Well known thief Bruce Rauner tries to steal a $400 million from Teacher's Pensions

Governor Bruce Rauner made an attempt to swindle a $400 million from the TRS pension system. Currently, the TRS is funded by member contributions, investment dividends, and state controbutions. If investment returns don't perform up to expecrations the State of Illinois has to make up the difference by law. Accutarial scientists have advised revising the rate of return downward from 7.5% to 7%. The TRS board was set to accept the accutarial change, which according to the Chicago Tribune would mean;

If the board voted for the 7 percent figure, state government would be on the hook to make up the difference, estimated to cost an extra $400 million to $500 million a year, an expense that would come due starting in July. The governor and lawmakers would have to find that extra money, worsening a state budget that's already in free fall amid a budget impasse that's lasted more than a year. 

If the board voted for the 7.5 percent figure, the state would not have had to pay all of that extra money right away. But if investments failed to hit the benchmark, the shortfall would have been tacked on to the pension fund's $65 billion debt. Taxpayers would be hit either way; the question was whether it would be in the short term or long term.

So, Rauner's "solution" was to request the TRS board delay. Just like every other Illinois Governor,  Rauner wanted to kick the can down the road. Because delay long enough and when the bill comes due, Rauner knows he won't be in office and it'll be someone else's problem.

It's ironic and sick to see Rauner mess around with the TRS pensions. Rauner's fortune, he once I'm refered to himself as the 1% of the 1%, came from clipping money from the TRS pension system. Rauner's hedge fund GTCR "managed" the TRS pension for two decades. Consequently, he managed to amass billions of dollars by taking some of the pension money for himself, while the pension itself has been "nickeled and dimed" and has been pushed into debt.

Of course, Bruce Rauner doesn't care. Rauner got rich off of other people's labor. Rauner is a Rentier, he doesn't make money from producing anything, or from refining an existing product, or from inventing a new device, or from discovering something. No, Rauner's money comes from charging rent, extracting fees, and siphoning off of other people's money. 

Bruce Rauner like all Plutocrats is a Vandal. Illlinois Public Pension insolvency is his and other Capitalists fault

Bruce Rauner is running for Governor of Illinois. He'll have to win the Republican Primary for a chance to square off against Governor Quinn in the general election. Rauner's sole remaining competition for the Republican Primary is Kirk Dillard after Rauner's Squad eliminated Dan Rutherford's chances with allegations of Sexual Harassment and a homosexual relationship with an intern.

Billionaire Bruce Rauner is an implacable foe of Working people in Illinois. Besides vowing to reduce Illinois' Minimum Wage to make Illinois workers more appealing to Corporate Wage Slavers, once he wins, a Governor Bruce Rauner will do to the State and citizens of Illinois what he and other Capitalists have done to Illinois Public Pensions, they will cart off all the assets in a legislative orgy of Vandalism.

Because that is what Bruce Rauner is; A Vandal, in the most ancient sense of the term. Rauner's entire fortune has been made from identifying previously existing wealth charging in and looting it.

Bruce Rauner worked for 30 years at "Wealth Management" Firm GTCR, the R for Rauner was added during his tenure. Rauner's firm "managed" Public Pensions for nearly two decades. Now, after Rauner and other Vandal Capitalists have had access to Pensions, surprise Illinois is facing a massive Pension Crisis.

By Rauner's own estimate 2/3rds of GTCR funds were supplied by Public Pensions. Here in Illinois

GTCR has "managed" money for the Illinois Teachers' Retirement System (TRS) and the Illinois State Board of Investment, the state's largest and third-largest, respectively. Additionally, GTCR had access to state and municipal pension plans from the San Francisco City and County Employees' Retirement System to the Massachusetts Pension Reserves Investment Management Board. 

For this "work" GTCR, takes a 20% or more slice plus consultation and management fees. Rauner got paid no matter what the funds he "managed" did.

So, it's not surprising that Illinois and other Public Pensions began to go into insolvency once Vandal Capitalists got their hands on the funds. In fiscal year 2009, TRS lost $4.4 Billion (22% of its' value) in 2008 TRS lost 5% of it's value because of the Management of their Portfolios by Rauner-types.

