OPINION - Why banksters laugh with the recent ECOFIN decision

Many people today, know about the case of Agglo-Irish bank’s higher executives, where two of them have been recorded talking about how they misled Irish government, by asking 7 billion euros bailout for a start, while they knew that this amount was not enough for the bank rescue. In these recordings that have been revealed by the Irish Independent (http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/inside-anglo-the-secret-recordings-29366837.html), banksters appear to hide the real damage of the collapsing bank, in order to drag government in a

repeated cycle of bailout packages, at the expense of taxpayers of course. The final bailout for the Agglo-Irish bank, reached the amount of 30 billion euros, nearly 22 per cent of Ireland’s GDP!

It is almost certain that, the banksters will laugh this time, with the European Economic and Financial Affairs Council’s (ECOFIN) decision, taken about a month ago, concerning the participation of shareholders and depositors in future possible damages of the banks, what they called “bail in”. And this because, in such deregulation conditions, banksters will have the opportunity, not only to get away without paying a cent, in a potential banking crisis, but on the contrary, to gain from such a situation according various possible scenarios.

For a start, the decision transforms the depositors into “investors against their will”, but with a major difference since they will not have any right on the investment options of any bank. Just think that, three decades ago, or earlier, the deposits in banks, enjoyed security and high interest rates. Through this decision, the depositors, not only left unprotected from golden boys’ choices, which are guided exclusively by their greed, but they will be considered equally responsible for these choices, and will participate in damages, without having the right to decide.

On the basis of a potential scenario, the key shareholders and depositors of special privileges, who will have the suitable access on “inside information” about an oncoming banking crisis, will have the opportunity to withdraw capitals and deposits on time, leaving the rest, therefore mostly, small depositors and independent shareholders, to pay the bill. After that, they will have the opportunity to “come back” – if they want and if the bank is still alive – under different investment fund formations, as saviors of the collapsing bank, obtaining again the basic control, and gaining from the whole situation since they will not have to contribute with their original capital in the required minimum fractional reserve.

This, of course, is just one of the many potential scenarios. Beyond this, the decision hits particularly the small commercial banks, which depend to a great extent on deposits, and thus, they become even easier victims for the big investment banks, which control the money flow in eurozone, and are mainly responsible for the last big economic crisis in the United States and Europe, according to the US Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission report.

The biggest insurance companies will also benefit from the decision since, in a potential “bail in”, those who will be called first for the bank rescue, besides shareholders, will be the uninsuranced creditors and the uninsuranced deposits of big companies.

Additionally, ECOFIN’s officials, didn’t bother to clarify, what will happen with the decision of the European leaders, about a year ago in the European summit, an initiative of the Italian ex-Prime Minister, Mario Monti, according to which, European banks will be re-capitalized straightly from the European support mechanisms, without the “annoying” inspection of each member-state separately, but in expense, of course, of the European taxpayers as a whole.

Thus, the pointless effort of the European authorities to put some rules in a system which has been deregulated by them, and which they continue to deregulate further, guided by the Greek crisis, for the benefit of the big capital, seems that makes banksters laugh again. But the rest of us, as we experiencing the tragic consequences of the crisis they created, unfortunately, we don’t have the … luxury to laugh.

failedevolution

OPINION - Winners and losers in Snowden fiasco

Everyone knows the competition between China and the US is  key to 21st century international relations. But China’s strength  still lags far behind that of the US. As China’s comprehensive  strategic partner, Russia took the initiative in the Snowden case  and came to the forefront of the rivalry with the US, which  shows multipolar flexibility in global geopolitics. Russia’s action  deserves respect from China.

US President Barack Obama has announced he will attend the  G20 summit in St. Petersburg this September. A meeting  between Russian and US defense and foreign ministers will  also be scheduled for later this week in Washington. Although  Obama canceled his Moscow summit last week with Russian  President Vladimir Putin ahead of the G20 summit, it is a  relatively insignificant change. The US has apparently accepted  the fact that Russia granted one-year asylum to National  Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden. Russia has  impressed the world, which views the Kremlin as the “winner”  and the White House as the “loser.”

This judgment is correct. In the Snowden case, all the other  countries involved have become winners while the US is the  sole loser. Washington put on a show of bravado, but failed to  extradite Snowden in the end. By contrast, Moscow displayed  its national characteristics of decisiveness and boldness and  kept Washington at bay.

Many Chinese netizens believe China should have done so, but  China only showed hesitation and weakness.

If China had Snowden in its care, a big change in its attitude  toward Sino-US relations would have been brought and China  would have had to undertake risks associated with such a  change.

Yet China ostensibly chose to not interfere. Now, the decision  seems to have generated better results. Some of the US’  hypocritical national policies were exposed, and Snowden was  not extradited to the US. International opinion is scathing of the  US in information security issues. At the same time, Sino-US  relations have not been greatly affected.

Moscow has consolidated its tough diplomatic attitude toward  Washington and drawn closer in diplomatic status when a gap  still exists in terms of the actual strength of the two. Moscow is  willing to take the lead in the Snowden case and has experience  in doing so. This perfectly fits Beijing’s interests.

Everyone knows the competition between China and the US is  key to 21st century international relations. But China’s strength  still lags far behind that of the US. As China’s comprehensive  strategic partner, Russia took the initiative in the Snowden case  and came to the forefront of the rivalry with the US, which  shows multipolar flexibility in global geopolitics. Russia’s action  deserves respect from China.

China is not willing to engage in a head-on confrontation with  the US, but it has already had the ability to unite with those who  can restrict the US’ abuses of power. We did not confront the  US directly, and this serves the long-term interests of China’s  diplomacy.

Washington ate the dirt this time, but it does not necessarily  mean it is really awed by Moscow. In the same manner,  Washington is unlikely to fear Beijing, and Beijing needn’t fear  Washington. What Beijing should care about most is how to  maximize its interests in its relations with Washington.

Snowden can do more in a country like Russia. The  performance that has disgraced the US is far from over.

rickrozoff

Exposed Gov't Criminals - Where Are They Today?

For the last several years former CIA officer Philip Giraldi has been fearlessly reporting and writing on two no-no topics for the US government and its extension- the US media: Espionage and Illegal Arms Trafficking by Israel and Turkey, facilitated by a group of treasonous US officials. Despite Giraldi’s credentials as a former CIA operative, his extensive first-hand knowledge and experience, and no matter the amount of documentation and numerous well-established cases he presents, these alarming facts and trends always go ignored or intentionally blacked-out by the mainstream and pseudo alternative media alike.

By Sibel Edmonds
Boiling Frogs Post

On August 1, 2013, Giraldi published another damning article in his long-running series involving espionage and arms trafficking by the two major US allies, facilitated by their extensions within the US government:

    Ten years ago, FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds revealed that the defense ministries of several major recipients of United States military hardware were being scrutinized because they had been falsifying end-user certificates, claiming that the equipment was intended for their own use while at the same time arranging to sell it to other militaries that were blocked from receiving the sensitive technology. In May 2006, I described in a Deep Background column for TAC how the two countries most heavily engaged in the practice—Israel and Turkey—also benefited from their connections with leading neoconservatives in Washington. Richard Perle and Doug Feith in particular benefited financially from their ties to defense industries in Israel while also serving as richly rewarded “consultants” for Turkish interests. Feith’s International Advisors Inc., a registered agent for Turkey in 1989-1994, was paid $600,000 a year by Turkish sources, while Richard Perle received $48,000 annually as a consultant. Feith has also long been associated with Northrop Grumman sales in the Middle East. While at the Pentagon in 1983, Perle was criticized for endorsing the U.S. Army’s purchase of an armaments system from an Israeli company that had paid him $50,000 in consulting fees one year before.

Here is an excerpt from Giraldi’s 2006 article mentioned above:

    Someone has to be in the middle to keep the happy affair going, so enter the neocons, intent on securing Israel against all comers and also keen to turn a dollar. In fact the neocons seem to have a deep and abiding interest in Turkey, which, under other circumstances, might be difficult to explain.

That’s right: “Someone” has to be in the middle and facilitate these criminal activities. Someone(s) with access, power, and influence. Someone(s) in a position as a US government official-whether appointed or elected.

Giraldi specifically mentions the following names directly connected to the high-level US players involved in these nefarious foreign lobbies and their related espionage and illegal arms trafficking: Douglas Feith, Richard Perle, Marc Grossman, Eric Edelman, Paul Wolfowitz, and Stephen Solarz.

And here is my infamous State Secrets Gallery released in 2005-2006 depicting the high-level US officials involved in my State Secrets Privilege case: Click Here . Do you recognize the pictures and names from Giraldi’s exposés?

