Weekday NEWS to Comfort the Disturbed and Disturb the Comfortable.

Tuesday 08.31.2010

The Summer the Recovery Went Missing
By Bill Bonner - DailyReckoning.com
08/30/10 Paris, France - Let's see, what happened this summer? Easy question. The recovery went missing.
Ben Bernanke said so last weekÉor almost. He noted that the economy wasn't quite as spiffy as he had hoped and that the Fed stands ready, willing, and able to provide more help.
The stock market liked the news. After falling for many days, it rallied 164 points on Friday. Gold was flat.
The New York Times reports:
THE American economy is once again tilting toward danger. Despite an aggressive regimen of treatments from the conventional to the exotic - more than $800 billion in federal spending, and trillions of dollars worth of credit from the Federal Reserve - fears of a second recession are growing, along with worries that the country may face several more years of lean prospects.

Figuring out the Real Importance of Gold
By Rocky Vega - DailyReckoning.com
08/30/10 Stockholm, Sweden - Gold remains in high demand among individual investors, hedge funds, and central banks all swapping cash for the yellow metal. This past weekend, an FT reportage looked into what the latest money flows into gold can tell us about it's real importance.
Among others, the Financial Times spoke with Texas Republican Congressman Ron Paul:

"'We were in a financial crisis and inflation was high,' Paul recalls. 'But the Federal Reserve wasn't interested. I remember Paul Volcker [then president of the Federal Reserve] walking into a room in 1980 - at the height of the financial crisis, when gold went up to more than $800 per ounce - and saying, "What's the price of gold?"' According to Paul, 'Everyone knows a high gold price is a vote of no-confidence in paper. That is why governments will manipulate and try to give you an artificial price for gold.'

Gold Poised for Biggest Monthly Advance Since April on Demand
By Kim Kyoungwha
Aug. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Gold is set for the biggest monthly advance since April as signs that the global economic recovery may be faltering prompt investors to boost their holdings to try to preserve their wealth.
Gold for immediate delivery was little changed at $1,236.90 an ounce at 9:15 a.m. in Singapore, having climbed 4.7 percent this month. The metal reached a record $1,265.30 in June. The December contract was also little changed today at $1,237.70.

Gold Bullion Likely to Pull Back Then Rocket Higher
By David Banister - Minyanville.com
Back in late June I forecasted a big top in gold, mostly due to the five wave structures up from the October 2008 lows to June highs, and the five waves up from February lows to June highs converging. We then dropped from $1243 at the time of the forecast to $1155, which was one of my potential "A wave down" rally pivots. I expected a countertrend rally or "B" wave up to $1212-1225. So, all of that worked out pretty well, until we hit $1238. Now, $1238 is a 78% Fibonacci retracement of the drop from $1265 to $1155. Normally, a retracement in a weaker market or sector is capped at 61.8% or 50%.
The strength of that countertrend move caused me to go back and review my patterns a few more times. Most of this is pure instinct and experience, but I think $1155 was the low of the correction. It also looks like that was an ABC correction to $1155, and with the strong rally, it means we're likely beginning a new set of five waves up from $1155.

The Death Of Cash?
All Over The World Governments
Are Banning Large Cash Transactions
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Are we witnessing the slow but certain death of cash in this generation? Is a truly cashless society on the horizon? Legislation currently pending in the Mexican legislature would ban a vast array of large cash transactions, but the truth is that Mexico is far from alone in trying to restrict cash. All over the world, governments are either placing stringent reporting requirements on large cash transactions or they are banning them altogether. We are being told that such measures are needed to battle illegal drug traffic, to catch tax evaders and to fight the war on terror. But are we rapidly getting to the point where we will have no financial privacy left whatsoever? Should we just accept that we have entered a time when the government will watch, track and trace all financial transactions? Is it inevitable that at some point in the near future ALL transactions will go through the banking system in one form or another (check, credit card, debit card, etc.)?

Failed bank's 'White House' for sale
By J. Scott Trubey - The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Who says the White House can't be bought?
No, not the real one, nor even the famous Atlanta replica off Briarcliff Road.
This White House is the former home of the failed American United Bank in Lawrenceville. And it's on the market, though a price hasn't been set.
The 13,000-square foot bank building, modeled after the president's residence, lacks the Oval Office and stately Rose Garden, but 1888 Old Norcross Road does have something 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. doesn't: a drive-through window.

Why Bernanke's attempts to fix the economy are only a façade
By Eric Fry - DailyReckoning.com
08/30/10 Laguna Beach, California - America has an economy that produces about $13 trillion of activity each year. America also has a Federal Reserve Chairman that produces about 13 trillion raised eyebrows each year.
Last week, in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Bernanke raised a few more eyebrows by asserting that the Federal Reserve remains in control - more or less - of economic conditions here in the United States.

Is Ben Lost?
by Andrew Butter - LewRockwell.com
The much awaited speech by Ben Bernanke, on Friday, was a bit of a non-event. It was interesting, however, to see the 30-year bounce, from 3.55% to 3.7%, the moment that Ben explained his cunning plan to push long-term interest rates down. But at least we learned that $140 billion of the $1.25 billion the Fed advanced to buy agency debt and MBS, got repaid.
One question Ben: "How much did you pay for the $140 billion that got repaid? Did you make a profit, or are you going to wait until Ron Paul's audit before you let us know how that went?."

***** Timely interview *****

Interesting take on the American economic situation from the Asian point of view by Canadian, Benjamin Fulford, in Japan. The whole financial system needs 'rebooting' and it will happen. Decisions are being made now, and this financial expert has some excellent ideas about how to deal with America's 204 trillion dollar debt through restructuring and issuing new currency (not the Amero) - listen to the 3rd segment, if nothing else. . .

Benjamin Fulford on Rense - August 25 2010 Part 1/3

Benjamin Fulford on Rense - August 25 2010 Part 2/3

Benjamin Fulford on Rense - August 25 2010 Part 3/3

Backlash over China curb on metal exports
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
China's draconian export curbs on rare earth minerals needed by the rest of the world for frontier technologies is escalating into a serious diplomatic and trade clash with the United States and other leading powers.
Japan's foreign minister Katsuya Okada issued what amounted to a formal protest at top-level meeting with Chinese officials in Beijing over the weekend, saying the sudden cut-off was "affecting the global production chain".
It is the latest sign of rising pressure after angry complaints by companies outside China that rely on this family of 17 metals for hybrid cars, mobile phones, superconductors, navigation, and a host of high-tech industries.

Lehman Derivatives Records a 'Mess,' Barclays Executive Says
By Linda Sandler
Aug. 30 (Bloomberg) -- Barclays Plc had no idea how big Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s futures-and-options trading business was when it considered taking over the defunct bank's derivatives trades at exchanges in 2008, a Barclays executive said.
"Lehman's books were in such a mess that I don't think they knew where they were," Elizabeth James, a director of Barclays's futures business, testified today in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan. James worked on Barclays's purchase of Lehman's brokerage during the 2008 financial crisis.

Treasuries Set for Longest Monthly Winning Streak Since 2008
By Candice Zachariahs and Wes Goodman
Aug. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Treasuries headed for a fifth monthly gain, the longest winning streak since March 2008, before reports this week forecast to show employers cut jobs for a third month and manufacturing growth slowed.
Two-year note yields were within five basis points of a record low before the Institute for Supply Management is predicted to say tomorrow that factories in the U.S. expanded at the weakest pace in close to a year. The unemployment rate rose in August, the Labor Department will likely say Sept. 3.

Financial Crises Linked to Central Bank Stupidity
By The Mogambo Guru - DailyReckoning.com
08/30/10 Tampa, Florida - It was an interesting psychological phenomenon when I read where Michael Kosares of USAGold.com wrote, "Private citizen, Alan Greenspan, could afford to be blunt," but I interpreted it in my Mysterious Mogambo Mind (MMM) to mean, "Private citizen, Alan Greenspan, should be afforded a blunt instrument applied with extreme prejudice to his stupid head, over and over, as he is the moron that, as chairman of the Federal Reserve from 1987-2006, created all the money and credit to finance the now-busting booms in stocks, booms in bonds, booms in houses, booms in derivatives, and booms in the size and cost of governments, and if there is one sorry, worthless bastard who can be singled out as guilty, guilty, guilty, it is Alan Greenspan."

China: Rumors of the Central Bank Chief's Defection
Stratfor Global Intelligence
Rumors have circulated in China that People's Bank of China (PBC) Gov. Zhou Xiaochuan may have left the country. The rumors appear to have started following reports on Aug. 28 which cited Ming Pao, a Hong Kong-based news agency, saying that because of an approximately $430 billion loss on U.S. Treasury bonds, the Chinese government may punish some individuals within the PBC, including Zhou. Although Ming Pao on Aug. 30 published a report on its website indicating that the prior report was fabricated by a mainland news site that had attributed the false information to Ming Pao, rumors of Zhou's defection have spread around China intensively, and Zhou's name has been blocked from Internet search engines in China.

Obama Calls for Congress to Pass Small-Business Bill
As Soon As Possible
By DANNY KING - DailyFinance.com
In an attempt to help spur hiring and cut the unemployment rate, President Barack Obama on Monday pushed Congress to make the small-business bill a priority when it returns from summer break next month, the Associated Press reported.
The package of tax cuts and incentives intended to help small businesses is "fully paid for," said Obama, who referred to Senate Republicans' opposition to it as "partisan politics," according to the wire-service story.

Credit is finally available, but no one wants it
by Nin-Hai Tseng - CNNMoney.com
FORTUNE -- Finally, nearly two years after they were bailed out by Congress, big banks are beginning to ease lending standards for individuals and small businesses. But it's not exactly having the reception many believed it would. Just when credit becomes more available, there's little evidence of a surge in demand for it.
Since the financial crisis, banks have been blamed for slowing the pace of economic recovery because of their reluctance to lend. Unlike larger companies that can borrow from bond markets, small businesses and consumers mostly depend on loans from banks. Federal officials have said tight credit has kept households from spending more and small businesses from hiring more.

A year ago, cash-for-clunkers spurred sales, but did it work?
By Sharon Silke Carty, USA TODAY
DETROIT - When August auto sales come out Wednesday, it isn't going to be pretty.
The year-over-year sales decline for the month will look terrible - down an estimated 30% - because the comparison will be with the buying frenzy fueled last August by the government's cash-for-clunkers program.
The program gave as much as $4,500 to buyers who traded an older car or truck for a new car with higher fuel economy. Its aim was a shot in the arm for auto sales at a time when consumers were not buying because of growing job losses, bank failures, automaker bankruptcies and tight credit. Without that government boost, supporters say, the auto industry - and the U.S. jobs dependent on both domestic and foreign makers - would have imploded and dug the economy into an even deeper hole.
Did it work?

5 reasons why falling home prices will be good for the economy
Higher homes values does not mean higher home equity, financial sector profits back up to 30 percent of all corporate profits, the mortgage debt equation.
DoctorHousingBubble.com
A recent report shows that 11 million homeowners with a mortgage are underwater with a deep red line item on their household budget. Add into the mix those with less than 5 percent equity and we realize that 28 percent of all "homeowners" are either in a negative equity position or teetering close to it. States like California have negative equity rates of 33 percent thanks to the growth of highly questionable mortgage products. Yet California looks like a saint when compared to Nevada with an underwater rate of 68 percent! If we want to examine the core premise of the debate surrounding the bailouts, it is that higher home values by default are good for the economy. I would argue that having high home values as a mission is misguided if that is the only goal we are seeking (and that is basically what we have been doing for the last few years). In fact, the majority of Americans would benefit from lower home prices. A market with higher home values is only beneficial if incomes and the economy move along in synchronization. Popping the last few balloons of the housing bubble is a good thing for most. Let us examine five reasons why falling home prices will be a good thing for the economy moving forward.

Obama Administration Plans Mortgage Aid, HUD's Donovan Says
By Holly Rosenkrantz
Aug. 30 (Bloomberg) -- The Obama administration plans to set up an emergency loan program for the unemployed and a government mortgage refinancing effort in the next few weeks to help homeowners after home sales dropped in July, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan said.
"The July numbers were worse than we expected, worse than the general market expected, and we are concerned," Donovan said on CNN's "State of the Union" program yesterday. "That's why we are taking additional steps to move forward."

Mortgage closing costs 37% higher
By Stephanie Armour, USA TODAY
A new federal rule this year requiring mortgage lenders to give borrowers reliable estimates of closing costs appears to be working - whether it's also costing borrowers more money is uncertain.
A recent survey by Bankrate.com found that, on average, origination and third-party fees on a $200,000 purchase mortgage added up to $3,741 - a 37% jump over last year's average of $2,739.
The fees can include appraisals, credit reports, a closing or settlement attorney and surveys.

One in Six Americans Is Now on Medicaid
By MELLY ALAZRAKI - DailyFinance.com
A record one in six Americans is on Medicaid, the government's health program for the poor, according to USA Today. And Medicaid is just one of several government anti-poverty programs that have seen large increases in caseloads and in costs.
Millions of Americans lost their jobs during the recession, and large numbers of those have lost their employee-sponsored health insurance, too. COBRA subsidies notwithstanding, those job losses have cost most the ability to pay for private health insurance as well.

Cash-Poor Governments Ditching Public Hospitals
By SUZANNE SATALINE - WSJ.com (free)
Faced with mounting debt and looming costs from the new federal health-care law, many local governments are leaving the hospital business, shedding public facilities that can be the caregiver of last resort.
Officials in Lauderdale County, Ala., this spring opted to transfer their 91-year-old Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital and other properties to a for-profit company after struggling to satisfy an angry bond insurer.
"We were next to knocking on bankruptcy's door,'' said Rhea Fulmer, a Lauderdale County commissioner who approved the deal with RegionalCare Hospital Partners, of Brentwood, Tenn, but with trepidation. She said the county had no guarantee the company would improve care in the decades to come. "Time will tell.''

Huge verdict shakes up nursing home industry
By PAUL ELIAS - AP -
$677 million decision has advocates of tort reform taking notice
SAN FRANCISCO - During Cindy Cool's almost daily visits to the nursing home, she would routinely find her Alzheimer's-suffering father wearing urine-soaked clothes.
The Blue Lake, Calif. resident said it would take upwards of 20 minutes for the apparently short-handed staff of Eureka Healthcare and Rehabilitation to respond and help Cool clean her father. Other patients fared worse, she said.
"A lot of times I walked out of there crying because of the things I saw," Cool said an interview.
She provided key testimony before a Humboldt County jury last month slammed the owners of her father's nursing home with a $677 million verdict, sending shock waves through the industry and rekindling calls for tort reform.

Savings rate inches lower in July, U.S. data show
Consumers' spending outpaces growth in personal incomes
By Greg Robb, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The savings rate for U.S. households fell in July to the lowest level in three months as spending outpaced income, the Commerce Department estimated Monday.
Consumer spending rose 0.4% in July while personal income increased 0.2%.
The report was mixed in terms of market expectations. Incomes rose less than the 0.3% expected, while spending was stronger than the 0.3% gain expected by economists surveyed by MarketWatch.
U.S. stocks opened moderately lower after the report. See Market Snapshot.

Thinking about raiding your 401(k) plan? Don't do it
By Sandra Block
It's no secret that millions of Americans haven't saved enough to finance a comfortable retirement. Now comes even more worrisome news: Thousands of workers are raiding their retirement-savings plans to pay their bills.
In the second quarter, a record 2.2% of participants in 401(k) plans managed by Fidelity Investments took hardship withdrawals from their savings, up from 2% a year earlier. In addition, 45% of participants who took a hardship withdrawal a year ago took another one in the second quarter.

Made in USA - For now
Despite the odds, these businesses have managed to stay truly all-American. But for how long?
Aegis Bicycles
Headquarters: Camden, Maine
Products: High-end bicycles
"Made in USA still matters." That is, and will remain Aegis' motto, even if it ultimately becomes the death knell for the company, promised owner Pete Orne.
Orne bought the business in 2004 and like so many domestic businesses, it's hanging on by a thread.
Three years ago, Aegis was selling about 800 frames a year for between $3,000 to $4,000 each, making as much as $3 million a year. Then the recession hit.

California students get tracking devices
by Alex - TheIntelHub.com
RICHMOND, Calif. - California officials are outfitting preschoolers in Contra Costa County with tracking devices they say will save staff time and money.
The system was introduced Tuesday. When at the school, students will wear a jersey that has a small radio frequency tag. The tag will send signals to sensors that help track children's whereabouts, attendance and even whether they've eaten or not.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)
a key part of the global surveillance society
a technological advancement over Nazi tattooing of prisoners
Radio Frequency ID chips will soon be in cash, credit cards, your drivers license, cheap crap at grocery stores, cars, car tires, possibly under your skin.
Wal-Mart is mandating its adoption by its suppliers, which will force all of corporate "america" to switch from bar codes, which merely track what kind of product something is, with RFID, which uses an 18 digit number to track which specific product it is. Bar codes track an model of car tire, RFID would track the specific tire -- which could then be cross-referenced in the great Homeland Insecurity Totalitarian Information Awareness uber-database. Simple RFID readers will probably be set up just about everywhere that will then read all RFID chips in the vicinity for plugging into the system. This is far, far more intrusive than the nightmarish vision of George Orwell's 1984.

Wal-Mart Radio Tags to Track Clothing
By MIGUEL BUSTILLO - WSJ.com July 23, 2010 (free)
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. plans to roll out sophisticated electronic ID tags to track individual pairs of jeans and underwear, the first step in a system that advocates say better controls inventory but some critics say raises privacy concerns.
Starting next month, the retailer will place removable "smart tags" on individual garments that can be read by a hand-held scanner. Wal-Mart workers will be able to quickly learn, for instance, which size of Wrangler jeans is missing, with the aim of ensuring shelves are optimally stocked and inventory tightly watched. If successful, the radio-frequency ID tags will be rolled out on other products at Wal-Mart's more than 3,750 U.S. stores.

Deadly denial of 'Core Exit.' Evacuations. Griff's Agenda 21 facts.
Deborah Dupré - Human Rights Examiner
Agenda 21's written goals are the same as the outcome of their actions in the Gulf of Mexico." A.C. Griffith
Deadly Denial of Core Exit
Denial that Americans are under a planned chemical warfare attack by their own own government gassing Gulf coast residents is resulting in a deadly slow-kill, rendering it impossible for most locals to self-relocate. Project Gulf Impact filmmaker has learned from government officials that "forced evacuation will begin within days" as Agenda 21 escalates, impacting not only Gulf Coast residents but also, in a domino effect, the entire nation equally in denial due to the unprecedented petrochemical-military-industrial-complex (PMIC) cover-up of the continuing U.S. crime against humanity for its ultimate "Full Spectrum Dominance."

High Seas Delay BP's Work at Gulf of Mexico Well
By Jim Polson and Mark Chediak
Aug. 30 (Bloomberg) -- BP Plc's effort to permanently plug the Gulf of Mexico well that caused the largest U.S. offshore oil spill in history probably will be delayed two or three days by rough seas, National Incident Commander Thad Allen said.
Waves up to 8 feet (2.4 meters) make it unsafe to remove and replace heavy valve assemblies a mile below the water's surface, Allen said in a conference call today while aboard a ship at the well site. Storms may persist another three days at the Macondo well, he said.

The Gulf Blue Plague is Evolving - Part II:
Corexit + Bacteria = Mutated Viruses
by Michael Edward - TheWorldVisionPortal.org
Without a doubt, the Gulf Blue Plague is evolving biologically as you will see factually set before you here. In all probability, this is the primary reason the mainstream media (MSM) has been silenced, especially with regards to local media outlets along the Gulf Coast.
The Gulf of Mexico is a biological time bomb that is undoubtedly evolving into a chemically induced breeding ground for mutating viruses. All the aspects exist in the Gulf right now and have been established for over three months. Their ongoing manipulated evolution into a viral plague or viral epidemic is evident, yet has been ignored.
THE CATALYIST: COREXIT DISPERSANT CHEMICALS

Obama Widens North Korea Sanctions on Nuclear Funding
By Flavia Krause-Jackson
Aug. 30 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama widened U.S. financial sanctions on North Korea today in an effort to cut off sources of income that fund the nuclear weapons program of the regime's leader, Kim Jong Il.
The U.S. will freeze the assets of four North Koreans, three of the country's companies and five government agencies suspected of "illicit and deceptive activities" that support the regime's weapons industry, according to an executive order posted on the Treasury Department's website.
Those blacklisted bought luxury goods on behalf of the regime and are suspected of drug trafficking, money laundering and currency counterfeiting, the U.S. said.

Obama goes out on a limb for Middle East peace talks
By Christi Parsons and Paul Richter, Los Angeles Times
The president personally coaxed the Israeli and Palestinian leaders to agree to talks, even as some advisors questioned the wisdom of him linking so visibly to an intractable conflict.
After 18 months of faltering efforts to launch Middle East peace negotiations, President Obama is dramatically increasing his personal stake and his own political risk by hosting direct talks this week.
Obama personally helped coax Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to come to Washington to meet with him Wednesday and resume talks the next day.

Obama's Department of Justice Puts Out Master Patriot Hit-list
Alex Jones Tv 1/5

Obama's Department of Justice Puts Out Master Patriot Hit-list
Alex Jones Tv 2/5

Obama's Department of Justice Puts Out Master Patriot Hit-list
Alex Jones Tv 3/5

Obama's Department of Justice Puts Out Master Patriot Hit-list
Alex Jones Tv 4/5

Obama's Department of Justice Puts Out Master Patriot Hit-list
Alex Jones Tv 5/5

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Monday 08.30.2010

Banks back switch to renminbi for trade
By Robert Cookson in Hong Kong - FT.com
A number of the world's biggest banks have launched international roadshows promoting the use of the renminbi to corporate customers instead of the dollar for trade deals with China.
HSBC, which recently moved its chief executive from London to Hong Kong, and Standard Chartered, are offering discounted transaction fees and other financial incentives to companies that choose to settle trade in the Chinese currency.
"We're now capable of doing renminbi settlement in many parts of the world," said Chris Lewis, HSBC's head of trade for greater China. "All the other major international banks are frantically trying to do the same thing."

In Toledo, the 'Glass City,' New Label: Made in China
By JAMES T. AREDDY - WSJ.com (free)
The Toledo Museum of Art's $30 million Glass Pavilion is a symbol of America's "Glass City," and reflects the legacy of its local glassmakers.
A smudge on the image: The pavilion glass was imported from China, the new global powerhouse of the glass industry.
No one in the U.S. had the capability to satisfy cutting-edge architectural specifications for the curving pavilion, even though the 2006 job involved techniques advanced decades ago by Toledo inventors: bending and laminating glass. The pavilion features 360 thick glass panels, each up to 13.5 feet tall, eight feet wide and weighing over 1,300 pounds.

Three Flashpoints to $220 Oil
By Byron King - dailyreckoning.com
08/27/10 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania - With oil sitting comfortably at $73 a barrel this morning, we cast a nervous eye toward the Middle EastÉwhere three little-noted developments are setting the stage for a return to triple-digit prices. Maybe very soon.
1) On the surface, this looks like a pretty routine Iraq story: An ambush there yesterday killed six members of a Sunni militia known as the "Awakening Councils."
But the background the media didn't supply makes this much more interesting - and ominous. See, the Awakening Councils are Sunni Muslims the US government paid off in 2007 so they'd stop shooting at US troops.

The Fed Is Still Clueless About Bubbles and So Is the WSJ
cepr.net - Center for Economic and Policy Research
The economists and central bankers attending the annual meeting of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming apparently have not noticed the collapse of the housing bubble and the wreckage it has caused. This is the only plausible explanation for a WSJ article that told readers about a paper on a new approach to fiscal policy that argues:
"fiscal policy could benefit from the more scientific approach taken by monetary policy over the past two decades."
The article continues:
"The former U.S. Federal Reserve economist [the person presenting the paper] noted how monetary policy has improved after central banks started to adopt goals such as inflation targeting and as central bankers started to articulate the 'science' in public speeches."

Full Text of Ben Bernanke's Fed speech
DAYTON BUSINESS JOURNAL
The following is the full text of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's speech at the annual Fed symposium in Wyoming:
The Economic Outlook and Monetary Policy
The annual meeting at Jackson Hole always provides a valuable opportunity to reflect on the economic and financial developments of the preceding year, and recently we have had a great deal on which to reflect. A year ago, in my remarks to this conference, I reviewed the response of the global policy community to the financial crisis.1 On the whole, when the eruption of the Panic of 2008 threatened the very foundations of the global economy, the world rose to the challenge, with a remarkable degree of international cooperation, despite very difficult conditions and compressed time frames. And when last we gathered here, there were strong indications that the sharp contraction of the global economy of late 2008 and early 2009 had ended. Most economies were growing again, and international trade was once again expanding.

Policy Solutions, Part Three of Four
By Bill Baker - dailyreckoning.com
08/29/10 Baltimore, Maryland - The printing of money used to replenish the financial system may cause inflation - whether or not this series of radical measures is adopted. It will monetize public and private debt, and the key to not letting the surge in inflation become embedded permanently will be the taking of a credible stance to redraw our system with reduced liability going forward. While we are printing money, our government should quietly (if possible) buy gold with which it would promise to redeem dollars beginning at some point when our economic recovery is certain. No doubt this would be at a price that might shock the world today: perhaps $5,000, $10,000, or higher. Let the market bracket the possibilities; perhaps gold ETFs or digital gold accounts such as those at goldmoney.com would be our new private currency, and we could get out of the money-printing business once and for all.

America's Top Military Chief: Debt is Main Threat to U.S. National Security ... Pentagon Must Cut Spending
Washington's Blog
In February 2009, the head of U.S. intelligence - Dennis Blair - said that the global financial crisis was the largest threat to America's national security. All of America's intelligence agencies apparently agreed.
The same month, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff - Admiral Mullen - also agreed.
Now, Mullen is focusing on a specific economic threat. Specifically, Mullen is focusing on the debt:
The national debt is the single biggest threat to national security, according to Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Tax payers will be paying around $600 billion in interest on the national debt by 2012, the chairman told students and local leaders in Detroit.

Debt, Depression, Default. America is in Deep Trouble
By Eileen F. Toplansky - AmericanThinker.com
Consumers are spending less. Small retailers are closing shop -- even cable television subscriptions are seeing a loss in revenue. Mike Shedlock of globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com cites reports by Jacqui Cheng of Ars Technica, Mercedes Cardon of Finance Daily, and Jon Chavez of the Toledo Blade, highlighting America's economic woes with the following:

Everything is OK [satire / spoof]

Fed ready to take 'unconventional measures'
By Hibah Yousuf,
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke bluntly acknowledged that the U.S. economic recovery has lost considerable steam, but said the central bank has the necessary policy tools to support continued growth.
"The issue at this stage is not whether we have the tools to help support economic activity and guard against inflation," Bernanke said at the Fed annual symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyo. "We do."
Making his first public comments since the central bank announced it would buy additional long-term Treasurys to boost the recovery, Bernanke said that the pace of economic growth is "somewhat less vigorous" than expected, but remained optimistic for a pickup in 2011.

The All But Forgotten Self-Governing Economy
By Joel Bowman - dailyreckoning.com
08/28/10 Alexander City, Alabama -
GDP growth revised downward to an "anemic" 1.6%É
Jobless claims rise more than forecast ...
Home sales fall off a cliffÉworse than economists expectedÉ
Faced with a slew of deteriorating economic data points, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke delivered a speech on Friday designed to assure investors that he has the fate of the nation's economy under control.
The Fed, said he, "is prepared to provide additional monetary accommodation through unconventional measures if it proves necessary, especially if the outlook were to deteriorate significantly."
Come again, Mr. Bernanke? "Deteriorate significantly"? What happened to the recovery? What happened to the "substantial progress" you had so earnestly forecast at last year's annual Federal Reserve retreat?

Fed stands by to boost US growth
By Alan Rappeport in New York - FT.com
Ben Bernanke, Federal Reserve chairman, said on Friday that weaker-than-expected consumer spending growth and a "depressed" housing market had slowed the pace of the US recovery and promised that the central bank was ready to take "unconventional" steps to stimulate the economy if needed.
In a speech at a gathering of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Mr Bernanke acknowledged that the pace of economic growth had been "less vigorous" than the Fed was expecting and that the pace of the labour market's recovery had been "painfully" slow.

Government at the heart of the crisis
The Economist.com
I'M FINDING the exchange on the financial crisis illuminating in a number of ways, but especially as it lays bare the ideological assumptions and motivations we each bring to these questions. In his latest assay, my esteemed colleague seeks to absolve government from any significant responsibility for the meltdown. (We seem to have moved beyond the question of inequality, which is fine by me.) Having concluded that "the CRA was largely irrelevant" and that "Fanny and Freddie were also-rans", he finds it "hard to understand how one could put government at the heart of the crisis." Let me try to help.

A Chat With Steve Forbes
Written by Mad Hedge Fund Trader - OilPrice.com
I sat down with Forbes magazine publisher and perennial Republican presidential candidate, Steve Forbes, whose father, Malcolm, I knew from my journalism days in the seventies. He was there formally to promote his new book, Power Ambition Glory, but I couldn't help but sense his loftier goals.
He says that the crash was a failure of government. It was caused by the Fed, which pursued a weak dollar policy, kept interest rates too low for too long, and printed too much money. Our central bank should pursue a strong dollar policy which will bring a revival of the credit markets. We have the most hard left president and congress in history, and they are on the cusp of getting what they want. Lifting the rules on upticks and naked shorting threw gasoline on the fire

Citigroup Is Cooking the Books
By Charlie Gasparino - FOXBusiness
An all-out war has broken out between Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit and a prominent securities analyst who is saying that the big bank may be cooking the books by inflating its earnings through an accounting gimmick, FOX Business Network has learned.
The analyst, Mike Mayo, of the securities firm CLSA, has been telling investors that Citigroup (C: 3.72 ,+0.06 ,+1.78%) should take a writedown, or a loss on some $50 billion of "deferred-tax assets," or DTAs. That is a tax credit the firm has on its financial statement that Mayo says is inflating profits at the big bank by as much as $10 billion.

John Williams on the Revised GDP Number
JESSE'S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
John Williams' comments on the GDP number were short and to the point. I am still not on board with his hyperinflation forecast preferring to stick with a pernicious stagflation, although what he sees is certainly possible, as is a Japan style deflation. That is what 'fiat' is all about.
The correlation in stocks across the various indices today is remarkably uniform. Do you need to buy a vowel?
John Williams of ShadowStats
Economic Data Will Get Much Worse.
The kindest thing I can say about a stock market that rallies on the "stronger than expected" news that annualized growth in second-quarter GDP was revised from 2.4% to just 1.6%, instead of to the expected 1.4% (keep in mind those numbers are quarterly growth rates raised to the fourth power), or that gyrates over meaningless swings in seasonally-distorted weekly new unemployment claims, is that it is irrational, unstable and terribly dangerous.

Gerald Celente on Mitch Henck 26 Aug 2010
on the bailout bubble, unemployment, and equity crisis of 2010

Economist Shiller Sees Potential for 'Double Dip' Recession
By SIMON CONSTABLE - WSJ.com (free)
With the U.S. economic recovery losing steam, the chances of a second phase of a slowdown are increasing, according to a leading economist.
Speaking in The Wall Street Journal's The Big Interview show, Robert Shiller, professor of economics at Yale University, said he thought the second dip down of a so-called double-dip recession "may be imminent."
Earlier this month, he told the Wall Street Journal he thought the chance of a double-dip recession, which he noted is a rare event, was greater than 50%.

How does double dip recession affect Gold?
By Julian D.W. Phillips - CommodityOnline.com
What is the likelihood of a Double-Dip Recession?
Nearly all the commentary we have heard on this question says the same. "Yes, the prospects of a Double-Dip recession have increased but it remains unlikely that it will happen". We feel that there may be just a hint of self-interest in these answers. The shockwaves that will reverberate should some say it is going to happen, or if the news confirmed that it had started would rattle the markets hugely. Despite the ability to disseminate news instantly, we have to wait a month before reliable figures are published to confirm one way or the other that this is or is not the case.

Why gold price is rising
By Dan Norcini - CommodityOnline.com
The equity bulls were salivating over the prospect of watching another episode of "let's take the shorts out and slaughter them all" as the world eagerly awaited the giving of the law from Mt. Jackson Hole. With claps of thunder in the background and with flashes of lightning interrupting his keen observations upon the state of the US economy, (some swear that they saw the angelic host), the prophet of Monetary religion sounded forth his prognostications and then looked upon his handiwork. He then saw that his work was good and sat down and rested on the seventh day.

