That Dec. 7 assault on banks...

There is an idea out there that we can fight back against the banksters by coordinating a mass withdrawal on Dec. 7, 2010.  It even has celebrity backing from a major soccer star.

Eric Cantona's call for bank protest sparks online campaign

Thousands of French protesters have taken up the former Man United footballer's call for a mass cash withdrawal

The Observer, Sunday 21 November 2010

As students and public sector workers across Europe prepare for a winter of protests, they have been offered advice from the archetypal football rebel Eric Cantona.

Cantona was once a famous exponent of direct action against adversaries on and off the pitch. In 1995 he was given a nine-month ban after launching a karate kick at a Crystal Palace fan who shouted racist abuse at the former Manchester United star after he was sent off. But while sympathising with the predicament of the protesters in France, the now retired Cantona is urging a more sophisticated approach to dissent.

The 44-year-old former footballer recommended a run on the cash reserves of the world's banks during a newspaper interview that was also filmed. The interview has become a YouTube hit and has spawned a new political movement. more

December 7 Is The Unofficial Pan-European Bank Mutiny Day

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/01/2010 21:07 -0500

After German blog "All is Smoke and Mirrors" floated an idea of an organized bank run (something attempted previously in the US without much success) in France in response to French austerity protests (which have resulted in no gains), the effort has since expanded to a pan-European organized bank run day on December 7, 2010, and has metastasized to Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, the UK and Greece. We are confident that very soon the rest of Europe, which is currently gripped in a climate of extremely unpopular austerity, will join in this symbolic protest against banking, which unlike the US, may just succeed, considering the European banking system is in total shambles, and in far worse shape than its American counterpart.

Since virtually all actions in 2010 by the global central banking cartel have been geared toward stabilizing the European banking system which continues to wobble on the edge of a complete systemic collapse, perhaps the marginal withdrawal of a few billion in deposits could be just the straw that forces a reset first in Europe, and shortly thereafter in the rest of the globalized developed (and then developing, proving what a joke the whole concept of decoupling is) world. As America has demonstrated so very well, 25 weeks of consistent withdrawals from domestic funds (sorry CNBC, there have not been inflows yet, confirming yet again that fact and propaganda don't mix yet) have resulted in a quarter in which bank earnings were simply said crushed. 

Had Americans followed through and withdrawn their deposits from banks it would have been the final straw. Luckily, the lack of organization among the US population gave the US banking system a reprieve. In Europe things are different: banks are not as reliant on trading, however, they are far more reliant on a stable deposit base to sustain the Ponzi. Therefore, even a partially successful withdrawal campaign could have far more dire consequences to the continent's banking system, and bring the financial system to its proverbial knees. more

Even Playboy thinks there is a working plan for common folks to hit back at the banksters.

HOW TO DESTROY A BANK

On the night of March 10, 2010 an other wise anonymous American financial writer working under the name of Eddie “Edmundo” Braverman sat at his computer and took a sip of rum. He was about to take the biggest risk of his life.

On his screen was an article he had written for WallStreetOasis.com, an investment -banking website. This article set forth a plan for how consumers could destroy one of America’s four largest banks. Customers would deliver a series of escalating threats against Wells Fargo, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Citibank, demanding policy changes. The threats would culminate in a series of flash-mob bank runs that targeted one of the banks.

Eddie was hardly alone in believing today’s finance industry rested on accounting fraud and government complacency. While perhaps naive in its assumptions and overreaching in its goals, Eddie’s plan held promise: ordinary people taking control of an industry that was out of control. If Eddie’s plan was followed and his identity revealed, he could be held legally accountable for unleashing the destructive power of the mob. He took another sip and reviewed his plan one more time.

Here’s how Eddie would destroy your bank. And how you can help him do it. more

And then there is the good American lefty who thinks this might work.

On December 7, Take Your Money and Run! Show the Banks (and Politicians) Who's Boss

Mon, 11/22/2010 - 11:46 

Dave Lindorff

Leave it to a soccer hero to kickstart some serious political action.

Eric Cantona, a French soccer star who finished his playing career at Manchester United and went into acting, has sparked a European, and perhaps a global uprising against the global banking industry by calling on people everywhere to simply take their money and run away from the big banks on December 7.

Cantona, in a television interview about his career, got political in a hurry, saying that demonstrations such as those that occurred last month across France in opposition to cuts in that country's retirement program, were meaningless and "accomplish nothing except to further the aims of the oppressors." He called on those same protesters, and on people everywhere, to take "effective action" by withdrawing all their savings from the banks.

His challenge has caught fire across Europe, where the action is being coordinated on Facebook and via a website called Bankrun 2010. More recently, this campaign has made its way across the Atlantic to America, where soccer's not such a big game, and where most of the economic protest action has been focussed on the reactionary anti-tax Tea Party crowd. But even here in the US, the idea of sticking it to the big banks has begun to resonate, with a website called Stopbank USA calling for a day of action by Americans on December 7.

The banking industry is clearly nervous. In France, a spokeswoman for the banking industry called the idea of an organized bank run "stupid," and warned that it would be an invitation to thieves to steal people's money.

But organizers in the US have an easy answer to that. The US movement is calling on people not to take their money out as cash, but to close their accounts at major regional or national banks and to move the money on Dec. 7 to independent community banks or--better yet--to credit unions. more

Ok everyone.  Time to take a deep breath here.  While bank "runs" have an interesting history of destroying banks, it is VERY unlikely such a thing would work in 2010--especially one that was announced so well in advance.

1. Remember, your deposit in a bank represents a liability for the bank.  Banks don't make money from depositors--they make money from performing loans.  Because banks can get an almost unlimited supply of money from the Fed at almost zero interest, flesh and blood depositors are mostly just a nuisance.
2. Real bank runs these days are done electronically--NOT by a mob of angry depositors milling around outside waiting for the bank to open.  It would require an army of very wealthy depositors demanding their money to cause 1/1000 of the damage caused by an electronic "run" on a bank.
3. The banking system has a nearly unlimited capacity to cover short-term emergencies like a bank run.  Don't believe me?  We now know the size of some of the emergency loans that were made to tide banks through their latest self-inflicted calamity.

47,942,000,000

Courtney Comstock | Dec. 1, 2010, 3:27 PM 

And the largest loan given through the Federal emergency loan program during the crisis was...

An astounding $47,942,000,000, given to BarCap on September 18th, 2008.

(Morgan Stanley got a $47,620,400,000 overnight loan on September 26, 2008 that came in a close second.)

The record-breaking nearly $48 billion overnight loan was made to Barclays Capital through the Fed's PDCF loan program, which was designed to, in the Fed's words:

Function as an overnight loan facility for primary dealers, similar to the way the Federal Reserve's discount window provides a backup source of funding to depository institutions. By providing a source of liquidity to primary dealers when funding was not available elsewhere in the market, the program helped to improve financial market conditions more generally. more

Got that--the banking system was able to lend $48 billion to cover an emergency in ONE financial institution.  Billion.  A citizen-generated bank run is very unlikely reach such a size.

On the other hand, if there was a large-scale social movement that got everyone to stop paying their mortgages and credit card debt for 90 days, the banksters really WOULD be in trouble. (see #1 above)