You can read the entire article by Giraldi here. It has been over 10 years since these revelations – by me, Philip Giraldi, Sunday Times series, Vanity Fair exposé …, and yet the involved criminal fat cats are still in operation-one way or another, and have been getting fatter and fatter. Let me give you a few more examples from my States Secrets Gallery:

Former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert is now officially a Registered Foreign Agent with Turkey:

    Former Speaker of the House J. Dennis Hastert, R-Plano, is now lobbying for the Republic of Turkey, according to papers filed last week with the Justice Department’s Foreign Agents Registration Act unit.
    Mr. Hastert and others at Dickstein Shapiro share a $35,000-per-month subcontract with the Gephardt Group, led by former House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Mo., Turkey’s principal lobbyist since last year, according to The Hill, a Washington, D.C.-based publication that first reported Mr. Hastert’s involvement.

So what if he was exposed by the Vanity Fair article?! The magazine’s readers in the millions were busy reading the parallel article on Jennifer Aniston. They couldn’t give a hoot about the scandals involving the United States Speaker of the House.

In 2005 Marc Grossman, the former third highest level person at the State Department- Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs, joined Turkey’s Imam Fethullah Gulen related Ihlas Holding, a large and alleged shady Turkish company, which is also active in several Central Asian countries. Grossman is reported to receive $100,000 per month for his advisory position with Ihlas. You can read more on this here.

So who cares if he was exposed to millions by the Sunday Times’ Series in 2006-2007? Apparently no one.

How about another figure from the treason circle: Richard Armitage? Do you know where he is since he left his position only to indirectly continue his operations? Well, check it out:

    Now it is official. Former U.S. Secretary of State Richard Armitage is on his way to take over the Chairmanship of the American Turkish Council from Brent Scowcroft.

Not only that. As with the Perle and Feith marriage, other high-level criminal players also get together and form illicit marriages:

    In May 2010, DLA Piper, one of the world’s largest international lobby-law firms, hired Marc Grossman as their front man for their Turkish operations. The man in charge of one of DLA Piper major accounts-Turkey is none other than our good ole Dennis Hastert. That makes two former FBI criminal targets for one firm.

Last month Washington Post’s Style section ran an article on a few well-known government whistleblowers-profiling where they are today – years after blowing the whistle, court and congressional battles, persecution and prosecutions. Basically, the gist of the piece was “Where are they today?”

The media must similarly investigate and publish similar articles and profiles on those government criminals who were exposed and reported by government whistleblowers. They should. They must. Otherwise the picture will never be complete. Because the complete picture, the real story in-full, would clearly show  that the exposed US government criminals, whether NSA heads engaged in illegal wiretapping of all Americans and blackmailing US politicians, whether those responsible for torture and renditions, whether those operating as foreign spies or in illegal weapons or drug trafficking, always end up keeping their positions or actually getting promoted to higher levels, or, they operate from the outside – influencing those inside while filling their pockets with millions of illicit dollars channeled to them through intentional loopholes.

That is right. We have US public officials engaged in treason, espionage, torture, blackmail, kidnapping and rendition, illegal weapons trafficking and intelligence dealings-those who choose to betray the people and prostitute the people’s trust and their public positions. And, they stay in power and keep getting fatter and fatter.

Then of course we have the prosecution of Bradley Manning, the hunt for Edward Snowden, the imprisonment of John Kiriakou and … Those who chose to expose rather than betray- They chose integrity over treason. And, they are being made to pay.

So what is all this? Good O’l American government, politics and Justice? Systemic American ignorance and apathy? A morally and intellectually corrupt nation descending rapidly? What say you? What do all these realities and facts tell us? What kind of nation are we? What does all this make us, the people of the United States?

Sibel Edmonds is the Publisher & Editor of Boiling Frogs Post and the author of the Memoir Classified Woman: The Sibel Edmonds Story. She is the recipient of the 2006 PEN Newman’s Own First Amendment Award for her “commitment to preserving the free flow of information in the United States in a time of growing international isolation and increasing government secrecy” Ms. Edmonds has a MA in Public Policy and International Commerce from George Mason University, a BA in Criminal Justice and Psychology from George Washington University.

RON PAUL: Why Won’t The US Tell Us the Truth About NSA Spying?

In 2001, the Patriot Act opened the door to US government monitoring of Americans without a warrant. It was unconstitutional, but most in Congress over my strong objection were so determined to do something after the attacks of 9/11 that they did not seem to give it too much thought. Civil liberties groups were concerned, and some of us in Congress warned about giving up our liberties even in the post-9/11 panic. But at the time most Americans did not seem too worried about the intrusion.

This complacency has suddenly shifted given recent revelations of the extent of government spying on Americans. Politicians and bureaucrats are faced with serious backlash from Americans outraged that their most personal communications are intercepted and stored. They had been told that only the terrorists would be monitored. In response to this anger, defenders of the program have time and again resorted to spreading lies and distortions. But these untruths are now being exposed very quickly.

In a Senate hearing this March, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told Senator Ron Wyden that the NSA did not collect phone records of millions of Americans. This was just three months before the revelations of an NSA leaker made it clear that Clapper was not telling the truth. Pressed on his false testimony before Congress, Clapper apologized for giving an “erroneous” answer but claimed it was just because he “simply didn’t think of Section 215 of the Patriot Act.” Wow.

As the story broke in June of the extent of warrantless NSA spying against Americans, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers assured us that the project was a strictly limited and not invasive. He described it as a “lockbox with only phone numbers, no names, no addresses in it, we’ve used it sparingly, it is absolutely overseen by the legislature, the judicial branch and the executive branch, has lots of protections built in...”

But we soon discovered that also was not true either. We learned in another Guardian newspaper article last week that the top secret “X-Keyscore” program allows even low-level analysts to “search with no prior authorization through vast databases containing emails, online chats and the browsing histories of millions of individuals.”

The keys to Rogers’ “lockbox” seem to have been handed out to everyone but the janitors! As Chairman of the Committee that is supposed to be most in the loop on these matters, it seems either the Intelligence Community misled him about their programs or he misled the rest of us. It sure would be nice to know which one it is.

Likewise, Rep. Rogers and many other defenders of the NSA spying program promised us that this dragnet scooping up the personal electronic communications of millions of Americans had already stopped “dozens” of terrorist plots against the United States. In June, NSA director General Keith Alexander claimed that the just-disclosed bulk collection of Americans’ phone and other electronic records had “foiled 50 terror plots.”

Opponents of the program were to be charged with being unconcerned with our security.

But none of it was true.

The Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday heard dramatic testimony from NSA deputy director John C. Inglis. According to the Guardian:

    “The NSA has previously claimed that 54 terrorist plots had been disrupted ‘over the lifetime’ of the bulk phone records collection and the separate program collecting the internet habits and communications of people believed to be non-Americans. On Wednesday, Inglis said that at most one plot might have been disrupted by the bulk phone records collection alone.”

From dozens to “at most one”?

Supporters of these programs are now on the defensive, with several competing pieces of legislation in the House and Senate seeking to rein in an administration and intelligence apparatus that is clearly out of control. This is to be commended. What is even more important, though, is for more and more and more Americans to educate themselves about our precious liberties and to demand that their government abide by the Constitution. We do not have to accept being lied to – or spied on -- by our government.

the-free-foundation.org

EYE-OPENER - Darwinism: Then and Now - A Look At Why The Elite Loves "Social Darwinism"

This article was written by Erik G. Magro and first published on Aug. 16th, 2005. It is a SLAP to all of those who still believe that leftist ideologies and philysofical fluff will save the world. We urge all of our readers to read this article carefully. In our opinion this is a MUST READ.

The Victorian Age in England was a time of dramatic changes, new inventions, the Industrial Revolution, and an introduction to new ideologies, all of which would transform the way significant portions of society lived and thought of life forever. The overwhelming external changes in daily life during this period would match in intensity the nature of changes happening in the internal lives of the public.

Charles Darwin, as a naturalist, helped usher in this change after a long voyage to the South Seas where he observed several widely unknown species. In 1859, a year after his return, he presented his observations in a book, The Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. In it he deduced from their widely diverse natures a common thread that linked all species to a single ancestor; the Theory of Evolution as he called the phenomenon soon became a household word and stirred up massive controversy and debate, still resounding today.

The implications of Darwin's theory created a deep divide in culture, a conflict of natural versus supernatural order. Not only did it offer an alternate account of the genesis of life from the Old Testament, but it also gave a sense of moral freedom from the divine Creator and His judgment; it became a cause unto itself in society among leaders in political and industrial circles, effecting science and academia.

Darwinism, as the collection of theories was called, changed the course of man's history forever.

In the immediate aftermath of unleashing the evolution theory to the public, the common man was faced with a choice of how to look at life and live it. Among those exposed to these choices were some of the most important men in the business community, men who could, with their influence of wealth and power, determine the lifestyles of the middle class population by means of their product prices, work policies, and wages in the factories they owned.