Gold may hit new high in coming weeks
by B G Shirsa - Business-Standard.com
Gold is likely to hit a new high with gold futures for December delivery expected to breach the June 21 high of $1,266.50 an ounce in the next two to three weeks. The October futures traded on the Multi-Commodity Exchange (MCX) is expected to cross Rs 19,200 in the coming weeks. The Federal Reserve chairman's assessment of the US economy on Friday confirms the view of most gold traders that the metal is likely to continue working its way higher in the weeks ahead

Why hasn't gold hit $2,000/oz? Doug Silver blames U.S. dollar
If gold really is supposed to shine during tough economic times, former International Royalty Corp. founder Doug Silver wonders why gold prices haven't soared much higher by now.
Author: Dorothy Kosich - MineWeb.com
If gold does best during times of uncertainty and fear, Balfour Holdings Chief and private investor Doug Silver said it should be doing much better.
In his annual talk to the Geological Society of Nevada, Silver, the founder of International Royalty Corp. (IRC) and founder of Denver-based mining analysts Balfour Holdings, said, "If we ever wanted a time for gold prices to take off, we are there." Silver sold IRC to Royal Gold earlier this year in a Cdn$749 million cash-and-shares deal.
Silver told his audience of exploration geologists that he is "quite surprised that gold hasn't gone to $2,000/oz."

Silver To Make A Major Move On Breakout
Jeb Handwerger - SilverBearCafe.com
Silver had very powerful break out Wednesday as investors are seeking assets that are safe and will retain value during a debt crisis. Silver is seeing demand at these price levels as it is historically cheap relative to gold. If the ratio came down to the levels it was in 2006 it would be close to $27 an ounce. Silver is soaring because investors are realizing this is a hard asset, it is money and it is historically cheap compared to gold.

The Billionaire Right-Winger
By Joe Conason - Truthdig.com
Despite the kaleidoscopic proliferation of political media over the past decade, most of what Americans hear and read about the workings of our democracy can be politely termed superficial. Only very rarely does journalism fully penetrate the glittering illusions created by partisans on every side to reveal the grittier realities. When a reporter does blast through the usual scrim of deception, that is worth noting-as in the case of Jane Mayer's investigation in the current issue of The New Yorker of the Koch family and its malign influence.
For decades, the Koch brothers, billionaire heirs of one of the largest privately held companies in the United States, have covertly sought to promote their hard-right ideology through third parties, think tanks, foundations and front groups. Their late father, Fred, having earned a fortune assisting the nascent Soviet oil industry, eventually became a right-wing extremist and member of the John Birch Society. His sons, especially David Koch, have not only expanded the family business but infiltrated their father's political views into the mainstream.

They Go or Obama Goes
By Robert Scheer - Truthdig.com
Barack Obama and the Democrats he led to a stunning victory two years ago are going down hard in the face of an economic crisis that he did nothing to create but which he has failed to solve. That is somewhat unfair because the basic blame belongs to his predecessors, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, who let the bulls of Wall Street run wild in the streets where ordinary folks lived. And there was universal Republican support in Congress for the radical deregulation of the financial industry that produced this debacle.

Ninety Seven Percent of All Americans are Brain Dead
Economic Rant - SilverBearCafe.com
If you still think we have a two party system in this country please look at the chart below.
Carter (not on chart) far outspent all previous presidents and put us into hyperinflation. Pseudoconservative Reagan outspent all previous presidents. Bush Sr. outspent him. Clinton went nuts. Bush Jr. continued the insanity. Obama is now King of the Spenders. The National Debt will be paid in the form of the Much Greater Depression. Each man, woman and child in America owes $200,000. Every family of four (including infants) owes $800,000. It's hopeless folks. All debts get paid in the end, either by the buyer or the seller. Always.
TriOptima just reported there are $450 trillion in derivatives worldwide. Derivatives are basically a complex scam based on smoke and mirrors.

The Death of the First Amendment and
The Nazification of the United States
Paul Craig Roberts - SilverBearCafe.com
Chuck Norris is no pinko-liberal-commie, and Human Events is a very conservative publication. The two have come together to produce an important article, "Obama's US Assassination Program."
It seems only yesterday that Americans, or those interested in their civil liberties, were shocked that the Bush regime so flagrantly violated the FlSA law against spying on American citizens without a warrant. A federal judge serving on the FISA court even resigned in protest to the illegality of the spying.

On the Edge with Joern Berninger (1/2)

On the Edge with Joern Berninger - 27 August 2010 (2/2)

China's banking system shows disturbing, U.S.-style cracks
By Kathy Chu, USA TODAY
HONG KONG - Off-balance-sheet liabilities. Bad mortgage loans. Uncertain growth prospects.
These issues, which nearly toppled the U.S. banking industry and triggered the financial meltdown, are increasingly threatening the stability of Chinese banks.
Last week, a slew of Chinese banks - including Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, Bank of China and Agricultural Bank of China - reported strong profits. ICBC, the country's largest, earned $12.4 billion in the first six months of the year, above analysts' expectations. But rather than providing reassurance about banks' health, the positive numbers are fanning fears of what's yet to come.

Blockbuster bankruptcy is imminent
THE BUSINESS JOURNAL OF MILWAUKEE - BY Dallas Business Journal
Blockbuster has plans to file for a pre-packaged bankruptcy in September, the Los Angeles Times is reporting.
The paper is quoting unidentified sources who claim executive management is going the route of a pre-packaged bankruptcy filing, which will allow the company to reorganize in court and shed its debt burden.
Michael Pachter, an analyst with Wedbush Securities, said there's no reason not to believe the news report. He added that Blockbuster has no way of reorganizing out of court given its current debt load. "They have senior secured debt and unsecured debt," he said. "If you do anything out of bankruptcy to change the terms of the debt on one, it triggers a default on the other."

US stocks gain on stimulus hopes
By Hannah Kuchler in New York - FT.com
US shares regained ground on Friday and remained higher as investors digested Ben Bernanke's speech to central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. The Fed chief's pledge to take action, if necessary, to safeguard the economic recovery was viewed positively.
Stocks had originally rose as investors were cheered by a revised GDP figure which, though lower than the original number, was not quite as bad as they feared, before falling after news of a reduced forecast from Intel.

Small businesses hold off spending while waiting for aid
By Laura Petrecca, USA TODAY
Small businesses have put hiring, supply buying and real estate expansion on hold as they wait out the vote on a small-business-aid bill that stalled in the Senate earlier this summer.
The much-debated legislation offers tax breaks and waived loan fees. But it also comes with more divisive components, such as a $30 billion fund that would help community banks give loans to small businesses. Opponents say the fund would be a mini version of the often-criticized TARP large-bank bailout program.

Business Pulse: A third are thinking of quitting their jobs
DENVER BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Mark Harden
A third of denverbusinessjournal.com readers who answered our latest Business Pulse question say they're thinking of quitting their jobs over the next year.
The results of our non-scientific survey echo national polling indicating that many workers who stuck out jobs they don't like through the recession -- along with pay cuts and boosted work hours -- are now beginning to think of finding something better.
A Rasmussen survey released Aug. 11 said 27 percent of U.S. adult workers are looking for a job outside their current company, the highest percentage in over a year.

US consumers split into two camps
By Greg Farrell and James Politi - FT.com
Consumer spending in the US has turned into a tale of two cities in 2010, with an entire segment of consumers splurging confidently on the finer things in life, while another segment, concerned about unemployment and with little or no discretionary income, spends only on bare necessities.
This bifurcation of the US consumer has become apparent across the spectrum, from restaurants and grocery stores to products such as coffee and beer.

Charlotte-area unemployment DIPS to 11.2%
CHARLOTTE BUSINESS JOURNAL
Unemployment in the Charlotte metro area dropped to 11.2 percent in July from an adjusted 11.4 percent rate in June, according to the N.C. Employment Security Commission.
The ESC says 95,788 residents were unemployed in July in the Charlotte-Gastonia-Concord area.
The Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton metro area had an unemployment rate of 12.7 percent, down from 13.1 percent in June. The ESC says 21,091 residents in that area were unemployed in July.
Mecklenburg County's jobless rate rose to 10.4 percent from 10.3 percent in June.

Commercial real estate failures are easier to spot
than residential woes
By SHERYL JEAN / The Dallas Morning News
Ann Strain walks Junebug, a Boston terrier, past a ghost town - hundreds of abandoned apartments with broken windows and weeds.
Neighbors think squatters have lived at times at the Signature Pointe apartments on Lovers Lane, just east of North Central Expressway. The Dallas police SWAT team trains there.
The apartments were emptied of tenants at least 2 ? years ago to make way for new rental units and retail, but that never happened. Now a bank owns the 13 acres.

Foreclosures of million-dollar-plus homes on the rise
By Lauren Beale, Los Angeles Times
The number of homes in the $1-million-and-up slice of the market that have become bank owned has tripled during the last three years in Los Angeles County, and the trend has shown little sign of slowing.
Foreclosure is blind.
After the mortgage meltdown and the plunge in home prices, record numbers of ordinary houses tumbled into foreclosure across Southern California as borrowers became unable or unwilling to pay their mortgages. But the rich aren't so different after all: Million-dollar-plus homes have reverted to lender ownership in increasing numbers - previous sales prices, prime locations and even celebrity pedigrees have provided no immunity.

Time to let home prices fall?
By Tom Petruno - Market Beat - LATimes.com
Many expect another wave of foreclosures to further deflate prices. The government could offer new incentives - or let market forces rule.
You can't force someone to buy a house.
But as a society we've long tried to make homeownership an offer you couldn't refuse.
And since the real estate mega-bubble burst three years ago, the government has tried even more tricks to get people to sign home purchase contracts.
Now, a grim reality has set in: Despite the still-rich basket of tax breaks for residential property owners, and the lowest mortgage rates in a generation, the pool of willing or able buyers is dwindling.

Housing's new nightmare
By Tami Luhby - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- In another ominous sign for the economy, the number of people falling behind on their mortgages for the first time is on the rise.
This grim statistic is only the latest bad news for the reeling economy. Home sales are in free fall, initial jobless claims remain high and the gross domestic product slowed to a near halt in the second quarter, government reports issued this week showed.
The increase in short-term delinquencies is leaving some experts wondering whether a new round of foreclosures is on the horizon, even as the current wave begins to ebb.

Mortgage-loan modification marathon starts today in West Palm Beach
Event is being held at Palm Beach County Convention Center
in West Palm Beach
By HARRIET JOHNSON BRACKEY
Sun-Sentinel Staff Writer
Today at 9 a.m., is the official opening for the Neighborhood Assistance Corp. of America major mortgage modification event in West Palm Beach.
When NACA was last in West Palm Beach, in February, its counselors worked on 24,000 loans and modified 16,097 of them.
The association held an event in Miami Beach in April, helping about 15,000 people get loan modifications.
People will be lined up overnight, waiting for the Save The Dream Tour to open. Things will probably start getting busy Thursday. At 1 p.m. West Palm Beach Mayor Lois Frankel plans to hold a news conference with NACA Chief Executive Officer Bruce Marks to announce the event.

from April 2010 - a partial solution we haven't heard much about

The Right to Rent Plan
BY DEAN BAKER - CEPR
Millions of families face the loss of their homes over the next few years. While there is a long list of complicated and sometimes convoluted proposals to address the country's foreclosure crisis, there is a simple solution: Congress and the Obama Administration can give families facing foreclosure the right to rent their homes at the market rate for a substantial period of time.
This Right to Rent plan1 would prevent families from being thrown out of their homes as well as help reduce the neighborhood blight that is devastating communities with high levels of foreclosures.

This legislation is still in committee
H.R.5028
Title: Right to Rent Act of 2010
Sponsor: Rep Grijalva, Raul M. [AZ-7] (introduced 4/15/2010) Cosponsors (12)
Latest Major Action: 4/15/2010 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Financial Services.

Could the Right to Rent Stop the Foreclosure Hurricane?
Greg Kaufmann - TheNation.com
When the foreclosure hurricane first hit, subprime borrowers absorbed the brunt of it. Homeowners who had been fooled with teaser rates suddenly faced balloon payments they couldn't afford. Others couldn't refinance because of prepayment penalties they hadn't been aware of. And some people had made bad decisions and were now paying for it with their homes.
The crisis has now morphed - it's hitting everyone with an equal-opportunity kind of vengeance - the prime, subprime, underwater and unemployed. And that makes passing the Right to Rent Act introduced by Democratic Representatives Raœl Grijalva and Marcy Kaptur, and cosponsored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers among others, all the more critical. It would give homeowners who would otherwise by kicked out of their homes the right to rent for five years.

Social Security: The Futile Fight For What's Been Promised
Bill Bonner - SilverBearCafe.com
No discussion of the upcoming collapse of the bond market would be complete without a mention of Social Security.
At least, after they've lost their money in stocks, real estate and bonds, Americans will at least have Social Security to live on, right? Wrong!
You know all that money you pay in Social Security taxes? Where do you think it goes? Into current expenses and US bonds!
That's right, the feds just use the money to finance whatever fool scheme they've got going at the moment...and give the Social Security Administration a bond in return. In theory, the SSA has assets. In practice, all they've got is the hope that the feds can squeeze enough money out of taxpayers to meet their obligations.

Obamacare Might Kill Off College Students' Health Plans
There's an easy fix: Repeal Obamacare, and replace it with real reform.
BY JEFFREY H. ANDERSON - The WeeklyStandard.com
According to President Obama, "If you like your health-care plan, you can keep your health-care plan. Period. No one will take it away. No matter what." You can keep your plan, that is, if your employer doesn't decide to dump it in the wake of Obamacare's passage (as many major employers are already considering doing), if you aren't one of the estimated 51 percent of American workers (66 percent of workers in small businesses) - according to the administration's own figures - whose plans would have to be changed or dropped under Obamacare, and if you don't have a Medicare Advantage plan or a consumer-driven (high-deductible, low-premium) plan. Now it appears that another type of plan might well be on the chopping block: college students' health plans.

TOTAL TYRANNY is staring us in the face
News Stories from The Strange Stack - Alex Jones Tv
Listen to part about RFID chips (WalMart) and recycling in Celeveland, Ohio, eavesdropping by Google in your homes, And people loosing their homes for less than $100. fines.

The Government Can Use GPS to Track Your Moves
By Adam Cohen - Time.com
Government agents can sneak onto your property in the middle of the night, put a GPS device on the bottom of your car and keep track of everywhere you go. This doesn't violate your Fourth Amendment rights, because you do not have any reasonable expectation of privacy in your own driveway - and no reasonable expectation that the government isn't tracking your movements.
That is the bizarre - and scary - rule that now applies in California and eight other Western states. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which covers this vast jurisdiction, recently decided the government can monitor you in this way virtually anytime it wants - with no need for a search warrant.
It is a dangerous decision - one that, as the dissenting judges warned, could turn America into the sort of totalitarian state imagined by George Orwell. It is particularly offensive because the judges added insult to injury with some shocking class bias: the little personal privacy that still exists, the court suggested, should belong mainly to the rich.

Environmental Protection Agency Reviewing Petition to Ban Lead Bullets
Will the EPA infuriate gun owners--
and seal the fate of Democrats on Nov 2nd?
BY JOHN MCCORMACK - The WeeklyStandard.com
Will Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson make a back door move to ban lead bullets the day before the November 2 elections?
Several environmentalist groups led by the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) are petitioning the EPA to ban lead bullets and shot (as well as lead sinkers for fishing) under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). Although EPA is barred by statute from controlling ammunition, CBD is seeking to work farther back along the manufacturing chain and have EPA ban the use of lead in bullets and shot because non-lead alternatives are available. But here's the catch: the alternatives to lead bullets are more expensive. A ban on the sale of lead ammunition would force hunters and sport shooters to buy non-lead ammunition that is often double the cost of traditional lead ammunition. A box of deer hunting bullets in a popular caliber could be upwards of $55.

Glenn Beck Cult Holds Creepy Revival at Lincoln Memorial in DC
Andrew Steele - infowars.com
People gathered Saturday in DC at the Lincoln Memorial as part of an event that Glenn Beck was hosting. The rally was a hybrid neocon pep rally/religious revival, consisting of pictures on a giant TV screen of famous moments from American history, along with inspirational music, waving flags, and talk of destiny and God from a loudmouth Fox News preacher who hides the insincerity in his eyes behind a thick layer of glasses while weeping in breathy sobs to mask his laughter.

Beck Says Rally Showed Discontent With U.S. Direction
By Lisa Lerer and John McCormick
Aug. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Fox News commentator Glenn Beck said the hundreds of thousands who attended his rally yesterday in Washington were expressing a deep dissatisfaction with the direction of the country under the Obama administration.
"People aren't happy about things," he said in an interview on the "Fox News Sunday" program. "A good number of people are not happy with the direction we're going."
The "Restoring Honor" rally was billed as a "nonpolitical" celebration of the military, patriotism and American heritage. Beck, 46, shied away from the partisan commentary that has made him famous during yesterday's rally, focusing instead on religious themes.

We Need A Revolution, Not A Movement
Chuck Baldwin - infowars.com
The elections of 2008 (and the early elections of 2010) produced two significant phenomena: the "Ron Paul Revolution," and the "Tea Party Movement." And, mark it down: both of them will have profound effects upon the upcoming November electionsÐand upon the 2012 elections as well. Call them what you want, however, America doesn't need another movement; it needs a genuine revolution.
The Tea Party movement, while still a force with which to be contended, has already been diluted and compromised. The primary elections plainly reveal the reality of this fact. The high spots so far are the defeats of Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania and Bob Bennett in Utah. The low spots so far are the reelection of John McCain in Arizona and the election of Dan Coats in Indiana.

Obama could kill fossil fuels overnight with a nuclear dash for thorium
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
If Barack Obama were to marshal America's vast scientific and strategic resources behind a new Manhattan Project, he might reasonably hope to reinvent the global energy landscape and sketch an end to our dependence on fossil fuels within three to five years.
We could then stop arguing about wind mills, deepwater drilling, IPCC hockey sticks, or strategic reliance on the Kremlin. History will move on fast.
Muddling on with the status quo is not a grown-up policy. The International Energy Agency says the world must invest $26 trillion (£16.7 trillion) over the next 20 years to avert an energy shock. The scramble for scarce fuel is already leading to friction between China, India, and the West.

Corporate Media Dismisses Castro's Bin Laden Claim As Far-Fetched Conspiracy Theory
Paul Joseph Watson - PrisonPlanet.com
The corporate media wasted little time in seizing upon controversial Cuban leader Fidel Castro's comments about Osama bin Laden being a U.S. spy to deride the claim as a far-fetched conspiracy theory, and yet the fact that Bin Laden was once a CIA protŽgŽ and has been used time and again to the benefit of the U.S. governmentÕs geopolitical agenda is a documented fact.
It sounds like Fidel Castro has been reading Prison Planet.com, but the Guardian claims that the notorious revolutionary has "gone too far" in claiming Osama Bin Laden is a U.S. double agent.
The Cuban leader cites Wikileaks for his contention that Osama bin Laden is a CIA asset, but he went further in pointing out the fact that Bin Laden was routinely used by the Bush administration as a convenient boogeyman.

Cybersecurity Act of 2010 Passes Senate Committee
by Sharon Fisher - daniweb.com
S.3480 -- Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act of 2010
This year's version of the Cybersecurity Act was approved by the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs after amending it to limit the president's authority in the event of a cyber emergency, reported The Hill.
The bill, sponsored by Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), Susan Collins (R-Maine), and Tom Carper (D-Del.), is an update to a bill from last year that was also worked on by Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-West Virginia) and Senator Olympia Snowe (R-Maine). At that time, people were concerned about reports that it would give the President a "kill switch" to shut down the Internet, though the technical details of exactly how a single switch could shut down the Internet were not specified.
"Giving government, especially the president, unprecedented control over America's trunk line of information, over electronic free speech and over business activities simply invites suspicions about whether it would be used politically to frighten people at election time-as did the color-code alerts-and to trample on constitutional rights like the Patriot Act did," wrote the Idaho Mountain Express, noting that Lieberman said he had modeled that aspect of the bill on governmental rights in Communist China.

Mexican cop investigating murders of 72 migrants is dead
USAToday.com
The Mexican detective heading the investigation into the murders of 72 migrants has been found dead near the massacre site along with another officer, Britain's Guardian reports, citing local media.
Roberto Suarez has been missing since Wednesday. A local officer was with him. "I am almost certain my husband and the other man were kidnapped," his wife told the BBC.

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Friday 08.27.2010

Is It Just Me Or Is 2010 Feeling A Lot Like 2008?
Graham Summers - SilverBearCafe.com
Haven't we been here before?
One of the strangest aspects of history is that it not only repeats itself but that the repeats often come in rapid succession. Today, the entire financial world is repeating the 2008 debacle on a sovereign basis and few if any commentators seem to sense it.
Weird isn't it? The 2008 Autumn debacle happened less than two years ago. The policy response to it was to simply shift garbage debt from Wall Street to the Federal Reserve, suspend accounting standards, and pump the financial system with TRILLIONS of Dollars (NONE of which fundamentally addressed any of the problems causing the crisis) and yet grown adults with fancy titles and degrees actually believed that the issues were FIXED.

Fed in emergency bid to put bailout ruling on hold
(Reuters) - The Federal Reserve asked a U.S. appeals court to delay implementing a ruling that would force the central bank to disclose details of its emergency lending programs to banks during the financial crisis.
Wednesday's emergency request for a 90-day delay came after the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals on August 20 denied a motion by the Fed to rehear the case, which had been brought by Bloomberg LP, the parent of Bloomberg News, and News Corp's Fox News Network.
A stay would give the Fed and the Clearing House Association, a group of major U.S. and European banks, until November 18 to appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Fed programs were designed to shore up the financial markets, and more than doubled the central bank's balance sheet to well over $2 trillion, especially after the September 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.

Bernanke, Trichet Economic Paths May Diverge at Jackson Hole
By Simon Kennedy and Scott Lanman
Aug. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet, who united to fight the worst global recession in six decades, may be diverging over the outlook for their economies.
The Bernanke-led Fed, while saying U.S. growth would be slower than anticipated, announced on Aug. 10 it will buy Treasuries to set a $2.05 trillion floor on its balance sheet and keep interest rates from rising. Trichet said Aug. 5 that the euro-area economy was surpassing forecasts, which may pave the way for the ECB to look at phasing out its emergency lending measures.

In Jackson Hole, a laid-back retreat with some serious policymaking
By Neil Irwin - WashingtonPost.com
JACKSON, Wyo. -- I'm in Grand Teton National Park for the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City's annual economic symposium, one of the most important events for the world's makers of monetary policy.
The conference itself begins this evening, though participants started trickling in last night. It is an odd scene here in the lobby of the Jackson Lake Lodge, which is an awfully good place to be for economic groupies (if such people exist). Right now, Axel Weber and Allan Meltzer are in quiet conversation across the room. Nearby is a guy trying to get his kids organized to go hiking, almost certainly oblivious to the fact that he is standing next to the second-most powerful central banker in Europe and the leading historian of the Federal Reserve.

Fed Seeks Delay of Bank Data Release While Considering Appeal
By Bob Ivry and David Glovin
Aug. 26 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve Board sought to delay the court-ordered release of documents identifying banks that might have failed without the U.S. government bailout while it considers an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Fed asked the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York yesterday to delay implementation of a ruling that compels the central bank to release the documents.
"The stay is necessary to permit the board to consult with the Department of Justice regarding an appeal to the Supreme Court," Fed spokesman David Skidmore said.
The appeals court on Aug. 20 denied the Fed's request to reconsider its decision requiring it to release records of the $2 trillion U.S. loan program.

Audit the Fed!!!
Posted by WARREN MOSLER - MoslerEconomics.com
The Fed should offer full transparency. These are the reasons the Fed gives for secrecy:
"The Fed argued that allowing disclosure could stigmatize banks, causing a loss of confidence that could lead to deposit runs, bank failures and damage to the economy."
The fact that the Fed fears a liquidity crisis is evidence that it doesn't understand banking.
With the FDIC offering deposit insurance for up to 100% of any bank's liabilities, it should be clear to the Fed the liability side of banking is not the place for market discipline. Liquidity should not be an issue and it should be provided in unlimited quantities at all times, much like most of the rest of the world's central banks have been doing for a long time.

Fresh flight to Swiss franc as Europe's bond strains return
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
The Swiss franc has surged to an all-time high against the euro on capital flight from the eurozone after Irish, Greek, and Portuguese bonds came under renewed fire.
Yields on 10-year Swiss bonds fell to 1.02pc as investors flocked into the ultimate safe-haven asset, now outperforming gold.
No country in the developed world apart form Japan has ever seen 10-year yields drop below 1pc. Rates remained significantly higher during the two great depressions of the 1870s and the 1930s.
Within the eurozone investors turned to German Bunds, pushing yields to an historical low of 2.11pc. The search for safety seems driven by swirling mix of fears over a double-dip recession in the US, austerity overkill across the West, and sovereign debt worries on the eurozone periphery.

Fed's Bernanke Running Out of Options
WRITTEN BY BOB ADELMANN - The New American
When Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke speaks on Friday at the Fed's annual meeting in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Fed-watchers from around the world will be hanging on his every word, phrase, and nuance for clues. They'll be listening to hear that the chairman knows what's happening in the economy, and that if things get worse, he has a plan.
The economy continues to suffer as shown by weak demand for housing, high unemployment, and declines in hard goods manufacturing. As Randall Forsythe put it, "Every data point on employment and housing since midyear has fallen short of expectations, in some cases, far short." The numbers just released by the National Association of Realtors for July were horrific, despite the Fed's efforts to "re-flate" the housing market, as Tom Eddlem pointed out.

Cancer & Desperation of QE2
By: Jim Willie CB, GoldSeek.com
History is being made. The American public has never been so nervous, perhaps fearful of something dreadful and imminent. The global monetary system is crumbling. The typical stimulus has failed to jumpstart the USEconomy. The 20 months of near 0% short-term official interest rate has failed to revive the moribund US housing market. The phony FASB accounting rules has failed to accomplish anything except a stay of execution for the big US banks, which do not lend much. In fact, the US banks are largely dead entities showing enough life for to receive USGovt largesse aid. Witness the failure of the US financial sector. Witness the climax chapter of failure for the Fascist Business Model. The US banker brain trust, which possesses only a modicum of economic wisdom, analytic prowess, or foresight, finds itself in a desperate corner. Their talk of an Exit Strategy in the last several months was summarily dismissed as nonsense, propaganda, and wishful thinking by the Jackass here on a consistent irrefutable basis. The US Federal Reserve is ready to embark on the second round of Quantitative Easing. The monetization of US$-based bonds of many types will be done on a second initiative, on cue. Here is the irony, the stupidity, the insanity, the recklessness, the tragedy. What failed, they will do again, maybe even bigger! At risk is global confidence and trust, hardly a zero cost item.

UK bank accounting rules 'fatally flawed',
warns influential watchdog
By Louise Armitstead - Telegraph.co.uk
The Government has been warned of a "regulatory fiasco" in which British banks have apparently adhered to flawed reporting standards for more than five years.
An influential watchdog has written to the Department of Business listing a catalogue of staggering regulatory errors that allegedly contributed to the collapse of several banks in 2008 - and still threatens the system today.
While reviewing the proposed expansion of the International Financial Reporting Standards for accounting, Tim Bush, a member of the "Urgent Issues Task Force" that scrutinises the work of the Accounting Standards Board (ASB), claims to have uncovered "fatal" and "dangerous" flaws in the system.

Economy Entering 5-Year Period of Stagnation?
U.S. News and World Report's Rick Newman argues the U.S. economy has entered a period of no growth.

Gold demand robust in 2010
CommodityOnline.com
Demand for gold will remain robust during 2010 as a result of accelerating demand from India and China, as well as increasing global investment demand driven by continuing uncertainty over public debt and economic recovery, the World Gold Council (WGC) said.
According to the WGC's Gold Demand Trends report for Q2 2010, published today, demand for gold for the rest of 2010 will be underpinned by the following market forces:

My Take on Gold
Richard Russell - SilverBearCafe.com
Dennis Gartman is an experienced commodity trader. Dennis has been very cautious about gold; he "sort of" likes gold, so he calls himself a "gold agnostic." For this reason it's most interesting to read what Dennis says about gold in today's report.
"Turning, then to gold and other metals, prices turned sharply for the better yesterday as the world rushed out of equities and looked for any safe harbors that were available. Certainly the rush to the Swiss franc was obvious, as noted above, and so too the rush into sovereign debt securities. But frankly, the rush was on to gold once again. We remain long what we have referred to as an 'insurance' position in gold, but we own it in terms of EUROs and /or of British pounds sterling, otherwise we remain an agnostic. To assuage our friends who are gold-bug-leaners, we shall not be short of gold. Nothing likely shall ever turn us manifestly bearish of it. But for the moment we are simply hard upon the sidelines, owning only this small 'insurance' position and comfortably in that position.

Precious metals decouple from Dow
NEW JERSEY (Commodity Online): Precious metals have now decoupled from the Dow Jones Industrial Index with Dow falling 6.1% from its high on August 9th, along with both gold and silver rising by about 3.3% during the same period.
A year ago we would consistently see precious metals and stock market prices rise and fall in parallel, according to National Inflation Association (NIA).
The Dow Jones to gold ratio is now down to 8.1, near its low for 2010 of 7.9. The gold to silver ratio still remains at a historically high level of 66. However, silver was up today by $0.65 to $19.03 per ounce, its biggest one day gain since early June. We expect silver to significantly outperform gold in the months to come.

Silver Prices Now Rising Faster Than Gold
By: Peter J. Cooper - SilverSeek.com
August is usually a quiet month in the precious metals market but this month is different. Silver has started behaving 100 per cent like a precious metal and not as an industrial commodity, and while stocks and Dr Copper have been falling, silver has been outperforming gold which is also on the up.
What is going on here? This is actually fully consistent with the bullion market rumors about the bank cartel unwinding its silver futures positions in the quietest month of the year.

The Ethics of Gold
By Ron Robins - alrroya.com
The rising price of gold stands as the ethical barometer of the mismanagement of our fiscal, monetary, and currency systems. Gold is in the early stages of re-asserting its historic role of helping to bring order to monetary and currency chaos. Its price has risen more than fourfold over the past ten years as a result of investors anticipating the predictable financial and currency chaos we have today-and what is likely yet to come.
The central banks and government treasuries, particularly those of the US, Europe, and Japan, have been weakened and our trust in them eroded. For decades they assured us that only they and their paper currencies and fractional reserve banking systems can keep our economies growing forever. They are now failing for all to see. And before the ships of state sink and economies further submerge they bail out their banking friends.

The Economy When Debt Is Everywhere
Bob Chapman - The International Forecaster
Greece forced into a harsh reality, madness, next is Spain, Portugal and Italy to be sold to IMF servitude for decades, twenty countries now headed into bankruptcy, no relief from unemployment, reduced US GDP, a million jobs to be lost... nightmares for the economy ahead.
Debt is everywhere and it certainly is onerous. We all have heard about the sovereign debt crisis, the debt of Greece and the debts of Ireland, Spain, Portugal and Italy. During that process the euro fell from $1.50 to $1.187; which gave euro zone exporters quite an advantage. The euro has since rebounded to a high of $1.33 and for now settled in near $1.28. Business confidence is back, but in the meantime the next course of action is to be higher taxes and austerity. Even consumers believe things are not going to improve. They all probably see the advantages of a cheaper euro. Even the CDS premiums have disappeared, which means at least for now the crisis has been arrested with a Band-Aid called loans - loans that will take these countries years to repay accompanied by years of depression. As a result, Greece is on the edge of revolt.

Bob Chapman on Radio Liberty 23 Aug 2010

Obama confers with economic team
by Mike Memoli - The Swamp - Chicago Tribune
President Obama was silent yesterday as the White House punched back at House Minority Leader John Boehner, who in a major speech called on the president to dismiss his economic team.
Today, the White House released a so-called "readout" of a call Obama held with that team, which seemed in part another response to Boehner's remarks and a vote of confidence for his advisers.

Dollar May Extend Decline to Below 70 Yen
By Yoshiaki Nohara and Hiroko Komiya
Aug. 27 (Bloomberg) -- The dollar may drop to less than 70 yen, surpassing a record low reached in 1995, Mizuho Corporate Bank Ltd. said, citing trading patterns.
A weekly ichimoku chart shows the U.S. currency has been in a downtrend since it reached this year's high of 94.99 yen in May, said Hiroyuki Tanaka, chief technical analyst in Tokyo at the unit of Japan's second-largest bank. A daily ichimoku chart signals any gains in the dollar will be limited as the currency stays below the so-called conversion line and baseline, he said.

