Merkel Tells Greece to Back Cuts or Face Euro Exit

Berlusconi ‘called Merkel an unfuckable lard-arse’
http://www.theweek.co.uk/europe/fall-berlusconi/2191/berlusconi-%E2%80%98called-merkel-unfuckable-lard-arse%E2%80%99

Merkel Dictates Austerity or Else

Are JPM and the other Too Big to Fails Burning the Furniture to Heat Their House?

Down In Monterey

MONTERREY, Mexico — Forty-nine decapitated and mutilated bodies were found Sunday dumped on a highway connecting the northern Mexican metropolis of Monterrey to the U.S. border in what could be the latest outburst in an escalating war of terror among drug gangs.
Down In Monterey

Terrorist Plot Foiled by Jetblue Airlines. Be Afraid America. Be Very Afraid

This beautiful 3 year old girl was thrown off a Jetblue flight in Fort Lauderdale due to her name being on a no fly list. Fear sells and further enriches the powered elites.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/240720.html

What a Dumb Fat Bastard

Pasok leader Evangelos Venizelos said there was no clear mandate for any single party. He called for a national unity government, comprised of all pro-EU parties, regardless of their position on the harsh fiscal adjustment programme.

Venizelos said that the electorate completely upset the political scene, and he attributed the electoral disaster to the fact that Pasok on its own had to manage the crisis all on its own.

“We embittered the people to protect the future of the nation. History will judge,” Venizelos said after the 9.30pm results. “Let the God of Greece help us!” he proclaimed, declaring that the party must be “reborn”.

Fat Drunk and Stupid is no way to Go Through Life, Son

Nuevo Laredo

Nuevo Laredo (along with Laredo, Texas) is the most important trade border crossing of Latin America (approximately 8500 trucks cross the border each day).^[4][5] Its geographical position has enabled this city to grow and specialize in the international trade business. Nuevo Laredo has a very developed logistics and transportation industry, complemented with a variety of hotel chains, restaurants and a cultural center where events such as the Tamaulipas International Festival take place.
Nuevo Laredo is located on the primary trade route connecting Canada, the United States and Mexico. Both Nuevo Laredo and Laredo, Texas are now the gateway to Mexico's burgeoning industrial complex, offering diverse markets, business opportunities and profit potential, which both business and industry cannot not find anywhere else.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuevo_Laredo

MEXICO CITY -- Another 23 bodies were discovered Friday in the embattled border city of Nuevo Laredo, including five men and four women hanging from a highway overpass, authorities said.
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Also Friday in Nuevo Laredo, 14 headless bodies were found in black garbage bags in a truck parked outside a government customs building, authorities said. The heads were later found in three ice chests near City Hall.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/05/23-killed-mexican-border-city-decapitated-hanging-bridge-nuevo-laredo.html

Just Another Day in the Sleepy Little Country South of the Border

The renowned journalist Regina Martinez, Process correspondent in Veracruz, was found dead, apparently strangled in her own home in Colonia Reforma, Xalapa. La PGJE ya abrió una investigación sobre los lamentables hechos de quien fuera una periodista crítica del gobierno y reportara durante años los violentos hechos relacionados con el narcotráfico en el estado. The PGJE has opened an investigation into the tragic events of a journalist who was critical of the government for years and will report the violent drug-related events in the state.









Hitmen in Sinaloa military attack ... could be 50 dead

At dawn today, Mexican military officials were surprised by unknown gunmen traveling in cloned units of the Ministry of Defence, Federal Police and the State Preventive Police.
Los militares fueron atacados por los sicarios en el municipio de Choix, Sinaloa, durante la madrugada de hoy sábado. The soldiers were attacked by gunmen in the town of Choix, Sinaloa, in the early hours of Saturday. Los sicarios se encontraban esperando a los soldados entre las localidades de San Simón y Potrero de Los Fierros. The gunmen were waiting for the soldiers between the towns of San Simon and Potrero de Los Fierros.
Mexico. Never realy been but I'd sure like to go.

U.S. Secret Service Agents Banging Colombian Whores, Bombs and Obama

CARTAGENA, Colombia (AP) - Alleged misconduct by a dozen Secret Service agents sent to provide security for President Barack Obama in Colombia threatened to overshadow his diplomatic mission to Latin America.
On Friday night, a caller who said he had knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press that the misconduct involved prostitutes in Cartagena, site of the Summit of the Americas this weekend. A Secret Service spokesman did not dispute that.
The White House had no comment, but also did not dispute the allegations.
Colombian Chicks are Hot

CARTAGENA, Colombia (AP) - Colombian officials are reporting no injuries or damage from three small explosions as Western Hemisphere leaders arrived for a summit.
Two of the low-intensity blasts occurred in Cartagena where the summit is being held and one was close to the U.S. Embassy in Bogota.
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20120414/D9U4EA6O4.html

CARTAGENA, Colombia (AP) - Putting an election year spin on his international agenda, President Barack Obama on Friday cast Latin America's rapid rise as a business opportunity for the U.S. economy.
Secret Service Agents Banging Colombian Whores is Good for U.S. Economy Says Obama

I Want to Stick My Tongue Down the Throat of Ex-FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair

"Best of all, it will mean that none of us have to work for a living anymore.
/
Under my plan, each American household could borrow $10 million from the Fed at zero interest. The more conservative among us can take that money and buy 10-year Treasury bonds. At the current 2 percent annual interest rate, we can pocket a nice $200,000 a year to live on.
/
Of course, we will have to persuade Congress to pass a law authorizing all this Fed lending, but that shouldn’t be hard. Congress is really good at spending money, so long as lawmakers don’t have to come up with a way to pay for it.
/
[m]y proposal won’t cost taxpayers anything because the Fed is just going to print the money.
/
Because we will be making money in basically the same way as hedge fund managers, we should have to pay only 15 percent in taxes, just like they do. And since we will be earning money through investments, not work, we won’t have to pay Social Security taxes or Medicare premiums. That means no more money will go into these programs, but so what? No one will need them anymore, with all the cash we’ll be raking in thanks to our cheap loans from the Fed.
/
We can stop worrying about education, too. Who needs to understand the value of pi or the history of civilization when all you have to do to make a living is order up a few trades? Let the kids stay home with us. They can play video games while we pop bonbons and watch the soaps and talk shows. The liberals will love this plan because it reduces income inequality; the conservatives will love it because it promotes family time.
I’m really excited! This is the best American financial innovation since liar loans and pick-a-payment mortgages. I can’t wait to get my super PAC started to help candidates who support this important cause. I think I will call my proposal the “Get Rid of Employment and Education Directive.”
/
That couldn’t happen here. This is America. Why should hedge funds and big financial institutions get all the goodies?
Look out 1 percent, here we come."
Sheila Bair is Hot

"In support of security, peace, freedom and democracy everywhere."

Video of Blackwater Supporting Democracy in Iraq

Meet the New Boss. Same as the Old Boss

President Obama threw his support behind Yemen's Vice President just days before an election expected to enshrine him as the new leader of a country the US sees as crucial to the fight against al-Qaeda.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/story/2012-02-19/obama-supports-yemen-vice-president/53156486/1

BREAKING NEWS: YEMEN REVOLUTION Yemeni forces fire on protesters in Taizz; casualties reported
http://www.presstv.ir/

bin Laden's staed goal was to bring about the financial collapse of the US so they could no longer afford to prop up puppet governments or place their soldiers on Muslim land. One way he hoped to achieve this was by having as little as two men wave a flag, call themselves al-Qaeda and watch the US military industrial complex burn through billions of taxpayer dollars to attack these "terrorists."

What is never discussed in the US, by the government or in the extremely lame media is the fact that Yemen and Bahrain have a large Shia population. A sect of Islam that Saud royals use as a tool for uniting thier Wahabist's behind them as they do the biddings of Israel and the US in seeking to kill Shia's and forment hatred, to goad Iran into taking actions that can be twisted into offensive acts of terrorism

Ten Heads All in a Row

Incredible this doesn't get covered by the US MSM,

Brutal Photo warning:
Ten Heads Left on Display
Scroll down for ten heads, won't link direct

Barofsky Cries Fraud

It's a Recovery. No Really, the eCONomy is Expanding

Pot Meet Kettle

"Despite years of urging and oversight by American advisers, President Hamid Karzai’s government has yet to prosecute a high-level corruption case."
/
"The players include people tied to President Hamid Karzai’s inner circle, many of whom have profited from the crony capitalism that has come to define Afghanistan’s economic order, and nearly brought down Kabul Bank."
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/08/world/asia/corruption-remains-intractable-in-afghanistan-under-karzai-government.html?hp

Missing Iraqi money may have been stolen:
Reporting from Washington — After the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the George W. Bush administration flooded the conquered country with so much cash to pay for reconstruction and other projects in the first year that a new unit of measurement was born.
Pentagon officials determined that one giant C-130 Hercules cargo plane could carry $2.4 billion in shrink-wrapped bricks of $100 bills. They sent an initial full planeload of cash, followed by 20 other flights to Iraq by May 2004 in a $12-billion haul that U.S. officials believe to be the biggest international cash airlift of all time.
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jun/13/world/la-fg-missing-billions-20110613

Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton Each Prosecuted Financial Crime More Aggressively than Obama

Top economists and financial experts agree that our economy will never recover unless Wall Street fraud is prosecuted. See this and this.
But the government has more or less made it official policy not to prosecute fraud, and instead to do everything necessary to cover up for Wall Street
.http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/11/obama-prosecuting-fewer-financial-crimes-than-under-either-bush-presidency.html

Ryssdal: What about the argument, though, that the financial system is so fragile still, and these cases so complicated, that we can’t really tear things apart with substantive investigations and prosecutions because it will all fall apart again?

Black: Yeah, that’s an excellent point. We should leave felons in charge of our largest financial institutions as a means of achieving financial stability

When more junior officials took actions discouraging criminal investigations against Charles Keating that were considerably less harmful than Geithner’s actions the Congress, the administration, and the media treated those actions as infamous and the head of the Office of Thrift Supervision, Danny Wall, had to resign. Why aren’t Geithner’s and Holder’s far more harmful and unprincipled actions, and failures to act, with regard to the elite criminals that caused the Great Recession a national scandal? Why isn’t Attorney General Mukasey, who was even more derelict than Holder, considered a national embarrassment? Have we lost our capacity as a nation for outrage? Are these elite ethical failures too powerful to hold accountable?
http://www.creditwritedowns.com/2011/04/reflections-on-geithners-hatred-for-prosecuting-criminal-contributors.html

“This is not some evil conspiracy of two guys sitting in a room saying we should let people create crony capitalism and steal with impunity,” said William K. Black, a professor of law at University of Missouri, Kansas City, and the federal government’s director of litigation during the savings and loan crisis. “But their policies have created an exceptional criminogenic environment. There were no criminal referrals from the regulators. No fraud working groups. No national task force. There has been no effective punishment of the elites here.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/14/business/14prosecute.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1331219877-EgbUWAfRX7xJGIpPXntv8A