A staunch supporter of evolution, Herbert Spencer, developed the social application of Darwinism, which was highly influential on the practices of such powerful moguls. The ideology was known as Social Darwinism and made use of the models Darwin used to describe evolution in nature, namely, survival of the fittest and natural selection. These orders of development were the philosophical basis that publicly justified the methods factory owners were already applying in their businesses to stay competitive. As leaders of industry, they believed they had the right to impose whatever treatment they saw fit for those below them on the social ladder.

Social Darwinism reduced society to the rule of the jungle in a sense. Man became a commodity, a worker bee to be exploited by a stronger species - as opposed to a sacred being made in the image of God. Soon larger segments of society in Europe and America suffered brutal working conditions throughout most of the Industrial Revolution. Extremely long hours, puny wages, underage workers, little or no benefits, and broken spirits were the rule of the day.

The strong words of activist Annie Besant give testimony of the desperate frustration during this time:

     "Oh if we had but a people's Dante, to make a special circle in the Inferno for those who live on the misery, and suck wealth out of the starvation of helpless girls" (1717).

Once the tremendous hardships were no longer bearable, public attention eventually organized successfully to agitate reform in labor laws and would soon influence other industrialized countries around the world like America, Germany, and France, opening the door for further progress in the workplace effecting workers even today. Whether or not they were conscious of it, by the masses taking such actions they were in essence rejecting the precepts of Darwinism: a great instance of irony, as they were popular during this time.

Even as the materialism and dialectic principles were known and influential among the ruling and elite classes long before the Victorian Age, thinkers like Darwin, Malthus, and Spencer repackaged and updated them with new observations and analysis of the natural world and society, helping to popularize them among intellectual spheres and civilians.

Once these widely shared worldviews were politicized, new forms of government emerged employing many of the perceived scientific principles described by evolutionists. Two very important shapers of political thought during this time were Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. They believed Social Darwinism provided a way to perfect mankind behaviorally and socially. Marx even offered to dedicate his first volume of Das Kapital to Darwin.

Darwin's book had given God's presence "the death-blow," he exulted to fellow socialist, Lassalle (Marx). By enhancing Socialism with Darwinism, Communism emerged as a powerful movement led by Vladimir Lenin and the Bolshevik Party, later wrenching control of Russia in the Revolution of 1917.

All land, materials, and biological (including human) resources became property of the state. Lenin implemented social programs and began starving and slaughtering whole societies whom he regarded as herds of animals. He was encouraged by the deaths of millions and believed people would lose faith in God and turn more to socialism. To survive the famine, many turned to cannibalism.

Lenin's ideology was inspired by Darwin's Origin of Species:

     "Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of higher animals, directly follows" (Darwin 1886).

As Darwinism spread throughout Europe, violence was legitimized under the "struggle for existence" theory.

As Austro-Hungarian chief of staff, Franz Baron Conrad von Hoetzendorff wrote in his post-war memoirs:

     "It is in accordance with this great principle that the catastrophe of the World War came about as the result of the motive forces in the lives of states and peoples--" (qtd. in Joll 164).

Following in Lenin's footsteps, Stalin took control of Soviet Russia. Earlier in life, right before Stalin became a priest he read Origin of Species, and his life quickly changed; he became atheist and joined the Bolsheviks. As dictator, he executed scientists who rejected evolution and the projects developed from it, like soaking seeds in cold water for long periods of time expecting them to adapt to the low temperatures in Russia. As a result, 9 million starved to death and cannibalism once again turned humans into wild savages.

During Stalin's reign, 40 million died at his hands, more than the 25 million that died fighting Nazi Germany. The system of Communism paved the way for other disciples of Marxist-Leninist-Darwinism to rise to power in Asia, such as Mao Zedong.

After Darwin's work was translated in 1895 into Chinese, many believed constant violence was how evolution occurred. Under Mao, 40 million starved in his Great Leap Forward social program, 78 million in general. Communism eventually spread into surrounding North Korea, North Vietnam, and Cambodia, dragging America into strung out bloody guerilla wars with the terrorist regimes.

Today, these ideologies still exist - effecting world politics in no small measure - and make Evolution mandatory learning in the education system, force families apart premised on views that humans as advanced apes do not need them, or religion and ethics, and instead must show loyalty only to the state as the highest authority.

Fascist forms of government indoctrinate the same concepts of Darwinism as Communist governments.

Mussolini and Hitler were great advocates of Darwin and Spencer's work. Hitler's National Socialist German Worker's (Nazi) Party combined their deep mystical beliefs with Darwinism to inspire a grandiose vision of world conquest, leading the globe into a new age of enlightenment. Anyone who did not conform to Hitler's ideas of the model citizen were rounded up and executed as inferior races that were holding back the rest of society from evolving.

Professor of modern European History, Richard Weikart reviewing his book, From Darwin to Hitler, says

     "Darwinism played a key role not only in the rise of eugenics, but also in euthanasia, infanticide, abortion, and racial extermination, all ultimately embraced by the Nazis" (Weikart).

Every major war and revolution from the Victorian Age onward has its catalyst rooted in the dialectical-materialism philosophy known as Evolution. Today these concepts are found in Communist regimes and the western world.

In the US, Communist activism broke out on the streets and college campuses during the 60s and 70s in war protests, and in general counter-culture movements under the cloak of various civil rights movements such as feminism and often with the radical motives of breaking up families.

In the 1950s, Senator Joe McCarthy exposed many high-level Communists working in various posts in Washington D.C. Many of the accusations were false, but many were supported, including the allegation that elements within the US were funding Mao's regime.

Professor Antony Sutton exposed the false dichotomy of Capitalism versus Communism by documenting how Wall Street and centralized banks created the Soviet superpower threat (Sutton).

Neoconservatives such as Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Rove fill key positions in the current US administration, and Irving Kristol, a disciple of Leon Trotsky (one of Lenin's top officers), founded Neoconservatism in the 1980s.

Kristol explains:

     "Ever since I can remember, I've been a neo-something: a neo-Marxist, a neo-Trotskyist, a neo-liberal, a neo-conservative;" ("New York").

On top of this, national archives in the US detail how Wall Street banker, senator, and grandfather of George W. Bush, Prescott Bush, underscored the Nazi war machine and several major US corporations were contracted to build it (Aris and Campbell).

Yale's secret society, Skull and Bones, was founded in 1832 by W. Russell, a member of a Germanic cult linked to the Thule Society, later morphing into the Nazi party (Sawyer).

From Prescott to George W., the Bushes have been members of S&B, a.k.a. the Death's Head - death as the means to advance man's evolution through "struggle for existence". The ideologies of Fascist-Communism, thus, Social Darwinism, grip the US establishment today.

The long-winding path of Darwinism has an unmistakable imprint on the course of history since the Victorian Age and affects the globe today. The conflict of the natural evolution versus the supernatural creation of man will continue as long as the ideas do.

Whether the world's remaining free peoples will abandon the laws of God and acquiesce under the mantras and slogans of socialist shills depends on the success of transnational corporations and the revolving door into the highest world councils that they co-opt. This global plutocracy via world banking and the IMF directs world governments, economies, mass media, education, resources, religion, and planetary conflict to push for the next step in man's evolution: a New World Order.

Works Cited

• Aris, Ben, and Campbell, Duncan. "How Bush's Grandfather Helped Hitler's Rise to Power." Guardian Unlimited 25 Sept. 2004. 18 Mar. 2005.
• Besant, Annie. "The 'White Slavery' of London Match Workers." The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Seventh ed. Vol. 2. Eds. M. H. Abrams and Stephen Greenblatt. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company, 2000. 1715-17.
• Darwin, Charles. "From Origin of Species." The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Seventh ed. Vol. 2. Eds. M. H. Abrams and Stephen Greenblatt. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company, 2000. 1679-86.
• Joll, James. Europe Since 1870: An International History. Middlesex, Lnd: Penguin Books, 1990.
• Marx, Karl. Letter. Marxist Internet Archive. 1942. International Publishers. 16 Mar. 2005.
• "New York Intellectuals." 1999. PBS Online. 18 Mar. 2005.
• Sawyer, Roy. "Skull and Bones, Bush's Nazi Link."
• thermag.com. 4 Jan. 2002. 18 Mar. 2005.
• Sutton, Antony. Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution. Cutchogue, NY: Buccaneer Books, 1974. 18 Mar. 2005.
• Weikart, Richard. "Dustjacket Blurb." From Darwin to Hitler: Evolutionary Ethics, Eugenics, and Racism in Germany. 17 Dec. 2004. CSU. 16 Mar. 2005.

hattimehascome

Puttin’ the Pressure on Vladimir Putin

The Obama administration continues to compound the diplomatic mess around former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. The latest blunder was announcing that the U.S. wouldn’t torture or execute Snowden, a reminder to the world how far Official Washington has strayed from civilized behavior, notes ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern. The main question now on the fate of truth-teller Edward Snowden is whether Russian President Vladimir Putin will see any benefit in helping stop the United States from further embarrassing itself as it prances around the globe acting like a “pitiful, helpless giant.” That image was coined by President Richard Nixon, who insisted that the giant of America would merit those adjectives if it did not prevail in South Vietnam.