Blackstone urges court to throw out IPO appeal
By Jonathan Stempel -
(Reuters) - Blackstone Group LP urged a federal appeals court not to revive an investor lawsuit accusing it of hiding bad investments before raising $4.7 billion in its 2007 initial public offering.
A lawyer for the private equity firm argued that U.S. securities laws did not require the private equity firm to disclose expansive details about hundreds of investments that it believed the investors sought.
But investor's attorney David Brower countered that U.S. District Judge Harold Baer was wrong to dismiss the lawsuit in September 2009.
"Blackstone has the obligation to report significantly negative, and even significantly positive, results," Brower, a partner at Brower Piven PC, told the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York.

Economic Armageddon:
Ladies and Gentlemen, the Double Dip is Here!
Pravda.ru [caveat lector]
The worst nightmare forecast by economic specialists over the previous years has come true: new research by economic gurus in the United States of America has revealed a bleak scenario: the United States' economy is in a state of depression. Yes, it is the Double Dip, a roller-coaster ride to economic catastrophe and it has arrived. To come: massive debt default, the failure of entire nations and widespread starvation in the western world.
The research referring to the works of a number of leading economists (David Rosenberg, Fred Harrison, Arthur Laffer, Nobel Prizewinner Paul Krugman, Robin Griffiths) is revealed in the article by US based analyst and writer, Terrence Aym*. And it makes terrifying reading.
While these leading economists represent different views from opposite ends of the political spectrums both in the USA and the UK, on one thing they agree: the decade ahead is going to get worse.

The Rise and Fall of the U.S.S.A.?
WRITTEN BY CHRISTIAN GOMEZ - The New American
In the latest issue of Trends Journal Gerald Celente, the founder and director of Trends Research Institute and also bestselling author of Trends 2000 and Trends Tracking, writes that the United States is walking down the same road of demise as the former Soviet Union.
Celente further elaborated on this point in a recent video "tech-ticker" interview, available online at Yahoo! Finance, saying, "In a lot of ways it's empire decline; they ran the Cold War race and they lost, we're still in the race..."

China Buys Euros as Fear of World Depression Grows
By Webster G. Tarpley
The US Treasury has just announced that China's official holdings of U.S. Treasury securities declined by about $30 billion between April and May of this year, from about $900 billion to some $868 billion. According to the US authorities, this means that Chinese holdings of US government paper are now at the lowest level in the past year. A 2% to 3% decline in a month does not qualify as massive dumping, but simply means that China is in the process of diversification. It is also very likely that China has more U.S. Treasury bonds than this official count would indicate, quite possibly through proxy purchases via Hong Kong and other places.
With the sales of existing homes in the United States falling by 27% this morning, together with disastrous statistics regarding unemployment and foreclosures, it ought to be obvious that the US economy is in depression. Even experts interviewed on CNBC are beginning to wake up to this obvious fact.

Goldman Looks to Move Proprietary Trading Desk

Foreclosures Fall, but Rise in Delinquency Causes Concern
By DAVID STREITFELD - NYTimes.com
The foreclosure crisis finally began to improve in the second quarter, but with the continued weakness in the economy and the recent deterioration of the housing market the gains may prove fleeting, data released Thursday indicated.
For the first time since 2006 the number of loans in the process of foreclosure fell, the Mortgage Bankers Association said.
But the group's chief economist, Jay Brinkmann, said any conclusion that the improvements would continue was premature. "It's more of a hope than anything at this point," he said.

28% of Ga. mortgages underwater
ATLANTA BUSINESS CHRONICLE
Some 28 percent of homeowners in Georgia were underwater in their mortgages in the second quarter.
CoreLogic reported Thursday 449,969 negative equity mortgages out of the Peach State's 1,601,921 total mortgages.
A borrower is in negative equity if he or she owes more on the mortgage than the home is worth.
CoreLogic also reported 11 million, or 23 percent, of all residential properties with mortgages in the United States were in negative equity at the end of the second quarter, down from 11.2 million and 24 percent from the first quarter of 2010. Foreclosures, rather than meaningful price appreciation, were the primary driver in the change in negative equity.

One in 10 mortgage holders faces foreclosure
by Alan Zibel - AP -MSNBC.MSN.com
Government aid efforts having little impact stemming housing crisis
WASHINGTON - One in 10 American households with a mortgage was at risk of foreclosure this summer as the government's efforts to help have had little impact stemming the housing crisis.
About 9.9 percent of homeowners had missed at least one mortgage payment as of June 30, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Thursday.
That number, which is adjusted for seasonal factors, was down slightly from a record-high of more than 10 percent as of April 30.

Real Estate: No New McMansions Sold in July
By DAN BURROWS - DailyFinance.com
Not only did new-home sales plunge in July to a record low going back to 1963, but the McMansion market saw no activity whatsoever -- for the second month in a row.
As David Rosenberg, the presciently bearish chief economist and strategist at Canadian asset manager Gluskin Sheff told clients Thursday: "The high-end market, in particular, is under tremendous pressure. In fact, it is becoming non-existent."
Not a single new home priced above $750,000 sold in July or June, Rosenberg notes. As for houses priced between $500,000 and $750,000, only 1,000 new units were sold last month. When it comes to new homes that did find buyers in July, more than 80% were priced under $300,000.

Procrastination on Foreclosures, Now 'Blatant,' May Backfire
By Jeff Horwitz and Kate Berry - AmericanBanker.com
Ever since the housing collapse began, market seers have warned of a coming wave of foreclosures that would make the already heightened activity look like a trickle.
The dam would break when moratoriums ended, teaser rates expired, modifications failed and banks finally trained the army of specialists needed to process the volume.
But the flood hasn't happened. The simple reason is that servicers are not initiating or processing foreclosures at the pace they could be.

Foreclosures fall but new delinquencies up: MBA
By Al Yoon
(Reuters) - The number of U.S. homes headed for foreclosure fell during the second quarter, marking the first such drop since the housing slump began in 2006, but the improvement may be fleeting as the number of newly delinquent homeowners rose, a banking group said on Wednesday.
The percentage of loans in the foreclosure process declined last quarter to 4.57 percent from 4.63 percent in the first quarter, partly because of lender efforts to ease payments for homeowners and the impact of temporary home purchase tax credits, the Mortgage Bankers Association said in a report.

New home sales fall to record low
By Alejandro Lazo, Los Angeles Times
July's annualized sales rate of 276,000 units was the lowest since the government began keeping track in 1963.
Sales of new homes unexpectedly sank 12.4% in July to the lowest point since government records starting being kept in 1963. It underscored continued weakness in the housing market, which tanked after the expiration this spring of a tax break for home buyers who were already facing a stagnant job market.
The Commerce Department said Wednesday that new single-family houses in July were sold at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 276,000 units. It marked a 32.4% drop from the same month a year ago.

Keiser Report No:72

Credit Card Rates Push the Envelope
By: Rick Ackerman - GoldSeek.com
You've got to wonder what the banks have in mind now that they've raised credit card rates to an average 14.7 percent, up 160 basis points from a year ago. Are lenders perhaps trying to tell us that they are no longer interested in advancing cash to users of plastic? After all, what shopper or diner would borrow a dime with a credit card if it carried such an exorbitant interest charge? And even if there were borrowers at such usurious rates, how many of them could be counted on to service their loans indefinitely (which is how long it would take to pay off such loans)? It's not as though the banks can go after delinquent borrowers with such time-honored tools of the loan shark as baseball bats, brass-buckled belts and straight razors.

10 Big Retailers Closing Stores
By MERCEDES CARDONA - DailyFinance.com
Your next shopping trip may not be as convenient as it used to be. The second quarter earnings season brought news from several major retailers that they will be shutting down stores. Both Saks (SKS) and Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) said they were closing stores in several parts of the country. Meanwhile, other stores like the struggling Blockbuster video rental chain, continue to slash stores by the dozens. American Apparel (APP), which is close to defaulting on its loans, just may be next.
Consumers just aren't shopping the way they used to. Even Wal-Mart Stores (WMT), which typically fares well during tough economic times, is worried. "The slow economic recovery will continue to affect our customers, and we expect they will remain cautious about spending," said president and CEO Mike Duke in a statement that was released during the company's second quarter earnings report.

Blockbuster tells Hollywood studios it's preparing for mid-September bankruptcy
LATimes.com
After dominating the home video rental business for more than a decade and struggling to survive in recent years against upstarts Netflix and Redbox, Blockbuster Inc. is preparing to file for bankruptcy next month, according to people who have been briefed on the matter.
Executives from Blockbuster and its senior debt holders last week held meetings with the six major movie studios to discuss their intention to enter a "pre-planned" bankruptcy in mid-September, said several people familiar with the situation who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of ongoing talks.

America's Millionaires Are Feeling More Bearish
Tim Iacono - SeekingAlpha.com
U.S. investors with assets in seven or more figures are not feeling nearly as chipper about the domestic state of affairs as they were over the last year or so, that is, when stock prices were generally rising. Reuters reports on how their mood has soured.
The Spectrem millionaire investor confidence index fell to its lowest level in more than a year in August as wealthy U.S. investors worried about politics and unemployment, according to Spectrem Group.

Desperate Consumers Stop Paying Mortgages
in Order to Pay Credit Cards
By CHARLES WALLACE - DailyFinance.com
Normally, it would be considered a positive sign that people are reducing their credit card debt load. But a series of statistical releases this week confirms an ominous new trend among desperate consumers: They have stopped paying their mortgages but are continuing to pay off their credit cards so they can continue to buy staples, like food.
"People are trying to free up cash so they have it on a daily basis," says Theodore W. Connolly, a bankruptcy attorney in Boston who has just published a new book on the problem, The Road Out of Debt: Bankruptcies and Other Solutions to Your Financial Problems. "People are getting fearful again and are worrying about just paying for their groceries and doing the laundry."

The Hidden Income Tax Surcharge
By James Schaefer - WeElectedYou.org
Think you are in the 15% tax bracket, or the 25% tax bracket? Think again.
The tax rates for Social Security and Medicare total 15.3%, and have been at that level for the past twenty years. Most workers only see half that figure deducted from their paychecks, but if your employer didn't have to give 7.65% of your salary to the government he could give it to you.
The $2.5 trillion Social Security trust fund doesn't really have $2.5 trillion in it, because all the money is invested in Treasury Bonds. A Treasury bond is a loan to the government, and it goes without saying that our congressmen spent the borrowed money as soon as they got their hands on it. Future payments to Social Security beneficiaries will have to be paid from future taxes.

The Social Security Obligation
By James Schaefer - WeElectedYou.org
Dr. Krugman's comment about "people who . . . are itching to dismantle Social Security" is an interesting one. It would appear that government has already done this over the past forty years, using the Social Security trust fund to cover federal budget shortfalls. The well is now dry, and making Social Security solvent can only be done at additional future expense to taxpayers.
Taxpayers will now have to pay twice to fund Social Security, the first time out of their paychecks during their working years, and - starting this year - yet again, to pay back the IOUs to keep the system running.

The U.S. Labor Force Is Being Killed Off
Ever wonder what Obama really means by a "jobless recovery"? It means that the British are killing off the U.S. labor force with their Nazi policies of "creative destruction," and trying to convince you that it's good, and that we're in a "recovery."
How bad is real unemployment? Worse than the Great Depression of the 1930s, and rapidly deteriorating. Most people try to determine unemployment by accretion of categories: official unemployment + underemployed + part time workers + discouraged workers + this + that. But that misses the actual picture, which only emerges when you take the top-down approach developed by LaRouche's science of physical economy.

Obama jobs death toll watch: More health care layoffs
By Michelle Malkin
I said yesterday in my Beltway Chainsaw Massacre column that the GOP needs to track the Obama jobs death toll and tell the victims' stories far and wide.
But there's no need to wait for the GOP. I'll keep doing it right here.
The first story of the day comes from the Fort Worth Star Telegram in Texas, where a health insurer called Health Markets has laid off 70 workers and expects up to 180 more as it braces for the costs of Obamacare and other government mandates:
HealthMarkets, the North Richland Hills-based seller of health insurance, laid off 70 employees this month and expects to trim 180 more positions by the end of the first quarter of 2011, according to a recent federal filing.

Health Insurer Cash Shifts to Favor Republicans Before Election
By Drew Armstrong
Aug. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Health insurers led by WellPoint Inc. are backing Republicans with campaign donations by an 8-to - 1 margin, favoring the party that's promised to repeal President Barack Obama's health-care overhaul if it wins back Congress.
WellPoint, along with Coventry Health Care Inc. and Humana Inc., gave Republican candidates $315,000 from May through July, according to U.S. Federal Election Commission records. That compares with $41,000 given to Democrats by the three companies as the parties near November elections that will determine who controls the U.S. House and Senate next year.

Can GOP Repeal Parts of Health-Care Reform?
Galen Institute President Grace Marie Turner on what measures in the health-care law a Republican House might be able to overturn.

A Relativist, Wrapped in a Muslim, Inside an Agnostic
George Neumayr - The American Spectator
Why does a significant chunk of the American electorate think Obama is a Muslim? Let's count some of the reasons: he speaks of his "Muslim roots," says he hails from "generations of Muslims," was born to a line of Muslim males and given by them an Arabic name, went to a Muslim school in Islamic Indonesia, speaks glowingly of Islam whenever he gets the chance, holds a Ramadan dinner in the White House, tells his NASA head to turn the space agency into a Muslim outreach program, and last but not least insults doctrinal Christians routinely.
The voice of the people is the voice of God, the pander bears and demagogues of the left usually say. But not on this one. With great impatience they have appeared on cable shows this week to lecture the American people on Obama's "real" religion. Has the left-wing chattering class ever been more eager to pronounce a president Christian?

Rotten Eggs and Our Broken Democracy
By Amy Goodman - Truthdig.com
What do a half-billion eggs have to do with democracy? The massive recall of salmonella-infected eggs, the largest egg recall in U.S. history, opens a window on the power of large corporations over not only our health, but over our government.
While scores of brands have been recalled, they all can be traced back to just two egg farms. Our food supply is increasingly in the hands of larger and larger companies, which wield enormous power in our political process. As with the food industry, so, too, is it with oil and with banks: Giant corporations, some with budgets larger than most nations, are controlling our health, our environment, our economy and increasingly, our elections.

Sheriff Babeu:
It's 'An Outrage' Obama Stopped Building Border Fence
By Terence P. Jeffrey, Editor-in-Chief - CNSNews.com
(CNSNews.com) - Sheriff Paul Babeu of Pinal County, Ariz., says it is "an outrage" the Obama administration has stopped building the double-fencing needed to assist the Border Patrol in securing the U.S.-Mexico border and says it is time for the United States to begin fighting illegal immigration and drug smuggling directly at the border instead of within the country where it harms American citizens and communities.
By the time Obama was inaugurated in January 2009, according to the Justice Department, only 108 miles of the 262-mile-long Arizona portion of the 2,000-mile-long U.S.-Mexico border had been fenced.

Debt Burden for Squirrels
by Michael Smith - WeElectedYou.org
Just watched an ABC News feature on the rope bridges Arizona will construct to keep Mount Graham red squirrels from becoming roadkill. The bridges are expected to save five squirrels per year, at a cost of $1.25 million. The funding will be provided by-wait for it-the Federal Highway Administration!
Show of hands here-who would borrow money from China to do this?

Gulf Oil Spill: Rick Steiner Got BP Disaster Right From The Beginning, Warns Crisis Is Far From Over
Dan Froomkin - SilverBearCafe.com
I first spoke to Rick Steiner more than three months ago - about two weeks into the Deepwater Horizon disaster - after a source recommended I talk to him for a story I was writing about the spill as a teachable moment. Steiner is a marine conservationist and activist in Alaska who started studying oil spills when the Exxon Valdez ran aground in 1989, and never stopped.
What Steiner said to me during that first interview was blunt, depressing - and struck me as having the ring of truth. Little did I know how true.
"Government and industry will habitually understate the volume of the spill and the impact, and they will overstate the effectiveness of the cleanup and their response," he told me at the time. "There's no such thing as an effective response. There's never been an effective response - ever - where more than 10 or 20 percent of the oil is ever recovered from the water.

"We're seeing way more dispersant than ever before" Large, thick oil plumes, freshly sprayed with poison!
by Alex - The IntelHub.com
Today, Project Gulf Impact is out on the waters in and around Orange Beach Alabama. What they have found is exactly the opposite of what BP and the federal government have told the American people. Not only did they find oil but they apparently found what looks to be freshly sprayed dispersant, still in powder form.
Why is this toxic dispersant still being sprayed? Warnings from scientists and independent journalists have indicated that Corexit could effect the gulf for at least twenty years.

Gulf Chemist: Mercenaries Hired By BP Are Now Applying
Toxic Dispersant at Night and In an Uncontrolled Manner -
Which BP Says It No Longer Uses
Washington's Blog
Bob Naman is an analytical chemist with almost 30 years in the field, based in Mobile, Alabama. When WKRG News 5 gave Naman samples of water from the Gulf of Mexico, Naman found oil contamination, and one of his samples actually exploded during testing due - he believes - to the presence of methane gas or Corexit, the dispersant that BP has been using in the Gulf: [see video]
But the story only starts there.
A few days ago, Naman was sent a sample of water from Cotton Bayou, Alabama. Naman found 13.3 parts per million of the dispersant Corexit in the sample: [see video]
That's a little perplexing, given that Admiral Thad Allen said on August 9th that dispersants have not been used in the Gulf since mid-July:
We have not used dispersant since the capping stack was put on. I believe that was the 15th of July.

BP's Wells Says He Doesn't Know Who Was in Charge
By Joe Carroll and Katarzyna Klimasinska
Aug. 26 (Bloomberg) -- BP Plc'sKent Wells, a senior vice president who joined the Gulf of Mexico oil-spill response two days after it began four months ago, said he doesn't know who was in charge aboard the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig when it exploded in April.
Wells told a federal panel today in Houston that he was concentrating on halting the spill and coordinating the cleanup, rather than examining who may have been at fault in the disaster that killed 11 people and spewed an estimated 4.9 million barrels of crude from the damaged Macondo well.

Key Karzai Aide in Corruption Inquiry Is Linked to C.I.A.
By DEXTER FILKINS and MARK MAZZETTI - NYTimes.com
KABUL, Afghanistan - The aide to President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan at the center of a politically sensitive corruption investigation is being paid by the Central Intelligence Agency, according to Afghan and American officials.
Mohammed Zia Salehi, the chief of administration for the National Security Council, appears to have been on the payroll for many years, according to officials in Kabul and Washington. It is unclear exactly what Mr. Salehi does in exchange for his money, whether providing information to the spy agency, advancing American views inside the presidential palace, or both.

Is Iraq About to Fall to Iran?
By Joel Hilliker | theTrumpet.com
Iraq is headless, and America is leaving.
Since 2003, the U.S. has sacrificed over 4,400 of its soldiers and spent over a trillion dollars in Iraq. What is there to show for these enormous costs?
Iraq is bedlam. Violence continues to percolate. July was the country's deadliest month since May 2008. Five and a half months after elections, a government still has not formed. In the meantime, the prime minister has agreed not to make any major decisions about Iraq's future.
This is a shell of a country. Ripe for conquest.

The U.S. Wants to Save the World From Terrorism,
Who Will Save the World from the U.S.?
Iza’as Almada is a writer and columnist for the NR
The arrogance and the false air of superiority with which the U.S. government behaves in the contemporary world, besides tiring, are becoming a danger to the survival of humanity. To my knowledge, except for the few countries whose governments maintain a totally submissive stance to the interests of Americans (and I refer to the heads of Colombia, Costa Rica, Saudi Arabia and South Korea as the most significant examples), none of us mortals gave procuration to Washington to think and act on our behalf.
This "fight against terrorism," to "defend democracy" and the "war on drugs" already does not convince anyone. Who wants to cheat Uncle Sam? Fight against terrorism? But who armed the Taliban? Who created Osama Bin Laden? Who tortures innocents in Guantanamo Bay? Who supported the majority of the military coups in Latin America in the '50s, '60s and '70s and the recent coup in Honduras? Who supported Operation Condor and practiced terrorist attacks in the Southern Cone? Who financed terrorists like Posada Carriles, who lives in exile in the U.S.?

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Thursday 08.26.2010

Relax America, The Global Elites Love You
By Giordano Bruno - Neithercorp Press
In the grand scheme of history, in the great wash of the collective American cosmos, in the midst of the day to day howls and earth rattles of towering financial and political giants, many of us tend to see ourselves as "the little people". We consider ourselves inconsequential in the wake of epic events that appear to rise and fall like irregular tides and determined by some frenetic force of chance; a great cultural roulette wheel. In fact, we are often encouraged to emulate this belief. Better to roll with the river of difficult times than to fight against the current in a fruitless attempt at changing its direction. Better to let more important and more powerful men blaze the trails that we will later follow, right...?
Human beings have a strange attachment to the concept of the "decision makers vs. the decision followers", even in the U.S. The Declaration of Independence was meant to herald the birth of a society which dissolved the separation between the rulers and those who are ruled. Our country was built upon the premise that every citizen has a right to participate in the making of his own providence, to play a part in the decisions that directly or indirectly affect his future. Of course, those were the days when average Americans saw themselves as giants, as innovators of history, not as little people.

USA a failed state? It may be closer than you think
By Paul Wallis - DigitalJournal.com
There's only one common factor in the failure of great nations: Mismanagement. The USA is heading down a well traveled road to its own Armageddon. Rome, China, Russia, the British Empire and others have all been there before.
The Caligula- like state of the US as a corporate entity is hardly a secret. Caligula made his horse a god, the US media has made dis-informative demagogues gods. Any factually inaccurate piece of information has a fairly good chance of becoming accepted as gospel truth in this environment.

Putting the Brakes on ObamaCare
How a Republican Congress could begin the process of repealing this unpopular law. By GRACE-MARIE TURNER - WSJ.com
If Republicans take control of one or both houses of Congress this fall, many will have been elected with a promise to "repeal and replace" ObamaCare. But what are their options, really? There likely will be an initial showdown, but President Obama will surely veto any challenge to the law, and it would be hard to imagine mustering the votes to overturn it.
Information is the key weapon. Republicans can use congressional hearings to explain what ObamaCare is doing to the economy and the health sector. Their strongest cases would be built around jobs, the cost of health care, and the rising deficit.

Headlines Sound the Alarm about Deeper Economic Problems
By: Paul Mladjenovic - Safehaven.com
The following three headlines are alarming symptoms of the economic insanity unfolding before our eyes:

1. "Philly requiring bloggers to pay $300 for a business license"
2. "LA unveils $578-Million school, costliest in the nation"
3. "Record Number Of Americans Using Retirement Funds As Source Of Immediate Cash"

Yes, those are actual headlines. They may seem like random and disjointed stories but really they are connected to the same economic and financial crisis that is here now and threatens to get much worse.
Philadelphia is forcing bloggers that make little or no money cough up $300 for what is annoyingly labeled a "Business Priviledge Tax". The struggling city is searching for new revenue to pay for their over-spending. This silly tax may yield some modest revenue for the city but the unintended consequence will be to chase away budding entrepreneurs. In other words, they will get much less revenue than they think. This is at a time when they desperately need to attract and encourage entrepreneurs.

The Nonsense Recovery
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
08/25/10 Ouzilly, France - Eventually, investors are going to realize that the discussion of a "recovery" is nonsense. The economy can never recover the pace and frenzy of the bubble years - and so much the better. It has to move on to something new. The big question is: What will this new economy look like?
One important detail: in this new economy US stocks are not likely to be as highly prized as they are now. That is not to say that companies won't make money. They will - especially those that are taking advantage of strong rates of growth overseas. But investors are likely to appreciate them less regardless. That's what happens in a bear market: the price-to-earnings ratio falls. Earnings do not necessarily go down; but the multiple investors are willing to pay for each dollar of earnings does.

The trillion dollar bailout you didn't hear about
Commercial real estate values plummet again yet banks hide losses. A $3.5 trillion financial disaster in the making.
We are now proud owners of an AMC theater and Chick-fil-A.
MyBudget360.com
The latest data on existing home sales should tell you exactly where we are in this so called recovery. Average Americans are unable to purchase big ticket items without massive government subsidies. It is also the case that all the too big to fail banks are standing only because of the generous support of taxpayer money. Without large tax credits and the Federal Reserve buying down mortgage rates the housing market is extremely weak. Yet very few of the housing "analysts" actually bother to ask why they are weak in the first place. The employment market is in disarray and wages have fallen for everyone outside of the top 1 percent of income earners. The bailout fatigue is running out of steam but banks are using clandestine methods to offload trillions of dollars of commercial real estate to taxpayers. The next giant bailout is already happening but you probably haven't heard about it.

10 Practical Steps That You Can Take To Insulate Yourself
(At Least Somewhat) From The Coming Economic Collapse
TheComingEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Most Americans are still operating under the delusion that this "recession" will end and that the "good times" will return soon, but a growing minority of Americans are starting to realize that things are fundamentally changing and that they better start preparing for what is ahead. These "preppers" come from all over the political spectrum and from every age group. More than at any other time in modern history, the American people lack faith in the U.S. economic system. In dozens of previous columns, I have detailed the horrific economic problems that we are now facing in excruciating detail. Many readers have started to complain that all I do is "scare" people and that I don't provide any practical solutions. Well, not everyone can move to Montana and start a llama farm, but hopefully this article will give people some practical steps that they can take to insulate themselves (at least to an extent) from the coming economic collapse.

1. Get Out Of Debt:
2. Find New Sources Of Income:
3. Reduce Your Expenses:
4. Learn To Grow Your Own Food:
5. Make Sure You Have A Reliable Water Supply:
6. Buy Land:
7. Get Off The Grid:
8. Store Non-Perishable Supplies:
9. Develop Stronger Relationships:
10. Get Educated And Stay Flexible:

Morgan Stanley: Government Defaults Inevitable
JESSE'S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
In addition to "It's different this time" one of the deadliest assumptions is "It can never happen here."
Morgan Stanley says what we have all known for some time. There will be government defaults of various types on debts which have become unmanageable.
As we see in a UK Telegraph story today, a report claims the Tories are placing the greatest pain in managing their budget gaps on the backs of the less well to do, presumably protecting their more well to do constituency. No surprise to anyone if it is true. And yet this may not be enough unless the economy recovers and the great mass of the public can regain some reasonable level of organic economic activity.

Roubini Says Third Quarter Growth in U.S. to Be "Well Below" 1%
By Bob Willis
Roubini Sees U.S. Growth Below 1%,
Chance of Double-Dip Recession at 40%
Aug. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Nouriel Roubini, the New York University economist who predicted the global financial crisis, said U.S. growth will be "well below" 1 percent in the third quarter and put the odds of a renewed recession at 40 percent.
Roubini, chairman of Roubini Global Economics LLC, said his forecast assumes the government will lower its estimate for growth in the second quarter to an annual rate of 1.2 percent "at best."
"All the growth tailwinds of the first half of the year become headwinds in the second half," he said in an e-mail message, including the government's $814-billion stimulus plan, hiring for the census, and incentives such the cash-for-clunkers program and tax credits for first-time home buyers.

The Fed's Biggest Bubble
By: Michael Pento - Safehaven.com
I've made a living out of exposing economic fallacies, but there's one whale that I can't seem to harpoon. Even top-flight Wall Street analysts seem to believe that the Fed's doubling of the monetary base after the credit crunch has not had an inflationary impact on our economy. Their logic can be summed up like so: "The money the Fed created and dropped from helicopters has all been caught in the trees." In other words, the Fed is creating money, but it is just being held as excess reserves by the banking system instead of being loaned to the public. Therefore, the money supply hasn't truly increased, there is no money multiplier effect, and aggregate price levels are behaving themselves.

As economy slows and Fed voices conflict, markets look to Bernanke for guidance By Neil Irwin - Washington Post Staff Writer
With the housing market retreating, unemployment lingering and top officials at the Federal Reserve in open disagreement over what to do, Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke is under rising pressure to offer solutions in an address Friday that is likely to be his most important since the end of the financial crisis.
The central bank's policy intentions have been unusually muddled in the past two months, according to a widespread view among economists and people in the financial world. They say it is unclear how likely it is that the Fed will undertake major new efforts to try to support the economy, what economic conditions would trigger such actions and what form those actions would take.

The Idiots Guide to Repairing an Economy
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
08/25/10 Ouzilly, France - Too bad Thomas Friedman has stopped writing about the economy. We could use a good laugh this morning. Chilly winds are blowing across this part of France. The children have all gone. The sun is low and cool. It's quiet here, and a bit sad.
But Friedman has moved on to giving bad advice on other subjects.
So, this morning we turn to Bob Burnett, "retired Silicon Valley executive." Mr. Burnett is writing on a site that we believe is part of The Huffington Post. His photo shows a man who seems affable. At least, he's smiling. The edges of his mouth curl up, revealing the incipient insanity of the self-assured. He knows what he knows; too bad that what he knows isn't so.

Earth to Bill Gross:
We Chickens Know You Are The Fox Minding the Henhouse
NakedCapitalism.com
Boy, when you think you've seen the worst in utterly shameless, self serving tripe, someone manages to outdo it. Admittedly, it's awfully hard to beat Steve Schwarzmann's recent one-two punch of utter canard wrapped in tasteless hyperbole, that of Obama proposals that private equity kingpins pay taxes on what is really the fruits of their labor like other working stiffs was a "warÉ like when Hitler invaded Poland in 1939."
But no, Pimco's Bill Gross bests Schwarzmann in making it clear to the great unwashed his unabashed belief that what is good for him is good, period. Schwarzmann is a tad less horrid by at least limiting his grandiose claims to his own industry. Gross is marginally less offensive to good taste (although a discussion of his body odor in an investment piece is certainly a novel wrinkle), but makes it up by insulting his audience's intelligence, namely, by presenting himself as a staunch ally of the little guy.

Recession Double Dippers In The Ascendancy
By: PaddyPowerTrader - MarketOracle.co.uk
US stocks declined Tuesday, sending the S&P 500 Index to a seven-week low, as a record plunge in home sales cast further doubt on the viability of the economic recovery as the battle between "moderators" and "double dippers" is currently being won hands down by the latter. Existing US home sales where a real horror show - resales dropped a record 27.2 percent-nearly twice as much as analysts had expected - to an annual rate of $3.83 m in July, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. Meanwhile, inventories rose to 12.5 months from 8.9 months in June, pressuring already depressed home prices. Inventories are at their highest level in more than a decade.

Silver and Gold Breaking Out As Safe Haven Buying Continues
By: Jeb Handwerger - Safehaven.com
Silver had very powerful break out today as investors are seeking assets that are safe and will retain value during a debt crisis. Silver is seeing demand at these price levels as it is historically cheap relative to gold. If the ratio came down to the levels it was in 2006 it would be close to $27 an ounce. Silver is soaring because investors are realizing this is a hard asset, it is money and it is historically cheap compared to gold.
Gold has reached overbought conditions from my July 28th buy signal. Right now gold is a bit overbought while silver is at an interesting buy point, having found support for the fourth time at its long term 200 day moving average. Today's breakout of the symmetrical triangle, a very bullish chart pattern, is a sign that silver has built up a lot of internal strength and could break out into new three year highs. Remember, silver is significantly below all time highs while gold has already broken into new highs.

Gold May Gain to $1,252 an Ounce
By Wendy Pugh
Aug. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Gold may climb to as high as $1,252.35 an ounce, as long as prices do not drop below the 55- day moving average for two consecutive days, according to a report from Commerzbank AG technical analyst Axel Rudolph.
The precious metal has rallied from a three-month low on July 28 as concern that the global economic recovery is slowing boosted investment demand. Spot gold closed at $1,240.05 yesterday, the highest price in eight weeks and 2 percent from the record $1,265.30 reached on June 21.

How Financial Instruments Suppress Silver's Value
By: Dr Jeff Lewis - MarketOracle.co.uk
One fact is very, very clear: the silver markets are horribly suppressed. As we reported months ago, it was discovered in May that the silver futures market is purely paper, and there is an actual whistleblower to tell the tale. However, that testimony was subsequently squandered when the closed circuit TV had "technical errors," and days later Andrew Maguire, the famed whistleblower, was in a hit and run accident.
However, not all of the suppression talk need be reserved for so called "conspiracies," as silver is suppressed right before your eyes.

