The Right to Keep and Bear Arms

Critics Deride Bill Designed to Keep Weapons Out of Terrorists’ Hands

May 17, 2009

Fox News - A bill designed to keep weapons out of the hands of terrorists is drawing fire from gun rights advocates who say it could infringe upon regular citizens’ constitutional right to bear arms.

The Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Terrorists Act of 2009 would authorize Attorney General Eric Holder to deny the sale or transfer of firearms to known or suspected terrorists — a list that could extend beyond groups such as radical Islamists and other groups connected to international terror organizations.

Critics say the names of suspected terrorists could be drawn from existing government watch lists that cover such broad categories as animal rights extremists, Christian identity extremists, black separatists, anti-abortion extremists, anti-immigration extremists and anti-technology extremists...

Man Held on $500,000 Bail for 30,000 Bullets

May 17, 2009

Eagle-Tribune (North Andover, MA) - Keni Garcia told police he intended to use the 30,000 bullets they found in his car and home for target practice... Garcia, who allegedly bought thousands of rounds of ammunition and had 10,000 bullets in his car when he was stopped by police Thursday, was ordered held on $500,000 cash bail yesterday. Garcia is charged with three counts of possession of a high-capacity firearm, illegal possession of ammunition and illegal storage of a firearm...

Bill Would Prevent Federal Government from Regulating Firearms in TN

May 6, 2009

WZTV Fox 17 - Tennessee lawmakers may soon send the federal government a loud message — hands off our guns. A new law is under consideration that would say if firearms are manufactured and sold inside the state of Tennessee, federal gun law would not apply.

Visit any gun store right now, and youll hear the same story. Gun buyers are stocking up on weapons, and ammunition is in short supply. “It is a very significant fear for a lot of Tennesseans,” says John Harris, Executive Director of the Tennessee Firearms Association

Harris says gun owners are worried. They believe the Federal government may soon restrict certain weapons. “But it’s our way to make a statement to say this is Tennessee. These our are guns,” says Rep. Henry Fincher, (D) Cookeville.

Now, lawmakers have proposed a new bill called the Tennessee Firearms Freedom Act.

USA Buys Enough Guns in 3 Months to Outfit the Entire Chinese and Indian Army

April 22, 2009

AmmoLand.com - US citizens bought on average 3,177,256 guns every 3 months in 2008. In just 3 months Americans bought enough guns to outfit the entire Chinese and Indian army’s combined.

“You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass.” - Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto WWII

You also bought 1,529,635,000 rounds of ammunition in just the month of December 2008. Yeah that is right, that is billion with a “B.” This number takes no accounting of reloading or reloaded ammunition.

This is an evaluation of overall firearms and ammunition purchases based on low end numbers per Federal NIC instacheck data base Statistics. The numbers presented are only PART of the overall numbers of arms and ammunition that have been sold. The actual numbers are much higher.

Former Top Rated NRA Senator to Introduce Gun Ban This Week

May 11, 2009

Infowars - Senator Kirsten Gillibrand’s bill tests the waters for additional gun-grabber legislation now in the works...

McCarthy’s bill, H.R. 6676, would utilize the National Instant Criminal Background Check System for background checks on all gun store employees and dealers. In addition to H.R. 6676, three other bills have been offered including laws that would make it illegal for known or suspected terrorists to buy guns.

As reported by Infowars last week, the House is currently working on H.R. 2159, Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Terrorists Act of 2009, sponsored by Rep. Peter King of New York. The bill would “increase public safety by permitting the Attorney General to deny the transfer of a firearm or the issuance of firearms or explosives licenses to a known or suspected dangerous terrorist.”

Larry Pratt, executive director of Gun Owners of America, told WorldNetDaily the bill will likely be used in junction with the DHS “Rightwing Extremism” report that characterizes advocates of the Second Amendment and others as terrorists. “By those standards, I’m one of [DHS Secretary] Janet Napolitano’s terrorists,” Pratt said. “This bill would enable the attorney general to put all of the people who voted against Obama on no-gun lists, because according to the DHS, they’re all potential terrorists.”

Senator Gillibrand is working closely with gun-grabbing organizations, including New Yorkers Against Gun Violence and the Brady Campaign, according to Matt Canter, Gillibrand’s spokesman. New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly and others are working with Gillibrand on “anti-trafficking legislation to stop the flow of illegal guns,” Canter told Newsday.

The Obama administration recently attempted to link the right to own firearms to drug cartel violence in Mexico. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other administration officials have said 90 percent of the weapons used to commit crimes in Mexico come from the United States. In fact, only 17 percent of guns found at Mexican crime scenes have been traced to the U.S. Statistics reveal that most of the guns flowing into Mexico come from the black market, Russian crime organizations, South America, Asia, Guatemala, and the Mexican Army...

Obama Supports Treaty Outlawing Gun Possession

May 3, 2009

Infowars - Obama is in favor of the ratifying CIFTA, the Inter-American Convention Against Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms. On its face, the treaty sounds reasonable because it would “prevent, combat, and eradicate the illicit manufacturing of and trafficking in firearms, ammunition, explosives, and other related materials” (emphasis added). However, upon reading the bill we discover the following:

Stressing the need, in peace processes and post-conflict situations, to achieve effective control of firearms, ammunition, explosives, and other related materials in order to prevent their entry into the illicit market.

Obama has promised Mexican President Felipe Calderon that he would urge the Senate to take up CIFTA. He is doing this under the cover of the drug cartel violence in Mexico. Obama and Calderon quoted a statistic echoed by the corporate media that 90% of the weapons seized in Mexican raids were purchased from U.S. gun shops and a reason why the U.S. needs to ratify this treaty. In fact, this is a lie — only a mere 17% of guns found at Mexico crime scenes have been traced to the U.S.

CIFTA would bury the Second Amendment under “pertinent resolutions of the United Nations General Assembly.” It would criminalize ammunition reloading (defined as explosives manufacture) and gun assembly (including firearm kits and presumably breaking down weapons for cleaning or transport).

Language contained in the CIFTA treaty insists it respects “the principles of sovereignty, nonintervention, and the juridical equality of states.” Not mentioned is the fact the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties has a superior rank to national laws. If the CIFTA treaty is ratified without exception, it would kill U.S. sovereignty and lead the way to destroying the Second Amendment.

It should be noted that only the Senate needs to ratify the treaty. Article II, section 2, of the Constitution states that the president “shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two-thirds of the Senators present concur.”

The United States was one of the first signatories to CIFTA in November 1997. The Convention was transmitted to the Senate in June 1998 and to this day awaits the Senate’s advice and consent. Twenty-nine of the 34 OAS member states have ratified CIFTA. Only the U.S., Canada, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica and St. Vincent and Grenadines have yet to do so.

Obama Positioning for Back Door Gun Control

April 24, 2009

NewsWithViews - On his recent trip to Central America, President Barack Obama did more than cozy up to Marxist dictators; he also signed onto an international treaty that could, in effect, be used as backdoor gun control. It appears that Obama wants to use international treaties to do what congressional legislation is not able to do: further restrict the right of the American people to keep and bear arms...

Civil Liberties, Health Care, Food Policies

Judge Threatens Amish Couple

May 11, 2009

Tribune-Democrat (Johnstown, PA) - Judge Norman Krumenacker today ordered two Amish couples to leave their homes by 10 a.m. Monday or face eviction by the sheriff because they’ve not complied with sewage and building code regulations.

Krumenacker said that sheriff deputies will padlock the houses and any barns or outbuildings on the properties, and the padlocks will remain in place until the properties are brought into compliance.

He held in them in contempt of court for not following his January order that gave them 60 days to be in compliance.

The couples are Joely and Mary Swartzentruver, who, along with their three young children, live along Amadei Road in Barr Township, and John and Susan Miller, who with their one child, live along Duman Road in Blacklick Township.

They are members of the ultraconservative Swartzentruver sect which does not use modern conveniences.

