Nearly One-Third of all Immigrants Targeted for Deportation in California by Secure Communities are Not Criminals

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The LA Times reports the following:

California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris told local law enforcement agencies Tuesday that they were not obligated to comply with a federal program whose stated goal is to deport illegal immigrants convicted of serious crimes.

The statistics show that 28% of the immigrants targeted by Secure Communities in the State of California were not criminals. After seeing the statistics, Harris commented that SCOMM "has not held up to what it aspired to be" advising each California State law enforcement agency to "make its own decision" about whether to follow the immigration enforcement directive.  
The Obama administration characterizes SCOMM as "a simple and common sense way to carry out ICE's priorities." Harris sees it differently: "I want that rape victim to be absolutely secure that if she waves down an officer in a car that she will be protected … and not fear that she's waving down an immigration officer."  
Click here for the original source of this story.

Luis De La Cruz, Husband and Father of Two Citizen Children, is Facing Deportation and Needs your Help.

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From DREAMActivist.org:

Luis, originally from the Dominican Republic came to the United States in 2002 in search of a better life. He settled in Florida where he lives with his wife and his 2 U.S. citizen children. In 2007, Luis was issued an order of deportation however never left so that he could provide for his family.

On April 5th, while on his way to purchase products for his business, Luis was pulled over by the police. He was then arrested for driving with an expired license and for a bench warrant he had been issued for traffic tickets but had no knowledge of. Luis was immediately transferred to ICE and has been at the Broward Detention Center since.

Since his arrest his family has been suffering economic setbacks and emotional hardships. His wife has been unable to make ends meet, she is unable to pay for rent and other bills. Luis’ 2 U.S. citizen children are set to start school soon and their mother has not been able to buy them school supplies and uniforms. His children know that his father is detained and beg for his father to be back. Luis is the main provider of his family and they need him at home. He is a loving and caring husband and father who deserves to be reunited with his family.

While in detention, Luis has developed pain in his testicles and has repeatedly asked for medical assistance for 40 days but all he has received are painkillers and a urine test. Luis needs medical attention not deportation. He has a pending U-Visa and needs to be home with his family. 

According to the memo issued by John Morton, Luis is a low-priority case and should be granted favorable use of prosecutorial discretion. Luis has no criminal record and is the main provider for his family. He deserves to be with them.

Click here to sign the petition that calls for the Administration to exercise prosecutorial discretion by releasing Luis de la Cruz (A# 200-139-118) from Broward Transitional Center so that he can obtain proper medical care, as well as putting a stop to his deportation on humanitarian grounds.

BIA to Hear Appeal of former Nazi Concentration Camp Guard

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The AP/Washington Post reports that the Board of Immigration Appeals is reviewing an appeal of a 2010 deportation order issued to 88-year-old Anton Geiser of Sharon, Pennsylvania.  Mr. Geiser was charged with removal as a result of his service in the Nazi SS where he was a guard in the Sachsenhausen and Buchenwald concentration camps.
Geiser does not dispute that he was a member of the Nazi's Schutzstaffel (SS), nor that he served as a guard in both the Sachsenhausen and Buchenwald concentration camps:  “I was not proud where I served and I didn’t like it then and I didn’t like it now.” 

Geiser is represented by Adrien Roe who argues that a then 17-year-old Geiser did not voluntarily serve, and was therefore not really a Nazi.  The Department, represented by Susan Siegal, counters that Geiser's service was not involuntary because he could have refused to serve in the camps, and moreover, the "just following orders" defense already failed at Nuremberg. 
When I read this story I couldn't help but think of the following quotation attributed to Martin Niemöller regarding the failure of the people of Germany to take a stand against the Nazis.

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the socialists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for me,
and there was no one left to speak for me.

Fortunately for Mr. Geiser he lives in one of the only countries in the entire world where even individuals guilty of unspeakable crimes against humanity are guaranteed the right to have someone speak for you. 
Enjoy your right to due process Mr. Geiser, and be glad that this isn't Nazi Germany.

ICE arrests Senator Bob Menendez's undocumented intern alleging he is a registered sex offender

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It has been reported that Luis Abrahan Sanchez Zavaleta, an unpaid intern working in Senator Bob Menendez's (D - NJ) office was arrested by ICE on December 6, 2012, in New Jersey.  It is alleged that the intern is both an undocumented immigrant and a registered sex offender. Hudson County, N.J., prosecutor's office alleges that Zavaleta was required to register as a sex offender after an offense allegedly committed in 2010.  Details are unavailable due to the fact that apparently Zavaleta was a minor at the time of the alleged prosecution.  It has been reported that Zavaleta entered the United States with a visitor's visa, which he overstayed, and is a native and citizen of Peru.
Menendez' response via MSNBC:

"I didn't know anything about the young man's status until this Monday so — actually, before I came onto this program. My staff knew about it on Monday, I didn't know it until right before I came onto your program."

Mendez is a leading voice in the Senate on the issue of immigration reform. We can only hope that this incident will have no impact on the Senator's ability to participate in immigration reform negotiations, as his voice is desperately needed in the debate.

Colorlines Report: 205K Deportations of Parents of U.S. Citizens since 2010

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Seth Freed Wessler of Colorlines News for Action reports that there have been nearly 205,000 parents of United States citizen children deported since 2010. The data was obtain through a Freedom of Information Act request. The full statistics compiled regarding final orders sought, obtained, and actual removals of individuals claiming to be parents of United States citizen children may be viewed here.
Maybe it is time for the Obama administration to consider expanding deferred action to parents of United States citizen children as a stop gap measure until immigration reform is implemented.  I'd also add spouses of United States citizens to the list as well.  
Just a thought.

Tea party stays on the sidelines as Obama, Republicans in Congress tackle fiscal cliff - The ideas advocated by the tea party — which helped propel concerns about federal spending and borrowing to the forefront of the national debate and fuel 2010’s Republican sweep of the House — still resonate in the GOP.

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From The Washington Post:

The tea party movement has been nearly invisible in the intensive lobbying campaign over the “fiscal cliff,” even as Congress and the White House debate the issues of government spending and national debt that are at the core of the movement’s identity.

In many ways, the tea party was made for this moment. The grass-roots opposition to President Obama’s agenda that arose in 2009 has been so focused on fiscal concerns that leaders once prevented speakers at tea party rallies from even discussing abortion and other social issues.

And in fact, it is the tea party that helped bring the country to this moment. The automatic spending cuts at the heart of the year-end fiscal cliff grew out of the tea party’s fierce campaign last year to slash federal budgets and cap government borrowing.

Yet as groups across the political spectrum seek to influence any deal to avert the cuts and tax increases set to kick in Jan. 1, the tea party has been unusually — and deliberately — quiet. Members still call and e-mail Congress but have held no rallies and done little lobbying.