Gold and Silver Protection From Economic Cancer and Desperation of QE2 By: Jim Willie CB - MarketOracle.co.uk
History is being made. The American public has never been no nervous, perhaps fearful of something dreadful and imminent. The global monetary system is crumbling. The typical stimulus has failed to jumpstart the USEconomy. The 20 months of near 0% short-term official interest rate has failed to revive the moribund US housing market. The phony FASB accounting rules has failed to accomplish anything except a stay of execution for the big US banks, which do not lend much. In fact, the US banks are largely dead entities showing enough life for to receive USGovt largesse aid. Witness the failure of the US financial sector. Witness the climax chapter of failure for the Fascist Business Model.

Safe-haven buying lifts gold to 8-wk highs
Reuters - businessday.co.za
Gold rose for a second day on Wednesday to eight-week highs near $1240 an ounce as the dollar fell against the euro and concern over economic growth hit equities, sparking interest in the metal as a safe haven
Gold rose for a second day on Wednesday to eight-week highs near $1240 an ounce as the dollar fell against the euro and concern over economic growth hit equities, sparking interest in the metal as a safe haven.

You'll Buy Gold Now and Like It!
By: Jeff Clark - Safehaven.com
I get this question a lot: "Should I buy gold now, or wait for a pullback?"
It's a valid question. For nearly two years, gold hasn't had a serious decline. There have been pullbacks, of course, but nothing assumption-challenging. In fact, since October 2008, gold's largest price drop is 10.6% (based on London PM fix prices), and yet the average of all declines since 2001 is 13% (of those greater than 5%). The biggest pullback we've seen this summer is 8.2%. Technically the summer's not over, but I'll admit I'm surprised we haven't had a better buying opportunity.

GOLD RUSHING ON
Submitted by Frank Holmes - FinancialSense.com
The World Gold Council's latest quarterly recap of the gold market confirms much of the big-picture story we already knew: demand is strong (up 36 percent from a year earlier), supply is not keeping pace (up 17 percent), and global economic worries are driving investors toward gold as a safe haven.
Drilling down a little further turns up a number of interesting points:

China's Gold Demand: Saving, Not Spending
By: Adrian Ash - Safehaven.com
What jewelry-selling Western consumers have discovered about China's gold buying...
WHATEVER the reasons for China's massive household savings rate (Western economists blame the lack of social security, so you can guess their cure), the World Gold Council's Gold Demand Trends today showed private consumers putting ever-more money into physical gold.
Compared to household savings, in fact, revised forecasts here at BullionVault this morning put likely gold purchases in 2010 at the equivalent of almost 1.7% - over twice the level of five years ago.

Ron Paul Calls for Audit of US Gold Reserves
TEXAS (Kitco News): U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Tex, plans to introduce a new bill next year that will allow for an audit of US gold reserves, he told Kitco News in an exclusive interview.
Paul dropped the news in the interview, indicating that the bill still does not have an official name yet but will be unveiled at the start of the new U.S. Congress.
"If there was no question about the gold being there, you think they would be anxious to prove gold is there," he said of the Federal Reserve.
This is not the first time the congressman has made his pitch. "In the early 1980s when I was on the gold commission, I asked them to recommend to the Congress that they audit the gold reserves - we had 17 members of the commission and 15 voted not to the audit," said Paul. "I think there was only one decent audit done 50 years ago," he said.

Inflation versus Deflation Debate Part 2
By: Fred Sheehan - MarketOracle.co.uk
Inflation versus deflation discussions are the rule for columnists, economists and BubbleTV. This false distinction is potentially harmful for investors and shoppers who think they must decide between the two, then act. Inflation and deflation act contemporaneously. The relative movement of what is inflating and what is deflating (e.g., common stocks vs. gas, bonds vs. bread) influences, and possibly changes, the way we live.

Inflation Follows the Stimulus Boom
By: The Mogambo Guru - Savehaven.com
Peter Schiff of Euro Pacific Capital notes that the Federal Reserve, and the idiots like Paul Krugman who genuflect at the altar of Keynes, is not done with destroying the economy, but that "Bernanke and his supporters have said that their stimulus will be withdrawn as soon as the recovery takes hold in earnest." Hahaha!
I laugh because this makes me think of my dad saying, in answer to my constant whining, "Shut up! I'll buy you a motorcycle when your Uncle Raymond pays me back the money I loaned him,' which finally got to be a family joke because Uncle Ray never came across with a dime because he was a penniless mooch all his life! Hahaha!

Fed to Outline Future Actions Friday
By SEWELL CHAN - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - With fresh signs that the housing market is weakening, the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, on Friday will offer his outlook on the economy, explain the Fed's recent modest move to halt the slide and possibly outline other actions.
Mr. Bernanke's speech, at an annual Fed symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyo., will be his first public comments since the Fed announced it would invest proceeds from its holdings of mortgage bonds to buy more long-term Treasury securities to prop up the recovery.

Goldman's Hatzius Says Fed Will Move Toward Additional Stimulus
By Bob Willis and Tom Keene
Aug. 24 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve will probably ease monetary policy further as the U.S. economy weakens, said Jan Hatzius, chief U.S. economist at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in New York.
"The Fed will eventually move to additional monetary stimulus via asset purchases or other unconventional measures," Hatzius said in a radio interview today with Tom Keene on "Bloomberg Surveillance." Should the Fed opt for more securities purchases, he said, there is "no point in doing anything less than" $1 trillion.

Top book in China hammers Goldman Sachs
Calls company source of crisis
By Elaine Kurtenbach - Associated Press - WashingtonTimes.com
SHANGHAI | Goldman Sachs & Co., reviled in the U.S. for its role in the financial crisis, is now getting hammered in the world's No. 2 economy with a sensationalist new book accusing the investment bank of trying to destroy China.
The "Goldman Sachs Conspiracy," which has sold over 100,000 copies since it was released in June, reaching popular website Sina.com's top 10 list, follows another by author Li Delin, "Eliminate All Competitors - How Goldman Sachs Wins Over the World," published last year.

Debt crisis just beginning, Morgan Stanley says
by Colin Barr - Fortune CNN
This spring's bond market tussle in Europe was just a warm-up, Morgan Stanley says.
The investment bank warns in a report Wednesday that the sovereign debt crisis is far from over -- and won't end till deeply indebted rich country governments give holders of their bonds a good soaking.
The remarks amount to the latest warning issued to investors who have herded into government bonds this month, following a downturn in U.S. economic indicators and a series of anxious-sounding comments from Federal Reserve officials. The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond has plunged to a recent 2.45% from the already low level of 3% at the end of last month.

Obama should get rid of Geithner, Summers
It's time for a new economic theory
By Darrell Delamaide
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- At last, an economic strategy that can muster truly bipartisan support: House Minority Leader John Boehner's call this week to fire Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and White House economic adviser Larry Summers.
Boehner, who was not previously known for his insights into economics, found a surprising resonance in the press with his call to get rid of President Barack Obama's top two economic aides.

Despite Reform, Banks Have Room for Risky Deals
By NELSON D. SCHWARTZ and ERIC DASH - NYTimes.com
When Congress passed a new financial regulation bill last month, it sought to prevent federally insured banks from making speculative bets using their own money. But that will not stop banks from making bets that some critics deem risky, even as the rules go into effect over the next few years.
That is because many such bets - on the direction of the stock market or the price of coal, for example - are done on behalf of clients. So, the banks say, they will continue to be allowable despite the new restrictions.

SEC backs labor on corporate board votes
By Patrice Hill - The Washington Times
Business groups denounce move as burdensome, favoring special interests
The Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday handed labor and social-activist groups a big victory by approving rules making it easier for them to put allies on corporate boards throughout the country.
The measure was approved on a 3-2 vote by a divided commission, with Republican members warning that the change may not pass muster in the courts. It is the first major regulation from last months landmark financial-reform law to win approval.

Chronicle - The Foundation
The Patriot Post
"We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt." --Thomas Jefferson
Editorial Exegesis
Obama's fiscal plan
"Speaking last Wednesday in Columbus, Ohio, President Obama asked, 'How do we, over the long term, get control of our deficit?' Good question. Here's the answer suggested by last Thursday's semi-annual budget summary from the Congressional Budget Office: Stop spending so much. CBO's mid-year review largely reinforces the bad news we already knew -- to wit, that spending has exploded since Democrats took over Congress in 2007, first with the acquiescence of George W. Bush and then into hyperdrive after Mr. Obama entered the White House. To appreciate the magnitude of this spending blowout, compare CBO's budget 'baseline' estimate in January 2008 with the baseline it released Thursday. The baseline predicts future spending based on the law at the time. ... In a mere 31 months Congress has added more than $4.4 trillion to the 10-year spending baseline. ... As recently as 2005, total federal spending was only $2.47 trillion.

Housing still at heart of our problems
Prices could fall a lot more before it's over
By MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- How in the world can Americans feel secure or confident in the economy when the value of their single-biggest asset is dropping?
Americans have already lost more than $6 trillion, on paper, on the value of their homes. Millions have lost something more tangible: the roof over their heads.
Now, four years after the housing bubble began to explode, it looks like home owners may have to accept further losses before it's all over.

Plunge in Home Sales Stokes Economy Fears
By SUDEEP REDDY And NICK TIMIRAOS - WSJ.com
U.S. home sales plummeted in July to a level not seen in more than a decade, spurring fears of renewed weakness in housing prices and the broader economy.
Sales of previously owned homes fell 27.2% from June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.83 million, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday, the lowest level since the industry group started its tally in 1999.
The expiration of a home-buyer tax credit in the spring was expected to damp buying, though less severely. Economists said the sales drop - together with a corresponding rise in the inventory of unsold homes - meant another decline in housing prices was on the horizon. House prices had stabilized last year after declining since 2006.

Recovery in Danger as Firms, Homebuyers Cut Back
By: AP - CNBC.com
The economic recovery appears to be stalling as companies cut back last month on their investments in equipment and machines and Americans bought new homes at the weakest pace in decades.
Overall orders for big-ticket manufactured goods increased 0.3 percent in July, the Commerce Department said Wednesday. But that was only because of a 76 percent jump in demand for commercial aircraft.

US mortgage lenders report profit despite home woes
By Dave Clarke
WASHINGTON, Aug 25 (Reuters) - The U.S. thrift industry reported $1.49 billion in profits for the second quarter, a slip from the previous quarter, but up from a $94 million loss a year ago.
It was the fourth consecutive profitable quarter for the industry, which reported a profit of $1.72 billion in the previous quarter.
The industry still faces challenges from delinquent loans, the Office of Thrift Supervision said on Wednesday.

Housing: The Lost Half Decade
BespokeInvest.com
While it has been a 'lost decade' for equities, housing isn't too far behind. The sector is now in the midst of a lost half decade and counting. Following up on yesterday's downright awful release of existing home sales, today's new home sales report for July came in at a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of just 276K, which is a record low dating back to 1963. Since peaking in July 2005, new home sales have now declined by more than 80% in five years. As seen in the chart, while the slope of the rally in housing was steep, the decline has been even steeper.

The Housing Mirage
By John Frisby - LuxLibertas.com
Homeowner subsidies have only delayed the day of reckoning.
Yesterday's news that sales of existing homes fell a record 27% in July did not trigger the end of civilization. Instead, while stocks generally declined on the news, shares of home building companies rallied on the chance that this market has finally found a bottom.
We make no predictions on whether the expected rebound in August or autumn sales will come to pass, after more than four years of a declining market and numerous federal programs delaying the inevitable correction. The trigger for yesterday's decline was the expiration of the $8,000 first-time home buyer tax credit, a political gimmick that altered the timing of some sales, provided a larger tax benefit to many people who were going to buy anyway, and did nothing to change the fundamental supply and demand for housing.

Existing Home Sales Plunge!
By Chuck Butler - The DailyReckoning.com
08/25/10 St. Louis, Missouri - An awful Existing Home Sales report yesterday is causing more people to jump on my bandwagon... You know, the one about the double dip recession, which will be fueled by another housing slump... Of course I call it a double dip, but in reality, I truly believe it to be a "single scoop," for I don't believe like our government officials, and Fed Heads that we "came out of the recession."... But that's just me, thinking logically, as always!
Did you strap yourself in for the Existing Home Sales for July report yesterday like I warned you to do? Good thing, because, July Existing Home Sales fell -27%!!!!! (Consensus was for a -12% decline!)

The Subprime Mortgage Crisis on Trial
Peter J. Henning - White Collar Watch - NYTimes.com
The financial crisis has led to only a few civil and criminal cases against executives, and even those focused on peripheral issues: Goldman Sachs's peddling of a credit derivative obligation and the communications of two former Bear Stearns hedge fund managers.
But the Securities and Exchange Commission's securities fraud action against Angelo R. Mozilo, former chief executive of Countrywide Financial, promises to feature the aggressive mortgage practices of what was then the nation's largest mortgage lender.

U.S. Economy: Durables, Housing Signal Recession Risk
By Timothy R. Homan and Courtney Schlisserman
Aug. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Orders for durable goods in the U.S. increased less than forecast in July and sales of new homes unexpectedly dropped, increasing the risk of a renewed recession in the world's largest economy.
Bookings for goods made to last at least three years rose 0.3 percent, figures from the Commerce Department showed today in Washington. Excluding transportation equipment, demand fell by the most in more than a year. Purchases of new dwellings fell 12 percent to an annual pace of 276,000, the weakest since data began in 1963, figures from the same agency showed.

Inventory Explodes Past the Worst of the Housing Crash
by Michael David White - HousingStory.net
Soft demand for existing homes pushed up inventory to a record 12.5 months of sales and easily broke the previous high of 11.3 months scored in April 2008. By this basic measure, the price of homes may reasonably be expected to fall at the most torrential pace seen during our four-year-old crash.
Yet you will see only the most tepid warnings of this risk as described by the mainstream media with results released today being worse than the most pessimistic forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. Please review the chart (above) and note that it is in record territory for the history of months-of-inventory for sale.

The Five Stages of America's Housing Bubble
by Michael David White - HousingStory.net
See charts

Budget hits families and pensioners twice as hard
Telegraph.co.uk
Pensioners and families with children will be the biggest victims of George Osborne's emergency Budget, according to an analysis published today.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies says the two groups will lose much more of their income than childless couples over the next four years because of the Coalition's tax and benefit changes.
According to the institute, the country's leading economic think tank, this is because the increase in VAT and other taxes combined with changes to the benefit system will disproportionately affect pensioners and families.

Disabled Face Sharply Higher Jobless Rate
By SARA MURRAY - WSJ.com
The government's first detailed look at disabled workers' employment shows they are far more likely than the overall work force to be older, working part-time or jobless.
The average unemployment rate for disabled workers was 14.5% last year, the Labor Department said Wednesday, well above the 9% rate for those without disabilities. By the Labor Department's count, there were roughly 27 million Americans 16 years or older with a disability last year.
The employment situation doesn't appear to have improved this year: The unemployment rate for those with disabilities had risen to 16.4% as of July.

We Killed The Goose That Laid The Golden Egg
And Now The Number Of Americans Receiving Long-Term Unemployment Benefits Has Risen A Whopping 60 Percent In Just One Year TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
For middle class Americans, the new global economy has provided mountains of cheap products made in China, India and dozens of other nations, but it has also killed the goose that laid the golden egg. Millions of American workers have been discovering that the price for all of those inexpensive foreign-made goodies is their jobs. Now we have so many long-term unemployed workers in the United States that we are inventing new terms (such as "the 99ers") to describe them. Unemployment is on the rise again (we'll get to the figures in a minute) and everyone seems perplexed at the continuing inability of the "greatest economy in the world" to provide jobs for everyone. But the truth is that this has been coming for a long time. The debt-fueled prosperity of the past couple of decades allowed us to live far beyond our means and provide very high levels of employment for a while, but now economic reality is setting in. The millions of middle class jobs that have been shipped overseas are never coming back. Unfortunately, the existence of a large class of chronically unemployed Americans that are struggling just to survive is going to quickly become "the new normal".

Retiree Ponzi Scheme Is $16 Trillion Short
Commentary by Laurence Kotlikoff
Aug. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Social Security just celebrated its 75th birthday. Love it or hate it, it has done its job and should retire. We need a new system, the Personal Security System, which retains Social Security's best features, scraps the rest, and covers its costs.
Social Security's objective -- forcing people to save for retirement -- is legit. Otherwise millions of us would seek handouts in our old age.
But Social Security has also played a central role in the massive, six-decade Ponzi scheme known as U.S. fiscal policy, which transfers ever-larger sums from the young to the old.

Seniors may be forced to swap health care plan
By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar - AP - WashingtonTimes.com
More than 3 million seniors may have to switch their Medicare prescription plan next year, even if they are happy with it, as a result of an attempt by the government to simplify their lives.
The policy change could turn into a hassle for seniors who hadn't intended to switch plans during Medicare's open-enrollment season this fall.
And it risks undercutting President Obama's promise that people who like their health care plans can keep them.

California to Delay Payments Sooner than Expected
AP - CNBC.com
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, California's state controller and treasurer, decided Monday to delay $2.9 billion a month in payments to school districts and counties sooner than expected so the state can meet debt and pension obligations.
The leaders issued a joint letter notifying state lawmakers of their decision to begin withholding the payments in September instead of October.
The move reflected the limited resources the state has to work with as the impasse over California's $19 billion budget shortfall has dragged on for nearly two months.

Google Is Offering Phone Calls via Gmail
By CLAIRE CAIN MILLER - NYTimes.com
SAN FRANCISCO - Google entered a new businesses beyond Internet search on Wednesday with a service within Gmail to make phone calls over the Web to landlines or cellphones.
The service will thrust Google into direct competition with Skype, the Internet telephone company, and with telecommunications providers. It could also make Google a more ubiquitous part of people's social interactions by uniting the service for phone calls with e-mail, text messages and video chats.

The dirty little secret about Google Android
Author: Jason Hiner - TechRepublic.com
Google Android began with the greatest of intentions - freedom, openness, and quality software for all. However, freedom always comes with price, and often results in unintended consequences. With Android, one of the most important of those unintended consequences is now becoming clear as Google gets increasingly pragmatic about the smartphone market and less and less tied to its original ideals.
Here's the dirty little secret about Android: After all the work Apple did to get AT&T to relinquish device control for the iPhone and all the great efforts Google made to get the FCC and the U.S. telecoms to agree to open access rules as part of the 700 MHz auction, Android is taking all of those gains and handing the power back to the telecoms.

Cell Towers For the Home Work Best in Worst Sites
by Walter S. Mossberg - AllThingsD
If you have lousy cellphone reception in your house, you may have wished you had a cellular tower nearby. Well, now you can buy your own and plant it right inside your home.
Verizon (VZ), Sprint (S) and AT&T (T) all have started selling gadgets that act as mini-cell towers, broadcasting wireless phone service just like a real cell tower does, though over a much smaller area: a single house.

Chinese Authorities Move to Ease Jam
By SHAI OSTER - WSJ.com (free)
BEIJING - Emergency measures appeared Wednesday to have eased congestion on a main route into the capital that was the scene of a massive traffic jam that lasted more than 10 days and drew widespread media attention.
Still, trucks remained backed up at the border between Inner Mongolia and Hebei province, about 150 miles from Beijing, as authorities there held back traffic to help clear a badly blocked stretch of road closer to the city, state media said.

Mexican Military Finds 72 Bodies Near Border
By DAVID LUHNOW and JOSE DE CORDOBA - WSJ.com (free)
MEXICO CITY - Gunmen from a drug cartel appear to have massacred 72 migrants from Central and South America who were on their way to the U.S., a grisly event that marks the single biggest killing in Mexico's war on organized crime.
Mexican marines discovered the 72 bodies - 58 men and 14 women - on Tuesday after the lone survivor of the massacre, a wounded migrant from Ecuador, stumbled into a Navy checkpoint the previous day and told of being shot on Monday at a nearby ranch, Mexican officials said on Wednesday.

Two minutes to midnight?
By Tony Karon - AsiaTimes
America's march to a disastrous war in Iraq began in the media, where an unprovoked United States invasion of an Arab country was introduced as a legitimate policy option, then debated as a prudent and necessary one. Now, a similarly flawed media conversation on Iran is gaining momentum.
Last month, TIME's Joe Klein warned that Barack Obama administration sources had told him bombing Iran's nuclear facilities was "back on the table". In an interview with CNN, former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director Admiral Mike Hayden next spoke of an "inexorable" dynamic toward confrontation, claiming that bombing was a more viable option for the Obama administration than it had been for his predecessor, George W Bush.

BP frozen out of Arctic oil drilling race
Terry Macalister in Nuuk -guardian.co.uk,
British energy giant BP forced to abandon hopes of Greenland exploration owing to tarnished reputation from Gulf oil spill
BP has been forced to abandon hopes of drilling in the Arctic, currently the centre of a new oil rush, owing to its tarnished reputation after the Gulf of Mexico spill.
The company confirmed tonight that it was no longer trying to win an exploration licence in Greenland, despite earlier reports of its interest. "We are not participating in the bid round," said a spokesman at BP's London headquarters, who declined to discuss its reasons for the reverse.

BP executive says blowout preventer was not connected properly
By David S. Hilzenrath - WashingtonPost.com
As BP and Transocean officials struggled to contain the oil gusher in the Gulf of Mexico, they discovered that the plumbing on the blowout preventer was connected improperly, a BP executive testified Wednesday.
"It would mean that the pipe rams could not be closed," said Harry Thierens, BP executive vice president for drilling and completions. "I was frankly astonished that this could have happened."
Thierens was testifying in Houston before a federal panel investigating the April 22 disaster.

John McCain wins Arizona Republican primary
Ewen MacAskill in Washington - guardian.co.uk
Former presidential candidate triumphs against Tea Party-backed talkshow host with a little help from Sarah Palin
The former Republican presidential candidate, John McCain, has repulsed a challenge from rightwing conservatives by defeating a talk-radio personality in the Arizona primary.
The Tea Party activists had hoped to claim their biggest scalp of the Republican primary season but McCain - seeking a fifth term as senator - saw off JD Hayworth, a former congressman and conservative radio talkshow host.
At the end of a bruising campaign, one of McCain's spokesmen on Tuesday morning described Hayworth "as dead as Elvis".

Murkowski trails tea party foe in Alaska
Joe Miller ahead in Senate race
By Sean Lengell - The Washington Times
Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski trails a "tea party"-backed challenger by a slim margin in the state's Republican primary held on Tuesday that's still too close to call.
If the results hold, Mrs. Murkowski would join a growing list of Republican Party insiders who have fallen to political upstarts in primary elections in a year that has featured an unusually high level of GOP infighting.
"It was really her race to lose, and she's almost lost it," said University of Alaska at Fairbanks political science professor Jerry McBeath. "It's going to be very difficult for her to come through."

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Wednesday 08.25.2010

The Fed Can Create Money, Not Confidence
Inflation - or stagflation - remains the more serious danger than deflation. By GEORGE MELLOAN - WSJ.com (free)
A report by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York last week showed that consumers are having difficulty climbing out of the debt hole they dug for themselves before the credit bubble began to deflate in late 2007. The report gives support to the fears of those asset managers and economists who believe the U.S. is facing deflation.
Bill Gross, manager of the $239 billion Pimco bond fund, is one. His evidence is that the Consumer Price Index (CPI), annualized over the last two years, has fallen slightly.

This Economy Is Ripping The Dignity Of Millions
Of Unemployed Americans To Shreds
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
If you can still put a roof over your head and food on the table for your family, you should consider yourself to be very fortunate. There are millions of Americans out there right now that are really, really suffering. The cold, hard reality of it is that there aren't even close to enough jobs out there for everyone right now. It is almost as if we are all caught in a really bizarre game of musical chairs where the losers get stripped of their tickets to the middle class. What this horrible economy is doing to the dignity of millions of middle class Americans is incredibly saddening. There are a lot of very highly educated and very hard working Americans who cannot seem to get jobs no matter what they do and now find themselves doing whatever they can just to survive. It can be really hard to keep your dignity when you played by all the rules and you worked as hard as you could all your life and now you find yourself a half step away from being homeless. Those of us who are still doing okay should never look down on those who are struggling in this economy, because the truth is that any of us could be next.

THE TRUE NATIONAL DEBT
By Jim Quinn - TheBurningPlatform.com
When I read Paul Krugman and the other Keynesian boneheads saying that our debt is not a problem, they quote figures about our debt of $13.3 trillion versus our GDP of $14.6 trillion not being so bad. That is only 91% of GDP. They point to World War II when our national debt reached 120% of GDP. They say everything worked out after that.
Well lets analyze that comparison for just a second. In 1945, Europe, Russia and Asia lay in ruins. The devastation was epic. The United States stood alone as the only unscathed country in the world. America became the manufacturer to the world. We rebuilt Europe and Asia. Our GDP soared, as our National Debt declined from $269 billion in 1946 to $255 billion in 1951, remaining below $300 billion until 1963.
Today our reported National Debt is $13.362 TRILLION. This is the first big lie.

The Multi-Trillion Dollar Debt and What It Mean
to Your Standard of Living Right Now
by Robert Wenzel - EconomicPolicyJournal.com
Current U.S. debt stands at $13,363,228, 000, 000. This number is often broken down on a per capita basis, currently $44,000.
I have always thought of the per capita number as somewhat misleading. I'm guessing that most people who don't have $44,000 in the bank, shrug and think, "Good luck with collecting that from me."
But the way the $13,363,228, 000, 000 should be looked at is debt that results in that much money not being available for private sector business to borrow. It boggles the mind to think what research could be conducted and products produced and created if that money was available for the business sector. In this fashion, the huge debt is impacting the person, right now, who doesn't have $44,000 in the bank, by the products that haven't been created because of the debt. One has to wonder how higher a standard of living a person would face, who doesn't have $44,000 in the bank, but who would live in a world where government borrowed so aggressively.

Economy Caught in Depression, Not Recession: Rosenberg
By: Jeff Cox - CNBC.com Staff Writer
Positive gross domestic product readings and other mildly hopeful signs are masking an ugly truth: The US economy is in a 1930s-style Depression, Gluskin Sheff economist David Rosenberg said Tuesday.
Writing in his daily briefing to investors, Rosenberg said the Great Depression also had its high points, with a series of positive GDP reports and sharp stock market gains.
But then as now, those signs of recovery were unsustainable and only provided a false sense of stability, said Rosenberg.

Recession or Depression?
David Rosenberg, Gluskin Sheff & Associates chief economist, discusses his belief that we are in a depression, a prolonged recession, despite the government's best efforts.

Dow Faces Bouncy Ride to 5,000
By: CNBC.com
The Dow Jones Industrial Average will lose about half of its value over the next couple of years as it follows a Nikkei-like pattern of several sharp rallies in an overall decline, according to Charles Nenner, founder and president of Charles Nenner research.
Stocks are currently in a bear-market rally, and looking at charts and past trends, unemployment and leading indicators suggest the Dow will drop to 5,000 in the next two to two-and-a-half years, Nenner told CNBC in an e-mail.
Deflation will arrive, along with a sharp double-dip recession, pushing the Dow lower, although, like the Japanese market, stocks will see several jumps of 30 percent to 40 percent, he said.

Charles Nenner on CNBC: Dow 5,000 (Interview with Maria Bartiromo - July 2010)

Precipitous market drop will be bullish for Gold
CommodityOnline.com
Addicted to Profits Newsletter Writer David Skarica has an addiction that might just benefit you. David is addicted to making himself and his subscribers money. In this exclusive interview with The Gold Report, David predicts that the U.S. economy will decline very slowly, describing the process as "Chinese water torture." David says any precipitous market drop will be pre-empted by further quantitative easing. And this, he says, will be bullish for gold. He also names some companies that might help folks suffering David's sweet affliction.

Rethinking Gold: What if It Isn't a Commodity After All?
Jeff D. Opdyke - SilverBearCafe.com
This won't sit well with some people: Gold isn't a commodity. There. I've said it.
But before you fire off an angry response, hear me out. The facts might change your view of gold's role in a portfolio.
For a long time, we've all heard that gold is a commodity - no different, really, from silver or wheat or pork bellies. Its price ebbs and flows (supposedly) with inflation, which historically drives commodity prices.
Odd, then, that gold's elevated price hasn't fallen in response to tepid U.S. inflation numbers. The Consumer Price Index as of July pegged inflation at just 1.2% for the previous 12 months, not counting seasonal adjustments. Nor has gold reacted to what Mohamed El-Erian, Pimco's chief executive, recently called "the road to deflation" on which he sees the U.S. traveling.
Data show that gold closely mirrors the movement of the U.S. dollar.

Silver plays double regardless of economic conditions
By Richard Mills - CommodityOnline.com
As a general rule, the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information in the time of the ancient Babylonians - long before the periodic table - there were seven sacred metals: gold, silver, copper, iron, tin, lead and mercury.
In Roman and Greek Mythology, the First Age was called Golden, the Second Age Silver. Apollo, the god of truth and light, and teacher of medicine, carried a silver bow.

Peter Schiff and Marc Faber on CNBC 8/23/10:
Time to Flee U.S. Treasuries!

Bancor:
The Name Of The Global Currency
That A Shocking IMF Report Is Proposing
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Sometimes there are things that are so shocking that you just do not want to report them unless they can be completely and totally documented. Over the past few years, there have been many rumors about a coming global currency, but at times it has been difficult to pin down evidence that plans for such a currency are actually in the works. Not anymore. A paper entitled "Reserve Accumulation and International Monetary Stability" by the Strategy, Policy and Review Department of the IMF recommends that the world adopt a global currency called the "Bancor" and that a global central bank be established to administer that currency. The report is dated April 13, 2010 and a full copy can be read here. Unfortunately this is not hype and it is not a rumor. This is a very serious proposal in an official document from one of the mega-powerful institutions that is actually running the world economy. Anyone who follows the IMF knows that what the IMF wants, the IMF usually gets. So could a global currency known as the "Bancor" be on the horizon? That is now a legitimate question.

"Enron Accounting" Has Bankrupted America:
U.S. Deficit Really $202 Trillion, Kotlikoff Says
by Peter Gorenstein - TechTicker
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecasts the U.S. budget deficit will hit $1.3 trillion this year. An astronomical figure, to be sure, but that's lower than was projected in March. It's also less than last year's record $1.41 trillion deficit, which was close to 10% of GDP.
And, that's the good news.
As the deficit grows so does the national debt, which is currently more than $13.3 trillion, according to official figures.
But the situation is actually much, much worse, according to Boston University economics professor Laurence Kotlikoff.

Boehner: Geithner and Summers should go
'Virtually' no one in the White House has run a small business
By Ronald D. Orol, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- President Barack Obama should call for the resignation of both Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Larry Summers, the head of the White House's national economic team, House Minority Leader John Boehner said Tuesday.
"President Obama should ask for -- and accept -- the resignations of the remaining members of his economic team, starting with Secretary Geithner and Larry Summers," Boehner (R., Ohio) said in an economic address to the City Club of Cleveland.
The comments came as Republicans prepare their economic line of attack ahead of mid-term elections for Congress.

Boehner: Obama economic team should resign
By thomas Ferraro - Reuters via MSNBC.com
John Boehner urges Obama to oust economic team
WASHINGTON - The top Republican in the House of Representatives called on Tuesday for President Barack Obama to fire his economic team in a campaign-style speech meant to focus voters on the weak American economy.
House Republican leader John Boehner said Obama should begin clearing house by replacing Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and White House economic adviser Larry Summers.
"It's time to put grown-ups in charge. It's time for people willing to accept responsibility," Boehner told a civic group in Cleveland.

Geithner Resignation Calls May Increase as 2010 Election Nears
By Robert Schmidt and Lorraine Woellert
Nov. 20 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, as part of a grilling on Capitol Hill yesterday, was asked by a Republican lawmaker to resign. It is a call he is likely to hear again and again as next year's election campaign heats up.
Earlier in the week, a Republican challenger for a U.S. Senate seat in Connecticut had demanded Geithner quit, lambasting him for being "cozy" with banks bailed out by the federal government. Two other Republicans have requested hearings into Geithner's handling of the bailout of insurer American International Group Inc.

Why Bernanke Isn't Having a Nervous Breakdown
by Robert Wenzel - EconomicPolicyJournal.com
The short answer is that he is too delusional.
WSJ has a detailed report about the inner thinking of various Fed members, here.
Bottom line: The deliberating body of the Federal Reserve doesn't have a clue. It does not appear most of the members understand how Bernanke's new tools work. It does not appear that most members understand the difference between low interest rates and Fed money printing. Further, the confusion is multiple and from many different directions.
But what really caught my eye in the WSJ report was this snippet:

Before the meeting, officials at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which manages the Fed's portfolio, had grown concerned, according to people familiar with the matter. The Fed's portfolio of mortgage-backed securities was about to begin shrinking much more rapidly than anticipated, as low mortgage rates led more Americans to refinance their mortgages. That in turn meant the mortgage-backed securities held by the Fed were being paid off.