By Ray McGovern
The Ugly Truth

It is no secret that Putin is chuckling as Attorney General Eric Holder and other empty-shirts-cum-corporate-law-office-silk-ties – assisted ably by White House spokesperson Jay Carney – proceed willy-nilly to transform the Snowden case from a red-faced diplomatic embarrassment for the United States into a huge geopolitical black eye before the rest of the world.

Reminding the planet how out of step the United States has been from most of the civilized world, Holder offered a written promise to the Russians on July 9 (and released on Friday) that Snowden would neither be tortured nor put to death for disclosing secrets about how the National Security Agency has been spying on Americans and pretty much everybody else on Earth.

Holder assured the Russian Justice Minister that the U.S. “would not seek the death penalty for Mr. Snowden should he return to the United States.” Holder also saw fit to reassure his Russian counterpart that, “Mr. Snowden will not be tortured. Torture is unlawful in the United States.” Wow, that’s a relief!

The United States is so refined in its views on human rights that it won’t torture or execute a whistleblower. Of course, that only reminded everyone that the United States is one of the few advanced societies that still puts lots of people to death and was caught just last decade torturing detainees at CIA “black sites,” not to mention the brutal treatment of other prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

And, there was the humiliating treatment afforded another American whistleblower, Private Bradley Manning, whose forced nudity and long periods in solitary confinement during eight months of confinement at the Marine base at Quantico, Virginia, just outside of Washington D.C. prompted international accusations of torture.

Holder’s strange promise may have been designed to undercut Snowden’s bid for asylum, but it also reminded the world of America’s abysmal behavior on human rights. And, even if the United States promises not to torture someone, government lawyers have shown how they can play games with the definition of the term or just outright lie. Holder’s reputation for veracity is just a thin notch above that of National Intelligence Director James Clapper, who admits he has chosen to testify under oath to the “least untruthful” things.

Perhaps no one has told Holder how shockingly out of step with other civilized nations the U.S. finds itself on the issue of capital punishment. Just calling attention to that is a diplomatic gaffe of some proportion. The global trend toward abolition of the death penalty is unmistakable and increasing. The United States even is the outlier on this issue when compared to “brutal” Russia. In Russia, there has been a moratorium on executions since 1996, although it is still technically lawful.

The European Union holds a strong and principled position against the death penalty, and the abolition of capital punishment is a pre-condition for entry into the Union. The U.S. enjoys the dubious distinction of joining a list with China, Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia as the leaders in executing people.

Closing the Barn Door Too Late

Holder’s high-profile push to get the Russians to hand over Snowden damages the United States in other ways, too, such as reminding the world how the U.S. government has violated the privacy rights of people everywhere, including in allied countries. There is a reasonable argument to be made that the smartest U.S. move would be to simply leave Snowden alone.

Depending on your perspective, Edward Snowden has already done his damage – or, in my view, accomplished his patriotic duty of truth-telling – demonstrating with documents how the administrations of George W. Bush and Barack Obama have trashed the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Moreover, Snowden apparently had the foresight to handle his revelations in such way that, to the degree there are still more genies about to be let out of the bottle, it will be near impossible to stuff them back in. Indeed, he has said as much, in indicating how easily he can accede to Putin’s condition that he does “no further harm” to the U.S. Snowden has even been specific in acknowledging that he cannot prevent journalist Glenn Greenwald and others from publishing more of the material he made available.

So why the hue and cry from Washington? While the Obama White House has utterly failed to honor Obama’s earlier promises to run a transparent administration, there is one area in which it has been as transparent as Saran Wrap. And that is its fixation with pursuing whistleblowers “to the full extent of the law” … and then some.

The administration has been transparently vindictive, revengeful and determined to exact retribution on “leakers” as a warning to others whose consciences might trouble them enough to reveal war crimes, as Bradley Manning did, or crass violations of our rights as citizens, as Edward Snowden did.

But the recent thrashing around — demanding and cajoling Putin to turn over Snowden — has further made the United States look petulant and inept. Meanwhile, Putin has demonstrated a much more deft touch in handling this delicate international incident.

After making it clear that “we do not extradite,” Putin has had the good sense to put some distance between himself and the Snowden affair. As Secretary of State John Kerry bemoaned (from Saudi Arabia, of all places) about “standards of behavior between sovereign nations,” and (of all things) “respect for the rule of law,” Putin said the issue is simple:

“Should such people [as Snowden] be extradited to be jailed, or not? In any case, I would prefer not to deal with such issues, because this is just the same as shaving a piglet – too much noise but too little hair.”

Will Putin Cave?

Do the feckless folks running President Barack Obama’s foreign policy really think they can force Putin to back down? Can they actually believe they can achieve that by putting into play what they apparently consider a diplomatic “nuclear option”? The thinly veiled threat surfaced ten days ago that Obama will snub Putin by canceling their planned tete-a-tete before the G-20 summit in St. Petersburg in September.

Can they possibly think that by pouting, jibing and stamping their feet, they will frighten Putin into “behaving” as obediently as the malleable Italians, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Austrians did when they forced down Bolivian President Evo Morales’s plane for inspection? Morales was en route home from a visit to Russia when someone provided the U.S. with a “tip” that Snowden was hiding on Morales’s plane.

I find myself wondering who provided Washington with that great tip, and whether it is no longer the practice among U.S. intelligence agencies to take rudimentary steps to verify such tips before they let their masters get greasy diplomatic egg all over their faces?

Finally, how many more times does Putin have to say, as he did through his spokesman again Friday that: “Russia has never extradited anyone, and will not extradite [Snowden].”

Months ago, former UK MI6 intelligence officer Annie Machon coined the term “asymmetric extradition law” referring to U.S. policy, which, in the vernacular, might be called “pick-and-choose.” While there is no extradition treaty between the U.S. and Russia, there has been one between the U.S. and Italy for 30 years. Yet, Washington has turned a deaf ear to Italy’s appeals to extradite convicted kidnapper Robert Seldon Lady, former head of the CIA worker bees in Milan where the CIA mounted an “extraordinary rendition” against the Muslim cleric known as Abu Omar off the streets in 2003. Omar was given over to the tender mercies of Egyptian intelligence interrogators.

In 2005, when Lady got a tip that the Italian police were coming for him, he reportedly fled his villa without destroying sensitive files on the CIA’s mission. Italy convicted Lady and 22 other U.S. operatives in absentia and gave them hefty jail sentences. Last December, Italy’s justice minister signed a warrant for Lady’s arrest. On July 18, Lady was identified and detained in Panama, but slipped away the next day on a plane headed toward the U.S.

Few were surprised that Panama was pressured into joining the servile company of the four U.S.-crony European countries that had already embarrassed themselves as accessories to the Washington’s latest Excellent Adventure regarding Evo Morales’s plane – a fiasco code-named OARR (for Operation Airline Rest Room) after the suspected place where Snowden was believed stowed away.

But when it came to extraditing a convicted kidnapper from Panama to Italy? Puleeze. Great powers don’t have to do that kind of thing, treaty or not. Except for Russia, you see. Moscow must surrender Snowden, even absent a U.S.-Russia extradition treaty. And Putin should understand that, no?

It must have been that kind of superpower-think that prompted Jay Carney on July 12 to add insult to injury, as he jibed at the Russian government to “afford human rights organizations the ability to do their work in Russia throughout Russia, not just at the Moscow transit lounge.” That kind of comment is sure to endear the White House to the Kremlin.

Vladimir Volokh, head of the Russian Migration Service, seemed to welcome a chance to retaliate in kind. Rubbing in the awkwardness of Snowden’s present status because of actions by Washington, Volokh told the Interfax news agency Friday: “We know that he is Edward Snowden only from his words. The passport he has has been canceled. … He is under protection in the transit area for his safety. He is an individual being pursued and his life is in danger.”

The Russians, and pretty much everyone else, are smart enough to realize that, given Washington’s transparent motives, there is nothing to be gained by serving Snowden up to American “justice,” such as it has become. Russia is no banana republic, so it beggars belief that President Putin will follow the supine example of Panama. Nor is the fawning example of Italy, France, Spain and Portugal something Putin would wish to emulate.

Russian History

Scholars of Russian history make an important point that is relevant here: it is Russia’s deeply embedded inferiority complex vis-à-vis the West. Recite to Vladimir Putin the familiar adage, “Scratch the Russian and find the Tatar,” and see what happens.

