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Bankers Get $4 Trillion Gift from Barney Frank |
It supports the biggest banks. It authorizes Federal Reserve banks to provide as much as $4 trillion in emergency funding the next time Wall Street crashes. So much for "no-more-bailouts" talk. That is more than twice what the Fed pumped into markets this time around. The size of the fund makes the bribes in the Senate's health-care bill look minuscule. The legislation does create a council of regulators to spot risks to the financial system and big financial firms. Unfortunately this group is made up of folks who missed the problems that led to the current crisis. full story |
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President Makes Top 10 List of Corrupt Politicians |
President Obama has been named to a "Top 10" list he'd likely be grateful to avoid: Judicial Watch's "Ten Most Wanted Corrupt Politicians," for 2009. "President Obama boldly proclaimed that 'transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency,' but his administration is addicted to secrecy, stonewalling far too many of Judicial Watch's Freedom of Information Act requests and is refusing to make public White House visitor logs as federal law requires," the organization said. full story |
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Obama Gives Foreign Cops New Police Powers in U.S. |
A little-discussed executive order from President Obama giving foreign cops new police powers in the United States by exempting them from such drudgery as compliance with the Freedom of Information Act is raising alarm among commentators who say INTERPOL already had most of the same privileges as diplomats. That means, van der Galien wrote today, "this foreign law enforcement organization can operate free of an important safeguard against government and abuse." full story |
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America Under Barack Obama |
Nat Hentoff: I try to avoid hyperbole, but I think Obama is possibly the most dangerous and destructive president we have ever had. An example is ObamaCare, which is now embattled in the Senate. If that goes through the way Obama wants, we will have something very much like the British system. If the American people have their health care paid for by the government, depending on their age and their condition, they will be subject to a health commission just like in England which will decide if their lives are worth living much longer. full story |
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Whitehouse: Foes of Health Care Bill are Birthers, Right-wing Militias, Aryan Groups |
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) today took shots at those who are not supporting the health care legislation. During a floor speech, he excoriated Senate GOP members for holding up the pending health care bill and accused their supporters of being birthers and fanatics in right-wing militia and Aryan support groups. He started off by citing an editorial from the Manchester Journal Inquirer, which used the insult "lunatic fringe." full story |
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Nearly 60 percent Say President Obama's Decisions 'Bad for America' |
A majority of Americans believe an increased government role in health care would lead to more government corruption, while a plurality of Americans think that scientific data supporting man-made global warming is "mostly falsified." That is what a new poll by Survey USA reveals. The poll also shows that 58 percent of Americans believe that decisions by the Obama administration have been "bad for America," as opposed to 37 percent who think Obama's decisions have been "good for America." full story |
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Obama's Push for Copenhagen Deal Could Violate Constitution |
When Obama arrives in Copenhagen Friday, he is hoping to cut a deal on a new global-warming agreement. Even though the conference is not likely to produce a legally binding deal, critics say if the president signs an international climate treaty pledging reductions in carbon emissions, he will violate the Constitution. "President Obama cannot bind the American people to job killing international agreements on climate change without the advice and consent of the United States Senate," former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich wrote. full story |
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The Federal Bureaucracy-Plutocracy |
According to an analysis of federal payroll data by USA Today, the federal bureaucracy has flourished during the current recession. Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14% to 19% of civil servants during the recession's first 18 months - and that's before overtime pay and bonuses are counted. Federal workers are enjoying an extraordinary boom time -- in pay and hiring -- during a recession that has cost 7.3 million jobs in the private sector. full story |
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Binyamin Netanyahu Must Decide Whether to Strike Iran's Nuclear Facilities |
Binyamin Netanyahu may have to make the most difficult decision of his career, whether to launch a military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities and risk triggering a conflagration that could spread across the Middle East. Israeli experts believe the point of no return may be only 6 months away when Iran's nuclear programme will have, if it has not already, metastasised into a multitude of smaller, difficult-to-trace facilities in deserts and mountains, while its main reactor at Bushehr will have come online and bombing it would send a radioactive cloud over the Gulf nations. full story |
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Drug Dealers Use Child Care as Front |
More than a dozen Wisconsin child-care centers that reaped millions of dollars in state subsidies have had close ties to drug-dealing operations, including big-time crime bosses. The Sentinel identified 16 child-care centers with recent connections to drug operations, and the number is likely much higher. Those 16 alone have collected more than $8.5?million in public subsidies since 2006. Records show many of those centers have been used to stash and transport drugs, launder dirty cash and provide fake employment for criminals at taxpayers' expense. full story |
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Monsanto Seed Biz Role Revealed |
With Monsanto's patented genes being inserted into roughly 95 percent of all soybeans and 80 percent of all corn grown in the U.S., the company also is using its wide reach to control the ability of new biotech firms to get wide distribution for their products, according to a review of several Monsanto licensing agreements and dozens of interviews with seed industry participants, agriculture and legal experts. Declining competition in the seed business could lead to price hikes that ripple out to every family's dinner table. full story |
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Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid of Obama's Latest Big Brother Plan |
Most recently OPM made news when the Obama administration sought to use it as a tool upon which to consolidate power. Under orders from the White House, it is being reported that OPM is on a mission to rid the executive branch bureaucracy of Bush-era personnel who are no longer political appointees and who have lawfully become civil servants. The Obama administration has now ordered a purging of Republicans from federal government civil service. full story |
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Strong Reaction Follows Editorial Calling for Global One-child Dictatorship |
In her editorial published on Tuesday, columnist Diane Francis wrote that, "A planetary law, such as China's one-child policy, is the only way to reverse the disastrous global birthrate." Just days later, the Chinese government delegation at the Copenhagen climate change conference argued that the Communist dictatorship's one child policy should "serve as a model for integrating population programs into the framework of climate change adaptation." full story |
