History Rhymes

Mr. Bush, at a rare prime-time news conference, portrayed himself as the protector of the country and repeatedly invoked the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, saying Mr. Hussein posed a comparable danger.
He tried anew to link Iraq to terrorists, warning that the country could not afford to wait for Mr. Hussein to unleash his weapons against the United States.
/
''I will not leave the American people at the mercy of the Iraqi dictator and his weapons,'' Mr. Bush said, in the first formal East Room news conference in nearly a year and a half. He said Sept. 11 ''should say to the American people that we're now a battlefield.''
/
''He's a murderer,'' he said. ''He has trained and financed Al Qaeda type organizations. I take the threat seriously.''
/http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/07/world/threats-responses-president-president-readies-us-for-prospect-imminent-war.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

As some in the Bush administration press the case for a pre-emptive strike against Iraq, weapons experts say there is mounting evidence that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has amassed large stocks of chemical and biological weapons he is hiding from a possible U.S. military attack.Washington's concern is that Iraq could supply those weapons to terrorist groups, although U.S. officials say that there is no evidence that has happened so far."If we wait for the danger to become clear, it could be too late," said Sen. Joseph Biden
http://articles.cnn.com/2002-09-02/world/iraq.weapons_1_biological-weapons-weapons-inspectors-iraqi-president-saddam-hussein?_s=PM:WORLD

PHNOM PENH — The US said Friday that Syrian officials would be "held accountable" if they failed to safeguard the country's chemical weapons after a report suggested some were being moved out of storage.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iDByw1zdhSVlssmDYThQ2b914ugQ?docId=CNG.9deb90352b40f5a2c047699e3e4f2944.51

BEIRUT, Lebanon — New details emerging Saturday about what local Syrian activists called a massacre of civilians near the central city of Hama indicated that it was more likely an uneven clash between the heavily armed Syrian military and local fighters bearing light weapons.
/
Col. Riad al-Assad, based in Turkey as the ostensible leader of the loose coalition of fighters called the Free Syrian Army, told the Arabic television network Al Jazeera on Thursday that there had been no opposition fighters in the town.
Although what actually happened in Tremseh remains murky, the evidence available suggested that events on Thursday more closely followed the Syrian government account.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/15/world/middleeast/details-of-a-battle-challenge-reports-of-a-syrian-massacre.html

The Two Faces of Hillary Clinton

Though one is cleary enough.

CAIRO — In the days before Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton arrived here on Saturday, becoming the highest-ranking American official to meet with Egypt’s newly elected Islamist president, she planned to deliver a forceful public speech about democracy.

 But with the new president still struggling to wrest power from Egypt’s top generals, there were too many questions, too many pitfalls and too little new for Mrs. Clinton to offer, said several people briefed on the process. After rejecting at least three different drafts, the administration called off the speech days before its scheduled delivery, these people said.
/
She said she would work with Congress and the Egyptian government on the details of delivering a $1 billion aid package that President Obama promised a year ago and that Egypt desperately needs. [Fatboy: The Congressional Budget Office said that 45 million people in 2011 received Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, a 70% increase from 2007. It said the number of people receiving the benefits, commonly known as food stamps, would continue growing until 2014. The US also desperately needs an aid package. The US government borrows $1 billion from China to provide aid to Egypt?]
/
But she alluded only lightly to the military’s recent grab for power, or its failure to deliver on its promise hand power to civilians by July 1.
/
Officials say that the generals have repeatedly ignored American pressure, including the threat that the United States might end its $1.5 billion a year in economic assistance to Egypt, including $1.3 billion in military aid.
/
She said she planned to meet Sunday with Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/15/world/middleeast/clinton-arrives-in-egypt-for-meeting-with-new-president.html


On Friday, thousands took to the streets of Cairo to demonstrate for the demands of the revolution and against the US-backed counter-revolution in Egypt. The military-installed regime of Prime Minister Essam Sharaf passed a law on Wednesday banning all protests and demonstrations, and punishes violations against the legislation with draconian penalties.
/
The attempt of the Egyptian bourgeoisie to stabilise the economy through the use of force and thereby reassure foreign investors has the full support of governments in Europe and the US.
/
Ahmed, an unemployed journalist interviewed by the WSWS in Tahrir Square, said, “At least by the time Sharaf and the military moved to clear Tahrir Square, it was obvious they are controlled by the old forces. The military leadership, in particular, still stands for the old Mubarak dictatorship. I especially hate Tantawi. He’s an old friend of Mubarak and a close ally of the US”.
Ahmed said that the hypocrisy of the US’s role in events knew no bounds: “Hillary Clinton now tears around Tahrir Square, exhorting the virtues of democracy! I remember very well the weapons and the tear gas ‘made in the US’ that were used against us”.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/mar2011/egyp-m28.shtml