Homeschooler Has Due Process Right Stripped Under Patriot Act

April 30, 2009

WRAL (Oxford, N.C.) — Sixteen-year-old Ashton Lundeby’s bedroom in his mother’s Granville County home is nothing, if not patriotic. Images of American flags are everywhere – on the bed, on the floor, on the wall.

But according to the United States government, the tenth-grade home-schooler is being held on a criminal complaint that he made a bomb threat from his home on the night of Feb. 15.

The family was at a church function that night, his mother, Annette Lundeby, said. Undoubtedly, they were given false information, or they would not have had 12 agents in my house with a widow and two children and three cats," Lundeby said.

Around 10 p.m. on March 5, Lundeby said, armed FBI agents along with three local law enforcement officers stormed her home looking for her son. They handcuffed him and presented her with a search warrant. "I was terrified," Lundeby's mother said. "There were guns, and I don't allow guns around my children. I don't believe in guns."

Lundeby told the officers that someone had hacked into her son's IP address and was using it to make crank calls connected through the Internet, making it look like the calls had originated from her home when they did not. Her argument was ignored, she said. Agents seized a computer, a cell phone, gaming console, routers, bank statements and school records, according to federal search warrants. "There were no bomb-making materials, not even a blasting cap, not even a wire," Lundeby said.

Ashton now sits in a juvenile facility in South Bend, Ind. His mother has had little access to him since his arrest. She has gone to her state representatives as well as attorneys, seeking assistance, but, she said, there is nothing she can do.

Lundeby said the USA Patriot Act stripped her son of his due process rights. "We have no rights under the Patriot Act to even defend them, because the Patriot Act basically supersedes the Constitution," she said. "It wasn't intended to drag your barely 16-year-old, 120-pound son out in the middle of the night on a charge that we can't even defend."

Passed after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the U.S., the Patriot Act allows federal agents to investigate suspected cases of terrorism swiftly to better protect the country. In part, it gives the federal government more latitude to search telephone records, e-mails and other records.

"They're saying that 'We feel this individual is a terrorist or an enemy combatant against the United States, and we're going to suspend all of those due process rights because this person is an enemy of the United States," said Dan Boyce, a defense attorney and former U.S. attorney not connected to the Lundeby case.

Critics of the statute say it threatens the most basic of liberties. "There's nothing a matter of public record," Boyce said "All those normal rights are just suspended in the air."

In a bi-partisan effort, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., and Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., last month introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives a bill that would narrow subpoena power in a provision of the Patriot Act, called the National Security Letters, to curb what some consider to be abuse of power by federal law enforcement officers.

Boyce said the Patriot Act was written with good intentions, but he said he believes it has gone too far in some cases. Lundeby's might be one of them, he said. "It very well could be a case of overreaction, where an agent leaped to certain conclusions or has made certain assumptions about this individual and about how serious the threat really is," Boyce said.

Because a federal judge issued a gag order in the case, the U.S. attorney in Indiana cannot comment on the case, nor can the FBI. The North Carolina Highway Patrol did confirm that officers assisted with the FBI operation at the Lundeby home on March 5.

"Never in my worst nightmare did I ever think that it would be my own government that I would have to protect my children from," Lundeby said. "This is the United States, and I feel like I live in a third world country now."

Lundeby said she does not think this type of case is what the Patriot Act was intended for. Boyce agrees. "It was to protect the public, but what we need to do is to make sure there are checks and balances to make sure those new laws are not abused," he said.

Taxpayer Handouts and Ripoffs

Obama Wants U.S. to Loan $100 Billion to Global Bailout Fund

May 20, 2009

CNSNews - President Obama has asked Congress to authorize $100 billion in loans to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to help create a $500 billion global bailout fund...

Insurers Get Preliminary OK for Treasury Funds

May 14, 2009

AP - The Treasury Department has agreed to extend billions in bailout funds to six major life insurers, following a months-long quest by some in the sector for government help in shoring up capital positions in the wake of major investment losses.

The Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. was the first to disclose Thursday that it had been notified by the Treasury Department that it was eligible for $3.4 billion from the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP. Lincoln National Corp., which commonly goes by the name Lincoln Financial Group, said it has been initially approved for a $2.5 billion injection from TARP's Capital Purchase Program.

Allstate Corp., Ameriprise Financial Inc., Principal Financial Group Inc. and Prudential Financial Inc. also are among insurers receiving preliminary investment approval, Treasury spokesman Andrew Williams confirmed. He declined to disclose the amount of investment each company will receive.

The total capital injection into the six companies will be less than $22 billion, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing a person familiar with the situation.

The $700 billion TARP bailout fund, approved by Congress last year, was originally intended to purchase toxic loans on the books of banks that were inhibiting their ability to make loans. But the fund quickly morphed into a capital backstop fund for banks that also was used by the Treasury Department to make loans to General Motors Corp., Chrysler and insurance giant American International Group Inc.

Life insurers also requested government aid, worried that their balance sheets had became clogged by illiquid assets and escalating liabilities to policy holders who bought in to this decade's explosion in the variable annuities market. But a final word from the government was slow in arriving, and the stocks of most public insurance companies plunged in recent months.

Life insurers own 18 percent of all corporate bonds, so aiding them is consistent with the bailout program's goal of unclogging credit markets. Insurers also have seen their investment portfolios slammed by declines in stocks, real estate and other financial assets in the last two years. Analysts have warned that some insurers risked falling below necessary capital levels, which is essential to avoiding costly downgrades from ratings agencies.

Insurance companies won backing from the Bush administration last year to be considered for the government's TARP program because some of the companies either owned savings and loans or acquired them to be considered for the bailout program, or were already classified as bank holding companies. The Hartford and Lincoln National, two of the nation's largest life insurers, and several others applied to become thrift holding companies last fall...

Geithner Says Small Banks Can Apply for Bailout Money

May 11, 2009

Triangle Business Journal - U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said funds from the Troubled Asset Relief Program will now be available to small and privately owned banks, according to numerous media reports Wednesday...

Bank of America Needs $34 Billion, Citi May Need $5-$10 Billion in 'New Capital'

May 6, 2009

Reuters - Bank of America, the largest U.S. bank, needs $34 billion in extra cash, a source familiar with U.S. government stress tests on leading banks told Reuters, unsettling markets and stoking talk of a possible asset sale in China. Separately on Wednesday the New York Times said Citigroup Inc may have to raise between $5 illion and $10 billion in the wake of the U.S. stress tests, a series of health checks which has been keeping a firm grip on financial markets this week.

Citigroup, whose shares were down 2.7 percent in U.S. pre-market trading, estimated that U.S. banks subject to stress testing by regulators would need $75 billion in total, of which BofA would eat up $33 billion. BofA shares fell 8.7 percent.

The news spooked investors, who had hoped the stress tests on 19 big banks would show the industry was in less dire condition than feared...

Obama Gives Chrysler $8 Billion to File Bankruptcy

April 30, 2009

AP - General Motors Corp. could get as much as $5 billion more in federal loans, while Chrysler LLC could get $500 million as they race against government-imposed deadlines to restructure, according to a government report filed Tuesday...

Chrysler will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in New York, giving Chrysler time to galvanize a partnership with the Italian car maker Fiat Group SpA. The government, which has poured $4 billion in loans into Chrysler, would provide up to $8 billion more to carry the company through bankruptcy, said senior administration officials speaking on condition of anonymity. The government also will help appoint a new board of directors...

Bankrupting the Common People

Housing Bubble Smackdown: Bigger Crash Ahead

Only 30 Percent of Foreclosures Have Been Relisted; 600,000 Foreclosed Homes have Disappeared

April 21, 2009

Global Research - Due to the lifting of the foreclosure moratorium at the end of March, the downward slide in housing is gaining speed. The moratorium was initiated in January to give Obama’s anti-foreclosure program—which is a combination of mortgage modifications and refinancing—a chance to succeed. The goal of the plan was to keep up to 9 million struggling homeowners in their homes, but it’s clear now that the program will fall well-short of its objective.

