15 Signs That You Better Get Prepared For The Obama Recession Of 2013
Mike Snyder
You better get ready, because there are a whole host of signs that economic trouble is on the horizon. U.S. economic growth slipped into negative territory during the fourth quarter of 2012. That was the first time that has happened in more than three years. Several important measures of manufacturing activity have also contracted in recent weeks, and consumer confidence is way down. There is a tremendous amount of economic pessimism in the air right now, and Americans are pulling enormous amounts of money out of our banks and they are buying up precious metals at unprecedented rates. Meanwhile, our "leaders" seem very confused about what is happening. For example, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid continues to insist that we are "in a recovery", and some other Democrats are calling the latest GDP numbers "the best-looking contraction in U.S. GDP you'll ever see". On the other hand, the Federal Reserve says that economic growth has "paused" in recent months, and therefore a continuation of their latest quantitative easing scheme is necessary. Well, no matter how hard any of them try to spin the numbers, there is no way that they are going to get them to look good. Despite four years of outrageous "stimulus" spending by the federal government, despite four years of record low interest rates, and despite four years of unprecedented money printing by the Federal Reserve, the U.S. economy continues to perform miserably. Later this year the federal government will probably finally acknowledge that we have entered another recession, even though the truth is that if the federal government used honest numbers they would indicate that we are already in one. In any event, nobody should have ever expected that our debt-fueled prosperity would last forever. When the debt bubble that we have been living in completely bursts, a "recession" will be the least of our worries.
Hopefully this little stretch of false economic hope that we have been living in will last for a little while longer. I don't think that too many people are very eager to repeat the horrible economic pain that we experienced back in 2008 and 2009. Unfortunately, we never fully recovered from that last downturn and now the incredibly foolish decisions that our "leaders" continue to make have made another major economic downturn inevitable.
Personally, I would very much prefer for 2013 to be a year of peace and prosperity for America. But at this point there appears to be a great deal of downward momentum for the economy.
The following are 15 signs that you better get prepared for the Obama recession of 2013...
#1 The mainstream media was absolutely shocked when it was announced that U.S. GDP actually contracted at an annual rate of 0.1 percent during the fourth quarter of 2012. This was the first contraction that the official numbers have shown in more than three years. But of course the truth is that the official numbers always make things appear better than they really are. According to John Williams of shadowstats.com, U.S. GDP growth has actually been continuously negative all the way back to 2005 once you account "for distortions in government inflation usage and methodological changes that have resulted in a built-in upside bias to official reporting."
#2 For the entire year of 2012, official U.S. GDP growth was only about 1.5%. According to Art Cashin, every time economic growth has fallen that low (below 2 percent annually) the U.S. economy has always ended up going into a recession.
#3 According to the Conference Board, consumer confidence in the United States has hit its lowest level in more than a year.
#4 For the week ending January 26th, initial claims for unemployment rose to 368,000. In future weeks, watch to see if it goes above 400,000. If we hit that level, that will be a sign of real trouble for the economy.
#5 During the first full week of January, an astounding $114 billion was pulled out of U.S. banks. That is the largest amount that we have seen moved out of U.S. banks in one week since 2001.
#6 The U.S. Mint was on pace to sell more silver eagles during the first month of 2013 than it did during the entire year of 2007. Why is so much silver being sold all of a sudden?
#7 The payroll tax hike that went into effect in January has reduced the paychecks of average American workers by about $100 a month.
#8 Several important measures of manufacturing activity along the east coast missed expectations by a huge margin in January. The following summary is from a recent Zero Hedge article...
So much for the latest "recovery." While everyone continued to forget that in the New Normal markets do not reflect the underlying economy in the least, and that the all time highs in the Russell 2000 should indicate that the US economy has never been better, things in reality took a deep dive for the worse, at least according to the Empire State Fed, the Philly Fed, and now the Richmond Fed, all of which missed expectations by a huge margin, and are now deep in contraction territory. Moments ago, the Richmond Fed reported that the Manufacturing Index imploded from a 9 in November, 5 in December and missed expectations of a 5 print at -12: this was the biggest miss to expectations since September 2009.
#9 An astounding 33 percent of all "subprime student loans" are at least 90 days past due. Back in 2007, that number was only at 24 percent. Could this be evidence that the student loan debt bubble is beginning to burst?
#10 Time Inc. has just announced that it will be eliminating hundreds of jobs.
#11 Blockbuster recently announced that they are closing hundreds of stores and eliminating about 3,000 jobs.
#12 Toy maker Hasbro has announced that the size of their workforce will be reduced by about 10 percent.
#13 According to a new Pew Research study that was just released, one out of every seven adults in the United States is financially supporting their kids and their parents at the same time. Pew Research is calling it "the Sandwich Generation".
#14 According to one recent Gallup poll, 65 percent of all Americans believe that 2013 will be a year of "economic difficulty", and 50 percent of all Americans believe that the "best days" of America are now behind us.
#15 According to a different Gallup poll, Americans are now more pessimistic about where the U.S. economy will be five years from now than Gallup has ever recorded before.
So what is Barack Obama doing about all of this?
Not much.
Actually, he is shutting down his much ballyhooed "Council on Jobs and Competitiveness". It last convened more than a year ago on Jan. 17th, 2012, and apparently Obama does not feel that it is needed any longer.
Of course we all know that it was just a political stunt to begin with.
Sadly, the truth is that both parties have been leading us down a road toward economic oblivion. The past four years under Obama have been absolutely nightmarish, and even though the Republicans have been in control of the House for the last couple of years they have done very little to even slow him down.
For much more on the decline of the economy over the past four years, please see this article: "37 Statistics Which Show How Four Years Of Obama Have Wrecked The U.S. Economy".
Yes, I tend to criticize Obama's economic policies a lot, and rightfully so, but neither political party is willing to tell the American people the truth.
40 years ago, the total amount of debt in the U.S. economic system was less than 2 trillion dollars.
Today, the total amount of debt in the U.S. economic system has grown to more than 55 trillion dollars.
It hasn't mattered which party has occupied the White House or which party has been in control of Congress. The debt bubble that we have been living in has just continued to grow.
And all bubbles eventually pop.
The mainstream media is endlessly obsessed with the little fights that the Republicans and the Democrats are having, but they never talk about the bigger picture.
The prosperity that we are enjoying today is the result of the biggest debt binge in the history of the world.
We have stolen a giant mountain of money from our children and our grandchildren and we have destroyed their futures.
People can debate about whether the next "recession" has already started or not, but the truth is that what we are experiencing now is nothing compared to what is coming.
In the end, we will pay a great price for our decades of foolishness.
The U.S. economy is going to completely collapse, and the last few years have only been the very beginning of that process.
Link:
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/15-signs-that-you-better-get-prepared-for-the-obama-recession-of-2013
Thursday, January 31, 2013
I can't believe I was a liberal once. You can't make this crap up...
Center for American Progress’ Christie Hefner: Climate change a factor in Chicago’s murder rate
Jeff Poor
On Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” the Center for American Progress’ Christie Hefner said that Chicago’s sky-high murder rate could be blamed — at least in part — on climate change.
“Yes, last year we hit a record number of murders from guns [in Chicago],” Hefner, the former chairwoman and chief executive officer of Playboy Enterprises, said. “And this year we are already outpacing last year’s numbers. Now, there are contributing factors that are not under anybody’s control and may seem odd, but it is factually true. One of them is actually the weather. There is a dramatic increase in gun violence when it is warmer. And we are having this climate change effect that is driving that.”
The average high temperature July, the hottest month in both Chicago and the much-safer New York City, is the same for both cities at 84 degrees Fahrenheit. Scarborough took a moment to sardonically thank Hefner for that statement on behalf of conservative bloggers.
“Christie, can I just stop you and say conservative bloggers across America, thank you for saying that climate change is responsible for the rising murder rates in Chicago,” Scarborough said. “You have just made a lot of people in their basements of their mothers’ homes very happy.”
Hefner denied that was exactly what she said, but just wanted to point out the correlation.
“I don’t believe that’s exactly what I said,” Hefner said. “I said there are a number of contributing factors and a correlation with heat waves and gun violence. But, what I was going to say is, yes from my understanding from talking to people in the city is there has been a different approach to policing since Mayor Emanuel was elected. And there is a theory — but back to the point of we need to get facts — there is a theory that that is demonstrably less effective, and that’s being reexamined right now.”
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/01/30/center-for-american-progress-christie-hefner-climate-change-a-factor-in-chicagos-murder-rate/
Jeff Poor
On Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” the Center for American Progress’ Christie Hefner said that Chicago’s sky-high murder rate could be blamed — at least in part — on climate change.
“Yes, last year we hit a record number of murders from guns [in Chicago],” Hefner, the former chairwoman and chief executive officer of Playboy Enterprises, said. “And this year we are already outpacing last year’s numbers. Now, there are contributing factors that are not under anybody’s control and may seem odd, but it is factually true. One of them is actually the weather. There is a dramatic increase in gun violence when it is warmer. And we are having this climate change effect that is driving that.”
The average high temperature July, the hottest month in both Chicago and the much-safer New York City, is the same for both cities at 84 degrees Fahrenheit. Scarborough took a moment to sardonically thank Hefner for that statement on behalf of conservative bloggers.
“Christie, can I just stop you and say conservative bloggers across America, thank you for saying that climate change is responsible for the rising murder rates in Chicago,” Scarborough said. “You have just made a lot of people in their basements of their mothers’ homes very happy.”
Hefner denied that was exactly what she said, but just wanted to point out the correlation.
“I don’t believe that’s exactly what I said,” Hefner said. “I said there are a number of contributing factors and a correlation with heat waves and gun violence. But, what I was going to say is, yes from my understanding from talking to people in the city is there has been a different approach to policing since Mayor Emanuel was elected. And there is a theory — but back to the point of we need to get facts — there is a theory that that is demonstrably less effective, and that’s being reexamined right now.”
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/01/30/center-for-american-progress-christie-hefner-climate-change-a-factor-in-chicagos-murder-rate/
"The American people, with their long tradition of gun ownership, have an option that the citizens of those European and Asian countries don’t have in the event they find themselves in the throes of a tyrannical regime: resist with force, an option that would enable American men to more adequately protect their wives and daughters and families if the worst were to happen."
Gun Control and State-Sponsored Rape
by Jacob G. Hornberger
Who can ever forget the scene in Braveheart in which a husband is required, under force of arms, to surrender his new bride to the noble who has been given the legal right by the English king to rape the woman on her wedding night? Given that the husband was not permitted to own a sword, there was no way that he and his family and friends were able to oppose the troops who were taking away his bride for the night.
Of course, one might say that it was just a movie or that the so-called right of prima nocta might have been mythical.
But they can’t say the same about Efrain Rios Montt, the former Guatemalan military dictator who has just been charged with genocide and other crimes arising out of rapes, torture, and murder of defenseless Guatemalan villagers committed by troops under his command.
Of course, one might say that that it’s only foreign troops who commit rape against defenseless women. But we mustn’t forget that Rios Montt and many of his military henchmen were graduates of the U.S. Army’s infamous School of the Americas, which was notorious for having an official torture manual that it used to teach its students.
We would also be remiss if we forgot that Rios Montt participated in the CIA coup in Guatemala in 1953, which succeeding in ousting the democratically elected president of the country, Jacobo Arbenz, from power, and installing into power a series of brutal, U.S.-supported military dictators, including Rioss Montt.
Or we might consider Nick Turse’s new book, Kill Anything That Moves, which details accounts of U.S. troops raping girls and women and even murdering them afterward so that they couldn’t testify to the rapes. Turse documents in excruciating detail efforts by high U.S. military officials to bury investigations into the rapes and murders, whitewash them, or dole out light sentences to the malefactors.
Or we might consider the numerous rapes that were committed by military interrogators operating under the command of army General Augusto Pinochet, the military dictator whom the U.S. military and the CIA helped install into power in Chile after ousting the country’s democratically elected president, Salvador Allende.
In many of those instances, the victims were unable to adequately defend themselves owing to strict gun control within the countries. One reads with horror, for example, as husbands and fathers in Chile watched helplessly as wives and daughters were arrested and taken away to military dungeons to be raped and tortured. What else could they do — throw rocks at the well-armed troops who were carting them away?
According to Wikipedia, the head of Pinochet’s secret police, army General Manuel Contreras, is “currently serving 25 sentences totaling 289 years in prison for kidnapping, forced disappearance and assassination.” It is revealing that the CIA hired Contreras to be a CIA agent during the precise time that he was leading Pinochet’s secret police to hunt down and murder Pinochet’s opponents.
Or we might consider the things that the CIA and the troops did at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, some of them so horrific that even Congress favored burying the photographs and videos of the acts from public view forever.
The primary reason that our American ancestors included the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights was to ensure that Americans would retain the means to defend themselves in the event that tyranny were ever to befall the U.S. government. The inclusion of the Second Amendment was an implicit acknowledgement of the possibility, no matter how remote or unlikely, of a tyrannical or oppressive regime taking control of the federal government.
If that were to ever happen, the primary way by which such a tyrannical regime would impose and enforce its oppression is the same as that employed by tyrannical regimes throughout history — through the military, the national police (e.g., the DEA), and the CIA. There is also the possibility that UN troops would be called in to help maintain “order and stability” — foreign troops who might have fewer reservations about abusing Americans, especially Americans who were believed to be terrorists, communists, or traitors.
In his dissenting opinion in the case of Silveira v. Lockyer, Judge Alex Konsinski expressed the brilliant insight that when people in a country give up their guns, it is a mistake that they can make only once. If the worst were to happen and the federal government became a tyrannical regime, then American citizens would end up doing what disarmed people in other countries do under such circumstances — they would end up meekly, quietly, and obediently accepting the tyranny and perhaps even praising it.
It would be too late to say, “Hey, that was a bad mistake we made when we gave up our guns. Let’s correct it and start reacquiring them” because the tyrannical regime’s oppressive control would prevent the mistake from being rectified. American men in particular might well find themselves doing what Chilean men did — watch helplessly in anguish as their wives and daughters are carted away by well-armed military, police, or intelligence forces to be tortured, raped, and murdered or disappeared.
Konsinski’s words are worth pondering carefully:
My excellent colleagues have forgotten these bitter lessons of history. The prospect of tyranny may not grab the headlines the way vivid stories of gun crime routinely do. But few saw the Third Reich coming until it was too late. The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed — where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once.
Fortunately, the Framers were wise enough to entrench the right of the people to keep and bear arms within our constitutional structure. The purpose and importance of that right was still fresh in their minds, and they spelled it out clearly so it would not be forgotten. Despite the panel’s mighty struggle to erase these words, they remain, and the people themselves can read what they say plainly enough:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
American gun-control statists love to point to European or Asian countries as models of how gun control has brought about more peaceful and safe societies. Of course, gun-control opponents have challenged their conclusions and also pointed to Switzerland, a peaceful and safe society where the Swiss citizens are among the best-armed people in the world.
But what Americans should always keep in mind is the fundamental difference between European and Asian countries and the United States when it comes to guns and tyranny. When European and Asian countries find themselves in the throes of a tyrannical regime, there is little the citizens can do to resist it. They have but two options — succumb or die.
The American people, with their long tradition of gun ownership, have an option that the citizens of those European and Asian countries don’t have in the event they find themselves in the throes of a tyrannical regime: resist with force, an option that would enable American men to more adequately protect their wives and daughters and families if the worst were to happen.