To stop the theft from continuing, it requires that the most basic rules of capitalism be applied to our banks and that our future national wealth be safeguarded by the U.S. Government. The current custodian of America's wealth, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, is not doing a good job of either. The time for corrective action is now.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33586124/ns/msnbc_tv-the_dylan_ratigan_show/t/why-keep-geithner/

[A]bout how money dominates politics, distorting free markets and endangering democracy. “As a result,” Stockman says, “we have neither capitalism nor democracy. We have crony capitalism."
http://billmoyers.com/episode/crony-capitalism/

Heads Still Rolling in Mexico

Don't know what will stop this evil.
Three Heads are Better Than One

Sacre bleu! Sarko Runs But he can't Hide

Sarkozy would get 23 percent of votes and Hollande 30.5 percent in a first round of the election on April 22. The gap between the two candidates widened to 7.5 percentage points in the survey conducted on March 2-3 from six points on Feb. 19, the poll published today by LH2 poll for Yahoo! showed.
/
Sarkozy is also increasingly trailing Hollande in the May 6 second round of the election with support at 42 percent, against 58 percent for his Socialist rival. That 16-point gap is more than the 10-point difference measured on Feb. 19.
Sarko is Dog Meat

Guido's Still Pissed

November, 2010:
 Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega has been saying out loud what his colleagues have been whispering: the time of the US dollar as reserve currency is over.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/LK13Aa01.html

Although nations now have the tools to defuse a standoff, the possibility of a currency war "absolutely" remains, Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega said at the conclusion of the two-day summit.
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov/13/world/la-fg-obama-g20-20101113

July 2011:
Brazil's Finance Minister Guido Mantega recently told the Financial Times that the global currency war "was absolutely not over," and cited two countries that, according to him, have not ceased the hostilities: China and the United States.
http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/9498/brazil-caught-between-titans-in-global-currency-war

February 2012:
Brazil has declared a fresh “currency war” on the US and Europe, extending a tax on foreign borrowings and threatening further capital controls in an effort to protect the country’s struggling manufacturers.

Guido Mantega, the finance minister who was the first to use the controversial term in 2010, said the government would not “sit by passively” as developed nations continue to pursue expansionary monetary policies at the expense of Brazil.

“When the real appreciates, it reduces our competitiveness. Exports are more expensive, imports are cheaper and it creates unfair competition for businesses in Brazil,” he said on Thursday after announcing changes to the so-called IOF tax
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/

The Fed is a patsy. It is a pathetic dependent of the big Wall Street banks, traders and hedge funds. Everything (it does) is designed to keep this rickety structure from unwinding

"I'm a libertarian. If someone wants to do leveraged buyouts, more power to them. If they want to have a brothel, let them run a brothel. But it doesn't mean that public policy ought to be biased dramatically to encourage one kind of business arrangement over another. And right now public policy and taxes and free money from the Fed are encouraging way too much debt, way too much speculation and not enough productive real investment and growth."
Bernanke is a Coward Thief

“Do they want Chinese banks to turn into liars and parasites?” said Du.

Yes Du, they do.

“State-owned industry should not be privatized,” Du shouted as Zoellick was talking, adding, “this report from the World Bank is poison.”
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/229186.html

How Does One Unintentionally Burn Books?

A senior U.S. military official said Tuesday that the Korans were removed from the prison library because they had radical or inflammatory messages scrawled in them.
/
 "[I] assure you . . . I promise you . . . this was NOT intentional in any way.” Gen. John Allen, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan said.
NATO Burns Korans


If the Koran's were removed due to radical or inflammatory scrawlings, how can this General claim the burnings weren't intentional? They were accidently dropped into a fire after being removed from the library?

Criminogenic-Producing or Intended to Produce Crime and Criminality

"At a time of continuing unrest in Yemen and the threat of escalating violence, we see it as helpful for President Saleh to be out of the country in the run up to interim presidential elections in February," the British spokesman said.
http://www.france24.com/en/20120129-yemen-president-saleh-arrives-usa-medical-treatment-power-transfer-protests

That, in a nutshell, is how many Yemenis see the US role in their country. The United States “should have never made counterterrorism a source of profit for the regime, because that increased terrorism,” asserts Iryani. “Their agenda was to keep terrorism alive, because it was their cash cow.” The US bombings, he said, were “a bad mistake. Military action often backfires by killing civilians, by the violation of sovereignty. That offends a lot of Yemenis.” For the United States, the most serious question that lingers over Yemen after Ali Abdullah Saleh is: Did US counterterrorism policy strengthen the very threat it sought to eliminate? “It was a major fiasco,” Iryani says of the past decade of US counterterrorism policy in Yemen. “I think if we had been left alone, we would have less terrorists in Yemen than we do now.”
https://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/02/15-8

Criminogenic-Producing or Intended to Produce Crime and Criminality

“There is no more low- hanging fruit out there - all the low-hanging fruit is gone. Difficult structural reforms are what lie ahead.” said IMF Greece mission head Poul Thomsen

