Cross-posted at Wolves of Liberty News.

Michelle Malkin exposes the theatrical collusion that has come to define Washington not only in the political arena, but between politics and big business:

The GOP wants SEC correspondence disclosed. Here’s that story. In related news, Goldman Sachs cheerleader and beneficiary Rahm Emanuel met with NYC business elite about the financial reform plan.

That’s not all:

While President Obama assails the culture of greed and recklessness practiced by the men of Goldman Sachs, his administration is infested with them. The White House can no more disown Government Sachs than Da Boss-in-chief can disown Chicago politics.

Read the whole post.

Most troubling is Greg Gordon article at McClatchy exposing the White House visitor logs:

While Goldman Sachs’ lawyers negotiated with the Securities and Exchange Commission over potentially explosive civil fraud charges, Goldman’s chief executive visited the White House at least four times.

White House logs show that Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein traveled to Washington for at least two events with President Barack Obama, whose 2008 presidential campaign received $994,795 in donations from Goldman’s political action committee, its employees and their relatives. He also met twice with Obama’s top economic adviser, Larry Summers.

…Goldman’s connections to the White House and the Obama administration are raising eyebrows at a time when Washington and Wall Street are dueling over how to overhaul regulation of the financial world.

…According to White House visitor logs, Blankfein was among the business leaders who attended an Obama speech on Feb. 13, 2009, and he also joined more than a dozen bank CEOs in a meeting with Obama on March 27, 2009.

Blankfein also was supposed be among the CEOs who met with Obama in December, but he and two others phoned in from New York, blaming inclement weather.

He and his wife, Laura, were listed on the logs among 438 presidential guests at the Kennedy Center Honors the previous week.

…Several former Goldman executives hold senior positions in the Obama administration, including Gary Gensler, the chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission; Mark Patterson, a former Goldman lobbyist who is chief of staff to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner; and Robert Hormats, the undersecretary of state for economic, energy and agricultural affairs.

Jacobs of the University of Minnesota said that the administration now risks “kind of a feeding frenzy.”

“The administration has to be very careful,” he said, “because . . . they’re seen as the ones who bailed out Wall Street. If there are indications that the administration was talking to regulators or to Justice Department people about when and how Goldman or other firms would be investigated, I think that’s going to create almost a mob scene.”

I am reminded of Dr. Larry Hunter’s lessons in political theater:

What do Harlem Globetrotters basketball, professional wrestling and American politics all have in common? They are FAKES.

Oh, the consequences are real enough and can be catastrophic. And, the players are not fakes; some are marvelous performers and others are fine athletes (was there ever a better ball handler than Meadowlark Lemon or a political bone crusher better at the political Hammerlock and the High Crotch Takedown than Nancy Pelosi?); it is the contest that is fake; it is choreographed violence, cliffhanging drama; a blood sport with real blood carefully let that titillates a gullible audience. Although professional wrestlers appear to be bitter foes inside the ring, outside the ropes they are drinking buddies, just like U.S. Senators. Wrestling matches, like congressional debates, are carefully choreographed and the punches, gouges and kicks are pulled or exaggerated for effect. The blood in the ring is real enough—wrestlers frequently use a small razor to ‘blade’ (cut themselves) to draw blood—which completes the illusion and makes the match more exhilarating and dramatic for the fans.

So is this just more theater in the road to over-regulation of the free market? Did the actors already know their assigned parts before the drama began? One wonders.

In other news:

Update on Navy SEALs case

If you want to go fast – go alone. If you want to go far – go together.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 22nd, 2010 at 2:40 pm and is filed under General Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.