Link:
http://fff.org/2013/01/31/gun-control-and-state-sponsored-rape/
by Jacob G. Hornberger
Who can ever forget the scene in Braveheart in which a husband is required, under force of arms, to surrender his new bride to the noble who has been given the legal right by the English king to rape the woman on her wedding night? Given that the husband was not permitted to own a sword, there was no way that he and his family and friends were able to oppose the troops who were taking away his bride for the night.
Of course, one might say that it was just a movie or that the so-called right of prima nocta might have been mythical.
But they can’t say the same about Efrain Rios Montt, the former Guatemalan military dictator who has just been charged with genocide and other crimes arising out of rapes, torture, and murder of defenseless Guatemalan villagers committed by troops under his command.
Of course, one might say that that it’s only foreign troops who commit rape against defenseless women. But we mustn’t forget that Rios Montt and many of his military henchmen were graduates of the U.S. Army’s infamous School of the Americas, which was notorious for having an official torture manual that it used to teach its students.
We would also be remiss if we forgot that Rios Montt participated in the CIA coup in Guatemala in 1953, which succeeding in ousting the democratically elected president of the country, Jacobo Arbenz, from power, and installing into power a series of brutal, U.S.-supported military dictators, including Rioss Montt.
Or we might consider Nick Turse’s new book, Kill Anything That Moves, which details accounts of U.S. troops raping girls and women and even murdering them afterward so that they couldn’t testify to the rapes. Turse documents in excruciating detail efforts by high U.S. military officials to bury investigations into the rapes and murders, whitewash them, or dole out light sentences to the malefactors.
Or we might consider the numerous rapes that were committed by military interrogators operating under the command of army General Augusto Pinochet, the military dictator whom the U.S. military and the CIA helped install into power in Chile after ousting the country’s democratically elected president, Salvador Allende.
In many of those instances, the victims were unable to adequately defend themselves owing to strict gun control within the countries. One reads with horror, for example, as husbands and fathers in Chile watched helplessly as wives and daughters were arrested and taken away to military dungeons to be raped and tortured. What else could they do — throw rocks at the well-armed troops who were carting them away?
According to Wikipedia, the head of Pinochet’s secret police, army General Manuel Contreras, is “currently serving 25 sentences totaling 289 years in prison for kidnapping, forced disappearance and assassination.” It is revealing that the CIA hired Contreras to be a CIA agent during the precise time that he was leading Pinochet’s secret police to hunt down and murder Pinochet’s opponents.
Or we might consider the things that the CIA and the troops did at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, some of them so horrific that even Congress favored burying the photographs and videos of the acts from public view forever.
The primary reason that our American ancestors included the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights was to ensure that Americans would retain the means to defend themselves in the event that tyranny were ever to befall the U.S. government. The inclusion of the Second Amendment was an implicit acknowledgement of the possibility, no matter how remote or unlikely, of a tyrannical or oppressive regime taking control of the federal government.
If that were to ever happen, the primary way by which such a tyrannical regime would impose and enforce its oppression is the same as that employed by tyrannical regimes throughout history — through the military, the national police (e.g., the DEA), and the CIA. There is also the possibility that UN troops would be called in to help maintain “order and stability” — foreign troops who might have fewer reservations about abusing Americans, especially Americans who were believed to be terrorists, communists, or traitors.
In his dissenting opinion in the case of Silveira v. Lockyer, Judge Alex Konsinski expressed the brilliant insight that when people in a country give up their guns, it is a mistake that they can make only once. If the worst were to happen and the federal government became a tyrannical regime, then American citizens would end up doing what disarmed people in other countries do under such circumstances — they would end up meekly, quietly, and obediently accepting the tyranny and perhaps even praising it.
It would be too late to say, “Hey, that was a bad mistake we made when we gave up our guns. Let’s correct it and start reacquiring them” because the tyrannical regime’s oppressive control would prevent the mistake from being rectified. American men in particular might well find themselves doing what Chilean men did — watch helplessly in anguish as their wives and daughters are carted away by well-armed military, police, or intelligence forces to be tortured, raped, and murdered or disappeared.
Konsinski’s words are worth pondering carefully:
My excellent colleagues have forgotten these bitter lessons of history. The prospect of tyranny may not grab the headlines the way vivid stories of gun crime routinely do. But few saw the Third Reich coming until it was too late. The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed — where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once.
Fortunately, the Framers were wise enough to entrench the right of the people to keep and bear arms within our constitutional structure. The purpose and importance of that right was still fresh in their minds, and they spelled it out clearly so it would not be forgotten. Despite the panel’s mighty struggle to erase these words, they remain, and the people themselves can read what they say plainly enough:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
American gun-control statists love to point to European or Asian countries as models of how gun control has brought about more peaceful and safe societies. Of course, gun-control opponents have challenged their conclusions and also pointed to Switzerland, a peaceful and safe society where the Swiss citizens are among the best-armed people in the world.
But what Americans should always keep in mind is the fundamental difference between European and Asian countries and the United States when it comes to guns and tyranny. When European and Asian countries find themselves in the throes of a tyrannical regime, there is little the citizens can do to resist it. They have but two options — succumb or die.
The American people, with their long tradition of gun ownership, have an option that the citizens of those European and Asian countries don’t have in the event they find themselves in the throes of a tyrannical regime: resist with force, an option that would enable American men to more adequately protect their wives and daughters and families if the worst were to happen.
Link:
http://fff.org/2013/01/31/gun-control-and-state-sponsored-rape/
Let's hope so...
by Eric Peters
Americans either don’t see it or don’t care. One reader put it as follows:
“I wish I had some faith in all of this but history isn’t kind to it. My prediction is that a few of you will be made examples which will be splashed all over the media, 99.9 percent will do as they are told, and the rest will merely hide/bury their guns for another day . . . which never comes. California already made the SKS (rifle) illegal retroactively and all the owners meekly handed them over. This won’t be any different. It is to easy to go to work, make another deal with the devil, and hope that nothing worse happens … but it will. The cattle cars will next and you won’t resist those either. Your neighbor will be called a terrorist but you won’t care because he always was a little funny, kept putting leaves in your yard, and most importantly it isn’t you….”
It could certainly go that way (as history so depressingly shows us). But it could also go a different way. I suspect it will. In fact, I submit that we already have evidence that it is going differently.
For one thing, a lot of people are already wake – and more are waking up every day.
In percentage terms, the numbers are small – perhaps 5 percent of the population is comprised of people who reject the state – organized violence – in principle and who adhere consciously to the Non-Aggression Principle (NAP). However, that 5 percent is also millions of people. Now consider that there are tens of millions more gun owners who are frightened by – and angry about – what’s going on. Who are beginning to comprehend that a right that matters to them is under siege – and thus, inevitably, they are beginning to appreciate that all of their rights (and by necessary implication, the rights of others) are also under siege. They are beginning to get it. And their numbers are increasing at a geometric rate. Witness the eruption of rage in New York. The widespread and public utterances of defiance. (See here and here.) Even the cops – some of them, at any rate – are coming out openly on the right side. Our side. (See here.)
It is unprecedented – and thus, heartening.
If even 10 percent of these waking-up Americans join the cause, that’s an army of tens of millions of people.
Armed, determined people. Who realize what’s at stake – that is, everything. And who are therefore prepared to go to the mattresses over it, if need be.
This is no small thing.
And it is an important difference relative to the situation of Germany – and Germany’s Jews and other soon-to-be-victims – in the 1930s.
Or even America – and Americans – in the 1990s.
The Jews and other non-Nazis of 1930s Germany were – largely – naive civilians; typical “liberals,” in modern parlance – people who didn’t reject the state (organized violence) in principle. In fact, most of them embraced the state. They were socialists or social democrats or communists… in other words, authoritarians of one type or another. They did not question the essential thing – the lawful violence that is the state. Most of them accepted it. This is what blinded them to the inevitable result of the NSDAP and Adolf Hitler. They could not see the trains to Auschwitz.
The same, arguably, was true of Americans in the 1990s. Back then, most people still accepted as legitimate what the government did – or at least, much of what it did. Most people did not see that what was done at Waco – and Ruby Ridge - could be happen to them, too.
We can – and do – see it.
Millions of us.
The oven-fodder of Germany had their epiphany about state violence when it was already far too late. We, on the other hand, have the benefit of foresight. We know – intellectually as well as in our gut – what they are up to; that the state is not a benevolent force. That it is an evil force.
That it is force – period.
The importance of this cannot be over-stated.
Now consider some other differences about the situation today vs. the situation then:
Millions of Americans are already armed. Not with merely with small caliber revolvers and shotguns, either. Hence the hysteria – of the Piers Morgan/Diane Feinstein/Chuck Schumer axis – about “assault weapons.” Germany’s doomed did not have sturmgewehrs – or know how to use them. Millions of Americans have “black rifles” of one type or another – and do know how to use them. Combine this fact with the above fact – the growing awareness about the nature of the legalized mafia that goes by the name, “government” – and you have a hornet’s nest that the Morgan/Feinstein/Schumer axis would be ill-advised to hit with a stick.
This realization may have already begun to penetrate their heads – and given them pause.
Another very important difference: The United States military is not – yet – the Deutsche Wehrmacht. Or more importantly, the Reichswehr – what the German army was before it became the Wehrmacht. It is an important distinction. Hitler had the support of the Reichswehr. Its officer corps believed in Der Fuhrer. I do not believe that Barry Obama enjoys such support. And more importantly, I do not believe the soldiery supports the new regime. Yes, many will salute – then submit – and attempt to force us to obey. But there are hundreds of thousands of active duty military and police who will not. (See here, for instance.) And there are millions of veterans who will not. These millions will add their numbers to the millions of civilians who know they must draw the line, here and now – or consign themselves and their children and perhaps their children’s children to the same fate that awaited Germany’s vaporized millions.
And this is why you cannot find a “high capacity” magazine at any price, anywhere. Why the shelves are swept clean of ammunition. Why those dread “black rifles” are worth their weight in gold… if you can even find one. Previous generations of victims failed to arm themselves because they did not appreciate the nature of the gathering storm. Neither did most Americans as recently as the 1990s – the last time the government went after “black rifles.” It was tolerated then.
This time, it will be different.
Because it already is.
Link:
http://ericpetersautos.com/2013/01/29/why-they-will-lose-this-time/
" If the government can restrain the freedom to travel on the basis of an immutable characteristic of birth, there is no limit to the restraints it can impose."
Immigration and Freedom
by Andrew P. Napolitano
As President Obama and Congress grapple for prominence in the debate over immigration, both have lost sight of the true nature of the issue at hand.
The issue the politicians and bureaucrats would rather avoid is the natural law. The natural law is a term used to refer to human rights that all persons possess by virtue of our humanity. These rights encompass areas of human behavior where individuals are sovereign and thus need no permission from the government before making choices in those areas. Truly, in the Judeo-Christian tradition, only God is sovereign – meaning He is the source of His own power.
Having received freedom from our Creator and, in America, thanks to the values embraced by most of the Founding Fathers, individuals are sovereign with respect to our natural rights. St. Thomas Aquinas taught that our sovereignty is a part of our human nature, and our humanity is a gift from God. In 1776, Thomas Jefferson himself recognized personal sovereignty in the Declaration of Independence when he wrote about Nature’s God as the Creator and thus the originator of our inalienable human rights.
The rights that Jefferson identified consist of the well-known litany of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. By the time his ideological soul mate James Madison was serving as the scrivener at the Constitutional Convention in 1787, the list of natural rights had been expanded to include those now encompassed by the Bill of Rights. Yet again, the authors of the Constitution and its first 10 amendments recognized that the rights being insulated from government interference had their origin in a source other than the government.
This view of the natural law is sweet to the heart and pleasing to the ear when politicians praise it at patriotic events, but it is also a bane to them when it restrains their exercise of the coercive powers of the government. Thus, since the freedom of speech, the development of personality, the right to worship or not to worship, the right to use technologically contemporary means for self-defense, the right to be left alone, and the right to own and use property all stem from our humanity, the government simply is without authority to regulate human behavior in these areas, no matter what powers it purports to give to itself and no matter what crises may occur. Among the rights in this category is the freedom of movement, which today is called the right to travel.
The right to travel is an individual personal human right, long recognized under the natural law as immune from governmental interference. Of course, governments have been interfering with this right for millennia. The Romans restricted the travel of Jews; Parliament restricted the travel of serfs; Congress restricted the travel of slaves; and starting in the late 19th century, the federal government has restricted the travel of non-Americans who want to come here and even the travel of those already here. All of these abominable restrictions of the right to travel are based not on any culpability of individuals, but rather on membership in the groups to which persons have belonged from birth.
The initial reasons for these immigration restrictions involved the different appearance and culture of those seeking to come here and the nativism of those running the government here. Somehow, the people who ran the government believed that they who were born here were superior persons and more worthy of American-style freedoms than those who sought to come here. This extols nativism.
Nativism is the arch-enemy of the freedom to travel, as its adherents believe they can use the coercive power of the government to impair the freedom of travel of persons who are unwanted not because of personal behavior, but solely on the basis of where they were born. Nativism teaches that we lack natural rights and enjoy only those rights the government permits us to exercise.
Yet, the freedom to travel is a fundamental natural right. This is not a novel view. In addition to Aquinas and Jefferson, it has been embraced by St. Augustine, John Locke, Thomas Paine, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Pope John Paul II and Justice Clarence Thomas. Our fundamental human rights are not conditioned or even conditionable on the laws or traditions of the place where our mothers were physically located when we were born. They are not attenuated because our mothers were not in the United States at the moment of our births. Stated differently, we all possess natural rights, no more and no less than any others. All humans have the full panoply of freedom of choice in areas of personal behavior protected from governmental interference by the natural law, no matter where they were born.
Americans are not possessed of more natural rights than non-Americans; rather, we enjoy more opportunities to exercise those rights because the government is theoretically restrained by the Constitution, which explicitly recognizes the natural law. That recognition is articulated in the Ninth Amendment, which declares that the enumeration of certain rights in the Constitution shall not be used by the government as an excuse to deny or disparage other unnamed and unnamable rights retained by the people.
So, if I want to invite my cousins from Florence, Italy, to come here and live in my house and work on my farm in New Jersey, or if a multinational corporation wants the best engineers from India to work in its labs in Texas, or if my neighbor wants a friend of a friend from Mexico City to come here to work in his shop, we have the natural right to ask, they have the natural right to come here, and the government has no moral right to interfere with any of these freely made decisions.
If the government can restrain the freedom to travel on the basis of an immutable characteristic of birth, there is no limit to the restraints it can impose.
Link:
http://lewrockwell.com/napolitano/napolitano85.1.html
by Andrew P. Napolitano
As President Obama and Congress grapple for prominence in the debate over immigration, both have lost sight of the true nature of the issue at hand.
The issue the politicians and bureaucrats would rather avoid is the natural law. The natural law is a term used to refer to human rights that all persons possess by virtue of our humanity. These rights encompass areas of human behavior where individuals are sovereign and thus need no permission from the government before making choices in those areas. Truly, in the Judeo-Christian tradition, only God is sovereign – meaning He is the source of His own power.
Having received freedom from our Creator and, in America, thanks to the values embraced by most of the Founding Fathers, individuals are sovereign with respect to our natural rights. St. Thomas Aquinas taught that our sovereignty is a part of our human nature, and our humanity is a gift from God. In 1776, Thomas Jefferson himself recognized personal sovereignty in the Declaration of Independence when he wrote about Nature’s God as the Creator and thus the originator of our inalienable human rights.
The rights that Jefferson identified consist of the well-known litany of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. By the time his ideological soul mate James Madison was serving as the scrivener at the Constitutional Convention in 1787, the list of natural rights had been expanded to include those now encompassed by the Bill of Rights. Yet again, the authors of the Constitution and its first 10 amendments recognized that the rights being insulated from government interference had their origin in a source other than the government.