Call in the Helicopters:
What We Need to Stimulate the Economy
By CHARLES HUGH SMITH - DailyFinance.com
What if the U.S. Treasury and the Federal Reserve stopped trying to stimulate the economy by encouraging more borrowing with quantitative easing -- and instead dropped money into household bank accounts?
In an era of rising concern about massive Federal deficits, such a policy may seem like the wrong idea at the wrong time, but proponents have an interesting argument, which the country should understand without dismissing out of hand.
While the economics jargon can get very heavy in discussions of monetary and fiscal policy, the basic ideas aren't that difficult to understand.

Hard-nosed Fed sends global markets reeling
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
The global bond markets and the twin havens of the yen and Swiss franc have been flashing warning signs for weeks, tracking leading indicators as they topple like dominoes. They always sniff trouble first.
Wall Street and Western bourses have until now brushed aside worries that recovery in the US, Japan and southern Europe may be stalling - as have commodity markets - betting the lords of finance will come to the rescue with more liquidity if needed.
Equity investors learned this week that they had misjudged the risk of a relapse as fiscal stimulus wears off, and misread the willingness of the US Federal Reserve to respond. Wrongly viewing Ben Bernanke's Fed as a soft touch, they took a fresh blast of quantitative easing for granted before it was agreed.

St Louis Fed Explains Why The Fed Has Cornered Itself
Between Deflation And (Hyper) Inflation
by Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
In its September Monetary Trends letter titled "The Monetary Base and Bank Lending: You Can Lead a Horse to Water..." the St Louis Fed analyzes the phenomenon that has all monetarists up in arms, namely the surge in the monetary base and the very muted increase (and outright alleged drop in the case of the M3) of monetary stock, going back to the core topic at every debate over hyperinflation/deflation: the money multiplier, and its current reading of well below 1. What is the reason for this discrepancy: as the St Louis Fed explains: "The answer centers on the willingness of depository institutions (banks) to lend and the perceived creditworthiness of potential borrowers. A deposit is created when a bank makes a loan. Ordinarily, bank loans-and hence deposits-increase when the Fed adds reserves to the banking system. How ever, despite an increase in reserves of over $1 trillion, total commercial bank loans were some $200 billion lower in May 2010 than in September 2008. Banks added to their holdings of securities, which resulted in a modest increase in deposits and the money stock, but many banks were reluctant to make new loans." And herein lies the rub: if and when the economy ever picks up, and at this point that looks like an event that may well never happen, "Many economists worry that bank lending and monetary growth will eventually surge and, ultimately, cause higher inflation."

Fed divided over policy direction, WSJ reports
By MarketWatch
TEL AVIV (MarketWatch) -- At its Aug. 10 meeting, at least seven of 17 Federal Reserve officials opposed or hesitated over the decision to stimulate the economy by keeping the Fed's securities portfolio from winding down, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
At issue was whether to reinvest principal payments to the Fed back into the markets.
The Wall Street Journal report said Fed members were divided into two camps.
New York Fed President William Dudley, Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren, San Francisco Fed President Janet Yellen and others were concerned about the economy and "more inclined to act," it said.

Fed Split on Move to Bolster Sluggish Economy
By JON HILSENRATH - WSJ.com
WASHINGTON - The Aug. 10 meeting of top Federal Reserve officials was among the most contentious in Ben Bernanke's four-and-a-half year tenure as central bank chairman.
With the economic outlook unexpectedly darkening, the issue was a seemingly technical one: whether to alter the way the Fed manages its huge portfolio of securities.
But it had big implications: Doing so would plunge the Fed back into the markets and might be a prelude to a future easing of monetary policy, moves that divided the men and women atop the central bank.

* * * * * Important! * * * * *

Indymac Boys Get Sweetheart Deal
Those Indymac boys were given deal by the FDIC, and borrowers were strong-armed. February, 2010.

FDIC Insurance Limits and Indymac Bank Loan Modifications
from September, 2008.

Stocks Drop After Sharp Fall In July Home Sales
NEW YORK (AP) - Stocks are falling after another disappointing report on the housing market renewed worries about the economy.
The Dow Jones industrial average is down 60 points in midday trading Tuesday following news that sales of previously occupied homes fell to their lowest level in 15 years. The National Association of Realtors says sales plunged 27 percent last month to an annual rate of 3.83 million.
Investors seeking refuge from the latest stock swings piled back into Treasurys, sending interest rates lower.

Carts and Horses
Peter Schiff - SilverBearCafe.com
In a CNBC debate last week, former Labor Secretary Robert Reich presented a set of contradictory beliefs that unfortunately reflect the conventional wisdom of modern economists. In a discussion with Wall Street Journal columnist Stephen Moore, Reich correctly and comprehensively listed the reasons why American consumers could spend so lavishly before the crash of 2008 and why they can no longer keep up the pace. But instead of making the logical conclusion that former levels of spending were unsustainable and that spending should now reflect current conditions, he advocated that government take on additional debt so that tapped out consumers can spend like they used to.
To achieve this, Reich called for lowering taxes on working Americans and raising taxes on the rich. He argued that middle-income Americans are more likely to spend additional dollars while the rich are more likely to save and invest. As a "demand-side" economist, Reich made clear that spending is superior to savings and investing as a catalyst for growth.

Corporate America, it's time to spread the wealth
Businesses are sitting on a record hoard of cash, but they're not using it to hire workers or pay existing ones better wages. Broadly distributing the fruits of economic growth is the only way to sustain that growth.
ByMichael Hiltzik - LATimes.com
Corporate America must be in a bad way. Job growth has stagnated, the prospects for hiring, at least in the near term, seem grim, and the polls of top executives sound universally glum.
And yet, operating earnings of companies in the Standard & Poor's 500 index jumped 38.4% in the second quarter compared with a year earlier, according to Thomson Reuters, and companies are sitting on an estimated $1.8 trillion in cash -- by some measures, a record mound of cash.
Somebody's making money in this economy. Unfortunately, it's not the middle class or the working class. And that's our real problem.

The fallacy of cheap home prices and the two income trap
dual income households underscore massive housing inflation.
Nationwide home prices overvalued by 25 percent.
DrHousingBubble.com Blog
Housing inflation has run at an elevated pace since the 1970s and ramped up starting in the 1990s. Yet what masked much of the pain was access to easy credit but also the rise of the two income household. The housing bubble is worse than many expect and probably for the wrong reasons. Many readers make the wrong assumption that because we are largely a two income household nation that home values had to rise simply because of this transition. It was a simple 2 plus 2 calculation. This is wrong and it is more likely that home values grew in the last decade more on the introduction of exotic mortgage products that didn't rely on income measures. There is little debate that many cities in California are still in major housing bubbles. Yet nationwide home values are still overpriced by 25 percent. Let us examine why.

Why nobody wants to buy a house
With government bribe money gone, so is any sane demand
By MarketWatch
CHICAGO (MarketWatch) -- Nobody wants to buy a house. Nobody in their right mind, anyway.
Oh, sure, a lot of gullible first-time buyers got lured into the market over the last 18 months to take advantage of an $8,000 federal tax credit (not realizing how little difference that money will make when the first property-tax bill hits at the same time the roof springs a pesky leak and the city hits you with a special assessment for sidewalk repair). But that tax credit has expired -- and, with it, any semblance of demand for homes.

Home buyers scatter in July after incentives end
BUSINESS FIRST OF COLUMBUS
The expiration of federal tax-credit incentives led Central Ohio home shoppers to tap the brakes in June, but slam on the pedals in July, according to new statistics from the Columbus Board of Realtors.
The board on Tuesday reported sales of 1,483 single-family homes and condominiums last month, down 28 percent from 2,057 a year ago. Home sales dropped 36 percent from June after a modest 4 percent monthly decline from May.

Housing in 'Double-Dip': Economist Zandi
By: Michelle Lodge - Special to CNBC.com
The US housing market is in a double-dip recession, Moody's Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi told CNBC Monday.
"Tomorrow we are going to get an existing home sales number that that I think is going to be very, very weak, closer to 4 million units, which I think would be a new low in this cycle," said Zandi, who is also the author of forthcoming Paying the Price.
"We probably, almost assuredly, will experience more house price declines. By those two criteria, I think that would qualify as a double dip."
Home prices fell 5.1 percent in June to an annualized pace of 5.37 million homes, the weakest since March.

Sales of previously occupied homes plunge
By Dina Elboghdady - WashingtonPost.com
Purchases of previously built single-family homes plunged in July to their lowest level since May 1995 as job fears trumped today's low mortgage interest rates and relatively affordable home prices.
The sales of existing single-family homes, condominiums and townhouses fell to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.83 million, the National Association of Realtors reported Tuesday. That's a 27.2 percent drop from June, about twice as much as analysts surveyed by Bloomberg expected. That's also a 25.5 percent drop from the same time a year ago. The sales of all these housing types combined was the lowest since the group started tracking the numbers in 1999.

Existing-home sales plunge 27.2%
Inventory of unsold homes jumps to 11-year high
By Jeffry Bartash, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The sale of existing U.S. homes sank 27.2% in July -- the biggest one-month drop ever -- largely because of the phase-out of a federal tax credit, according to an industry trade group.
The National Association of Realtors said existing-home sales fell to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.83 million in July from 5.26 million the month before. Sales of single-family homes fell to the lowest rate in 15 years.

Diving home sales stoke new worries about economic recovery
U.S. sales fall for the third consecutive month to the lowest rate since 1999, pushing down stocks and fueling fears of a 'double dip' in the housing market.
By Alejandro Lazo, Los Angeles Times
The end of a popular government stimulus program drove home sales in July to their lowest levels in more than a decade, fueling fresh concerns about the economic recovery.
Home sales fell 27.2% nationwide from a month earlier, the National Assn. of Realtors reported. That was a much bigger drop than expected, as the boost evaporated from a now-expired federal tax credit that had been driving sales this spring. The plunge came despite rock-bottom rates on home loans.
Concern over the summer swoon reverberated from Wall Street to the White House. The Dow Jones industrial average briefly slid below the 10,000 benchmark and was down 1.3% on the day.

Existing Home Sales Hit 15-Year Low;
Housing Market Weakens
By: Reuters and AP - CNBC.com
Sales of previously owned U.S. homes dropped more steeply than expected in July to their lowest pace in 15 years, an industry group said Tuesday, implying further loss of momentum in the economic recovery.
The National Association of Realtors said sales dropped a record 27.2 percent from June to an annual rate of 3.83 million units, the lowest level since May 1995. June's sales pace was revised down to a 5.26 million-unit pace.
The record drop in existing U.S. home sales in July showed that the country must still do more to improve the economy, White House spokesman Bill Burton said Tuesday.

Goldman Sachs-Its Class WarFare. Oct 2009
Webster Tarpley talks about how there is 1 million new foreclosure claims as the bailout boyz from Goldman Sachs,JP Morgan Chase,Morgan and Stanley BOA,Wells Fargo are still paying top bonuses to their employees..

Housing Slide in U.S. May Drag Economy Into Recession
By John Gittelsohn and Bob Willis
Aug. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Housing led the U.S. out of seven of the last eight recessions. This time, it may kill the recovery.
Home sales collapsed after a federal tax credit for buyers expired in April. Since then, the manufacturing-led expansion, which began in the second half of 2009, has been waning, with jobless claims rising and factory orders falling.
"If foreclosures continue to mount and depress home prices, that could send the economy back into a recession," said Celia Chen, an economist who tracks the industry for Moody's Analytics Inc. "The housing market and the broader economy are closely intertwined."

States Show Few Gains in Fight Against Unemployment
By: Joseph Pisani - CNBC News Associate
State unemployment rates have shown only minimal improvements, with 18 states and the District of Columbia reporting decreases in July, 14 showing increases and 18 with no change at all, government data released Friday showed.
Just a month before, 39 states and the District of Columbia saw their rates decrease.
Nevada had the highest jobless rate in the nation for the third month in a row, since dethroning Michigan for the top spot in May, according to the report released by the Labor Department.

State tax hikes could go too far
By Ben Rooney
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Some U.S. states facing steep budget gaps have resorted to tax policies that could be harmful over the long term, a non-profit research group said Monday.
In a review of 2010 changes in state tax policy, the Tax Foundation said certain states have targeted tax increases on high-income earners, smokers and out-of-state business transactions. These taxes may be politically convenient, but the foundation said that relying too heavily on such sources can lead to problems over the long run.

US Said Preparing New Laws
To Seize Americans Retirement Accounts
Posted by EU Times
First They Destroy Private Healthcare in America - Yes, the socialist Democrats won their first battle to destroy the private healthcare system in the US but the automatic IRA bill now in Congress is their next attack to also control, confiscate and destroy the private retirement system. Ultimately, nationalizing healthcare is designed to create a major new government revenue stream by replacing private health insurance with a nationalized, mandatory, government program and their goal is identical with your retirement plan.
Washington will decide the annual forced healthcare premiums on all Americans with the middle and upper wage earners paying far higher premiums than the subsidized voting constituencies who will be the primary beneficiaries of the program. Their goal is to allow Washington to steal much of the annual health premiums (taxes) for current revenue needs and to bailout and subsidize with your premiums the health programs for the voting blocks of poor and underemployed, illegals, unions and the millions of city, county, state and federal government employees. Eventually there will be no private competition available except for the very wealthy and Washington will constantly increase premiums just as they raise taxes today.

Ron Paul on CNN American Morning 8/24/10:
The NYC Mosque Sideshow

Does Barack Obama want to be re-elected in 2012?
By Toby Harnden - Telegraph.co.uk
Few Americans consider themselves bigger than the presidency but Obama might be one of them. The man in the Oval Office, argues Toby Harnden, may already be preparing for a role as a post-president in a post-American world.
When David Plouffe, President Barack Obama's 2008 campaign manager, wrote recently that his former boss was "not concerned with his re-election", there was predictable scepticism.
After all, it has long been a truism that every politician wants to cling to power and a reality that presidential campaigns are planned years in advance. Pronouncements about not looking at polls and concentrating on getting things done are, moreover, standard fare from poll-driven, election-obsessed politicians and their apparatchiks.

The Disappearing Gulf Oil Plumes Redux
Ronald Bailey | Reason.com
Remember the rosy scenario report by the Obama administration that 75 percent of the oil from the BP oil blowout had disappeared. Then a week ago came a somber report in Science declaring that the crude was still lurking Jaws-like below the surface in giant greasy plumes. This report provoked some policymakers and environmentalists to denounce the Obama administration for making stuff up about dire environmental situation in the Gulf of Mexico.
Now comes another research report in Science that says that previously unknown bacteria just love dining on the plumes with the result that the plumes are now completely undectectable. As Science News reports:
In May, researchers began reporting that the massive jets of crude emanating from BP's damaged Deepwater Horizon well were creating deep, diffuse plumes of oil in the Gulf of Mexico. Since then, chemical oceanographers have been probing the plumes for indirect clues about how quickly native bacteria might be gobbling up the oil.

Red Alert! Attack on the Coasts and Fisheries of Norway!
William B. Fox - SilverBearCafe.com
Dear Fellow Norwegians and Norwegian-Americans:
Contrary to reports that we see in mainstream media that British Petroleum has the "Gulf spill" under control, we see numerous credible reports in alternative media that massive amounts of oil and gas continue to rise from the sea floor at a horrendous rate from over ten locations outside of the main drill hole, which has been badly fractured in many locations beneath the ocean floor.1
We also see many reports of massive clusters of dead fish now washing up on shores all over the East Coast, from Florida to Massachusetts. 2 Many experts fear that a highly toxic stream of contaminated ocean water is now flowing in the Gulf Stream towards Northern Europe, where it could cause severe damage to Norway's fisheries and fjords within about six months if nothing is done. 3 In addition, the 9 Aug 2010 article Special Post - Gulf Stream & North Atlantic Current Dying by Lord Stirling cites concerns by Italian theoretical physicist Dr. Giangluigi Zangari that pollution has already broken the Gulf Loop Current, resulting in a "dramatic weakening in the vorticity of the Gulf Stream and North Atlantic Current, and a reduction in North Atlantic water temperatures of 10C." 4 This in turn means that Ice Age conditions could advance on Norway.

The Gulf Crisis is Not Over
Anne McClintock - SilverBearCafe.com
Slow Violence and the BP Coverups
Three vanishing acts are being played out in the Gulf: the disappearing of the oil from the ocean surface by Corexit, the disappearing of the story by the media blockade, and the disappearing from view of the shadowy private contractors who are making a mint helping BP and the Coast Guard keep a cover on the clean-up. This triple vanishing trick, collectively choreographed by BP and sundry federal agencies, culminated on August 4th in a report released by NOAA that claimed 75% of the oil spill had been captured, burned, evaporated or broken down. The White House hailed the report as something to celebrate. Energy advisor Carol Browne announced: "the vast majority of the oil is gone."
A clamor of outrage immediately rose from the Gulf, as residents refused to dance the crisis-is-over, happy-feet dance. Hundreds of locals furiously insisted that they were still seeing masses of oil on ocean, beaches and marshes, and dead fish, dolphins, sharks, birds and other marine life washing ashore. Then on August 18th scientists from the Universities of Georgia and South Florida produced an open challenge to the White House report, asserting that 70% to 79% of the oil in the Gulf still remained in the water. Charles Hopkinson, a professor of marine science at the University of Georgia declared: "The idea that 75% of the oil is gone and of no concern to the environment is just absolutely incorrect."

A blunt view of Afghan deadline
Does Obama's plan help the enemy?
By Mark Mardell - BBC.com
The man in charge of the United States Marines, who has just returned from a tour of Afghanistan, has said President Obama's plan to start withdrawing troops next summer has given sustenance to the enemy.
General James Conway said that it will be a few years before the time is right to hand over to Afghan forces in some key areas.
The assessment by the Commandant of the Marines, who are fighting in the most critical areas of Afghanistan, is the most blunt so far from a senior military figure.

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Tuesday 08.24.2010

The taxman cometh
By Palash R. Ghosh - IBTimes.com
Prospects for higher taxes in 2011 and beyond will retard the pace of economic recovery in the U.S.
Milton Ezrati, senior economist and market strategist, said that the tax increases both planned (and threatened) by the current administration over the next few years will likely cut GDP growth.
Consider the plethora of tax hikes on the horizon:
The tax cuts initiated by George W. Bush in 2001 and 2003 are scheduled to expire at the end of this year. The President and Congress will probably extend the cuts for all but the two top brackets of wealthier Americans, thereby letting the tax brackets rise from their present levels of 35 percent and 33 percent, respectively, to 39.6 percent and 36 percent.

ObamaCare's Tax on Taxes
WSJ.com - $$
The latest gambit to punish for-profit health insurers.
Lately a lot of Democrats are taking the ObamaCare walk of shame, and not only those whose votes may return them to the labor market this fall. Liberals still think the bill didn't raise taxes enough.
So they've cooked up a virtuoso new scheme. A phalanx of powerful committee Chairmen - including Henry Waxman (House Commerce), Max Baucus (Senate Finance) and Sander Levin (Ways and Means) - want to tax the taxes that the health insurance industry already pays.

The Decline in American Optimism
By Richard Posner
I don't put much weight on public opinion polls that show a drop in Americans' optimism about the economic future of the country. Optimism and pessimism are personality traits that condition people's reaction to uncertainty, but they are also influenced by uncertainty. This was one of Keynes's insights. When a sharp economic downturn creates the kind of uncertainty about economic prospects that we're now observing, people's "animal spirits" (his term for optimism) droop; hoarding increases and entrepreneurship flags. These are rational responses to uncertainty, but they do not predict a nation's future economic performance.

79 Common Sense Reasons For A Gold Standard
By: Toni Straka - Safehaven.com
The world enters the final stage of financial destruction thanks to a one-sided application of John Maynard Keynes' equation because politicians and central bankers did a terrific job in deficit spending since the USA defaulted on its gold obligations in 1971, but never followed Keynes advice to build reserves in surplus years. This is a direct result of a fiat money system that allows to create money at essentially no cost, to quote Fed chair Ben Bernanke from his infamous 2002 speech.
IMHO the heated discussion about a new gold standard will follow philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer's saying: "All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident."

Will The Price Of Gold Reach $5,000?
By: Marvin Clark - iStockAnalyst.com
All the current chatter these days on whether or not to reduce a portfolio's exposure to gold is, to put it bluntly, a short term trader's conversation. A crowded trade, whales exiting a crowded trade, is it deflation or inflation? Gold is the inferior commodity to soft commodities such as wheat; gold's current price elasticity, and more, all sound reasonable.
However, if you are a trend position builder and/or a long term investor of gold, we shall now review other important long term considerations that transactional traders omit from discussions.

Why Gold Is Not In A Bull Market
By: Julian D. W. Phillips - Safehaven.com
What is a 'Bull' market? It is a market in an upward price phase of a market with the expectation that it will be followed by a 'Bear' or downward phase of a market. This mindset is common to all markets. Sayings like, "everything that goes up must come down" is pretty standard and taken as part of life itself, but few examine it to see if it is really true. Why should everything that goes up come down? For some years now gold has been thought of as moving in the opposite direction to the U.S. Dollar. So if gold goes up it must come down must also mean that if the Dollar goes down it must come up? Is that true? The history of currencies in the last few thousand years tell us something quite different. Currencies have gone down and never come up again, just disappeared. Gold has always retained a monetary value. Since the eighties to 1999, gold has gone down and in this century has gone up. So we take issue with the saying, in the light of the history of gold. Even though the 'powers that be' have tried to discredit gold and underlying money, the vast majority of central banks have retained most of their gold because they believed it to be a very valuable reserve asset.

China Ditches US Currency - Are Times Changing?
By: Shae Smith - Safehaven.com
We all know the US flogs its debt to anyone willing to buy it. And up until recently, that's been China.
Very slowly, over the past twelve months China has been lowering its exposure to US treasuries. In fact, in the last twelve months, they've offloaded about USD$100 billion dollars worth.
Some of this has been by simply not purchasing more bonds upon maturity. While some of it has been by turning those US dollars into precious resources. Instead of waiting for bonds to mature, it has used the cash to buy up natural gas stores, investing in oil rigs and even throwing money into companies with large iron ore mines.

How Hyperinflation Will Happen
by Gonzalo Lira
Right now, we are in the middle of deflation. The Global Depression we are experiencing has squeezed both aggregate demand levels and aggregate asset prices as never before. Since the credit crunch of September 2008, the U.S. and world economies have been slowly circling the deflationary drain.
To counter this, the U.S. government has been running massive deficits, as it seeks to prop up aggregate demand levels by way of fiscal "stimulus" spending-the classic Keynesian move, the same old prescription since donkey's ears.
But the stimulus, apart from being slow and inefficient, has simply not been enough to offset the fall in consumer spending.

Hyperinflation is a Fiscal, Not Monetary Phenomenon
By: Jordan Roy-Byrne - Safehaven.com
Months ago we wrote about the true causes of hyperinflation. We proceed to expand upon our views as we disagree with the views put forth by John Mauldin, Mike Shedlock and now Jim Rickards who all focus on velocity and/or bank lending as important causes of hyperinflation.
The reality is that hyperinflation is first and foremost set in motion and driven by a deteriorating fiscal situation. In fact, significant economic weakness and deflation is a precursor to hyperinflation. Too many analysts believe that there has to be some economic demand or some consumption to stimulate inflation or hyperinflation. Printing money to try and stimulate your economy or excessive credit growth is what leads to inflation. Printing money because you are broke and can't service your debts is what leads to hyperinflation.

SEC suspends trading in more stocks this year
By Matt Krantz, USA TODAY
Regulators are stepping up efforts to weed out some of the smallest and most questionable publicly traded companies.
Hoping to prevent investors from being misled by companies with big promises but little financial information, the Securities and Exchange Commission suspended trading in 202 stocks this year, already topping the 183 stocks that were suspended through the end of the third quarter of 2009. The SEC suspended a record 234 companies for all of 2009, a level that will be easily surpassed this year at the current clip. Suspensions are way up from the 183 and 98 in 2008 and 2007, respectively, a USA TODAY analysis of SEC data shows.

Fed Loses Bid for Review of Bailout Disclosure Ruling
By Bob Ivry
Aug. 23 (Bloomberg) -- An appeals court refused to reconsider a decision compelling the Federal Reserve Board to release documents identifying banks that might have failed without the U.S. government bailout.
The full U.S. Court of Appeals in New York, in a docket entry dated Aug. 20, denied a May 4 request by the Fed to review a three-judge panel's unanimous March 19 decision requiring the agency to release records of the unprecedented $2 trillion U.S. loan program begun primarily after the 2008 collapse of Bear Stearns Cos.

Lunch with the FT: Adam Fergusson
By Jonathan Ford - FT.com
As befits a man who has written an acclaimed book about money and prices, Adam Fergusson starts our encounter by eyeing the menu beadily and asking who will be paying the bill. "Milton Friedman said the most efficient way of spending money is to spend your own, and the least efficient way is to spend other people's," he says. "If you go out to lunch and have to pay your own bill, you have what you want and can afford. If someone else is paying, you may as well have the lobster."

BoA sees US double-dip danger from 'fiscal chicken'
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
Bank of America has accused the Democrats and Republicans in Congress of endangering the US economy in a game "fiscal chicken", risking a grave policy error by tightening too early.
Ethan Harris, the bank's chief North American economist, said early data for August suggest that "an already weak recovery is getting weaker" with a rising risk of a relapse into recession, yet the two parties seemed determined to outbid each other with austerity measures.
"Politicians are clamouring for quick action, not to stimulate a dangerously weak economy, but to bring down the budget deficit. We strongly support efforts to bring down the deficit, but only once the economy is on a healthy growth trajectory," Mr Harris said.

Global Shivers Mean That Nobody Escapes
the Worsening Economic Cold
By Irwin Stelzer - WSJ.com
The U.S. economy grows smartly-at an annual rate of 5.6% in the last quarter of last year-but when the final figures are in America will have recorded a growth rate of less than 2% in the most recent quarter. Meanwhile, in that recent quarter Germany grew at an annual rate of close to 9%, and powered the euro-zone annual growth rate to almost 4%. But in part because America has now slowed, the Bundesbank and other experts are forecasting much lower growth rates in the second half of the year. In short, America spurts, Europe slows, so America slows; Europe spurts, America slows, so Europe slows. Coincidence? Not likely.

CFR: China Poised to Shock the Oil Market
And Its Possible Consequences for Hyperinflation
I found this paper published by the Council on Foreign Relations to be a plausible argument in favor of the exhaustion of cheap oil, also known as Peak Oil. This growth in Chinese oil consumption into the 'knee of the curve' given its growing per capital income could very well cause an oil shock as the title of the paper suggests. As you may recall it was an oil shock that triggered the stagflation of the 1970's, a black swan event if there ever was one.

Stimulus round 2 waiting in the wings: PineBridge
By Hao Li - IBTimes.com
A second round of stimulus is waiting in the wings, ready to be deployed if the economy further deteriorates, said PineBridge Investments, an investment adviser with $78 billion in assets under management.
If the Chinese economy does not glide into the "soft landing" engineered by their regulators, PineBridge believes their government will resort to fiscal stimulus near the end of 2010. For the U.S., regulators are gearing up for another round of quantitative easing if the economy worsens, said PineBridge.

Fed's Hoenig Says Big Banks Benefit From Safety Net
By Steve Matthews
Aug. 23 (Bloomberg) -- The largest U.S. banks have an implied government safety net that gives them a lower cost of capital compared to community banks even after a congressional overhaul of banking regulation, Kansas City Federal Reserve President Thomas Hoenig said.
"Despite the provisions of the Dodd-Frank Act to end too- big-to-fail, community banks will continue to face higher costs of capital and deposits until investors are convinced it has ended," Hoenig said today in testimony to a congressional hearing in Overland Park, Kansas.

Investors Shake Up Funds With Record Bond Love Affair
By Charles Stein
Aug. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Retail investors in the U.S., burned by two market crashes in a decade, have shunned stocks for the longest stretch in more than 23 years, upsetting the balance of power in the $10.5 trillion mutual-fund industry.
Bond funds attracted more money than their equity counterparts in 30 straight months through June, according to the Investment Company Institute, a Washington-based trade group. Preliminary data show the trend continued in July, matching the streak posted by bonds from 1984 through 1987.

Greek Banks Pressured to Merge as Economic Slump Hurts Profits
By Niklas Magnusson
Aug. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Greek banks are under growing political pressure to merge as second-quarter earnings probably slumped on rising loan losses and worsening asset quality in the debt-burdened country.
National Bank of Greece SA, EFG Eurobank Ergasias SA, Alpha Bank SA and Piraeus Bank SA, which will report results within the next week, have been called upon to consider partnerships by Greek Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou and Bank of Greece Governor George Provopoulos. Profits at the lenders probably fell more than 60 percent, according to analysts' estimate.

U.S. Judges Sound Off on Bank Settlements
By BINYAMIN APPELBAUM - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - Everything was rolling along traditional lines. A bank broke the rules. The government found out. The company agreed to pay a fine and improve its behavior.
And then the judge assigned to approve the deal blew his top.
In a scene that is becoming increasingly common, Judge Emmet G. Sullivan of Federal District Court chewed out federal prosecutors at a hearing in Washington last week for a proposed settlement with Barclays.
"Why isn't the government getting tough with banks?" he asked.

Now That's Rich
By PAUL KRUGMAN - NYTimes.com
We need to pinch pennies these days. Don't you know we have a budget deficit? For months that has been the word from Republicans and conservative Democrats, who have rejected every suggestion that we do more to avoid deep cuts in public services and help the ailing economy.
But these same politicians are eager to cut checks averaging $3 million each to the richest 120,000 people in the country.

Paul Craig Roberts: America is Truly being Destroyed by Design - 1

Paul Craig Roberts: America is Truly being Destroyed by Design - 2

Paul Craig Roberts: America is Truly being Destroyed by Design - 3

Commercial foreclosures revisit Chicago Loop
Office tower at 500 W. Monroe flirts with foreclosure again
By: Eddie Baeb and Thomas A. Corfma - ChicagoBusiness.com
The owner of a downtown skyscraper that managed to stave off foreclosure last year is on the hot seat again as the commercial real estate market continues to sag.
A Georgia firm that holds two junior mortgages on the 46-story tower at 500 W. Monroe St. says the building's loans went unpaid when they came due this month and that the company may foreclose and take control of the property.

How States Hide Their Budget Deficits
By John Frisby - Lux Libertas
The SEC's charges against New Jersey for misleading investors should warn other states against sweeping the truth under the rug.
Article By STEVE MALANGA
In April, the New York State Comptroller, Thomas DiNapoli, issued a damning report on the Empire State's financial practices. Albany's budgets, he observed, increasingly employ "fiscal manipulations" to present a "distorted view of the State's finances." Money shuffled among accounts to hide deficits, loans made by the state to itself, and other maneuvers Mr. DiNapoli called a "fiscal shell game" are meant to "mask the true magnitude of the State's structural budget deficit."
The comptroller's report produced yawns. Last week, however, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed fraud charges against New Jersey for misrepresenting its financial obligations, particularly its pension obligations, and misleading investors in its bonds. New York - and many other states - had better sit up and take notice.

Americans Using Their Rainy Day Savings to Live
BY CHUCK - RebelTraders.net
Recently I commented on the outflow of money from mutual funds and the increase in 401K hardship withdraws.
Today the New York Times carries the story further by stating that investors have simply given up on the stock market. While this may indeed be true that investors simply don’t trust it anymore, and who could blame them, I contend that there is still a significant percentage of those pulling money from stocks who need the funds to live.
Investors withdrew a staggering $33.12 billion from domestic stock market mutual funds in the first seven months of this year, according to the Investment Company Institute, the mutual fund industry trade group. Now many are choosing investments they deem safer, like bonds.

How low can we fall this fall?
TheAutomaticEarth.com
. . . . A society cannot buy its way out of a debt-driven depression by taking on more debt, or at least not when a number of vital necessities are entirely lacking. When there's no (rise in) productive capacity, or in consumer spending, and when exports can't go up substantially, in other words, when every penny written off has to be replaced by another penny borrowed just to stand still, it doesn't really matter what all sorts of statistics seem to indicate, that society is no better off for it, and can thus not be said to be out of its recession.