In a letter obtained by Reuters Friday, the Federation of Greek Police accused the officials of "...blackmail, covertly abolishing or eroding democracy and national sovereignty" and said one target of its warrants would be the IMF's top official for Greece, Poul Thomsen.
/
"Since you are continuing this destructive policy, we warn you that you cannot make us fight against our brothers. We refuse to stand against our parents, our brothers, our children or any citizen who protests and demands a change of policy," said the union, which represents more than two-thirds of Greek policemen.
"We warn you that as legal representatives of Greek policemen, we will issue arrest warrants for a series of legal violations ... such as blackmail, covertly abolishing or eroding democracy and national sovereignty."
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/10/us-greece-police-idUSTRE8190UC20120210

16.09 The Greek police federation Poasy is now offering a bounty of €1 for each of the mission chiefs from the troika, dubbing them, quite poetically, as the "undertakers of our people's dreams". Obviously they think that the Greek people don't need much of a financial incentive to assist in bringing them in...
For two years, the national federation of police officers has warned you that the policies you dictate and demand to be implemented at gunpoint will explode social cohesion and kill off any hope to restore the Greek economy. We will ask for the immediate issue of arrest warrants
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/debt-crisis-live/9073437/Debt-crisis-live.html

Ignorant Elitist Media and State Dept. Pricks Abound

BAGHDAD — Less than two months after American troops left, the State Department is preparing to slash by as much as half the enormous diplomatic presence it had planned for Iraq
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[t]he Americans have been frustrated by Iraqi obstructionism and are now largely confined to the embassy because of security concerns, unable to interact enough with ordinary Iraqis to justify the $6 billion annual price tag.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/08/world/middleeast/united-states-planning-to-slash-iraq-embassy-staff-by-half.html

How Did the BLS Arrive at the Figure of 243,000K New Jobs Created in January?

Total non-farm employment in the U.S., before seasonal adjustments, fell by 2,689,000 jobs in January. However, because it's typical for the economy to lose a large number of jobs after the holidays, largely in retail trade, construction, and manufacturing, the BLS estimated that the "normal" seasonal decline in employment should have been 2,932,000 jobs in January. The difference between the two numbers, of course, was 243,000 jobs, which was reported as an increase in employment. The fact that the size of the seasonal adjustment was more than 12 times the number of reported jobs, and more than 30 times the "beat" in economists' expectations, should provoke at least some hesitation in taking the number at face value.

Notably, the January 2011 and 2012 seasonal adjustment factors ( seasonally adjusted payrolls divided by unadjusted payrolls) have been the two largest factors used by the BLS since the 1960's, at 1.0166 and 1.0165, respectively. This compares with a January seasonal factor of 1.0155 a decade ago, and a factor of 1.0152 as recently as 2009. Now, a range of 0.0014 in the seasonal factors for January may not seem like much, until you consider that non-seasonally adjusted payrolls are presently about 130 million jobs, so variation in the seasonal adjustment factor alone amounts to a difference of 182,000 reported jobs. I'm not suggesting there's anything nefarious going on here, it's just that part of what we're seeing here is most likely a statistical artifact of the adjustment process.
http://www.hussmanfunds.com/wmc/wmc120206.htm

Promoting Democracy?

View from the propoganda based US MSM:
CAIRO — The Egyptian authorities have referred 19 Americans and two dozen others to face criminal trials, the state media reported Sunday. The move is part of a politically charged investigation into the foreign financing of nonprofit groups that has shaken the 30-year alliance between the United States and Egypt.
/
The International Republican Institute and its sister organization, the National Democratic Institute, are independent nonprofit groups, with close ties to the Congressional leadership, that promote democracy in countries around the world.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/06/world/middleeast/egypt-will-try-19-americans-on-criminal-charges.html?hp

Now, the rest of the story...

Criminogenic-Producing or Intended to Produce Crime and Criminality

The NY Times has discovered that the Banks that were rescued by the public have turned into serial fraud offenders. JP Morgan is near the top of their ranks, with Goldman Sachs and Bank of America not far behind.   Only Citigroup seems to have fallen out of favor.
/
Obama talks a good game, and presents a moral face through the media, but an examination of his actions and his record shows that his administration serves the monied interests to the detriment of the public interest. In many cases they are merely following the same practices begun in the Clinton Administration and carried on by Bush.  It is a bad situation indeed when the 'reformer' elected by the people has failed to reform. 

He may not be as brazen and open as his Republican opponents in promoting the interests of the Wall Street, perhaps, and certainly is not as favorable to Big Oil, but the corruption of justice for all in American politics seems to have become pervasive over the last fifteen years.
http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/2012/02/sec-allows-americas-biiggest-wall-st.html

WASHINGTON — Even as the Securities and Exchange Commission has stepped up its investigations of Wall Street in the last decade, the agency has repeatedly allowed the biggest firms to avoid punishments specifically meant to apply to fraud cases.

By granting exemptions to laws and regulations that act as a deterrent to securities fraud, the S.E.C. has let financial giants like JPMorganChase, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America continue to have advantages reserved for the most dependable companies, making it easier for them to raise money from investors, for example, and to avoid liability from lawsuits if their financial forecasts turn out to be wrong.

An analysis by The New York Times of S.E.C. investigations over the last decade found nearly 350 instances where the agency has given big Wall Street institutions and other financial companies a pass on those or other sanctions. Those instances also include waivers permitting firms to underwrite certain stock and bond sales and manage mutual fund portfolios.

