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Saturday, March 31, 2012

What you need to know about the Federal Reserve...

What every American needs to know about the Federal Reserve System

by Fabius Maximus

Summary: The Federal Reserve has become one of the most powerful government agencies, operating almost free of checks and balances. Worse, it represents one of the most outrageous examples of regulatory capture, private interests taking control of agencies intended to supervise them. Today we have Michael Hudson to explain to use the significance of these events.

An interview with Michael Hudson published on the Russian website Terra America. Posted here with his generous permission. His bio appears at the end. Red emphasis added.

Question: What is the place of the Federal Reserve System in the American financial and economic structure?

Prior to the Federal Reserve’s founding in 1913, U.S. monetary policy was conducted by the Treasury. Like the Fed, it had district sub-treasuries that performed nearly all the financial functions that the Fed later took over: providing credit to move the crops in autumn, managing government debt, and so forth.

But after the severe 1907 financial crisis, a National Monetary Commission was reformed. Under the then-Republican administration, it recognized a need for more active government intervention to prevent future financial crises. It also recognized the desirability of moving away from the Anglo-Dutch-American system of “merchant banking” based on short-term lending against collateral in place, or for shipping of goods already produced. The National Monetary Commission’s longest volumes were on the great German industrial banks, and Republican policy aimed at bringing banking into the industrial era, to provide long-term funding after the model of German and other Central European banks.

However, the leading bankers sought to use the crisis as an opportunity to grab power for Wall Street, away from the Treasury. In this sense, the Fed was founded in large part to take monetary control away from Washington’s elected officials and appointees, and privatize the supply of money and credit.

So its place in the U.S. financial and economic structure is to allocate credit, primarily to serve Wall Street financial interests. That explains the insistence on the financial class here and abroad in insisting on an “independent” central bank. It means that instead of serving the public interest, it serves the interests of the banking class. The hoped-for transformation of commercial banking into long-term industrial banking was not achieved.

Q: Can we imagine the global economic system without Federal Reserve today? If yes/no, why?

As David Kinley’s book for the National Monetary Commission pointed out a century ago, nearly all the financial functions performed by the Fed already were performed by the national Treasury. In more recent times, Milton Friedman and his University of Chicago colleagues suggested that the entire Fed could be reduced to a single desk inside the Treasury. The “Chicago Plan” of the 1930s urged Treasury control, as does Congressman Dennis Kucinich’s current bank reform.

There is no inherent need for a monetary agency to exist outside of the national government, except to serve the interests of the financial class as distinct from those of government, industry and labor. And the banking sector’s business plan is to load down real estate, labor, industry and the government with as much interest-bearing debt as possible.

Q: Some people in the US (especially supporters of the congressman Ron Paul) believe that the Federal Reserve is the reason of serious problems within the American financial system. Do you agree with this claim?

The Fed is a reason for serious problems, but not the only reason. Unfortunately, Ron Paul’s proposal opposes paper credit itself, whether issued by the Fed or the Treasury. He wants to return to the gold standard and clash government spending – in effect, to create an economy without government. So what he actually advocates is not only the end of the Fed, but the end of a functioning credit and tax system. The idea is otherworldly and has no possible chance of being enacted, because it would cause a vast debt default as a result of plunging prices, incomes and employment.

Q: Contrary to most of European central banks the Federal Reserve is quite autonomous and has some private aspects. Doesn’t it give too much power to this financial structure? Or maybe this power is part of the checks and balances within the American political system? If yes, what is its precise role and place?

The Federal Reserve is private in name only. Its heads are appointed by Washington, but Wall Street has veto power over it (as it has over the appointment of major Treasury and other regulatory agency officials). So the problem is not that the Fed is technically owned by its stockholders, but that Wall Street has gained overpowering control over government itself.

The financial sector has sought to dismantle checks and balances, making it protect Wall Street even as financial interests diverge from the promoting of economic growth and rising living standards.

Q: What is the priority for the Fed leadership: solving national American problems or serving the interests of the global system?

The Fed is officially supposed to perform two functions: First, to promote “price stability.” This means in practice, fight against wage inflation and preserve sufficient unemployment so that wages will not increase. The “prices” that are supposed to stabilize are the price of labor (wages) and commodity prices.

Meanwhile, the Fed seeks to inflate asset prices, above all real estate prices. Under Alan Greenspan, the aim of the Bubble Economy was to inflate housing prices by enough so that homeowners could borrow the interest to pay the bankers each year, and even enough to spend on consumer goods that their stagnant wage levels were not sufficient to buy. The result was to vastly increase the volume of debt – and debt service became a rising element of prices throughout the economy. Debt-leveraged housing prices ended up absorbing about 40 percent of typical family budgets, and a rising share of corporate income as well, leaving less for spending on current production of consumer goods and capital goods.

The second function the Fed was supposed to perform was to promote full employment. Mr. Greenspan made it clear that he believes that this is incompatible with the ideal of price stability. He pointed out before Congress that the virtue of loading down homeowners, college students and others with debt was that they were afraid to go on strike or even complain about working conditions or seek higher wages, for fear of being fired and missing a mortgage payment or credit-card payment. Going on strike or losing as job would threaten them with loss of a home, and an immediate increase in the credit-card interest rates and penalties that they had to pay. So the Fed became the leading administrator in Wall Street’s war against labor.

Under Mr. Greenspan’s tenure and that of his successor, Ben Bernanke, the Fed has overseen the greatest shift of wealth n American history since the Robber Barons.

Finally, the Fed has taken over the functions of government by threatening to close down the economy if the government does not bail out the banks at taxpayer expense, and protect the wealthy 1% against losing money.

Q: How different were the three last Fed chairmen? Who was the most successful?

Paul Volker came from the Chase Manhattan Bank. In the late 1970s he coped with the U.S. balance-of-payments deficit (stemming mainly from overseas military spending) and consequent the inflationary pressures by raising interest rates to 20%, thereby plunging stock market and real estate prices.

His successor, Alan Greenspan, was a Wall Street lobbyist and a follower of Ayn Rand. Diametrically opposite from Paul Volcker, he pressed to deregulate the economy and sponsored the financial bubble to pump enough credit (debt) into the economy to enable debtors to pay the banks the interest that was mounting up. As a bank lobbyist in control of the banking system, he “freed” the bank from government control – and promoted the greatest debt bubble in U.S. history.

Ben Bernanke was an academic, not a banker but sufficiently brainwashed in neoliberal, pro-Wall Street ideology to be trusted by the banks to flood the economy with credit in an attempt to re-inflate the bubble economy so as to pull real estate prices out of negative equity – thereby saving the banks from their bad loans. Instead of writing down debts, the Fed made sure that no bank would lose, or even be prosecuted for the financial fraud that has risen to epic proportions over the past decade. My UMKC colleague Prof. Bill Black calls this phenomenon “criminogenic.” So in effect, Mr. Bernanke is as much a bank lobbyist as Mr. Greenspan.

In this sense, both Mr. Greenspan and Mr. Bernanke were successful in steering U.S. financial policy to benefit Wall Street by loading down the economy with debt, and then using public credit to bail out the banks and pass the losses onto taxpayers. But this “success” is leaving the U.S. economy debt-ridden and uncompetitive internationally, because its industrial producers face such heavy debt charges that they are priced out of world markets for most products except for military arms, agriculture and high-technology monopoly goods and patented motion pictures and entertainment.

Q: The existence of the Federal Reserve: does it match with the ideas of the classical liberalism? How liberal is this institution?

The Federal Reserve is antithetical to the classical liberal aim of using financial and tax policy to minimize the economy’s cost of production. From the Physiocrats and Adam Smith through Ricardo, John Stuart Mill and the Reform Era, the aim was to minimize land rent (by either taxing it away or nationalizing the land), monopoly rent (by price regulation or by keeping natural monopolies in the public domain) and interest or other financial charges that were payments for special privilege.

Acting on behalf of the banks, the Fed has sponsored the un-taxing of real estate and monopolies, as these have become the major bank customers. And by deregulating Wall Street, the Fed has underwritten the overgrowth of unproductive credit – credit extended not to finance industrial capital formation, but simply to speculate and to transfer ownership of assets already in existence.

The guiding philosophy of the Fed is to inflate prices of assets in order to expand the market for real estate loans (which account for some 80 percent of bank loans in the United States), corporate takeover loans and speculative “casino capitalist” loans for foreign-currency and interest-rate arbitrage.


Read more:
http://fabiusmaximus.wordpress.com/2012/03/31/37021/?

Iran Bashing, Terrorism and Who Chose The Chosen People, Anyway?



Dedicated to the long-suffering Palestinians and Iranians who have been sidelined by the United Nations in favour of the Nuclear Apartheid State of Zionist Israel in the most blatant exercise in International Double Standards that our world has ever known.

This video demonstrates that the United States is not a democracy, it is a bribeocracy, largely controlled by Zionists. But citizens of other nations need not be complacent, for there is much evidence to suggest that the same pressures are being brought to bear on their politicians and officials to support Israel's excesses, and an Internet search will reveal that the first ever European Jewish Parliament held its inaugural meeting early in February, 2012; something that the mainstream media seemed reluctant to publicise.

Anthony Lawson, March 31st, 2012


Link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eptPeSmA37U&feature=player_embedded#!