When tea party leader Jenny Beth Martin recently journeyed to the Capitol from her Atlanta area home, for example, she did not bring with her the bus loads of tea party members who once descended on Washington to rally for fiscal restraint.

As she toured the offices of several Republican House members, Martin barely brought up the fiscal cliff negotiations that could chart the nation’s budgetary future, according to Martin and congressional aides.

Her focus instead? Fighting over spending at the state level.

“We’re sitting back’’ on the fiscal cliff, said Martin, co-founder of Tea Party Patriots, the nation’s largest tea party group. Republicans in Congress, she said, “have proven they’re not going to listen to us,’’ adding that House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) is a “cave man” for his willingness to consider tax increases.

Tea party activists say they feel despised by Democrats and ignored by Republicans, and they still resent the blame they received for last year’s debt ceiling crisis, in which tea-party backed lawmakers demanded deep spending cuts in return for increasing the federal borrowing limit and helped push the nation to the brink of default.

“We’re thinking, ‘instead of wasting our time with these people, maybe we should go home and actually enjoy our families for the holidays,’’ said Marianne Gasiecki, an Ohio tea party activist. “We’re saying, ‘You can’t blame us for this one.’ But they’ll blame us anyway. Someone has to be the scapegoat.’’

Unless members of Congress “are blind, deaf and dumb,’’ Gasiecki added, “there’s no way they could not have heard what’s been screamed at them for the past four years.’’

Indeed, the ideas advocated by the tea party — which helped propel concerns about federal spending and borrowing to the forefront of the national debate and fuel 2010’s Republican sweep of the House — still resonate in the GOP. An example, said conservative strategist Keith Appell, was the failure last week of Boehner’s “Plan B” legislation to avoid the fiscal cliff, which was doomed when conservative Republicans in the House declined to endorse a tax increase even on millionaires.

“The tea party vision for fiscal sanity is still very powerful in Washington,’’ said Appell, senior vice president at CRC Public Relations in Alexandria.

Michael Steel, a Boehner spokesman, said the speaker, “like virtually every House Republican, was elected with Tea Party support in 2010 and 2012 — and he deeply appreciates that support.”

“The (fiscal cliff) is obviously a massive debate about what our country’s fiscal future is going to look like, and you’re looking around going, ‘Where is the tea party?’’’ said Ned Ryun, president of American Majority, a political training institute allied with the movement. “Part of this is simply that some of the movement has disappeared.’’

That is a far cry from the tea party’s halcyon days, when members flocked to D.C. rallies against Obama’s health-care overhaul and what they considered excessive spending. During last year’s dispute over the debt ceiling, tea party members called for a government shutdown during a rally at the Capitol. The debate ultimately produced a deal to raise the borrowing limit but also set up automatic cuts, which are part of the fiscal cliff.

But soon after the Nov. 6 election, more than 100 Tea Party Patriots leaders and state coordinators gathered at a Hyatt hotel in Washington and chose a different strategy for the fiscal cliff. “We decided to treat Congress like grown-ups and say, ‘Fix it,’’’ said Gasiecki. “It’s like parents who have raised their kids well and step back and say, ‘Prove to us that you’ve been listening.’"

Clout Diminished, Tea Party Turns to Narrower Issues - FreedomWorks, a national group that has played a crucial role in organizing Tea Party activists and backing insurgent candidates, has been riven by turmoil, leading to the departure last month of its chairman, Dick Armey.

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From The New York Times:

The Tea Party might not be over, but it is increasingly clear that the election last month significantly weakened the once-surging movement, which nearly captured control of the Republican Party through a potent combination of populism and fury.

Leading Congressional Republicans, though they remain far apart from President Obama, have embraced raising tax revenues in budget negotiations, repudiating a central tenet of the Tea Party. Even more telling, Tea Party activists in the middle of the country are skirting the fiscal showdown in Congress and turning to narrower issues, raising questions about whether the movement still represents a citizen groundswell to which attention must be paid.
      
Grass-roots leaders said this month that after losing any chance of repealing the national health care law, they would press states to “nullify” or ignore it. They also plan to focus on a two-decade-old United Nations resolution that they call a plot against property rights, and on “fraud” by local election boards that, some believe, let the Democrats steal the November vote.        But unlike the broader, galvanizing issues of health care and the size of the federal government that ignited the Tea Party, the new topics seem likely to bolster critics who portray the movement as a distraction to the Republican Party.        “People in positions of responsibility within the Republican Party tolerated too much of this,” said Fergus Cullen, a former chairman of the New Hampshire Republican Party. He blamed a backlash against “tinfoil hat” issues pushed by the Tea Party-dominated legislature in New Hampshire for the loss of a Republican majority in the State House last month and a near loss in the State Senate. Republican leaders “looked the other way too often,” he said. “They sort of smiled, winked and nodded too often, when they should have been calling ‘crazy, crazy.’ ”        The movement is not going away — most Republicans in the House have more to fear from primary challengers on their right than from Democratic challengers. An unpopular budget deal could reignite the Tea Party, as the antitax crusader Grover Norquist predicts.        But surveys of voters leaving the polls last month showed that support for the Tea Party had dropped precipitously from 2010, when a wave of recession-fueled anger over bailouts, federal spending and the health care overhaul won the Republicans a majority in the House.        The House members elected with Tea Party backing in 2010 forced onto the national agenda their goals of deep cuts to spending and changes to entitlement programs, embodied by the budget blueprints of Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, who became Mitt Romney’s running mate. And some of those lawmakers led the revolt last week that prompted Speaker John A. Boehner to cancel a House vote on a plan to avert a year-end fiscal crisis by raising tax rates on household income above $1 million.        “The Tea Party put a lot of steel in the spine of the Republican Party,” said Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma.        But the Tea Party activists have not been front and center in the fiscal fight. And Mr. Cole added that Tea Party leaders now excoriating Mr. Boehner for offering higher taxes in a budget deal did not recognize political reality.        “These guys want instant success,” said Mr. Cole, a member of the House Republican leadership. “If they want to see a better result, they’ve got to help us win the United States Senate. We’ve thrown away some seats out of political immaturity.”        But a number of Republican leaders said the Tea Party seemed headed toward becoming just another political faction, not a broad movement. It may rally purists, but it will continue to alienate realists and centrists, they said.        “I think the Tea Party movement is to the Republicans in 2013 what the McGovernites were to the Democrats in 1971 and 1972,” said Don Gaetz, a Republican who is the president of the Florida Senate. “They will cost Republicans seats in Congress and in state legislatures. But they will also help Republicans win seats.”        Because the Tea Party comprises thousands of local groups, it is impossible to determine whether its ranks shrank after the many electoral defeats last month, which activists said caused grief and deep frustration.    Greg Cummings, the leader of the We the People Tea Party in rural Decatur County, Iowa, said his group had picked up 12 members since the election, for a total of about 50. “If you were in a fight and someone gave you a good left hook, it doesn’t mean the fight is over,” he said.        But Everett Wilkinson, the chairman of the Florida Tea Party in Palm Beach County, said the number of active Tea Party groups statewide “has diminished significantly in the last year or so, certainly in the last couple of months,” with only a third of what there once was.        “A lot of people gave their heart and soul to trying to get Obama out; they’re frustrated,” he added. “They don’t know what to do. They got involved with the electoral process, and that didn’t work out.”        FreedomWorks, a national group that has played a crucial role in organizing Tea Party activists and backing insurgent candidates, has been riven by turmoil, leading to the departure last month of its chairman, Dick Armey, a former Republican majority leader in the House.        Mr. Armey said in news accounts that he questioned the ethical behavior of senior officials in the group, though others told of a power struggle. He was eased out with an $8 million consulting contract, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press.        FreedomWorks spent nearly $40 million on the 2012 elections but backed a string of losing Senate candidates, including Richard E. Mourdock of Indiana, Josh Mandel of Ohio and Connie Mack of Florida. Some Tea Party firebrands lost their House seats, including Allen B. West of Florida and Joe Walsh of Illinois.        One notable success for the Tea Party was the Senate victory by Ted Cruz of Texas.        Mr. Cummings, who is the Midwest coordinator for Tea Party Patriots, a national group, said a major issue he would be focusing on now was Agenda 21, a United Nations resolution that encourages sustainable development. It has no force of law in the United States, but a passionate element of the Tea Party sees it as a plot against American property rights.        Billie Tucker, an activist with the First Coast Tea Party in Florida, said she and others suspected that corruption on local election boards had led to Mr. Obama’s victory in the state. Activists want to investigate.        “Some people say it’s just a conspiracy theory, but there’s rumbling all around,” she said. “There’s all kinds of data, and no one’s talking about it, including, hello, the mainstream media.”        Another issue boiling is the “nullification” of the Affordable Care Act. Angry that Mr. Obama’s re-election means that the health care law will not be repealed, some activists claim that states can deny the authority of the federal government and refuse to carry it out.        At a Florida State Senate meeting this month, two dozen Tea Party activists called the law “tyrannical” and said the state had the right to nullify it.        Mr. Gaetz, the Senate president, a conservative Republican, said in an interview that he, too, disagreed with the Supreme Court ruling that upheld the law. But he called nullification “kooky.” “We’re not a banana republic,” he said. It is “dangerous to the foundation of the republic when we pick and choose which laws we will obey.”