Criminogenic-Producing or Intended to Produce Crime and Criminality

A U.S. Justice Department source has told The Daily Caller that at least two DOJ prosecutors accepted cash bribes from allegedly corrupt finance executives who were indicted under court seal within the past 13 months, but never arrested or prosecuted.
The sitting governor of the U.S. Virgin Islands, his attorney general and an unspecified number of Virgin Islands legislators also accepted bribes, the source said, adding that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is aware prosecutors and elected officials were bribed and otherwise compromised, but has not held anyone accountable.
The bribed officials, an attorney with knowledge of the investigation told TheDC, remain on the taxpayers’ payroll at the Justice Department without any accountability. The DOJ source said Holder does not want to admit public officials accepted bribes while under his leadership.
http://dailycaller.com/2012/02/01/bribery-compromised-officials-leave-indicted-financial-crime-suspects-free-from-prosecution-under-holders-doj/8/

How Swedes and Norwegians Broke the Power of the ‘1 Percent’

by George Lakey

[S]weden and Norway, for example, both experienced a major power shift in the 1930s after prolonged nonviolent struggle. They “fired” the top 1 percent of people who set the direction for society and created the basis for something different. Both countries had a history of horrendous poverty. When the 1 percent was in charge, hundreds of thousands of people emigrated to avoid starvation.

/

They realized that, with the 1 percent in charge, electoral “democracy” was stacked against them, so nonviolent direct action was needed to exert the power for change. In both countries, the troops were called out to defend the 1 percent; people died.

/

In the 1920s strikes increased in intensity. The town of Hammerfest formed a commune in 1921, led by workers councils; the army intervened to crush it.

/

The Norwegian 1 percent decided not to rely simply on the army; in 1926 they formed a social movement called the Patriotic League, recruiting mainly from the middle class. By the 1930s, the League included as many as 100,000 people for armed protection of strike breakers—this in a country of only 3 million.

/

Many people then found that their mortgages were in jeopardy. (Sound familiar?) The Depression continued, and farmers were unable to keep up payment on their debts.

/

The 1 percent thereby lost its historic power to dominate the economy and society.

/

When Conservatives eventually tried a fling with neoliberal policies, the economy generated a bubble and headed for disaster. (Sound familiar?)

/

Labor stepped in, seized the three largest banks, fired the top management, left the stockholders without a dime and refused to bail out any of the smaller banks. The well-purged Norwegian financial sector was not one of those countries that lurched into crisis in 2008; carefully regulated and much of it publicly owned, the sector was solid.

https://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/01/26-3

Criminogenic-Producing or Intended to Produce Crime and Criminality



"I don't know where the $1.2 billion of client money invested with a primary dealer of my Federal Reserve went to. Three ring tosses for $1, only takes one to win a prize."



the findings so far suggest that a "significant amount" of the money could have "vaporized" as a result of chaotic trading at MF Global during the week before the company's Oct. 31 bankruptcy filing, said a person close to the investigation."
The Worlds Largest Central Bank Staffed by Carnies

The Second Tier Simulacrum that is the U.S. Economic Recovery

Plato speaks of two kinds of image-making. The first is a faithful reproduction, attempted to copy precisely the original. The second tier is distorted intentionally in order to make the copy appear correct to viewers.

"The Obama administration has been touting the “recovery” of the American economy and yet this recent data seems to demonstrate that the average household is still waiting for some of the benefits seen in the stock market."

/

"If we are in recovery, why have American’s incomes dropped more during the recovery than they did in the recession? The facts are clear:
Personal incomes fell during the recession by 3.2%.
During the recovery (since July 2009), personal incomes have fallen an additional 6.7%
Personal Incomes Fall Faster and Further During the "Recovery" than During the Recession

Criminogenic-Producing or Intended to Produce Crime and Criminality

"Information on CPCE and the other measures of inflation is available monthly. There’s no reason (that I can think of) why the Fed chose to deliberately omit two years of data that would conflict with the “desired’ conclusion. To me, it looks like the authors manipulated the report."
All bankers are liars. All central bankers are liars and money printers

Criminogenic-Producing or Intended to Produce Crime and Criminality



Shoplift a $4 T-Shirt from Wal-Mart and you'll be maced, beaten and incarcerated. Steal billions of dollars from US taxpayers and the head of the US Justice Department will run interference for you.

/

(Reuters) - U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Lanny Breuer, head of the Justice Department's criminal division, were partners for years at a Washington law firm that represented a Who's Who of big banks and other companies at the center of alleged foreclosure fraud, a Reuters inquiry shows.

/
Law professors and other federal ethics experts said that federal conflict of interest rules required Holder and Breuer to recuse themselves from any Justice Department decisions relating to law firm clients they personally had done work for.
/
Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler said Holder and Breuer had complied fully with conflict of interest regulations, but she declined to say if they had recused themselves from any matters related to the former clients.
/
Reuters reported in December that under Holder and Breuer, the Justice Department hasn't brought any criminal cases against big banks or other companies involved in mortgage servicing, even though copious evidence has surfaced of apparent criminal violations in foreclosure cases.
The evidence, including records from federal and state courts and local clerks' offices around the country, shows widespread forgery, perjury, obstruction of justice, and illegal foreclosures on the homes of thousands of active-duty military personnel.
/
AG Holder Protects His Own