The Wall Street-Hedge Fund-Wealth Management Implosion of 2007 and on-going Republican Recession was the end result of unchaining Capitalism and opening up the gates to the Vandal Capitalists like Rauner. The Vandals took the secure Public backed funds from dozens of states, hundreds of municipalities and Unions and stole them.

Bruce Rauner's not alone in the Vandal Capitalist method. It's the method de rigueur of the 1%.

"The problem is that the world and this country should not talk about envy of the 1 percent. It should talk about emulating the 1 percent. The 1 percent work harder. The 1 percent are much bigger factors in all forms of our society." Sam Zell, in defense of Tom Perkins who compared the Working Class to Nazis.

The 1% do work hard. It takes a lot of gall for the Vandals to raid, loot and plunder and call themselves Job Creators.

Chris Hayes summed up Zell's "business" model,

Let me tell you something about Sam Zell. He bought The Tribune Company in 2008 for $8.2 billion, an extremely highly leveraged deal. It was widely regarded. I reported on it at the time as an unsustainable debt structure that would implode in on itself.  

Well, guess what? Less than a year, the company went bankrupt, listing $7.6 billion in assets and $13 billion in debt. More than 4,200 people lost their jobs. But despite the company`s troubles, executives received tens of millions of dollars in bonuses. 

Sam Zell is like the action movie hero who throws the lighter behind him not bothering to look back at the explosion. That`s Sam Zell.

Zell bought the Tribune Company and loaded them up with debt ($13 billion) as he drained the companies assets then had them claim bankruptcy and sold off the Chicago Cubs to the semi-odious Billionaire Rickets Family.

Loading debt onto companies in highly leveraged deals is a classic technique Zell and Mitt Romney have profited from immensely. This is the Hard Work that Zell, Rauner, Romney, Steven Cohen, Paul E. Singer, Stephen Schwarzman, Clifford S. Asness, the Koch Brothers, and Tom Perkins demand to be lauded for, deferred to and praised.

The Vandals have already sacked the Public Pensions. With the help of Republican Governors, like Koch Brothers controlled Scott Walker in Wisconsin, several states have fallen to the rapacious hunger of the Vandal Capitalists.

If Bruce Rauner makes his way into Springfield as the Governor of Illinois, another gate will be thrown open to his Looting brethren and Illinois will be Sacked, just as the Vandals have done to other States.

Advancing the Free Enterprise System upon the backs of the Working Class in 2014

"They don’t have a true free enterprise system." - Representative Paul Ryan. Erstwhile Catholic Paul Ryan shows his true allegiance as he disagrees with The Pope in order to defend his True Lord, the American One Percent.

Paul Ryan's family "made" all their money by government contracts while Ryan himself went on the government dole after a mere 6 months as a "Businessman". Last year during the Republican coup d'état to overthrow Democracy and install Corporate Control of the Nation, Ryan let on to the real reason the Right was and still is trying to sabotage the now wildly successful ACA, "we're not going to give up on destroying the health care system for the American people."

There are three canards which Right-Wingers repeatedly trot out as the be all, end all; Privatization, Deregulation, and Taxpayer Welfare for the Rich.

What the Republicans and their Moneyed Masters really mean when they recite their mantras is the 1% plans to use the Awesome Power of Government to siphon off money from the from the Poor and Working Class and transfer it to the Rich.

What they seek is giving Corporations and the Rich total economic control over the Nation. The great trick, ALEC and the Rich have pulled is stealing from and oppressing people and getting those people to blame the Government for it.

Freedom Industries poisoned the entire water supply for 300,000 Americans in West Virginia an incident which would have Faux News calling for Jack Bauer to torture every brown person he could find and the Impeachment of President Obama if it was alleged to have been caused by muslim terrorists. Yet, since it was due to the criminal negligence and malfeasance of a Corporation, Speaker of the House John Boehner immediately put the blame on Too Much Regulation and... President Obama.

Freedom Industries recently filed for Bankruptcy protection to ensure they are protected from financial responsibility as well as being protected from criminal prosecution.

Meanwhile, the type of American that Republicans love and conservatism breeds is Terry Rupe of Kentucky. Mr. Rupe receives federal assistance especially medical care for his daughter.