This view of the natural law is sweet to the heart and pleasing to the ear when politicians praise it at patriotic events, but it is also a bane to them when it restrains their exercise of the coercive powers of the government. Thus, since the freedom of speech, the development of personality, the right to worship or not to worship, the right to use technologically contemporary means for self-defense, the right to be left alone, and the right to own and use property all stem from our humanity, the government simply is without authority to regulate human behavior in these areas, no matter what powers it purports to give to itself and no matter what crises may occur. Among the rights in this category is the freedom of movement, which today is called the right to travel.
The right to travel is an individual personal human right, long recognized under the natural law as immune from governmental interference. Of course, governments have been interfering with this right for millennia. The Romans restricted the travel of Jews; Parliament restricted the travel of serfs; Congress restricted the travel of slaves; and starting in the late 19th century, the federal government has restricted the travel of non-Americans who want to come here and even the travel of those already here. All of these abominable restrictions of the right to travel are based not on any culpability of individuals, but rather on membership in the groups to which persons have belonged from birth.
The initial reasons for these immigration restrictions involved the different appearance and culture of those seeking to come here and the nativism of those running the government here. Somehow, the people who ran the government believed that they who were born here were superior persons and more worthy of American-style freedoms than those who sought to come here. This extols nativism.
Nativism is the arch-enemy of the freedom to travel, as its adherents believe they can use the coercive power of the government to impair the freedom of travel of persons who are unwanted not because of personal behavior, but solely on the basis of where they were born. Nativism teaches that we lack natural rights and enjoy only those rights the government permits us to exercise.
Yet, the freedom to travel is a fundamental natural right. This is not a novel view. In addition to Aquinas and Jefferson, it has been embraced by St. Augustine, John Locke, Thomas Paine, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Pope John Paul II and Justice Clarence Thomas. Our fundamental human rights are not conditioned or even conditionable on the laws or traditions of the place where our mothers were physically located when we were born. They are not attenuated because our mothers were not in the United States at the moment of our births. Stated differently, we all possess natural rights, no more and no less than any others. All humans have the full panoply of freedom of choice in areas of personal behavior protected from governmental interference by the natural law, no matter where they were born.
Americans are not possessed of more natural rights than non-Americans; rather, we enjoy more opportunities to exercise those rights because the government is theoretically restrained by the Constitution, which explicitly recognizes the natural law. That recognition is articulated in the Ninth Amendment, which declares that the enumeration of certain rights in the Constitution shall not be used by the government as an excuse to deny or disparage other unnamed and unnamable rights retained by the people.
So, if I want to invite my cousins from Florence, Italy, to come here and live in my house and work on my farm in New Jersey, or if a multinational corporation wants the best engineers from India to work in its labs in Texas, or if my neighbor wants a friend of a friend from Mexico City to come here to work in his shop, we have the natural right to ask, they have the natural right to come here, and the government has no moral right to interfere with any of these freely made decisions.
If the government can restrain the freedom to travel on the basis of an immutable characteristic of birth, there is no limit to the restraints it can impose.
Link:
http://lewrockwell.com/napolitano/napolitano85.1.html
Fighting terror one terrorist at a time...
Six-Year-Old Girl Expelled For Bringing Plastic Toy Gun To Show & Tell
Schools all over the country are weeding out the terrorists
Steve Watson
The deadly rise of extremism in America continues as yet another child has been expelled from school for wielding a toy gun.
WLTX news reports that six-year-old Naomi McKinney brought a small transparent plastic toy gun to school for a show and tell, causing her teachers to freak out. The kindergartner’s father told reporters that he was called to Alice Drive Elementary in Sumter, South Carolina, because his daughter “was fixing to be expelled.” “I got in the car and rushed down there and when I got in there the principal told me that she had a gun at school and she pulls it out and it is a little clear plastic gun.” Hank McKinney said. “You have to show some kind of judgment,” the father continued. “I know there is a lot going on with guns and schools and that is tragic but a six year old bringing a toy to school doesn’t know better.” The school has expelled Naomi indefinitely, saying in a statement that weapons or replica weapons are prohibited. School officials refused to release any pictures or details of the offending item, saying they are “part of the child’s discipline record.” “I’m sorry anything can be a weapon,” the father said. “A pencil is more of a weapon than the toy gun she brought to school.” When the parents tried to appeal, the school sent them a letter saying that the girl would be subject to criminal trespassing charges if she is seen on the campus or at any school sponsored event. Naomi will instead be assigned a home-based instructor from the school district, according to officials. When asked what her intentions were regarding the dangerous weapon, the girl said “I chose to bring it to school because I thought I could show my friends it because they might like seeing it.” When asked to react to her expulsion, Naomi said “I felt bad because i didn’t want to miss all my friends”. Clearly she is very much a dangerous terror threat and has been dealt with accordingly. This case is far from isolated, as we have seen over the past days and weeks, in the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting. It is now a daily occurrence. Yesterday we reported on the five-year-old in Massachusetts who faces suspension for building a small toy gun out of lego bricks and play-shooting his classmates. Earlier this week, we reported on an incident that erupted when a discussion between two children about a toy nerf gun caused a lockdown and a massive armed police response at two elementary schools in the Bronx. Earlier this month, a Long Island high school was also placed on lock down for 6 hours in response to a student carrying a toy nerf gun. Another incident this month saw a five-year-old girl suspended after a three hour grilling, and described as a “terroristic threat”, when she brought a pink bubble gun to school. Last week, a South Philadelphia elementary student was searched in front of classmates and threatened with arrest after she mistakenly brought a “paper gun” to school. A 6-year-old boy was suspended from his elementary school in Maryland for making a gun gesture with his hand and saying “pow”. Days later another two 6-year-olds in Maryland were suspended for pointing their fingers into gun shapes while playing “cops and robbers” with each other. In Oklahoma, a five-year-old boy was also recently suspended for making a gun gesture with his hand. A 13-year-old Middle School seventh grade student in Pennsylvania was also suspended for the same hand gesture. When will this reign of terror end? Link: http://www.prisonplanet.com/six-year-old-girl-expelled-for-bringing-plastic-toy-gun-to-show-tell.html
Schools all over the country are weeding out the terrorists
Steve Watson
The deadly rise of extremism in America continues as yet another child has been expelled from school for wielding a toy gun.
WLTX news reports that six-year-old Naomi McKinney brought a small transparent plastic toy gun to school for a show and tell, causing her teachers to freak out. The kindergartner’s father told reporters that he was called to Alice Drive Elementary in Sumter, South Carolina, because his daughter “was fixing to be expelled.” “I got in the car and rushed down there and when I got in there the principal told me that she had a gun at school and she pulls it out and it is a little clear plastic gun.” Hank McKinney said. “You have to show some kind of judgment,” the father continued. “I know there is a lot going on with guns and schools and that is tragic but a six year old bringing a toy to school doesn’t know better.” The school has expelled Naomi indefinitely, saying in a statement that weapons or replica weapons are prohibited. School officials refused to release any pictures or details of the offending item, saying they are “part of the child’s discipline record.” “I’m sorry anything can be a weapon,” the father said. “A pencil is more of a weapon than the toy gun she brought to school.” When the parents tried to appeal, the school sent them a letter saying that the girl would be subject to criminal trespassing charges if she is seen on the campus or at any school sponsored event. Naomi will instead be assigned a home-based instructor from the school district, according to officials. When asked what her intentions were regarding the dangerous weapon, the girl said “I chose to bring it to school because I thought I could show my friends it because they might like seeing it.” When asked to react to her expulsion, Naomi said “I felt bad because i didn’t want to miss all my friends”. Clearly she is very much a dangerous terror threat and has been dealt with accordingly. This case is far from isolated, as we have seen over the past days and weeks, in the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting. It is now a daily occurrence. Yesterday we reported on the five-year-old in Massachusetts who faces suspension for building a small toy gun out of lego bricks and play-shooting his classmates. Earlier this week, we reported on an incident that erupted when a discussion between two children about a toy nerf gun caused a lockdown and a massive armed police response at two elementary schools in the Bronx. Earlier this month, a Long Island high school was also placed on lock down for 6 hours in response to a student carrying a toy nerf gun. Another incident this month saw a five-year-old girl suspended after a three hour grilling, and described as a “terroristic threat”, when she brought a pink bubble gun to school. Last week, a South Philadelphia elementary student was searched in front of classmates and threatened with arrest after she mistakenly brought a “paper gun” to school. A 6-year-old boy was suspended from his elementary school in Maryland for making a gun gesture with his hand and saying “pow”. Days later another two 6-year-olds in Maryland were suspended for pointing their fingers into gun shapes while playing “cops and robbers” with each other. In Oklahoma, a five-year-old boy was also recently suspended for making a gun gesture with his hand. A 13-year-old Middle School seventh grade student in Pennsylvania was also suspended for the same hand gesture. When will this reign of terror end? Link: http://www.prisonplanet.com/six-year-old-girl-expelled-for-bringing-plastic-toy-gun-to-show-tell.html
"Be prepared in the next year or two for all criticism of “our freedom and democracy” government to be shut down. In Amerika, truth is about to be exterminated."
In Amerika Law No Longer Exists: the extermination of truth
Paul Craig Roberts
In the 21st century Americans have experienced an extraordinary collapse in the rule of law and in their constitutional protections. Today American citizens, once a free people protected by law, can be assassinated and detained in prison indefinitely without any evidence being presented to a court of their guilt, and they can be sentenced to prison on the basis of secret testimony by anonymous witnesses not subject to cross examination. The US “justice system” has been transformed by the Bush/Obama regime into the ”justice system” of Gestapo Germany and Stalinist Russia. There is no difference.
In an article available here: http://www.wrmea.org/wrmea-archives/541-washington-report-archives-2011-2015/january-february-2013/11611-why-all-americans-should-care-about-the-holy-land-foundation-case.html Stephen Downs, formerly Chief Attorney with the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct and Kathy Manley, a criminal defense attorney and member of the New York Civil Liberties Union, report on how the US government destroyed a charity, the Holy Land Foundation, which provided money for feeding the poor and for building schools and hospitals in Palestine.
The charity, aware of the perils of being based in the US and doing anything for Palestinians, relied on the US State Department and the US Department of Justice (sic) for guidance on where to send humanitarian aid. The charity sent its aid to the same aid committees in Palestine that the US Agency for International Development and the UN used to distribute aid to the Palestinians.
In the first trial of the Holy Land Foundation, the US government admitted that none of the charity’s donations had gone to terrorist organizations, and the federal prosecutors failed to achieve a conviction. So the prosecutors tried the charity again.
In the second trial, the judge permitted the prosecutors to call an “anonymous expert” to tell the jury that some of the committees used by USAID and the UN and approved by the US Department of State were controlled by Hamas, the elected government of Palestine that Israel requires the US government to brand as “terrorist.”
As Downs and Manley point out, an “anonymous expert” cannot “be challenged because he is unknown.” There cannot be a cross examination. The “expert” could be anyone–someone paid to lie to the jury, a Jew who believes all help to Palestinians comprises “aid to terrorists,” or a member of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service that has throughly infiltrated the US according to US intelligence experts.
Injustices are everywhere, the authors admit, so why is this important to you? The answer is that the due process clause of the US Constitution requires that criminal laws give fair notice as to what conduct is prohibited. According to Downs and Manley, the Holy Land Foundation followed the US State Department’s list of designated terrorist organizations and avoided all contact with organizations on the list, but were indicted and convicted regardless. This tells us that federal prosecutors are viciously corrupt and that jurors are so inept and propagandized that they are useless to defendants.
The US Supreme Court refused to review this most blatant case of wrongful conviction. By so doing, the US Supreme Court established that the court, like the US House of Representatives, the US Senate, and the executive branch, is not only a servant of the police state but also a servant of Israel and supports the destruction of the Palestinians by designating aid to Palestine as an act of terrorism.
What this means for you is that your involvement in legal transactions or associations can be declared ex post facto by secret witnesses to be criminal involvements. The criminality of your past behavior can now be established, according to Downs and Manley, by “anonymous experts,” mouthpieces for the government prosecutors who cannot “be confronted or cross-examined within the meaning of the 6th Amendment.”
Downs and Manley write: “The implications are enormous. The government can now criminalize political, religious and social ideology and speech. Donating to peace groups, participating in protests, attending church, mosque or synagogue, entertaining friends, and posting material on the Internet, for example, could later be found to be illegal because of ‘associations,’ manufactured by anonymous experts, which in some way allegedly support designated terrorist organizations one has never heard of.”
The authors could have added that if the government wants to get you, all it has to do is to declare that someone or some organization somewhere in your past was connected in a vague undefined way with terrorism. The government’s assertion suffices. No proof is needed. The brainwashed jury will not protect you.
Be prepared in the next year or two for all criticism of “our freedom and democracy” government to be shut down. In Amerika, truth is about to be exterminated.
Link:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/in-amerika-law-no-longer-exists-the-extermination-of-truth.html
Paul Craig Roberts
In the 21st century Americans have experienced an extraordinary collapse in the rule of law and in their constitutional protections. Today American citizens, once a free people protected by law, can be assassinated and detained in prison indefinitely without any evidence being presented to a court of their guilt, and they can be sentenced to prison on the basis of secret testimony by anonymous witnesses not subject to cross examination. The US “justice system” has been transformed by the Bush/Obama regime into the ”justice system” of Gestapo Germany and Stalinist Russia. There is no difference.
In an article available here: http://www.wrmea.org/wrmea-archives/541-washington-report-archives-2011-2015/january-february-2013/11611-why-all-americans-should-care-about-the-holy-land-foundation-case.html Stephen Downs, formerly Chief Attorney with the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct and Kathy Manley, a criminal defense attorney and member of the New York Civil Liberties Union, report on how the US government destroyed a charity, the Holy Land Foundation, which provided money for feeding the poor and for building schools and hospitals in Palestine.
The charity, aware of the perils of being based in the US and doing anything for Palestinians, relied on the US State Department and the US Department of Justice (sic) for guidance on where to send humanitarian aid. The charity sent its aid to the same aid committees in Palestine that the US Agency for International Development and the UN used to distribute aid to the Palestinians.
In the first trial of the Holy Land Foundation, the US government admitted that none of the charity’s donations had gone to terrorist organizations, and the federal prosecutors failed to achieve a conviction. So the prosecutors tried the charity again.
In the second trial, the judge permitted the prosecutors to call an “anonymous expert” to tell the jury that some of the committees used by USAID and the UN and approved by the US Department of State were controlled by Hamas, the elected government of Palestine that Israel requires the US government to brand as “terrorist.”
As Downs and Manley point out, an “anonymous expert” cannot “be challenged because he is unknown.” There cannot be a cross examination. The “expert” could be anyone–someone paid to lie to the jury, a Jew who believes all help to Palestinians comprises “aid to terrorists,” or a member of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service that has throughly infiltrated the US according to US intelligence experts.
Injustices are everywhere, the authors admit, so why is this important to you? The answer is that the due process clause of the US Constitution requires that criminal laws give fair notice as to what conduct is prohibited. According to Downs and Manley, the Holy Land Foundation followed the US State Department’s list of designated terrorist organizations and avoided all contact with organizations on the list, but were indicted and convicted regardless. This tells us that federal prosecutors are viciously corrupt and that jurors are so inept and propagandized that they are useless to defendants.
