Citigroup Earnings Rise 74% As Cops Giggle Over Citibank Arrests

Cheer up, America! You might be spending your evening meal staring down that last half-can of reheated Spaghetti-Os salted with your own tears, but your old corporate person frenemy Citigroup posted a cool 74% increase in earnings this quarter! $3.8 billion! How do they do it? Let's check the AP report:  "more of its customers paid their bills on time, leading to lower losses from loans." Ha ha, good thing they got their customers to pay their bills BEFORE THEYARRESTED THEM ALL! That is a very smart business move. Speaking of the arrests, here is an interesting interview the Village Voice did with Citibank protester Marshall Garrett, who spent the weekend in jail listening to undercover cops brag -- insanely -- about inciting violence among the protesters:

Q: How big was your group?

Garrett: It was about 27, 28 of us. When we got to the bank, we marched in, and clapped, and had a meeting. We had an open forum, and we actually tried to involve the bank employees, if they wished. And a few people talked about student loans and what debt was doing to them as individuals, and what could be changed about that. Unilike a lot of the reports, it was very respectful. We told the employees that we wanted them to keep their jobs and we were respectful. And they asked us to leave.

But legally, we're allowed to stay until the cops come and say, if you don't leave you'll be arrested. But what was unknown to us and to a lot of people that day, including those in Times Square, was that there were undercover cops already there, paid to be disruptive and to be loud. One undercover cop present [at Citi] was louder than the entire group.

Q: How did you know he was an undercover cop?

Garrett: He arrested one of the protestors outside, and slammed her into the wall, and pushed her back into the bank. We all saw him at the precinct with us. He was laughing with the fellow white shirt cops, telling them about what we'd been saying, basically. It was a bit startling how inside their information was - how they were being paid to go to these protests and put us in situations where we'd be arrested and not be able to leave.

[ AP / Village Voice ]