Audit the Fed, then End the Fed

Just released transcripts from a Federal Reserve Board meeting held five years earlier:
“I really believe that the drop in housing is actually on net going to make liquidity available for other sectors rather than being a drain going forward, and that will also get the growth rate more positive,” Ms. Bies told colleagues at the committee’s June meeting. Ms. Bies could not be reached for comment Thursday.
/
And even Ms. Yellen did not believe that the problems in the housing market would have broader consequences. “Of course, housing is a relatively small sector of the economy, and its decline should be self-correcting,” she said.
/
“I would say that the capital markets are probably more profitable and more robust at this moment, or at least going into the six-week opportunity, than they have perhaps ever been,” Kevin Warsh, the Fed governor who watched Wall Street most closely, said at the meeting in September 2006. Three months later Mr. Warsh said almost exactly the same thing. He did not respond to an e-mail seeking comment Thursday.
/
For the Fed 2006 began with the departure of Mr. Greenspan, who presided in January over his final meeting as Fed chairman and was then widely regarded as the epitome of a central banker, a master who had guided the American economy through almost 20 years of remarkably consistent growth.
“I’d like the record to show that I think you’re pretty terrific, too,” Mr. Geithner said in adding his voice to the chorus of tributes at that final meeting. “And thinking in terms of probabilities, I think the risk that we decide in the future that you’re even better than we think is higher than the alternative.”
/
Ms. Yellen said: “It’s fitting for Chairman Greenspan to leave office with the economy in such solid shape. The situation you’re handing off to your successor is a lot like a tennis racquet with a gigantic sweet spot.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/13/business/transcripts-show-an-unfazed-fed-in-2006.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp

Though little Timmay and the silver fox Yellen could not of been more wrong, both were promoted to postitions of higher authority and power with Yellen often mentioned as next in line for Fed chair.

In Amerika, When One Protests a Law Authorizing Unconstitutional Arrests, they are, well, Arrested

US Unemployment Rate is only 8.5 Percent?

That's the government version. Headlines read UE falls to lowest level in three years! But wait. How can this be? March 2009 BLS Employment Situation News Release:
"...the unemployment rate rose from 8.1 to 8.5 percent, the Bureau of Labor
Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today."
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_04032009.htm

Okay, great. UE rate is the lowest in nearly three years. But wait.
Covered employment, those eligible to file for unemployment as of March 2009: 133,886,830
                                                                                                Dec.   2011: 126,188,733
Click weekly claims data for historic levels:
http://www.ows.doleta.gov/unemploy/wkclaims/report.asp

MF Global Sold Millions in Assets to GS Days Before Going Bust

Line of credit extended to MF Global by JPM was $1.2B, the same amount of customer funds that have gone "missing." Did JPM seize assets, customer funds of MF Global so they would be made whole while fucking over the clients of MF Global? Not far fetched at all when you consider the US governemnt is an organized crime syndicate with nukes and the politicians need donations from the finance sector to be re-elected.

http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/2012/01/mf-global-sold-assets-to-goldman-days.html

Greece will exit from the crisis President of the Republic says, while asking for "austerity with dignity".

http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/8/51922

«The country has no need for elections, but rather a capable government that will work towards averting the danger it faces,»
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/8/51327

Greece now tops a list of European countries where the suicide rate has risen.
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/1/51289

Heating oil is now considered a luxury item in Greece.
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/9/51295

Teachers' unions are warning that incidents of children turning up hungry in school are rising, due to benefit cuts and a sharp increase in unemployment
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/14/51149


Show dignity Greek people, the birthplace of democracy, as you shiver from the cold, your children go hungry and you hold a pistol to your head. Do all of this with dignity for the bankers must be made whole. If they are not, an undignified austerity will follow. You have been warned.

I Had No Idea Sarko was this Short in Stature

The Current State of the US Government Prophesied Over 70 Years Ago

"The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself. That in its essence is fascism: ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or any controlling private power.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt

 

He May be a Bloodthirsty Murdering Sonuvabitch but He's Our Bloodthirsty Murdering Sonuvabitch

SANAA, Yemen (AP) - Tens of thousands of Yemenis held demonstrations around the country Friday to demand their longtime president face trial for the killings of hundreds of unarmed protesters in the pro-democracy uprising that began 10 months ago.
President Ali Abdullah Saleh, in power for 33 years, signed a deal granting him immunity from prosecution in return for stepping down.
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20111230/D9RUUNO81.html

Embattled Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh will be allowed to come to the United States for medical treatment in New York, a senior Obama administration official said Tuesday.
US Welcomes Murderous Yemen Leader

The United States supplies a large part of the Egyptian military budget
He may be a sonuvabitch but he's our sonuvabitch

Video begins at 30 second mark

Corzine Again Asked Where is the $1.2 Billion

“I simply do not know where the money is, or why the accounts have not been reconciled.” The former Golman Sachs CEO, US Senator and governor of New Jersey replied.
"Come on, leave the man alone. He's already told you he doesn't know what happened to the 1.2 billion dollars." President Obama then spoke in defense of his top campaign bundler of funds.

There Will Be Chaos....

Photos taken in Cairo on Saturday, December 17

CAIRO (AP) - Hundreds of Egyptian soldiers swept into Cairo's Tahrir Square on Saturday, chasing protesters and beating them to the ground with sticks and tossing journalists' TV cameras off of balconies in the second day of a violent crackdown on anti-military protesters that has left eight dead and hundreds injured.
The violent, chaotic scenes have brought to the fore the simmering tensions between the ruling military council that took power after Hosni Mubarak's ouster and activists demanding the generals transfer power immediately to civilians.