Another 20 percent carved off the aggregate value of US housing means another $4 trillion loss to homeowners.

In March, housing prices accelerated on the downside indicating bigger adjustments dead-ahead. Trend-lines are steeper now than ever before–nearly perpendicular. Housing prices are not falling, they’re crashing and crashing hard.

Now that the foreclosure moratorium has ended, Notices of Default (NOD) have spiked to an all-time high. These Notices will turn into foreclosures in 4 to 5 months time creating another cascade of foreclosures. Market analysts predict there will be 5 MILLION MORE FORECLOSURES BETWEEN NOW AND 2011. It’s a disaster bigger than Katrina.

Soaring unemployment and rising foreclosures ensure that hundreds of banks and financial institutions will be forced into bankruptcy. Forty percent of delinquent homeowners have already vacated their homes. There’s nothing Obama can do to make them stay.

Worse still, only 30 percent of foreclosures have been relisted for sale suggesting more hanky-panky at the banks. Where have the houses gone? Have they simply vanished?

600,000 "DISAPPEARED HOMES?"

Here’s a excerpt from the SF Gate explaining the mystery:

"Lenders nationwide are sitting on hundreds of thousands of foreclosed homes that they have not resold or listed for sale, according to numerous data sources. And foreclosures, which banks unload at fire-sale prices, are a major factor driving home values down.

"We believe there are in the neighborhood of 600,000 properties nationwide that banks have repossessed but not put on the market," said Rick Sharga, vice president of RealtyTrac, which compiles nationwide statistics on foreclosures. "California probably represents 80,000 of those homes. It could be disastrous if the banks suddenly flooded the market with those distressed properties. You’d have further depreciation and carnage."

In a recent study, RealtyTrac compared its database of bank-repossessed homes to MLS listings of for-sale homes in four states, including California. It found a significant disparity—only 30 percent of the foreclosures were listed for sale in the Multiple Listing Service. The remainder is known in the industry as "shadow inventory." ("Banks aren’t Selling Many Foreclosed Homes" SF Gate)

If regulators were deployed to the banks that are keeping foreclosed homes off the market, they would probably find that the banks are actually servicing the mortgages on a monthly basis to conceal the extent of their losses. They’d also find that the banks are trying to keep housing prices artificially high to avoid heftier losses that would put them out of business. One thing is certain, 600,000 "disappeared" homes means that housing prices have a lot farther to fall and that an even larger segment of the banking system is underwater.

Here is more on the story from Mr. Mortgage "California Foreclosures About to Soar… Again:"

"Are you ready to see the future? Tens of thousands of foreclosures are only 1-5 months away from hitting that will take total foreclosure counts back to all-time highs. This will flood an already beaten-bloody real estate market with even more supply just in time for the Spring/Summer home selling season… Foreclosure start (NOD) and Trustee Sale (NTS) notices are going out at levels not seen since mid 2008. Once an NTS goes out, the property is taken to the courthouse and auctioned within 21-45 days… The bottom line is that there is a massive wave of actual foreclosures that will hit beginning in April that can’t be stopped without a national moratorium."

JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Fannie Mae have all stepped up their foreclosure activity in recent weeks. Delinquencies have skyrocketed foreshadowing more price-slashing into the foreseeable future. According to the Wall Street Journal:

"Ronald Temple, co-director of research at Lazard Asset Management, expects home prices to fall 22% to 27% from their January levels. More than 2.1 million homes will be lost this year because borrowers can’t meet their loan payments, up from about 1.7 million in 2008." (Ruth Simon, "The housing crisis is about to take center stage once again," Wall Street Journal)

Another 20 percent carved off the aggregate value of US housing means another $4 trillion loss to homeowners. That means smaller retirement savings, less discretionary spending, and lower living standards.

The next leg down in housing will be excruciating; every sector will feel the pain. Obama’s $75 billion mortgage rescue plan is a mere pittance; it won’t reduce the principle on mortgages and it won’t stop the bleeding.

Policymakers have decided they’ve done enough and are refusing to help. They don’t see the tsunami looming in front of them plain as day. The housing market is going under and it’s going to drag a good part of the broader economy along with it. Stocks, too.

VIDEO: Sacramento Tent City Homeless Get Vacate Notices

April 13, 2009

iCare America - “What you do to the least of those, you do to me.” iCare America videotapes the police passing out vacate notices to the homeless people living at Tent City in Sacramento, CA. The loss of self-esteem these people experience is magnified by the stigma of violating “laws” because of where they rest their heads. Imagine laying down each night in fear that you will be arrested and knowing there is no safe place to go. Its not right and we will do whatever it takes to bring integrity to this travesty - Val Jon Farris

Increase in First-Time Delinquent Income Taxpayers

April 14, 2009

Reuters - As a deep recession strips Americans of their jobs, homes and investments, the 2009 U.S. tax season promises to see a large uptick in first-time delinquent income taxpayers.

“Our calls are up 280 percent,” said Richard Boggs, founder and chief executive of Los Angeles-based Nationwide Tax Relief, a firm that helps delinquent taxpayers resolve tax issues. “We’ve seen a huge rise in what we call the rookie delinquent taxpayer,” he said. “They are incredibly scared, and they have no idea what’s going to happen to them because, God bless them, they’ve never owed before.”

As the weak economy puts job security and a steady flow of income on a slippery slope, many are wary of the U.S. tax man, tax consultants say. With household balance sheets under pressure, more U.S. households are having trouble keeping up with their day-to-day bills and struggling to pay their taxes.

Riskiest Places For U.S. Homeowners

April 12, 2009

Forbes - The recession may have spread across the global economy, but recovery efforts haven't taken the edge off the mortgage meltdown that helped start it all. In fact, many American real estate markets may be at risk of even worse declines.

While the president's Homeowner Stabilization Initiative, announced on Feb. 18, offers loan modifications for homeowners already in negative-equity situations and the stimulus package offers an $8,000 tax credit for first-time buyers, there are several places where such efforts are likely to have little effect.

Specifically, you don't want to be a homeowner in several parts of California, Florida and the upper Midwest. Detroit, Mich., Miami, Fla., and Merced, Calif., are among the top five riskiest spots for homeowners, ranking second, third and fifth, respectively. California and Florida areas dominate the list, taking up almost three-quarters of the 25 spots.

One thing all the spots on our list have in common, though, is they're only going to get worse. As foreclosures rise and home prices plummet (27% since their 2006 peak, but more than one-third in many other places), the ability of many borrowers to make payments becomes more difficult as unemployment rises.

The national foreclosure average is now 3%, but the average for subprime loans--a disproportionate share of mortgages in high-stress markets--is 13.9%. That number could rise even after the recession ends because solid economic growth can't bring back housing prices that fell so far so fast after the boom.

"We had a housing decline in Massachusetts in the 1990s with no recession," says Mark Fleming, chief economist of real estate analytics firm First American CoreLogic, "and a recession in 2001 within the middle of the housing boom."

In other words, home prices and lending rates rising right along with the economy was never good for borrowers...

U.S. Home Price Drops Set Records in January

April 4, 2009

AP - Home prices sank by the sharpest annual rate on record in January, and the pace continues to accelerate, but there were a handful of battered metro areas where price declines slowed, according to data released Tuesday.

The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller index of home prices in 20 major cities tumbled by a record 19 percent from January 2008. It was the largest decline since the index started in 2000. The 10-city index dropped 19.4 percent, also a new record.

All 20 cities in the report showed monthly and annual price declines, with 13 posting new annual records. Prices dropped by more than 10 percent in 14 cities. Faring better were Dallas, Denver and Cleveland, with annual price declines of around 5 percent.