Nothing Egypt's military council has done in its past suggests it has the capacity or inclination to introduce speedy and radical change. Guaranteed its $1.3bn (£812m) annual grant from the US — a dividend from the Camp David peace accord with Israel – it has gained the reputation as a hidebound institution with little appetite for reform.
The frustration of the military's American benefactors shines through in leaked US cables, where the criticism focuses mostly on the man at the top, 75-year-old Field Marshal Muhammad Tantawi.
In March 2008 cable [146040], the US ambassador to Cairo, Francis Ricciardone, described Tantawi as "aged and change-resistant".
Tantawi and [Hosni] Mubarak are focused on regime stability and maintaining the status quo through the end of their time. They simply do not have the energy, inclination or world view to do anything differently," it reads
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/feb/14/wikileaks-cables-egyptian-military-head

Hélder Câmara

If there is some corner of the world which has remained peaceful, but with a peace based on injustices the peace of a swamp with rotten matter fermenting in its depths - we may be sure that that peace is false. Violence attracts violence. Let us repeat fearlessly and ceaselessly: injustices bring revolt, either from the oppressed or from the young, determined to fight for a more just and more human world.

In the developed countries of the capitalist world, the mass media are beginning to become businesses, and huge businesses at that. The freedom of journalists is now becoming, in most cases, a very relative thing: it ends where the interests of the business begin

Violence builds up at three levels in a society. Primary violence is the everyday effect of structurally ingrained social injustice. This generates secondary violence - the revolt of the oppressed. And that in turn provokes tertiary violence - repression by the powerful to secure their privileged position. And so the spiral of violence tightens.

Russia No Longer on the Sidelines Hillary

"I ask you to reach out to Russia and China and not only ask but demand that they get off the sidelines," said Mrs. Clinton
http://articles.cnn.com/2012-07-06/middleeast/world_meast_syria-unrest_1_syrian-president-bashar-al-assad-syrian-people-syrian-opposition?_s=PM:MIDDLEEAST

MOSCOW — Russia, which seems intent on positioning itself as an increasingly decisive broker in the Syrian crisis, announced on Tuesday that a flotilla of navy vessels had sailed to the Mediterranean Sea and some would dock in the Syrian port of Tartus. The naval group includes several landing craft with marines.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/11/world/middleeast/russia-sends-warships-on-maneuvers-near-syria.html

A. This guys a dumbass B. This guy's a liar or C. This guy's a lying dumbass



Mr Tucker said he could not be sure that abuse of the Libor system is not continuing to this day, telling the committee: “I can't be confident of anything after learning of this cesspit.”
The Libor scandal could be repeated in a number of other “self-certifying” markets where prices are determined, he said.
“Self-certification is clearly open to abuse, so this could occur elsewhere,” he said
/
“We thought it was a malfunctioning market, not a dishonest market,” he said.
/
“We made a judgement that moving away from the existing method of self-certification was just not feasible during a financial crisis”.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/9387710/A-cesspit-Libor-scandal-may-be-going-on-elsewhere.html



When Will the US Push for Democracy in Saudi Arabia?

Saudi citizens, who happen to be Shias, march in protest of the killing of two unarmed protestors gunned down by Saudi security forces.

Olafur Ragnar Grimsson. One Bad Ass Dude

A recent quote from Olafur:
"[I']m simply saying if the collective decision-making structure of the European Union can take such wrong decisions and follow a misleading course and fundamentally unwise for the healthy future of the European banking system, as I advised before, Arguing that private banks should operate in a way that the profits go to them, but the losses go to ordinary people back home is something that they need to examine.