In short, while Europe was coming out of the Dark Ages into the Renaissance, the Russians were for more than two centuries under the likes of Genghis Khan and his hordes – a period the Russians call the “Tatar Yoke.” This reality had very serious consequences and is deeply embedded in the Russian consciousness. In a sense, the Russians have been playing catch-up ball ever since.

Their struggle seems never ending, but now and again they reach high ground. L’Affaire Snowden is one of those “nows.” Russia occupies the high moral ground, helped immeasurably by the behavior of the Bush and Obama administrations, which have squandered the moral advantage the U.S. used to enjoy.

Worse still, from President Obama’s perspective, there is little leverage he can bring to bear on the Russian Bear. If Putin thought Obama was really running things in Washington, he might try to barter Snowden’s freedom for some significant concession. But Moscow is not likely to believe Obama could deliver on any such concession, and Russian officials are probably right.

Obama, Holder, Carney and the rest would be well advised not to push any more geopolitical chips onto the table in a risky bet on winning back Snowden. Russia has the better cards on this one, and it is a mark of realism, as well as intelligence, to recognize “when to fold them.”

Otherwise, and particularly if Putin keeps seeing the pastel-tie empty suits pontificating on how Russia must do its duty in surrendering Edward Snowden, there is a chance we may see Putin take Snowden to asylum in Latin America on his own plane, overflying Austria, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal and Panama en route.

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. His graduate degree is in Russian history, which served him well as a Soviet analyst during the first decade of his 27-year tenure at the CIA. He is co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).

The Power Of The Big Banks - Who Controls The Global Economy?

Are the big banks really as powerful as some people say that they are?  Do they really control the global economy?  If you ask most people, they would tell you that governments control the global economy.  But the campaigns of our politicians are funded by the ultra-wealthy, the big banks and the large corporations that they control.  Others would tell you that the Federal Reserve and the rest of the central banks around the world control the global economy.

But the truth is that the Federal Reserve was established by the bankers and for the benefit of the bankers.  As you will see below, at the very core of the global economy there exists a "super-entity" of financial institutions that control an almost unimaginable amount of wealth and power.  These financial institutions and the ultra-wealthy individuals behind them are really the ones that are pulling all the strings.  In this world money equals power, and the borrower is the servant of the lender.

When you follow the pyramid all the way to the top, it begins to become very clear who really is in control.

In business schools all over America today, instead of dreaming of starting new businesses and contributing something positive to society, most business students are dreaming of going to Wall Street and getting rich.  But Wall Street doesn't actually create or build anything of value for society.  Instead, the bankers make most of their profits by essentially pushing money and paper around.


In a recent article, Chris Martenson commented on this...

    Today, some of the most celebrated individuals and institutions are ensconced within the financial industry; in banks, hedge funds, and private equity firms. Which is odd because none of these firms or individuals actually make anything, which society might point to as additive to our living standards. Instead, these financial magicians harvest value from the rest of society that has to work hard to produce real things of real value.
    While the work they do is quite sophisticated and takes a lot of skill, very few of these firms direct capital to new efforts, new products, and new innovations. Instead they either trade in the secondary markets for equities, bonds, derivatives, and the like, which perform the 'service' of moving paper from one location to another while generating 'profits.' Or, in the case of banks, they create money out of thin air and lend it out – at interest of course.

But just because they aren't adding much value to society does not mean that these big banks are not extremely powerful.  In fact, anyone that underestimates that power of these monolithic financial institutions is being quite foolish.

A team of researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich studied the relationships between 37 million companies and investors worldwide, and what they found was absolutely stunning.

What they discovered is that there is a "super-entity" of just 147 very tightly knit companies that controls 40 percent of the entire network...

    When the team further untangled the web of ownership, it found much of it tracked back to a "super-entity" of 147 even more tightly knit companies - all of their ownership was held by other members of the super-entity - that controlled 40 per cent of the total wealth in the network. "In effect, less than 1 per cent of the companies were able to control 40 per cent of the entire network," says Glattfelder. Most were financial institutions. The top 20 included Barclays Bank, JPMorgan Chase & Co, and The Goldman Sachs Group.

So exactly who are the companies that are at the core of this "super-entity"?

Well, almost all of them are banks or financial institutions.  The following is a list of the 50 "most connected" companies from the study, and the notes in parentheses are from Chris Martenson...

1. Barclays plc
2. Capital Group Companies Inc (Investment Management)
3. FMR Corporation (Financial Services)
4. AXA (Investments & Life Insurance)
5. State Street Corporation (Investment Management)
6. JP Morgan Chase & Co (Bank)
7. Legal & General Group plc (Investments & Life Insurance)
8. Vanguard Group Inc (Investment Management)
9. UBS AG (Bank)
10. Merrill Lynch & Co Inc (Bank)
11. Wellington Management Co LLP (Investment Management)
12. Deutsche Bank AG (Bank)
13. Franklin Resources Inc (Investment Management)
14. Credit Suisse Group (Bank)
15. Walton Enterprises LLC
16. Bank of New York Mellon Corp (Bank)
17. Natixis (Investment Management)
18. Goldman Sachs Group Inc (Bank)
19. T Rowe Price Group Inc (Investment Management)
20. Legg Mason Inc (Investment Management)
21. Morgan Stanley (Bank)
22. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc (Bank)
23. Northern Trust Corporation (Investment Management)
24. Société Générale (Bank)
25. Bank of America Corporation (Bank)
26. Lloyds TSB Group plc (Bank)
27. Invesco plc (Investment mgmt) 28. Allianz SE 29. TIAA (Investments & Insurance)
30. Old Mutual Public Limited Company (Investments & Insurance)
31. Aviva plc (Insurance)
32. Schroders plc (Investment Management)
33. Dodge & Cox (Investment Management)
34. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc* (Bank)
35. Sun Life Financial Inc (Investments & Insurance)
36. Standard Life plc (Investments & Insurance)
37. CNCE
38. Nomura Holdings Inc (Investments and Financial Services)
39. The Depository Trust Company (Securities Depository)
40. Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance
41. ING Groep NV (Bank, Investments & Insurance)
42. Brandes Investment Partners LP (Financial Services)
43. Unicredito Italiano SPA (Bank)
44. Deposit Insurance Corporation of Japan (Owns a lot of banks' shares in Japan)
45. Vereniging Aegon (Investments & Insurance)
46. BNP Paribas (Bank)
47. Affiliated Managers Group Inc (Owns stakes in 27 money management firms)
48. Resona Holdings Inc (Banking Group in Japan)
49. Capital Group International Inc (Investments and Financial Services)
50. China Petrochemical Group Company

Are you starting to get the idea?

The global economy truly is completely dominated by banks and other financial institutions.
In the United States, the big banks are not just content to own other companies anymore.  Now, some of our largest banks are actually starting to directly get into businesses such as "electric power production, oil refining and distribution, owning and operating of public assets such as ports and airports, and even uranium mining".  The following is an excerpt from a letter that several members of the U.S. Congress recently sent to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke...

    We write in regards to the expansion of large banks into what had traditionally been non-financial commercial spheres. Specifically, we are concerned about how large banks have recently expanded their businesses into such fields as electric power production, oil refining and distribution, owning and operating of public assets such as ports and airports, and even uranium mining.
    Here are a few examples. Morgan Stanley imported 4 million barrels of oil and petroleum products into the United States in June, 2012. Goldman Sachs stores aluminum in vast warehouses in Detroit as well as serving as a commodities derivatives dealer. This “bank” is also expanding into the ownership and operation of airports, toll roads, and ports. JP Morgan markets electricity in California.
    In other words, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, and Morgan Stanley are no longer just banks – they have effectively become oil companies, port and airport operators, commodities dealers, and electric utilities as well. This is causing unforeseen problems for the industrial sector of the economy. For example, Coca Cola has filed a complaint with the London Metal Exchange that Goldman Sachs was hoarding aluminum. JP Morgan is currently being probed by regulators for manipulating power prices in California, where the “bank” was marketing electricity from power plants it controlled. We don’t know what other price manipulation could be occurring due to potential informational advantages accruing to derivatives dealers who also market and sell commodities. The long shadow of Enron could loom in these activities.

This week, Goldman Sachs has been facing allegations that it has cost American consumers billions of dollars by manipulating the price of aluminum.  The following is from an article that was posted on CNBC...

    Hundreds of millions of times a day, thirsty Americans open a can of soda, beer or juice. And every time they do it, they pay a fraction of a penny more because of a shrewd maneuver by Goldman Sachs and other financial players that ultimately costs consumers billions of dollars.
    The story of how this works begins in 27 industrial warehouses in the Detroit area where Goldman stores customers' aluminum. Each day, a fleet of trucks shuffles 1,500-pound bars of the metal among the warehouses. Two or three times a day, sometimes more, the drivers make the same circuits. They load in one warehouse. They unload in another. And then they do it again.
    This industrial dance has been choreographed by Goldman to exploit pricing regulations set up by an overseas commodities exchange, an investigation by The New York Times has found. The back–and-forth lengthens the storage time. And that adds many millions a year to the coffers of Goldman, which owns the warehouses and charges rent to store the metal. It also increases prices paid by manufacturers and consumers across the country.