OOPS!!!

Global warming happened in Medieval times with no CO2 emissions

By JohnThomas Didymus

A team of scientists have raised questions about current scientific theories about global warming. They showed there was a similar pattern of “global warming” during medieval times and that the planet cooled down after that leading to a “mini ice age.”

The group of scientists from the Syracuse University in New York state, led by geochemist Zunli Lu, found that the period known as the “Medieval Warm Period” occurred about 500 to 1,000 years ago and was not limited only to Europe as previously thought, but covered almost the entire world, including the Antarctica.

The significance of their work, as Daily Mail points out, is that the world has experienced global warming in the past, even in the absence of the current CO2 emissions that many scientists have blamed for the current pattern of global warming.

The consensus among scientists that the Earth is warming up due to CO2 emission, according to The Register, comes largely from the work of Michael Mann and Phil Jones, with its conclusions upheld by the IPCC. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) says that the Medieval Warm Period was only in Europe and that, therefore, the global warming we are experiencing now is caused by greenhouse gases emitted by man's industrial activities.

The Blaze reports that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency cautiously aligns with the IPCC view that the Medieval Warm Period was a local anomaly. EPA says temperatures have been relatively stable in the last 2,000 years apart from the periods of the Little Ice Age and what it terms the "Medieval Climate Anomaly," that is, the Medieval Warming Period, and now finally the temperature increase of the Industrial Era believed to be caused by greenhouse gas emissions. According to The Blaze, EPA acknowledges the fact of the Medieval Warm Period but says that “the geographical extent, magnitude and timing of the warmth during this period is uncertain.”

But in their study recently published online in the journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters, and titled "An Ikaite record of late Holocene climate at the Antarctic Peninsula," Professor Lu and his colleagues argue that there is evidence that the Medieval Warm Period was a global phenomenon. According to Lu, the clinching evidence that the Medieval Warm Period was global comes from study of the rare mineral ikaite which is formed in cold waters. According to The Register, Lu described ikaite as "an icy version of limestone. The crystals are only stable under cold conditions and actually melt at room temperature.”

Daily Mail reports that the researchers, in their study, showed that ikaite is a reliable way to study past conditions of the Earth's climate. Studies of the rare mineral derived from sediment cores off the coast of Antarctica deposited over 2,000 years ago includes those deposited in the so-called "Little Ice Age" about 300 to 500 years ago. The Little Ice Age occurred after the Medieval Warm Period.

Previous studies have documented both the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age in Northern Europe but it was never established with certainty that the conditions extended beyond Northern Europe.

Lu and his colleagues explain that hydration water that holds the crystal structure of this rare mineral together can give clues about temperature levels at the time when the crystals were formed. According to a Syracuse University release: "Ikaite crystals incorporate ocean bottom water into their structure as they form. During cooling periods, when ice sheets are expanding, ocean bottom water accumulates heavy oxygen isotopes (oxygen 18). When glaciers melt, fresh water, enriched in light oxygen isotopes (oxygen 16), mixes with the bottom water. The scientists analyzed the ratio of the oxygen isotopes in the hydration water and in the calcium carbonate. They compared the results with climate conditions established in Northern Europe across a 2,000-year time frame. They found a direct correlation between the rise and fall of oxygen 18 in the crystals and the documented warming and cooling periods."

In other words, the team looked at the amount of heavy oxygen isotopes found in the crystals and found that during cool periods there were high concentrations of the isotopes and during warm periods there were low concentrations of the isotopes.

Using the evidence from levels of heavy oxygen isotopes in the crystals from the Antarctica, Lu and his colleagues were able to show that the Medieval Warm Period was a global phenomenon.

The Register reports Lu said: "We showed that the Northern European climate events influenced climate conditions in Antarctica. More importantly, we are extremely happy to figure out how to get a climate signal out of this peculiar mineral. A new proxy is always welcome when studying past climate changes."

The importance of showing that the Medieval Warm Period was a global phenomenon rests on the fact that a major debate in the global warming controversy is that the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age were only regional. The Medieval Warm Period occurred approximately between 900 AD and 1250 AD and according to scientists temperature levels during this period were as high as what we are now experiencing. Evidence that the phenomenon was global would, of course, call the current global warming theories based on effects of CO2 concentrations into question and suggest that global warming is a natural process that occurs periodically.

Forbes‘s Tim Worstall points out a subtle fact that opponents of the current theories of global warming will miss, the fact that while global warming might have occurred in the past, a new complicating factor has been introduced into the phenomenon in the Industrial Era, and that is rising CO2 levels. The Register notes that the present CO2 levels in the atmosphere is 0.04 per cent "and may climb to 0.07 per cent in the medium term." These are projections of significant changes in CO2 levels which complicate the simpler picture of what happened in the medieval.

It is too early to say with certainty that the present pattern of climate change will behave exactly as it did in the medieval when global warming gave way to a "mini ice age." Lu's findings suggests the need to build new models of climate change which incorporate the new findings that global warming may occur independent of industrial emissions and then attempt to predict the impact of greenhouse gas emissions on the current trend we are witnessing.


Read more: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/321868#ixzz1qiILozd1

Globalists call off war with Iran, for now...

Brezinski: Attacking Iran "Will Produce Disasters Now”

Former U.S. National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski said in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “Political Capital With Al Hunt, the U.S. should “be patient in pursuing” an agreement with Iran, while extending its nuclear deterrence pledge to Israel and Persian Gulf nations.

“We have done that successfully in protecting South Korea and Japan from North Korea,” he said. “We did the same thing for decades in Europe against the Soviet Union. We have deterred the would-be nuclear threats, but we didn’t preempt and go to war in a preventive attack.”

A pre-emptive attack on Iran to stop its nuclear program “will produce disasters now,” he said


Link:
http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2012/03/brezenski-attacking-iran-will-produce.html

Can Israel use air bases near Iran?

McGrath: 'US intelligence is turning the nation into a battlefield'...

NSA storing the personal data of Americans?

Cartoon, picture, joke of the day...


Link:
http://whatreallyhappened.com/IMAGES/SMALL_kkkstunt.jpg

We don't need the media's help...

Why We Shouldn’t Want the Media’s Help

by Allan Stevo




A common complaint in the liberty movement is that the media is no help. For numerous reasons that’s an ideal situation for us.

The Media Offers No Help

There are plenty of media sources that censor Ron Paul. We can react to that in a variety of ways. The reasons media sources do not mention Ron Paul are numerous. The goals of not mentioning him are few and include – 1. Discouraging his supporters and 2. Distracting his supporters.

They underestimate the ardent Ron Paul supporters if they think a supporter will get discouraged by Ron Paul’s 89 seconds of time in a CBS debate. They underestimate us if they think a lack of mainstream media mention will get us down. They underestimate us if they think they will discourage us by acknowledging Ron Paul only when it looks like there’s an opportunity to discredit him. The media utterly fails at discouraging Ron Paul supporters, because largely they don’t understand the passion for freedom that Ron Paul supporters have. If you don’t "get" freedom, you’re going to have a hard time "getting" Ron Paul’s supporters.

What the media succeeds at is the second goal. Ron Paul supporters can get easily distracted. Ron Paul supporters flood comments sections, chat rooms, and Facebook fan pages and make a big show of the latest outrage on the internet. But NONE OF THAT MATTERS. Only one thing matters in a campaign and that is winning. Some will say Ron Paul runs to preach the message of freedom, that he runs for the sake of debate, that he runs to inspire the future generations. There are lots of better ways to do that than spending very long hours campaigning. The reason to run a campaign is singular – to win. All the rest can be nice secondary bonuses, but when the Republican National Convention convenes in late August 2012 in Tampa, Florida, the only thing we want is to see Ron Paul with the nomination. Without that, the campaign is lost. That’s all there is to it.

The way to beat every journalist and political analyst who laughs at Ron Paul and his supporters for their quaint notions of freedom is to win the GOP nomination.

A Media Myth

Here’s a funny thing about the media – they think they matter. Every Ron Paul supporter bringing 10 friends (And as you’re reading this, I hope you’re making a list of who those 10 supporters will be!) to the polls with him renders the mainstream media meaningless. Bring 10 friends and it won’t matter what the media says. Some will say it hasn’t mattered for a while, and I don’t think that’s really true, but today the mainstream media can, for the first time, be made worthless in a presidential election. We can nullify them.

We can make every smug journalist from Tallahassee to Kauai spit out his coffee morning-after-morning after reading on the internet about Ron Paul’s blazing success in the primaries the day before. You and I realize that interpersonal online connections matter, and that the mainstream media has in many ways stopped mattering. We will activate the networks we’ve spent years building, and we will use those networks to win the GOP nomination and then the U.S. presidency.

We Don’t Need The Old Media and We Shouldn’t Want Their Help

There are lies that can be told about every candidate. There are truths that can be spun to make every candidate appear ugly and to make it easier for any candidate to lose. When those attacks on Ron Paul begin, they will run rampant through the mainstream media with ease. When that happens, we will be grateful that we long ago gave up on the mainstream media and focused on building our own channels of communication instead of allowing the media to be the "communicator" of ideas for us.