"There are very few bright spots that one can see in the data," David Blitzer, chairman of S&P's index committee, said in a prepared statement. "Most of the nation appears to remain on a downward path."

In the Cleveland, Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Washington D.C. metro areas—all ravaged by foreclosures—annual price declines eased somewhat. Meanwhile, six cities, including Minneapolis, Charlotte, Seattle and New York, showed smaller price declines in January compared with December...

One in Every 10 Americans is Receiving Food Stamps

April 2, 2009

Reuters - A record 32.2 million people -- one in every 10 Americans -- received food stamps at latest count, the government said on Thursday, a reflection of the recession now in its 16th month.

Food stamps are the major U.S. antihunger program and help poor people buy groceries. The average benefit was $112.82 per person in January. The January figure marks the third time in five months that enrollment set a record...

Flint, MI, Considers Shutting Down Quadrants of City

April 1, 2009

Flint Journal (Flint, Michigan) - Property abandonment is getting so bad in Flint that some in government are talking about an extreme measure that was once unthinkable — shutting down portions of the city, officially abandoning them and cutting off police and fire service.

Temporary Mayor Michael Brown made the off-the-cuff suggestion Friday in response to a question at a Rotary Club of Flint luncheon about the thousands of empty houses in Flint.

Brown said that as more people abandon homes, eating away at the city’s tax base and creating more blight, the city might need to examine “shutting down quadrants of the city where we (wouldn’t) provide services...”

U.S. Private Sector Axes 742,000 Jobs in March

April 1, 2009

Reuters - Job losses in the U.S. private sector accelerated in March, more than economists’ expectations, according to a report by ADP Employer Services...

Pension Insurer Shifted to Stocks Just Months Before Collapse

March 30, 2009

Boston Globe - Just months before the start of last year's stock market collapse, the federal agency that insures the retirement funds of 44 million Americans departed from its conservative investment strategy and decided to put much of its $64 billion insurance fund into stocks.

Switching from a heavy reliance on bonds, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation decided to pour billions of dollars into speculative investments such as stocks in emerging foreign markets, real estate, and private equity funds...

Nonetheless, analysts expressed concern that large portions of the trust fund might have been lost at a time when many private pension plans are suffering major losses. The guarantee fund would be the only way to cover the plans if their companies go into bankruptcy.

"The truth is, this could be huge," said Zvi Bodie, a Boston University finance professor who in 2002 advised the agency to rely almost entirely on bonds. "This has the potential to be another several hundred billion dollars. If the auto companies go under, they have huge unfunded liabilities" in pension plans that would be passed on to the agency...

The Pension Benefit Guaranty scandal that isn't (at least not yet)

The Collapse of the U.S. Economy and Government Finances

White House Pushing GM Toward Bankruptcy

April 14, 2009

World Socialist Web Site - The White House is laying the groundwork for General Motors to declare bankruptcy by June 1. Obama wants to dump the company’s health care and pension obligations in order to create a “good,” more profitable GM...

Obama to Push to Make 12 Million Illegal Immigrants Legal

April 12, 2009

New York Times - Republicans say they will seek to mobilize popular outrage against any effort to legalize unauthorized immigrant workers while so many Americans are out of jobs...

Financial Rescue Nears GDP as Pledges Top $12.8 Trillion

April 1, 2009

Bloomberg - The U.S. government and the Federal Reserve have spent, lent or committed $12.8 trillion, an amount that approaches the value of everything produced in the country last year.

AIG Crisis Could Be the Tip of an Insurance Iceberg

April 1, 2009

Los Angeles Times AIG’s problems extend across most of its business lines, including its massive life insurance and retirement services operations, which reported a staggering $18-billion quarterly loss this month...

Vehicle Mileage Tax

Mileage Tax Is Alive and Well and Living in Congress

April 28, 2009

The Infrastructurist - Just two months ago, the idea of taxing motorists on the basis of how many miles they drive seemed to be dead as a doornail. After being floated by the new transportation secretary as a way to fund our highways, his boss — the guy everyone calls “Mr President” — shot it down remorselessly.

Usually, when a Mr President shoots something down, it stays dead. [Insert own Dick Cheney hunting joke here.] But not in this case. Today, James Oberstar, the head of the House transportation committee, said he wants a mileage tax. And not only does he want one, he wants it to happen in as little as two years — not the decade or more that many advocates have been talking about.

The Associated Press reports:

Oberstar said he believes the technology exists to implement a mileage tax. He said he sees no point in waiting years for the results of pilot programs since such a tax system is inevitable as federal gasoline tax revenues decline.

“Why do we need a pilot program? Why don’t we just phase it in?” said Oberstar, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee chairman. Oberstar is drafting a six-year transportation bill to fund highway and transit programs that is expected to total around a half trillion dollars.

Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., [...] said public acceptance, not technology, is the main obstacle to a mileage-based tax. [...]

Oberstar shrugged off that concern.

“I’m at a point of impatience with more studies,” Oberstar said. He suggested that Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., chairman of the highways and transit subcommittee, set up a meeting of transportation experts and members of Congress to figure out how it could be done.

The tax would entail equipping vehicles with GPS technology to determine how many miles a car has been driven and whether on interstate highways or secondary roads. The devices would also calculate the amount of tax owed.

“At this point there are a lot of things that are under consideration and there is also a strong need to find revenue,” Oberstar spokesman Jim Berard said. “A vehicle miles-traveled tax is a logical complement, and perhaps a future replacement, for fuel taxes.”

Gas tax revenues — the primary source of federal funding for highway programs — have dropped dramatically in the last two years, first because gas prices were high and later because of the economic downturn. They are forecast to continue going down as drivers switch to fuel efficient and alternative fuel vehicles.This is probably something Secretary LaHood was well aware of.

In the video we posted yesterday, he seemed almost to stifle a smile when asked about the mileage tax. He said–wink, wink–that the question was entirely in the hands of Congress. Given that Oberstar is the guy responsible for writing the first draft of next transportation bill (which could be signed into law later this year), it seems quite likely that there will be provisions for a mileage tax in it.

NY Times: Mileage Tax Would ‘Track Where Motorists Have Been’

March 9, 2008

Prison Planet - A New York Times article about the different test studies being conducted as a precursor to the introduction of a CO2 or mileage tax admits that cars will contain tracking devices that will record where motorists have been.

Obama’s transportation secretary Ray LaHood recently caused controversy when he let slip that the administration was considering a “vehicles miles traveled” tax to replace the federal fuel tax. Press secretary Robert Gibbs hastily moved to offset concerns by claiming that such a tax “is not and will not be the policy of the Obama administration.”

However, as the New York Times reported in its Sunday edition, a number of different large scale beta-testing programs are currently underway to trial that exact scheme. The largest is the $16.5 million federal Road User Study, under which thousands of volunteers in Austin, Tex.; Baltimore; Boise, Idaho; Raleigh and Durham, N.C.; San Diego; and the Quad Cities region of Iowa are driving cars equipped with tracking devices that catalogue their every movement.

For such a program to achieve its objective of taxing people by the mile, one would think that the only information the tracking device would need to measure is how many miles the vehicle has traveled. However, the true purpose of the technology is revealed when we learn that the system will also “record where motorists have been...”

Government Prepares the Public for Cradle to Grave Surveillance

CFR member and current DHS boss Janet Napolitano rolled out the idea of “enhanced driver’s licenses,” that is to say RFID national ID cards.

February 28, 2009

Infowars - Last week Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood floated the idea of a mileage tax.

“The idea — which involves tracking drivers through Global Positioning System (GPS) units in their cars — is gaining support in some states as a way of making up for a shortfall in highway funding,” reports CNN.

It didn’t take long for Obama to reject the idea — at least for now. The National Surface Transportation Infrastructure Financing Commission report rolling out the mileage tax is designed not to foist this intrusive technology on the American people in the short term, but rather get them acclimated to the idea of being tracked and taxed...