From February of this year:
http://fatboysez.blogspot.com/2011/02/there-will-be-chaos-in-egypt-which-is.html

Obama OutBushes Bush. Cheney Joins Obama Re-Election Campaign

Despite his promise to veto amendments within the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) President Obama said Wednesday he will approve the law allowing the U.S. military to arrest and hold anyone it deems a terrorist, even on American soil.
Obama Authorizes Indefinite Detention of Amerikan Citizens on Amerikan Soil

 

US Main Ally in the Middle East Beheads Woman for Practicing Sorcery

RIYADH: A Saudi woman was beheaded on Monday after being convicted of practising sorcery, which is banned in the ultra-conservative kingdom, the interior ministry said.
Amina bint Abdulhalim Nassar was executed in the northern province of Jawf for "practising witchcraft and sorcery,"
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/middle-east/Saudi-woman-beheaded-for-sorcery/articleshow/11081842.cms

Greece. The Birthplace of Democracy

«The country has no need for elections, but rather a capable government that will work towards averting the danger it faces,»
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/8/51327

Recovery?

The red line is wages as a percent of GDP – the blue line shows the sum of those same wages – as augmented by increased consumer debt (borrowings) – again as a percent of GDP.

Headlines from the Athens News

Seven armed robberies in Attica One in two cannot afford heating oil Venizelos calls for unity More than 80 percent of respondents said they were dissatisfied with the government, according to Public Issue, which conducted a telephone survey of 1,008 people between December 1-5. Greece has fastest rise in suicide rates in Europe According to experts, the suicide rate in Greece has increased by 40 percent in the first five months of 2011 and the rising trend coincides with the start of the economic crisis. http://www.athensnews.gr/ 

Wall Sreet is a Crack House

"Europe doesn't face a liquidity problem. It faces a solvency problem. What investors really want isn't just for someone to buy distressed European debt, but for someone to buy that debt and willingly take a loss on it so the money doesn't ever actually have to be repaid."
/

Frankly, I am concerned that Wall Street is becoming little more than a glorified crack house. Day after day, the sole focus of Wall Street is on more sugar, stronger sugar, Big Bazookas of sugar, unlimited sugar, and anything that will get somebody to deliver the sugar faster. This is like offering a lollipop to quiet down a 2-year old throwing a tantrum, and expecting that the result will be fewer tantrums.

What we have increasingly observed over the past decade is nothing but the gradual destruction of the ability of the financial markets to allocate capital for the benefit of future growth. By preventing the natural discipline of the markets to impose losses on poor stewards of capital, and to impose interest rates high enough to force debtors to allocate the capital usefully, the world's policy makers are increasingly wrecking the prospects for long-term economic growth. The world's standard of living (what we can consume for the work we do) is intimately tied to its productivity (what we can produce for the work we do). That productivity requires our scarce savings to be allocated to productive physical capital, and to productive human capital (primarily education).

Nietzsche famously said "What does not kill me makes me stronger." The corollary is "What constantly rescues me makes me weaker." The world will only stop looking for bailouts when policy makers stop handing them out.

http://www.hussmanfunds.com/wmc/wmc111205.htm

Recovery?

"We were hit by inflation, a declining net worth, and increased government debt all at the same time. This wicked combination made the 3rd quarter of 2011 the 2nd worst quarter of the last 50 years. So much for that sustainable recovery theory."
Potemkin Village

 According to this story, Potemkin, who led the Crimean military campaign, had hollow facades of villages constructed along the desolate banks of the Dnieper River in order to impress the monarch and her entourage with the value of her new conquests, thus enhancing his standing in the empress's eyes

Delaying the Inevitable

“THERE IS NO MEANS OF AVOIDING THE FINAL COLLAPSE OF A BOOM BROUGHT ABOUT BY CREDIT EXPANSION. THE ALTERNATIVE IS ONLY WHETHER THE CRISIS SHOULD COME SOONER AS A RESULT OF A VOLUNTARY ABANDONMENT OF FURTHER CREDIT EXPANSION, OR LATER AS A FINAL OR TOTAL CATASTROPHE OF THE CURRENCY SYSTEM INVOLVED”

Ludwig von Mises



Former Goldman Sachs CEO, Governor of New Jersey and Top Obama Campaign Contributor Speaks

As CEO of MF Global, a primary dealer for Bernanke's US Federal Reserve, $1.2 billion of client money has vanished under his watch. The honorable John Corzine responds:
“I simply do not know where the money is, or why the accounts have not been reconciled,”
Show Me the Money Pigman Corzine

Update:
Not only is Pigman Corzine at a loss as to where the $1.2B MF Global's client's money is, so is the CFTC and the SEC. But, if you are caught shoplifting a $3 T-Shirt from WalMart, you will be beaten, arrested and incarcerated.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/not-just-corzine-who-cant-find-the-money-2011-12-08?link=MW_home_latest_news

MF Global's role as a Primary Dealer for Bernanke's Federal Reserve:

What Does Primary Dealer Mean?
A pre-approved bank, broker/dealer or other financial institution that is able to make business deals with the U.S. Federal Reserve, such as underwriting new government debt. These dealers must meet certain liquidity and quality requirements as well as provide a valuable flow of information to the Fed about the state of the worldwide markets.

Investopedia explains Primary Dealer
These primary dealers, which all bid for government contacts competitively, purchase the majority of Treasuries at auction and then redistribute them to their clients, creating the initial market in the process

Read more: http://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/primarydealer.asp#ixzz1fyAE6BHn

What Would You do if...

your son or daughter joined the US military after the 9/11 attacks, after George Bush had spouted lie after lie in an attempt to link Iraq to the 9/11 attacks and spread disinformation that Iraq planned on using WMD's that didn't exist. Your son or daughter is then killed in the line of a duty. The US Department of Defense assures you that the remains of your son or daughter will be treated with the utmost respect. Then you read this:
Remains of at least 274 US soldiers killed in the line of duty are dumped in landfill

Democracy is Dead.