If that sounds shady to you, that is because it is shady.

But as the big banks continue to gain even more power in our society, this kind of thing will become even more common.

So what can we do about it?

Not much.

Do you think that the media will tell us the truth about all of this?  I wouldn't count on it.  At this point, there are just six giant media corporations that control more than 90 percent of the news and entertainment that you see on your television.  And those six giant media corporations are very hesitant to do anything that will damage their corporate owners or their corporate advertisers.

Do you think that our politicians will do anything about all of this?  I wouldn't count on it.  In national elections, the candidate that raises more money wins more than 80 percent of the time.  Our politicians know where their bread is buttered, and as history has shown most of them are very good to the guys with the big checkbooks.

As I said at the top of this article, money is power, and according to a report that was released last summer, the global elite have up to 32 TRILLION dollars stashed in offshore banks around the globe.

The global economy belongs to them.  We are just living in it.

But hopefully if enough people start waking up, someday we will see some significant changes.

By Michael Snyder - This article first appeared on the Economic Collapse Blog.  Michael Snyder is a writer, speaker and activist who writes and edits his own blogs The American Dream and Economic Collapse Blog. Click here to visit his blog.

EYE-OPENER - The Bi-Polar World of Rich Bankers Racking Up More Profits

On July 16, 2013, Goldman Sachs, the fifth largest US bank by assets announced its second quarter profits doubled the previous year to $1.93 billion. J. P. Morgan, the largest bank made $6.1 billion in the second quarter up 32% over the year before and expects to make $25 billion in profits in 2013.

Wells Fargo, the fourth largest bank, reaped $5.27 billion up 20%. Citigroup’s profits topped $4.18 billion, up 42% over the previous year.

The ruling elite, the financial CEOs pay is soaring: John Stumpf of Wells Fargo received $19.3 million in 2012; Jamie Dimon of J. P. Morgan Chase pocketed $18.7 million and Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs took $13.3 million.

The Bush-Obama Wall Street bailout has resulted in the deepening financialization of the US economy: Finance has displaced the technology industry as the profitable sector of the US economy. While the US economy stagnates and the European Union wallows in recession and with over 50 million unemployed, US financial corporations in the Standard and Poor 500 index earned aggregate profits of $49 billion in the second quarter of 2013, while the tech sector reported $41.5 billion. For 2013, Wall Street is projected to earn $198.5 billion in profits, while tech companies are expected to earn $183.1 billion. Within the financial sector the most ‘speculative sectors’, investment banks and brokerage houses, are dominant and dynamic growing 40% in 2013 .Over 20% of the S and P 500 corporate profits are concentrated in the financial sector.

The financial crash of 2008-2009 and the Obama bailout, reinforced the dominance of Wall Street over the US economy. The result is that the parasitic financial sector is extracting enormous rents and profits from the economy and depriving the productive industries of capital and earnings. The recovery and boom of corporate profits since the crises turns out to be concentrated in the same financial sector which provoked the crash a few years back.

The Crises of Labor Deepens – 2013

The new speculative bubble of 2012 – 2013 is a product of the central bank’s (the Federal Reserve in the United States) low (virtually zero) interest policies which allows Wall Street to borrow cheaply and speculate, activities which puff up stock prices but do not generate employment, depress industry and further polarize the economy.

The Obama regime’s promotion of financial profits is accompanied by its policies reducing living standards for wage and salaried workers. The White House and Congress have slashed public spending on health, education and social services.They have cut funds for food stamp programs, day care centers, unemployment benefits, social security inflation adjustments, Medicare and Medicare programs .As a result the gap between the top 10% and the bottom 90% have widened. Wages and salaries have declined in relative and absolute terms, as employees take advantage of high unemployment (7.8% official) underemployment (15%) and precarious employment.

In 2013 capitalist profits , especially in the financial capital are booming, while the crises of labor persists, deepens and provokes political alienation .Outside of North America, especially in the European periphery mass unemployment and declining living standards has led to mass protests and repeated general strikes.

In the first half of 2013 Greek workers organized four general strikes protesting the massive firing of public sector workers; in Portugal two general strikes have led to calls for the resignation of the Prime Minister and new elections. In Spain corruption at the highest level, fiscal austerity leading to 25% unemployment and repression have led to intensifying street fighting and calls for the regime to resign.

The bi-polar world of rich bankers in the North racking up record profits and workers everywhere receiving a shrinking share of national income spells out the class bases of “recovery” and “depression”, prosperity for the few and immiseration for the many. By the end of 2013, the imbalances between finance and production foretell a new cycle of boom and bust. Emblematic of the demise of the “productive economy” is the city of Detroit’s declaration of bankruptcy: with 79,000 vacant homes, stores and factories the city resembles Bagdad after a US bombing attack. The Wall Street devastated city, has debts totaling $20 billion, as the big three auto companies relocate overseas and in non-union states and bankers “restructure” the economy, breaking unions, lowering wages , reneging on pensions and ruling by administrative decree.

The following article was written by James Petras  and featured on Boiling Frog's Post - Professor James Petras is a Boiling Frogs Post contributing analyst, and the author of more than 62 books published in 29 languages, and over 600 articles in professional journals, including the American Sociological Review, British Journal of Sociology, Social Research, and Journal of Peasant Studies. He has a long history of commitment to social justice, working in particular with the Brazilian Landless Workers Movement for 11 years. He writes a monthly column for the Mexican newspaper, La Jornada, and previously, for the Spanish daily, El Mundo. Dr. Petras received his B.A. from Boston University and Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley.

Using fake names on Facebook, the Surveillance State, androids

File this one in the ever-burgeoning category of: how insane can legislators get? The US Congress is now debating an update to the 1986 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Turns out it’s already a misdemeanor to “exceed authorized use” of a computer, but the DOJ wants to make it a felony. Of course, what does “exceeds authorized use” mean? Well, it means, for instance, an employee sending emails to pals while he’s at the office—because his employer has a rule against that.

In other words, the feds want to back up employers’ rules and turn them into felonies. Splendid.

     “Yeah, you remember Jack, don’t you? Used to work here? One day he made an online reservation at the Wynn in Vegas, and now he’s in jail. Life is tough, keep your eyes straight ahead and don’t mess with the boss.”
     “And Betty? She ordered three lipsticks on a slow Thursday and she’s now upstate. I hear the shrinks got hold of her. Dosing her with an anti-psychotic. Hope she has three live brain cells to rub together when she gets out.”

Then there’s the Facebook issue. The company, originally bankrolled by a CIA front, has a rule against users setting up accounts with fake names. Does the DOJ want to go after Facebook users who break the rules? The Surveillance State, aided by Facebook, wants to know who you are at all times. They want you to be your name and no other name.

It’s a technical issue, see? It’s a lot easier to spy on you if you’re Mary Jones all the time when you’re online. As opposed to Mary Jones and Dragon Lady and HiHat and Ben Franklin and The Beast From 40 Fathoms… The joke is, most people lead lives that are fictional already. The NSA and its allied partners spy on those lives.

Here’s the same thing from another angle. John Smith, citizen, follows the straight and narrow. He, like every other John Smith, is a target of the Surveillance State. He hasn’t committed any crimes. He isn’t a threat. But that doesn’t matter. He’s there. He’s a unit. Therefore, he’s on the radar. But John Smith is a fiction. He’s a convenient, solid, average, normal persona/role in the stage play called Society cooked up by the Real John Smith, who is hiding. Inside himself. You rarely see him. Once in a blue moon, he pokes his head out and says something off-key. Then he retreats behind his facade.

There are millions and John Smiths, and the NSA is spying on all of them. The fake ones. The fictions.

What if every John Smith invented six or seven new personae?

     “Sir, are you pretending to be somebody else?”
     “Yes, and the pretending is now more intense. It’s ongoing.”
     “But you see, sir, that introduces confusion, when we spy on you.”
     “I used to believe I was a John Smith android forever. Wow, was I kidding myself. I used to go to one church service on Sunday. Now I go to three different churches. And I’m also an atheist.”
     “Excuse me?”
     “I campaigned for Democrats only. Now I campaign for Democrats, Republican, Libertarians, Communists, and Anarchists. Of course I don’t vote for anyone. I’m exploring monarchy as well. I think the divine right of kings could make a comeback.”
     “But who do you actually worship?”
     “The NSA, of course. And the CIA and DIA, Interpol, MI-5, the old GRU, and the Chinese Secret Service.”
     “Sir, we have you on the record talking about eight different wives.”
     “Only eight? I must have misplaced a couple.”