CFR Corporate Members Get Lion's Share of Bailout Funds

CFR Corporate Members Get Lion's Share of Bailout Funds

April 25, 2009

New American - Newspapers are fixated upon $160 million in bonuses given to American International Group (AIG) executives. And it’s nice to know where the millions are going (note: the bonuses could have been cancelled had the federal government let the company go bankrupt, as officials should have). But where are the trillions in TARP, TALC and Federal Reserve Bank bailout funds going?

The man in charge of administering the bailouts is Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who served as a staff member of the New York City-based Council on Foreign Relations before being hired in 2003 to head the New York City branch of the Federal Reserve Bank (Fed).

As the vice chairman of the Fed’s Open Market Committee, Geithner is probably a poor choice to get the nation out of its current economic mess. He served as Alan Greenspan’s number two man at the Fed, so Geithner is as responsible as anyone for facilitating the severity of the real estate and financial bubble and its subsequent collapse. After all, the Fed was the driving force behind the asset bubble, inflating the bubble larger and larger through artificially low interest rates and an inflationary easy-money policy.

Under Geithner and his predecessor (former Goldman Sachs CEO Henry “Hank” Paulson), the majority of bailout funds have been awarded to high-level donors to Geithner's former employer: the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). Here’s a survey of TARP bailout awards to the CFR’s corporate members (there are a total of only a little more than 200 corporate members at all levels):

Among the “Founders” (those who give $100,000 or more to CFR) can be found:

• American Express Company: $3.39 billion TARP
• Goldman Sachs: $10 billion TARP, plus a separate Federal Reserve bailout and more than $13 billion of the allotment to AIG (below)
• Merrill Lynch: $45 billion through its corporate parent, Bank of America, which is also a CFR Premium corporate member, plus $6.8 billion of AIG’s bailout funds

“President’s Circle” members (those who give $60,000 - $99,999 to CFR) received the following bailout funds:

• American International Group (AIG): $182 billion in total TARP/TALF funds to date
• Citibank: $50 billion TARP
• Morgan Stanley: $10 billion TARP

“Premium” members (those who give $30,000 - $59,999 to CFR):

• Bank of New York/Mellon Corporation: $3 billion TARP
• Freddie Mac: Sharing with Fannie Mae $1.25 trillion (that’s $1,250 billion in mortgage securities being purchased from the Federal Reserve Bank)
• Chrysler: $4 billion TARP, plus $1.5 billion TARP for Chrysler Financial
• JP Morgan Chase: $25 billion TARP
• CIT Group: $2.33 billion TARP

That’s a total of more than $1 trillion in bailout funds for CFR corporate members, easily the lion’s share of the total bailout funds awarded to date. CFR membership seems to have its benefits, and then some.

So why is no one asking questions about why most of the funds are going to the former employers of our Treasury secretaries? Perhaps because many of the entities who should ask "why" are also CFR corporate members. Among the financial press, the CFR counts among its members Bloomberg, General Electric (NBC, CNBC, MSNBC), News Corporation (Fox, Fox Business), Standard and Poor's, ABC News, Time Warner (CNN, Time magazine, etc.), Moody's, and McGraw Hill (book publishers).

Somebody should ask the question why the same people who brought us this financial crisis are now bringing us the "cure," and why that cure necessarily involves financing former employers of the people making the decisions.

Credit Card Defaults Could Be the Next Financial Storm

April 23, 2009

Politico - ...Consumer outrage about credit cards is at an all-time high. So are delinquencies, which hit 5.56 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008. That’s a 60 percent jump since 2005, according to the Federal Reserve.

And then there are the fears that credit card defaults could be the next financial storm to hit already struggling consumers. Even some of the industry’s longtime allies on Capitol Hill admit that change is coming. “Most of the banks realize that some of what they’ve done before — the processes being followed — don’t really look very good in the light of day,” said Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.), whose state is home base for a large number of credit card firms.

What remains unclear is whether Obama will throw enough political capital behind the issue to get a bill passed into law...

The House Financial Services Committee approved credit card reform legislation Wednesday, and the bill is expected to pass the House easily as early as next week.

The House would largely codify into law new rules authored by Rep. Carolyn Maloney and approved by the Federal Reserve last year but not scheduled to take effect until July 2010. The House bill wouldn’t kick in much sooner, but Maloney won an amendment that speeds up the start date for a provision requiring card companies to provide consumers with a 45-day notice before they hike interest rates. Under Maloney’s amendment, the companies would be required to give 90 days’ notice...

Dems: Freeze rate hikes on credit cards
Dealing with the Next Crisis: Credit Cards

Geithner Defends Bank Rescue Program Amid Warnings

April 21, 2009

AP - Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner defended the bank rescue program devised by the Obama administration Tuesday as the International Monetary Fund predicted U.S. financial institutions could lose $2.7 trillion from the global credit crisis.

Geithner testifying before the rescue plan's Congressional Oversight Panel (and expressing concern over "the capital needs of the 19 largest banks in the country"), faced several questions about how Treasury is using the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program and how it intends to help rid financial institutions of their bad loans and securities.

His testimony came in the wake of a watchdog agency report that warned Obama administration initiatives could increasingly expose taxpayers to losses and make the government more vulnerable to fraud.

A special inspector general assigned to the bailout program concluded in a 250-page quarterly report to Congress that a private-public partnership designed to buy up bad assets is tilted in favor of private investors and creates "potential unfairness to the taxpayer."

Geithner said the new plan "strikes the right balance" by letting taxpayers share the risk with the private sector while at the same time letting private industry use competition to set market prices for the assets.

"If the government alone purchased these legacy assets from banks, it would assume the entire share of the losses and risk overpaying," Geithner said in his remarks. "Alternatively, if we simply hoped that banks would work off these assets over time, we would be prolonging the economic crisis, which in turn would cost more to the taxpayer over time."

Geithner said "the vast majority of banks" have more capital than they need to be considered well-capitalized. But he said the economic crisis and the bad assets have created uncertainty about the health of individual banks and reduced lending across the system.

"For every dollar that banks are short of the capital they need, they will be forced to shrink their lending by $8 to $12," he said.

While credit conditions have improved in the past few months, "reports on bank lending show significant declines in consumer loans, including credit card loans, and commercial and industrial loans," Geithner said.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
Elizabeth Warren Pt. 1
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Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis Political Humor

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
Elizabeth Warren Pt. 2
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Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis Political Humor

In a letter Tuesday to oversight panel chairwoman Elizabeth Warren, Geithner said that $109.6 billion in resources remain in the rescue fund. But officials expect the fund will be boosted over the next year by about $25 billion as some institutions pay back money they have received.

But under questioning from panel members, Geithner said that even if banks want to pay back the money, that doesn't mean the government would necessarily accept the payment.

"Ultimately we have to look at two things, one is do the institutions themselves have enough capital to be able to lend and does the system as a whole, is it working for the American people for recovery," Geithner said.

The government's effort to stabilize the financial sector and unclog the credit markets has come under heavy scrutiny. Treasury officials say the Obama administration has been holding participants more accountable. Geithner sent key members of Congress six-page letters last week spelling out his department's measures.

Still, Inspector General Neil Barofksy, using blunt language, offered a series of recommendations to protect the public and took the Treasury to task for not implementing previous advice.

Overall, the report said the public-private partnership — using Treasury, Federal Reserve and private investor money — could total $2 trillion. "The sheer size of the program ... is so large and the leverage being provided to the private equity participants so beneficial, that the taxpayer risk is many times that of the private parties, thereby potentially skewing the economic incentives," the report stated.

In particular, the report cited funds that would be used to purchase troubled real estate-related securities from financial institutions. Under plans unveiled by Treasury, for every $1 of private investment, Treasury would invest $1 and could provide another dollar in a nonrecourse loan. That money could then leverage a loan from another government fund backed mostly by the Federal Reserve, a step that Barofsky said would dilute the incentive for private fund managers to exercise due diligence.

