Ken Lewis on the Last Flight to Abu Dhabi?

What better way to celebrate the New York Attorney General’s suit charging Bank of America’s Ken Lewis with fraud than by listening to Billy Bragg’s new song on the big banks which he previewed at a benefit for Haiti in London this week. This is a very rough cut of "Last Flight to Abu Dhabi" from a fan, but you get the very amusing gist.

Jonty was a banker, he made a lot of cash
Betting on derivatives, he helped to cause the crash
Now that everybody wants to limit his income
Jonty's packed his bags and he's going on the run

He's on the last flight to Abu Dhabi (the richest city in the world)
He's on the last flight to Abu Dhabi

The famous balladeer has taken the fight against the banks to a new level and wrote to the British Secretary of the Treasury to announce that he will not be paying his taxes to protest the bonuses paid to employees of the Royal Bank of Scotland. To learn more about the campaign visit his social networking site: No Bonus for RBS and his website.

BanksterUSA has reported extensively about the controversial deal BofA deal. The short story is that BofA failed to notify shareholders about a massive bonus package paid to Merrill Lynch executives when BofA acquired Merrill in September of 2008. Because it failed to fully disclose the bonuses as required by law, BofA was fined by the SEC. The SEC's $33 million fine was less than 1% of the 3.6 billion in bonuses. A federal judge in New York tossed out the deal as suspect and insufficient (pointing out that both institutions were bankrupt and the money was really taxpayer bailout money) and gave the SEC a kick in the pants for its tepid enforcement of the law.

Yesterday, the SEC announced a new fine of $150 million against the bank. Later that same day, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo Cuomo announced he is going to do the job the SEC should have done in the first place. charging BofA CEO Ken Lewis and Chief Financial Officer Joe Price with serious crimes. Although, Lewis is now gone, the culture of privilege and disregard for the taxpayers he engendered marches on. BofA announced this week $4.4 billion in bonuses to its top executives made possible through the generosity of the American taxpayer.