We have, however, concentrated on our recovery, and paradoxically, what we are seeing in the last two years is that many sectors in Iceland: the energy sector, the tourism sector, the IT sector, the manufacturing sector, and the fishing sector are doing better in the last two years than they did prior to the banking crisis. And you might also find it interesting that the collapse of the banks revealed to us a very interesting aspect of modern banking, which I think has been more or less overlooked in this discussion in Europe and in America in the last two or three years: the Icelandic banks, like all modern big banks in Europe and America and all the other parts of the world, are no longer banks in the old-fashioned way. They have become high-tech companies. High-ranked engineers, mathematicians, computer scientists, programmers and so on and so forth. And their success depends largely on how successful they are in hiring people with this education and capability, not necessarily those trained in business schools or finance, but in engineering, mathematics, computer science and so on."



A story from Forbes Magazine from 18 months ago:
[R]efusing to repay the money will do more than just piss off the U.K. and Netherlands which are now taking Iceland to court. It could very well hurt Iceland’s own financial capacity.
Just last week, Moody’s downgraded Iceland’s debt ratings outlook to negative from stable citing concerns about its recovery related to this very repayment dispute. Now that the people have voted to to repayment there is a sense that more credit ratings agencies including Moody’s will further downgrade the country’s rating.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/halahtouryalai/2011/04/11/icelands-stand-against-bailout-repayment-will-hurt/

WSJ from a week ago:
REYKJAVIK, Iceland— Iceland's President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, who wielded the political power of his traditionally ceremonial office and rejected a deal that would have put taxpayers on the hook for $5 billion to Britain and the Netherlands, has been elected to a fifth term.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304211804577500471830800592.html

NYT's yesterday:
REYKJAVIK, Iceland -- For a country that four years ago plunged into a financial abyss so deep it all but shut down overnight, Iceland seems to be doing surprisingly well.
It has repaid, early, many of the international loans that kept it afloat. Unemployment is hovering around 6 percent, and falling. And while much of Europe is struggling to pull itself out of the recessionary swamp, Iceland's economy is expected to grow by 2.8 percent this year.
/
But during the crisis, the country did many things different from its European counterparts. It let its three largest banks fail, instead of bailing them out'
/
Some Icelanders say they have been soothed, too, by the country's bold decision to initiate an extensive criminal investigation into the financial debacle. Many members of the old banking elite have been identified as possible suspects, and some of their cases are beginning to come to trial; several people were convicted of financial crimes last month.
Bypass Paywalls and Log-Ins


So, Iceland under the leadership of Olafur, who as the WSJ article stated, overruled Iceland's Parliment and PM by allowing the banks to fail and telling the Brits to bugger off and actually prosecuted the banking elites now has lower unemployment and larger GDP growth then the Eurozone, Great Britian and the U.S. combined. This proves that capitalism works as well as proving that the U.S, Eurozone and Great Britan's style of cronyism, Oliogarchy, captured politicians and allowing the banks to function as an organized crime syndicate doesn't.

Fill up your glass with Vodka, arise and salute the citizens of Iceland and Olafur as you listen to their national anthem.

US Txxpayer Backed Jordanian Government MP Pulls Pistol on Live TV

“You are a spy in the pay of” the Syrian government, Shawabka said.
Murad, in return, accused Shawabka of being a spy in the pay of the Israeli Mossad agency and said the lawmaker was “a thief.”

Many commentators believe that the Western media remain silent toward the demonstrations in Jordan, shifting the public attention to the turmoil in Syria.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2012/07/08/249926/jordan-mp-whips-out-gun-in-live-tv-show/

Come Now Hillary. You Fool No One

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lambasted Russia and China on Friday for blocking efforts to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who has lost a key general to defection.
/
She urged the other 100 or so nations and organizations represented at the summit to "make it clear that Russia and China will pay a price" for that position.
/
"I ask you to reach out to Russia and China and not only ask but demand that they get off the sidelines," she said. "I don't think Russia and China believe they are paying any price at all, nothing at all, for standing with (the) Assad regime."
Hillary Carries the Torch of George W. Bush as She Calls for "Democracy" in the Middle East


The relationship means the People's Bank of China buys U.S. debt using a different method than any other central bank in the world.
/
China, which holds $1.17 trillion in U.S. Treasuries, still buys some Treasuries through primary dealers, but since June 2011, that route hasn't been necessary.
/
China can now participate in auctions without placing bids through primary dealers. If it wants to sell, however, it still has to go through the market.
The change was not announced publicly or in any message to primary dealers
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/21/us-usa-treasuries-china-idUSBRE84K11720120521

The currency holdings, reported by the central bank on its website today, rose by $199 billion to $2.85 trillion,
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-01-11/china-s-currency-reserves-rise-to-record-domestic-lending-exceeds-target.html

Russia – the Union's largest energy resources importer (2009)

• 36% of the EU’s total gas imports originate from Russia
• 31% of the EU's total crude oil imports originate from Russia
• 30% of the EU's coal imports originate from Russia

The EU – Russia's largest trade partner for energy goods

• 80% of all Russian oil exports go to the EU
• 70% of all Russian gas exports go to the EU
• 50% of all Russian coal exports go to the EU

http://ec.europa.eu/energy/international/russia/russia_en.htm

Breaking: George W. Bush and Dick Cheney In Syria to Consult with Assad Regime. Developing.

