Six US banks control 60% of GDP
“They are Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo. They have assets equivalent to 60 percent of our gross national product.
“And to put this in perspective, in the mid-1990s, these six banks or their predecessors, since there have been a lot of mergers, had less than 20 percent. Their assets were less than 20 percent of the gross national product.”
— James Kwak, co-author of the new book Thirteen Bankers: The Wall St. Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown, in an April 23 Alternet.org interview.
Mexico rejects same meat consumed in US
“In 2008, Mexican authorities rejected a shipment of U.S. beef because the meat exceeded Mexico's regulatory tolerance for copper. The rejected meat was returned to the United States, where it was sold and consumed, because the U.S. has no regulatory threshold for copper in meat ...”
“While the public has gotten used to microbes like E. coli and salmonella threatening the nation's meat supply ... contamination of meat by heavy metals, veterinary drugs and pesticides has been slipping
through the bureaucratic cracks.”
— May 1 Alternet.org article.
United States: Little trust in government
“Only 22% of all Americans surveyed said they trusted the government in Washington almost always or most of the time — among the lowest measures in half a century — according to a Pew Research Center survey released Sunday night.
“The results point to ‘a perfect storm’ of public unrest, Pew reports, a dismal economy, an unhappy public, bitter,
partisan-based backlash and epic discontent with Congress and elected officials.”
— April 19 Los Angeles Times article.