Howard's End: Old Name, Old Money, Old Influence

Without the backing of George Bush Snr and his network of big business and eastern financial "establishment" interests it was highly unlikely that George W. Jnr would have a show of becoming US President. The familiar brand-name "the Bush Family" is about to restore the aristocracy to power. John Howard writes.

The Bush family comes from an old line of Connecticut lineage with connections to Wall Street financiers, pharmaceuticals, tobacco and oil interests.

Father of George Snr., Prescott Sheldon Bush, was born in Columbus Ohio, on 15 May 1895. He graduated from Yale University where he was initiated into the powerful fraternity, the Skull & Bones Club - a club which requires sworn secrecy.

Each Skull & Bones cell contains 15 members with initiates of Prescott's cell, going on to become some of the most powerful men in America.

Men like Averell and E. Roland Harriman of international banking fame, Henry Mallon president of Dresser Industries (oil drilling equipment), Henry Isham banker, John Farrar chairman of publishers Farrar and Rienhart Inc, and Artemus Gates, president of the New York Trust Company, Union Pacific, TIME, Boeing Company. Gates was also assistant secretary of the navy in 1941 and under-secretary for part of 1945.

These fraternity brothers have stuck together in establishment business with Prescott Bush becoming a director of the Union Banking Corproation and a partner in Brown Brothers Harriman, a position he held until his death.

The significance of some of these corporations was their role in the building up of both the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. Adolf Hitler received his backing from foreign and domestic sources including an affiliate of Harriman banking interests - Bank Voor Handel en Scheepvart N.V. in Rotterdam.

This bank was a subsidiary of Thyssens Bank (formerly von der Heyd's bank) in Germany. The Dutch bank controlled the Union Banking Corporation in New York which was a joint venture of Thyssen-Harriman.

In the 1930's Union Bank had the following directors: - E. Roland Harriman, (Vice President of W.A. Harriman) H.J. Kouwenhoven (managing director of Bank Vor Handel) J.G. Groeningen (German steel cartel) C. Lievens, (President of Union Bank) E.S. James (Harriman partner) and Prescott Bush. Prescott was also a US Senator.

It was logical, therefore, that Prescott's son George Snr would, in 1948, also be initiated as a Skull & Bones member and start his career in oil company Dresser Industries where his father Prescott was a director.

The 1983 Skull & Bones membership list reveals how political philosophies are drawn together and then bound by an oath in a secret society.

The Bush family set up George Snr in his own oil and gas lease business and he was President of Bush-Overby Development Company from 1951-1953. He then became co-founder and President of the Zapata Off-Shore Oil Company. Why a Bush oil company was named after Emiliano Zapata, revolutionary, guerrilla fighter, killer and ally of Pancho Villa and the revolutionary forces is one of life's puzzling mysteries.

Although he failed in two early attempts at becoming a US senator, George Snr, had a remarkably fast-tracked political career finally becoming director of the CIA, UN Ambassador, Congressman and then US Vice-President and President.

A network controlled by George Bush Snr first opened the floodgates for the funds that bought 'W' the election. The old man's network is probably around 50,000 people and includes Dick Cheney, General Colin Powell, former Secretary of State, George Baker, Pentagon official Paul Wolfowitz and National Security aid, Condoleeza Rice. From Bush Snr's brigade, 'W' also has former Federal Reserve appointee Lawrence Sommers and faithful soldier Andrew Card.

Then there's the circle of investors and corporate barons made rich by Bush Snr who are collected into the Carlyle Group, a cabalistic Washington-based merchant bank chaired by Ronald Reagans' former Pentagon chief, Frank Calucci.

'W' also has that cabal of loyal tobacco, oil and financial interests who support him as Governor of Texas. As Governor, 'W' decreed it impossible for the civil lawsuit against tobacco companies to proceed in Texas.

Karl Rove, a quiet enforcer of 'W's' will in Texas and who goes back 30 years as a Republican and a supporter of Bush Snr, was formerly a paid political intelligence operative for the Philip Morris cigarette company.

In 2000 Philip Morris was sued by Columbia's taxation office accused of being involved in cigarette smuggling and in the laundering of drug money. The company denied the allegations and, without admitting any wrong-doing, it signed an agreement with Columbia pledging to prevent its products from entering the black market.

In 1995 the company was also tangled with the drug money issue. Its former distributors in northern South America were indicted in the Federal District Court in Puerto Rico for laundering $40 million in black market pesos.

Philip Morris severed its relationship with its distributor and said it did not know its products, such as Marlboro brand cigarettes, were regularly used to launder drug money through what is called the Black Market Peso Exchange.

It's not surprising that "W" now says, "I never dreamed about being President. All of a sudden people started talking to me about the presidency."

An analyst with Sutro in New York, Larry Smith, says, " There's been a sigh of relief." Bush's proclaimed victory was greeted by a sudden leap in the share value of big pharamceutical companies, big insurers of health care, and the big oil and tobacco companies.

For many Americans, however, the Bush family dynasty particularly in Texas - with its 1.4 million children without health insurance, squandered surplus, appalling pollution record, exaggerated school standards, housing crisis and its legal execution factory, - is not an alluring model for America.

© Scoop Media