"I don't have any use for the federal government," Rupe said, even though his household's $13,000 yearly income comes exclusively from Washington. "[T]hey've never done anything for me. I'm not ungrateful, but I don't have much faith in this health care law. Do I think it's going to work? No. Do I think it's going to bankrupt the country? Yes."

Getting people to vote themselves into Wage Slavery and Corporate Bondage.

"And the Post Office actually has some real assets. They have real estate, they have an overfunded pension fund..."

Here is Steve Forbes licking his chops at getting at the Post Office Pension where Wall Street financiers can clip it and whittle it away, as they have done to other State Pensions, until the workers have nothing and Forbes has several million more in off-shore bank accounts.

Modern Capitalists like Steve Forbes don't create anything these days, and this is the way the Current Robber Barons are different and perhaps even worse than the Rockefeller's, Mellon's and Morgans of the 19th century. That is the Free Enterprise System Paul Ryan wants to implement. A system in which money is taken from the Workers and given to the Capitalists by Republican Goons.

The bigger a Corporation gets the less and less in real dollars they end up paying in taxes.

ESPN the "Worldwide Leader" in Sports Broadcasting has received $260 Million over 12 years in taxpayer Welfare. Big Fish swim for free. Most subscriber packages come with ESPN and since Americans can't customize their cable choices not only do you have to pay a fee for having the privilege to have ESPN but, part of your taxes subsidizes their existence.

From 2011 through 2012, the CEOs of the top six publicly held fast food chains including McDonald's, Yum! Brands, Wendy's, Burger King, Domino's and Dunkin' Brands, hauled in more than $183 million in fully tax deductible "performance pay," lowering their companies’ IRS bills by an estimated $64 million. "Performance Pay" is a euphemism for taxpayer funded welfare for Billionaires.

In 2009, dozens of American Plutocrats sued to keep their names secret as the Department of Justice began investigating the Swiss-based Banking Giant UBS. It turned out that in the last days of the George W(orst President Ever) Bush Regime, 52,000 Americans illegally stole and moved Hundreds of Billions of purloined loot from the United States into Switzerland. 6 months later UBS agreed to pay a $780 million dollar fine (an unheard of event in the history of Swiss Banking) to keep the names and total dollar amounts stolen secret.

Now, RNC propagandists Reince Priebus and Solomon Yue are pushing for a repeal of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), which is set to take effect on 07/01/14.

Approved in 2010 after a tax-avoidance scandal involving a Swiss bank, FATCA requires most foreign banks and investment funds to report to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service information about U.S. customers' accounts worth $50,000 or more.

Of course, the Super Rich who control this country want the Law repealed. The Rich in this Nation aren't increasing the wealth through elbow grease and hard work but through byzantine tax laws, legerdemain and political control.

The American Plutocratic Overlords do want a smaller government; small enough to fit in their pocket. And that is what their Wholly Owned Republican and Pro-Business Democratic henchmen are paid to accomplish.

Governor Candidate Bruce Rauner has a message for Illinois, I Plan to Crush Workers and give Taxpayer welfare to Corporations

Bruce Rauner has reported incomes of $27 million in 2010, $28 million in 2011 and $53 million in 2012 has concluded that the minimum wage in Illinois is too high.

"Capitalism is the greatest poverty-fighting machine in the history of mankind, and I’m proud of the role I’ve played in it," Bruce Rauner.  

Rauner "worked" for 30 years at GTCR which has "managed money" for decades for the Illinois Teachers' Retirement System (TRS) and the Illinois State Board of Investment, the largest and third-largest state pension funds, respectively, in Illinois.

Of course, like all modern "wealth managment" millionaires, Rauner made his money by accounting gimmicks and legerdemain. He's charged extorbinant consultation fees and clipped money from Pensioners, while mismanaging public pension funds.

Just like Mitt Romney and other so-called Capitalists, Rauner made his money the old-fashioned way... He Stole It. Now that he's skimmed off millions he's quick to lambast Illinois' underfunded pension liability.

"When those excess benefits are being paid out to government employees, taxpayers lose." Bruce Rauner

Yeah, lazy Teachers! Working for 30 years and then expecting a pension, whereas Rauner's Role as a Rentier, extracting $100 million from the Pensions over the last 3 years alone, is beautiful capitalism at work of which he's "proud".