The US Supreme Court refused to review this most blatant case of wrongful conviction. By so doing, the US Supreme Court established that the court, like the US House of Representatives, the US Senate, and the executive branch, is not only a servant of the police state but also a servant of Israel and supports the destruction of the Palestinians by designating aid to Palestine as an act of terrorism.
What this means for you is that your involvement in legal transactions or associations can be declared ex post facto by secret witnesses to be criminal involvements. The criminality of your past behavior can now be established, according to Downs and Manley, by “anonymous experts,” mouthpieces for the government prosecutors who cannot “be confronted or cross-examined within the meaning of the 6th Amendment.”
Downs and Manley write: “The implications are enormous. The government can now criminalize political, religious and social ideology and speech. Donating to peace groups, participating in protests, attending church, mosque or synagogue, entertaining friends, and posting material on the Internet, for example, could later be found to be illegal because of ‘associations,’ manufactured by anonymous experts, which in some way allegedly support designated terrorist organizations one has never heard of.”
The authors could have added that if the government wants to get you, all it has to do is to declare that someone or some organization somewhere in your past was connected in a vague undefined way with terrorism. The government’s assertion suffices. No proof is needed. The brainwashed jury will not protect you.
Be prepared in the next year or two for all criticism of “our freedom and democracy” government to be shut down. In Amerika, truth is about to be exterminated.
Link:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/in-amerika-law-no-longer-exists-the-extermination-of-truth.html
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
You mean like the one that happened on Nov. 22, 1963???
Could a Military Coup Happen in the United States?
by Jacob G. Hornberger
Uh, oh! The Egyptian people might well be learning a lesson about standing armies that America’s Founding Fathers tried to impart to the American people. Egypt’s standing army, which has long been built up and fortified by U.S. foreign aid, is sending a not-so-subtle message to Egyptians that if the civilian authorities are unable to bring the current crisis in Egypt under control, the military might have to step in to establish “order and stability.” Defense Minister Abdel Fattah El Sissi stated, “The continuation of the conflict between the different political forces and their differences over how the country should be run could lead to the collapse of the state and threaten future generations.”
One might say, “Well, at least the American people don’t have to worry about the U.S. military establishment.”
Interestingly, however, two U.S. presidents and one former U.S. president believed otherwise. Like our nation’s Founding Fathers, they believed that America’s permanent military or intelligence establishment constituted a grave threat to the freedom and well-being of the American people.
The first president was Dwight D. Eisenhower, a retired army general who served as Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in World War II. In his Farewell Address in 1961, he warned Americans of the grave threat posed by the military-industrial complex to America’s democratic processes:
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
The second president was John F. Kennedy, who, by the time he was assassinated, totally distrusted the military and the CIA. Here are his precise words about whether a coup was possible here in the United States:
It’s possible. It could happen in this country, but the conditions would have to be just right. If, for example, the country had a young President, and he had a Bay of Pigs, there would be a certain uneasiness. Maybe the military would do a little criticizing behind his back, but this would be written off as the usual military dissatisfaction with civilian control. Then if there were another Bay of Pigs, the reaction of the country would be, “Is he too young and inexperienced?” The military would almost feel that it was their patriotic obligation to stand ready to preserve the integrity of the nation, and only God knows just what segment of democracy they would be defending if they overthrew the elected establishment…. Then, if there were a third Bay of Pigs, it could happen…. But it won’t happen on my watch.
Moreover, Kennedy had read the novel Seven Days in May, which posited a military coup here in the United States. According to Wikipedia, Kennedy “believed the scenario as described could actually occur in the United States.” Kennedy encouraged the making of a movie based on the novel as a way to warn the American people of the danger, notwithstanding the fact that the Pentagon ardently opposed the making of the film. The movie was ultimately made and starred Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas, Frederic March, Ava Gardner, and Edmond O’Brien.
The former president was Harry S. Truman. Thirty days after the Kennedy assassination, he published an op-ed in the Washington Post about the CIA. Pointing out that the CIA was intended to serve only as an intelligence-gathering agency, Truman stated:
I never had any thought that when I set up the CIA that it would be injected into peacetime cloak and dagger operations. Some of the complications and embarrassment I think we have experienced are in part attributable to the fact that this quiet intelligence arm of the President has been so removed from its intended role that it is being interpreted as a symbol of sinister and mysterious foreign intrigue — and a subject for cold war enemy propaganda….
We have grown up as a nation, respected for our free institutions and for our ability to maintain a free and open society. There is something about the way the CIA has been functioning that is casting a shadow over our historic position and I feel that we need to correct it.
Since then, however, not one single president has dared to say such things about the military, the military-industrial complex, and the CIA. On the contrary, ever since 1963, every single president has been a cheerleader for an ever-expanding national-security state, with ever-increasing budgets, power, and influence for the military and the CIA.
It should be pointed out though that both before and after Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Truman said those things, the U.S. military and the CIA supported and participated in coups that brought dictatorships into power, such as the 1953 coup in Iran, the 1954 military coup in Guatemala, and the 1973 military coup in Chile.
Why did the U.S. military and the CIA support and participate in those coups, all of which destroyed the democratic processes in those nations? Because they believed in them as fervently as the military establishments that instigated them. They believed the coups were necessary to maintain “order and stability” and to protect “national security” in those nations as well as “national security” here at home.
Time will tell whether the Egyptian people experience the same thing that the Iranian, Guatemalan, Chilean, and others suffered–military coups that destroy democracy in the name of establishing “order and stability” and protecting “national security.”
Of course, Americans once didn’t have to be concerned about the possibility that such a thing could happen here. That’s because Americans chose to live without a standing army, a military industrial complex, and a CIA for the first century-and-a-half of our nation’s existence.
Link:
http://fff.org/2013/01/30/could-a-military-coup-happen-in-the-united-states/
by Jacob G. Hornberger
Uh, oh! The Egyptian people might well be learning a lesson about standing armies that America’s Founding Fathers tried to impart to the American people. Egypt’s standing army, which has long been built up and fortified by U.S. foreign aid, is sending a not-so-subtle message to Egyptians that if the civilian authorities are unable to bring the current crisis in Egypt under control, the military might have to step in to establish “order and stability.” Defense Minister Abdel Fattah El Sissi stated, “The continuation of the conflict between the different political forces and their differences over how the country should be run could lead to the collapse of the state and threaten future generations.”
One might say, “Well, at least the American people don’t have to worry about the U.S. military establishment.”
Interestingly, however, two U.S. presidents and one former U.S. president believed otherwise. Like our nation’s Founding Fathers, they believed that America’s permanent military or intelligence establishment constituted a grave threat to the freedom and well-being of the American people.
The first president was Dwight D. Eisenhower, a retired army general who served as Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in World War II. In his Farewell Address in 1961, he warned Americans of the grave threat posed by the military-industrial complex to America’s democratic processes:
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
The second president was John F. Kennedy, who, by the time he was assassinated, totally distrusted the military and the CIA. Here are his precise words about whether a coup was possible here in the United States:
It’s possible. It could happen in this country, but the conditions would have to be just right. If, for example, the country had a young President, and he had a Bay of Pigs, there would be a certain uneasiness. Maybe the military would do a little criticizing behind his back, but this would be written off as the usual military dissatisfaction with civilian control. Then if there were another Bay of Pigs, the reaction of the country would be, “Is he too young and inexperienced?” The military would almost feel that it was their patriotic obligation to stand ready to preserve the integrity of the nation, and only God knows just what segment of democracy they would be defending if they overthrew the elected establishment…. Then, if there were a third Bay of Pigs, it could happen…. But it won’t happen on my watch.
Moreover, Kennedy had read the novel Seven Days in May, which posited a military coup here in the United States. According to Wikipedia, Kennedy “believed the scenario as described could actually occur in the United States.” Kennedy encouraged the making of a movie based on the novel as a way to warn the American people of the danger, notwithstanding the fact that the Pentagon ardently opposed the making of the film. The movie was ultimately made and starred Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas, Frederic March, Ava Gardner, and Edmond O’Brien.
The former president was Harry S. Truman. Thirty days after the Kennedy assassination, he published an op-ed in the Washington Post about the CIA. Pointing out that the CIA was intended to serve only as an intelligence-gathering agency, Truman stated:
I never had any thought that when I set up the CIA that it would be injected into peacetime cloak and dagger operations. Some of the complications and embarrassment I think we have experienced are in part attributable to the fact that this quiet intelligence arm of the President has been so removed from its intended role that it is being interpreted as a symbol of sinister and mysterious foreign intrigue — and a subject for cold war enemy propaganda….
We have grown up as a nation, respected for our free institutions and for our ability to maintain a free and open society. There is something about the way the CIA has been functioning that is casting a shadow over our historic position and I feel that we need to correct it.
Since then, however, not one single president has dared to say such things about the military, the military-industrial complex, and the CIA. On the contrary, ever since 1963, every single president has been a cheerleader for an ever-expanding national-security state, with ever-increasing budgets, power, and influence for the military and the CIA.
It should be pointed out though that both before and after Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Truman said those things, the U.S. military and the CIA supported and participated in coups that brought dictatorships into power, such as the 1953 coup in Iran, the 1954 military coup in Guatemala, and the 1973 military coup in Chile.
Why did the U.S. military and the CIA support and participate in those coups, all of which destroyed the democratic processes in those nations? Because they believed in them as fervently as the military establishments that instigated them. They believed the coups were necessary to maintain “order and stability” and to protect “national security” in those nations as well as “national security” here at home.
Time will tell whether the Egyptian people experience the same thing that the Iranian, Guatemalan, Chilean, and others suffered–military coups that destroy democracy in the name of establishing “order and stability” and protecting “national security.”
Of course, Americans once didn’t have to be concerned about the possibility that such a thing could happen here. That’s because Americans chose to live without a standing army, a military industrial complex, and a CIA for the first century-and-a-half of our nation’s existence.
Link:
http://fff.org/2013/01/30/could-a-military-coup-happen-in-the-united-states/
"The government should get out of the student loan business altogether and let the private market take over..."
Student Loan Consequences: Real, Costly, and Personal
Written by Bob Adelmann
The consequences of making low-interest loans to unqualified buyers created the real-estate bubble that popped in 2007, resulting in the Great Recession. According to Gary Jason at the American Thinker, it’s about to happen again, only this time over student loans. He wrote: “This bubble has been fueled by the federal government’s lavish subsidization of the student loan program … in a way similar to how the housing bubble was fueled by government agencies pushing subprime mortgages.”
Under the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA) signed into law as part of ObamaCare in March of 2010, students may borrow money directly from the federal government regardless of their credit score or any other financial “issues” they may be facing. They are not priced according to any “individualized measure of risk” nor are there loan limits. They are instead politically determined by Congress with undergraduates receiving lower interest rates than graduate students, but graduate students allowed to borrow more than undergrads.
This forced entry by the government into what was once a private market transaction has numerous consequences, nearly all of them negative, and most of them predictable.
First, private lenders disappeared from the market as they could not compete with taxpayer funds and taxpayer guarantees and the resulting below-market interest rates that became available.
Second, the growth in the education industry expanded far beyond what was normal as college administrations saw their opportunity to dip into the “honey bucket” of federal funds, with the consequent growth in administration overhead and higher tuition fees. According to a study by Bain & Company (yes, Mitt Romney’s Bain), “operating expenses are getting higher [at major colleges and universities such as Cornell, Harvard, and Princeton] and they’re running out of cash to cover it.” According to that study, the growth in those colleges’ debt and rate of spending on new buildings and equipment rose far faster than did their spending on actual education itself. Said Bain, "Boards of trustees and presidents need to put their collective foot down on the growth of support and maintenance costs. In no other industry would overhead costs be allowed to grow at this rate — executives would lose their jobs."
Thirdly, this growth in the cost of obtaining what was once a coveted possession, a college degree, makes any mathematical justification or cost-benefit analysis highly questionable. Many students are entering a job market with degrees that over-qualify them for what the market is able to provide. According to Jason, “over half of all recent college grads are unemployed (or employed only at jobs not requiring a college education).”
The unnatural increase in the flow of funds into the education industry has predictably driven prices higher. As Jason Bower pointed out at The Freeman,
Since 2000, tuition at public, four-year colleges has risen by an inflation-adjusted 72 percent, and over the past 25 years it has increased at an annual rate 6 percentage points higher than the cost of living. [Emphases added.]
Fourth, when the deferred payments on these loans start, the newly-minted grads without work cannot make them and they go into default. In a recent Department of Education study, loan default rates have risen in each of the last five years, and at an increasing rate, touching almost one in every seven students with a loan.
Fifth, those loans cannot be dissolved or forgiven in bankruptcy except in extreme circumstances, leaving students in a figurative “debtors’ prison” interminably. As The New American noted,
Inasmuch as the student borrowers are uniquely required by law to repay under [nearly] any circumstances, the student loan business is the closest thing … to debtor prison in modern society.
With such a debt burden, students are forced to make, or avoid making, life choices, such as getting married or buying a home. Who would want to take on a partner who owes tens of thousands to the federal government on the day of the wedding?
And then there is the issue of bribery and insider-dealing. Lenders found ways to entice school officials to direct students needing money to them in exchange for incentives. In addition, administration officials found it profitable to support candidates willing to enhance the loan programs for the benefit of the schools. Peter Wood, executive director of the National Association of Scholars, put the matter succinctly:
The "free market" in this case was never anything close to lean and efficient. To the contrary, it was (and still is) inefficient and frequently corrupt, dominated by players who found it easy to bribe college officials, wring favors from politicians by means of campaign contributions, bilk the Department of Education, and live off generous subsidies.
All of these consequences come from first causes: the belief that the government has the right to impose its ideological position onto students and then force taxpayers to pay for those consequences when they inevitably arrive. As Kevin Villani, former chief economist at Freddie Mac, wrote in the American Banker, the progression from ideology to practice is fraught with danger. First, he says, the government must
declare that the opportunity to … go to college, is a basic right. Then [set] a goal for … college attendance well above private individual demand. When budgets become tight, have government lenders replace private lenders.
This cements into place the “moral hazard” that provides government loans to students without concern about how they might be paid back, because ultimately all government promises are backed by the taxpayer.
The ultimate consequence is borne by the student himself. Once he realizes his predicament — like a lobster trap — it’s too late.
For 36-year-old Nick Keith, it’s too late.
When he decided to go to culinary school, Keith was persuaded that he could indulge his interest in food by learning the food service industry. The school provided him with all the answers to his questions (for which the school later was successfully sued for making false statements but far too late to help Keith), and pointed him to the sources to lend him the money.
Said Keith, “I should have seen all the signs. [The campus tour guide] had a used car salesman’s answer for everything,” including the lie that 99 percent of all graduates found work after graduation. It turned out later — much later — that the real number was closer to 48 percent, and that counted graduates who had to find work outside of food service. Keith’s first job upon graduation was working on a meal assembly line, making $10 an hour.
But that’s when his student loan payment program kicked in. He had to make a choice: Pay the rent, or his student loan, but not both.
It’s now nearly a decade since his graduation. His debt, with interest compounded upon interest, is $142,000 at a 17-percent interest rate. He can’t get out:
I get my groceries at the local food bank. I have sold or lost 99 percent of everything I ever owned.
He can’t get work because his bad credit turns off prospective employers. He lives in an aged minivan, relies on the Salvation Army for meals, and parks his van at highway truck stops. For all intents and purposes, he is homeless.
Solutions abound, at least in theory. The government should get out of the student loan business altogether and let the private market take over. And Congress should allow students to declare bankruptcy over their loans when necessary. Even there, however, the consequences are towering. There is more than $1 trillion in student loan debt. Almost 15 percent of loans are already in default. The Department of Education would have to receive special funding from Congress — the taxpayer — to be able to write off the bad loans that would result.