The media had little to do with making Ron Paul popular – after all the people who learned enough about Ron Paul to want to vote for him did not learn about Ron Paul from the mainstream media – and therefore it would follow the media can do little to make Ron Paul unpopular. The members of our movement have generally learned not to pay the media much attention. While it has taken us a great deal of work to build these interpersonal networks that sidestep the media, it allows our movement to be much stronger, much more independent in its thoughts, and less prone to being influenced by the mainstream media.

To put a twist on a common political adage "A mainstream media strong enough to give you everything you want, is a mainstream media strong enough to take everything you have."


Link:
http://lewrockwell.com/stevo/stevo16.1.html

'...if Trayvon had been shot dead by a black neighborhood watch volunteer, Jesse Jackson would not have been in a pulpit in Sanford, Fla., howling that he had been "murdered and martyred."'

It's All About Race Now

by Patrick J. Buchanan


If it had been a white teenager who was shot, and a 28-year-old black guy who shot him, the black guy would have been arrested.

So assert those demanding the arrest of George Zimmerman, who shot and killed Trayvon Martin.

And they may be right.

Yet if Trayvon had been shot dead by a black neighborhood watch volunteer, Jesse Jackson would not have been in a pulpit in Sanford, Fla., howling that he had been "murdered and martyred."

Maxine Waters would not be screaming "hate crime."

Rep. Hank Johnson would not be raging that Trayvon had been "executed." And ex-Black Panther Bobby Rush would not have been wearing a hoodie in the well of the House.

Which tells you what this whipped-up hysteria is all about.

It is not about finding the truth about what happened that night in Sanford when Zimmerman followed Trayvon in his SUV, and the two wound up in a fight, with Trayvon dead.

It is about the exacerbation of and the exploitation of racial conflict.

And it is about an irreconcilable conflict of visions about what the real America is in the year 2012.

Zimmerman "profiled" Trayvon, we are told. And perhaps he did.

But why? What did George Zimmerman, self-styled protector of his gated community, see that night from the wheel of his SUV?

He saw a male. And males are 90 percent of prison inmates. He saw a stranger over 6 feet tall. And he saw a black man or youth with a hood over his head.

Why would this raise Zimmerman's antennae?

Perhaps because black males between 16 and 36, though only 2 to 3 percent of the population, are responsible for a third of all our crimes.

In some cities, 40 percent of all black males are in jail or prison, on probation or parole, or have criminal records. This is not a product of white racism but of prosecutions and convictions of criminal acts.

Had Zimmerman seen a black woman or older man in his neighborhood, he likely would never have tensed up or called in.

For all the abuse he has received, Geraldo Rivera had a point.

Whenever cable TV runs hidden-camera footage of a liquor or convenience store being held up and someone behind the counter being shot, the perp is often a black male wearing a hoodie.

Listening to the heated rhetoric coming from demonstrations around the country, from the Black Caucus and TV talkers – about how America is a terrifying place for young black males to grow up in because of the constant danger from white vigilantes – one wonders what country of the mind these people are living in.

The real America is a country where the black crime rate is seven times as high as the white rate. It is a country where white criminals choose black victims in 3 percent of their crimes, but black criminals choose white victims in 45 percent of their crimes.

Black journalists point to the racism manifest even in progressive cities, where cabs deliberately pass them by to pick up white folks down the block.

That this happens is undeniable. But, again, what is behind it?

As Heather Mac Donald of the Manhattan Institute has written, from January to June 2008 in New York City, 83 percent of all identified gun assailants were black and 15 percent were Hispanics.

Together, blacks and Hispanics accounted for 98 percent of gun assaults.

Translated: If a cabdriver is going to be mugged or murdered in New York City by a fare, 49 times out of 50 his assailant or killer will be black or Hispanic.

Fernando Mateo of the New York State Federation of Taxi Drivers has told his drivers, "Profile your passengers" for your own protection. "The God's honest truth is that 99 percent of the people that are robbing, stealing, killing these guys are blacks and Hispanics."

Fernando Mateo is himself black and Hispanic.

To much of America's black leadership and its media auxiliaries, what happened in Sanford was, as Jesse put it, that an innocent kid was "shot down in cold blood by a vigilante."

Yet, from police reports, witness statements, and the father and friends of Zimmerman, another picture emerges.

Zimmerman followed Trayvon, confronted him, and was punched in the nose, knocked flat on his back and jumped on, getting his head pounded, when he pulled his gun and fired. That Trayvon's body was found face down, not face up, would tend to support this.

But, to Florida Congresswoman Federica Wilson, "this sweet young boy ... was hunted down like a dog, shot on the street, and his killer is still at large."

Some Sanford police believed Zimmerman; others did not.

But now that it is being investigated by a special prosecutor, the FBI, the Justice Department and a coming grand jury, what is the purpose of this venomous portrayal of George Zimmerman?

As yet convicted of no crime, he is being crucified in the arena of public opinion as a hate-crime monster and murderer.

Is this our idea of justice?

No. But if the purpose here is to turn this into a national black-white face-off, instead of a mutual search for truth and justice, it is succeeding marvelously well.


Link:
http://lewrockwell.com/buchanan/buchanan227.html

North American Leaders Summit: "This summit is preliminary to a hemispheric summit to be held later in April. Note these words: citizen security, energy, and climate change. Allow me to translate: police state, rationing, and regulation."

They are determined to create their one world government...

Cross-Border Martial Law: Stage 1

by Gary North


On Monday, April 2, the leaders of the United States, Mexico, and Canada will meet at what is billed as the North American Leaders Summit. Here is the agenda, as posted on the website of the White House.

On April 2, 2012, President Obama will host Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada and President Felipe Calderon of Mexico for the North American Leaders' Summit (NALS) in Washington, DC. This meeting will build on wide-ranging and ongoing cooperation among the United States, Canada, and Mexico with a particular focus on economic growth and competitiveness, citizen security, energy, and climate change. The leaders will also discuss North America's role in the Americas in anticipation of the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia later in April, as well as other global economic, political, and security issues.

Note: This summit is preliminary to a hemispheric summit to be held later in April. Note these words: citizen security, energy, and climate change. Allow me to translate: police state, rationing, and regulation.

If you think I am exaggerating, consider the following.

TRILATERAL DEFENSE: STAGE 1

The Defense Department has posted a press release on steps leading up to this summit. A new system of multi-national defense has been created. It is called the North American Defence Ministry. Notice the way Defense is spelled: Oh, Canada! You can read the press release here.

According to the three Ministers of Defence, North America is facing threats so enormous that the three nations must work together to thwart them. But what nation is strong enough to offer such a threat? None is mentioned. Nevertheless, those threats are out there, the three ministers oi defense assure us.

The first meeting of what they call "the trilateral collaboration" was held in Ottawa. Here is what they decided.

By virtue of our geography, our peoples, and our trading relationship, our three nations share many defense interests. Threats to North America and the hemisphere are increasingly complex and require non-traditional responses. Building upon the trilateral collaboration under the North American Leaders Summit process, we share a determination to enhance our common understanding of those threats and of the approaches needed to address them.

It would be helpful to know what these "increasingly complex" threats to North America are. It would be even more helpful to know which "non-traditional responses" are being contemplated.

Our countries are committed to working together to address challenges in the region. We know that transnational threats require transnational responses.

That word, "transnational," needs clarification. What are some of these transnational threats? What nation might be planning transnational threats against Canada and Mexico, as well as the United States? What nation has identified these three nations as enemies? I have heard of none.

It turns out that the threats do not come from nations. They come from SPECTRE. You remember SPECTRE, the SPecial Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion. Sean Connery's James Bond battled against SPECTRE. Well, maybe SPECTRE isn't the threat it once was, but something like it is.

With this in mind, we have agreed to enhance our cooperation to support efforts to counter transnational criminal organizations and to respond to natural disasters in the hemisphere.

The trilateral collaboration is determined not to let these criminal organizations get the upper hand. Neither is nature: natural disasters in the hemisphere. We all remember what the hemisphere was almost wiped out by. . . . By. . . . By whatever it was. Back then. Never again!

Our meeting today has established the framework necessary to build North America's resilience by pursuing a practical agenda built on sustained trilateral cooperation on issues related to defense. As part of our initial work plan, we intend to:

Develop a joint trilateral defense threat assessment for North America to deepen our common understanding of the threats and challenges we face.
Explore ways to improve our support to the efforts of civilian public security agencies in countering illicit activities in our respective countries and the hemisphere, such as narcotics trafficking.

If we are to believe this press release, the Mexican drug dealers are so well armed and post such a threat that the defense departments of all three North American nations must now cooperate trilaterally.

But that's not all. The defense ministers will also

Explore how we can collaborate to increase the speed and efficiency with which our armed forces support civilian-led responses to disasters.

The armed forces of the three nations must increase their response time and efficiency to support "civilian-led responses to disasters."

I am curious. What disasters across all three borders are such a threat that it requires a new trilateral defense system to respond?

I can think of one: a joint operation to release airborne anthrax in three cities, for example: Washington, Ottawa, and Mexico City. But why, exactly, will it take joint military responses to deal with this? The terrorists will be long gone.

I can think of another: a joint operation of a suicide squad that has been infected with smallpox. Each of them flies to a different city. He or she then goes to the movies. Lots of movies. If you are curious about the likely effects, do a Google search for "Dark Winter" and "terrorism." I did. Here are the results.