GTCR has raised the largest percentage portion of its money from public pension funds. Pensions supplied half to two-thirds of the firms funds according to Rauner's own estimate. His former partners decline to comment, citing a state prohibition on asset managers who receive public money from trying to influence elections.

A month ago, Bruce Rauner pledged at a Downstate candidates’ forum that if elected governor he would reduce the state’s minimum wage by $1 to make it equal to the federal rate in an effort to make Illinois more economically competitive.

"I made a mistake. I was flippant and I was quick. I should have said, 'Tie the Illinois minimum wage to the national wage and, in that context, with other changes in being pro-business, I support raising the national minimum wage.' I’m OK with that," said the Republican from Winnetka.

Key words to remember are to make Illinois "Pro-Business", that means crushing labor. Modern day Capitalists view labor as an unnecessary expense. One of the long sought after goals of the 1%, in pursuit of a Wage Slave State, has been the total defeat of Labor. 

Here in Illinois we've seen many times business try and strong-arm the Governor and Legislature (Sears Inc., CME Group and Office Max) in Pay-to-Play and the Race-to-the-Bottom schemes.

In fact, Illinois Residents overwhelmingly want Fair Tax Legislation passed in which Corporations and Millionaires, like Rauner, pay their fair share of taxes instead of receiving Illinois taxpayer welfare so we can be privileged by their scores of minimum wage jobs. A Better Illinois points out that over 75% of Illinois residents want a Fair Progressive Tax.

Billionaires and Corporate Thieves are so opposed to shouldering their burden of the Taxes that spearheaded by the Koch Brothers, conservative think tanks are planning a non stop propaganda blitz to poison this effort.

Bruce Rauner has unequivocally stated he intends to use the Awesome Power of Government to crush labor, reduce wages, impoverish workers, eliminate Unions, and place further unfair burdens on the over-taxed working class and shrinking middle class. Like all Republicans, a Rauner Governorship would be an implacable foe of the Working Class and would he align himself with the Koch Brothers.

Jim Oberweis uses his Government position to make money for his Business

Illinois State Senator Jim Oberweis is mad that the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) has not raised the speed limit in and around Chicago to 70mph.

Oberweis said he was upset that IDOT, which had the authority to draw up the speed limit map, left unchanged the 55-mph speed limit across virtually all of the Chicago region

"It's just clear that they (IDOT) are disregarding the will of the people." Oberweis said, adding that the interstates are designed to handle vehicles traveling 70 mph and speed limits were set at that level before the federal government imposed a national 55-mph limit in 1974. That limit was scrapped in 1995, and states across the U.S. have been raising highway speed limits since then.

Of course, Oberweis has a massive dairy production and retail corporation which relies heavily upon the Illinois infrastructure for the distribution of his product. Oberweis also distributes to Wisconsin and Indiana.

Oberweis said he will try to bring his push for 70-mph Chicago-area speed limits to the legislature and may settle on a 65-mph limit.

And the damage to roadways, necessary improvements and construction well those costs will be borne by the taxpayer.

Of course, earlier this month Oberweis voted to steal Teacher Pensions and violate the contracts signed by other Illinois Public employees. Oberweis called the Pension Theft a "step in the right direction" but was worried, "There is no guarantee that the money saved by these reforms will actually be used to pay down debt, instead of being used for new programs." Paying down the debt means transferring taxpayer money to Corporations.

When it comes to making him money Oberweis will use all the power of his Government position to advance his private corporation. Jim Oberweis is planning a run for the U.S. Senate so that he can make taxpayers from across the Nation pay to maintain his Corporation.

This is just another example of American Capitalism, Profits are Privatized and Costs are Socialized.

Pension Theft the latest Capitalist Scheme

"Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate. Purge the rottenness out of the system. High costs of living and high living will come down... enterprising people will pick up the wrecks from less competent people," Secretary of Treasury Andrew Mellon to President Herbert Hoover in 1931.

The politics of Neoliberal Capitalism require the destruction of the wealth and political power of the 99% for the enrichment of the 1%.

Pension Theft is now the latest in the arsenal.