Barofsky recommended that Treasury not allow the use of Fed loans "unless significant mitigating measures are included to address these dangers."

Among Barofsky's recommendations:

• Treasury should set tough conflict of interest rules on public-private fund managers to prevent investment decisions that benefit them at taxpayer expense.
• Treasury should disclose the owners of all private equity stakes in a public-private fund.
• Fund managers should have "investor-screening" procedures to prevent asset purchase transactions from being used for money laundering.

Bank of America: It May Take a While to Payback $45 Billion to U.S. Taxpayers

April 2, 2009

Reuters - Bank of America Corp (BAC.N) Chairman and Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis said it may take several quarters for the bank to repay its $45 billion of federal bailout money, although he believes the U.S. economy may bottom out in the second half of this year... Bank of America took $25 billion from the federal Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) last year and another $20 billion in January to absorb losses at Merrill. Lewis said he regretted taking that much and said the bank would not need more aid...

Report: B of A CEO says he was told to be quiet on Merrill

The Right to Keep and Bear Arms

Obama Pushing Treaty To Ban Reloading

April 27, 2009

Gun Owners of America - Reloading ammunition — or putting together a lawful firearm from a kit — is clearly “illicit manufacturing” under proposed treaty...

California Gun Decision Muddies 2nd Amendment Waters

Bob Barr - We’re witnessing confusion being sown involving the scope of the 2nd Amendment and of the extent to which it may permissibly be limited...

Ten Years After Columbine, It's Easier to Bear Arms

April 20, 2009

Time - Monday April 20 marks 10 years since Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold permanently etched the words Columbine High School into this nation's collective memory. What happened that day in 1999 also seemed to wake America up to the reality that it had become a nation of gun owners - and too often a nation of shooters.

The carnage in Littleton, Colorado - 12 classmates and a teacher before the killers offed themselves - and the ease with which the teenagers acquired their weapons (two sawed-off shotguns, a 9-mm semiautomatic carbine and a TEC-9 handgun) seemed to usher in a new era of, well if not gun control, then at least gun awareness.

In the decade since, massacres perpetrated by deranged gunmen have continued - including the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre in which Cho Seung-Hui killed 32 people and wounded many others. But something odd has occurred. Whatever momentum the Columbine killings gave to gun control has long since petered out.

This spring, for example, Texas lawmakers are mulling a new law that would allow college students to carry firearms to campus (Utah already makes this legal)... But efforts like Woods' are up against powerful headwinds - and not just because of the powerful gun lobby that often strangles gun-control laws. Americans in general have cooled significantly to the idea of restricting gun rights. A poll released last week by CNN showed that support for stricter gun laws was at an all-time low, with just 39% of respondents in favor. Eight years ago that number was 54%...'

Since 2003, at least eight states have either passed new laws giving most residents the right to carry concealed handguns or changed existing laws to make it harder for state officials to deny those permits, according to a 2008 study in the Yale Law & Policy Review. In the past couple of years, another trend has taken root, too: the expansion of the so-called Castle Doctrine, a legal theory enshrined in common law. It is used to justify deadly force in the defense of one's home, although it's usually interpreted to include a duty to try to avoid confrontation if one can. But in the past three years, the National Rifle Association has encouraged states to write the doctrine into statute, without imposing the attendant obligation to flee for safety. Many have done so, including Alabama, Arizona, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi and South Dakota. In 2007, Texas took things a step farther, and expanded its law to protect shooters who act in self-defense or act to stop certain crimes anywhere the shooter has a legal right to be — such as at work, in his car or the like...

The biggest change of all came last year at the Supreme Court, when the justices struck down what had been the strictest gun-control ordinance in the country — the ban on handguns in murder-plagued Washington, D.C. Taking only its second gun-rights case in 70 years, the court established for the first time that the Second Amendment, like the First, enshrines fundamental rights that belong to each citizen, not just the community as a whole. The implications for state and local gun-control laws haven't yet been fully understood — and probably won't for years to come as lower-court cases work out how to interpret the ruling.

Obama Laments Not Being Able to Ban Assault Weapons

April 18, 2009

The Examiner - We’ve all seen the news stories about how retail sales of firearms have been at record levels ever since Barack Obama won the election. Two primary reasons have been cited for this spike in ownership, uncertainty about the economy leading to fears of increased crime and the concern that the Obama administration will move to reinstate the "Assault Weapons Ban" which expired in 2004.

Many of those stories have quoted anti-gun pundits as saying gun owners are being paranoid and that the new government isn’t out to ban guns. This claim was repeated when U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said, "as President Obama indicated during the campaign, there are just a few gun-related changes that we would like to make, and among them would be to reinstate the ban on the sale of assault weapons."

About a month later, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton echoed that claim when she opined, "I think these assault weapons, these military style weapons, don’t belong on anyone’s street." She also noted, "We’re going to talk to the Congress, I’m not going to sugarcoat it. It’s a very heavy lift." It’s a heavy lift because the People don’t want more of their rights taken away.

Now, after letting his administration hammer away at the issue, President Obama let his true feelings be known during a press conference yesterday.

"I continue to believe that we can respect and honor the Second Amendment right in our Constitution — the rights of sportsmen and hunters and homeowners that want to keep their families safe — to lawfully bear arms, while dealing with assault weapons that, as we know here in Mexico, are used to fuel violence," Obama said.

The last president to lie to the American people was impeached. Obama must have been directing this particular lie to Mexican citizens. It is a lie because in the United States, gun that were covered by the expired AWB accounted for a very small percentage of all gun related crimes, hardly qualifying them to "fuel violence." It is also a lie because his administration continues to perpetuate the myth that 90% of all weapons used in the Mexican Drug Wars come from the United States. All people have to do is watch news footage or read articles showing automatic rifles, grenades, explosives, and RPGs being used, none of which are readily available in the U.S...

Obama Gun Ban: Not If We Can Help It!

April 16, 2009

American Daily Review - According to George Mason, father of the Bill of Rights, we are about to be enslaved, as he said, "What is the militia? It is the whole person. To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them. According to Soviet Communist Revolutionary Vladimir Lenin 'one person with a gun can control one hundred without one.'"

The writing has been on the wall and hard-working, law-abiding Americans are MUCH less inclined to tolerate the diabolical legislation and hypocritical statements pouring out of the White House in record numbers. We’re lectured constantly about accountability and 'reform' from people who refuse to be accountable and have offered nothing except for out of control government spending, huge ridiculous programs for people who don’t contribute a dime, weak foreign policy, and shady cabinet appointments.

These same individuals have been seeking excuses, reasons and methods in which to strip us of our constitutional rights, including those encapsulated by the Second Amendment: the right to bear arms!

Why?

Because if the people have no access to guns, they have no way to fight the Federal Government when it decides to strip any or all of the people’s rights afforded by the First Amendment. Those being the right to freedom of the press, free speech, freedom of religion, the right to assemble, and the right to redress grievances.

Anyone capable of reading understands that throughout history whenever economies suffer, crime rises. This, coupled with the crisis along the Mexican/U.S. Border, has easily exacerbated the current argument into a full blown push for gun control; i.e., the false claim that 90% of weapons used to commit crimes in Mexico come from the U.S. The fact is, the statistic isn’t 90%- it’s much closer to 17% of guns used in Mexican crimes were traced to the United States. Liberals don’t want to talk about this; it doesn’t serve their purpose.

Brad O’Leary, author of the best seller “The Audacity of Deceit, Barack Obama’s War on American Values” predicted word for word, line for line the sequence that Barack Obama would follow to ban the private ownership of weapons as much as possible in the hope of the eventual abolishment of the Second Amendment completely. The entire second chapter is devoted to the subject and includes Barack Obama’s “yes” answers regarding questions about the ban of handguns, assault weapons, and mandatory background checks before anyone can purchase any kind of a gun. Let’s not forget that Obama was also on the board of The Joyce Foundation, another George Soros sponsored Socialist entity which is involved in the lobbying for ridiculous standards on environmental, educational and, of course, gun ownership issues.