Conclusion: the targets of this trilateral planning are civilians, not terrorists. This is all about a cross-border system of martial law. This is stage one. There is stage two.

Continue to work together to strengthen hemispheric defence forums.

How long will this trilateral cooperation go on? Indefinitely.

We have agreed to meet on a regular basis in order to build on today's historic meeting and continue our cooperation in addressing shared continental threats. We will pursue this trilateral agenda respectful of national sovereignty and in coordination with other agencies in our respective governments. The results of our meeting will be conveyed to our respective leaders in advance of the upcoming North American Leaders Summit.

Notice the phrase, "respectful of national sovereignty." If you think NAFTA was a bad idea, sovereignty-wise, wait until you see what comes next.

CANADA'S ECONOMIC ACTION PLAN

In 2011, the Canadian government posted what it called an Economic Action Plan. This is a bilateral plan to integrate economically the USA and Canada.

What caught my eye is this. They are concerned about public resistance. Remember, this is Canada – good old stodgy Canada.

Coordinate and share research on how people become radicalized and turn to violence;
Share best practices and tools for law enforcement and corrections partners to detect, prevent and respond to this threat;
Develop a common messaging and strategic communications approach; and
Emphasize community-based and community-driven efforts. This will include collaborating on how to engage with communities and build their resilience against violent extremists who seek to target specific communities in our respective countries, as well as coordinating community outreach.

Then there is CBNRE. Every problem needs an acronym. That is what CBRNE is.

Establish binational plans and capabilities for emergency management, with a focus on chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosives (CBRNE) events.

In addition to this is the threat to the communications system.

Coordinate national-level emergency communications plans and strategies;
Identify future trends and technologies related to communications interoperability;
Promote the use of standards in emergency communications;
Promote governance models and structures; and
Share best practices and lessons learned.

All in all, the Canadian government pledges the following:

We build on the efforts of many partners – from police and other emergency workers to our armed forces – who continue to safeguard us from the complex threats we face.

We also recognize that cooperation across air, land, and maritime domains, as well as in space and cyberspace, our enduring bi-national defence relationship, and military support for civilian authorities engaged in disaster response efforts and critical infrastructure protection, have all contributed significantly to the security of our populations.

This is being promoted to Canadian voters as an economic action plan. It is a great deal more than an economic action plan. This is not merely about freer trade. It is about cross-border martial law.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper up until now has pursued bilateralism: USA and Canada. That policy is about to go the way of all flesh. Trilateralism is the agenda of the North American Leaders Summit.

Harper's government in February 2011 published a detailed outline of a system of bilateral government regulations on trade: transportation, agriculture, health products, and environmental safety. This sounded harmless to Canadians. But the extension of cross-border economic regulations is part of a much more comprehensive plan to integrate the economies of Mexico, Canada, and the United States. This, in turn, is preparatory for regional/hemispheric integration.

If all this sounds familiar, that's because it is. When David Rockefeller created the Trilateral Commission in 1973, he had something like this in mind. Step by step, the program has extended. Think of this as the dream of the wonderful folks who gave us the euro.

FROM FREE TRADE TO POLITICAL UNIFICATION

For over two centuries, believers in political centralization have used a bait-and-switch strategy that has worked repeatedly.

First, they extol the benefits of free trade, meaning the elimination of sales taxes on imported goods. Their model: Adam Smith's book, The Wealth of Nations (1776).

Second, they call for the creation of a joint free trade zone. They never recommend unilateral reductions of tariffs by one government on one side of a border. Always, there must be a negotiated free trade zone: joint sovereignty.

Third, they call for joint regulations making the judicial rules of production fair.

Fourth, they call for a common currency. This always turns into a call for a national central bank, then a common international central bank.

Fifth, they call for regional military defense.

Sixth, they call for political integration: the United States of Whatever.

This strategy was designed by James Madison. He attempted to get it passed at the Annapolis Convention of 1786. When that failed, he called for a closed-door convention in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787.

Delegates from several states were authorized to attend, but only on this basis: to lower tariffs, not to replace the Articles of Confederation. As soon as the closed-door session opened, four separate plans were submitted to replace the Articles of Confederation. (I wrote a book on this: Conspiracy in Philadelphia. It's free.)

The Constitution denied the right of the states to issue currency. The federal government alone had this right,

Three years after ratification, Hamilton succeeded in getting Congress to adopt a central bank, privately owed.

In 1861, the Confederacy decided to set up its own free trade zone. The North invaded.

Throughout the 1930s, internationalists promoted the idea of a free trade zone under the League of Nations. Large multinational corporations would be licensed by the League to trade, immune from national tariffs, with the League taxing them for the privilege. The most famous advocate was New York lawyer John Foster Dulles.

In 1951, the European Coal and Steel Community was set up to conduct free trade in Western Europe. This led to the creation of the Common Market in 1957. This morphed into the European Union in 1992. This required the European Central Bank, which gave Europe the euro in 1999.

It is bait and switch.

CONCLUSION

Central planners cannot get the voters to accept internationally what the voters have long accepted nationally. So, they adopt a stealth program. It is a bait-and-switch strategy. Again and again, it has worked.

North America got NAFTA in 1994. Unless Congress stops the process, we will soon get a joint military system of domestic crowd control. The boundary markers for this system have been laid: milestones. Next will come the laying of the foundations.

Most voters know nothing of this. Of those who do know, most ignore it.

The trap is set with tax breaks: low tariffs. That is the bait. It is tasty bait. Then the trap is sprung.

Paraphrasing Patrick Henry in 1765, if that's a conspiracy theory, make the most of it.


Link:
http://lewrockwell.com/north/north1117.html

"This isn’t a mere campaign. It’s a revolution."

More proof Ron Paul has more support than the other presidential wannabees. You don't see crowds like this at Romney rallies. What a damn shame the Republican establishment has stolen the the nomination from him...

Ron Paul Rocks Wisconsin


I posted something at Paulitical Ticker just yesterday explaining why Ron Paul continues to play to packed houses.

Yesterday in Wisconsin, Dr. Paul was greeted by over 5,000 faithful liberty lovers, in 40 degree weather no less. Wow.

I can’t tell you how happy and excited for the future Paul’s supporters make me. I can only imagine the enthusiasm Dr. Paul feels.


This isn’t a mere campaign. It’s a revolution.

Link:
http://www.ronpaul2012.com/2012/03/30/ron-paul-rocks-wisconsin/

"Those of us who have looked at the evidence that’s been gathered by 9/11 truth activists know that U.S. and Israeli officials are sitting on dynamite and keeping the world in the dark. These officials, in cooperation with the establishment media, are waging a sustained and multifaceted psychological war against the global mind, and especially the Western mind."

A Radical Rethinking of Conspiracy Theories Is Underway Globally

Saman Mohammadi


You Can Laugh At 9/11 Truth-Tellers Till Kingdom Come. But You Can’t Destroy The Truth About 9/11.

“Consciousness has been left at the door.” - Michael Tsarion.

“The world is all the richer for having a devil in it, so long as we keep our foot upon his neck.” - William James.

“Like the Gutenberg Press before it, the Internet Reformation is undermining the established myths that Western elites have concocted in their efforts to create a New World Order. We like to think that the Daily Bell is one modest example.” - The Daily Bell.

“But our present “state” is the dictatorship of evil. “Oh, we’ve known that for a long time,” I hear you object, “and it isn’t necessary to bring that to our attention again.” But, I ask you, if you know that, why do you not bestir yourselves, why do you allow these men who are in power to rob you step by step, openly and in secret, of one domain of your rights after another, until one day nothing, nothing at all will be left but a mechanized state system presided over by criminals and drunks? Is your spirit already so crushed by abuse that you forget it is your right – or rather, your moral duty – to eliminate this system? But if a man no longer can summon the strength to demand his right, then it is absolutely certain that he will perish. We would deserve to be dispersed through the earth like dust before the wind if we do not muster our powers at this late hour and finally find the courage which up to now we have lacked. Do not hide your cowardice behind a cloak of expediency, for with every new day that you hesitate, failing to oppose this offspring of Hell, your guilt, as in a parabolic curve, grows higher and higher.” – The White Rose, The Third Leaflet.

The language of the enemy contains terms like ‘conspiracy theorist’ that are a direct attack on the freedom of thought and insult the intelligence of civil society. We must counter-attack the totalitarian assault on our minds with the conscious use of language: the language of resistance.

You can either embrace the term conspiracy theorist and psychologically flip the language of the enemy to serve freedom, or you can use the language of the resistance, in which the smear term conspiracy theorist is dropped and replaced with the respectable term informed citizen.

We have to be ever mindful of language, especially when it is used to discredit political speech. Language conditions our thought, shapes our outlook, and defines our worldview.

In Islamist language, “infidel” is a perfect example of how one word can limit our understanding of other cultures and our recognition of the worth of other human beings who do not look like us, think like us, and worship like us. In Western language, “conspiracy theorist” is used by government officials, politicians, and the establishment media to turn dissent into paranoia, and truth-telling into a product of mental illness.

Every totalitarian state and cult leader in history has utilized the power of language to set the parameters of thought and public debate. As conscious citizens, we cannot allow language to be diluted, deformed, and debased by the state, politicians, and the establishment media. Once our language goes, so goes our consciousness and our freedoms.