The costs of college education would rise to more normal, market-driven levels, keeping some qualified students away. Colleges and universities would have to make massive, perhaps draconian, cuts in their overhead. It would take years for some semblance of balance between supply and demand to return to the education industry. And changing the laws would have precious little immediate impact on people such as Keith.
Restoring freedom through private markets, however, is worth the effort despite the pain. The alternative — a continuing debtors’ prison for students and a continuing of the corrupt educational cartel and its incestuous relationship with politicians — is unthinkable.
Link:
http://thenewamerican.com/economy/markets/item/14363-student-loan-consequences-real-costly-and-personal
Written by Bob Adelmann
The consequences of making low-interest loans to unqualified buyers created the real-estate bubble that popped in 2007, resulting in the Great Recession. According to Gary Jason at the American Thinker, it’s about to happen again, only this time over student loans. He wrote: “This bubble has been fueled by the federal government’s lavish subsidization of the student loan program … in a way similar to how the housing bubble was fueled by government agencies pushing subprime mortgages.”
Under the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA) signed into law as part of ObamaCare in March of 2010, students may borrow money directly from the federal government regardless of their credit score or any other financial “issues” they may be facing. They are not priced according to any “individualized measure of risk” nor are there loan limits. They are instead politically determined by Congress with undergraduates receiving lower interest rates than graduate students, but graduate students allowed to borrow more than undergrads.
This forced entry by the government into what was once a private market transaction has numerous consequences, nearly all of them negative, and most of them predictable.
First, private lenders disappeared from the market as they could not compete with taxpayer funds and taxpayer guarantees and the resulting below-market interest rates that became available.
Second, the growth in the education industry expanded far beyond what was normal as college administrations saw their opportunity to dip into the “honey bucket” of federal funds, with the consequent growth in administration overhead and higher tuition fees. According to a study by Bain & Company (yes, Mitt Romney’s Bain), “operating expenses are getting higher [at major colleges and universities such as Cornell, Harvard, and Princeton] and they’re running out of cash to cover it.” According to that study, the growth in those colleges’ debt and rate of spending on new buildings and equipment rose far faster than did their spending on actual education itself. Said Bain, "Boards of trustees and presidents need to put their collective foot down on the growth of support and maintenance costs. In no other industry would overhead costs be allowed to grow at this rate — executives would lose their jobs."
Thirdly, this growth in the cost of obtaining what was once a coveted possession, a college degree, makes any mathematical justification or cost-benefit analysis highly questionable. Many students are entering a job market with degrees that over-qualify them for what the market is able to provide. According to Jason, “over half of all recent college grads are unemployed (or employed only at jobs not requiring a college education).”
The unnatural increase in the flow of funds into the education industry has predictably driven prices higher. As Jason Bower pointed out at The Freeman,
Since 2000, tuition at public, four-year colleges has risen by an inflation-adjusted 72 percent, and over the past 25 years it has increased at an annual rate 6 percentage points higher than the cost of living. [Emphases added.]
Fourth, when the deferred payments on these loans start, the newly-minted grads without work cannot make them and they go into default. In a recent Department of Education study, loan default rates have risen in each of the last five years, and at an increasing rate, touching almost one in every seven students with a loan.
Fifth, those loans cannot be dissolved or forgiven in bankruptcy except in extreme circumstances, leaving students in a figurative “debtors’ prison” interminably. As The New American noted,
Inasmuch as the student borrowers are uniquely required by law to repay under [nearly] any circumstances, the student loan business is the closest thing … to debtor prison in modern society.
With such a debt burden, students are forced to make, or avoid making, life choices, such as getting married or buying a home. Who would want to take on a partner who owes tens of thousands to the federal government on the day of the wedding?
And then there is the issue of bribery and insider-dealing. Lenders found ways to entice school officials to direct students needing money to them in exchange for incentives. In addition, administration officials found it profitable to support candidates willing to enhance the loan programs for the benefit of the schools. Peter Wood, executive director of the National Association of Scholars, put the matter succinctly:
The "free market" in this case was never anything close to lean and efficient. To the contrary, it was (and still is) inefficient and frequently corrupt, dominated by players who found it easy to bribe college officials, wring favors from politicians by means of campaign contributions, bilk the Department of Education, and live off generous subsidies.
All of these consequences come from first causes: the belief that the government has the right to impose its ideological position onto students and then force taxpayers to pay for those consequences when they inevitably arrive. As Kevin Villani, former chief economist at Freddie Mac, wrote in the American Banker, the progression from ideology to practice is fraught with danger. First, he says, the government must
declare that the opportunity to … go to college, is a basic right. Then [set] a goal for … college attendance well above private individual demand. When budgets become tight, have government lenders replace private lenders.
This cements into place the “moral hazard” that provides government loans to students without concern about how they might be paid back, because ultimately all government promises are backed by the taxpayer.
The ultimate consequence is borne by the student himself. Once he realizes his predicament — like a lobster trap — it’s too late.
For 36-year-old Nick Keith, it’s too late.
When he decided to go to culinary school, Keith was persuaded that he could indulge his interest in food by learning the food service industry. The school provided him with all the answers to his questions (for which the school later was successfully sued for making false statements but far too late to help Keith), and pointed him to the sources to lend him the money.
Said Keith, “I should have seen all the signs. [The campus tour guide] had a used car salesman’s answer for everything,” including the lie that 99 percent of all graduates found work after graduation. It turned out later — much later — that the real number was closer to 48 percent, and that counted graduates who had to find work outside of food service. Keith’s first job upon graduation was working on a meal assembly line, making $10 an hour.
But that’s when his student loan payment program kicked in. He had to make a choice: Pay the rent, or his student loan, but not both.
It’s now nearly a decade since his graduation. His debt, with interest compounded upon interest, is $142,000 at a 17-percent interest rate. He can’t get out:
I get my groceries at the local food bank. I have sold or lost 99 percent of everything I ever owned.
He can’t get work because his bad credit turns off prospective employers. He lives in an aged minivan, relies on the Salvation Army for meals, and parks his van at highway truck stops. For all intents and purposes, he is homeless.
Solutions abound, at least in theory. The government should get out of the student loan business altogether and let the private market take over. And Congress should allow students to declare bankruptcy over their loans when necessary. Even there, however, the consequences are towering. There is more than $1 trillion in student loan debt. Almost 15 percent of loans are already in default. The Department of Education would have to receive special funding from Congress — the taxpayer — to be able to write off the bad loans that would result.
The costs of college education would rise to more normal, market-driven levels, keeping some qualified students away. Colleges and universities would have to make massive, perhaps draconian, cuts in their overhead. It would take years for some semblance of balance between supply and demand to return to the education industry. And changing the laws would have precious little immediate impact on people such as Keith.
Restoring freedom through private markets, however, is worth the effort despite the pain. The alternative — a continuing debtors’ prison for students and a continuing of the corrupt educational cartel and its incestuous relationship with politicians — is unthinkable.
Link:
http://thenewamerican.com/economy/markets/item/14363-student-loan-consequences-real-costly-and-personal
"Money is the opposite of gold and silver..."
What if the Fed Is Short Germany’s Gold?
by Gijsbert Groenewegen
Why are central banks buying gold, the opposite of their own creation, paper money?
Money is the opposite of gold and silver. Fiat money is based on ordinance and credibility and is not self-limiting (can be printed infinitely) whilst gold and silver is commodity based and physically limited to the amount of physical gold and silver available and mined, you choose either one or the other. One is purely based on credibility hence why notes need to mention the nominal value in order to give the piece of paper value. American paper money is backed by only the size and strength of the American economy. The other money is based on real value, the value of the gold itself. And especially for that reason investors should be warned considering the fact that more and more central banks are buying gold, the opposite of their own creation: paper money. This is so contrarian. It is like the butcher who doesn’t want to eat his own sausages because he knows what is in it. Why would central banks buy gold, which “limits” their creation of credit? The answer is: the fear of lost credibility of paper money, because of the constant undermining, dilution, debasement of their currencies with quantitative easing measures not sorting the desired effect of sustained economic growth because we have passed the tipping point whereby the overwhelming debt levels (Debt/GDP > 77-90%) have started to depress economic growth.
Central banks have been buying gold since 2008!
In this context it is interesting that the world's central banks have been net buyers of gold since 2008. In 2011, global central banks continued to be net buyers of gold as they attempted to “diversify” from their dollar and euro holdings, rebalance reserves, and protect national wealth. Why, if gold has no monetary function any longer, why buy gold? Why buy the opposite of the US dollar, the anchor of the financial system? Total world production is around 2,700 tonnes, in other words central banks are purchasing about 20% of the world’s gold production!
A growing number of emerging countries have also increased their purchases of gold in recent years to bolster their rapidly growing currency reserves, as sovereign debt crises have weighed on traditional reserve currencies such as the U.S. dollar and the Euro. Nations from Brazil to Iraq to Russia are buying the precious metal to add to official reserves. National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) said in late December it raised the percentage of gold in its reserves in 2012 to 7.72% from 4.36% a year ago. The bank said it is boosting its gold reserves “to avoid the negative impact of the global crisis on the economic development of the country as it works on diversifying the components of international reserves in Ukraine.” Brazil doubled its gold holdings in two months last year, buying 17.2 metric tons in October and 14.7 metric tons in November. According to data released late last month by the International Monetary Fund, Iraq bought gold during August-September, lifting its official precious metals reserves from 5.8 metric tons to 31.07 metric tons. The worldwide stimulus measures and ultra low interest rates will continue to support investor interest in gold in the absence of low-risk investments that can offer acceptable yields. The conclusion is that the central banks have been a major force behind the increase in the gold price. The gold price rose more than threefold between 2007 and late 2011 -- from around $600/oz to a peak of $1,895/oz. The most important question is why all these banks buy gold, the opposite of their own creation: paper money?
The “objective” of the Washington Agreement was “reversed”.
The irony is that the central banks created the so-called Washington Agreement in 1999 in order to ensure an orderly disposal of their gold inventories. The agreement came in response to concerns in the gold market after the United Kingdom treasury sold the UK gold reserves through Bank of England auctions starting in 1999, coupled with the prospect of significant sales by the Swiss National Bank and the possibility of on-going sales by Austria and the Netherlands, plus proposals of sales by the IMF. Under the agreement, the European Central Bank (ECB), the 11 national central banks of nations then participating in the new European currency, plus those of Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, agreed that “gold should remain an important element of global monetary reserves” and limited their sales to no more than 400 tonnes (12.9 million oz) annually over the five years from September 1999 to September 2004, being 2,000 tonnes (64.5 million oz) in all. These agreements were extended every five years with varying quota ranging from 2,000 to 2,500 tonnes. As above mentioned its purpose was to deal in a controlled way with the fear that central banks had abandoned gold as a reserve asset, and were planning to sell all that they had in their vaults. Well that fear has clearly been reversed since 2008 when they started buying gold instead of selling it!
Many central banks store part of their gold reserves at the NY Fed
Many central banks besides the Bundesbank store their gold at the vaults of the Fed of NY and the BOE and this should make people think. Why would a country, when there is no geopolitical threat, keep an important part of its wealth in foreign hands. According to a recent report The Bank of Mexico holds less than 5% of its gold reserves within Mexico, while the remaining 95% of it’s ‘physical’ gold reserves are held in the US and London (translation - nearly the entirety of Mexico’s gold reserves are held at the Bank of England and the NY Fed basement, and have likely been leased more times than MFG client’s assets).
The Austrian central bank keeps most of its 280 metric tons of gold reserves in the United Kingdom, Vice Governor Wolfgang Duchatczek was quoted as saying in the finance committee of the country’s parliament, according to Bloomberg.
According to Former Dutch central bank governor Nout Wellink, the Netherlands now holds 612 metric tons of gold and has no plans to sell. The Dutch gold reserves are vaulted in New York, Ottawa, London, and Amsterdam. The Dutch central bank declared that it has no plans to physically inspect its gold reserves held in other countries, despite recent demands of the German Bundesrechnungshof to do so with respect to the German gold reserves. Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem cited yearly accounting procedures and his trust in foreign central banks where Dutch gold is stored, in a letter to parliament published in December 2012. Dijsselbloem said that 51% of Dutch gold reserves are in New York, 20% per cent in Ottawa, 18% in London and 11% in Amsterdam.
But what do you really have if you don’t have real possession of the country’s gold reserves, why hold the reserves in foreign vaults, why give foreign powers “possession” over “real money” that belongs to the Dutch people. We all know that trade surpluses and the Cold War and fear of a Russian invasion were the main reasons to keep most of the gold reserves with the New York Fed. Though that situation doesn’t exist any longer and therefore the question begs why keep a large part of the Dutch gold reserves in the NY Fed vaults? What ensues if the markets and the financial system or credit system collapse? What happens then to the Dutch gold in foreign central vaults? Who can one trust if all the trust and credibility in the financial system is completely erased? I can’t emphasize enough; paper obligation or no possession of a physical asset represents counter party risk. Counter party risk is the risk to each party of a contract that the counterparty will not live up to its contractual obligations. When the proverbial *&%$#@ hits the fan will the gold still be in the vaults or will there be only an IOU and a letter stating, “I am sorry.”
Why did the Dutch central bank order a pension fund to reduce its gold holdings?
In the context of the “relaxed” stance of the Dutch vis a vis the Dutch gold being stored in foreign vaults the following case is the more remarkable. In February 2011 a Netherlands-based $400 million pension fund for workers at several Dutch glassmaking plants was ordered to significantly reduce its gold allocation, from 13% to 3%, by De Nederlandse Bank (DNB), the Dutch central bank and also the Dutch pensions regulator, which ruled the scheme's exposure to the precious metal as too risky. How risky can it be to hold gold when the gold price has risen from $255/oz in 2001 to $1,700/oz today as a result of the debasement of the currencies and fall in purchasing power? Spurred by concerns over inflation and the stability of the euro, the pension fund began purchasing gold in July 2008. "We invest in members' interests, and have benefited from the appreciation in the gold price. Especially in uncertain economic times, it proved a refuge, we trust in gold as an investment." Since then, the price of gold has increased substantially from $600 per ounce. The pension fund had wanted to maintain its gold allocation. Yet a Rotterdam court sided with the Dutch central bank. The regulator argued that the average fund has just 2.7% in commodities, including gold.
The DNB expressed concerns that the pension's solvency ratio could be hurt if the price of gold were to suddenly drop now. The DNB claimed that investment of such amounts in gold is too risky; the price of gold fluctuates too much for it to be classified as an investment and that it does not share the risk analysis of the pension fund! And that wouldn’t be the case with other investment classes!? I think the DNB should first check the volatility and performance of other asset classes before it makes a statement as stated. In fact gold has a lower volatility than many other asset classes. However, the scheme says the gold was kept as a security against the instability of the Euro and there is only one obligation the scheme has to consider; to pay members upon retirement. How are pension funds going to meet actuarial interest rates of between 7-8% when worldwide interest rates are sub par because of massive stimulus measures? It had no risky investments such as equity and holds gold as a back up against the dangers of a turbulent Euro market and rising inflation. The argumentation of the pension fund couldn’t have been more spot on and the reasoning of the DNB couldn’t be more wrong; see an article by Blackrock’s iShares...
Read the rest here:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/spl5/fed-short-germanys-gold.html
by Gijsbert Groenewegen
Why are central banks buying gold, the opposite of their own creation, paper money?