"Basat al reeh." "Dulab." "Falaqa." They are Arabic names for torture techniques that send chills through the hearts of Syrians, particularly the untold thousands who are believed to have been detained during the uprising of the last 15 months.
http://articles.cnn.com/2012-07-03/middleeast/world_meast_syria-torture-report_1_torture-victims-human-rights-watch-latakia?_s=PM:MIDDLEEAST

On January 27th, President Bush, in an interview with the Times, assured the world that “torture is never acceptable, nor do we hand over people to countries that do torture.” Maher Arar, a Canadian engineer who was born in Syria, was surprised to learn of Bush’s statement. Two and a half years ago, American officials, suspecting Arar of being a terrorist, apprehended him in New York and sent him back to Syria, where he endured months of brutal interrogation, including torture. When Arar described his experience in a phone interview recently, he invoked an Arabic expression. The pain was so unbearable, he said, that “you forget the milk that you have been fed from the breast of your mother.”
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0208-13.htm

Car Bombs and Kidnapped Mayors Turning Up Dead in Mexico

A car bomb exploded outside the mayor of Nuevo Laredo, killing seven civilians injured, property damage the facade of the building and 11 vehicles with damage, according to the Government of Tamaulipas

Within the limits of the states of Oaxaca and Veracruz, was found dead the mayor of Tlacojolpan, Veracruz, Marisol Mora Cuevas, who had been reported kidnapped on the night of June 24 in their home, confirmed Attorney's Office Oaxaca.
The body was found by members of the State Investigation Agency dependent on the Regional Deputy Justice in the road near Bonita Springs - City Island, near the gas plant to plant "Amapa". The body was found handcuffed, plus they showed signs of torture and burns.
NarcoBlog

Fight the Power

This exists to help hide and obscure people's real identity. This is done by seeding the fake data into search engines.
Fake identities on the public internet are not dangerous. Real identities are!
/
This is actually a list of 250 million people, indexed by the WRONG address, name, phone, and SSN.
This data is ficticious. Any resemblance to an actual person, living or dead is purely coincidence.
http://www.xdd.org/faq/faq.html

They are Not Radicals They are Freedom Fighters, Really They Are

Saudi officials are preparing to pay the salaries of the Free Syria Army as a means of encouraging mass defections from the military and increasing pressure on the Assad regime, the Guardian has learned.
[T]urkey has also allowed the establishment of a command centre in Istanbul which is co-ordinating supply lines in consultation with FSA leaders inside Syria
"[S]enator Lieberman also supports the idea of ensuring that the armed opposition fighters receive regular and sufficient pay, although he does not believe it is necessary for the United States to provide this funding itself directly."
[D]iplomatic sources have told the Guardian two US intelligence officers were in Syria's third city of Homs between December and early February, trying to establish command and control within rebel ranks.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jun/22/saudi-arabia-syria-rebel-army

History Rhymes

Turkey Doing the Bidding of the Dying Democracies Within the Antiquated Structure of NATO?

[S]ince the war against Libya was launched by U.S. Africa Command under the codename Operation Odyssey Dawn to the present NATO-run Operation Unified Protector in place since March 31, air operations have been run from NATO’s Air Command Headquarters for Southern Europe in Izmir, Turkey.

[T]urkey hosted a conference of Syrian opposition forces called “Change in Syria” from May 1-June 2 in the city of Antalya. Although held under the sponsorship of the Egyptian-based National Organisation of Human Rights, logistics and security were provided by the host country.