What is needed is a reexamination of the use of the term conspiracy theory and Western political language in general. By restoring the independence of language and removing the parameters of debate set by the totalitarian state, our brainwashed countries will regain the freedom of thought that must be at the core of any free and dignified society.

A radical rethinking of conspiracy theories is already underway globally. Mark Fenster, a professor of law at the University of Florida, argued that there needs to be a rethinking of conspiracy theories in his book, “Conspiracy Theories: Secrecy and Power in American Culture.” In an interview with the journal Rorotoko on January 20, 2009, Fenster explained why he wrote the book, saying:

“First, I argue that the dominant mode of understanding conspiracy theory is flawed. Academics and journalists have wrongly assumed that conspiracy theories are necessarily a pathological cry from the political and social margins. The notion that they and their adherents are “paranoid” is most frequently associated today with the work of Richard Hofstadter, a preeminent American historian in the 1950s and 1960s, who placed conspiracy theories within what he called the “paranoid style in American politics.” Viewed this way, a conspiracy theory is symptomatic of a larger sickness from which the believers suffer, caused in part by their marginal position within society. Conspiracy theories are more complex than this simple story tells—historically, politically, and culturally. They have played a key or at least non-trivial role in many of the social movements throughout American history, from the beginnings of the Republic to the present day. Moreover, conspiracy theories remain remarkably popular. In the political world, politicians and partisans disparage their opponents’ beliefs as conspiracy theory while they maintain that those same opponents are engaged in conspiratorial acts. Do I even need to give examples of how widespread conspiracy theories are in popular culture? Or how in our private conversations we frequently describe dealings in the workplace or in the political world as conspiratorial, whether in jest or in all seriousness? The book’s first claim, then, is critical: we need to rethink the basic conceptual framework by which we understand conspiracy theories.”

In the interview, Professor Fenster said that he doesn’t believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories. Although that’s disappointing, his research and knowledge shouldn’t be dismissed out of hand just because he doesn’t find any merit in the argument that the governments of the U.S. and Israel carried out the 9/11 attacks.

Those of us who have looked at the evidence that’s been gathered by 9/11 truth activists know that U.S. and Israeli officials are sitting on dynamite and keeping the world in the dark. These officials, in cooperation with the establishment media, are waging a sustained and multifaceted psychological war against the global mind, and especially the Western mind.

But the psychological war is not going well because the rise of the Internet as the main medium of news and opinion has turned the tables on the mass mind controllers. The new global alternative media has had a massive influence on the global public debate about the false flag 9/11 attacks and the evil war on terrorism.

The Internet is like Zeus’s lightning bolt. It has awakened the globe. The people of the planet have been de-brainwashed thanks to the work done by 9/11 truth-tellers, researchers, authors, activists, lecturers, and groups like Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth.

The Pentagon committed the biggest mistake in its history by deciding to cold-bloodedly kill 3,000 innocent Americans and then use the tragedy to galvanize the American people to take over the world at the behest of evil banksters, war corporations, and Israel.

The military-industrial complex’s war on human consciousness and human enlightenment is failing big time. The global alternative media has exposed its crimes against humanity, especially the two biggest ones: aggressive war and state terrorism.

Washington’s empire of mind control is collapsing.

A recent New York Times/CBS News poll showed that 70 percent of the American people want the government to immediately bring an end to the war in Afghanistan. That number will increase to 99 percent once more people become aware of the evidence that proves the U.S. and Israeli governments orchestrated the 9/11 attacks to mobilize international public opinion to support their radical policies in the Middle East.

9/11 truth conferences like the Toronto Hearings that took place in September 2011 have brought mainstream credibility to the global 9/11 truth and accountability movement. The strength of this movement is that it is educational in nature and not connected to any political party, group, ideology, or cause. And it should remain that way.

9/11 truth-tellers are part of a global grassroots campaign to educate the world about the biggest act of state terrorism in human history, and raise collective human consciousness in the process.

Award-winning Canadian journalist Barrie Zwicker said in 2009 that, “the worldwide 9/11 truth movement is currently the largest investigative journalism project on the planet.”

The global 9/11 truth and accountability movement is not about politics and ideology. It is about restoring the rule of law, public trust in government, and government transparency in America, Israel, and the West.

Victory is more than possible. It is inevitable.


Link:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/a-radical-rethinking-of-conspiracy-theories-is-underway-globally.html

Don't worry, the government has got everything under control....

Everything Is Going To Be Alright?

Is the U.S. economy going to be okay? Well, if the only source you listened to was the mainstream media, you would be left with the distinct impression that the U.S. economy is heading toward a full recovery and that everything is going to be alright. Unfortunately, that is not the case at all. The United States is rapidly becoming poorer as a nation and less competitive in the global marketplace. At the same time, consumer debt levels are rising, corporate debt levels are rising, state and local government debt levels are rising and the U.S. government is indulging in a debt binge unlike anything the world has ever seen. Considering the insane amount of money the U.S. government has been pumping into the economy, we should have seen a much more robust recovery by now. Instead, the employment statistics have barely moved and government dependence is at an all-time high. That is really sad, because this is as good as "the recovery" is going to get. The next major economic downturn is just around the bend, and in future years millions of us will desperately yearn for the "good old days" of 2012.

Below, I have compiled a list of things that I have entitled "Everything Is Going To Be Alright?"

It is composed in the form of a song, but it really isn't meant to be sung. It is probably actually more of an economic horror poem than it is a song. What I have tried to do is to point out the absurdity of what we are all being told by our politicians and by the media. Hopefully you will enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it....

-----

Yahoo is going to be laying off thousands of workers starting next work.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

Best Buy has just announced plans to close 50 stores.

Don't worry about a thing - JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon says everything is going to be alright.

The mayor of Los Angeles has announced that the city will be laying off "a large number of employees".

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

Baltimore is so broke that it has decided to look into selling off some of the most famous historical landmarks in the city.

Don't worry about a thing - the mainstream media says everything is going to be alright.

The city of Costa Mesa, California is so broke that is has decided to sell off its police helicopters.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

The city of Trenton, New Jersey is so broke that it has decided to indefinitely postpone buying more toilet paper for city buildings.

Don't worry about a thing - Joe Biden says everything is going to be alright.

The capital city of Pennsylvania is so broke that it has decided to start skipping debt payments.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

The state of Nevada has a 12.3 percent unemployment rate.

Don't worry about a thing - the pretty people on television say everything is going to be alright.

Total student loan debt in America has now passed the 1 trillion dollar mark, and about 270 billion dollars of those loans are at least 30 days delinquent.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

The savings rate in the United States has fallen back to pre-financial crisis levels.

Don't worry about a thing - Harry Reid says everything is going to be alright.

Home prices in the United States hit a 10 year low in the month of January. They are now down 34.4 percent from the peak in 2006.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

The average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States is rapidly approaching the $4.00 mark.

Don't worry about a thing - Anderson Cooper says everything is going to be alright.

Median household income in the United States is down 7.8 percent since December 2007 after adjusting for inflation.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

When Barack Obama first took office, the number of "long-term unemployed workers" in the United States was approximately 2.6 million. Today, that number is sitting at 5.6 million.

Don't worry about a thing - Nancy Pelosi says everything is going to be alright.

The BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) are publicly declaring that it is time to move away from the U.S. dollar as the primary reserve currency of the world.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

One out of every five Americans will be 65 or older by 2030 and nobody has any idea where all the money is going to come from to pay them the benefits that they have been promised.

Don't worry about a thing - Rachel Maddow says everything is going to be alright.

More Americans are dependent on the government right now than at any other time in all of U.S. history.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

The number of Americans on food stamps has increased by 14 million since Barack Obama became president and is sitting at an all-time record high.

Don't worry about a thing - Hillary Clinton says everything is going to be alright.

The U.S. government will add more to the national debt in 2012 than it did from the time that George Washington became president to the time that Ronald Reagan became president.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.

The U.S. national debt is currently increasing by about 150 million dollars every single hour.

Don't worry about a thing - Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke says everything is going to be alright.

The Federal Reserve bought approximately 61 percent of all government debt issued by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2011. This is a Ponzi scheme that will completely collapse at some point.

Don't worry about a thing - Barack Obama says everything is going to be alright.


Link:
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/everything-is-going-to-be-alright

Friday, March 30, 2012

America does bidding of multi-national corporations by going to war in Africa over resources...

U.S. Puts Boots on Ground Across Africa

Humanitarian relief efforts mask ulterior agenda

By Richard Walker


As the war in Afghanistan winds down, the Pentagon’s focus has shifted to Africa and a new kind of warfare, using drone and missile attacks, small Special Forces teams and a mixture of Marines and special advisers to train African national armies to act as proxies in the American global empire.

Much of this warfare is being promoted under the rubrics of humanitarian aid and combating piracy. While those may be two reasons for establishing a bridgehead on the African continent they do not tell the complete story. Secretly, the objective has been to wage war against a range of perceived enemies, with fewer boots on the ground and less accountability to the American electorate.