Just Do It Mr. President: Give Chuck a Chance

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Tom Friedman writes in The New York Times:

In case you haven’t heard, President Obama is considering appointing Chuck Hagel, a former United States senator from Nebraska and a Purple Heart winner, as the next secretary of defense — and this has triggered a minifirefight among Hagel critics and supporters. I am a Hagel supporter. I think he would make a fine secretary of defense — precisely because some of his views are not “mainstream.” I find the opposition to him falling into two baskets: the disgusting and the philosophical. It is vital to look at both to appreciate why Hagel would be a good fit for Defense at this time.

The disgusting is the fact that because Hagel once described the Israel lobby as the “Jewish lobby” (it also contains some Christians). And because he has rather bluntly stated that his job as a U.S. senator was not to take orders from the Israel lobby but to advance U.S. interests, he is smeared as an Israel-hater at best and an anti-Semite at worst. If ever Israel needed a U.S. defense secretary who was committed to Israel’s survival, as Hagel has repeatedly stated — but who was convinced that ensuring that survival didn’t mean having America go along with Israel’s self-destructive drift into settling the West Bank and obviating a two-state solution — it is now.
      
I am certain that the vast majority of U.S. senators and policy makers quietly believe exactly what Hagel believes on Israel — that it is surrounded by more implacable enemies than ever and needs and deserves America’s backing. But, at the same time, this Israeli government is so spoiled and has shifted so far to the right that it makes no effort to take U.S. interests into account by slowing its self-isolating settlement adventure. And it’s going to get worse. Israel’s friends need to understand that the center-left in Israel is dying. The Israeli election in January will bring to power Israeli rightists who never spoke at your local Israel Bonds dinner. These are people who want to annex the West Bank. Bibi Netanyahu is a dove in this crowd. The only thing standing between Israel and national suicide any more is America and its willingness to tell Israel the truth. But most U.S. senators, policy makers and Jews prefer to stick their heads in the sand, because confronting Israel is so unpleasant and politically dangerous. Hagel at least cares enough about Israel to be an exception.        No one captured the despair in Israel better than Bradley Burston, a columnist for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, who wrote the other day: “This year, for Hanukkah, I want one person running this country, this Israel, to show me one scrap of light. One move — any move — for freedom, for all the peoples who live here. One step — no matter how slight — in the direction of a better future. What makes this Hanukkah different from all others? It’s the dark. It’s the sense that this country — beset by enemies, beset by itself — has locked down every single door against the future, and sealed shut every last window against hope. ... This country has begun to feel like a lamp whose body is cracked and whose light seems all but spent. On these long nights, we can make out little but an occupation growing ever more permanent, and a democracy growing ever more temporary.”        So, yes, put me in the camp of those who think that a few more bluntly outspoken friends of Israel in the U.S. cabinet would be a good thing.        The legitimate philosophical criticism of Hagel concerns his stated preferences for finding a negotiated solution to Iran’s nuclear program, his willingness to engage Hamas to see if it can be moved from its extremism, his belief that the Pentagon budget must be cut, and his aversion to going to war again in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, because he has been to war and knows how much can go wrong. Whether you agree with these views or not, it would be nothing but healthy to have them included in the president’s national security debates.        For instance, it’s impossible for me to see how America can secure its interests in Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Bahrain and Lebanon without ending the U.S.-Iran cold war in the Middle East. I’m skeptical that it’s possible. I think the Iranian regime needs hostility with America to justify its hold on power. But with sanctions really biting Iran, I’d like to test and test again whether a diplomatic deal is possible before any military strike. I think Hamas is dedicated to Israel’s destruction and has been a disaster for the Palestinians. But it is a deeply rooted organization. It controls Gaza. It is not going away. I don’t think America or Israel have anything to lose by engaging Hamas to see if a different future is possible. I think the world needs a strong America to maintain global stability. But the “fiscal cliff” tells you that our defense budget is coming down and we need to cut with a smart strategic plan. I think it would be useful to have a defense secretary who starts with that view and does not have to be bludgeoned into it.        So, yes, Hagel is out of the mainstream. That is exactly why his voice would be valuable right now. President Obama will still make all the final calls, but let him do so after having heard all the alternatives.