Money is the opposite of gold and silver. Fiat money is based on ordinance and credibility and is not self-limiting (can be printed infinitely) whilst gold and silver is commodity based and physically limited to the amount of physical gold and silver available and mined, you choose either one or the other. One is purely based on credibility hence why notes need to mention the nominal value in order to give the piece of paper value. American paper money is backed by only the size and strength of the American economy. The other money is based on real value, the value of the gold itself. And especially for that reason investors should be warned considering the fact that more and more central banks are buying gold, the opposite of their own creation: paper money. This is so contrarian. It is like the butcher who doesn’t want to eat his own sausages because he knows what is in it. Why would central banks buy gold, which “limits” their creation of credit? The answer is: the fear of lost credibility of paper money, because of the constant undermining, dilution, debasement of their currencies with quantitative easing measures not sorting the desired effect of sustained economic growth because we have passed the tipping point whereby the overwhelming debt levels (Debt/GDP > 77-90%) have started to depress economic growth.
Central banks have been buying gold since 2008!
In this context it is interesting that the world's central banks have been net buyers of gold since 2008. In 2011, global central banks continued to be net buyers of gold as they attempted to “diversify” from their dollar and euro holdings, rebalance reserves, and protect national wealth. Why, if gold has no monetary function any longer, why buy gold? Why buy the opposite of the US dollar, the anchor of the financial system? Total world production is around 2,700 tonnes, in other words central banks are purchasing about 20% of the world’s gold production!
A growing number of emerging countries have also increased their purchases of gold in recent years to bolster their rapidly growing currency reserves, as sovereign debt crises have weighed on traditional reserve currencies such as the U.S. dollar and the Euro. Nations from Brazil to Iraq to Russia are buying the precious metal to add to official reserves. National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) said in late December it raised the percentage of gold in its reserves in 2012 to 7.72% from 4.36% a year ago. The bank said it is boosting its gold reserves “to avoid the negative impact of the global crisis on the economic development of the country as it works on diversifying the components of international reserves in Ukraine.” Brazil doubled its gold holdings in two months last year, buying 17.2 metric tons in October and 14.7 metric tons in November. According to data released late last month by the International Monetary Fund, Iraq bought gold during August-September, lifting its official precious metals reserves from 5.8 metric tons to 31.07 metric tons. The worldwide stimulus measures and ultra low interest rates will continue to support investor interest in gold in the absence of low-risk investments that can offer acceptable yields. The conclusion is that the central banks have been a major force behind the increase in the gold price. The gold price rose more than threefold between 2007 and late 2011 -- from around $600/oz to a peak of $1,895/oz. The most important question is why all these banks buy gold, the opposite of their own creation: paper money?
The “objective” of the Washington Agreement was “reversed”.
The irony is that the central banks created the so-called Washington Agreement in 1999 in order to ensure an orderly disposal of their gold inventories. The agreement came in response to concerns in the gold market after the United Kingdom treasury sold the UK gold reserves through Bank of England auctions starting in 1999, coupled with the prospect of significant sales by the Swiss National Bank and the possibility of on-going sales by Austria and the Netherlands, plus proposals of sales by the IMF. Under the agreement, the European Central Bank (ECB), the 11 national central banks of nations then participating in the new European currency, plus those of Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, agreed that “gold should remain an important element of global monetary reserves” and limited their sales to no more than 400 tonnes (12.9 million oz) annually over the five years from September 1999 to September 2004, being 2,000 tonnes (64.5 million oz) in all. These agreements were extended every five years with varying quota ranging from 2,000 to 2,500 tonnes. As above mentioned its purpose was to deal in a controlled way with the fear that central banks had abandoned gold as a reserve asset, and were planning to sell all that they had in their vaults. Well that fear has clearly been reversed since 2008 when they started buying gold instead of selling it!
Many central banks store part of their gold reserves at the NY Fed
Many central banks besides the Bundesbank store their gold at the vaults of the Fed of NY and the BOE and this should make people think. Why would a country, when there is no geopolitical threat, keep an important part of its wealth in foreign hands. According to a recent report The Bank of Mexico holds less than 5% of its gold reserves within Mexico, while the remaining 95% of it’s ‘physical’ gold reserves are held in the US and London (translation - nearly the entirety of Mexico’s gold reserves are held at the Bank of England and the NY Fed basement, and have likely been leased more times than MFG client’s assets).
The Austrian central bank keeps most of its 280 metric tons of gold reserves in the United Kingdom, Vice Governor Wolfgang Duchatczek was quoted as saying in the finance committee of the country’s parliament, according to Bloomberg.
According to Former Dutch central bank governor Nout Wellink, the Netherlands now holds 612 metric tons of gold and has no plans to sell. The Dutch gold reserves are vaulted in New York, Ottawa, London, and Amsterdam. The Dutch central bank declared that it has no plans to physically inspect its gold reserves held in other countries, despite recent demands of the German Bundesrechnungshof to do so with respect to the German gold reserves. Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem cited yearly accounting procedures and his trust in foreign central banks where Dutch gold is stored, in a letter to parliament published in December 2012. Dijsselbloem said that 51% of Dutch gold reserves are in New York, 20% per cent in Ottawa, 18% in London and 11% in Amsterdam.
But what do you really have if you don’t have real possession of the country’s gold reserves, why hold the reserves in foreign vaults, why give foreign powers “possession” over “real money” that belongs to the Dutch people. We all know that trade surpluses and the Cold War and fear of a Russian invasion were the main reasons to keep most of the gold reserves with the New York Fed. Though that situation doesn’t exist any longer and therefore the question begs why keep a large part of the Dutch gold reserves in the NY Fed vaults? What ensues if the markets and the financial system or credit system collapse? What happens then to the Dutch gold in foreign central vaults? Who can one trust if all the trust and credibility in the financial system is completely erased? I can’t emphasize enough; paper obligation or no possession of a physical asset represents counter party risk. Counter party risk is the risk to each party of a contract that the counterparty will not live up to its contractual obligations. When the proverbial *&%$#@ hits the fan will the gold still be in the vaults or will there be only an IOU and a letter stating, “I am sorry.”
Why did the Dutch central bank order a pension fund to reduce its gold holdings?
In the context of the “relaxed” stance of the Dutch vis a vis the Dutch gold being stored in foreign vaults the following case is the more remarkable. In February 2011 a Netherlands-based $400 million pension fund for workers at several Dutch glassmaking plants was ordered to significantly reduce its gold allocation, from 13% to 3%, by De Nederlandse Bank (DNB), the Dutch central bank and also the Dutch pensions regulator, which ruled the scheme's exposure to the precious metal as too risky. How risky can it be to hold gold when the gold price has risen from $255/oz in 2001 to $1,700/oz today as a result of the debasement of the currencies and fall in purchasing power? Spurred by concerns over inflation and the stability of the euro, the pension fund began purchasing gold in July 2008. "We invest in members' interests, and have benefited from the appreciation in the gold price. Especially in uncertain economic times, it proved a refuge, we trust in gold as an investment." Since then, the price of gold has increased substantially from $600 per ounce. The pension fund had wanted to maintain its gold allocation. Yet a Rotterdam court sided with the Dutch central bank. The regulator argued that the average fund has just 2.7% in commodities, including gold.
The DNB expressed concerns that the pension's solvency ratio could be hurt if the price of gold were to suddenly drop now. The DNB claimed that investment of such amounts in gold is too risky; the price of gold fluctuates too much for it to be classified as an investment and that it does not share the risk analysis of the pension fund! And that wouldn’t be the case with other investment classes!? I think the DNB should first check the volatility and performance of other asset classes before it makes a statement as stated. In fact gold has a lower volatility than many other asset classes. However, the scheme says the gold was kept as a security against the instability of the Euro and there is only one obligation the scheme has to consider; to pay members upon retirement. How are pension funds going to meet actuarial interest rates of between 7-8% when worldwide interest rates are sub par because of massive stimulus measures? It had no risky investments such as equity and holds gold as a back up against the dangers of a turbulent Euro market and rising inflation. The argumentation of the pension fund couldn’t have been more spot on and the reasoning of the DNB couldn’t be more wrong; see an article by Blackrock’s iShares...
Read the rest here:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/spl5/fed-short-germanys-gold.html
" I believe our nation is rapidly approaching our last chance to do something about runaway government before we face the type of economic turmoil seen in Greece and other European nations."
Official Lies
by Walter E. Williams
Let's expose presidential prevarication. Earlier this year, President Barack Obama warned that Social Security checks will be delayed if Congress fails to increase the government's borrowing authority by raising the debt ceiling. However, there's an issue with this warning. According to the 2012 Social Security trustees report, assets in Social Security's trust funds totaled $2.7 trillion, and Social Security expenditures totaled $773 billion. Therefore, regardless of what Congress does about the debt limit, Social Security recipients are guaranteed their checks. Just take the money from the $2.7 trillion assets held in trust.
Which is the lie, Social Security checks must be delayed if the debt ceiling is not raised or there's $2.7 trillion in the Social Security trust funds? The fact of the matter is that they are both lies. The Social Security trust funds contain nothing more than IOUs, bonds that have absolutely no market value. In other words, they are worthless bookkeeping entries. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go system, meaning that the taxes paid by today's workers are immediately sent out as payment to today's retirees. Social Security is just another federal program funded out of general revenues.
If the congressional Republicans had one ounce of brains, they could easily thwart the president and his leftist allies' attempt to frighten older Americans about not receiving their Social Security checks and thwart their attempt to frighten other Americans by saying "we are not a deadbeat nation" and suggesting the possibility of default if the debt ceiling is not raised. In 2012, monthly federal tax revenue was about $200 billion. Monthly Social Security expenditures were about $65 billion per month, and the monthly interest payment on our $16 trillion national debt was about $30 billion. The House could simply enact a bill prioritizing how federal tax revenues will be spent. It could mandate that Social Security recipients and interest payments on the national debt be the first priorities and then send the measure to the Senate and the president for concurrence. It might not be a matter of brains as to why the Republican House wouldn't enact such a measure; it likes spending just as the Democrats.
I believe our nation is rapidly approaching our last chance to do something about runaway government before we face the type of economic turmoil seen in Greece and other European nations. Tax revenue has remained constant for the past 50 years, averaging about 18 percent of gross domestic product. During that interval, federal spending has risen from less than 20 percent to more than 25 percent of GDP. What accounts for this growth in federal spending? The liberals like to blame national defense, but in 1962, national defense expenditures were 50 percent of the federal budget; today they are 19 percent. What accounts for most federal spending is the set of programs euphemistically called entitlements. In 1962, entitlement spending was 31 percent of the federal budget; today it is 62 percent. Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security alone take up 44 percent of the federal budget, and worse than that, it's those expenditures that are the most rapidly growing spending areas.
Our federal debt and deficits are unsustainable and are driven by programs under which Congress takes the earnings of one American to give to another, or entitlements. How long can Congress take in $200 billion in revenue per month and spend $360 billion per month? That means roughly 40 cents of every federal dollar spent has to be borrowed. The undeniable fact of business is that a greater number of people are living off government welfare programs than are paying taxes. That's what's driving Europe's economic problems, and it's what's driving ours. The true tragedy is that just to acknowledge that fact is political suicide, as presidential contender Mitt Romney found out. We can't blame politicians. It's the American people who will crucify a politician who even talks about cutting their favorite handout.
Link:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/williams-w/w-williams154.html
by Walter E. Williams
Let's expose presidential prevarication. Earlier this year, President Barack Obama warned that Social Security checks will be delayed if Congress fails to increase the government's borrowing authority by raising the debt ceiling. However, there's an issue with this warning. According to the 2012 Social Security trustees report, assets in Social Security's trust funds totaled $2.7 trillion, and Social Security expenditures totaled $773 billion. Therefore, regardless of what Congress does about the debt limit, Social Security recipients are guaranteed their checks. Just take the money from the $2.7 trillion assets held in trust.
Which is the lie, Social Security checks must be delayed if the debt ceiling is not raised or there's $2.7 trillion in the Social Security trust funds? The fact of the matter is that they are both lies. The Social Security trust funds contain nothing more than IOUs, bonds that have absolutely no market value. In other words, they are worthless bookkeeping entries. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go system, meaning that the taxes paid by today's workers are immediately sent out as payment to today's retirees. Social Security is just another federal program funded out of general revenues.
If the congressional Republicans had one ounce of brains, they could easily thwart the president and his leftist allies' attempt to frighten older Americans about not receiving their Social Security checks and thwart their attempt to frighten other Americans by saying "we are not a deadbeat nation" and suggesting the possibility of default if the debt ceiling is not raised. In 2012, monthly federal tax revenue was about $200 billion. Monthly Social Security expenditures were about $65 billion per month, and the monthly interest payment on our $16 trillion national debt was about $30 billion. The House could simply enact a bill prioritizing how federal tax revenues will be spent. It could mandate that Social Security recipients and interest payments on the national debt be the first priorities and then send the measure to the Senate and the president for concurrence. It might not be a matter of brains as to why the Republican House wouldn't enact such a measure; it likes spending just as the Democrats.
I believe our nation is rapidly approaching our last chance to do something about runaway government before we face the type of economic turmoil seen in Greece and other European nations. Tax revenue has remained constant for the past 50 years, averaging about 18 percent of gross domestic product. During that interval, federal spending has risen from less than 20 percent to more than 25 percent of GDP. What accounts for this growth in federal spending? The liberals like to blame national defense, but in 1962, national defense expenditures were 50 percent of the federal budget; today they are 19 percent. What accounts for most federal spending is the set of programs euphemistically called entitlements. In 1962, entitlement spending was 31 percent of the federal budget; today it is 62 percent. Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security alone take up 44 percent of the federal budget, and worse than that, it's those expenditures that are the most rapidly growing spending areas.
Our federal debt and deficits are unsustainable and are driven by programs under which Congress takes the earnings of one American to give to another, or entitlements. How long can Congress take in $200 billion in revenue per month and spend $360 billion per month? That means roughly 40 cents of every federal dollar spent has to be borrowed. The undeniable fact of business is that a greater number of people are living off government welfare programs than are paying taxes. That's what's driving Europe's economic problems, and it's what's driving ours. The true tragedy is that just to acknowledge that fact is political suicide, as presidential contender Mitt Romney found out. We can't blame politicians. It's the American people who will crucify a politician who even talks about cutting their favorite handout.
Link:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/williams-w/w-williams154.html
"It's all justified under by the claim that the US must defend itself from threats from Bad, Aggressive Actors, when the reality is the exact opposite: the new program is devoted to ensuring that the US remains the primary offensive threat to the rest of the world."
Pentagon's New Massive Expansion of 'Cyber-Security' Unit Is About Everything Except Defense
Cyber-threats are the new pretext to justify expansion of power and profit for the public-private National Security State
by Glenn Greenwald
As the US government depicts the Defense Department as shrinking due to budgetary constraints, the Washington Post this morning announces "a major expansion of [the Pentagon's] cybersecurity force over the next several years, increasing its size more than fivefold." Specifically, says the New York Times Monday, "the expansion would increase the Defense Department's Cyber Command by more than 4,000 people, up from the current 900." The Post describes this expansion as "part of an effort to turn an organization that has focused largely on defensive measures into the equivalent of an Internet-era fighting force." This Cyber Command Unit operates under the command of Gen. Keith Alexander, who also happens to be the head of the National Security Agency, the highly secretive government network that spies on the communications of foreign nationals – and American citizens.
The Pentagon's rhetorical justification for this expansion is deeply misleading. Beyond that, these activities pose a wide array of serious threats to internet freedom, privacy, and international law that, as usual, will be conducted with full-scale secrecy and with little to no oversight and accountability. And, as always, there is a small army of private-sector corporations who will benefit most from this expansion.