“[T]he West wants to put the region under Turkish control like in the Ottoman days. Turkey is a NATO member and embodies a safe kind of Islam for the West, so they have done a deal to give everything to Ankara.”
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.com/2011/06/21/turkish-actions-designed-to-trigger-nato-confrontation-with-syria/

SHANGHAI: In a statement that may be interpreted as the harshest response yet to the escalating 13-month-old Syrian crisis, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for the first time on Wednesday raised the possibility of calling on the NATO military alliance to protect Turkey’s border against incursions by Syrian forces.
http://syria360.wordpress.com/2012/04/11/turkey-can-invoke-natos-article-5-for-syrian-intervention/

Istanbul (CNN) -- Turkey officially considers the shooting down of one of its military fighter jets by Syria to be a hostile act, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said Sunday.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/24/world/meast/turkey-syria-plane/index.html

[T]he Turkish warplane shot down by Syria's air defense forces might have violated Syrian airspace, Turkish President Abdullah Gul said on Saturday.
"It is routine for jet fighters to sometimes fly in and out over [national] borders... when you consider their speed over the sea," Gul told the state-run Anatolia news agency. "These are not ill-intentioned things but happen beyond control due to the jets' speed."
http://en.rian.ru/world/20120623/174202636.html


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton condemned Syria's downing of a Turkish fighter yet as "brazen and unacceptable" on Sunday and vowed close U.S. cooperation with Turkey to promote a political transition in Syria.
"The United States condemns this brazen and unacceptable act in the strongest possible terms," Clinton said in a statement following a conversation on Saturday with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-rt-us-syria-crisis-clintonbre85n0l2-20120624,0,5568280.story


Turkish fighter jets violated Greek air space on February 9 2010, Greek daily Kathimeriny reported on February 10.
Reportedly, this was the first such trespassing of sovereign air space at the Aegean Sea perpetrated by the Turks since the turn of the new year, the report said quoting Greek defence officials.
The violation, as on previous occasions, was conducted by four F-16s and four Phantoms F-4s which penetrated Greek airspace at the south-eastern island of Samos, a touching distance from mainland Turkey.
Kathimerini said that the Phantoms peeled off from the initial formation and conducted a low flight over the islet of Farmakonisi. Greek fighter jets chased off the Turkish planes, the report said.
The Greek embassy in Ankara lodged an official complaint.
http://sofiaecho.com/2010/02/10/855589_eight-turkish-planes-violate-greek-airspace-and-are-chased-off-by-greek-fighters


The Associated Press
ANKARA, Turkey — Turkish warplanes have bombed Kurdish rebel hideouts deep inside northern Iraq, and Kurdish rebels killed one policeman and wounded three others in a roadside bomb attack inside Turkey on Sunday, authorities said.
http://www.ajc.com/news/nation-world/turkey-hits-kurdish-rebels-1463570.html

Democracy My Fat White Ass

Corporate profits as a percent of GDP

Wages paid as percent of GDP

WTF?

No purchase, payment, or contribution necessary to enter or win. Contributing will not improve chances of winning. Void where prohibited. Entries must be received by June 30, 2012. You may enter by contributing to Sponsor here or click here to enter without contributing. Three winners will each receive the following prize package: round-trip tickets for winner and a guest from within the fifty U.S. States, DC, or Puerto Rico to a destination to be determined by the Sponsor; hotel accommodations; and dinner with President Obama on a date to be determined by the Sponsor (approximate retail value of all prizes $4,800). Odds of winning depend on number of entries received. Promotion open only to U.S. citizens, or lawful permanent U.S. residents who are legal residents of 50 United States, District of Columbia and Puerto Rico and 18 or older (or of majority under applicable law). Promotion subject to Official Rules and additional restrictions on eligibility. Sponsor: Obama for America, 130 E. Randolph St., Chicago, IL 60601.                   

Desperate

Hitler Screwed by CNBC, Goldman, Geithner and Bernanke

Hu's On First?

China’s President Hu Jintao, left, is followed by Kyrgyzstan’s President Almaz Atambayev, second left, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, second right, and Tajikistan’s President Emomali Rahmonov as they walk to attend a signing ceremony in Shanghai

Shannon Van Sant

 

June 07, 2012

BEIJING – A regional security alliance led by China and Russia announced its opposition to outside intervention in the Syrian crisis in a joint statement released Thursday.

http://www.voanews.com/content/sco-opposes-military-option-for-syria/1204441.html

Insanity

LONDON — While the Spanish government was able to sell all the bonds it wanted to Thursday, it was the usual suspects that did most of the buying: Spain's increasingly fragile banks.
[First Sentence From a NY Times Puff Piece. No Need to Provide Link, it won't work]

[M]eanwhile, the same happens in Spain, where the government is forced to borrow money (at nearly 7%) it can hardly raise in order to shore up banks that are borrowing from the ECB (at 1%) to lend to the Spanish government at (7%) so that the latter can… bail them out. Not even the sickest of minds could make this up!
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2012/06/much-much-more-than-it-fears-syriza.html

What Could Go Wrong?