Democrats push for tax cuts they once opposed - Even as they agree that taxes shouldn’t rise on the middle class when the economy is still weak, some liberals are worried by the prevailing Democratic view that the bulk of the Bush tax cuts should be made permanent. - And while, a decade ago, many Democrats favored maintaining higher tax rates to help fund domestic programs. It is much harder to take away a tax cut than make it.

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From Tne Washington Post:

Democrats seeking a deal to avert the year-end “fiscal cliff” are trying to etch into stone the signature economic achievement of Republican President George W. Bush by permanently extending tax cuts enacted during his tenure.

President Obama has put the extension of the tax cuts for most Americans at the top of his domestic agenda, a remarkable turnaround for Democrats, who had staunchly opposed the tax breaks when they were written into law about a decade ago.

With Obama leaving his Hawaii vacation for Washington Wednesday evening and lawmakers returning Thursday, the main dividing line between Republicans and Democrats has come down to whether tax rates should increase for top earners at the end of the year, when the Bush-era tax cuts are set to expire. While Republicans want to extend all the cuts, Democrats are pushing to maintain lower rates on household income below $250,000. Those lower rates significantly reduce the taxes of nearly all American households that earn less than $250,000 — and many who earn more, even if tax rates are allowed to increase on income above that figure.

While it is increasingly unlikely that the two parties will reach an agreement to avoid the fiscal cliff before Jan. 1, it is all but certain that their ultimate deal, whenever it comes, will make permanent the lower rates for most Americans.

R. Glenn Hubbard, dean of the Columbia Business School and an architect of the Bush tax cuts, said it is “deeply ironic” for Democrats to favor extending most of them, given what he called their “visceral” opposition a decade ago. Keeping the lower rates even for income under $250,000 “would enshrine the vast bulk of the Bush tax cuts,” he said.

Democrats say they have reconsidered their opposition to the Bush tax cuts for several reasons. The cuts were written into law from 2001 to 2003 after a decade in which most Americans saw robust income growth. Over the past decade, by contrast, median wages have declined, after adjusting for inflation, amid a weak economy. Allowing tax cuts for the middle class to expire would further reduce take-home pay.

“We’ve had these tax cuts in place since 2001. The world changes, and the economy is where it is,” said Steven Elmendorf, who was chief of staff to former House minority leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.), a primary opponent of the Bush tax cuts. “With people’s economic status, we should not be raising taxes on people earning under $250,000.”

What’s more, income inequality has been growing. Sparing the middle class higher taxes while requiring the wealthy to pay more would tip the scales slightly in the other direction.

“The reason there’s been this movement toward broad consensus on renewing the tax cut for working- and middle-class families is that will give us a sharper progressivity in the tax system that is very much desired by Democrats and progressives who’ve seen an income distribution more and more distorted toward the wealthy,” said Betsey Stevenson, former chief economist in Obama’s Labor Department and a professor at the University of Michigan, who added that taxes may have to rise even more than currently contemplated to meet the country’s needs.

But more than economics is at work. Democrats have found what they consider a winning political argument in calling for lower taxes on the middle class and higher taxes on the wealthy. And while, a decade ago, many Democrats favored maintaining higher tax rates to help fund domestic programs, it is much harder to take away a tax cut than make it.

“Most fundamentally, it was due to a perception by Democrats that the political reality was moving to the right on economic policy,” said Jim Manley, a former top aide to Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.). “The Democratic Party has adjusted to those realities and recognizes you’ve got to be more careful about focusing on the middle class.”

Even as they agree that taxes shouldn’t rise on the middle class when the economy is still weak, some liberals are worried by the prevailing Democratic view that the bulk of the Bush tax cuts should be made permanent. Liberals fear that lower revenue means less money for domestic programs, such as education, as well as for the social safety net.

The Bush tax cuts involve a long list of provisions, including lower federal income-tax rates for all Americans, lower tax rates on investment income such as capital gains and dividends, and tax benefits for married couples with children. The scheduled expiration of the Bush cuts, combined with an end to other temporary tax cuts enacted more recently by Obama and deep spending cuts, constitute the fiscal cliff, which is to take effect in January barring action by Congress. These dramatic fiscal changes could tip the U.S. economy back into recession.

Although primarily targeted toward households earning less than $250,000, the middle-class component of the Bush tax cuts also benefits those earning above that. The first $250,000 earned by even the wealthiest families is subject to lower rates. For this reason, Obama noted last month that under his proposal, “every American, including the wealthiest Americans, gets a tax cut.”

For instance, an individual taxpayer earning between $200,000 and $500,000 a year would pay an average of $515 more in taxes next year if the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy expire, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. But if all the Bush tax cuts were to vanish and the rich had to pay higher rates on all their income, their tax bills would shoot up by an average of $6,000. The very richest — the top 1 percent of earners — would pay much higher taxes if solely the upper-income tax cuts expire, because the savings from extending the rest of the rates would be relatively negligible.

In 2001, when Bush proposed the tax cuts, Democrats argued they would benefit the wealthy, create long-term deficits and deprive social programs of needed money. Some Democrats at the time were open to a more modest tax cut, especially one less favorable to the rich. Bush could push his tax cuts through Congress only by agreeing they would expire a decade later.

Under GOP pressure, Obama renewed them in 2010. He has vowed not to extend the upper-income tax cuts again. He is also demanding that at least $400 billion worth of tax breaks for the wealthy be eliminated to further reduce the deficit.

As Democrats warned a decade ago, the benefits of the Bush tax cuts have disproportionately flowed to upper-income earners, according to economists. The tax cuts, however, have also benefited less-fortunate Americans, slashing taxes for many low-income households and creating new credits to lighten the financial load of raising children.

The Democrats were also correct in warning about the effect on the government’s debt. The tax cuts did more to fuel ballooning federal deficits over the past decade than any other Bush administration action — including the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the creation of a prescription drug benefit for seniors, according to the Pew Fiscal Analysis Initiative. And in coming years, the Bush-era tax cuts are projected to expand the deficit by trillions more.

“The bulk of the [tax cuts] is baked into the cake, and we don’t talk about that. From a fiscal and economic policy standpoint, it makes no sense,” said Bob Greenstein, president of the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and a White House ally. “I don’t see how you can go into future decades with these tax cuts.”

But it’s not clear whether they took a toll on funding for social programs. Bush, for instance, created the new Medicare prescription drug benefit through increased federal borrowing.

GOP thinking about the tax breaks has also shifted over the past decade. While long the party of tax cuts, Republicans justified the Bush cuts largely in terms of refunding projected budget surpluses that emerged about a dozen years ago. “A surplus in tax revenue, after all, means that taxpayers have been overcharged,” Bush said in 2001. “And usually when you’ve been overcharged, you expect to get something back.”

But today, even though the budget is in far worse shape, Republicans defend the Bush tax cuts as helping the economy.

“It’s completely different today,” said Steve Bell, a former senior GOP budget staffer in the Senate. “Back then, we were thinking we had all this extra money.”