Disguising aggression as "defense"
Let's begin with the way this so-called "cyber-security" expansion has been marketed. It is part of a sustained campaign which, quite typically, relies on blatant fear-mongering.
In March, 2010, the Washington Post published an amazing Op-Ed by Adm. Michael McConnell, Bush's former Director of National Intelligence and a past and current executive with Booz Allen, a firm representing numerous corporate contractors which profit enormously each time the government expands its "cyber-security" activities. McConnell's career over the last two decades – both at Booz, Allen and inside the government – has been devoted to accelerating the merger between the government and private sector in all intelligence, surveillance and national security matters (it was he who led the successful campaign to retroactively immunize the telecom giants for their participation in the illegal NSA domestic spying program). Privatizing government cyber-spying and cyber-warfare is his primary focus now.
McConnell's Op-Ed was as alarmist and hysterical as possible. Claiming that "the United States is fighting a cyber-war today, and we are losing", it warned that "chaos would result" from an enemy cyber-attack on US financial systems and that "our power grids, air and ground transportation, telecommunications, and water-filtration systems are in jeopardy as well." Based on these threats, McConnell advocated that "we" – meaning "the government and the private sector" – "need to develop an early-warning system to monitor cyberspace" and that "we need to reengineer the Internet to make attribution, geolocation, intelligence analysis and impact assessment – who did it, from where, why and what was the result – more manageable." As Wired's Ryan Singel wrote: "He's talking about changing the internet to make everything anyone does on the net traceable and geo-located so the National Security Agency can pinpoint users and their computers for retaliation."
The same week the Post published McConnell's extraordinary Op-Ed, the Obama White House issued its own fear-mongering decree on cyber-threats, depicting the US as a vulnerable victim to cyber-aggression. It began with this sentence: "President Obama has identified cybersecurity as one of the most serious economic and national security challenges we face as a nation, but one that we as a government or as a country are not adequately prepared to counter." It announced that "the Executive Branch was directed to work closely with all key players in US cybersecurity, including state and local governments and the private sector" and to "strengthen public/private partnerships", and specifically announced Obama's intent to "to implement the recommendations of the Cyberspace Policy Review built on the Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative (CNCI) launched by President George W. Bush."
Since then, the fear-mongering rhetoric from government officials has relentlessly intensified, all devoted to scaring citizens into believing that the US is at serious risk of cataclysmic cyber-attacks from "aggressors". This all culminated when Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, last October, warned of what he called a "cyber-Pearl Harbor". This "would cause physical destruction and the loss of life, an attack that would paralyze and shock the nation and create a profound new sense of vulnerability." Identifying China, Iran, and terrorist groups, he outlined a parade of horribles scarier than anything since Condoleezza Rice's 2002 Iraqi "mushroom cloud":
"An aggressor nation or extremist group could use these kinds of cyber tools to gain control of critical switches. They could derail passenger trains, or even more dangerous, derail passenger trains loaded with lethal chemicals. They could contaminate the water supply in major cities, or shut down the power grid across large parts of the country."
As usual, though, reality is exactly the opposite. This massive new expenditure of money is not primarily devoted to defending against cyber-aggressors. The US itself is the world's leading cyber-aggressor. A major purpose of this expansion is to strengthen the US's ability to destroy other nations with cyber-attacks. Indeed, even the Post report notes that a major component of this new expansion is to "conduct offensive computer operations against foreign adversaries".
It is the US – not Iran, Russia or "terror" groups – which already is the first nation (in partnership with Israel) to aggressively deploy a highly sophisticated and extremely dangerous cyber-attack. Last June, the New York Times' David Sanger reported what most of the world had already suspected: "From his first months in office, President Obama secretly ordered increasingly sophisticated attacks on the computer systems that run Iran's main nuclear enrichment facilities, significantly expanding America's first sustained use of cyberweapons." In fact, Obama "decided to accelerate the attacks . . . even after an element of the program accidentally became public in the summer of 2010 because of a programming error that allowed it to escape Iran's Natanz plant and sent it around the world on the Internet." According to the Sanger's report, Obama himself understood the significance of the US decision to be the first to use serious and aggressive cyber-warfare:
"Mr. Obama, according to participants in the many Situation Room meetings on Olympic Games, was acutely aware that with every attack he was pushing the United States into new territory, much as his predecessors had with the first use of atomic weapons in the 1940s, of intercontinental missiles in the 1950s and of drones in the past decade. He repeatedly expressed concerns that any American acknowledgment that it was using cyberweapons – even under the most careful and limited circumstances – could enable other countries, terrorists or hackers to justify their own attacks."
The US isn't the vulnerable victim of cyber-attacks. It's the leading perpetrator of those attacks. As Columbia Professor and cyber expert Misha Glenny wrote in the NYT last June: Obama's cyber-attack on Iran "marked a significant and dangerous turning point in the gradual militarization of the Internet."
Indeed, exactly as Obama knew would happen, revelations that it was the US which became the first country to use cyber-warfare against a sovereign country – just as it was the first to use the atomic bomb and then drones – would make it impossible for it to claim with any credibility (except among its own media and foreign policy community) that it was in a defensive posture when it came to cyber-warfare. As Professor Glenny wrote: "by introducing such pernicious viruses as Stuxnet and Flame, America has severely undermined its moral and political credibility." That's why, as the Post reported yesterday, the DOJ is engaged in such a frantic and invasive effort to root out Sanger's source: because it reveals the obvious truth that the US is the leading aggressor in the world when it comes to cyber-weapons.
This significant expansion under the Orwellian rubric of "cyber-security" is thus a perfect microcosm of US military spending generally. It's all justified under by the claim that the US must defend itself from threats from Bad, Aggressive Actors, when the reality is the exact opposite: the new program is devoted to ensuring that the US remains the primary offensive threat to the rest of the world. It's the same way the US develops offensive biological weapons under the guise of developing defenses against such weapons (such as the 2001 anthrax that the US government itself says came from a US Army lab). It's how the US government generally convinces its citizens that it is a peaceful victim of aggression by others when the reality is that the US builds more weapons, sells more arms and bombs more countries than virtually the rest of the world combined...
Read the rest here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/28/pentagon-cyber-security-expansion-stuxnet
Cyber-threats are the new pretext to justify expansion of power and profit for the public-private National Security State
by Glenn Greenwald
As the US government depicts the Defense Department as shrinking due to budgetary constraints, the Washington Post this morning announces "a major expansion of [the Pentagon's] cybersecurity force over the next several years, increasing its size more than fivefold." Specifically, says the New York Times Monday, "the expansion would increase the Defense Department's Cyber Command by more than 4,000 people, up from the current 900." The Post describes this expansion as "part of an effort to turn an organization that has focused largely on defensive measures into the equivalent of an Internet-era fighting force." This Cyber Command Unit operates under the command of Gen. Keith Alexander, who also happens to be the head of the National Security Agency, the highly secretive government network that spies on the communications of foreign nationals – and American citizens.
The Pentagon's rhetorical justification for this expansion is deeply misleading. Beyond that, these activities pose a wide array of serious threats to internet freedom, privacy, and international law that, as usual, will be conducted with full-scale secrecy and with little to no oversight and accountability. And, as always, there is a small army of private-sector corporations who will benefit most from this expansion.
Disguising aggression as "defense"
Let's begin with the way this so-called "cyber-security" expansion has been marketed. It is part of a sustained campaign which, quite typically, relies on blatant fear-mongering.
In March, 2010, the Washington Post published an amazing Op-Ed by Adm. Michael McConnell, Bush's former Director of National Intelligence and a past and current executive with Booz Allen, a firm representing numerous corporate contractors which profit enormously each time the government expands its "cyber-security" activities. McConnell's career over the last two decades – both at Booz, Allen and inside the government – has been devoted to accelerating the merger between the government and private sector in all intelligence, surveillance and national security matters (it was he who led the successful campaign to retroactively immunize the telecom giants for their participation in the illegal NSA domestic spying program). Privatizing government cyber-spying and cyber-warfare is his primary focus now.
McConnell's Op-Ed was as alarmist and hysterical as possible. Claiming that "the United States is fighting a cyber-war today, and we are losing", it warned that "chaos would result" from an enemy cyber-attack on US financial systems and that "our power grids, air and ground transportation, telecommunications, and water-filtration systems are in jeopardy as well." Based on these threats, McConnell advocated that "we" – meaning "the government and the private sector" – "need to develop an early-warning system to monitor cyberspace" and that "we need to reengineer the Internet to make attribution, geolocation, intelligence analysis and impact assessment – who did it, from where, why and what was the result – more manageable." As Wired's Ryan Singel wrote: "He's talking about changing the internet to make everything anyone does on the net traceable and geo-located so the National Security Agency can pinpoint users and their computers for retaliation."
The same week the Post published McConnell's extraordinary Op-Ed, the Obama White House issued its own fear-mongering decree on cyber-threats, depicting the US as a vulnerable victim to cyber-aggression. It began with this sentence: "President Obama has identified cybersecurity as one of the most serious economic and national security challenges we face as a nation, but one that we as a government or as a country are not adequately prepared to counter." It announced that "the Executive Branch was directed to work closely with all key players in US cybersecurity, including state and local governments and the private sector" and to "strengthen public/private partnerships", and specifically announced Obama's intent to "to implement the recommendations of the Cyberspace Policy Review built on the Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative (CNCI) launched by President George W. Bush."
Since then, the fear-mongering rhetoric from government officials has relentlessly intensified, all devoted to scaring citizens into believing that the US is at serious risk of cataclysmic cyber-attacks from "aggressors". This all culminated when Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, last October, warned of what he called a "cyber-Pearl Harbor". This "would cause physical destruction and the loss of life, an attack that would paralyze and shock the nation and create a profound new sense of vulnerability." Identifying China, Iran, and terrorist groups, he outlined a parade of horribles scarier than anything since Condoleezza Rice's 2002 Iraqi "mushroom cloud":
"An aggressor nation or extremist group could use these kinds of cyber tools to gain control of critical switches. They could derail passenger trains, or even more dangerous, derail passenger trains loaded with lethal chemicals. They could contaminate the water supply in major cities, or shut down the power grid across large parts of the country."
As usual, though, reality is exactly the opposite. This massive new expenditure of money is not primarily devoted to defending against cyber-aggressors. The US itself is the world's leading cyber-aggressor. A major purpose of this expansion is to strengthen the US's ability to destroy other nations with cyber-attacks. Indeed, even the Post report notes that a major component of this new expansion is to "conduct offensive computer operations against foreign adversaries".
It is the US – not Iran, Russia or "terror" groups – which already is the first nation (in partnership with Israel) to aggressively deploy a highly sophisticated and extremely dangerous cyber-attack. Last June, the New York Times' David Sanger reported what most of the world had already suspected: "From his first months in office, President Obama secretly ordered increasingly sophisticated attacks on the computer systems that run Iran's main nuclear enrichment facilities, significantly expanding America's first sustained use of cyberweapons." In fact, Obama "decided to accelerate the attacks . . . even after an element of the program accidentally became public in the summer of 2010 because of a programming error that allowed it to escape Iran's Natanz plant and sent it around the world on the Internet." According to the Sanger's report, Obama himself understood the significance of the US decision to be the first to use serious and aggressive cyber-warfare:
"Mr. Obama, according to participants in the many Situation Room meetings on Olympic Games, was acutely aware that with every attack he was pushing the United States into new territory, much as his predecessors had with the first use of atomic weapons in the 1940s, of intercontinental missiles in the 1950s and of drones in the past decade. He repeatedly expressed concerns that any American acknowledgment that it was using cyberweapons – even under the most careful and limited circumstances – could enable other countries, terrorists or hackers to justify their own attacks."
The US isn't the vulnerable victim of cyber-attacks. It's the leading perpetrator of those attacks. As Columbia Professor and cyber expert Misha Glenny wrote in the NYT last June: Obama's cyber-attack on Iran "marked a significant and dangerous turning point in the gradual militarization of the Internet."
Indeed, exactly as Obama knew would happen, revelations that it was the US which became the first country to use cyber-warfare against a sovereign country – just as it was the first to use the atomic bomb and then drones – would make it impossible for it to claim with any credibility (except among its own media and foreign policy community) that it was in a defensive posture when it came to cyber-warfare. As Professor Glenny wrote: "by introducing such pernicious viruses as Stuxnet and Flame, America has severely undermined its moral and political credibility." That's why, as the Post reported yesterday, the DOJ is engaged in such a frantic and invasive effort to root out Sanger's source: because it reveals the obvious truth that the US is the leading aggressor in the world when it comes to cyber-weapons.
This significant expansion under the Orwellian rubric of "cyber-security" is thus a perfect microcosm of US military spending generally. It's all justified under by the claim that the US must defend itself from threats from Bad, Aggressive Actors, when the reality is the exact opposite: the new program is devoted to ensuring that the US remains the primary offensive threat to the rest of the world. It's the same way the US develops offensive biological weapons under the guise of developing defenses against such weapons (such as the 2001 anthrax that the US government itself says came from a US Army lab). It's how the US government generally convinces its citizens that it is a peaceful victim of aggression by others when the reality is that the US builds more weapons, sells more arms and bombs more countries than virtually the rest of the world combined...
Read the rest here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/28/pentagon-cyber-security-expansion-stuxnet
The Washington Times asked the TSA source if TSA personnel were being set up for a staged shooting, but the source responded, “I hope the government wouldn’t do something like that.”
Report: TSA Training for Possible Checkpoint Shooting
by Raven Clabough
According to the Washington Times, the Department of Homeland Security is reportedly training Transportation Security Administration checkpoint screeners in preparation for a possible mass shooting at one of the agency’s security checkpoints.
According to the Times,
It is unclear whether the TSA is conducting the reported mass shooting scenario training at airports around the nation or only at the airport where our source, a veteran of the TSA, is assigned. The TSA source claims with obvious concern that his own life, along with the lives of other unarmed TSA personnel, would be in grave danger were an airport checkpoint shooting to unfold.
The source, who has already undergone the agency training, asserted that it created a chilling scenario that has instilled fear that something may unfold: “Every day when I arrive for work, I look for an escape route in case someone opens fire. We have been told to save ourselves.”
The training has compelled some to ask whether the TSA has intelligence of a possible impending checkpoint shooting.
The Times added that it is “unclear whether the alleged training is simply a prudent attempt by the agency to protect its own employees from every imaginable contingency," referencing the 2009 Christmas Day “Underwear Bomber” as a “reason to pay close attention to the details of Homeland Security’s operations.” According to Wikipedia, the so-called Underwear Bomber, Umar Abdulmutallab, "attempted to detonate plastic explosives hidden in his underwear" while onboard a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit. The Times notes that a witness who saw Abdulmutallab board the flight has suggested that U.S. government agents permitted him to do so while knowing he was a threat to safety:
Michigan attorney Kurt Haskell, a 2012 Democratic Congressional candidate who lost to incumbent Tim Walberg (R-MI), stated by way of a Victim Impact Statement during Abdulmutallab’s sentencing hearing in federal court that while he and his wife Lori waited to board the flight in Amsterdam, he observed a well-dressed man help the bomber board the flight without a passport.
Haskell is convinced that “a federal agent gave Abdulmutallab a defective bomb to carry onto the plane to create an incident that would cause the government to install full body scanners at airports nationwide,” according to USA Today.
Haskell stated, “Regardless of how media and government try to shape this case, I am convinced that Umar was given an intentionally defective bomb by a U.S. agent.”