Housing's Second Leg Down
by PAUL JACKSON - HousingWire.com
Home prices have fallen 34% from their peak in the middle of 2006, according to Standard & Poor's HPI data - but is that enough? Or is there further to go? How much further could we fall?
It's worth noting that the question of what happens next with home prices isn't merely an academic exercise. With CoreLogic estimating that more than 11.2 million U.S. borrowers were underwater on their mortgages at the end of the first quarter, the direction of U.S. home price trends over the next few years will have a direct impact on bank and related financial balance sheets the world over.

Housing Slide in U.S. May Drag Economy Into Recession
By John Gittelsohn and Bob Willis
Aug. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Housing led the U.S. out of seven of the last eight recessions. This time, it may kill the recovery.
Home sales collapsed after a federal tax credit for buyers expired in April. Since then, the manufacturing-led expansion, which began in the second half of 2009, has been waning, with jobless claims rising and factory orders falling.
"If foreclosures continue to mount and depress home prices, that could send the economy back into a recession," said Celia Chen, an economist who tracks the industry for Moody's Analytics Inc. "The housing market and the broader economy are closely intertwined."

The Costs of Homeownership Drive First-time Buyers Away
by CHRISTINE RICCIARDI - HousingWire.com
The costs of owning a home can substantially outweigh the benefits because of issues such minimal home equity retention and an owners desire to "flip" a home on the market quickly, researchers Wenli Li and Fang Yang said in their report American Dream or American Obsession? The Economic Benefits and Costs of Homeownership, published Friday by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
"One thing that is certain," the two analysts said, "is that homeownership is not for everyone, and thus, based on economic benefits, the case for trying to achieve a nation of homeowners needs to be rethought."

Let the Housing Market Normalize!
By: Ron Paul - Safehaven.com
Recently there have been some encouraging signs that Congress is finally willing to admit what should have been evident two years ago. Even after a $150 billion bailout, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are still bankrupt and should be abolished. Indeed Rep. Barney Frank, a longtime champion of Fannie and Freddie has made a few statements alluding to this and I have signed on to a letter asking him to clarify his remarks and hold hearings on this topic. There seems to be a growing consensus in favor of abolishing Fannie and Freddie. This is the good news.

Mortgage Fraud Is Rising, With a Twist
Adopting to Tighter Rules After Collapse,
Scammers Turn to More Complex Plots
By ROBBIE WHELAN - WSJ.com
New data suggests that mortgage fraud - which got tougher to pull off after the collapse of the U.S. real estate market - is returning in a big way.
Data prepared for The Wall Street Journal by research firm CoreLogic, examining about seven million home loans made by hundreds of lenders, show that losses from mortgage fraud - ranging from falsified credit reports to identity theft - rose 17% last year after declining 57% in the two years after its 2006 peak.
In 2009, $14 billion in loans, or about 0.7% of all mortgage loans made in the U.S., were originated with fraudulent application data.

Oregon loses 10,600 jobs in last year
PORTLAND BUSINESS JOURNAL
Oregon has lost 10,600 jobs in the past year, ranking No. 42 among all 50 states and the District of Columbia for job retention, according to the latest figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Thirty-one states increased their nonfarm employment totals between July 2009 and July 2010. Nineteen states - including Oregon - suffered declines, while Wyoming was unchanged.
Texas enjoyed the biggest increase in raw numbers, adding 134,600 nonfarm jobs during the past year. The runners-up were Indiana (up 47,600 jobs), Massachusetts (up 36,600) and Minnesota (up 23,200).
California suffered the biggest decline and lost 103,900 jobs in the past year.

Will the Next Generation be Better off Than Their Parents' Generation?
By Gary Becker
The great majority of parents would like to see their children become better off economically than they are, and that hope would be even more common among the children. Yet, polls for a while have suggested that neither the majority of children nor parents in the United States are confident that this progress will happen. Despite frequent recent commentary on these polls, little systematic analysis has been presented of what determines whether the average child will be better off than the average parent, and why pessimism about such progress has apparently grown in the US.

Credit-Card Rates Climb
Levels Hit Nine-Year High as New Rules Limiting Penalty Fees Help Fuel Rise By RUTH SIMON - WSJ.com - (free)
Interest rates continue to tumble for the U.S. Treasury, companies and home buyers alike. But for a large portion of 381 million U.S. credit-card accounts, borrowing rates have been moving only one way: up.
And average rates are likely to climb further in the near future.
New credit-card rules that took effect Sunday limit banks' ability to charge penalty fees. They come on top of rule changes earlier this year restricting issuers' ability to adjust rates on the fly. Issuers responded by pushing card rates to their highest level in nine years.

President: poor jobs numbers stem from inaction in Senate
By Joseph Picard - IBTimes.com
President Obama reacted to the grim news on job loss by calling on Congress to pass the Small Business Jobs Bill.
"In the final few months of last year, small businesses with fewer than 50 employees accounted for more than 60 percent of the job losses in America," Obama said. "These are the businesses that usually create most of the jobs in this country."
The president said that "if we want this economy to create more jobs more quickly, we need to help them."

Americans confused about healthcare reform
By Julie Steenhuysen - Reuters.com
(Reuters) - Julia Wood, a 51-year-old mother of 12 from Chicago's East side, has some health insurance through a state program -- but is so worried she may lose it she asks not to give her real name.
Wood's husband, a plumbing contractor, watched his business dry up in 2008 with the mortgage crisis.
"The economy hit us," said Wood in an interview at the not-for-profit Chicago Family Health Center.
Like millions of Americans, she is waiting for healthcare reform legislation signed into law by President Barack Obama in March to take effect. But like millions of Americans, she is not sure what it will do for her.

SB1070 critics boycott Budweiser, Hensley
PHOENIX BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Mike Sunnucks
A Hispanic group opposed to Arizona's Senate Bill 1070 immigration measure has launched a boycott of Budweiser beer and the Phoenix-based Anheuser-Busch distributorship headed by Cindy Hensley McCain.
Hensley McCain is the chairwoman of the Hensley & Co. distributorship and the wife of U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.
Somos America said today it wants consumers to boycott Budweiser beer until Hensley denounces SB 1070. The law has police determine the immigration status of those they have already detained and whom they suspect are illegally in the U.S.

Obama's Islamic agenda
He embraces the Muslim world and turns his back on us
By Jeffrey T. Kuhner - The Washington Times
President Obama has revealed his true nature. After 20 months in the Oval Office, he still remained a largely unknown figure. A picture is coming into focus now, and it should trouble all Americans. It is widely known that Mr. Obama is a post-national progressive. Yet he is also a cultural Muslim who is promoting an anti-American, pro-Islamic agenda. This is the real meaning of his warm - and completely needless - embrace of the Ground Zero Mosque.
At an Iftar dinner celebrating Ramadan at the White House, Mr. Obama told Muslim-Americans that he supports the building of an Islamic community center and mosque just two blocks away from where the Twin Towers were destroyed and nearly 3,000 Americans were murdered on Sept. 11, 2001. He later tried to back away from those comments. Mr. Obama said he was defending the right of religious freedom but not the "wisdom" of erecting the mosque.

Feinberg Says Spill Victims May Be Able to Sue Some Companies
By Jim Snyder
Aug. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Kenneth Feinberg, who today will start drawing from a $20 billion escrow fund for Gulf oil spill victims, hasn't decided whether they must waive their right to sue companies involved if they accept final reimbursement.
"The question of whether or not a final payment will require a claimant to release one defendant, BP Plc, or all defendants, has not yet been resolved by me," Feinberg said yesterday in a telephone press conference with reporters.

Germany to roll out ID cards with embedded RFID
International Business Times
The production of the RFID chips, an integral element of the new generation of German identity cards, has started after the government gave a 10 year contract to the chipmaker NXP in the Netherlands. Citizens will receive the mandatory new ID cards from the first of November.
The new ID card will contain all personal data on the security chip that can be accessed over a wireless connection.
The new card allows German authorities to identify people with speed and accuracy, the government said. These authorities include the police, customs and tax authorities and of course the local registration and passport granting authorities.

Is Tony Robbins Right About The Coming Economic Collapse?
By Michael Snyder - DailyMarkets.com
It seems like almost everyone is warning of a coming economic collapse these days. Do you remember Tony Robbins? He is probably the world's best known "motivational speaker" and his infomercials dominated late night television during the 80s and 90s. He was always urging all of us to "unleash the power within" and to take charge of our lives. Well guess what? Now Tony Robbins is warning that an economic collapse is coming. In fact, he has issued a special video warning about what he believes is about to happen. Considering the incredible connections that he has at the highest levels of the financial world, it makes a lot of sense to consider what he is trying to warn us about. Robbins says that a "major retracement" is coming to financial markets and that the coming collapse is going to be a "painful process" as we go through it.

Tony Robbins Economic Warning 1-2

Tony Robbins Economic Warning 2-2

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Monday 08.23.2010

Something smells (STINKS) in Chicago, at the ShoreBank . . .
Read articles two, three, and four VERY CAREFULLY.

ShoreBank, Seven Others Shuttered as 2010 Failures Reach 118
By Dakin Campbell and James Sterngold
Aug. 21 (Bloomberg) -- ShoreBank Corp., the Chicago lender operating under a Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. cease-and- desist order for 13 months, and seven other banks were shut by regulators as 2010 bank failures climbed to 118.
ShoreBank's 15 branches, including those in Chicago, Cleveland and Detroit, will open as Urban Partnership Bank, according to statements from the FDIC.
"The good news is that the bank, under this new management, will still be there and serving the South Side community," said Dory Rand, referring to Urban Partnership's William Farrow. Rand is president of the Chicago-based Woodstock Institute, a non-profit that studies community lending."They have made the South Side a decent place to live and work and do business."

Obama's Renewable Energy and Climate Change Agenda
Karl W.Miller - fool.com
This is an interesting story put together from various articles and TV shows by the British Times paper. It shows what Obama and his friends are really all about. It's not hope and change, it is money.
I warn you, the first part is a little boring, but stick with it. The second part connects all the dots for you (it will open your eyes). The end explains how Obama and all his cronies will end up as multi-billionaires. (It's definitely worth the read. You will not be disappointed).
A small bank in Chicago called SHORE BANK almost went bankrupt during the recession. The bank made a profit on its foreign micro-loans (see below) but had lost money in sub-prime mortgages in the US . It was facing likely closure by federal regulators. However, because the bank's executives were well connected with members of the Obama Administration, a private rescue bailout was arranged. The bank's employees had donated money to Obama's Senate campaign. In other words, Shore Bank was too politically connected to be allowed to go under.

The shady ShoreBank bailout
By Michelle Malkin
"No more bailouts, no more greed, how many profits do you need?"
That’s been a signature chant of community organizers and Big Labor thugs who have stormed bank offices and financial executives’ private homes decrying corporate welfare over the past several months. But now that the federal government and a coalition of big banking interests are poised to bail out a crony Chicago bank with longtime ties to the Obama administration, Saul Alinsky's avenging angels are nowhere to be found.
ShoreBank is a Windy City investment bank with all the right (or, rather, left) ties. Its stated progressive mission isn’t merely to make good lending decisions, but to engage in Barack Obama-esque social engineering to "create economic equity and a healthy environment." The ShoreBank corporate slogan: "Let's change the world."

Feds Looking into ShoreBank Connections
By Charlie Gasparino | FOXBusiness - Aug 4, 2010
As if ShoreBank doesn't have enough problems, the financially troubled but politically connected Chicago-based community lender is now facing a federal investigation into whether political pressure was applied to force several major Wall Street firms to bail out the bank before it was liquidated by banking regulators, FOX Business has learned.
Neil Barofsky, the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, which has agreed to earmark $75 million to help ShoreBank survive, has now bowed to pressure from Congressional Republicans and has agreed to investigate charges that key officials in the Obama White House, as well as FDIC chief Sheila Bair, pressured Wall Street firms to donate money to keep ShoreBank alive.

Regulators shut down big Chicago bank, seven others
WASHINGTON (AP) - Regulators on Friday shut down a big community bank based in Chicago that has been known for its social activism but racked by financial troubles in recent months. A consortium funded by several of the biggest U.S. financial firms is buying its assets and pledging to operate the new bank by the same principles.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. took over ShoreBank, with $2.16 billion in assets and $1.54 billion in deposits. Urban Partnership Bank, the newly chartered financial institution, agreed to assume ShoreBank's deposits and nearly all its assets.
The FDIC also seized seven other banks Friday, bringing to 118 the number of U.S. bank failures this year amid the recession and mounting loan defaults.

OneCalifornia Bank buys Shorebank Pacific
PORTLAND BUSINESS JOURNAL
ShoreBank Pacific will be acquired by OneCalifornia Bank.
ShoreBank, a community bank based in Ilwaco,Wash., employs 17 people and has about $80 million in assets. Its largest office is in downtown Portland.
OneCalifornia and ShoreBank announced the stock purchase agreement Saturday evening. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Little Timmy, the Goldman boy after all
At Treasury, Geithner Struggles to Escape a Past He Never Had
By JACKIE CALMES - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - Timothy F. Geithner has been misidentified as a former Wall Street insider from Goldman Sachs so many times since he became the Treasury secretary that he and his advisers had taken to joking about it. Then the joke backfired.
Earlier this month, Mr. Geithner had breakfast in Manhattan with Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and Robert Steel, a deputy mayor and former Treasury official in the Bush administration who had previously worked at Goldman. Facetiously, a Geithner aide said Mr. Steel and Mr. Geithner knew each other from the investment bank.
Later that day at a public event, the mayor in all seriousness referred to Mr. Steel and Mr. Geithner, and added, "They both worked at Goldman." Oops.

Gerald Celente On the Edge with Max Keiser - 20 August 2010

America no longer needs Chinese money, for now
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
As the Sino-American showdown in the South China and Yellow Seas escalates into the gravest superpower clash since the Cold War, the United States cannot wisely rely on China to help fund its budget deficit for an
The cacophony of voices in Beijing questioning or mocking the credit-worthiness of the US is now deafening, from premier Wen Jiabao on down. The results are in any case manifest: US Treasury data show that China has cut its holdings of Treasury debt by roughly $100bn (£65bn) over the past year to $844bn.
ZeroHedge reports that net purchases by the big three of China, Japan, and the UK (Mid-East petro-dollars) have been sliding for two years. In August they bought the least amount of US debt this year.

Wall Street debates prospect of bond bubble
By Adam Shell, USA TODAY
NEW YORK - Is a bubble brewing in the normally sedate U.S. government bond market?
That's the big debate raging on Wall Street. Heavy buying of 10-year Treasury notes by investors in search of a safe place to park cash, as well as higher yields than available on certificates of deposit, is pushing prices of government-issued debt sharply higher - and knocking yields down to levels last seen 17 months ago in the depths of the financial crisis.
In early April, the 10-year note yielded nearly 4%. On Friday, it was 2.62%, and last week, it hit its lowest yield since March 2009. Its all-time low yield was 2.06% in December 2008, three months after the collapse of Lehman Bros. nearly sparked a global financial meltdown.

Greek crisis refuses to go away
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
The European Commission has approved the next €9bn (£7.4bn) tranche of loans for Greece but the underlying economy continues to deteriorate as Greek banks suffer a record loss of deposits and output contracts at a quickening pace.
A report by HSBC said banks had lost 8pc of their entire deposit base in the five months to May. "The Greek market has never, since the first data in 2001, experienced such attrition," said banking analyst Joanna Telioudi.
While some withdrawals point to capital flight by wealthy Greeks, it is clear that households and companies are running down savings to make ends meet. The Athens Chamber of Commerce warned yesterday that its members are in "dire straits", with a majority facing a liquidity threat.

Ratio Analyses Suggest Gold and Silver Will Go MUCH Higher!
By: Lorimer Wilson - GoldSeek.com

1. Dow/Gold Ratio Suggests Possible Future $10,400 Gold!
2. Gold/S&P 500 Ratio Suggests Possible Future $6,000 Gold
3. Gold/Silver Ratio Suggests Future Price for Silver Somewhere Between $75 and $650
4. World Gold Mining Index/Gold Ratio Suggests Much Higher Prices for Gold and Silver Mining Shares
5. Gold/Oil Ratio Suggests Possible Future Prices for Gold and Oil in Excess of $3,150 and $250 Respectively

Ron Paul: Gold is Money!
The Dollar's Value is Destined to Go Down

The Best Gold Interview of 2010
Jeff Clark, Casey's Gold & Resource Report
Much of what passes for "insider" information these days is often conspiracy-edged or largely conjecture. True inside information is actually hard to come by. So what follows is the refreshingly candid and uncut version of my talk with a first-hand participant in the murky and little-understood world of gold bullion, mints, and bullion dealers.
Customarily, when considering a company for a potential recommendation, I hold a series of discussions with management. It was during one of these vetting procedures that I spoke with Andy Schectman of Miles Franklin - and heard some disturbing reports about supply that every investor should know. Andy is a bullion seller, so you're welcome to take his comments with a grain of salt. On the other hand, what he sees week after week and what he hears from his high-level industry contacts might just make you pull back on that salt shaker and re-inventory the number of ounces you own...

Silver Velocity- The Coming Bullet
Money can lose its value through excessive abundance, if so much silver is coined as to heighten people's demand for silver bullion. For in this way the coinage's estimation vanishes when it cannot buy as much silver as the money itself contains... The solution is to mint no more coinage until it recovers its par value -- Copernicus
Silver Velocity to rise
Our Hinde Silver Trend model has reached a significant low that usually precedes a dynamic move. This move can be lower or higher but our other technical indicators signal a move higher is the most likely scenario.

Peter Schiff - Dollar, CBO, Reich, Freddie & Fannie, Refis

Why Quantitative Easing is Likely to Trigger
a Collapse of the U.S. Dollar
John P. Hussman, Ph.D. - HussmanFunds.com
A week ago, the Federal Reserve initiated a new program of "quantitative easing" (QE), with the Fed purchasing U.S. Treasury securities and paying for those securities by creating billions of dollars in new monetary base. Treasury bond prices surged on the action. With the U.S. economy predictably weakening, this second round of quantitative easing appears likely to continue. Unfortunately, the unintended side effect of this policy shift is likely to be an abrupt collapse in the foreign exchange value of the U.S. dollar.

What Problems Lie Ahead for the U.S. Dollar?
By: Julian D. W. Phillips - GoldSeek.com
The recent history of the Dollar
China is the largest holder of the U.S. Dollar in its foreign exchange reserves at $2.45 + trillion. This is an impossible number to trade on foreign exchanges. So they're stuck with them until they can spend them. But, as long as the U.S. Dollar is the world's sole reserve currency, these reserves are useful to buy any asset in any country. It is vital that they retain their buying power. Buying power is defined by its exchange rate value and inside the U.S. relates to the inflation rate. A prime task of the Federal Reserve is to maintain price stability, i.e. buying power stability. So when China expressed concern over the value of the Dollar [and its buying power], we all became concerned. There are many reasons to be concerned about the future of the Dollar. We shall look at some of these in this article.

Inflation, not deflation, Mr. Bernanke
World divides into ice-cold and red-hot economies
By Andy Xie
BEIJING (Caixin Online) -- In the wake of a barrage of bad economic data, the yield on two-year U.S. Treasury notes has tumbled to 0.5% and the 10-year note to 2.8%, almost reaching the levels after Lehman's collapse. Pundits in the U.S. and other Western countries are talking about deflation again.
The decline in the consumer price index for the past three months gives this view ammunition. The Fed is coming under pressure to resume quantitative easing (QE). In anticipation of the Fed resuming QE -- nicknamed "QE 2" -- the dollar has declined quickly by 10% from its recent high. Both the Treasury and currency markets have already priced in "QE 2."

The Economy is in Big Trouble
By MIKE WHITNEY - CounterPunch.org
Imagine the reaction at the White House when the Department of Labor released its weekly unemployment figures on Thursday. Jobless claims rose by 12,000 to 500,000 in the second week of August. There's been no improvement in the jobs market in 9 months and now unemployment is edging upwards again. This wasn't supposed to happen. The Obama administration had bet everything that the economy had turned the corner and would gradually get better. Many economists saw less than a 10 per cent chance that the economy would tip back into recession. After all, double dip recessions are "extremely rare". Now more people are losing their jobs and Team Obama is caught in the headlights. There is no back-up plan, no Plan B. The Democrats will face the midterms with no stimulus to create new jobs and with an economy that is steadily deteriorating. It's going to be a massacre and they know it.

It's doom and gloom all over again
Survey sees fear trumping greed in the market
By Howard Gold
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Investors are scared--really, really scared.
That's what our latest MoneyShow.com Investors' Sentiment indicator tells us, in big, bold, red letters:
HELP!
Our most recent survey of the active, mainly self-directed investors who use MoneyShow.com showed the highest bearish ratings we've ever seen--far greater than back in February 2009, just before the market bottomed. Read MoneyShow's "Investors Aren't Believers."

Cost of this time down: Stagflation
Bubbles burst, and no amount of clever labels can change that fact. Recovery is going to take a while, and we can expect low growth and inflation while we wait.
By Bill Fleckenstein - MSN Money
Gauging the mood of the market over recent weeks, the dominant sentiments seem to be uncertainty and angst. Certainly there are a number of possible explanations: a weak economy, the ugly employment picture and deflation worries, to name a few.
But it was the lead editorial in the Aug. 12 New York Times, headlined, "When the Fed speaks," that I think most aptly put its finger on the recent bout of fear and unease.

And Now We're Headed For The GREATEST Depression,
Says Gerald Celente
by Henry Blodget - TechTicker
The fake "recovery" was nice while it lasted, says famous apocalyptic forecaster Gerald Celente, founder of the Trends Research Institute. But now the fun's over, and we're headed for what Celente describes as the "Greatest Depression."
Specifically, the always startling Celente says the country is headed for rising unemployment, poverty, and violent class warfare as the government efforts to keep the economy going begin to fail.

Abercrombie & Fitch to close 110 stores by 2011
SAN FRANCISCO BUSINESS TIMES - BY Sarah Duxbury
Abercrombie & Fitch said it would close up to 110 stores over the next 18 months.
Most closures will come through expiring leases, and will affect the Abercrombie Kids and Abercrombie and Fitch brands. The Ohio-based company said that it will close 60 U.S. stores over 2010 and an additional 50 U.S. stores in 2011.
Abercrombie currently operates 1,098 stores under the Abercrombie & Fitch, Abercrombie Kids, Hollister and Gilly Hicks brands.

Nevada unemployment grows in July
Some areas of Nevada economy are showing signs of stability
By JENNIFER ROBISON - LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
If you're waiting for an end to Nevada's 16-month string of record unemployment, well, hunker down and dig in.
Experts say it'll be at least half a year before the hiring picture stabilizes, and the Silver State could easily see jobless gains through the end of 2010.
"It really comes back to consumers," said Jered McDonald, an economist with the state Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation. "As long as consumers worry about maintaining a job and taking pay cuts, they're just not going to spend on a trip to Las Vegas, and until those folks can start coming back in greater numbers, we're probably going to remain on a negative economic trend."

Cochrane Sees U.S. Jobless Rate Exceeding 10 Percent

Fascism, American Style:
'Too Big to Fail' Is Killing the Middle Class, Celente Says
by Peter Gorenstein - TechTicker
August has been a hot bed of merger & acquisition activity, including:

• Intel to buy McAfee for $7.7 billion
• Mining giant BHP Billiton wants to takeover agricultural goliath Potash for $40 billion.
• Dell to buy 3PAR for about $1.2 billion in cash
• First Niagara Financial Group agreed to buy Connecticut's

NewAlliance Bancshares Inc. for about $1.5 billion in cash and stock.
M&A activity is generally viewed as a good sign for the market and economy.
To the contrary, says Gerald Celente, director of the Trends Research Institute. "This country went from a nation of Main Street, mom and pop businesses to Wall Street and 'too big to fails'," he tells Tech Ticker in this clip. ("Not only were they 'too big to fail,' they were 'too big to jail'," he says of Wall Street execs.)

This Is Why There Are No Jobs in America
By: DailyWealth - MarketOracle.co.uk
Porter Stansberry writes: I'd like to make you a business offer.
Seriously. This is a real offer. In fact, you really can't turn me down, as you'll come to understand in a moment...
Here's the deal. You're going to start a business or expand the one you've got now. It doesn't really matter what you do or what you're going to do. I'll partner with you no matter what business you're in - as long as it's legal.
But I can't give you any capital - you have to come up with that on your own. I won't give you any labor - that's definitely up to you. What I will do, however, is demand you follow all sorts of rules about what products and services you can offer, how much (and how often) you pay your employees, and where and when you're allowed to operate your business. That's my role in the affair: to tell you what to do. Seriously. This is a real offer. In fact, you really can't turn me down, as you'll come to understand in a moment...

U.S. Mortgage Relief Effort Is Falling Short of Its Goal
By DAVID STREITFELD - NYTimes.com
The Obama administration's mortgage relief program, originally intended to shield three million households from foreclosure, now looks as if it will permanently help as few as one-sixth of that number.
While millions say they need help avoiding foreclosure and many struggling households applied, data released Friday showed the dropout rate from the Making Home Affordable Program was very high: 96,000 trial modifications were canceled by lenders in July. The number of canceled trials now exceeds 616,000.

Post-Mortgage Meltdown, Where Do We Go Now?
NPR.org
For more than 20 years, the mantra in Washington has been "more, not less" when it comes to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the expansion of homeownership.
But in light of the financial crisis and Fannie and Freddie's near-collapse, policy leaders are also rethinking the government's role - and many Americans are starting to question whether homeownership is the only path to the American Dream.
Fannie and Freddie function by buying, bundling and then stamping a government guarantee on mortgages. Then they sell them to investors. It keeps the banks happy because it keeps capital flowing, and it keeps consumers happy because it makes low, fixed-rate mortgages possible.

Rense and Celente prepare for the worst

Mortgage Fraud Is Rising, With a Twist
Adopting to Tighter Rules After Collapse, Scammers Turn to More Complex Plots
By ROBBIE WHELAN
New data suggests that mortgage fraud - which got tougher to pull off after the collapse of the U.S. real estate market - is returning in a big way.
Data prepared for The Wall Street Journal by research firm CoreLogic, examining about seven million home loans made by hundreds of lenders, show that losses from mortgage fraud-ranging from falsified credit reports to identity theft - rose 17% last year after declining 57% in the two years after its 2006 peak.
In 2009, $14 billion in loans, or about 0.7% of all mortgage loans made in the U.S., were originated with fraudulent application data.

Housing Diagnosis: Still Weak
By DAVID REILLY - WSJ.com - $$
Talk of mortgage-market reform has started percolating in Washington. But housing numbers this week are likely to reinforce the notion that the market is still far too weak for radical surgery.
Existing-home sales for July, due Tuesday, are expected to come in at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.63 million, which would mark a nearly 10% decline compared to a year earlier and the first time since June 2009 that the rate has fallen back below 5 million units. Credit Suisse economists believe the figures could reach their lowest level since at least 1999. New-home sales figures due Wednesday, meanwhile, are expected to stay flat with the previous month, at a near-record low of about 330,000 units.

Hard Times Are Getting Harder: Why The Silence?
By Danny Schechter - NewsDissector.com
WHO IS TALKING ABOUT WHAT MATTERS?
We know we live in hard times that are on the verge of getting harder with 500,000 new claims for unemployment last week, a recent record. The stock market may be over for now as fear and panic drives small investors out. Big corporations hoard stashes of cash rather then hire workers.
Foreclosures are up, and the Administration's programs to stop them are down, well below their stated goals, only helping 1/6th of those promised assistance.
And here's a statistic for you: 300,000. That's the number of foreclosure filings every month for the past 17 months. This year, 1.9 million homes will be lost, down from 2 million last year. Is that progress? In July alone, 92, 858 homes were repossessed.

Ron Paul - Discussing Austrian vs. Keynesian Economics

Housing Fades as a Means to Build Wealth, Analysts Say
By DAVID STREITFELD - NYTimes.com
Housing will eventually recover from its great swoon. But many real estate experts now believe that home ownership will never again yield rewards like those enjoyed in the second half of the 20th century, when houses not only provided shelter but also a plump nest egg.
The wealth generated by housing in those decades, particularly on the coasts, did more than assure the owners a comfortable retirement. It powered the economy, paying for the education of children and grandchildren, keeping the cruise ships and golf courses full and the restaurants humming.

A housing fix
Entice investors back to MBS mart
By JONATHON TRUGMAN - NYPost.com
On Aug. 17, the Treasury Department held a "conference" on the future of housing finance. Just a mere two years after the seismic fall, It comes after Healthcare and Fin-Reg. Priorities, huh?
So, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Shaun Donovan of Housing and Urban Development held court with a dozen pre-selected panelists.
Not much really new came out of this confab except for the call by one to nationalize the industry and another to let the divine being sort things out (sort of).
Well, both are unrealistic. In the real world we need good, pragmatic solutions that work. This is serious stuff and so far the "A" Team hasn't come up with much.

California Short Sales and Foreclosures, Part 1 of 3

California Short Sales and Foreclosures, Part 2 of 3

California Short Sales and Foreclosures, Part 3 of 3

5 most (and least) affordable housing markets
First place: Syracuse, N.Y.
Median home price: $88,000
Median income: $64,300
Affordability score: 97.2%
This upstate New York City rocketed to the top of the most affordable major metro areas. More than 97% of all homes sold during the three months ended June 30 were within the reach of families earning the city's median family income.
Affordability is so high in Syracuse not because people make more money there -- the area's median income closely matches the national median of $64,400 -- but because home prices are so low. The median home sells for just under $65,000.

'Cash for clunkers' car dealers investigated
By Gregory Korte, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON - The government is investigating at least 20 car dealerships it claims violated the rules of last year's cash-for-clunkers program. Government auditors say up to $94 million in rebates may be ineligible because they lack the proper documentation.
One year after the $3 billion car-buying frenzy, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has reached an enforcement phase. Nine dealers have paid a total of $71,500 in fines.

Obama's GM bailout may destroy capitalism
Porter Stansberry - SilverBearCafe.com
I'm not going to get into what's fair. That's for individual bondholders to decide," explained new GM CEO (and former CFO) Fritz Henderson. Fair? There's nothing fair about doing business with the government or the unions...
Few people, especially in government and big business, seem to remember one of the founding principles of Western civilization and capitalism: private property. If you borrow someone's private property, you have to pay it back. It's not optional. GM has borrowed $27 billion from its bondholders - and Fritz Henderson was the person who arranged nearly all of these loans while he was CFO. Fritz promised lenders they would be repaid. If GM cannot repay these debts on time with interest, then according to all the laws of this country and 1,000 years of common-law tradition, GM's assets are legally transferred from the company's equity investors to the bondholders through bankruptcy. Them's the rules. But apparently, OBAMA! has other ideas about how things should work...

Fixing Social Security "Relatively Simple" But Pension Crisis Will "End in Tears," Mauldin Says
by Peter Gorenstein - TechTicker
Social Security turns 75 this month. A pillar of the New Deal era, Social Security remains vitally important to Americans and shapes the way many plan for retirement. "Half of Floridians on Social Security rely on the benefit for half their income. Some 25 percent count on Social Security for at least 90 percent of their income," notes a recent St. Petersburg Times story.
At 75, however, Social Security is showing its age. Based on current projections the program will fail to pay 100% of promised benefits in 2037. ItÕs also suffering a crisis of confidence among younger Americans. That same St. Pete Times article sites a recent USA Today-Gallup Poll that found 75% of those 18 to 34 "don't expect to get a Social Security check."

Fidelity: Withdrawals From Retirement Accounts Hit Record High
By HUGH COLLINS - DailyFinance.com
The number of workers making hardship withdrawals from their retirement accounts reached a record high in the second quarter as the sagging economy drains household wealth.
High unemployment, fewer working hours and reduced amounts of overtime have hit the take-home pay of many workers, The Associated Press reported.
"People tend to be taking home less," Beth McHugh, vice president of marketing insight at Fidelity Investments, told the AP. "As a result the percentage of individuals initiating hardship distributions is one of the things we're concerned about."

The Erosion of America's Middle Class
by Thomas Schulz - LewRockwell.com
While America's super-rich congratulate themselves on donating billions to charity, the rest of the country is worse off than ever. Long-term unemployment is rising and millions of Americans are struggling to survive. The gap between rich and poor is wider than ever and the middle class is disappearing.
Ventura is a small city on the Pacific coast, about an hour's drive north of Los Angeles. Luxury homes with a view of the ocean dot the hillsides, and the beaches are popular with surfers. Ventura is storybook California. "It's a well-off place," says Captain William Finley. "But about 20 percent of the city is what we call at risk of homelessness." Finley heads the local branch of the Salvation Army.