When Barack Obama sent 100 Special Operations troops to Uganda in 2011, his declared aim was to hunt down leaders of the so-called Lord’s Resistance Army, founded by Joseph Kony. That, however, was a smokescreen. As of Feb. 5, 2012, the U.S. military presence in Uganda has expanded, working to eliminate another group that has never attacked the United States—Harakat al-Shabaab al-Mujahideen, which operates in nearby Somalia and elsewhere in East Africa.

That became apparent with the arrival of soldiers from the Marine Force Reserve. One of its officers, Cpl Jad Sleiman, had this to say about its role: “Special Purpose Marine Air Ground Task Force 12, the Marines’ Sicily-based parent command, is tasked with sending small training groups into Africa to partner with local militaries in an effort to indirectly blunt the spread of extremist groups across the continent. The task force has dispatched teams across a wide swath of Africa over the course of their six month deployment in support of Marine Forces Africa, sending anywhere from five to 50 Marines into partner nations for days to months at a time.”

Uganda is not the only East African nation where there is a growing U.S. military presence. Others include Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Rwanda, South Sudan and Somalia.

Some of these nations are not merely hosting U.S. military trainers but have secret bases from which Special Forces can be dispatched to hit targets across the region. The largest base is Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti, but there are other U.S. sites in Ethiopia, which have been designed as launch pads for attacks on groups in Somalia and Yemen and for covert operations against Iran. Ethiopia, which has its eyes on Sudan’s oil, has had a long relationship with the Pentagon. As far back as 2003, it provided training facilities for the U.S. 20th Mountain Division.

The Horn of Africa is a powder keg of tribal friction. It is also an area rich in energy resources and is geographically positioned to allow the U.S. to keep eyes on Iran, Libya and Egypt. By maintaining only specialized forces in host nations like Uganda, the Pentagon knows there is less likelihood Africans will have flashbacks to the colonial decades when the British, French and Dutch controlled the region with considerable brutality.

Nevertheless, there is a real risk that the deeper the U.S. becomes entangled in the internal politics of some of these countries, the greater the likelihood secret wars will develop into larger conflicts. Israel also has a keen interest in the region and is believed to have surveillance and Special Operations posts in Eritrea and Ethiopia.


Link:
http://americanfreepress.net/?p=3376

California slammed by radiation from Japan...

California Slammed With Fukushima Radiation

Fukushima Radiation Plume Hit Southern and Central California

Washington's Blog

The Journal Environmental Science and Technology reports in a new study that the Fukushima radiation plume contacted North America at California “with greatest exposure in central and southern California”, and that Southern California’s seaweed tested over 500% higher for radioactive iodine-131 than anywhere else in the U.S. and Canada:

Projected paths of the radioactive atmospheric plume emanating from the Fukushima reactors, best described as airborne particles or aerosols for 131I, 137Cs, and 35S, and subsequent atmospheric monitoring showed it coming in contact with the North American continent at California, with greatest exposure in central and southern California. Government monitoring sites in Anaheim (southern California) recorded peak airborne concentrations of 131I at 1.9 pCi m−3

Anaheim is where Disneyland is located....


...In addition, radioactive debris is starting to wash up on the Pacific Coast. And because the Japanese are burning radioactive materials instead of disposing of them, radioactive rain-outs will continue for some time … even on the Pacific Coast.

Of course, the government is doing everything it can to help citizens cover up what’s occurring. We pointed out in January:

Instead of doing much to try to protect their citizens from Fukushima, Japan, the U.S. and the EU all just raised the radiation levels they deem “safe”.

Nuclear expert Arnie Gundersen says that high-level friends in the State Department told him that Hillary Clinton signed a pact with her counterpart in Japan agreeing that the U.S. will continue buying seafood from Japan, despite that food not being tested for radioactive materials [see this].

And the Department of Energy is trying to replace the scientifically accepted model of the dangers of low dose radiation based on voodoo science. Specifically, DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley Labs used a mutant line of human cells in a petri dish which was able to repair damage from low doses of radiation, and extrapolated to the unsupported conclusion that everyone is immune to low doses of radiation….

Indeed:

American and Canadian authorities have virtually stopped monitoring airborne radiation, and are not testing fish for radiation. (Indeed, the EPA reacted to Fukushima by raising “acceptable” radiation levels.)

So – as in Japan – radiation is usually discovered by citizens and the handful of research scientists with funding to check, and not the government. See this, this, this, this, this and this.

The Japanese government’s entire strategy from day one has been to cover up the severity of the Fukushima accident. This has likely led to unnecessary, additional deaths.

Indeed, the core problem is that all of the world’s nuclear agencies are wholly captured by the nuclear industry … as are virtually all of the supposedly independent health agencies.

So the failure of the American, Canadian and other governments to test for and share results is making it difficult to hold an open scientific debate about what is happening.

And it’s not just radiation from Japan. An effort by the Southern California Edison power company to secretly ramp up production to avoid public disclosure may have led to a leak at the San Onofre nuclear power plant.


Read more:
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2012/03/california-slammed-with-fukushima-radiation.html

MSM: NDAA, to Restrict Journalists?

Brave New Bank? BRICS moot dropping dollar, IMF...

The end of the fiat US dollar as the world's reserve currency has begun. Soon they will be discussing a new world currency to take its' place. Will the US go along with this? Might this be the plan all along with the BRICS acting as cover for the globalists real intent? A basis of a new way of organizing life on the planet? It appears that way. What about American sovereignty in this new order of things? It doesn't appear we are going to get to vote on this idea now does it? They know the current economic system is about to collapse and those who helped create its' demise are hard at work creating the next one. Keep buying silver folks...

Attacking the last bastion of freedom of speech...

FBI Exec Calls for Changes in Internet Technology

Kurt Nimmo


Shawn Henry, an FBI executive assistant director, admitted today that the ramped up and over-hyped effort by the government to put an end to hacking will not work unless there are “changes in technology.”

Mr. Henry did not specify what changes he had in mind, but despite this we have a good idea since the government has harangued us for years now on the changes it has in mind – nothing short of revamping the internet.

The establishment keeps telling us the internet is broken and we must start over. “Last year, the level and ferocity of cyber-attacks on the internet reached such a horrendous level that some are now thinking the unthinkable: to let the internet wither on the vine and start up a new more robust one instead,” professor Alan Woodward, billed as a cybersecurity expert, told the BBC earlier this year.

Congress proposed Obama be allowed to shut down the internet with a kill switch – sort of like the dictator Mubarak shutting down the internet, but on steroids – but the proposal was shelved in response to criticism and outrage. The SOPA and PIPA Trojan Horses also faced withering criticism and were subsequently withdrawn (or sent back to be modified and appear less draconian up re-introduction).

The Europeans are one step ahead of rustic Americans. They don’t have an antiquated and quaint (as the globalists see it) Constitution and Bill of Rights. For the European elites, freedom of speech is extended by government as it was once handed down by kings. It is not an innate or god-given right. It is a privilege that can be withdrawn at any time.

Last August, the European Commissin drafted a number of propsoals designed to regulate the internet, including the creation of a list of names, drawn up by governments, that would be banned from registering with the internet’s domain name system. If recent history is any indicator, the list will contain the names of websites and individuals who are not politically correct (for instance, websites that question aspects of the Holocaust would almost undoubtedly be banned as would those making apologies for Nazism or that deviate from official histories).

EC papers drawn up last August “also foresee that the enormous shift in power toward governments will happen within the next 12 months.” The documents appear to coincide with efforts on this side of the pond to propose drastic internet technology changes in response to supposed cyber security concerns.

Henry’s “grim appraisal of the nation’s efforts to keep computer hackers from plundering corporate data networks” published by the Wall Street Journal is the latest foray by the elite to lend an air of legitimacy to an ongoing effort to ultimately sanitize the internet and turn it into a corporatized Disneyland offering meaningless cultural and political pablum and where no serious challenges to the elite will be permitted (as they are not currently on the dinosaur television media platform owned largely by transnational communications corporations).

“I don’t see how we ever come out of this without changes in technology or changes in behavior, because with the status quo, it’s an unsustainable model. Unsustainable in that you never get ahead, never become secure, never have a reasonable expectation of privacy or security,” Henry said.

In February, NSA boss Gen. Keith Alexander made the absurd claim that the suspicious hacktivist collective Anonymous would be able to take down the nation’s power grid via the internet. As we noted at the time, it is not easy to disrupt the power grid in the United States. Most systems use proprietary operating systems and applications that are “not readily available for study by your average hacker,” writes Michael Tanj. Power grid systems and networks are not connected to the public internet.

Once again, Anonymous was being used (like a useful idiot is used) as an excuse by the government as it continue to roll out increasingly draconian surveillance programs under the aegis of “cyber security” and terror prevention.

As The Daily Bell notes, the ruling elite’s memes are beginning to crumble due to coverage by the alternative media.

“What the Internet has shown us with increasing clarity over this past decade is that Western banking elites and their enablers and associates will stop at nothing in their quest for ultimate power,” they write.

The exposure of the elite’s goals and its methodologies – its dependence on the corrupt counterfeiting practices of central banks for the trillion-dollar torrents of capital necessary to build world government – has led to an upswell of indignation and scrutiny around the world.

As a result, many of the elite’s dominant social themes are beginning to founder and fail. The elites had high hopes apparently for installing a carbon currency around the world based on the fraudulent message of global warming. But the Internet helped reveal emails that exposed the fraud.