Some people will assume I mean they should actually marry a dozen women. Those people are the literalists. They always go for the lowest-common-denominator reading. They think if they have a little fun, do a little acting, a little pretending, it might infect their minds. It might take them over. They’re the John Smiths. They live inside walls of fear.

Reality is one fiction among a limitless number of possible realities. The basic problem with Reality is that’s it’s only one. Any baby can teach you that. Play with the kid in just one way, over and over, and he’ll develop an itch he can’t scratch. He’ll cry and go off on you. Play with him a hundred different ways and he’ll gurgle and laugh and wriggle and decide coming into this life was a good idea after all.

Every kid needs an uncle and an aunt and a few cousins and a brother or sister. Parents tend to repeat themselves. Their repertoire wears thin. The kid needs a boost, a change, a different face, a new joke, a shift of rhythm.

People who can make you laugh take you out. They take you out of the one, forever, exhausting IS. Reality is the fiction of one and only one IS.

There are two types of laughs. One blows up reality. The other, which is the android laugh, comes across like tranquilized mule with a hernia.

The NSA is super-serious about the one persona that is supposed to be the super-serious you. That’s what they’re spying on.

The internet thrives on anonymity. This causes a lot of nonsense and crap to surface. That’s the price we pay. But the Surveillance State doesn’t want anonymity. It wants “just the facts.” It wants to scare people into being their android-selves and nothing more, nothing else. It wants The One Reality. If they can make that happen, they win. Afterward, it really doesn’t matter what people do.

I remember watching the very first episode of the original CSI. At the murder scene, the techs were going over an apartment, collecting evidence, bagging it. Then we were back in the lab.
More analysis.

I thought, are they kidding? They believe people want to watch this stuff? Well, people did. They wanted to watch the lab, the fine-tuning of hair, blood, DNA. The categorization, the tracking, the accessing of the data banks.

The first cousin to Surveillance.

You want to talk about operant conditioning? The whole CSI franchise is one giant psyop. For more than a decade. Getting people used to ubiquitous looking and spying and tracking, on behalf of justice. That’s what NSA wants to be. That’s how NSA wants the public to view it. Super-serious-android-NSA spying on super-serious-android-us. In the one and only Reality. That’s the op.

So… step back and calculate our chances if we continue to live in the one and only Reality and try to fight them from that position. Of course, entering and inventing other realities takes imagination. That’s the catch. It always was.

Ever since the first elite priest class on Earth cooked up some crazy spiritual Ponzi scheme to suck in the rubes, imagination has been the nemesis of the State.

Paraphrasing Grouch Marx: “In the 1930s, you could make a movie in which a woman fell down a flight of stairs, and people would laugh. But eventually it couldn’t be a movie. It had to be a real woman falling down a real flight of stairs.”

People are trained like dogs to appreciate and accept only one IS. The “real” IS. They convince themselves this is a good idea. These people are unconscious allies of the Surveillance State.

What’s that? People are into all sorts of multiple virtual realities? Yes, for a while, but they keep coming back to believing in The One and Only Just-the-Facts Reality. If they actually wanted new realities, they’d be cooking them up themselves, they wouldn’t be dreaming inside somebody else’s.

In light of all of the above, the universe of propaganda becomes more vivid. Its aim is reduction. Reduction of the way we see ourselves. We’re given bound images of human beings as citizens living in a walled fortress, where our every thought and action needs to be boiled down and made transparent, so our leaders can make threat assessments.

This is the fiction we’re being fed. Over and over.

     “It’s not asking too much, is it? It’s too hard to seek out and find terrorists. We need to collect everything on everybody, and then with suitable algorithms established, we can select out the dangerous ones.
     “In fact, it’s better if we consider everybody dangerous and track and limit their movements. That works.”

Yes, the NSA is looking at you. They’re looking at you as if you’re an android. Well, naturally. They’re androids. Wherever they look, they see androids.

Βυ Jon Rappoport - The author of two explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED and EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at www.nomorefakenews.com

OPINION - Was Victor Rothschild A "Soviet" Agent?

Here is proof that the Rothschild-controlled central banking cartel is behind Communism and world government tyranny.

     "Which is more plausible? One of the richest men in the world, Victor Rothschild espoused Communist ideals so that his own fabulous wealth and position could be taken away?  Or that Communism in fact was a deception designed to take away our wealth and freedom in the name of "equality" and "brotherhood"?  "

In 1942, Sir Mark Oliphant, a leading British physicist was shocked when a messenger delivered a part from his new radar technology with a warning from MI-5 Security Inspector Victor Rothschild to "tighten up your security."

A few days earlier Rothschild had visited Oliphant's Birmingham University lab, quizzed him on his research, and pocketed the three-inch diameter magnetron.

But talk about chutzpah!

Baron Rothschild was himself a Soviet agent! Before returning the magnetron, he had transmitted detailed drawings to Moscow, a fact later confirmed by his KGB handlers. Oliphant related this story in 1994 to Roland Perry, the Australian author of The Fifth Man (1994, Sedgwick and Jackson, 475 pp).

Between 1935 and 1963, the Soviet Union knew all of Britain's military and scientific secrets thanks  to "The Cambridge Five" a spy ring that operated in M1-5, MI-6 and the Foreign Office. Western intelligence agencies were rendered ineffective and Allied secrets, including the design of the atomic bomb, were stolen.

(Only a society bent of suicide would portray these dupes and traitors in a positive light.)

The traitors were Kim Philby, Donald Maclean, Guy Burgess and Anthony Blunt. But there is a natural reluctance to admit that "the Fifth Man" was Nathaniel Meyer Victor Rothschild (1910-1990), the Third Baron Rothschild, the British head of the world's richest banking dynasty , which controls the Bank of England.

In 1993, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, six retired KGB Colonels in Moscow confirmed Rothschild's identity to Roland Perry. Col. Yuri Modin, the spy ring's handler, went on the record.

Perry writes:

     "According to ...Modin, Rothschild was the key to most of the Cambridge ring's penetration of British intelligence. 'He had the contacts,' Modin noted. 'He was able to introduce Burgess, Blunt and others to important figures in Intelligence such as Stewart Menzies, Dick White and Robert Vansittart in the Foreign Office...who controlled Mi-6."  (p.89)

You can understand the reluctance. The Rothschilds are undoubtedly the largest shareholders in the world's central banking system. Victor Rothschild's career as Soviet agent confirms that these London-based bankers plan to translate their monopoly on credit into a monopoly on everything using government as their instrument, ultimately a "world government" dictatorship akin to Communism. It adds credence to the claim the Rothschilds were behind the Bolshevik Revolution, and used the Cold War and more recently the 9-11 hoax and bogus "War on Terror" to advance their world hegemony.

Which is more plausible? One of the richest men in the world, Victor Rothschild espoused Communist ideals so that his own fabulous wealth and position could be taken away?  Or that Communism in fact was a deception designed to take away our wealth and freedom in the name of "equality" and "brotherhood"?

MAN OF ACTION

According to "The Fifth Man", Victor Rothschild had an IQ of 184. He was a gifted jazz pianist with an intuitive understanding of many scientific disciplines. He saw banking as a dreary affair and preferred the exciting example of his great grandfather Lionel Rothschild (1808-1879) who Benjamin Disraeli immortalized as "Sidonia" in the novel Coningsby (1844).

     "No minister of state had such communication with secret agents and political spies as Sidonia. He held relations with all the clever outcasts of the world. The catalog of his acquaintances in the shape of Greeks, Armenians, Moors, secret Jews, Tartars, Gypsies, wandering Poles and Carbonari, would throw a curious light on those subterranean agencies of which the world in general knows so little, but which exercise so great an influence on public events. The secret history of the world was his pastime. His great pleasure was to contrast the hidden motive, with the public pretext, of transactions." (Coningsby pp. 218-219)

Rothschild studied Zoology at Cambridge where Anthony Blunt recruited him for the KGB about 1936. (Blunt later said it was Rothschild who recruited him.) Rothschild later joined MI-5 and was in charge of counter sabotage. He instructed the military on how to recognize and defuse bombs. Rothschild was a personal friend of Winston Churchill. Perry writes:

     "The two socialized often during the war years. Rothschild used his wealth and position to invite the prime minister to private parties. His entree to the wartime leader, plus access to all the key intelligence information, every major weapons development and his command of counter-sabotage operations in Britain, made Rothschild a secretly powerful figure during the war years...The result was that Stalin knew as much as Churchill about vital information, often before the British High Command was informed." (xxviii-xxix)

Rothschild helped neutralize enemies of the Soviet Union who came to the British for support. For example, he was involved in the cover-up of the assassination of Polish war leader and British ally Wladyslaw Sikorski, whose plane was blown up in July 1944. Sikorski had become burdensome to Stalin after he discovered the KGB had massacred 16,000 Polish officers in the Katyn Woods and elsewhere in 1940. 