For years Pensions and State Budgets have been underfunded because Corporations have engaged in political shenanigans getting more and more byzantine tax codes which end up with Corporations paying negative tax rates. Now, that the outcome is a "Pension Crisis" those same pensions which were funded only by Working Class people are going to be raided to transfer those monies to Corporations.

During the same Illinois Congressional Session in which Pension Theft was approved, the State Legislators voted to provide more taxpayer subsidies to Corporations. Under SB1, four of the five state pension systems: teachers, university employees, legislators and state government employees will be changed. Judges' pensions will not be affected. Read details and reactions to SB1 here.

This is just the latest salvo in the transfer of working class people's money to the 1%.

Workers have been dutifully making their contributions into the Pension system now the States are going to raid those Pension funds to give that money to Corporations.

For years, State Governments have given taxpayer welfare to Corporate Monsters under the guise of  'Job Creation' while also creating a byzantine tax code which taxes Corporations at 1/100th of 1%, thus the budget deficit caused underfunding of State Pensions.

Two years ago Illinois gave special tax status to Sears and this year Office Max/DePot has used the same gambit to extract a similar special tax exemption status.

Here is what Sears extorted from Governor Pat Quinn in December 2011;

The deal gives Sears tax credits worth $15 million a year for 10 years, which it can use against withheld employee income taxes. The deal also would extend a special taxing district, reducing the company's local property tax bill for another 15 years.

Sears Holding Corporation got a special property tax zone in Illinois. Sears Corporate Headquarters is located in Hoffman Estates, Illinois. Through accounting gimmicks and legerdemain Sears transfers money electronically from other stores in other states into the Corporate HQ special tax zone, those monies will then be listed on the Corporate profit sheet and will be accounted under the special taxation rate. This is known as the Las Vegas Loophole.

For years public-sector workers were paid less than those in the private sphere but, to make up for it public employees bargained for and signed legal contracts for Pensions and other benefits. Ah, but since the 1970's, Capitalists and their Government stooges have sought to undermine the advances of Unions and Progressives in creating living wages and worker protections.

"The standard of living of the average American has to decline." Paul Volcker, Chairman of the Federal Reserve 1979-1987.

The rise of computerization, jet speed air travel, off-shoring of jobs, importing of immigrants, increased participation of women in the workforce ended the Post World War II rise in wages and ushered in the Era of Neoliberal Capitalism.

All of sudden non-public sector employees wages stagnated and began to drop, jobs disappeared, and private pensions withered until they no longer exist at all.

Now, what did the brilliant Capitalists do? As they undercut and downsized their desperate workers, Plutocrats turned around and told workers it wasn't fair teachers still had rising wages and pensions.

Think Tanks set up by Billionaires staffed with right-wing drones and power apologists began to beat the drums, not to increase wages for workers in private companies, but to tear down teachers and other public sector employees,

"We are going to take on education next. Go after the Teachers and the Union organizers." - Andrew DEADbart on Sean Hannity's show, 18 April 2011.

The same right-wing drones who hate Unions, support the elimination of unemployment coverage, food stamps or medicaid, and advocate the abolishment of minimum wage because low-wage workers need incentives in order to work hard, turned right around and defended massive payments to CEOs as necessary to retain the "best and brightest", emergency TARP baillouts and Taxpayer welfare for Oil Conglomerates and decreasing taxes on Corporations in order to entice 'Job Creators'.

Capitalism is coming to it's natural conclusion the destruction and enslavement of the Working Class and a transformation of Nation-States into Neo-Feudalist Wage Slave State.

Capitalists have been working to eliminate restrictions on the flow of capital across borders and to force American workers to pit their labor costs against that of workers anywhere in the World.

No rich person ever created a job. Jobs exist because enough people have a demand for a good or service. A 'Job Creator' might have a fantastic vision of the premier cuneiform writing stylus but all the tax breaks and government subsides to him aren't going to create the demand for his clay tablets.

But, it's not the Republicans and Pro-Business Democrats don't know this, they do, it's that their job as the lap dogs of the Plutocracy to ensure that Tax Dollars are funnelled into the coffers of the 1%.

The End State, here, is a US which provides no protection for workers, which eliminates pesky anti-pollution laws and regulations on Corporate negligence, defends the Right of the Rich to engage in wage thievery and create smaller Government, one just small enough to fit into the pocket of the Plutocracy.