The so-called war on terror has long been revealed to be both fraudulent and unpopular. Creating a so-called long war to generate the kind of chaos that is necessary to move the world toward global governance is perhaps a good idea from an elite standpoint … but not one that has worked out well.

As elite memes have degraded, the attacks on the Internet have stepped up.

The FBI’s Henry is merely the latest government character to call for “changes in technology” that will if implemented not so much protect corporations as usher in a new era of control and banish the truth tellers to a pre-internet wilderness.


Link:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/fbi-exec-calls-for-changes-in-internet-technology.html

Biden Calls For “Global Minimum Tax”...

Still don't believe they are pushing for a world government? They've already figured out one way to pay for it...

The Fascinating Gang of Elitist Insiders Surrounding the World Trade Center Towers...

False-flag target getting into position...

USS Enterprise Prepares To Cross Suez Canal, Days Away From Anchor In Arabian Sea

Zero Hedge

Much noise has been emanating out of Israel vis-a-vis its Iranian intentions, with some opinions suggesting an attack is imminent, while others claiming that Israel will ultimately defer to D.C., and postpone an attack, and the eventual gasoline price shock, until after the election. The truth is nobody but a few select generals, knows: in warfare surprise is the key factor, so outright flashing invasion intentions is usually an indicator of just the opposite. That said, the most recent update that Azerbaijan has granted Israel access to its airbases along the Iran border is hardly encouraging for Nobel peace prize winners and other pacifists. Yet as we have been claiming for the past two weeks, ever since the launch of CVN-65 on its last tour of duty, the true catalyst, if any, will be the arrival of the USS Enterprise at what may well be its last place of anchor – somewhere in the Arabian Sea, just off the side of CVN 70 and CVN 72 both of which are patrolling the Straits of Hormuz. And as the map from Stratfor below shows, the Enterprise is about to cross the Suez Canal, from which point it will be at most days from entering its catalyst location, namely supporting the Israel air force. Just because the US has never had 3 concurrent aircraft carriers in proximity to Iran before.

Link:
http://www.blacklistednews.com/USS_Enterprise_Prepares_To_Cross_Suez_Canal%2C_Days_Away_From_Anchor_In_Arabian_Sea/18699/0/0/0/Y/M.html

'Enlist' -- Dow Chemical and Monsanto's New Genetically Modified Crops...

"Ron Paul will be the president that stops the midnight secret legislation. Ron Paul will be the president of anti-anti-Constitutional legislation."

Dr. No Gives Us a Chance To Pause and Reflect

by Allan Stevo


I have a friend who is a commodities broker that tells me "the markets love gridlock." They love when Washington can’t make up its mind.

Well, I tell him, then Ron Paul is the candidate he wants, because neither the Republican nor the Democratic establishment will be excited to see him as president. Ron Paul and the insiders aren’t going to agree on a darn thing.

You see, anyone who appreciates Ron Paul (me included) is going to have a lot of work cut out for him if he wants to see a Paul administration accomplish anything legislatively. January 20, 2013 is Inauguration Day. That’s the day we can march into DC alongside President-elect Ron Paul, but DC will not want us there. If we leave Ron Paul in DC alone with the wolves, nothing will be accomplished legislatively, and even if we don’t leave him alone with the wolves, it’s still unlikely that much will happen legislatively.

And that’s okay. That’s no problem. The system was set up that was – to be slow, to be full of "red tape." You see the red tape was built into the federal system to bind the hands of the government. It was not meant to bind the hands of anyone else. The more slowly moving and powerless government was, the less of a chance it had of destabilizing the people that permitted that government to exist. Making it slow moving would help ensure that government would be long lasting, because no one would care enough about it to want to overthrow it.

Finishing An Important Project

Have you ever worked full speed at a project, obsessively, over a long period of time, to finally accomplish the goal with resounding success only to wake up the next morning not knowing what to do?

Yup.

Me to.

It’s a common phenomena. That’s a great opportunity to give yourself some time to take a vacation, shore up your duties, take care of other responsibilities, recharge your batteries, rebuild your resources, and plan for your next step. It’s a great time to stop and think.

Two decades after the Cold War, that war that NATO survived and the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact did not survive, we have yet to determine what our priorities are in terms of foreign policy. And who can think clearly as we continue full speed ahead, without a vacation in which we can pause and reflect on the role of our foreign policy in a post-Cold War world.

A decade after the September 11 attacks, we have yet to figure out what our priorities are. Is it to engage in costly nation-building in the country that housed some of the terrorists that planned an attacked on us (Afghanistan)? Is it to take loads of lobbying money from the country where 15 of the 19 hijackers were from (Saudi Arabia)? Is it to bipartisanally bomb, probe, and annoy every country on the Neo-Con hitlist (Iraq, Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan)? Our foreign policy, to make an understatement, feels sort of unfocussed.

Two years after the passage of Obamacare, we have yet to figure out a way to talk about our major crisis in healthcare in a reasonable way. And there is undoubtedly a crisis; almost everyone on all sides agrees with that. We have yet to figure out how to talk about higher education. We have yet to talk reasonably about the housing market. All of these areas of life are being held at artificially high prices, essentially making involvement in them increasingly unlikely for many Americans without some sort of outside assistance.

In the middle of an economic crisis of epic proportion, we have yet to take a look at what kind of long-term policy might be sensible to solving the problem we are in the midst of. And our discussions on all of these issues seem incapable of going beyond mere 9 second media talking points and "I gotcha!!" one line zingers. We can do better than that.

We are running willy-nilly. And I might even wonder if the special interest groups in America like seeing Americans running willy-nilly. Fifteen years ago, the fictional movie Wag the Dog expressed that concern – the concern that vast groups of people might be manipulated for political gain.

Ron Paul Slows It Down

Ron Paul in the Oval Office slows all of that down. Under a Ron Paul presidency, journalists might continue business as usual and ask on camera: "Should the next bank bailout be $1.25 trillion or $1.28 trillion? There is a divisive fight in Washington about just that. Republican supporters of the $1.25 trillion relief bill are saying tax-and-spend Democrats are being fiscally irresponsible, while Democratic supporters of the $1.28 trillion relief bill are saying Republicans risk lowballing the solution and undermining the long-term success of the Rescue America’s Happiness Act. Let’s turn to our correspondent on Capitol Hill to ask ‘What are the congressional Democrats and Republicans saying about the next bailout to the banks?’" They can encourage that kind of false, narrowly framed debate, just like they are encouraging that kind of debate now. Ultimately, however, that debate won’t matter under a Ron Paul presidency. It doesn’t matter, because either party’s bailout is getting vetoed.

Legislation is so often presented as if a quick response is necessary and correspondingly, we get conned into having these heated debates over a $1.25 trillion or $1.28 trillion bailout, when many Americans don’t think a bailout is a good idea at all.

What are congressional Republicans and Democrats saying about legislation to eliminate steroids in baseball, to regulate the cost of healthcare, or offer free birth control, none of which are mentioned in the U.S. Constitution? It doesn’t matter. It’s getting vetoed.

What are Republican and Democratic insiders saying about extending the Patriot Act, expanding the War on Drugs, or placing sanctions on some distant country? It doesn’t matter. It’s getting vetoed.

How are the Democrats and Republicans on the Hill responding to the latest outcry from the media on injury bounties in the NFL, the punditry’s insistence for indefinite detention, or the demand that the Federal Reserve Bank be protected behind a veil of secrecy to ensure its independence? Guess what. It doesn’t matter. It’s getting vetoed.

These are all significant issues that I’m happy Americans are debating, because it allows us opportunities to think and to hear new ideas. It’s just not likely that those ideas will be acted on during a Ron Paul presidency. Either that, or Ron Paul will achieve unprecedented levels of bipartisan cooperation as Congress overrides his vetoes, which could happen, but would be a tough task.

Thinking of the Future

Ron Paul will be the gridlock president. Ron Paul will be the president that stops the midnight secret legislation. Ron Paul will be the president of anti-anti-Constitutional legislation. Some people won’t like that, but I know a lot of Americans for a long time into the future will love it. My generation and the generations after me will be grateful that America in the year 2012 decided to spend 4 years having a discussion about the course of our country.

We’ll be grateful that Americans decided to have that discussion rather than running around the world like a former Cold Warrior trained to kill whoever the bogeyman is, uneasy when he’s not geared up to kill a bogeyman. Uneasy when he’s with himself in a room, where it’s quiet and he needs to hear his own thoughts. And hopefully in that moment, we won’t hear our own vacuousness. Because that will feel scary. We need a minute to rest, to re-establish a working relationship between the government and the people, to pause and think instead of being knee-jerk in our long-term planning.

Time won’t end in 2012. Time to prepare for the future. Time for Ron Paul, the debate his presidency will inspire, and the calming gridlock that will come of that.

Link:
http://lewrockwell.com/stevo/stevo15.1.html

“All of the people who were 100% wrong [back in ‘08] are saying that everything’s OK [now]. I am telling them they didn’t solve the problem and are making it so much worse.”

Peter Schiff: Market-Crushing Treasury Collapse To Hit Around 2013

Agustino Fontevecchia

Peter Schiff, the divisive investor and commentator that predicted the subprime/real-estate bubble, is forecasting a U.S. dollar and bond crisis over the next couple of years. Schiff blames intervened bond markets, where rates are artificially and excessively low, and expects the coming crisis to blow the 2008-9 financial crisis out of the water.