What is the purpose of elections or representative governments when foreigners can dictate to a sovereign nation how they should spend their taxpayer's money? What citizen, what kind of man would sit back and allow this to occur? Children are going without meals as the distribution of wealth to the top 1% is larger than any time in history. You can die on your knees sucking banker's cocks or you can die standing, as a man. Which would you choose?


The European commission could be empowered to impose austerity measures on eurozone countries being bailed out, usurping the functions of government in countries such as Greece, Ireland, or Portugal. Bailed-out countries could also be stripped of their voting rights in the EU, under radical proposals being discussed at the highest level in Brussels before this week's crucial EU summit on the sovereign debt crisis.
Democracy is Dead

The US Faux Recovery Captured in One Chart

Portugal Raids the Pension Funds of their Citizens to Appease Global Banking Cartel

The cabinet agreed to transfer the assets from four of Portugal’s biggest banks to the state balance sheet.

The assets will be used to bridge a gap needed to meet the fiscal deficit target of 5.9pc of GDP set by the terms of the country’s €78bn bail-out from around 10pc in 2010.

"This measure is more than sufficient to meet the budget deficit goal in 2011," said Helder Rosalino, secretary of state for central administration, on Friday.

Portugal said it had informed the EU and IMF and assured them it would be a “one-off”. However the 2010 budget was met by shifting three pension plans from Portugal Telecom on to the public social security system. The liabilities don’t count, yet.

There have been no complaints from Eurostat but Raoul Ruperal from Open Europe said: “This can’t be seen as a future revenue stream in any way.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/8932687/Portugal-raids-pension-funds-to-meet-deficit-targets.html

The New Face Of Europe and it isn't Pretty



MERKOZY



International Law?

3.20pm GMT / 10.20am EST: Here's an update from a spokesman at the UK foreign office:

Senior officials have spoken to the Iranian charge in London to urge the Iranian authorities to act with utmost urgency to ensure the situation is brought under control and to protect our diplomatic compound, as they are obliged to do under international law

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/blog/2011/nov/29/iran-protesters-attack-uk-embassy-tehran-live

International law only applies to non-white, non-christians? The invasion of Iraq, torture, extreme rendition and cross border attacks that kill Pakistan soldiers are all violations of International law that have led to the death of hundreds of thousands of innocents in the Iraq invasion alone. Where was the outrage from UK foreign officials then? But when twenty non-white, non-christian college students storm an embassy, the international law card is played.

The death rattle of the world's leading democracies grows louder.

US/NATO Forces Kill 25 Pakistani Soldiers on Pakistan Soil

EU Mimics the Cosa Nostra wih Bustout Style Tactics

They loan you money knowing you can't repay. They increase the vig, then move in and strip you of all your assets with no regard to the damage it will cause.
FRANKFURT (MarketWatch) -- Italy has the assets to overcome the debt crisis and new Prime Minister Mario Monti is moving in the right direction to tackle the country's economic problems, Olli Rehn, European Union commissioner for economic and monetary affairs, told reporters in Rome on Friday. Rehn acknowledged that a sharp rise in bond yields in Italy and across other euro-zone countries was troubling. Italian bond yields jumped on Friday after the country saw borrowing costs rise sharply in auctions of short-term debt

Greece's repeated failure to meet budget targets including for privatization revenues has angered international lenders, raising questions about whether they will continue indefinitely to keep the country afloat with bailout loans.
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/11/50879




Of course it isn't completely fair to categorize all ECB members as mafioso's. Some, like former ECB board member Lorenzo Bini Smaghi, are better classified as terrorists who follow principles voiced by Osama bin Laden:

ECB Executive Board member Lorenzo Bini Smaghi yesterday: "Irish people also elected the governments that regulated the banks as the problems built, Mr Smaghi pointed out.
"If taxpayers have the right to share in decision-making, they must also accept the consequences," Mr Smaghi said.
I am Lorenzo Bini Laden Smaghi and I am a Financial Terrorist

bin Laden in 1997: "As for what you asked regarding the American people, they are not exonerated from responsibility, because they chose this government and voted for it..."
http://news.scotsman.com/topstories/Bin-Ladens-interview-with-CNNs.2261731.jp

Austrian Economy Mimics US Before the Crash

New York city, Oakland, Ca., Athens, Madrid or Cairo? Does it matter? Police brutalize citizens in each.

More than 30,000 people marched in central Athens beating drums, waving red flags and chanting “EU, IMF out!” in the first test of public defiance against technocrat Prime Minister Lucas Papdemos's new government.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/210679.html

Corporatocracy in Action. Democracy is Dead. Outside Wall St. November 17 2011

Bob Rubin:
"Tell the middle class they must sacrifice for the betterment of the nation. Tell them they must work longer for less Social Security and pay more in Medicare but receive less. Wrap your self in the flag, talk about Jesus and point your finger at an enemy. Speak of impending doom and incite fear."

Barack Obama:
"Yes Mr. Rubin."

ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE (AP) — President Barack Obama has urged leaders of Congress' supercommittee to press hard for a deal on slashing the deficit — and not look for an end run around a key enforcement mechanism.

"Why do people laugh at me Mr. President."


"Sometimes people are just mean Timmy. You want to go play some basketball then get an ice cream?"
"Gee Mr. President can we?"