Since the election, the Obama Administration has jumped right onto the gun control bandwagon, demanding reform, putting an end to unregistered gun sales at gun shows, requiring huge million dollar insurance policies on the owners for weapons, stricter oversights and the labeling of bullets, and even the suggestion that the U.S. adopt U.N. hand gun regulations, including a potential ban.

In short, the former Senator, who could only be bothered to show up to vote ‘present’ more than any other in history (when he showed up or wasn’t too late to vote at all), is going to try to make it nearly impossible to afford gun ownership in America.

Don’t believe it? Read the proposed, over-reaching, and Second Amendment-violating legislation proposed in H.R. 45, otherwise known as Blair Holt’s Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009...

Secret DHS Doc Predicts Violence in Response to New Gun Restrictions

April 13, 2009

Infowars - In the wake of the MIAC report and the Virginia Terrorism Threat Assessment, another document issued by the Department of Homeland Security “for official use only” covering so-called “rightwing extremism” has surfaced. The document warns federal and local officials to expect “terrorism” in response to planned firearm restrictions...

Internet Censorship

Federal Authority Over the Internet? The Cybersecurity Act of 2009

April 15, 2009

The Electronic Frontier Foundation - There’s a new bill working its way through Congress that is cause for some alarm: the Cybersecurity Act of 2009 ( PDF summary here), introduced by Senators Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME). The bill as it exists now risks giving the federal government unprecedented power over the Internet without necessarily improving security in the ways that matter most. It should be opposed or radically amended.

Essentially, the Act would federalize critical infrastructure security. Since many of our critical infrastructure systems (banks, telecommunications, energy) are in the hands of the private sector, the bill would create a major shift of power away from users and companies to the federal government. This is a potentially dangerous approach that favors the dramatic over the sober response.

One proposed provision, which gives the President unfettered authority to shut down Internet traffic in an emergency and disconnect critical infrastructure systems on national security, grounds goes too far. Certainly there are times when a network owner must block harmful traffic, but the bill gives no guidance on when or how the President could responsibly pull the kill switch on privately-owned and operated networks...

Feds Plan to Take Over Cybersecurity, Enforce Regulations on Private Industry

April 1, 2009

Washington Post - The proposals, in Senate legislation that could be introduced as early as today, would broaden the focus of the government’s cybersecurity efforts to include not only military networks but also private systems that control essentials such as electricity and water distribution...

Cybersecurity Act of 2009

April 6, 2009

Infowars - ...Obama’s internet agenda is an extension of his effort to impose government control over the private sector. Republicans call this socialism. In a way it is socialism, but not the kind you were told about in high school—it is a socialism devised by the Trilateralists and Council on Foreign Relations. It is a system of control that will be imposed by the bankers, and it has nothing to do with equality for all individuals or a fair or egalitarian method of compensation for workers. Banker socialism is about serfdom and poverty.

It should be obvious what is going on here. Not 'if' but 'when' the next false flag attack occurs here in America, the elite will turn off the internet in order to control the flow of information. They will tell us they were forced to do this in order to deny terrorists in caves or driving around with Ron Paul bumper stickers on their cars the ability to sabotage the power grid and banks...

Blitz of “Cyber Attacks” as Rockefeller Bill Approaches

International Copyright Law to Attack PC Privacy

March 26, 2009

Russia Today - The personal computer may soon be not-so-private, with the U.S. and some European nations working on laws allowing them access to search the content held on a person’s hard drive....

Rockefeller: Internet is 'Number One National Hazard'

March 23, 2009

Infowars - According to the great-grandson of John D. Rockefeller, nephew of banker David Rockefeller, and former Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, the internet represents a serious threat to national security. Rockefeller is not alone in this assessment. His belief that the internet is the “number one national hazard” to national security is shared by the former Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell and Obama’s current director Admiral Dennis C. Blair...

However, the real threat to internet freedom is currently posed by IT and ISP corporations, not the government. As Alex Jones explained last June, large corporate ISPs are now in the process of imposing bandwidth caps and routing traffic over their networks and blocking certain targeted websites...

VIDEO: Rockefeller Pontificates on the National Security Threat Posed by the Internet
VIDEO: Alex Jones Show on 'the Death of the Internet'
One in Four UK Government Websites are Illegal

In Australia, Banned Hyperlinks Could Cost You $11,000 a Day

March 17, 2009

Sydney Morning Herald - The Australian communications regulator says it will fine people who hyperlink to sites on its blacklist, which has been further expanded to include several pages on the anonymous whistleblower site Wikileaks.

Cybersecurity Chief Resigns

March 11, 2009

Wall Street Journal - The government's coordinator for cybersecurity programs, Rod Beckstrom, has quit, criticizing what he described as the National Security Agency's grip on cybersecurity. Mr. Beckstrom's National Cybersecurity Center, created last March to coordinate all government cybersecurity efforts, answers to the secretary of Homeland Security.

In reality, "NSA currently dominates most national cyber efforts," Mr. Beckstrom wrote to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano on Thursday. "While acknowledging the critical importance of NSA to our intelligence efforts, I believe this is a bad strategy on multiple grounds."

He added that "the threats to our democratic processes are significant if all top level government network security and monitoring are handled by any one organization (either directly or indirectly)." That echoed the view of some privacy advocates who worry about a government agency having too much information on individuals...

New York Times Calls for Internet 2

February 16, 2009

Infowars Editor’s Note: According to Markoff, the internet is so flawed and clogged with viruses, the only solution is to scrap it and start over. He suggests a “gated community” where users give up their anonymity and freedom in return for safety. Sounds like the same version of the internet our rulers have in mind.

The Final Push for World Government

Marines and Multinational Forces Train in Florida

April 26, 2009

The Florida Times-Union - During the past week, the troops - Marines from the U.S. and six countries in Central and South America, as well as soldiers from Canada - worked together at Camp Blanding, fast-roping out of helicopters, firing weapons and sharing tactics.

They jelled quickly. “The only difference in identity” said Lt. Col. Jorge Garcia of Colombia, “is in the color of the uniforms. We have the same objectives.”

The Tower of Basel: Secretive Plans for the Issuing of a Global Currency

April 19, 2009

Global Research - Do we really want the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) issuing our global currency? In an April 7 article in the London Daily Telegraph titled “The G20 Moves the World a Step Closer to a Global Currency,” Ambrose Evans-Pritchard wrote:

“A single clause in Point 19 of the communiqué issued by the G20 leaders amounts to revolution in the global financial order.

“We have agreed to support a general SDR allocation which will inject $250bn (£170bn) into the world economy and increase global liquidity,’ it said. SDRs are Special Drawing Rights, a synthetic paper currency issued by the International Monetary Fund that has lain dormant for half a century.

“In effect, the G20 leaders have activated the IMF’s power to create money and begin global ‘quantitative easing’. In doing so, they are putting a de facto world currency into play. It is outside the control of any sovereign body. Conspiracy theorists will love it.”

BIS, founded in Basel, Switzerland, in 1930, it has been scandal-ridden from its beginnings. According to Charles Higham in his book Trading with the Enemy, by the late 1930s the BIS had assumed an openly pro-Nazi bias.

Indeed they will. The article is subtitled, “The world is a step closer to a global currency, backed by a global central bank, running monetary policy for all humanity.” Which naturally raises the question, who or what will serve as this global central bank, cloaked with the power to issue the global currency and police monetary policy for all humanity? When the world’s central bankers met in Washington last September, they discussed what body might be in a position to serve in that awesome and fearful role. A former governor of the Bank of England stated:

“The answer might already be staring us in the face, in the form of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS)… The IMF tends to couch its warnings about economic problems in very diplomatic language, but the BIS is more independent and much better placed to deal with this if it is given the power to do so...”

