John McCain: A Closer Look at Evil (Part 3)

In the 1980s, John McCain performed as a perfect asset by enabling a $150 billion fraud while destroying the nation’s savings and loan sector. The systematic pillaging of that industry required lengthy premeditation, malice aforethought and what’s known in law as an “evil mind.”

But here’s the catch. McCain may not have aided this criminality mindfully. He may have lacked the requisite intent to hold him accountable except at the ballot box.

His most transparent con was the invasion of Iraq, a war built on a foundation of lies. McCain became the Senate’s most enthusiast cheerleader along with Joe Lieberman, his Zionist sidekick.

Did John McCain know that he enabled this fraud? Was he mindful? If so, he’s a foreign agent. Other than for another nation, who would take our military to war on false pretenses?

If not, he’s a classic asset: a person whose known dysfunctions are exploited by others. For those who know him best, McCain is noted for his irritability, anger and internal instability.

So was he mindful or not? Is he an agent or an asset? Only time will tell.

Meanwhile he’s running for a fifth term as U.S. Senator. Does his record merit six more years?

Recall the events of the past 24 years while he steadily gained Senate seniority. Can you identify a more corrupt era—either in this generation or the last?

The longer John McCain served, the worse things became both here and abroad.

Frauds with Foresight

Sophisticated frauds are often pre-staging for serial frauds. Their progression then appears to “the mark” like a natural progression of events.

S&L home mortgages became mortgage-backed securities. Those securitized debts became feedstock for the “financial creativity” now known as the subprime mortgage fraud.

So what fraud is teed-up to follow the war in Iraq—which was waged on false pretenses? Is the Global War on Terrorism a form of “geopolitical creativity”?

When John McCain was selling us this war, was he working for the same syndicate that sold us the subprime fraud? What’s next? War with Iran? Pakistan? Syria? Who is the next plausible Evil Doer? Or is this Evil Doer narrative just another profitable fraud?

Other than acquiescence, what role did McCain play in these mega-frauds? Was he willfully complicit? Or just incompetent? Neither trait is an appealing feature for a Senate candidate.

He’s back on the campaign trail albeit without his theme-setting campaign bus called the Straight Talk Express. Most of his political props remain unchanged: He still wraps himself in the flag, he touts his seniority on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and his appearances feature maps of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

He avoids any mention of Iraq or S&Ls. And blames the subprime meltdown on others.

Pre-staging Agents and Assets

“The issue of economics” John McCain conceded in 2007, “is not something I have understood as well as I should. I’ve got Greenspan’s book.”

Alan Greenspan’s unbridled faith in “financial creativity” enabled the subprime fraud. His tenure as chair of the Federal Reserve witnessed the worst downturn since the Great Depression.

A revealing career preceded Greenspan’s 1986 appointment to the Fed by Ronald Reagan the same year that McCain came to the Senate. Greenspan not only gave helpful opinions on the solvency of S&Ls, he also helped Arizonan Charles Keating recruit the infamous “Keating 5” Senators who extended the life—and the taxpayer cost—of that politically aided fraud.

A campaign contributor when McCain ran for Congress in 1982, Keating previously served as counsel to Carl Lindner in Cincinnati. Lindner routinely appears on the periphery of corrupt politicians along with Keating colleagues Leon Black and Michael “Junk Bond King” Milken.

Keating left Lindner’s employ to serve as the non-Ashkenazi face on Lincoln S&L in Phoenix, a massive control fraud overseen by Milken and Black from the now defunct Drexel Burnham Lambert. In 1987, Milken’s paycheck for his financial creativity totaled $550 million.

Much of the cost of bailed-out S&Ls can be traced to high-yield/high-risk bonds (aka junk). As with the subprime bailout, taxpayers got the mortgage (the debt) while financial sophisticates got the house: Milken, Black, Lindner, et.al.

Leon Black employed the Times Square Fizzler (aka the “Pakistani Terrorist”). Black’s father, Eli, also worked at the corrupt interface of finance and geopolitics. Back when this syndicate was discrediting the U.S. in Latin America, Eli Black was the epitome of the Ugly American as Lindner-associated firms bribed and murdered their way to great personal wealth.

With these networks of relationships spread over time and distance, it can be difficult to detect in real time the common source of the frauds that shape our lives and manipulate our geopolitics.

The political career of John McCain offers a case study in how organized crime operates in plain sight. Is he willfully complicit? When you hear him speak, all you know for certain is this: he’s a legend in his own mind.

Jeff Gates

A Vietnam veteran, Jeff Gates is a widely acclaimed author, attorney, investment banker, educator and consultant to government, corporate and union leaders worldwide. He served for seven years as counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance.

He is widely published in the trade, popular and academic press. His latest book is Guilt by Association: How Deception and Self-Deceit Took America to War.

His previous books include Democracy at Risk: Rescuing Main Street From Wall Street and The Ownership Solution: Toward a Shared Capitalism for the 21st Century. Topical commentaries appear on the Criminal State website.