Read all about it! Real all about it! - FreedomWorks tea party group nearly falls apart in fight between old and new guard

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From The Washington Post:

The day after Labor Day, just as campaign season was entering its final frenzy, FreedomWorks, the Washington-based tea party organization, went into free fall.

Richard K. Armey, the group’s chairman and a former House majority leader, walked into the group’s Capitol Hill offices with his wife, Susan, and an aide holstering a handgun at his waist. The aim was to seize control of the group and expel Armey’s enemies: The gun-wielding assistant escorted FreedomWorks’ top two employees off the premises, while Armey suspended several others who broke down in sobs at the news.

The coup lasted all of six days. By Sept. 10, Armey was gone — with a promise of $8 million — and the five ousted employees were back. The force behind their return was Richard J. Stephenson, a reclusive Illinois millionaire who has exerted increasing control over one of Washington’s most influential conservative grass-roots organizations.

Stephenson, the founder of the for-profit Cancer Treatment Centers of America and a director on the FreedomWorks board, agreed to commit $400,000 per year over 20 years in exchange for Armey’s agreement to leave the group.

The episode illustrates the growing role of wealthy donors in swaying the direction of FreedomWorks and other political groups, which increasingly rely on unlimited contributions from corporations and financiers for their financial livelihood. Such gifts are often sent through corporate shells or nonprofit groups that do not have to disclose their donors, making it impossible for the public to know who is funding them.

The disarray comes as the conservative movement is struggling to find its way after the November elections, which brought a second term for President Obama and Democratic gains in the House and Senate. Armey said in an interview that the near-meltdown at his former group has damaged the conservative cause.

“FreedomWorks was the spark plug, the energy source, the catalyst for the movement through the 2010 elections,” Armey said, referring to the GOP midterm sweep. “Harm was done to the movement.”

We’re Going to be in a New Recession 2013 - John Williams

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19 December 2012 By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com 

Economist John Williams thinks the economy is in worse shape than most people think.  In 2013, Williams predicts, “As this goes forward, you’re going to see we’re going to be in a new recession.” 
 
The Federal Reserve announced last week it is now printing a total of $85 billion every month to reduce unemployment and stimulate the economy.  Williams says, “That’s nonsense. . . . There’s nothing they can do to stimulate the economy.”  Williams has long contended the Fed is really just using the weak economy to continue to prop up the banking system.  Williams says, “If the Fed wasn’t doing what it’s doing . . . I’d presume you’d be on the road to a banking system collapse.  The banking system is still in trouble.”  Williams warns the “open-ended” printing of $85 billion a month “. . . will be part of what will eventually become hyperinflation.”   And if there is no deal on the so-called “fiscal cliff,” then Williams expects “heavy selling pressure on the U.S. dollar.”  Join Greg Hunter as he goes One-on-One with John Williams of Shadowstats.com.


Source @USAWatchdog

CIA 'tortured and sodomised' German Citizen as a 'terror suspect'

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Landmark European court of human rights judgment says CIA tortured wrongly detained German citizen

"Republican [Senate] members may prevent the report ever seeing the light of day..."

Thursday 13 December 2012 13.54 EST

The European court of human rights has ruled German citizen Khaled el-Masri was tortured by CIA agents, the first time the court has described treatment meted out by the CIA as torture. Photograph: Christian Hartmann/AP

CIA agents tortured a German citizen, sodomising, shackling, and beating him, as Macedonian state police looked on, the European court of human rights said in a historic judgment released on Thursday.


In a unanimous ruling, it also found Macedonia guilty of torturing, abusing, and secretly imprisoning Khaled el-Masri, a German of Lebanese origin allegedly linked to terrorist organisations.

Masri was seized in Macedonia in December 2003 and handed over to a CIA "rendition team" at Skopje airport and secretly flown to Afghanistan.

It is the first time the court has described CIA treatment meted out to terror suspects as torture.

"The grand chamber of the European court of human rights unanimously found that Mr el-Masri was subjected to forced disappearance, unlawful detention, extraordinary rendition outside any judicial process, and inhuman and degrading treatment," said James Goldston, executive director of the Open Society Justice Initiative.

He described the judgment as "an authoritative condemnation of some of the most objectionable tactics employed in the post-9/11 war on terror". It should be a wake-up call for the Obama administration and US courts, he told the Guardian. For them to continue to avoid serious scrutiny of CIA activities was "simply unacceptable", he said.

Jamil Dakwar, of the American Civil Liberties Union, described the ruling as "a huge victory for justice and the rule of law".

The use of CIA interrogation methods widely denounced as torture during the Bush administration's "war on terror" also came under scrutiny in Congress on Thursday. The US Senate's select committee on intelligence was expected to vote on whether to approve a mammoth review it has undertaken into the controversial practices that included waterboarding, stress positions, forced nudity, beatings and sleep and sensory deprivation.

The report, that runs to almost 6,000 pages based on a three-year review of more than 6m pieces of information, is believed to conclude that the "enhanced interrogation techniques" adopted by the CIA during the Bush years did not produce any major breakthroughs in intelligence, contrary to previous claims. The committee, which is dominated by the Democrats, is likely to vote to approve the report, though opposition from the Republican members may prevent the report ever seeing the light of day... More>>The Guardian

Whistleblower - $3.5 Billion Of Paper Used To Smash Gold Price

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December 19, 2012

Today renowned silver market whistleblower Andrew Maguire spoke with King World News about the state of the physical gold market and said that several billion dollars of paper selling from government agents was used to smash the gold price yesterday. 


Here is what whistleblower Maguire had to say:  “Gold is actually a currency, and it’s (the gold market is) intervened (in) by the government agents, which are the bullion banks.  Yesterday, clearly they (the bullion banks) sold gold in defense of the dollar.”
</frame>Maguire continues:
“Keep in mind that $3.5 billion of paper gold was actually cleared in London yesterday.  This selling was coordinated by the same bullion banks that are also active in the Comex.  At the same time, they are rigging enough of a decline to cover shorts into capitulating longs on the Comex market.
But the Eastern central banks are simply sitting back and allowing this defense of the dollar to occur.  They know what’s going on....
Continue reading the Andrew Maguire interview... Finish reading @Source

Hidden US Treasury Risks? Part II

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Part I refresher

By Axel Merk, December 19th, 2012. 
Biggest risk: economic growth?

In our surveys, inflation tends to be on top of investors’ minds, no matter how often government surveys show us that inflation is not the problem. Should inflation expectations continue to rise – and a reasonable person may be excused for coming to that conclusion given that the Fed appears to be increasingly focusing on employment rather than inflation – bonds might be selling off, putting upward pressure on the cost of borrowing for the government.