Understanding America's Class System...
Honk if you love caviar
Joe Bageant - SilverBearCafe.com
How about them political elites, huh? Five million bucks for Chelsea Clinton's wedding, 15K just to rent the air-conditioned shitters - huge chrome and glass babies with hot water and everything. No gas masks and waxy little squares of toilet paper for those guys.
Yes, it looks big time from the cheap seats. But the truth is that when we are looking at the political elite, we are looking at the dancing monkey, not the organ grinder who calls the tune. Washington's political class is about as upwardly removed from ordinary citizens as the ruling class is from the political class. For instance, they do not work for a living in the normal sense of a job, but rather obtain their income from abstractions such as investment and law, neither of which ever gave anybody a hernia or carpal tunnel. By comparison, the ruling class does not work at all.

How Many Laws Have You Broken Today?
by Mark Nestmann - LewRockwell.com
If you're like most Americans, you violate numerous laws each day, probably without even knowing it.
As I wrote in a blog entry nearly three years ago, in New Jersey, you can be arrested for driving by your own home. In Florida, a man was sentenced to six years in prison for carrying cash. In Pennsylvania, a woman faces prison for yelling obscenities at her clogged toilet. You can even be imprisoned for the crime of withdrawing lawfully earned currency from your own bank account.

Ron Paul: The American Empire Can't Afford Another War!

Top Expert: Geology is "Fractured", Relief Wells May Fail ...
Washington's Blog
BP is Using a "Cloak of Silence", Refusing to Share Even Basic Data with the Government
Few people in the world know more about oil drilling disasters than Dr. Robert Bea.
Bea teaches engineering at the University of California Berkeley, and has 55 years of experience in engineering and management of design, construction, maintenance, operation, and decommissioning of engineered systems including offshore platforms, pipelines and floating facilities. Bea has worked for many years in governmental and quasi-governmental roles, and has been a high-level governmental adviser concerning disasters. He worked for 16 years as a top mechanical engineer and manager for Shell Oil, and has worked with Bechtel and the Army Corps of Engineers. One of the world's top experts in offshore drilling problems, Bea is a member of the Deepwater Horizon Study Group, and has been interviewed by news media around the world concerning the BP oil disaster.
Washington's Blog spoke with Dr. Bea yesterday.

Scientists Question Government's Gulf Oil Findings

On the Death of Matthew Simmons
Tom Whipple - SilverBearCafe.com
Last week Matt Simmons, who was America's preeminent proponent of the idea that world oil production was about to peak, died at the age of 67. Simmons was unique among those talking and writing about peak oil in that he came from the very heart of American capitalism, a self-made investment banker for the oil industry. Unlike most who are outspoken on the issue of peak oil, Simmons was a Republican, an energy advisor to President George W. Bush, and commanded the attention of the financial and mainstream media.
Whenever the price of gasoline got a little too high for comfort, the worthies of the Fourth Estate would summon the unorthodox-but-acceptable Simmons to explain to obviously skeptical interviewers just why he believed that cheap gasoline would not be around much longer.

Is Barack Obama Really A Saudi / Muslim "Plant"
in the White House?

Israelis and Palestinians Plan Direct Peace Talks

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Archived Page Link
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Friday 08.20.2010

Iran watch . . . updated Friday mid-day

Is War with Iran imminent?
by Claude Salhani - OilPrice.com
Iran, it is believed, is on the fast track to develop nuclear weapons which Israel sees as a direct threat to not only its security, but to its very existence. The question is just how real is the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran?
Would the Islamic Republic deploy nukes against the Jewish state? In spite the rhetoric from its leadership, primarily its president, the possibility of an Iranian strike against Israel is most unlikely. Iran knows the repost will be instantaneous and devastating.

A major military surprise is close.
Galant scandal a smokescreen
DEBKAfile Special Report
War preparations are reported by DEBKAfile's military sources in Tehran and Damascus, DEBKAfile's military sources report.
In Tehran, Iran's Revolutionary Guards announced Friday, Aug. 20: "IRGC is in full readiness to encounter firmly with the stupidity of the US and the Zionist regime."
In Damascus, Syrian prime minister Naji al-Otari gathered his ministers and heads of security and emergency services Thursday and ordered them to place all their services on immediate war readiness.
And sources close to the Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas quoted him as saying that direct talks with Israel were not in the offing because "a big military surprise awaits the Middle East."

Worst-Case Scenarios: Possible Strike Plans for Iran Involve Risky Options
By Judson Berger - FOXNews.com
At some point, military leaders in the United States and in Israel will have to decide: Which is more dangerous -- an Iran capable of launching a nuclear weapon? Or an Iran that just got hit with tons of artillery and is out for revenge?Ê
Both scenarios are frightening, particularly to the Israelis. U.S. officials have described the prospects of a nuclear-armed Iran and a military confrontation as equally terrible, particularly at a time when the Obama administration is trying to end nearly a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan.
But the thought of military action is not far-fetched. The United States acknowledges it possesses an attack plan for Iran, and the Israelis reportedly have drawn up specific scenarios for a strike.

Gulf States Pushing for Attack on Iran
by Hillel Fendel - IsraelInternationslNews.com
First it was the United Arab Emirates ambassador in Washington, now it's a Saudi Arabian editorial, and John Bolton says the entire Persian Gulf feels the same: an attack on Iran is the only option - if it's not too late.
An editorial in an official Saudi Arabian newspaper indicates that a military attack against Iran might be the only way of stopping it from obtaining nuclear weapons. "Tehran is moving its conflict with the international community into high gear," the Al Madina daily wrote this week, "and [in this case] some may consider the military option to be the best solution."

Israelis Conducting Covert Maritime Operations in Persian Gulf
by Wayne Madsen - OilPrice.com
Chinese and Japanese intelligence agencies, which closely monitor events in the Persian Gulf due to the dependence of both countries on oil from the region, report that Israeli Navy commandos have recently been active in creating maritime incidents in the Gulf that could be blamed on Iran.
The five incidents that have Israel under the scrutiny of the intelligence services of China and Japan, the world's second and third largest economic powers, respectively, are the "robbery" attacks on four merchant ships off Basra, Iraq on August 8 and the July 28 explosion on the Japanese supertanker MV M. Star in the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

Al-Qaida prepares for Israel-Iran war
By JPOST.COM STAFF
Report: Al-Shehri warns against "the greater state of Israel."
Al-Qaida is ready to exploit a war "by the Jews against Iran," the Sunni group's second-in-command in Yemen, Saeed al-Shehri, said in an audio message this month, according to the Daily Beast.
The mostly Shi'ite nation of Iran is an enemy to Al-Qaida, and al-Shehri predicted that after Israel attacked Iranian nuclear installations, Iran would blame Saudi Arabia - which reports say may let Israel fly through its airspace to attack Iran - and use the opportunity to seize the holy cities of Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia.

U.S. Assures Israel That Iran Threat Is Not Imminent
By MARK MAZZETTI and DAVID E. SANGER - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - The Obama administration, citing evidence of continued troubles inside Iran's nuclear program, has persuaded Israel that it would take roughly a year - and perhaps longer ... for Iran to complete what one senior official called a "dash" for a nuclear weapon, according to American officials.
Administration officials said they believe the assessment has dimmed the prospect that Israel would pre-emptively strike against the country's nuclear facilities within the next year, as Israeli officials have suggested in thinly veiled threats.

Will Israel attack Iran's nuclear reactor?
By Chet Nagle - DailyCaller.com
Russia will begin loading fuel rods into Iran's new nuclear reactor on Friday. Ultimately, the Bushehr complex will produce Plutonium (Pu239) much faster than centrifuges can deliver Uranium (U235), and Pu239 is better material for atomic weapons. But unlike attacks on similar reactors in Iraq (1981) and Syria (2007), the Israelis will not attempt to destroy Bushehr in the next two days or, indeed, two months. Why not?
There are sound reasons for Israel to allow the fueling of the complex's first reactor, the Bushehr 1. The main reason is that the Obama administration agreed not to oppose starting Bushehr 1 in exchange for Russia's support of UN sanctions on Iran. Though those sanctions are largely useless, and though Russia, China, and others will continue to cheat on sanctions, Israel will not overtly oppose U.S. policy unless there is a clear and present danger to Israel. To embellish his policy of no military action against the Islamic Republic of Iran, President Obama signaled he wants to talk to Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - a futile wish he has made at least twice before. Echoing that sentiment, the State Department pooh-poohed the latest UN report on Iran's uranium enrichment violations by saying,"We are hopeful that Iran will express a willingness to come to the table. We stand ready to have that dialogue."

America Cannot Go to War for Israel
by Ahmed Moor - HuffingtonPost.com
The mongrel dogs of war are foaming at the bit. For years they've cowered in their damp trenches, bristling in the heat. But they're back now. They've gathered their sagging flesh and cast their milky, crusty eyes at Iran. The mongrel dogs of war are planning another war.
The Zionists Benjamin Netanyahu, Jeffrey Goldberg and George Will want young American men and women to attack Iran on behalf of Israel. These are the same men who wanted young American men to attack Iraq. But Iran is not Iraq, and many thousands of Americans will die in the next war. This will not be a cakewalk or a slam dunk. And no enwreathed children will greet Americans in the streets with lily-white flower petals.

HOMEOWNERS' REBELLION:
COULD 62 MILLION HOMES BE FORECLOSURE-PROOF?
Ellen Brown, WebOfDebt.com
.... MERS was convenient for the mortgage industry, but courts are now questioning the impact of all of this financial juggling when it comes to mortgage ownership. To foreclose on real property, the plaintiff must be able to establish the chain of title entitling it to relief. But MERS has acknowledged, and recent cases have held, that MERS is a mere "nominee" - an entity appointed by the true owner simply for the purpose of holding property in order to facilitate transactions. Recent court opinions stress that this defect is not just a procedural but is a substantive failure, one that is fatal to the plaintiff's legal ability to foreclose.
That means hordes of victims of predatory lending could end up owning their homes free and clear - while the financial industry could end up skewered on its own sword.

REPEALING OBAMACARE: HR 4972 and HR 5444
by William F. Jasper - Liberty News Online
Repealing ObamaCare is not an option - it is absolutely essential. It is absolutely essential, that is, if the United States of America is to survive as a constitutional republic with a federal government of limited powers. Repealing ObamaCare is also absolutely necessary if we hope to avoid national economic collapse.
To those who may think such statements are overblown, we strongly advise that they read, in particular, Thomas R. Eddlem's "Outcome of ObamaCare" as well as Michael Tennant's "The New World of ObamaCare." As these articles amply demonstrate, the mammoth "health care reform" bill that was rammed through Congress last March and signed by President Obama is jam-packed with dangerous language that will provide federal bureaucrats with vast new powers that are compatible with totalitarian systems of government, but not with the American tradition of liberty.

Analysts See $1.3 Trillion Deficit
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Congress' budget analysts are estimating that this year's federal deficit will exceed $1.3 trillion, slightly below last year's total but still a huge ocean of red ink.

China Dumps the Dollar as Yields Sink
BY DON MILLER, Associate Editor, Money Morning
China cut its holdings of Treasury notes and bonds by the most ever in June, instead favoring the debt of Europe, Japan and Korea. The move has fueled speculation that plummeting U.S. yields are driving away the Asian giant, which has ambitions for its currency, the yuan, to replace the dollar as the world's main reserve currency.
China's holdings of long-term Treasuries fell by $21.2 billion in June to $839.7 billion, a U.S. government report showed recently. Total Chinese investment in U.S. debt declined 2.8% to $843.7 billion, the smallest in a year, following a 3.6% slide in May.
The shift comes as President Barack Obama increases U.S. debt to record levels, making it harder to finance sales to sustain the U.S. economic expansion.

Western profits wilt on China's surging wages
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
Rising wage and production costs in China are eating into the profits of Western companies and may soon set off an exodus of multinational companies to cheaper locations.
A report by Credit Suisse said the vast majority of US and European companies in China are expecting a "margin hit" over the next 12 months and fear they will not be able to pass on the costs to consumers, with the biggest worries in electronics, clothing, and retail.
The bank said Footlocker, Liz Claiborne, and Office Depot would tip into outright loss in a worst-case scenario, defined as a 20pc rise in costs without any pass-through to customers.

We're Rolling Over Even With The Fed Openly Juicing The Market?
By: Graham Summers - iStockAnalyst.com
Is that all she wrote?
The bulls have gunned for 1,100 on the S&P 500 twice now in the last two days. Both times they got strongly rejected. In fact, yesterday's ramp job failed to even take out the Tuesday high of 1,099. This is hardly a bullish development especially given what's going on "behind the scenes."
As I've mentioned countless times, options expiration week is when the Federal Reserve makes its largest money pumps into the Wall Street banks. In fact, the Fed continued this practice even AFTER QE 1 officially ended in March 2010.

Gold manipulation: Central banks are now in deep trouble
FinanceAndEconomics.org
Central banks have routinely manipulated the gold market since the beginning of fractional reserve banking, but they have always eventually failed in their quest. This time there is circumstantial evidence that we could be on the verge of the most spectacular failure so far.
Physical bullion differs from other investment media because today there is no secondary market. Buyers of bullion are not speculators, or even investors: they take delivery, hoarding it from the market, and are not tempted to resupply it at any price. To some degree this loss from the market has been replaced by newly mined gold and scrap, but the size of the market is such that gold from these sources is now insufficient for hoarding demand. So when the bullion banks try to shake out the bulls, as they have recently, they may manage to reduce their short position in the paper markets; but the lower prices for bullion simply generates extra physical demand. The result is that the size of the paper market has become increasingly dangerous relative to the physical gold actually available.

The Failure of the Second London Gold Pool
By: Adrian Douglas - GoldSeek.com
This article is a sequel to my article entitled "Gold Market is not "Fixed", it's Rigged" which is essential reading before reading this article. The previous article demonstrated that had a trader consistently bought gold on the London AM Fix and sold it the same day on the London PM Fix and repeated it every day from April 2001 through to today the cumulative loss would be $500 per ounce. Yet gold has been in a bull market during that time and a "buy and hold" strategy over the same time period would have returned a gain of $950 per ounce.
I have termed the arithmetic difference between the PM Fix and the AM Fix the "intraday change." Figure 1 shows the evolution of the cumulative intraday change from 2001 to 2010 along with the gold price evolution as expressed by the London PM Fix price.

The Stealth Debt Restructuring: Inflation
By JACK EWING - NYTimes.com
Europe's sovereign debt crisis seems to have gone on holiday along with most of the rest of the Continent during August. But many economists warn that the underlying debt problem is merely in remission and could recur at any moment, once again upsetting world markets.
Joachim Fels, co-head of global economics at Morgan Stanley, talked Thursday about how Europe is ultimately likely to deal with excessive debt in Greece, Spain, Portugal and several other countries. His answer boils down to one word: inflation.

Dying of Money: Lessons of the Great German and American Inflations [Rare book PDF] by Jen O. Parsson
Most of us have at least a general idea of what we think inflation is. Inflation is the state of affairs in which prices go up. Inflation is an old, old story. Inflation is almost as ancient as money is, and money is almost as ancient as man himself.

Top feeds off the bottom
by Yogibear101 - Wall Street Examiner Forums and Bears Chat
You, we and 6 billion others are the bottom
The center of the financial universe is London, it's been in control since a calendar was invented.
Credit is money
No credit=no money
No money=the bottom is dead
The bottom dies=the top dies (in style of course)
If you wish to survive the die back, buy a tent and bic lighters.

The Great American Bond Bubble
If 10-year interest rates, which are now 2.8%, rise to 4% as they did last spring, bondholders will suffer a capital loss more than three times the current yield.
By JEREMY SIEGEL AND JEREMY SCHWARTZ
Ten years ago we experienced the biggest bubble in U.S. stock market history-the Internet and technology mania that saw high-flying tech stocks selling at an excess of 100 times earnings. The aftermath was predictable: Most of these highfliers declined 80% or more, and the Nasdaq today sells at less than half the peak it reached a decade ago.
A similar bubble is expanding today that may have far more serious consequences for investors. It is in bonds, particularly U.S. Treasury bonds. Investors, disenchanted with the stock market, have been pouring money into bond funds, and Treasury bonds have been among their favorites. The Investment Company Institute reports that from January 2008 through June 2010, outflows from equity funds totaled $232 billion while bond funds have seen a massive $559 billion of inflows.
We believe what is happening today is the flip side of what happened in 2000.

Hawker, union to start talks today
WICHITA BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Chris Moon
Contract talks begin today between the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers and Hawker Beechcraft Corp. - a discussion that could play a pivotal role in the plane-maker's future presence in Wichita.
The two sides are reopening talks after Hawker has said it is considering moving work outside of Wichita and, possibly, outside the United States.
The union's negotiating committee has said not reopening negotiations with Hawker "would be grim, drastically affecting the employment levels and the future of Wichita operations." The union has been talking with Hawker for the past several weeks about reopening negotiations.

NO GOLDEN EGG FROM THIS GOOSE
PowerLine.com
Fox News reports that new applications for unemployment insurance reached the half-million mark last week for the first time since November. According to the Department of Labor, there were no special factors that distorted the numbers. Therefore, this news is more evidence that employers are cutting jobs again as the economy slows.
Many economists had warned that a robust recovery was by no means guaranteed. Now, some are now predicting a double-dip recession and/or a lengthy period of stagnation like the one Japan experienced for about a decade.

Taxpayers on the hook for $3 trillion in pensions
By Hibah Yousuf,
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Even if the costly state pension system undergoes reform, taxpayers could get stuck with a hefty bill.
Under the current system, unfunded benefit liabilities -- the amount states owe in promised retirement benefits beyond what they've collected -- exceed $3 trillion.
But even moderate policy changes, which are highly controversial, would only trim that amount by a pinch, according to a recent study released Thursday by Northwestern University economist Joshua Rauh.

Jobless claims rise to highest level in 9 months
By CHRISTOPHER S. RUGABER - AP - MSNBC.com
WASHINGTON - New applications for unemployment insurance reached the half-million mark last week for the first time since November, a sign that employers are likely cutting jobs again as the economy slows.
The Labor Department said Thursday that initial claims for jobless benefits rose by 12,000 last week to 500,000, the fourth increase in the past five weeks. Wall Street economists forecast that claims would drop.

Jobless Data Overshadows Intel Deal on Wall Street
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Shares on Wall Street retreated Thursday after the Labor Department said claims for unemployment benefits rose unexpectedly, renewing concerns about the pace of a recovery.
The disappointing news about the jobs market came minutes after investors learned that the chip maker Intel was acquiring McAfee. The acquisition, valued at $7.68 billion, helped cushion the fall from the rise in unemployment benefit claims. Under the deal, Intel will pay $48 a share in cash, a 60 percent premium over McAfee's Wednesday closing price of $29.93.

Michael Moore: Profits Are Way Up at General Motors ...
So Why Aren't They Hiring?
"If we want a life worth living for ourselves and our kids, we have to go get it ourselves. We can't keep waiting for the cavalry to come. That's because we're the cavalry."
Michael Moore - AlterNet.com
So General Motors is back to making billions in profit. And if the past is any guide, we know what that means: time for some layoffs!
Or maybe not. Back in the '80s and '90s, when GM was consistently posting giant profits, they were simultaneously firing tens of thousands of workers in my hometown of Flint and across Michigan. Right now it looks like the only person being canned is CEO Edward Whitacre. (Only last week Whitacre was saying he wasn't planning to leave anytime soon-kind of ironic that the former president of the Boy Scouts of America failed to Be Prepared.)
But if they're not laying people off yet, they're also not hiring.

Four bankruptcies in Kansas per 1,000 residents
WICHITA BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Emily Behlmann
There were 4.04 bankruptcy filings in Kansas for every 1,000 residents during the year that ended June 30, 2010, according to data released this week by the Administrative Office of the United States Courts.
The data shows increases in bankruptcy filings nationwide.
Kansas' total means the state had the 32nd highest rate of per-capita bankruptcies nationwide.
Nevada had the highest rate, with 11.74 bankruptcies filed during the year for every 1,000 people.
A majority of bankruptcy filings on the nationwide report - about 90 percent - were by individuals, not businesses.

Four Banks May Face $42B Loss
By: Zacks Equity Research
The four largest U.S. banks may incur losses of up to $42 billion if housing finance giants Fannie Mae (FNMA - Snapshot Report) and Freddie Mac (FMCC - Analyst Report) force them to repurchase faulty mortgages, Fitch Ratings stated on Wednesday.
The four banks are JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM - Analyst Report), Citigroup Inc. (C - Analyst Report), Bank of America Corp. (BAC - Analyst Report) and Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC - Analyst Report). According to the rating agency, if these banks repurchase 25% of the mortgage giants' troubled loans, the expected loss would be $17 billion. However, if the government-sponsored entities (GSEs) compel them to repurchase half of their faulty loans, the loss could extend to $42 billion.
Fitch also said that if the scenario becomes extremely worse, the faulty loan amount for these four banks could total $175 billion to $180 billion.

5 Trillion More Dollars To Fix Fannie Mae And Freddie Mac???
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have become gigantic financial black holes that the U.S. government endlessly pours massive quantities of money into. Unfortunately, if the U.S. government did allow Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to totally implode, both the mortgage industry and the housing industry in the United States would completely collapse. So essentially the U.S. government finds itself between a rock and a hard place. Prior to the financial crisis of the last few years, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were profit-seeking private corporations that also had a government-chartered mission of expanding home ownership in America. But now that they have been officially taken over by the U.S. government, they have become gigantic bottomless money pits. It is hard to even describe just how much of a mess Fannie and Freddie are in. However, the unprecedented intervention by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in the mortgage market over the past couple of years has been about the only thing that has kept it from plunging into absolute chaos. So what does the future hold for Fannie Mae and for Freddie Mac? Well, according to one estimate, it could take another 5 trillion dollars to "fix" Fannie Mae And Freddie Mac.

Foreclosure rate soars in suburbs
Affluent areas now are among the hardest hit
BY STEVE LAW - The Portland Tribune
While Portlanders continue to be plagued by home foreclosures, the number of distressed homeowners is spiking even faster in the suburbs these days.
Foreclosure actions filed against homeowners in upscale Lake Oswego mushroomed 20 percent the first six months of this year, compared with the same period last year, and rose 10 percent in jobs-rich Hillsboro, according to RealtyTrac Inc., an Irvine, Calif., real estate data services company. RealtyTrac counted nearly 300 Lake Oswego properties socked with foreclosure actions from January through June and more than 500 Hillsboro properties.

Refinancing homeowners are going short
By Bill Briggs - msnbc.com contributor
Many customers take 30-year loans down to 15 or 20
After being blindsided by a job loss last spring, sales exec Ren Chirakos didn't need his new MBA degree to calculate the scary numbers: The math got simple real fast.
Zero income + new COBRA bills + a house payment = something had to give in the Chirakos family budget. The answer: refinancing his 30-year home loan to a shorter mortgage that tapped into the trend of ever-shrinking interest rates.
"I needed to keep my house," said Chirakos, who since has found work at a different company in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio. His wife is a stay-home mom who cares for their two daughters. "It forces you to look at 'OK, where is our money going?' You start looking for ways to shave fixed expenses. It really gives you cause to think."

Many renters don't ever plan to buy a house
BIRMINGHAM BUSINESS JOURNAL
More than a quarter of people who rent a place to live do not plan to buy a home, ever, according to a survey by real estate information business Trulia Inc.
San Francisco-based Trulia found that 27 percent of renters don't ever plan to buy, and that two-thirds of those who do plan to buy will wait more than two years. Such postponed buying could delay the U.S. housing market's recovery, Trulia said.
Pete Flint, Trulia's CEO, said, "Renters converting into buyers are crucial to turning around the housing slump."

California close to issuing IOUs - again
By Tami Luhby, senior writer
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- California is once again running out of money and may have to issue IOUs within a few weeks.
The state's financial crunch stems from the fact that it does not have a budget for the current fiscal year, which began July 1. The governor and lawmakers continue to squabble over how to close an estimated $19 billion shortfall.
State Controller John Chiang said Wednesday that the state could have to issue IOUs in two to four weeks to keep the state solvent. He estimates there are $2.2 billion in expenses -- mainly to social service agencies, vendors and schools -- that will go unpaid in August.

Pizza Hut Cuts Prices Again to Counteract the Slow Recovery
By STUART ELLIOTT - NYTimes.com
MONTHS after stirring up the pizza category with promotional price cuts, Pizza Hut is putting its products on sale.
Pizza Hut, part of Yum Brands, plans to introduce a campaign on Sunday for new everyday low prices on its mainstay menu items. Most medium pizzas will cost $8, most large pizzas will be priced at $10 and most so-called specialty pizzas - like the new behemoth Big Italy pie, which has 18 slices - will cost $12 each.

Intel to buy McAfee for $7.68 billion
by Lance Whitney - CNETNews.com
Intel plans to buy security company McAfee for $7.68 billion--the biggest acquisition in its 42-year history.
The chipmaker said Thursday it has entered into a definitive agreement to buy all of McAfee's common stock at $48 per share in cash. McAfee's stock closed Wednesday at $29.93, making Intel's offer a 60 percent premium.
The boards of both companies have approved the deal.
Security has become an essential element of online computing, on par with energy-efficient performance and connectivity, Intel said. But today's security isn't adequately addressing the array of new Net-connected machines on the market, such as mobile devices, TVs, cars, ATMs, and medical gadgets, according to Intel. Offering protection requires a new approach that can tie together software, hardware, and services, the company said.

Court OKs Covert iPhone Audio Recording
By David Kravets - Wired.com
Using an iPhone to secretly record a conversation is not a violation of the Wiretap Act if done for legitimate purposes, a federal appeals court has ruled.
"The defendant must have the intent to use the illicit recording to commit a tort of crime beyond the act of recording itself," (.pdf) the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled.
Friday's decision by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which involves a civil lawsuit over a secret audio recording produced from the 99-cent Recorder app, mirrors decisions in at least three other federal appeals courts.

Oil Plume From Spill Persists, Data Show
By ROBERT LEE HOTZ - WSJ.com (free)
Oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill formed an underwater plume of hydrocarbons the size of Manhattan, scientists said Thursday, raising fears of a lingering cloud of trace chemicals in the Gulf with an unknown long-term impact.
The new findings from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution add to evidence from other research groups this week that the offshore spill - the largest in history - is confounding scientists' assumptions about how the Gulf waters are interacting with the mass of oil.

BP and the Government Are Underplaying the Difficulty of Stopping the Oil Leak - Washington's Blog
While BP and the government say that permanently capping the oil well is no problem, they act like they have little idea of what they're doing.
Indeed, Admiral Thad Allen is now saying "We're concerned about the vital signs of this well":

"Concerned about the vital signs of this well --
We continue to be concerned about the vital signs"

He's also saying that completion of relief well will be delayed until mid-September, at the earliest, and that the government is looking for problematic "material" in the well:

JUST IN: Feds delay completion of relief well until MID-SEPTEMBER... "HOPEFULLY"

What's really going on?
Well, initially, if the well had structural integrity, there wouldn't be concern about the "vital signs" of the well, there wouldn't have been delay after delay in completing the relief wells, there wouldn't be never-ending rounds of new tests, there wouldn't have been an attempt to seal it (or perhaps more accurately, patch it) from the top using cement, there wouldn't be an attempt to remove "material" from the well.

Oil Plumes May Be More Toxic Than Thought, Scientists Warn
By JOHN COLLINS RUDOLF - NYTimes.com
Undersea plumes of microscopic oil droplets extending dozens of miles from the BP wellhead may be more toxic to marine microorganisms in the Gulf of Mexico than previously believed, according to preliminary experimental results from Florida researchers.
Scientists from the University of South Florida, working from a research vessel northeast of the wellhead, found oil droplets scattered in sediment along the gulf floor and in the water column, they said in a report on Tuesday. The dispersed oil appeared to be having a toxic effect on bacteria and phytoplankton, a photosynthetic microorganism that serves as a vital food for fish and other marine life.

The Age of Treason: 1958 Book Exposes Chemical Attack on Humanity
By Daniel Taylor - Old-Thinker News
Dr. R. Swinburne Clymer was in many ways a man ahead of his time, and most certainly controversial. He was attacked by the medical establishment for connecting diet with disease and mental health in his 1917 book Dietetics. Dr. Clymer received his medical degree in 1902 from the College of Medicine and Surgery in Chicago and began practicing Osteopathy. Accusations of fraud surround Dr. Clymer's career, including this 1923 edition of the Journal of the American Medical Association which claims that, "Our records fail to show that this man was ever regularly graduated by any reputable medical college." What Clymer had to say more than likely had something to do with the denouncement that he received from the medical establishment.
Though Dr. Clymer may be surrounded with controversy, his 1958 book Your Health and Sanity in the Age of Treason exposes toxic food additives and fluoride with documentation - the majority of which are mainstream scientific studies - that can be verified many times over. What makes this book unique is the fact that Dr. Clymer was one of the first to point out that statements by the elite indicated that these toxins were to be deliberately released "...for the mental deterioration and moral debasement of the mass..."

Growing number unsure of Obama's religion
by Mike Memoli - The Swamp - Chicago Tribune in Washington
For the first time in its polling, the Pew Research Center finds that more Americans don't know what President Obama's religion is than correctly identify him as a Christian.
All told, more than two-in-five Americans say they aren't clear about the president's religion, up 9 percent from the previous survey in March 2009. Only 34 percent say Obama is Christian, down a whopping 14 percent.

THE GREAT DECEIVER - Mike Fischer

Sheriff's Challenge to Obama:
Give Me Half Hour, I'll Show You How to Secure Border
By Terence P. Jeffrey, Editor-in-Chief
(CNSNews.com) - Sheriff Paul Babeu of Pinal County, Ariz., is issuing an invitation to President Barack Obama: If the president will come and spend a half hour with Babeu in Arizona, the sheriff says, he will convince the president he can succeed in securing the border and thus make himself a hero who transcends partisan politics.
Babeu's southern Arizona county, while not contiguous with the border, has been designated by the Justice Department as part of a High Intensity Drug Trafficking region that is a major route for drug and alien smugglers bringing narcotics and illegal aliens into the United States from Mexico. Babeu has joined with Sheriff Larry Dever of neighboring Cochise County, Ariz.-which does sit on the border - as well as with Arizona's two senators, John McCain and Jon Kyl, in endorsing a ten-point plan for securing the border.

Nearly Half of United States Considering Arizona-Style Immigration Legislation - By Fred Lucas, Staff Writer
(CNSNews.com) - Twenty-two states are now in the process of drafting or seeking to pass legislation similar to Arizona's law against illegal immigration. This is occurring despite the fact that the Obama administration has filed a lawsuit against the Arizona law and a federal judge has ruled against portions of that law - a ruling that is now being appealed.
Next month, two Rhode Island state lawmakers, a Democrat and a Republican, will travel to Arizona to speak with Republican Gov. Jan Brewer, local sheriffs, and other officials about how to better craft their own bipartisan immigration bill for Rhode Island, which already has been enforcing some federal immigration laws.

Mexico Under Siege
Business Heads Plead as Drug Gangs Terrorize Wealthy City
By NICHOLAS CASEY - WSJ.com (free)
MONTERREY, Mexico - A surge of drug violence in Mexico's business capital and richest city has prompted an outcry from business leaders who on Wednesday took out full-page ads asking President Felipe Calderón to send in more soldiers to stem the violence.
The growing violence in Monterrey, long one of Mexico's most modern and safe cities, is a sign that the country's war against drug gangs is spreading ever further from poorer battlegrounds along the border and into the country's wealthiest enclaves.

La Raza: Deporting 12 Million Illegal Aliens
'Not a Realistic Solution' and U.S. Should Stop Trying
By Adam Cassandra
(CNSNews.com) - The United States cannot deport all 12 million illegal aliens in the United States and should stop trying, a spokeswoman for the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) told CNSNews.com last week.
"We have to recognize that our immigration system has been broken for 20 years and there are now 12 million people living and working and praying among us who are here without documents. Many have spouses who are citizens or children fighting for our country," NCLR Immigration Field Coordinator A. Elena Lacayo said in an e-mail response to a question from CNSNews.com.
"Deporting 12 million people is not a realistic solution," she wrote. "It's time we create a rational immigration system, take these people out of the shadows and restore the rule of law."