In 1944, Blunt, Burgess and Philby all stayed with Victor at the Rothschild mansion in Paris.  Rothschild was briefly in charge of Allied intelligence in Paris and interrogated many prisoners.

After the war Rothschild spent time in the US overseeing attempts to learn the atom bomb secrets. Due in part to the Cambridge Five, Perry says "the Russians knew about every major intelligence operation run against them in the years 1945 to 1963."  (xxxi)

CONCLUSION

Victor Rothschild held many jobs that served to disguise his true role which I suspect was that of a member of the Illuminati Grand Council. (The Illuminati represent the highest rank of Freemasonry.)  He was not a lowly agent. He probably gave orders to people like Winston Churchill, FDR and Stalin.

For example, he ensured that the USSR supported the establishment of the State of Israel.  "He knew the proper back-channels to reach decision-makers in Moscow," a KGB Colonel told Perry. "Let us just say, he got things done. You only did that if you reached the top. He was very persuasive." (176)

T Stokes wrote:

     " In the Russian Intel archives Lord and Lady Rothschild are codenamed; "David and Rosa." Rothschild and Churchill were inseparable during W.W.II. The bankers bought Churchill's services in W.W.II for a recorded £50,000 to lobby for total war with Germany, and in W.W.1 Churchill had a bank account in the name of 'Colonel Arden,' to accept these secret donations."

The super rich have more in common with each other than they have with the rest of humanity. It appears they have abandoned their natural role as leaders and benefactors, and instead conspire to enchain us. It's too bad because the only thing they don't already have is... love.

The fact that Rothschild was protected until his death suggests this is a ruling class conspiracy. According to Greg Hallett, Anthony Blunt, a fellow spy, was an illegitimate son of George V, half-brother and look-alike to Edward VIII, the Duke of Windsor. Until his exposure in 1964, Blunt was Knighted and Curator of the Queen's art collection. He received immunity from prosecution in exchange for his confession.

Many believe this conspiracy is "Jewish." Yes but "generational Satanist" would be more accurate. These  Sabbatean Jews intermarry with Gentiles. The current Lord Jacob Rothschild, the Fourth Baron Rothschild is Victor's son by his first wife Barbara Hutchinson, pictured above, a non-Jew who converted. In Jewish law, Jacob Rothschild is not a Jew. He married Serena Dunn. By the way, Meyer Amschel,  Victor's only son by his second marriage, also to a non-Jew, 'committed suicide' in 1996.

While Victor Rothschild pretended to "socialist ideals," this was just a ruse to entrap misguided idealists. The banker was a conscious traitor. Treason is the template for contemporary politics. The central banking cartel is erecting its "world governance" dictatorship and anyone who wants to succeed must be loyal to the sick new paradigm and a traitor to the genuine old. While distracting us with sex and sports, our political and cultural "leaders" attack our national, religious, racial and family foundations using  war, homosexuality, pornography, feminism, mass migration and "diversity."

Clearly, we need new leaders who will stand up to the owners of the world monetary system. The destiny of humanity is at stake.

More At - http://henrymakow.com/

Facebook, Apple, Microsoft Partner With Privacy Groups To Call For NSA Transparency

A coalition of major tech companies and civil liberties groups on Thursday sent a letter to President Barack Obama calling for more transparency around a secret government program that collects private Internet and phone records. In the letter, the companies argued that Americans "are entitled to have an informed public debate" about surveillance requests.

The coalition urged the Obama administration to allow companies to report statistics about the number of national security requests they receive from government agencies for customer data. The letter said the government should also issue its own regular “transparency report” disclosing that information.

     "Basic information about how the government uses its various law enforcement–related investigative authorities has been published for years without any apparent disruption to criminal investigations," the letter reads. "We seek permission for the same information to be made available regarding the government’s national security–related authorities."
     "This information about how and how often the government is using these legal authorities is important to the American people, who are entitled to have an informed public debate about the appropriateness of those authorities and their use," the letter continues.

The companies addressed their petition to President Obama, Attorney General Eric Holder, NSA Director Keith Alexander, Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper and several members of Congress. It was signed by more than 20 tech companies and more than 30 trade associations and privacy groups -- including Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft, and the American Civil Liberties Union.

Silicon Valley and privacy groups do not always agree over privacy matters, making their partnership for the letter noteworthy. Tech companies have faced widespread criticism in recent weeks over reports that they cooperated with the government's secret Internet spying program. Many tech giants have expressed frustration that they are prohibited by law from discussing the surveillance orders.

read more - Huffington Post

Kissinger Says Terrorists Are People That Reject the Int'l System (VIDEO)

The video clip below (which should be viewed by all) is from a 2007 AKBank convention in Constantinopole, Turkey that was held right before the annual Bilderberg Meeting which took place in that country that very same year.

Aaron Dykes and Melissa Melton
Activist Post


In it, former National Security Advisor and Secretary of State, (as well as member of the Bilderberg Group, Council on Foreign Relations, Trilateral Commission, and Bohemian Grove among others) Henry Kissinger can be seen giving the following speech:

    In the Middle East, we live in a different world. The nations do not represent historic entities in the same sense that European nations did. Turkey of course does, and Iran in a considerable extent does. But in the region in between, the borders were drawn by the victors of World War I on the basis largely of what would facilitate their influence. So therefore, the identities of these countries, and of their borders, can be challenged more easily.
    What we in America call terrorists are really groups of people that reject the international system, and they’re trying to regroup it to a radical Islamic fundamentalists kind.

Clearly Kissinger is saying that, because many Middle Eastern countries do not have what appears to be in his view the ‘historical significance’ of older countries, they are wide open for attack, regime change and re-ordering.

Only a few years later, we have witnessed the Western-backed Arab Spring, which has turned over numerous North African and Middle Eastern nations. After nearly two years of semi-covertly arming al Qaeda fighters in Syria, most recently Western support and provision of arms for Syrian Rebels (who admittedly used their own chemical weapons) are becoming public knowledge now that a mythical ‘red line’ has supposedly been crossed by Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.

Remember how America ‘freed’ Egypt and Libya? Well Syria is wash, rinse, repeat.

On top of that, Kissinger is also saying the word “terrorist” is really someone who would reject the “international system” — a new world order.

Part of that order appears to be American empire building and the spreading of the US’s brand of “democracy” throughout the rest of the world… whether they like it or not.

How do you think someone with Kissinger’s perspective would see American patriots who reject the United Nations or central banking system? Surely, he sees them as “terrorists” as well. Further, if the State held similar views and used the “terrorist” label - which is used in this country like screaming “fire!” in a theater to circumvent the Constitution on a daily basis - such resistors to the new world order would be instantly criminalized, marginalized and marked for imprisonment or death.

Aaron and Melissa created TruthstreamMedia.com, where this article first appeared, as an outlet to examine the news, place it in a broader context, uncover the deceptions, pierce through the fabric of illusions, grasp the underlying factors, know the real enemy, unshackle from the system, and begin to imagine the path towards taking back our lives, one step at a time, so that one day we might truly be free...

Rothschild & Goldman Sachs - Main Bank Advisers of Greece

“Rothschild’s long history of working with governments dates back to the origins of our firm more than 200 years ago.”

Hellenic Motorways S.A.: The HR will proceed to the sale of its participation in the Hellenic Motorways Co or in its subsidiaries which will hold rights on the concessions with Aegean Motorway SA, Nea Odos SA, Kentriki Odos S.A., Olympia Odos S.A., Moreas S.A., Attiki Odos S.A. and Gefyra S.A., as well as any other rights which may derive from future concessions that the HR may decide to implement in road transport infrastructure, including Egnatia Odos Motorway. For that purpose Ernst & Young, Rothschild & Sons LTD and Barclays Bank PLC have been selected to act as HR’s financial advisors.

Natural Gas Storage “South Kavala”: For the privatisation of a newly established special purpose company in which the HR has decided to assign its rights in the Natural Gas Storage “South Kavala”, HSBC Bank PLC and EFG Eurobank Equities SA have been selected as HR’s financial advisors.

Frequency Spectrum: The HR has selected Analysys Mason Limited and Aegis Systems LTD as its technical advisors for the exploitation of its rights in the frequency spectrum”
http://www.minfin.gr/portal/en/resource/contentObject/id/569f1cb6-ce89-421e-8e0a-43b6bd828f74

“Greece hires Rothschild, Goldman for Proton, TT bank sell-off”
http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/06/28/greece-banks-idINL5N0F428M20130628

“Rothschild-made Financial Crisis”
http://euro-med.dk/?p=9101

“Rothschild engineered financial crisis”
http://www.planetization.org/rothschild.htm