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian pro-democracy campaigners called for a new uprising on Sunday, enraged that a court had spared former leader Hosni Mubarak his life over the killing of protesters during the street revolt that ended his three-decade rule.


Separately, Egypt planned to sell $496 million of treasury bills on Sunday, Bloomberg Businessweek reported.
The planned sale of debt will be split one-third in three-month and two-thirds in nine-month maturities. The yields at last week’s auction were 14.388% for the three-month debt and 15.825% for the nine-month issue, the news service reported.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/egyptians-continue-protests-debt-sale-planned-2012-06-03?link=MW_home_latest_news

History Rhymes

A truck driver waits to pass through the Salang Tunnel. NY Times

Entrance to the Salang Tunnel circa 1989

The Salang tunnel fire occurred on 3 November 1982 in Afghanistan's Salang tunnel during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Details are uncertain, but the incident may have been the deadliest known road accident, and one of the deadliest fires of modern times.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salang_tunnel_fire

Soviet troops are withdrawing from Afghanistan, nine years after they swept into the country.

/

The journey is especially dangerous on the Salang Pass through the Hindu Kush Mountains, where more than 10,000 mujahideen operate.

The mujahideen - Afghan Islamic fighters - have been involved in heavy battles to try to force a Soviet retreat.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/february/15/newsid_4160000/4160827.stm

SALANG PASS, Afghanistan — Nowhere is the impact of Pakistan’s ban on NATO truck traffic more visible than here at the top of the Hindu Kush, on one of the only alternative overland routes for supply convoys to reach Kabul and the rest of the country.

/

This is the only passable route for heavy truck traffic bringing NATO supplies in from the Central Asian republics to the north, as they now must come.

There are other roads, but they are often single-lane dirt tracks through even higher mountain passes, or they are frequently subject to ambushes by insurgents and bandits. So a tunnel built to handle 1,000 vehicles a day, and until the Pakistani boycott against NATO in November handling 2,000, now tries — and often fails — to let 10,000 vehicles through, alternating northbound and southbound truck traffic every other day.

“It’s only a matter of time until there’s a catastrophe,” said Lt. Gen. Mohammad Rajab, the head of maintenance for the Salang Pass. “One hundred percent certain, there will be a disaste[r]"

/

“I’d rather be driving to Kandahar,” he said. Trucks need to have armed guards because of insurgents on that route, he said, “but I’d rather do that than all this waiting.”

/

[P]akistan has expressed willingness to reopen the frontier: for a fee of thousands of dollars per truck, compared with $250 previously. “We’re not about to get gouged in the price,” Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/03/world/asia/us-pakistan-dispute-chokes-an-afghan-supply-route.html

There is one downside to the northern routes, however. Bringing supplies overland on trucks and railroads all the way from Europe and across Central Asia costs two or three times as much as shipping them by sea and moving them up through Pakistan.

"Cost is a huge issue, obviously, for anything we're doing in the [Defense] Department and the government right now," says Mitchell. "But obviously the protection of our forces and the ability to achieve our mission is also extraordinarily important, so we need to balance the cost with the urgent requirements on the ground."

http://www.npr.org/2011/09/16/140510790/u-s-now-relies-on-alternate-afghan-supply-routes

WASHINGTON — The U.S. is paying six times as much to send war supplies to troops in Afghanistan through alternate routes after Pakistan’s punitive decision in November to close border crossings to NATO convoys, the Associated Press has learned.

/

Pentagon figures provided to the AP show it is now costing about $104 million per month to send the supplies through a longer northern route. That is $87 million more per month than when the cargo moved through Pakistan.

/

Over the past year or so, the U.S. military has been shrinking its reliance on the Pakistani routes, which are used to transport fuel and other non-lethal supplies. U.S. officials say they could manage indefinitely without that access if Pakistan either makes the closure permanent or offers to reopen it under unacceptable conditions.