Upon hearing about the TSA training for a checkpoint shooting, he told the Washington Times that it “doesn’t surprise me at all,” adding that he feared the government may be planning another attack.
“As a first-hand eyewitness to a proven false-flag attack, I know that the government does stage fake attacks to further governmental policy,” he declared.
Following the attempted Christmas Day bombing, the State Department's Undersecretary for State for Management Patrick Kennedy told the House Committee on Homeland Security that Abdulmutallab’s visa had not been revoked due to a national security override related to a larger al-Qaeda investigation.
The Times points to examples of terrorism that have helped to enact government policies that may have otherwise been rejected by the American people, and draws connections to the current political atmosphere on gun control:
The acceptance by the public and members of Congress of new gun restrictions would constitute only the latest policy initiative pursued through a program based on the implementation of terror.
While in France, President Obama authorized the use of an autopen to sign into law the extension of three key components of the USA PATRIOT Act on May 26, 2011.
Were another major shooting to unfold in the midst of congressional debate over additional gun control legislation, such as Diane Feinstein’s proposed assault weapons ban, the ensuing crisis could sway wavering members of Congress to support the new gun restrictions.
The Washington Times asked the TSA source if TSA personnel were being set up for a staged shooting, but the source responded, “I hope the government wouldn’t do something like that.”
Without remarking on the likelihood of a government-sponsored attack, Becky Akers on the Lew Rockwell blog opines that a shooting at a security checkpoint would serve as further evidence that the TSA endangers more than protects fliers:
Of course, this is the scenario that many genuine experts in security — as opposed to the charlatans at the TSA — have predicted for years: that bad guys will attack the hundreds of people whom the TSA delays in long, vulnerable lines. And it is yet another proof that the agency actually endangers, rather than protects, passengers; politician of even minimal decency and concern for their constituents would abolish the TSA rather than annually stealing our money to finance its depredations on us.
The mystery behind the alleged TSA training is enhanced by a press release issued by Republican New York State Senator Greg Ball that brings attention to a DHS weapons purchase request for 7,000 5.56x45mm NATO “personal defense weapons” (PDW) — also known as “assault weapons," which Congress is attempting to ban for civilian use.
Steve McGough of RadioViceOnline.com reports that the DHS is asking for the weapons because they are “suitable for personal defense use in close quarters."
Link:
http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/item/14343-report-tsa-training-for-possible-checkpoint-shooting
by Raven Clabough
According to the Washington Times, the Department of Homeland Security is reportedly training Transportation Security Administration checkpoint screeners in preparation for a possible mass shooting at one of the agency’s security checkpoints.
According to the Times,
It is unclear whether the TSA is conducting the reported mass shooting scenario training at airports around the nation or only at the airport where our source, a veteran of the TSA, is assigned. The TSA source claims with obvious concern that his own life, along with the lives of other unarmed TSA personnel, would be in grave danger were an airport checkpoint shooting to unfold.
The source, who has already undergone the agency training, asserted that it created a chilling scenario that has instilled fear that something may unfold: “Every day when I arrive for work, I look for an escape route in case someone opens fire. We have been told to save ourselves.”
The training has compelled some to ask whether the TSA has intelligence of a possible impending checkpoint shooting.
The Times added that it is “unclear whether the alleged training is simply a prudent attempt by the agency to protect its own employees from every imaginable contingency," referencing the 2009 Christmas Day “Underwear Bomber” as a “reason to pay close attention to the details of Homeland Security’s operations.” According to Wikipedia, the so-called Underwear Bomber, Umar Abdulmutallab, "attempted to detonate plastic explosives hidden in his underwear" while onboard a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit. The Times notes that a witness who saw Abdulmutallab board the flight has suggested that U.S. government agents permitted him to do so while knowing he was a threat to safety:
Michigan attorney Kurt Haskell, a 2012 Democratic Congressional candidate who lost to incumbent Tim Walberg (R-MI), stated by way of a Victim Impact Statement during Abdulmutallab’s sentencing hearing in federal court that while he and his wife Lori waited to board the flight in Amsterdam, he observed a well-dressed man help the bomber board the flight without a passport.
Haskell is convinced that “a federal agent gave Abdulmutallab a defective bomb to carry onto the plane to create an incident that would cause the government to install full body scanners at airports nationwide,” according to USA Today.
Haskell stated, “Regardless of how media and government try to shape this case, I am convinced that Umar was given an intentionally defective bomb by a U.S. agent.”
Upon hearing about the TSA training for a checkpoint shooting, he told the Washington Times that it “doesn’t surprise me at all,” adding that he feared the government may be planning another attack.
“As a first-hand eyewitness to a proven false-flag attack, I know that the government does stage fake attacks to further governmental policy,” he declared.
Following the attempted Christmas Day bombing, the State Department's Undersecretary for State for Management Patrick Kennedy told the House Committee on Homeland Security that Abdulmutallab’s visa had not been revoked due to a national security override related to a larger al-Qaeda investigation.
The Times points to examples of terrorism that have helped to enact government policies that may have otherwise been rejected by the American people, and draws connections to the current political atmosphere on gun control:
The acceptance by the public and members of Congress of new gun restrictions would constitute only the latest policy initiative pursued through a program based on the implementation of terror.
While in France, President Obama authorized the use of an autopen to sign into law the extension of three key components of the USA PATRIOT Act on May 26, 2011.
Were another major shooting to unfold in the midst of congressional debate over additional gun control legislation, such as Diane Feinstein’s proposed assault weapons ban, the ensuing crisis could sway wavering members of Congress to support the new gun restrictions.
The Washington Times asked the TSA source if TSA personnel were being set up for a staged shooting, but the source responded, “I hope the government wouldn’t do something like that.”
Without remarking on the likelihood of a government-sponsored attack, Becky Akers on the Lew Rockwell blog opines that a shooting at a security checkpoint would serve as further evidence that the TSA endangers more than protects fliers:
Of course, this is the scenario that many genuine experts in security — as opposed to the charlatans at the TSA — have predicted for years: that bad guys will attack the hundreds of people whom the TSA delays in long, vulnerable lines. And it is yet another proof that the agency actually endangers, rather than protects, passengers; politician of even minimal decency and concern for their constituents would abolish the TSA rather than annually stealing our money to finance its depredations on us.
The mystery behind the alleged TSA training is enhanced by a press release issued by Republican New York State Senator Greg Ball that brings attention to a DHS weapons purchase request for 7,000 5.56x45mm NATO “personal defense weapons” (PDW) — also known as “assault weapons," which Congress is attempting to ban for civilian use.
Steve McGough of RadioViceOnline.com reports that the DHS is asking for the weapons because they are “suitable for personal defense use in close quarters."
Link:
http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/item/14343-report-tsa-training-for-possible-checkpoint-shooting
More folks going to jail...
Rise in Federal Prison Population is “Unprecedented,” Says CRS
“Since the early 1980s, there has been a historically unprecedented increase in the federal prison population,” a new report from the Congressional Research Service observes.
“The number of inmates under the Bureau of Prisons’ (BOP) jurisdiction has increased from approximately 25,000 in FY1980 to nearly 219,000 in FY2012. Since FY1980, the federal prison population has increased, on average, by approximately 6,100 inmates each year. Data show that a growing proportion of inmates are being incarcerated for immigration- and weapons-related offenses, but the largest portion of newly admitted inmates are being incarcerated for drug offenses.”
“Changes in federal sentencing and correctional policy since the early 1980s have contributed to the rapid growth in the federal prison population,” CRS explained. “These changes include increasing the number of federal offenses subject to mandatory minimum sentences; changes to the federal criminal code that have made more crimes federal offenses; and eliminating parole.”
A number of secondary problems are attributable to the rapid growth in incarceration, CRS said, including rising financial costs, overcrowding, and deteriorating prison infrastructure.
“Should Congress choose to consider policy options to address the issues resulting from the growth in the federal prison population, policymakers could choose options such as increasing the capacity of the federal prison system by building more prisons, investing in rehabilitative programming, or placing more inmates in private prisons.”
Alternatively, CRS said, “Policymakers might also consider whether they want to revise some of the policy changes that have been made over the past three decades that have contributed to the steadily increasing number of offenders being incarcerated. For example, Congress could consider options such as (1) modifying mandatory minimum penalties, (2) expanding the use of Residential Reentry Centers, (3) placing more offenders on probation, (4) reinstating parole for federal inmates, (5) expanding the amount of good time credit an inmate can earn, and (6) repealing federal criminal statutes for some offenses.”
A copy of the new report was obtained by Secrecy News. See The Federal Prison Population Buildup: Overview, Policy Changes, Issues, and Options, January 22, 2013
Link:
http://fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/rise-in-federal-prison-population-is-unprecedented-says-crs/33255/
“Since the early 1980s, there has been a historically unprecedented increase in the federal prison population,” a new report from the Congressional Research Service observes.
“The number of inmates under the Bureau of Prisons’ (BOP) jurisdiction has increased from approximately 25,000 in FY1980 to nearly 219,000 in FY2012. Since FY1980, the federal prison population has increased, on average, by approximately 6,100 inmates each year. Data show that a growing proportion of inmates are being incarcerated for immigration- and weapons-related offenses, but the largest portion of newly admitted inmates are being incarcerated for drug offenses.”
“Changes in federal sentencing and correctional policy since the early 1980s have contributed to the rapid growth in the federal prison population,” CRS explained. “These changes include increasing the number of federal offenses subject to mandatory minimum sentences; changes to the federal criminal code that have made more crimes federal offenses; and eliminating parole.”
A number of secondary problems are attributable to the rapid growth in incarceration, CRS said, including rising financial costs, overcrowding, and deteriorating prison infrastructure.
“Should Congress choose to consider policy options to address the issues resulting from the growth in the federal prison population, policymakers could choose options such as increasing the capacity of the federal prison system by building more prisons, investing in rehabilitative programming, or placing more inmates in private prisons.”
Alternatively, CRS said, “Policymakers might also consider whether they want to revise some of the policy changes that have been made over the past three decades that have contributed to the steadily increasing number of offenders being incarcerated. For example, Congress could consider options such as (1) modifying mandatory minimum penalties, (2) expanding the use of Residential Reentry Centers, (3) placing more offenders on probation, (4) reinstating parole for federal inmates, (5) expanding the amount of good time credit an inmate can earn, and (6) repealing federal criminal statutes for some offenses.”
A copy of the new report was obtained by Secrecy News. See The Federal Prison Population Buildup: Overview, Policy Changes, Issues, and Options, January 22, 2013
Link:
http://fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/rise-in-federal-prison-population-is-unprecedented-says-crs/33255/
Help Bambi??? Go to jail...
Mike Adams
An Indiana couple saved a wounded baby deer and nursed it back to life, saving its life and giving it a home. They named it “Little Orphan Dani.” When Indiana state officials got word of this courageous act of compassion, they ordered the deer euthanized. (Because government wants to kill everything you love.)
When the deer “escaped” right before it was schedule to be killed — and yes, I think the couple probably set it free rather than have it killed — the man and woman were charged with unlawful possession of a deer.
They now face $2,000 in fines and 60 days in jail.
This is yet another example of the government police state gone wild, and it’s on top of seemingly countless other stories of similar police state insanity such as armed government raids on raw milk distributors.
Click here for more details on this story from ABC News.
Click here for the Facebook support page calling for charges to be dropped against the couple.
Click here for the Change.org petition.
Who wants to kill the deer and imprison the couple? The DNR
The bastard a@#holes behind this action are, predictably, the Indiana Department of Natural Resources (DNR). This is the same name as the department in Michigan that forced small farmers in that state to murder their own baby pigs.
What we are seeing today across America, both at the state and federal levels, is big government gone BAD, ignoring the real criminals at the top while threatening, fining and imprisoning the “little people” who are only trying to do the right thing.
Recent examples:
Michigan gardener Julie Bass was threatened with jail time for teaching her young son gardening skills in a home garden planted in her front yard.
A woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma had her medicinal garden destroyed by thuggish government “officials” who waited until she was gone before gutting her entire plot of edible herbs.
James Stewart, the California “raw milk man,” was subjected to unbelievable jail torture in LA county for the “crime” of distributing fresh farm milk to happy customers. His “Rawesome Foods” was hit with an armed multi-agency government raid during which $50,000 in fresh eggs, milk, fruit and meat was confiscated and then destroyed. As he was held in jail in LA county, he was subjected to starvation, hypothermia and having his jail cell intentionally flooded with raw human feces as punishment.
These are just a few of the many examples of the government police state gone mad in America. There are many more for anyone who dares to look.
Government has become too large, too powerful, too arrogant and too dangerous
The big picture in all this? America’s current government is a grave danger to America herself. We are living under increasing tyranny, total government surveillance of our emails, texts and phone calls, and selective enforcement of laws in order to punish the little people while the powerful elite run free.
As an example of that, New York Mayor Bloomberg insists that everyone in New York should be stripped of all their firearms, but he walks around with five armed goons who intimidate journalists for daring to ask questions about Bloomberg’s outrageous hypocrisy.
America is being divided into the “privileged” class versus the working class. The privileged elite are immune to virtually all prosecution of existing laws while the working class are subjected to every nit-picking technical violation of every law imaginable. Nearly every person alive today commits three felonies a day without even knowing it. In fact, that’s the title of an eye-opening book by Harvey Silverglate.
As the book’s description states:
The average professional in this country wakes up in the morning, goes to work, comes home, eats dinner, and then goes to sleep, unaware that he or she has likely committed several federal crimes that day. Why? The answer lies in the very nature of modern federal criminal laws, which have exploded in number but also become impossibly broad and vague. In Three Felonies a Day, Harvey A. Silverglate reveals how federal criminal laws have become dangerously disconnected from the English common law tradition and how prosecutors can pin arguable federal crimes on any one of us, for even the most seemingly innocuous behavior.
That’s why this couple is being terrorized by their government for saving a little Bambi. The government wants to remind them who’s in charge, and the way to do that is to abandon all common sense and compassion and engage in the raw exercise of brute force power.
All government operates with the threat of violence against us all
Remember: All government operates at the end of a gun. Government achieves compliance solely by the threat of violence against the People. This is what is brilliantly revealed by Lew Rockwell and other intelligent critics of big government.
The reason government wants all Americans disarmed right now is because it wants a monopoly of violence that can be used against people to destroy their home gardens, criminalize saving animals, mandate forced vaccines, shut down medicinal herb companies and routinely terrorize the people. Even while the government wants us all to be disarmed, it is buying upthousands of full-auto assault rifles as well as over a billion rounds of ammunition to be used domestically, inside the USA.
Have you figured it out yet? There is no Al-Quaeda. There is no Bin Laden. The real terrorists are power-hungry government berserkers within our own government, and they will stop at nothing to usurp power and enslave the masses.
I’ve been shouting this for years, and with each astonishing transgression of this liberty-crushing government, more and more people are waking up. Every time the government threatens another innocent gardener, parent or animal rescue person with imprisonment, tens of thousands of people hear about it and wake up to the reality that government in America has gone rogue. It no longer serves the People. Instead, it considers the People to be its enemy, and it is dedicated to crushing the People.
It’s time we put government in its place. It’s time we took a stand for all the innocent victims of the terrorist government currently running things in this country. It’s time we stopped the government bailouts to rich, wealthy banksters and the criminalization of routine human activities like saving wounded animals or growing home gardens.
I’ve had enough. Have you? Are you ready yet to call for the end of tyrannical government and the restoration of justice, liberty and the Bill of Rights? Keep reading Natural News because this story has only just begun.
Link to article and hyperlinks:
http://www.naturalnews.com/038874_baby_deer_police_state_jail_time.html
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