There is little doubt that the Federal Reserve, with Chairman Ben Bernanke at the helm, is holding markets by the hand. Bernanke, himself a divisive figure, has done all he can to push interest rates lower, using quantitative easing and Operation Twist once nominal rates had hit the zero-range. While many believe ultra-loose monetary policy is dangerous, Schiff thinks it will lead to a catastrophic correction.

“The more you delay it, the bigger it will be,” Schiff tells Forbes in a phone interview Tuesday, “so we need to raise interest rates during the recession to confront the inefficiencies.” Schiff, who runs Euro Pacific Capital and is seen by many as permanently bearish, argues that government-intervened bond markets are leading to massive distortions in capital allocation that have only been exacerbated as the Fed reacted to the last couple of recessions.

Recent market behavior supports his thesis that massive dislocations in bond yields distort reality. Ten-year Treasury yields had traded in a narrow-range for about four months, on the presumption that a weak economy would continue to count on Bernanke’s monetary support (particularly of the bond market). On March 13, the policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) acknowledged an improved recovery, but did not mention more quantitative easing, or bond purchases, were on the way, sparking a violent sell-off in Treasuries (exacerbated by JPMorgan’s dividend announcement the same day, which triggered a rally in financial stocks) as market players fled a bond rally they considered fixed by the Fed.

While Bernanke delivered calm to bond markets on Monday in a speech that promised “continued accommodative policies,” the violence of the sell-off speaks to Schiff’s argument. “We consume more than we produce and we borrow abroad, but we are never going to be able to pay them back,” says Schiff.

The controversial investor and commentator expects a massive crash over the next two to three years as a bond market bubble, coupled with the U.S. dollar, collapses under the weight of excessive debt. Schiff, like PIMCO’s Bill Gross, doesn’t believe in the current deleveraging cycle. While households have reduced their leverage, government debt has ballooned on the back of stimulus programs, but, argued Schiff, the government’s debt is the people’s debt, thus overall leverage has actually increased.

In CNBC interview Wednesday, Schiff called Bernanke “public enemy number one” and warned that banks would crash if the bond market collapses. While most major banks, including the likes of JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, and even Bank of America, passed the Fed’s strenuous stress tests, which stipulated a massive decline in equity and real estate prices, Schiff still believes they’re in trouble. “The Fed didn’t ask the banks to stress test a big drop in the bond market because that’s what coming, and the banks would fail that,” he said.

Schiff cites the rising price of gold as evidence that U.S. dollar debasement, and inflation, are higher than the Fed, and consumer price data, suggest. Following the Austrian economic tradition, Schiff believes that only a massive correction, via a deflationary recession, can set the system straight. “In a deflation, real wages will rise because the cost of goods will fall faster,” he says, adding that the government should accompany the correction by lowering taxes and cutting back on regulation.

While Schiff does suggest saving in gold, he understands the limitations of the investment. “If you invest in gold, then the economy doesn’t benefit from savings, I want investment to go to plants and equipment.”

The system, he argues, is as broken as it was before the financial crisis. Schiff, who was very prescient in his forecast and prediction of how the subprime debacle would filter through to the broader real estate market and thus bring down the economy, believes complacency is widespread. “All of the people who were 100% wrong [back in ‘08] are saying that everything’s OK [now]. I am telling them they didn’t solve the problem and are making it so much worse.”

Schiff, who knows how to build his case, concludes it thusly: “I didn’t get lucky, I just understood the problem, and we are going to get another big one coming soon.”

Link:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/afontevecchia/2012/03/27/peter-schiff-market-crushing-treasury-collapse-to-hit-around-2013/

History stuff...

What War Really Is

Bionic Mosquito

Freedom Betrayed, by Herbert Hoover

Hoover asks the question, “Shall we send our youth to war?” in an article prepared for the August, 1939 issue of the American Magazine, he writes:

First, let me say something from this experience of what war really is. Those who lived in it, and our American boys who fought in it, dislike to recall its terribleness. We dwell upon its glories – the courage, the heroism, the greatness of spirit in men. I myself should like to forget all else….Amid the afterglow of glory and legend we forget the filth, the stench, the death, of the trenches. We forget the dumb grief of mothers, wives, and children.

War is hell. We are told this whenever we mention the atrocities committed, as if this pithy little phrase justifies the tragedy. Hoover here sees that war IS hell, however he sees this as reason to avoid entering in every way possible.

There is a scene in the movie The Americanization of Emily. This movie stars James Garner as Charlie Madison, an American officer in England during WWII, and Julie Andrews as Emily Barham, a British war widow – also having lost other family members to war.

The scene has Charlie Madison visiting the home of Mrs. Barham, Emily’s mother. Mrs. Barham is in great denial regarding the many deaths that war has brought to her family – her husband and son among others. She still acts as if her husband is alive, and Emily goes along with this denial.

When Mrs. Barham exclaims that after the war, it will be all the generals and statesmen writing books saying how it could have been avoided, Charlie explains that he doesn’t blame the generals and statesmen. He blames the mothers! The mothers make heroes out of their dead sons; they are the first to walk in the parade. Charlie explains that his own mother did this regarding Charlie’s brother. And now Charlie’s youngest brother can’t wait to enlist.

The clip is about ten minutes long, and I highly recommend spending the time. It can be found here:



In describing those who fought in the trenches in the First World War, Hoover writes:

Theirs was an inspiring heroism for all time. But how much greater a world it would be today if that heroism and character could have lived.


Some people (tragically too few) count the cost of war. Cost in lives, cost in injuries both physical and mental, cost to the family, cost in wealth destroyed. But what of the cost of the unseen? We are regularly told that those who go overseas to fight the wars are the best and the brightest of America’s youth. If so, what of the cost of what those same youth are NOT producing while fighting overseas – or worse, if they are killed or permanently injured?

In words that are as applicable today as when Hoover wrote them, he writes (regarding the First World War):

It has cost us 40 billions of dollars. And that represents more than just dollars. Today we have a quarter to a third of the American people below a decent standard of living. If that 40 billions of wealth had remained in America, these people would not be in this plight.

Forty billion dollars spent during WWI is the equivalent of something over $500 billion today. Estimates range regarding the costs of US wars over the last decade – somewhere between $1 trillion and $4 trillion. Over 15% of Americans live in poverty. Again, 15% receive food stamps. Official unemployment is reported at approximately 9%, but according to John Williams at Shadowstats is actually above 20%. Inflation, officially reported at approximately 3% is reported by Shadowstats at approximately 6%. To paraphrase Hoover, if those trillions of wealth had remained in America, these people would not be in this plight.

Hoover goes into self-examination regarding his support for America entering the WWI:

…I reluctantly joined in the almost unanimous view of our countrymen that America must go into that war. We had been directly attacked…I believed that with our singleness of purpose we could impose an enlightened peace; that we could make it a war to end war. I believed we could make the world safe for the spread of human liberty. If experience has any value to nations, there are in the wrecking of those hopes a thousand reasons why we should never attempt it again….

Several things strike me about these paragraphs. First, that Hoover believes the US was innocent in being attacked as provocation to enter the war. From Wikipedia:


Unknown to her passengers but probably no secret to the Germans, almost all her hidden cargo consisted of munitions and contraband destined for the British war effort. Lusitania departed Pier 54 in New York on 1 May 1915. The German Embassy in Washington had issued this warning on 22 April 1915.[41]

Notice!

Travellers intending to embark on the Atlantic voyage are reminded that a state of war exists between Germany and her allies and Great Britain and her allies; that the zone of war includes the waters adjacent to the British Isles; that, in accordance with formal notice given by the Imperial German Government, vessels flying the flag of Great Britain, or any of her allies, are liable to destruction in those waters and that travellers sailing in the war zone on the ships of Great Britain or her allies do so at their own risk.

Imperial German Embassy

Washington, D.C. 22nd April 1915

This warning was printed adjacent to an advertisement for Lusitania's return voyage. The warning led to some agitation in the press and worried the ship's passengers and crew.

Second, that Hoover naïvely and arrogantly believed that somehow his was the generation that could do what was never done before: win everlasting peace by fighting the next war.

Third, as discussed by Charlie Madison in the abovementioned video clip, it is the statesmen (in this case Hoover) who always write afterwards about what a mistake it was to go into the war that they previously advocated entering.

Finally, at least one can say Hoover has seen a glimpse of the light. From his past arrogance and blunders, he has concluded that a little humility and caution is in order.

Afghanistan and Iraq were not the first wars entered into by the US government on shifting and ever-changing causes and justifications.

And right before our eyes the game shifts. We were originally going to quarantine dictators and again save democracy. Today we have two or three dictators on our team….

…we can hold the light of liberty alight on this continent. That is the greatest service we can give to civilization…

Wonderful counsel given by Hoover in this 1939 article. It is unfortunate that this was not followed. Hitler and Stalin could have had a great time pummeling each other. It is more unfortunate that Hoover did not come to this view prior to the US entering WWI. Absent the involvement of the US, the next thirty years would likely have been far different in Europe. Different for the better, as events could not have transpired any worse.

Link:
http://lewrockwell.com/rep3/what-war-really-is.html