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2012/01/ap-us-costs-soar-for-new-war-supply-routes-011912/

History Rhymes

Nayirah Testimony refers to the controversial testimony given before the non-governmental Congressional Human Rights Caucus on October 10, 1990, by a female who provided only her first name, Nayirah. In her emotional testimony, Nayirah stated that after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait she had witnessed Iraqi soldiers take babies out of incubators in a Kuwaiti hospital, take the incubators, and leave the babies to die. Though reporters did not then have access to Kuwait, her testimony was regarded as credible at the time and was widely publicized. It was cited numerous times by United States senators and the president in their rationale to back Kuwait in the Gulf War.

In 1992, it was revealed that Nayirah's last name was al-Ṣabaḥ (Arabic: نيره الصباح‎) and that she was the daughter of Saud bin Nasir Al-Sabah, the Kuwaiti ambassador to the United States. Furthermore, it was revealed that her testimony was organized as part of the Citizens for a Free Kuwait public relations campaign which was run by Hill & Knowlton for the Kuwaiti government. Following this, al-Sabah's testimony has largely come to be regarded as wartime propaganda.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nayirah_(testimony)

Shaam News/AFP/Getty Images

A handout picture released by the Syrian opposition's Shaam News Network shows UN observers at a hospital morgue in the central Syrian town of Houla on Saturday.

It's hard to look at the images coming out of Syria today. They show the bloodied bodies of dozens of children strewn on the floors of morgues. Some of them are just babies, their gazes frozen, still wearing the outfits they had on when they were killed by government forces. In one image, there are so many dead children on a single rug, their limbs are overlapping. One of them is a little girl covered in blood. She's wearing a pink shirt dress with a yellow duckling.
As we've told you on this blog, the images from Syria are distributed by the opposition and taken by citizen journalists. But this time, we have confirmation from United Nations observers on the ground that this massacre in Houla did happen, yesterday.
According to the U.N., their observers visited the city today and counted bodies: More than 32 children under the age of 10 and 60 adults. Some of them killed during the shelling, but others, reports the BBC, were "summarily executed, or butchered" by a regime militia.
"This appalling and brutal crime involving indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force is a flagrant violation of international law and of the commitments of the Syrian Government to cease the use of heavy weapons in population centers and violence in all its forms," U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement. "Those responsible for perpetrating this crime must be held to account."
The United States said it was "horrified" by the killings.
"These acts serve as a vile testament to an illegitimate regime that responds to peaceful political protest with unspeakable and inhuman brutality," said Erin Pelton, of the president's National Security Council.
NPR Reports Must Coincide with US Government Propaganda or Their Funding Will be Cu


The Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) has said that ‘armed terrorist groups’ were responsible for the violence in Houla which reportedly killed 92 people.
Over the last few months many armed criminals have been arrested in Syria. Among these criminals there were 26 foreign Terrorists (many of the Al-Qaida members).
Reportedly, the terrorists are:
http://therearenosunglasses.wordpress.com/2012/05/27/who-is-responsible-for-houla-massacre/

Bloomberg's Market Commentary

Go to this link, http://finviz.com/news.ashx , scroll down on the left to 5:22 am and you see this headline; Saudi Shares Advance on US Confidence, China Pledge.

Scroll up to 10:20 am and the headline reads, Saudi Shares Drop on Concerns About Europe, Oil prices.

Obviously contradictory tick by tick market commentary but the interesting part to me at least is the fact that if you click on the earlier link it no longer exists and you are redirected to the latter post.

Bloomberg never get's it wrong.

G-8

The gathered leaders of the world's largest democracies. What could go wrong?

Jamie and Ben

The unit at the centre of JPMorgan Chase’s $2bn trading loss has built up positions totalling more than $100bn in asset-backed securities and structured products – the complex, risky bonds at the centre of the financial crisis in 2008.
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The unit, the chief investment office (CIO), has been the biggest buyer of European mortgage-backed bonds and other complex debt securities such as collateralised loan obligations in all markets for three years.
/
J.P. Morgan, the nation’s largest financial firm by assets, is struggling to contain the damage, which already has shaved off more than $25 billion in shareholder value
Ritholtz


"We should say we want smaller institutions so that they can safely fail if they need to fail," he said, although he also called J.P. Morgan "a good player."
Bulltard


JPM is the US' largest investment bank. They are Too Big To Fail. $!00b in worthless, if they prove to be, asset-backed securities means nothing to the good doctor. He can monetize those losses at the speed of light.

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.
/
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.
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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.
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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