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Is Obama Really Preparing For Civil War? |
According to an obscure report in the European Union Times (EUTimes.net), "Russian Military Analysts are reporting to Prime Minister Putin that US President Barack Obama has issued an order to his Northern Command's (USNORTHCOM) top leader, US Air Force General Gene Renuart, to 'begin immediately' increasing his military forces to 1 million troops by January 30, 2010, in what these reports warn is an expected outbreak of civil war within the United States before the end of winter. full story |
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Canadian Newspaper Calls for Malthusian Global Population Reduction Policy |
Diane Francis, writing for Canada's Financial Post, begins an editorial by declaring a myth - the world is over-populated. "The "inconvenient truth" overhanging the UN's Copenhagen conference is not that the climate is warming or cooling, but that humans are overpopulating the world," she writes. "A planetary law, such as China's one-child policy, is the only way to reverse the disastrous global birthrate currently, which is one million births every four days." An interesting choice of words. Planetary law. full story |
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Bankers Might Be Feeling Public's Wrath -- Literally |
A Los Angeles lawyer who had represented a failed subprime mortgage lender is found dead outside his home, having been shot in the head. Three men allegedly invade the home of a former subprime lender, and are arrested after reportedly injuring three people inside. Vandals target the home of the former CEO of the Royal Bank of Scotland, smashing windows in the banker's home and car. Those are just three notable incidents of violence aimed at people who were in some way linked to the financial crisis that has unfolded over the past year. full story |
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Homeland Security Embarks on Big Brother Programs to Read Our Minds and Emotions |
This past February, the Department of Homeland Security awarded a one-year, $2.6 million grant to the Cambridge, MA.-based Charles Stark Draper Laboratory to develop computerized sensors capable of detecting a person's level of "malintent" -- or intention to do harm. It's only the most recent of numerous contracts awarded to Draper and assorted research outfits by the U.S. government over the past few years under the auspices of a project called "Future Attribute Screening Technologies," or FAST. full story |
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Depression Good for Reducing Carbon Emissions |
In order to realize this return to the Dark Ages in the name of polar bears and bankers, much of the world will necessarily need to be pitched into utter poverty. As the "Danish text" reveals, this is precisely what our global managers have in mind for the so-called third world. "The UN Copenhagen climate talks are in disarray today after developing countries reacted furiously to leaked documents that show world leaders will next week be asked to sign an agreement that hands more power to rich countries and sidelines the UN's role in all future climate change negotiations." full story |
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Barack Obama's Rule by EPA Decree Is a Coup D'état against Congress |
Who needs tanks on the lawn when you have the Environmental Protection Agency? Barack Obama's use of the EPA to pressurise the Senate to pass his climate change Nuremberg Decrees shows his dictatorial mentality. He wants to override Congress, which is hostile to his climate gobbledegook because it is representative of the American electorate, and sideline the nation's elected Senators by ruling by decree, courtesy of the EPA. This is a coup d'état. full story |
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A Critical Decision |
Members of all branches of the United States Military will soon be facing a most critical decision. The European Union Times is reporting here that Obama is using the deployment of additional troops to Afghanistan to cover for the movement of some 200,000 troops, presently on duty in countries other than Iraq and Afghanistan, to USNORTHCOM to prepare for the "expected outbreak of Civil War within the United States before the end of winter." It would appear those who call themselves "public servants" believe the people they supposedly serve have become dissatisfied with their job performance and will resort to some form of civil disobedience, which will necessitate military intervention. full story |
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Sprint Received 8 MILLION Law Enforcement Requests for GPS Location Data in the Past Year |
Sprint received over 8 million requests for its customers' information in the past 13 months. That doesn't count requests for basic identification and billing information, or wiretapping requests, or requests to monitor who is calling who, or even requests for less-precise location data based on which cell phone towers a cell phone was in contact with. That's just GPS. And, that's not including legal requests from civil litigants, or from foreign intelligence investigators. That's just law enforcement. full story |
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Lawsuit Demands Answers About Social-Networking Surveillance |
Recent news reports have publicized the government's use of social networking data as evidence in various investigations, and Congress is currently considering several pieces of legislation that may increase protections for consumers who use social-networking websites and other online tools. In response, the Samuelson Clinic made over a dozen Freedom of Information Act requests on behalf of EFF to the CIA, the DoJ, the DHS, and other agencies, asking for information about how the government collects and uses this sensitive information. full story |
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Obama Treason Charges Advance in Tennessee Grand Jury |
If Obama is indeed guilty of treason - then we have a growing list of folks who are also committing treason. Namely, every member of law enforcement and the justice system who have taken an oath to uphold and defend the US Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic - along with every individual in Washington DC and beyond who has chosen to look the other way while denying American citizens their day in court - claiming that no citizen has the "legal standing" to ask who in the hell Barack Hussein Obama really is. full story |
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Arming Goldman With Pistols Against Public |
Senior Goldman people have loaded up on firearms and are now equipped to defend themselves if there is a populist uprising against the bank. Talk that Goldman bankers might have armed themselves in self-defense would sound ludicrous, were it not so apt a metaphor for the way that the most successful people on Wall Street have become a target for public rage. The bailout was meant to keep the curtain drawn on the way the rich make money, not from the free market, but from the lack of one. full story |
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HHS Would Become Federal Giant under Senate Plan |
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius would be awarded unprecedented new powers under the proposal, including the authority to decide what medical care should be covered by insurers as well as the terms and conditions of coverage and who should receive it. "The legislation lists 1,697 times where the secretary of health and humans services is given the authority to create, determine or define things in the bill," said Devon Herrick, a health care expert at the National Center for Policy Analysis. full story |
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