Gaddafi Outlines African Vision

April 15, 2009

BBC - Libyan leader and current African Union chairman Muammar Gaddafi has spelled out his plans to create a United States of Africa. At an AU Executive Council session in Tripoli, he called on the continent to speed up the integration process. His vision of a pan-African government was at the heart of disputes at February’s AU summit in Ethiopia.

He said an African Union Authority would replace all other organs and be run by three co-ordinators. The BBC’s Rana Jawad in Tripoli says the establishment of an AU Authority is meant to be the starting point for the envisioned United States of Africa.

More than 60 AU ministers and delegates gathered for a one-day meeting in the Libyan capital to hear Col Gaddafi outline in detail for the first time how his plan would work...

Obama Seeks $83.4 Billion to Continue U.S. Wars

April 11, 2009

World Socialist Web Site - With his request for $83.4 billion in “emergency” funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Obama is ensuring their continuation and escalation, as well as the extension of U.S. military aggression...

Green Stimulus Money Costs More Jobs Than It Creates, Study Shows

April 13, 2009

CNSNews Every “green job” created with government money in Spain over the last eight years came at the cost of 2.2 regular jobs...

Obama Hails the New World Order

April 3, 2009

The Independent - Gordon Brown declared that a $1 trillion package to stimulate economic growth agreed at yesterday’s G20 summit in London will ensure that the world pulls out of recession more quickly. Speaking after the one-day summit of the world’s richest nations in the Docklands, the Prime Minister said there were “no quick fixes,” adding: “Today’s decisions will not immediately solve the crisis. But we have begun the process by which it will be solved.”

He said: “This is the day that the world came together to fight back against the global recession, not with words, but with a plan for global recovery and for reform and with a clear timetable for its delivery.”

The US President Barack Obama played a key role in brokering the agreement, resolving tensions between China and France on tax havens.

The $1trn will be made available to countries that run into trouble via the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and World Trade Organisation, which will all be beefed up. Half the money will come from IMF loans, with $250bn to finance trade deals and a further $250bn from the IMF’s currency reserve.

Mr Brown and President Obama originally wanted the G20 summit to call for higher government spending and tax cuts, but they ran into opposition from European nations, led by Germany and France. However, the summit kept open the option of such action in 2010 if the $5trn fiscal stimulus scheme does not work. The IMF will have a new role in monitoring whether countries are doing enough to help the world economy grow at about 4 per cent a year.

G20 leaders will meet again to review progress, probably in New York in September, to coincide with the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly.

Last night British ministers said the real significance of yesterday’s agreement was not the $1trn package but the enhanced role it gave to world institutions like the IMF, whose budget will triple to $750bn.

“A new world financial order has been born, almost by accident, because of this crisis,” one cabinet minister said. “These bodies have been revamped; now they need to raise their game.”

The IMF will no longer be regarded as a last-resort option for nations facing bankruptcy, but will instead take preventative action. Many nations have been reluctant to turn to the fund because the stigma of doing so sends bad signals to the financial markets...

Venezuelan President Seeks Arab Support for New Oil-backed Currency

March 31, 2009

AP - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez tried Tuesday to court Arab support for another swipe at America as its economy stumbles: a proposal for a new, oil-backed currency to challenge the global prominence of the dollar.

The idea never reached the full agenda of a summit of leaders from South America and the Arab League—and has little hope of gaining any momentum among the U.S. allies in the Middle East. But it managed to reflect broader sentiments at the gathering: that Western financial leadership has been deeply eroded by the economic meltdown.

Chavez set the tone moments after arriving in Qatar, proposing a "petro-currency" that would have the backing of oil-rich nations such as Venezuela and its Arab partners in OPEC. Chavez has tried before, with little success, to undercut the dollar's role as the world's leading commercial currency.

The dollar, however, is facing real pressures elsewhere.

China has struck deals—most recently this week with Argentina—to conduct trade in currencies other than the dollar, and Beijing's central bank governor has proposed creating a new "reserve currency" comprising a basket of global currencies controlled by the International Monetary Fund. Iran has proposed replacing the dollar with the euro or other currencies to set worldwide oil prices, and other nations are swapping some foreign currency reserves in favor of the euro. "Venezuela supports... efforts to find an alternative reserve currency," Chavez told the summit.

Chavez plans stops in both Iran and China—in addition to Japan— after the one-day gathering, which focused heavily on trade issues but also touched on Arab worries about rival Iran's growing influence in Latin America.

"The global economic crisis erupted outside our regions, but nevertheless effect our economies," said a statement by business envoys from the two regions, who called for a "new international financial system" that includes greater influence from outside the West...

Arab Parliament Approves Yemeni Initiative to Develop Arab Joint Work

March 22, 2009

Yemen News Agency (Saba) - The Arab Parliament approved on Sunday a Yemeni initiative of developing Arab joint work. In its round held in Damascus capital of Syria, the parliament considered the initiative of Yemen as serious and typical step to enhance national security of the Arab nation and Arab-Arab ties. It thanked Yemen for the initiative, asking the speaker of the parliament to raise it to the secretary general of the Arab league to be presented then to the coming Arab summit.

Meanwhile, the parliament agreed to form a committee of solidarity with Sudan headed by the deputy speaker of the parliament Mansor al-Zandani. Al-Zandani told Saba that the initiative comes within concern of the Yemen represented by President Ali Abdullah Saleh to boost the joint Arab work to serve issues of the Arab nation.

Next Round of Talks on Russia-EU Deal To Be Held in June

April 3, 2009

RIA Novosti - The next round of talks on a comprehensive Russia-EU partnership deal will be held in June, Russia's EU envoy Vladimir Chizhov said on Friday.

Moscow hosted on Friday the fourth round of negotiations on a new cooperation agreement between Russia and the 27-nation bloc, set to replace the 1997 Partnership and Cooperation Agreement, which was extended after its expiry in December 2007...

The G-20 Summit: Neoliberal Agenda Untouched; Next Phase of the Crisis is Looming

April 2, 2009

Global Research - The G20 strategy is to put a fresh coat of paint on a world which is collapsing. Only a strong popular mobilization will make it possible to lay solid foundations to build another world in which finance is at the service of people, and not the other way round. The 28 and 30 March demos were big ones: 40,000 people in London, thousands and thousands in Vienna, Berlin, Stuttgart, Madrid, Brasilia, Rome, etc. with the common motto “Let the rich pay the crisis!”

The week of global action called for by the social movements from all over the world at the WSF at Belém last January thus had a gigantic echo. Those who had announced the end of the movement for another globalization were wrong. It has proved that it is able to bring large crowds together, and this is only the beginning. The success of the mobilizations in France on 29 January and 19 March (three million demonstrators were in the streets) is evidence that the workers, the unemployed and young people all want other solutions to the crisis than those which consist in bailing out bankers and imposing restrictions on the lower classes...

Brown: London Can Lead the New Order

April 1, 2009

This is London - London’s beleaguered bankers can lead the world to future prosperity by embracing reforms being unveiled at the G20 summit, Gordon Brown declared today.

Writing exclusively in the Evening Standard, the Prime Minister called on the City to adopt his agenda of better regulation and closer supervision, setting new standards for the world to follow.

“It is fitting that we are seeking to agree new rules for global financial markets here in London,” he wrote...

World Bank President Admits Agenda For Global Government

April 1, 2009

Prison Planet - World Bank President and Bilderberg elitist Robert Zoellick openly admitted the plan to eliminate national sovereignty and impose a global government during a speech on the eve of the G20 summit.

Speaking about the agenda to increase not just funding but power for international organizations on the back of the financial crisis, Zoellick stated, “If leaders are serious about creating new global responsibilities or governance, let them start by modernising multilateralism to empower the WTO, the IMF, and the World Bank Group to monitor national policies.”

In other words, give global institutions the power to regulate national policy as part of the creation of global government...