But if we assume inflation is indeed not an imminent concern (keep in mind that the Fed is also buying TIPS and, thus, distorting important inflation gauges in the market), we only need to look back at the spring of this year when a couple of good economic indicators got some investors to conclude that a recovery is finally under way. What happened? The bond market sold off rather sharply! A key reason why the Fed is increasingly moving towards employment targeting is to prevent a recurrence, namely a market-driven tightening, pushing up mortgage costs.

The government should be grateful that we have this “muddle-through” economy. Let some of that money that’s been printed “stick;” let the economy kick into high gear. In that scenario, the “good news” may well be reflected in a bond market that turns into a bear market.

Historically, when interest rates move higher in an economic recovery, the U.S. dollar is no beneficiary because foreigners tend to hold lots of Treasuries: should the bond market turn into a bear market, foreigners historically tend to wait for the end of the tightening cycle before recommitting to U.S. Treasuries.

The point we are making is that for bonds to sell off and the dollar to be under pressure, we don’t need inflation to show its ugly head; we don’t need China or Japan to engage in financial warfare by dumping their Treasury holdings. All we may need is economic growth! And while Timothy Geithner has studiously been trying to extend the average duration of U.S. debt, Ben Bernanke at the Fed has thrown him a curveball.

Perception is reality

One only needs to look at Spain to see that a long average duration of government debt is no guarantor against a debt crisis. Spain has an average maturity of government debt of 6 years, yet it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that borrowing at 6% in the market is not sustainable given the total debt burden. As such, markets tend to shiver when confidence is lost, even if, technically, governments could cling on for a while when the cost of borrowing surges.

History may repeat itself

It was only 11 years ago that the US government paid and average of 6% on its debt. Sure the average cost of borrowing has been coming down. But no matter what scenarios we paint, if the average cost of borrowing can come down to almost 2% from 6%, we believe it is entirely possible to have the reverse take place over the next 11 years. Given the additional risks the Fed’s actions have introduced, the timing could well be condensed. But even if not, we believe it is irresponsible for policy makers to pretend interest rates may stay low forever (except, maybe, Tim Geithner’s steps to increase the average maturity of government debt; but as pointed out, his efforts may be overwhelmed by those of the Fed)... Read more from source Hidden Treasury Risks? Part II | 247Bull.com

HSBC's Long History of Money Laundering

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Long History of HSBC Money Laundering
If there was any lingering doubt about the supremacy of the internationalist banker over the canons of law, the latest HSBC exemption from criminal charges proves that the real masters of the planet are the criminal banksters. 

If this settlement was an abnormality and not the rule, one might argue the expediency for pragmatism, while deployable, is necessary. Unfortunately, for the financial elites, the facts tell a very different story. 


The Associated Press reports in Government outlines HSBC ties to drug money laundering.

"In court papers filed in federal court in Brooklyn, the federal government said the case against HSBC is related to the laundering of proceeds from narcotics trafficking via the Black Market Peso Exchange, a method by which money launderers convert cash narcotics dollars into Colombian pesos by buying and re-selling wholesale consumer goods.

"The lack of an effective anti-money laundering program at HSBC Mexico and HSBC Bank USA, N.A. contributed to the conduct charged" in the money-laundering case against narcotics traffickers, Justice Department prosecutors said in court papers."

Published in the Globe and Mail account, HSBC failed to control drug-money laundering, Senate finds, indicates the political nature of this investigation.

"A year-long investigation by a Senate committee uncovered that HSBC acted as a conduit for drug money, disguised the sources of funds to evade U.S. sanctions against Iran, and included among its clients businesses with alleged ties to terrorism. HSBC’s internal culture has been "pervasively polluted for a long time," said Carl Levin, a senator from Michigan, who helped lead the investigation."

Instead of prosecuting criminal charges, the U.S. Department of Justice slaps a fine and demands stricter but inadequate regulations. Some of the details are provided in Banks on alert as regulators step up pressure on HSBC. The facade of accountability is insulting. Ian Fraser presents a correct assessment. HSBC’s $1.9 Billion Settlement Sets (Another) Dangerous Precedent.

"Sending executives to prison has far more deterrent value that bringing a company down, since many will argue that employees who had nothing to do with the criminal activity would also be harmed."

The muckraker Matt Taibbi gives a sober overview in a video that deserves watching, After Laundering $800 Million in Drug Money. His observations parallel that of Mr. Fraser.

"You can do real time in jail in America for all kinds of ridiculous offenses," Taibbi says. "Here we have a bank that laundered $800 million of drug money, and they can’t find a way to put anybody in jail for that. That sends an incredible message, not just to the financial sector but to everybody. It’s an obvious, clear double standard, where one set of people gets to break the rules as much as they want and another set of people can’t break any rules at all without going to jail."

The risk of going to jail for managing the enormous sums from the illicit drug trade is small, when governments are beholding for their contrived power to the banking cabals, which control the apparatus of fiat money. 
In the seminal study by John Hoefle coming out of the Executive Intelligence Research, HSBC: Flagship Bank Of Britain’s Dope, Inc., the historic composition of dishonest business dealings that transcend even shady banking is documented.

"It should come as no surprise that British banking giant HSBC was caught laundering money for drug cartels and terrorist groups. HSBC, as we shall show, is the kingpin bank of the global drug trade, a bank which, since its founding in 1865, has been devoted to financing drug crops and laundering the proceeds. HSBC is, in fact, one of the key controlling institutions of the global illicit drug cartel we call Dope, Inc.

If you think that is an outlandish claim, consider the fact that EIR, through its book Dope, Inc., and in its affilicated War on Drugs magazine, published in the early 1980s by the National Anti-Drug Coalition, have made this charge for over 30 years, and have never been sued or challenged by the bank."

Once a drug launderer it is an easy step to institutionalized money laundering.

Now watch the interview with Jeffrey Robinson on HSBC fine for money-laundering. Mr. Robinson’s appraisal rings similar with that of Fraser and Taibbi. This picture becomes clearer as more information becomes available. Even the establishment journal The Economist must conclude that Too big to jail is the reality in the world of international banking.

"The agreements put an end to uncertainty over the banks’ ability to operate within America, a key link in their global networks; their share prices both rose on the day the fines were announced. And the penalties are, in effect, levied on shareholders; not one corporate employee faces charges (although HSBC, at least, has clawed back payments to those responsible). Indeed, at a news conference this week Lanny Breuer, head of the Justice Department’s criminal division, suggested that an outright prosecution of HSBC was considered and rejected because of how damaging the impact could be on the bank’s viability, and thus on jobs and the American economy. Has a handful of banks become not too big to fail, but too big to jail?"

The significance of rejecting criminal pursuance of HSBC, and the long list of other mega banks is Prima Facie validation that the global economy operates under the self-serving guidance and often the practical permission of the largest international banking organizations.

