to DSK, the head of the IMF and his millionaire backers, as their ticket back to the Palace Elysee, the Presidency and the spoils of office.

“Colonial Socialism” in Europe, like “imperial liberalism” in the US, has a long and ignoble history: Both ‘trust’ the word of innocence of an indicted financier over the accusations of an immigrant black cleaning woman, which is not too surprising. They have a history of converting criminals into victims and the victims into criminal… conspirators.

One has only to look at the French Socialists and US Liberals support for Israeli colonialist over the Palestinians “terrorists”; or NATO occupiers against the Afghan resistance; or Tunisian autocrats over pro-democracy protestors.

The fact that sectors of the ‘left’ in France and America can claim DSK as a victim of some ‘elite conspiracy’ is a clear sign of their total and complete degeneracy and the perversion of any semblance of progressive sentiment. Under Strauss-Kahn’s dictates the IMF has imposed the most reactionary social cuts in recent history on Spain, Greece, and Portugal: Unemployment is 45% for under-30 year-olds in Spain and overall 22%; in Greece 16% and Portugal 13%. Pensions have been reduced by 15% and wages by a similar or greater amount. Vast sectors of the Greek economy, valued at 50 billion Euros are to be privatized, as DSK plays to the private multi-nationals. Under IMF austerity policies Southern European economies are regressing – as public investments and private consumption shrink and negative growth rates hover between 5% - 10% over the past 3 years with no end in sight.

If there is any ‘conspiracy’ to frame DSK it certainly does not come from any ‘elite’ or ‘banking cartel’. What is much more likely, is that after the initial jailing and indictment, the financial powers backing DSK will move into action – they have secured his conditional release under bail; the victim and accuser has been subject to intense police interrogation and more ‘media’ and legal pressure can be expected to force her to retract charges. The legal system rarely ever works in favor of working-class victims facing a high powered legal team backing a millionaire predator, especially one who speaks and works for the international capitalist class.

James Petras is a retired Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at Binghamton University, SUNY, New York, U.S., and adjunct professor at Saint Mary's University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada who has published prolifically on Latin American and Middle Eastern political issues. Petras received his B.A. from Boston University and Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley.
   

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article28175.htm