The pattern of selective prosecution by the Injustice Department is no revelation, when the war on drugs is so profitable for the diabolic alliances that run the drug trade. Banking and government by acquiesce is a historic construct that hide behinds the law, while dealing in bribes, payoffs and hidden offshore accounts. 

Drug trafficking continues to prosper because government needs the threat of an evil enemy, while the agencies charged with its eradication are often corrupt game players. 

The HSBC’s of this world are dirty participants in the real drug triangle; namely, drug traffickers, crooked government elements and complicit moneychangers.

James Hall – December 19, 2012


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More Illegal Aliens Getting Free Kidneys

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It's not just in California where illegal aliens are getting advanced medical treatment that they could get in their home of Mexico.  (h/t again to author W.R. Flynn.  Buy his new book here)  Illinois is also giving out American kidneys to illegal aliens who should be deported and get their new kidney in Mexico.

Chicago Tribune by Michael Holtz 

Illegal Immigrant Gets Kidney 

As an illegal immigrant, Jorge Mariscal waited eight years for a kidney transplant he feared would never come. 

His persistence paid off Thursday when he underwent the procedure at Loyola University Medical Center. 

After years of uncertainties, Mariscal said he's excited about his future and grateful for the help he received. But he remains frustrated with a health care system that he worries might leave out an untold number of illegal immigrants in need of lifesaving treatments. 

"Why can't we be treated the same?" he asked while sitting in his hospital room. "Health care should be a human right, not a privilege. At least give us the chance to fight for our lives with dignity."

Well, Jorge, if that's your real name.  Why isn't healthcare a human right in Mexico?  Why are you here?  Because you can get it free here?  Most likely.  In Mexico he would have had to pay for it.And it gets worse.  More saw the example and converged on the free welfare healthcare:

Landaverde said that after the strike, in addition to Mariscal's treatment at Loyola, the University of Illinois at Chicago Medical Center agreed to evaluate Lorenzo Arroyo, another illegal immigrant, for a possible liver transplant. Rush University Medical Center also placed Arroyo's brother, Elfego, on a transplant waiting list. Both brothers suffer from primary amyloidosis, a genetic liver disease.

And not a single question from our intrepid scribbler about why the government of Mexico does not consider healthcare a right.  Send him an email:  mholtz@tribune.com or on Twitter: @michael_holtz

Hugh Hewitt: Master Of Deceit

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Hugh Hewitt continues his lies, slander, and deceit in his relentless plan to bring amnesty and a Demoncrat majority to the United States.  
He recently had Nick Schultz from the American Enterprise Institute on his show and their combined program was one of lies and ignominious slander of Americans.  No link, just another of the episodes from his radio show that is not transcribed.
First the lies.  Hewitt follows the example from your typical communist to lie big.  As a journalist he puts Walter Duranty to shame.  Duranty at least was a communist working to advance communism, Hewitt is the arch-typical RINO, deceitfully weaseling his way into the conservative movement, pretending to be loyal but fighting ever so hard for the radical left, its causes, and its personalities, like Erwin Chemerinsky.  
Here the lie is that Hewitt is opposed to amnesty.  However he supports regularization.  Regularization is of course allowing all illegal aliens, other than terrorists and convicted criminals to remain in the United States.  It is no different from amnesty.  It is just using a word to deceive his listeners into thinking he is opposed to amnesty as are a majority of the American people.
Hewitt then goes on to define regularization as something that does not include citizenship for illegal aliens, but then immediately asks Schultz how long will those illegal aliens who get regularization but not citizenship will have to wait for citizenship.  Schultz of course ignores that question then states that there is an unlimited demand for access by aliens to the United States and that any resistance to immigration is inherently futile and any urge to resist will not be tolerated.   
Hewitt and Schultz then team up to denigrate every American.  Hewitt whines about what he calls the 10%ers, those who oppose amnesty in any of its manifestations.  The clear implication is that any refusal to support amnesty or what Hewitt calls regularization is racist. He refers to the majority of Americans who oppose amnesty as "just noise."
Schultz is more blatant. He just says that there is an unlimited market for immigrants, and he singles out Latin America, who want to come here and that America just has to lie back and enjoy it.  Of course Americans won't be enjoying paying for the welfare state that immigrants want and vote for.  He jumps from accommodating an indefinite demand by aliens for immigration benefits, but then states he is not for open borders, even though everything he says is to accomodate any alien who wants to come to the United States with no restrictions, because restrictions are pointless because the United States is a magnet for aliens.
So, for Hewitt and Schultz, supposed free enterprise and small government types, the solution is bringing in more Demoncrats on welfare.  Great idea there geniuses.  Geniuses only if you are intent on Bolshevising America.
Also of interest, note that the AEI is adamantly opposed to using E-Verify to control future illegal immigration, but Hewitt claims elsewhere that there should be a fence and E-Verify:

Hugh Hewitt December 6, 2012 

Thinking About Immigration 

1. The build-out of the border fence to an agreed upon length and on agreed upon areas... 

5.  Employer sanctions and E-verify should be greatly strengthened.  In an era when the computers of American Express refuses charges because they note "out-of-pattern" purchases, the idea that we cannot oblige employers to verify green card status post-regularization is absurd.  Make the penalties real and compliance will be accomplished.

So, how do you square the maximalist position from Schultz with Hewitt's?  Well, just go back to regularization.  To what purpose is E-Verify if everybody but terrorists and gang-bangers are allowed in?  Neither group is looking for a job.  Under Hewitt and the Ryan/Rubio plan, everybody gets in.  They are just the moderate foil to make the maximalist position of the radicals like Schultz look good, but in the end, everyone gets in. 
And the Republic is doomed.

Google Working Hard To Keep Blacks And Hispanics Out

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And there will be no consequences.  Google and other tech firms are notorious for demanding much of their workers.  And in the current legal climate they want to keep out the riff-raff.  Consequently they work hard during the initial hiring phase to weed out the useless dregs of society.  But while Google used the Microserf technique for years, long years of contractor status before hiring on as a regular employee,  it apparently found that inefficient.
It has gone all mathematical on NAMs, basically blacks and Hispanics, in an effort to keep from becoming the Detroit of high tech. 

SFGate December 8, 2012 by Caleb Garling

Tech Companies Use Tech To Hire The Best

But once a company finds the right candidate, there is still the question of making sure they integrate into corporate culture - especially considering how quickly tech companies fiddle with their products or develop new ones. Google, a company of more than 30,000 employees that releases some new feature or product almost every week, has turned the hiring and integration process into a science - literally.

Using tools typically reserved for statistics departments - regression analysis, T-tests, analysis of variance- Kathryn Dekas, who holds a doctorate focusing on organizational behavior, and her team in Google's People Operations (human resources) have put numerical values on a host of factors that contribute to making a new employee more productive from day one.

Their goal is to build mathematical models that answer the question of how to make Googlers perform at 100 percent - 100 percent of the time. Naturally, like most advanced mathematics at Google, the specifics are locked behind closed doors, but the idea is to effectively use qualitative measures so that they translate to the bottom line.

"We wanted to bake (analytics) into the fabric of the culture," Dekas said. (She stops short of saying Google has, in fact, distilled a precise business value of happiness.)

Consequently black, Hispanic and female employment percentages in Silicon Valley are declining, especially as high tech's demanding productivity standards and H-1Bs crowd out the lowest end of the IQ curve.
Of course, mathematics is mother fucking science, so it offers a little more protection than the obviously NAM and woman directed infamous Google interview questions:

Business Insider October 26, 2012 By Vivian Giang

Google-Like Interview Questions May Be Costing Employers Their Best Hires

Google is known for grilling candidates with brain-teaser questions like, "How many golf balls can fit in a school bus?" or "Why are manhole covers round?" during job interviews. 

These questions have no correct answers; the point is to test a candidate's ability to think on their feet. 

The "puzzle interview is being used with greater frequency by employers in a variety of industries," wrote Chris Wright, associate professor of psychology at San Francisco State University, in a recent study.

One can see the obvious jealousy coming from an obviously overlooked under-achieving Asian female and a looser professor from the 4th tier San Francisco State University.  It was clear they were aiming for an ACLU led lawsuit against Silicon Valley's leading corporations.  There are alot of these types in the Bay Area, especially young Asian-American women attracted to race based neo-Marxism, mostly because they don't want to work Google or Apple hours.  Alot easier to play the race card than do a 12 hour day making money for Steve Jobs or Eric Schmidt.
But just how did Google and the rest of Silicon Valley continue unhampered by the diversity police, not the rabble rousers like the Justice Brothers, but by the real diversity police, those with guns and Grand Jury indictments, the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice.  But Google and other campaign contributions and the upcoming nomination of Eric Schmidt as Secretary of Commerce, are probably part of the reason.  Although it must be pointed out that Microsoft was a big Bill Clinton supporter, but that did not stop it from being reamed by Janet Reno.  So beware you eggheads in the Valley. 
You might get Detroited after all.  Just look at Chicago, not even Rahm Emmanuel can protect the once great city of broad shoulders from the inevitability of the rising tide of failure.

Guest blog: Major League Baseball's "bitter cup of coffee"

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By Doug Gladstone   Here's a hypothetical for you -- Let's say you've been working for Company A for seven years. Company A, which is led by Casey Dunivan, has a pension eligibility policy of 10 years. In other words, you work for Casey for 10 years, and you're guaranteed a lifetime retirement annuity that you can pass on to your loved one or designated beneficiary when you croak. What's

Guest Blog: Do Assad's Torture Chambers Justify NATO Intervention In Syria?

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The United Kingdom and France have been taking a tough line against the behaviour of President Assad of Syria. The Middle Eastern dictator is variously accused of a number of crimes against humanity. He has attracted particularly fierce condemnation for his treatment of protesters, who are reportedly publicly objecting to his regime’s continued rule over the country and Assad’s refusal to hold

WACO: A New Revelation: New Evidence of FBI Cover-Up of the Civilian Slaughter (Full Version)

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Film released in 1999 – April 19, 1993 – The massacre of the Branch Davidians in Waco, TX by the U.S. government.  Remember Waco?  This video shows hard evidence that the media wouldn’t and still won’t show the American public.


Waco: A New Revelation is the film that triggered a new Congressional investigation of the Waco tragedy, and caused the Justice Department and the FBI to reverse their long-held positions on Waco. It has generated a firestorm of events unprecedented in the history of documentary filmmaking. After six years of painstaking investigation, the complete story of the tragedy in Texas is finally coming to light. This compelling feature-length documentary presents new revelations about the events that led up to the deaths of 79 men, women and children at Mount Carmel on April 19, 1993. In the spring of 1998, under the Freedom of Information Act, investigators from MGA Studio’s film division became the first private citizens to gain access to the Waco investigation evidence lockers. What they found was shocking. Upon examination, the evidence gathered under the supervision of federal officials appeared to contradict the FBI’s congressional testimony, raising serious and disturbing questions about events surrounding the siege at Mt. Carmel and the deaths of the Davidians.

Gene Cullen Since 1993, former members of the FBI, former Special Forces and CIA operatives have come forward with new evidence to suggest that the FBI’s claim is inaccurate.


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The Quadrillion-Dollar Derivatives Bubble

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December 10, 2012 by Philip Hodges
Thinking about a quadrillion dollars is like trying to imagine how big the universe is. The $16 trillion national debt is staggering enough, but reading about a quadrillion-dollar bubble is beyond mind-blowing.


While the media and Washington D.C. have our attention on the financial precipice allegedly ahead of us next year and the silly, fake “negotiations” that are going on, the biggest U.S. banks have been dealing with risky financial instruments called derivatives (specifically over-the-counter derivatives, a completely unregulated marketplace). Because these derivatives transactions can be done privately without going through an exchange, the total face value of the global derivatives market is estimated at upwards of $1.5 quadrillion. Compared to this derivatives bubble, the fiscal cliff is a mere crack in the pavement.

So what’s a derivative anyway? Here’s a simple definition taken from

TheEconomicCollapseBlog:

 “A derivative is a legal bet on the future value or performance of something else. Just like you can go to Las Vegas and bet on who will win the football games this weekend, bankers on Wall Street make trillions of dollars of bets about how interest rates will perform in the future or about what credit instruments are likely to default. Wall Street has been transformed into a gigantic casino where people are betting on just about anything that you can imagine.”Bankers can even trade derivatives based on other derivatives. Here’s a list of the top 9 U.S. banks and their respective derivatives exposures:

• Bank of New York Mellon – $1.375 trillion
• State Street Bank – $1.390 trillion
• Morgan Stanley – $1.722 trillion
• Wells Fargo – $3.332 trillion
• HSBC – $4.321 trillion
• Goldman Sachs – $44.192 trillion
• Bank of America – $50.135 trillion
• Citibank – $52.102 trillion
• JP Morgan Chase – $70.151 trillion

Collectively, that’s over $228 trillion. That’s just from these U.S. banks. Derivatives are traded all around the world. The Bank of International Settlements reported:

“Total notional amounts [notional means ‘face value’] outstanding of over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives rose by 18% in the first half of 2011, reaching $708 trillion by the end of June 2011.”
Keep in mind that the global GDP last year was $70 trillion. So, if these banks suffer a collapse, how will anybody or anything bail them out? If they were too big to fail 4 years ago, how much more will they be “too big to fail” when we’ll be dealing with hundreds of trillions of dollars or more instead of just measly billions? This is the financial Armageddon that the media and Washington should be talking about. The fiscal cliff is a complete distraction.

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