Stepping Toward Nuclear Armageddon
Brad MacDonald - theTrumpet.com
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a step closer to his goal of setting off a nuclear apocalypse.
If reports are accurate, in less than 48 hours the Islamic Republic of Iran will begin feeding uranium into its first and only nuclear power plant.
The moment this "irreversible step" is taken, stated Sergei Novikov, a spokesman for the Russian nuclear agency assisting Tehran, the "Bushehr plant will be officially considered a nuclear energy installation." If all goes well, Iran will be producing fissile material by October.
Across the world, news of Bushehr's activation has been met with emotions ranging from apathy to alarm. The indifferent argue that Bushehr's activation was merely a matter of time, and that the facility will not pose a significant threat because it will be used for the production of nuclear energy for civilian consumption. Many others, such as Michael Anton in the Weekly Standard, are deeply concerned because Bushehr, once fueled and operating, "will produce plutonium 239, which can be used to make nuclear weapons."

Pyongyang on its knees: only potatoes to stave off famine
The capital's population had grown accustomed to a slightly better diet compared to the rest of the country. But the sanctions, the five-year plans and currency reform are beginning to be felt. And the population shows signs of timid protests against the regime.
Seoul (AsiaNews) - The population of Pyongyang, the capital of the Stalinist regime of North Korea, is increasingly frustrated because of the price of basic necessities and lack of basic foods in stores, according to former residents, who have fled to South Korea. They point the finger at the last year's disastrous currency reform and against the five years economic plan, which the regime insists on continuing.
According to one source, "market prices continue to rise. The population is angry, and complains of these factors. According to some estimates, 60% of the population is dissatisfied with the authorities". On the other hand the inhabitants of Pyongyang, given its proximity to political power, were used to having better access to goods passing through the country: now they have to survive on potatoes.

U.S.-South Korea Exercises Rile China
Beijing Says Joint Military Drills in Yellow Sea Risk
Imperiling Chinese National Security and Provoking Pyongyang
By ANDREW BROWNE And EVAN RAMSTAD - WSJ.com - $$
BEIJING-Plans by the U.S. and South Korea to conduct military exercises in the Yellow Sea aimed at North Korea, despite China's strong objections, are ratcheting up tensions between Beijing and Washington, already at loggerheads over sensitive regional security issues.
Chinese officials warn that the exercises threaten a crisis on China's doorstep by provoking North Korea, and could inflame public opinion in China.
"There's a real danger things could get out of control - and that would be a real threat for China's national security," a senior official said.

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Thursday 08.19.2010

Made in the USA! . . .

Eric's cousin, Mark, a special guest on today's show is the owner of
ENERGY SHIELD - Energy Tax Credit Approved
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Time is running out for the West
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
The Great Recession has dramatically shrunk the time left for the big AAA states to prevent a full-blown sovereign debt crisis as their demographic time-bomb threatens, US rating agency Moody's has warned.
"Genuinely adverse debt dynamics were only expected to materialise in 15 to 20 years. The crisis has 'fast-forwarded' history, eroding all the time available to adjust," said the group's quarterly Sovereign Monitor.
Moody's fears that the US will crash through its safety buffer by 2013 if growth falters (adverse scenario), with interest payments topping 14pc of tax revenues. The debt-to-revenue ratio has already doubled in three years to 430pc.

While the Economists Lied the US Economy Died
Paul Craig Roberts - SilverBearCafe.com
On August 17, Bloomberg reported a US government release that industrial production rose twice as much as forecast, climbing 1 percent. Bloomberg interpreted this to mean that "increased business investment is propelling the gains in manufacturing, which accounts for 11 percent of the world's largest economy."
The stock market rose.
Let's look at this through the lens of statistician John Williams of shadowstats.com. Williams reports that "the primary driver of a 1.0% monthly gain in seasonally-adjusted July industrial production" was "warped seasonal factors" caused by "the irregular patterns in U.S. auto production in the last two years." Industrial production "shrank by 1.0% before seasonal adjustments."

The Boys From Brazil - Revisited
By: CAPTAINHOOK - GoldSeek.com
The economic news just keeps getting worse and worse (and worse), validating the view we spiraling down in another recession within a larger depression. Of course the effect this is having on an ever-decreasing population of traders (only the pros are left and their numbers are shrinking too as the trade patterns become increasingly bizarre) is to become even more bearish and keep on buying puts, because at some point stocks will turn lower to reflect the fundamentals, right? Unfortunately for surface dwellers that think like this they could keep the squeeze in stocks going far longer than most would remain solvent, being just fine with the bureaucracy because this will enable them to keep the illusion alive longer theoretically.

The World Won't Flock to Paper
National Inflation Association
On July 28th, NIA released an article entitled, "Gold and Silver Capitulation is Near". In this article NIA said, "The sentiment on gold and silver has abruptly changed to the negative like nothing we have ever seen before and to us this means the big move to the upside is right around the corner." It turns out that July 28th was the exact bottom for gold and silver prices. Since then, gold prices have risen 12 out of 15 days for a gain of 5.8% and silver prices have risen 11 out of 15 days for a gain of 5.2%.
It was just announced that China cut their long-term U.S. treasury holdings by $21.2 billion in June to $839.7 billion, their largest cut in U.S. treasury holdings in history. China's holdings of U.S. debt are now at their lowest level in a year. Meanwhile, China has more than doubled their holdings of South Korean debt. It speaks volumes that things have gotten so bad in the U.S. that China sees the need to diversify out of U.S. debt to buy the debt of a third-world nation.

Eighteen Signs That America Is Rotting Right In Front Of Our Eyes
The Economic Collapse - SilverBearCafe.com
Sometimes it isn't necessary to quote facts and figures about government debt, unemployment and the trade deficit in order to convey how badly America is decaying. The truth is that millions of Americans can watch America rotting right in front of their eyes by stepping out on their front porches. Record numbers of homes have been foreclosed on and in some of the most run down cities as many as a third of all houses have been abandoned. Unemployment remains at depressingly high levels and the number of Americans on food stamps continues to set new records month after month. Due to severe budget cuts, class sizes are exploding and school programs are being eliminated. In some areas of the U.S. schools are even going to four day weeks. With little to no funding available, bridges are crumbling and street lights are being turned off in many communities. In some areas, asphalt roads are actually being ground up and turned back into gravel roads because they are less expensive to maintain. There aren't even as many police available to patrol America's decaying cities because budget problems have forced local communities across the U.S. to lay off tens of thousands of officers.

10 Signs The U.S. is Becoming a Third World Country
Activist Post
The United States by every measure is hanging on by a thread to its First World status. Saddled by debt, engaged in wars on multiple fronts with a rising police state at home, declining economic productivity, and wild currency fluctuations all threaten America's future.
The general designations of the ranking system for world status date back to the 1950s, and have included countries at various stages of economic development. Since the Cold War, the definition has come to be synonymous with repressive countries where a wealthy class of ruling elites segment society into the haves and have-nots, many times capitalizing on the conditions that follow an economic crisis or war.

China Swallows Obama Stimulus Meant for U.S. Economy
Commentary by Andy Xie
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- The global economy is like fried ice cream: If you don't act fast, it turns into a mess.
American pundits, Nobel laureates included, are predicting Japan-style deflation for the U.S. and Europe. They are urging the Federal Reserve to pursue another round of quantitative easing to stop the onset of an Ice Age for Western economies. The Fed didn't oblige at its last meeting, but it threw a bone to the deflation crowd by promising not to pull money out of its previous round of asset purchases to stimulate a recovery.

Mixed US Data Keeps the Dollar in a Tight Range
By Chris Gaffney - The DailyReckoning.com
08/18/10 St. Louis, Missouri - Chuck headed on a multi stop cross-country trek to get out to San Francisco today, so he left the Pfennig to me. I think he said he had to fly through Dallas to get over to San Francisco; just one of the joys of no longer being a 'hub'airport.
There was a plethora of data releases here in the US yesterday, but the numbers offset each other keeping the markets fairly stable. Surprisingly strong industrial production data was offset by weak housing starts. Other data showed that wholesale costs in the US increased in July for the first time in four months, throwing cold water on those warning of deflation. Commodity prices were the main driver of the increases of 4.2% versus last year. The core price index (ex food and energy) was still up 1.5%, slightly higher than economists' projections. The data will quiet those who are warning about falling prices and will likely keep the boys and girls over at the FOMC on a "steady as she goes" course.

The Capital-Scarce World To Come
Martin Hutchinson - SilverBearCafe.com
The last 15 years in global markets have been marked by one consistent factor: the ready availability, even overabundance of capital. Returns to investors have been driven down to dangerously low levels, both in debt and equity, by over-expansionary monetary policy, while asset values even after crashes have been far higher than their historical norms. Yet this insouciance about capital, this preparedness to waste it in one feckless bubble after another, must have an inevitable result: at some point in the near future we will face a world of capital scarcity, like the late 1930s in the United States, the early 1950s in Europe or the 1980s in Latin America.

Most Bush Tax Cuts Should Be Extended, Pimco's McCulley Says
By Mary Childs and Kathleen Hays
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- President George W. Bush's tax cuts should be extended except for the top two brackets to help bolster the fragile economic recovery, said Paul McCulley, a managing director at Pacific Investment Management Co.
"Congress has to extend them or else the double-dip- recession risk will go up dramatically," McCulley said in a Bloomberg Radio interview with Kathleen Hays on 'The Hays Advantage.'

INFLATION 101
Jim Quinn - TheBurningPlatform.com
I know some of the people who come to this site understand financial concepts very well, but I also think there are many who might be confused by some of the terms we throw around on a daily basis. The most important concept for you to understand is inflation and how the Government and Federal Reserve have used it to screw you. They actually provide all the information you need to understand in one handy dandy chart. Here is the [download .txt file] link to that chart:
This chart provides the Consumer Price Index from 1913 until today. That is convenient because the Federal Reserve was created in 1913.
The CPI on January 1, 1913 was 9.8. Today it is 217.965. This means that a basket of goods that cost you $9.80 to buy in 1913 would now cost you $217.96. That is called inflation.
Another way to look at it is to divide 9.8 by 217.965. This equals .045. This means that a dollar in 1913 is now worth 4.5 cents. This is a 95.5% reduction in the purchasing power of a dollar in less than 100 years. The Federal Reserve has systematically screwed you for 97 years.

Prepare in August for Hyperinflationary Holidays
By: Dr. Jeffrey Lewis - GoldSeek.com
Ben Bernanke and the rest of the Federal Reserve are priming the pump for what could by a hyper-inflationary Christmas. While the Fed continues to build a pile of kindling, the spark could very well be this holiday shopping season.
Imagine that you had a pile of wood put together to make a camp fire. Your goal is to create the hottest fire imaginable, one that will last for quite some time. You start with the smallest pieces, a few leaves, a couple of pine cones, and a few small sticks. Next you throw on the larger timber. A few logs and some old fence posts will do here. Now, in the spirit of getting this camp fire going, you add a few gallons of pure gasoline. That should be enough to do it, right? Wait, what's that? You forgot the matches?!

The Fed Declares War on America
Drew Mason - SilverBearCafe.com
Bond markets aren't as forward-looking as Wall Street may believe
Does this title sound extreme? If you've been one of those Americans who has saved more than you borrowed and think your wealth is safe in savings accounts and bonds, this may not be extreme at all. As bond owners, CD holders and passbook savers, consciously or unconsciously Americans have stored wealth believing that the US government has their back. This week the Fed made it clear that additional quantitative easing is on the way and that savers of dollar-denominated investments won't be protected to any degree by Washington.

US Prepares For Gold Standard
By Bix Weir - GoldSeek.com
I have often written about the US Treasury and US Mint's very strange behavior when it comes to their part in continuing "business as usual" for the fiat monetary system. Although many have chalked up the Mint's rationing of Gold and Silver American Eagle coins to normal behavior of inept government employees and government bureaucracy, I have a much different take on the subject. I believe they are trying to DELAY and LIMIT the American Eagle program until such time as the US is ready to go back on a gold and silver standard.

The Great American Disaster:
How Much Gold Remains In Fort Knox?
by Chris Weber - LewRockwell.com
A Huge Mystery Remains To Be Solved
Yesterday marked the 39th anniversary of the day when the US Government declared bankruptcy. Oh, they didn't call it that at the time. But what happened on August 15, 1971 was that the US defaulted on its promise to pay gold for dollars.
Before that day, gold was the legal linchpin of the world monetary system. Although every currency was defined in terms of the US dollar, the dollar itself was legally defined as 1/35th of a troy ounce of gold.

All That Glitters...
Mary Anne & Pamela Aden - SilverBearCafe.com
It was another action packed month. The volatility never seems to end, at least that's the way it's been for many months now... actually, for the past few years.
The markets have essentially been reacting to the news of the day for what seems like ages. When the news is good, they rise. When it's bad, or perceived to be bad, the markets get nervous, they become vulnerable and they decline. And investors simply don't know what to do. They're still edgy and uncertain. And as long as this continues, the entire outcome could go either way....
Stay With Gold
So what's an investor to do? Stay in gold. Despite its recent volatility, it's the one investment that benefits during times of uncertainty. As you've seen, it does well during good times and bad. That's been true throughout history, and it still is.

Soros favoured gold in Q2, cut US equities
Gold now represents the billionaire investor's fund's biggest holding by dollar value and with the sale of so many other holdings, gold ETFs now represent almost 13% of the firms total equities
BOSTON (REUTERS) -
Billionaire investor George Soros in the second quarter stuck with his big bet on gold but slashed his holdings in dozens of major U.S. companies from Verizon Communications to Pfizer.
Soros also may have sold his entire holdings in Petroleo Brasileiro SA.
In a quarterly securities filing on Monday, Soros Fund Management reported owning substantially fewer U.S. listed stocks than three months earlier. The fund listed $5.1 billion of equities as of June 30, down 42 percent from $8.8 billion at the end of March.

Gold Rises for Third Day in New York as Demand for Haven Gains
By Millie Munshi
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Gold prices rose, capping a third straight gain, as investors purchased bullion as a haven.
Holdings in global exchange-traded-funds backed by bullion increased for five straight days, data compiled on Aug. 17 shows. That's the longest expansion streak since June 30. Gold reached a record $1,266.50 an ounce in June as investors sought a shield against financial turmoil and currency debasement.
"We're seeing a lot of clients increase their allocation to gold," said William Rhind, the head of U.S. sales and marketing for ETF Securities Ltd. in New York. "We're starting to see the safe-haven trade emerge again as people are uncertain about where growth is heading."

Gold price consolidation - poised for the next move?
Author: Lawrence Williams - MineWeb.com
The gold price appears to be consolidating again and we could well see its high tested and exceeded in September, historically a good month for the yellow metal.
LONDON - The pattern of the gold price over the past few days is for it to move up in steps - it has been reaching a level to prompt profit-taking by less-committed holders and once this profit taking is exhausted it pauses for breath, before moving up another small step. These steps have seemed to be at about $5 intervals of late. But lack of significant holding movement in the ETF sector also suggests the firmer holders are remaining with the precious metal.

Why gold bullion investment is risk free
By Stewart Thomson - CommodityOnline.com
"This is not working, let's try something new."
-approx. quotation from Deng Xiaoping, head of China, circa 1978.
Brilliant observation on Deng's part. Let's have a round of applause for Gman Deng. When you steal the entire wealth of your citizens for yourself, turn them into slaves, and murder millions of those who don't share your "enlightened new era vision," who prefer common sense instead of your Frankenstein Movie, yes, Deng, you need something new. Or maybe you shouldn't have tried to fix what wasn't broken by robbing and murdering millions. Just a "minor" observation on my part.
The past is the past, and Chinese corporations are moving forward, as is the Chinese Gman, (probably temporarily in the case of the Gman). Chinese citizens wonder if a day is coming where the goods in their dollar stores will be made in America. I don't see things going that far. It's a good thing that I don't. The 21st century will be about "the rise of many new major players" more than the new "Empire of China". Click here to read Jim "mighty man" Rogers' latest words on China, a view I not only share, but back up with personal buy action on the Chinese FXI-NYSE, the "Chinese Dow."

Protecting Your Cash, Part II
By Doug Casey - The DailyReckoning.com
08/18/10 Cafayate, Argentina - An Interview with Doug Casey from Cafayate, Argentina
Interviewer: Concerning the risk of foreign exchange controls here in the US, do you think people will have any warning at all?
Doug: I think it's going to come out of left field. It always does, with at most an official denial just before it happens. In August 1971, Nixon devalued the dollar, which immediately dropped against gold and all foreign currencies. I think there's a reasonable probability that the government will do that again. Gold may not be part of the equation, but they may decide to put in some sort of fixed exchange rate between the dollar and various foreign currencies.
The reason for thinking this is simple: with all the dollars outside the United States devalued by that much, that much of a liability just vanishes into thin air. And in the short term - it's never a long-term fix - US exports would go up. This would "stimulate" the domestic economy. Imports to the US would go down, which would make for fewer dollars leaving the US and adding to the $7 trillion overhang the US already has.

Gold resumes upward march
By Jeff Nichols - CommodityOnline.com
It looks increasingly likely that gold has already resumed its long upward march and before long could be registering new all-time highs.
Just in the past week or two there has been an important shift in world financial market sentiment and rising anxiety about the U.S. and global economic outlook is now prompting renewed investor interest in the yellow metal as a safe-haven asset.
Moreover, the latest news from the U.S. Federal Reserve, following last week's Federal Open Market Committee meeting, makes it clear that the Fed is resuming "quantitative easing," the Fed's code words for printing more money.

Gold turns volatile on profit selling
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online): Gold prices were slightly up but remained volatile in Asian trade Wednesday as some investors took to profit selling.
Gold for immediate delivery was seen trading at $1225. 81 an ounce at 12.00 noon Singapore time while U.S. gold futures for December delivery were steady at $1,227.5 an ounce.
Analysts however said, the precious yellow metal remained highly volatile and may swung between gains and losses during the day as record prompted some investors to sell to lock in gains.

Demand perspectives: driving the gold price ever higher
Six key demand factors which will come together and help drive the gold price upwards over the next couple of years.
Author: Julian D.W. Phillips - MineWeb.com
BENONI (GOLDFORECASTER.COM) -
At the moment, it appears that the gold price is being linked to the state of the global economic growth or lack thereof. Is it? Or are there other factors that contribute to the rise in the demand for gold? A look at the different types of demand gives us perspective on the real influences on the gold price.
CHINA
We start with this country's contribution to the gold price, because this week saw an announcement that China is now the second largest economy in the world as well as being the world's largest exporter. This is a landmark announcement as this country is headed fast to be the world's largest economy with the world's largest foreign exchange reserves.

Treasury Bonds Rise as Slowdown Fuels Fed Purchase Speculation
By Susanne Walker
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Treasury 30-year bonds rose, pushing yields to a 16-month low, as investors sought the highest- returning U.S. debt amid speculation the weakening economic recovery may prompt the Federal Reserve to boost debt purchases.
The Fed plans to acquire Treasuries due from 2016 to 2020 tomorrow, after buying $2.551 billion of debt yesterday, to hold borrowing costs down. It announced the purchases Aug. 10, saying it would buy securities for the first time since October using funds from principal payments of its holdings of mortgage-backed debt. Treasury notes erased gains as stocks rose.

Fed Buys $2.551 Billion Treasuries to Aid Economy
By Liz Capo McCormick and Mary Childs
Aug. 17 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve bought $2.551 billion of Treasuries in the first outright purchase of U.S. government debt since October to prevent money from being drained from the financial system.
The Fed bought 14 of the 25 securities listed for possible purchase. The notes mature from August 2014 to February 2016, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York said in a statement today on its website. The New York Fed conducts open-market operations to implement the policies of the Federal Reserve System.

Government Meddling: Bad News, Unless You're an Investor
By Ian Mathias - The DailyReckoning.com
08/18/10 Baltimore, Maryland - The stimulus debate du jour is how the government will save Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. More government support is vital, said Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, the maestro of yesterday's White House housing summit, "to make sure that Americans can borrow at reasonable interest rates to buy a house even in a downturn." It is, after all, your God-given right.
To be clear, the Treasury "will make sure the GSEs have the resources to meet their financial commitments," Geithner added. Whatever the fate of Fannie and Freddie, it will be financed with tax dollars and controlled by government. Both companies, despite being at the very heart of the financial crisis, were left out of the recent Financial Reform Bill.

YOU WANT THEM TO CONTROL HEALTHCARE?
By Chuck Baldwin - NewsWithViews.com
Among the scariest words ever heard are, "We are from the federal government, and we are here to help you." Shiver me timbers, matey! When you hear those words, pick up your peg leg and RUN, because you are about to get hammered. And that is exactly what is fixing to happen to the American people when the new Obama national healthcare law is fully implemented: we are going to get hammered.

Fannie and Freddie: The Exit Doors are Shut
The Automatic Earth - SilverBearCafe.com
From a purely political point of view, it's a
simple story. Existing homeowners are a far more powerful force at the voting booth than potential owners, homebuyers, are. It's therefore very much in the interest of the incumbent government to keep home prices as high as it can. Let them slide too much and you will pay for that at the next election. For potential buyers you can devise plans that lower interest rates and down payments, but that's all. More affordability simply through power prices is not on the political table.

U.S. Banks May Face $180 Billion in Loan Buybacks, Fitch Says
By Laura Keeley
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc. and Wells Fargo & Co. might face demands to repurchase as much as $180 billion of troubled mortgages from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Fitch Ratings said.
At the end of June, the two government-sponsored loan guarantors held a total of $355 billion of troubled mortgages in their portfolios, of which half were serviced by the four banks, the largest in the U.S., Fitch wrote in a report. While it is "conceivable" that debt eligible for repurchase may surpass $175 billion in "an extremely adverse scenario," the banks are more likely to face lesser demands, depending on foreclosure rates and loan documentation.

Credit default swap deals unnerve California
By Nathaniel Popper, Los Angeles Times
Some say credit default swaps may influence the market for muni bonds.
Reporting from New York - Is Wall Street profiting from California's misery?
That's been a concern of state Treasurer Bill Lockyer, who takes a dim view of financial instruments - known as credit default swaps - that enable speculators to bet against California's ability to pay its debts.
Like other giant Wall Street firms, JPMorgan Chase & Co. helps investors place such bets against California but also earns hefty fees from the state for helping it get the best prices on the bonds it sells to finance capital improvements and other expenses.

Why the U.S. may not be the next Japan
By Paul R. La Monica
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The fashionable thing for economists to worry about these days is deflation.
It's hard to go a day without someone proselytizing that the United States is the next Japan and that a Lost Decade looms on the horizon -- or might already have even begun.
The threat of deflation can't be cavalierly dismissed since there are plenty of troubling signs.
The job market is not recovering at a quick enough pace to spur consumers to spend. The housing market is still stagnant. And the Federal Reserve seems hell-bent on keeping both short-term and long-term rates low for the foreseeable future.

Letter from China: Where the consumer is queen
Fortune - CNNMoney.com
Fortune senior editor Jennifer Reingold is filing dispatches from China, where she is traveling with Procter & Gamble CEO Robert McDonald to observe the company's growing emphasis on Asia.
The apartment could be in an wealthy neighborhood in Paris or Manhattan: a gleaming kitchen with coffeemaker, a balcony with a child's bike perched outside, and his and her laptops. Instead, it belongs to an eager representative of China's exploding upper class, a 31-year old bank manager in Shanghai who is watching proudly as Bob McDonald, the CEO of Procter & Gamble (PG), inspects the contents of her bathroom cabinet.

Elephants in the Room
By Bill Baker - The DailyReckoning.com
08/18/10 Baltimore, Maryland -- Is it not heartening to politicians to seize and distribute today's wealth and promise more in future obligations knowing that erosion of the value of fiat currency will reduce the burden of government debt incurred?
Is not their public debt simply a scorecard representing the cumulative transfer of wealth mostly driven by past entitlements, for which politicians lacked the chutzpah to lay at the feet of the taxpayers?
To erase it with excessive printing of money would silently extract value from savers and investors, and most importantly cause capital to flee or be hoarded and essential investment to be foregone.

Tea, Tramadol & Today's Great Depression
By: Adrian Ash, BullionVault - GoldSeek.com
"Even at home there is generally a cup of tea going - a 'nice cup of tea' - and Father, who has been out of work since 1929, is temporarily happy because he has a sure tip for the Cesarewitch..."
- George Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier (London, 1936)
SEVENTY YEARS AGO last month, just as the Battle of Britain began, tea rationing struck the seat of empire.
Really, Herr Hitler had gone too far this time!
Caffeine mixed with sugar, hot water and milk had fuelled the Industrial Revolution just as surely as did cheap coal and expensive sweat. From back-to-back slum to baronial pile - and starting long before London proclaimed Victoria the Empress of India in 1876 - the daily cares of imperial power had been eased every few hours by a "nice cup of tea". According to one 1749 record, a tradesman's family spent more on tea and sugar each week than they did on the basic staple of bread.

U.S. can no longer afford housing tax breaks
By Paul Wiseman, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON - Federal housing policy offers the wealthiest Americans billions in tax breaks without delivering much bang for the buck in increased homeownership, critics told government policymakers Tuesday.
"We aren't getting our money's worth," Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Analytics, said at a government conference on reforming housing policy.
The government spent $230 billion last year to promote homeownership through tax breaks and spending programs. The biggest chunk - $80 billion - went toward the mortgage interest deduction, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Loan Officer Survey Offers No Surprises. Credit Standards Still Tight
by Jann Swanson - MND Newswire
Credit appears to be slowly loosening according to the July Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices conducted by the Federal Reserve. The change, however, is modest and concentrated on large banks lending in categories particularly affected by competitive pressures. The Fed defines large banks as those with more than $50 billion in assets and small banks as those with annual sales under $50 million. Fifty-seven domestic banks and 23 US branches of foreign banks responded to the quarterly survey.
Loosening of lending requirements was most pronounced in the area of commercial and industrial (C&I) loans. Residential lending was only modestly improved, with nearly as many banks reporting they had tightened credit as had loosened it.

Massive Taxpayer Liability or Somewhat More Expensive Mortgages For Everyone? Hmm, I'll Have to Think About That...
Peter Suderman - Reason.com
Policymakers in Washington held a confab yesterday over the head-scratching question of what to do about government-owned mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Discussions like these can sometimes be wonky and impenetrable, but, as this brief passage from The Washington Post's summary of the conference shows, the heart of the debate is actually fairly easy to grasp:
Bill Gross, who runs the world's biggest bond firm, Pimco, argued that the mortgage market should be completely nationalized...Gross's proposal could ensure that mortgages remain affordable for home buyers. That's because the government, which would borrow money to finance the mortgages, faces a relatively low interest rate in the markets. The downside is that taxpayers would be on the line for losses.

Are Federal Employees Compensating for Something?
By The Mogambo Guru - The DailyReckoning.com
08/18/10 Tampa, Florida - The US Bureau of Economic Analysis, an "official" source of news, reported what everybody has already known: Government worker compensation in now an average of more than $120,000, or about twice as much as the average private sector worker making less than $60,000.
I find this particularly interesting because I get a chance to answer some of my critics, who say to me, "Bah! Even though you are absolutely right about the foul Federal Reserve and how their continually creating more and more money is going to ignite an inflation in prices that will destroy us, and you are entirely correct that buying gold, silver and oil are terrific bargains right now because of it, and you are completely spot-on that Obama and Congress are repugnant socialist morons, but you are not as handsome as you think you are, and a lot more stupid, too. And lazy. For instance, you never do any real work."

Jobless millions signal death of the American dream for many
Paul Harris - The Observer - Guardian.co.uk
Even the criminals have fallen on hard times in America's poorest city as the long-term unemployed struggle to keep a grasp on normality
Richard Gaines is one of the best-known faces on Camden's Haddon Avenue. It is a rough-and-tumble street, lined with cheap businesses and boarded-up houses, and is prey to drug gangs. Gaines, 50, runs a barbershop, a hair salon and a fitness business. He works hard and is committed to his community. But Haddon Avenue is not an easy place to make a living in the best of times. And these are far from the best of times.
Just how badly the great recession has struck this fragile New Jersey city, which is currently the poorest in America, was recently spelled out to Gaines. In happier times - whatever that might mean for a city as destitute as Camden - local businesses on Haddon Avenue could at least rely on a bit of trade from those who made their money on the street.

Food Stamps or Paychecks?
by Newt Gingrich - HumanEvents.com
In the 2008 campaign, President Obama gave us all a hint of his socialist leanings when he promised to Joe the Plumber that he would "spread the wealth around." Last week, we found out that his policies and those of the Democrats are delivering on that promiseÉalthough probably not in the way they expected.
The use of food stamps hit a record high in May 2010, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, with 40.8 million Americans receiving Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) subsidies for food purchases. This is more than one-eighth of the population.
Worse, the USDA projects the number of Americans using food stamps will rise to 43.3 million in 2011.

Schwarzenegger Orders Furloughs After Top Court Rules
By Michael B. Marois
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said 150,000 government workers must begin taking time off without pay starting Aug. 20 following a court ruling lifting an injunction temporarily blocking the furloughs.
The California Supreme Court, saying it would review the governor's plan, stayed decisions by lower courts that had halted the furloughs. Schwarzenegger directed state workers to take three unpaid days off each month to save cash. The high court set a Sept. 8 hearing on a challenge to the order.

California Budget Logjam May Lead to IOUs Next Month
By Michael B. Marois
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- California may begin paying bills with IOUs in September for a second year in a row as a legislative logjam over erasing a $19 billion deficit prevents passage of a budget.
State Controller John Chiang said the IOUs may be issued in two to four weeks if the budget impasse persists. The warrants will pay for everything from contracted services to health-care clinics so California can preserve funds to make payments on priority items such as bonds.

US says it is not illegal for schools to spy on students at home
Nick Farrell - TheInquirer.net
IT LOOKS LIKE PROSECUTORS are not going to get involved in the bizarre case of the school which switched on laptops to spy on students while they were in their own bedrooms.
US Attorney Zane David Memeger told USA Today, investigators had found no evidence of criminal intent by Lower Merion School District employees who activated tracking software that took thousands of webcam and screenshot images on school-provided laptops.
A student and his family sued the district in February, claiming officials invaded his privacy by activating the software and the civil case is ongoing.
The school has admitted that it captured 56,000 screen shots and webcam images mostly so it could find missing student laptops. But in the case of this student the school appears to have been using the laptops to investigate home drug use.

USDA Rural Housing Program: Where's the Funding?
by Jann Swanson - MortgageNewsDaily.com
When the USDA ran out of money for its Section 502 guaranteed Rural Housing product in April, the program effectively shut down. At that time it was up to the Congress to appropriate the $150 million needed to continue the program through the September 30 end of the fiscal year. A month later, even though the legislation intended to provide the funding had not passed, USDA began issuing commitments for new loans, but there was a caveat: Loan approvals would be "subject to the availability of funds and Congressional authority to charge a 3.5 percent guarantee fee for purchase loans and a 2.25 percent guarantee fee for refinance loans."

California broadband projects pick up $205 million in federal funding
LATimes.com
Rural California will become a little more wired.
California will receive over $205 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds for seven projects aimed toward bringing fast broadband Internet access to rural and remote communities in the state.
The grants are part of the $1.8 billion in Recovery Act funds announced today by Vice President Joe Biden. The grants were awarded to 94 broadband projects in 37 states.

Fannie's Cozy Ties to Countrywide
by Valerie Richardson - HumanEvents.com
The Obama Administration managed to move financial regulatory reform in July with almost no mention of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, a feat that could be likened to cracking down on fast food without mentioning McDonald's. But the latest revelations about the federally backed mortgage giants could give even the most hardened everyone-deserves-a-house-they-can't-afford Democrat pause.
It turns out that Fannie Mae officials weren't just doing business with the execs at Countrywide Home Loans, they were actively schmoozing them. An internal Fannie Mae "Customer Engagement Plan" issued in 2004 outlines strategies designed to "deepen our relationship at all levels with Countrywide," including squeezing into the same foursome at golf tournaments.

Sowing The Seeds Of Starvation
by John Myers - PersonalLibertyDigest.com
"One death is a tragedy; one million is a statistic." - Joseph Stalin
This summer's searing heat has put a fire beneath grain prices. But worse than another round of inflation is the potential for widespread famine, particularly in the former Soviet Union, which has been beset by the worst heat wave in 130 years.
The Ukraine is no stranger to starvation. The Terror-Famine struck the Ukraine in 1932-33 when as many as 10 million starved. It should come as little surprise that Joseph Stalin was the architect of that tragedy.
In the 1920s, Lenin proved his political savvy and made concessions to the peasantry. This led to The New Economic Policy (NEP) and a rethinking by the Kremlin.

GM Files for IPO That Will Reduce Treasury's Stake
By David Welch and Michael Tsang
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- General Motors Co. filed for an initial share offering that will mark the return of what was once the world's largest automaker to public markets a year after it was bailed out by the government.
GM, 61 percent owned by the U.S. Treasury, didn't disclose the number of shares that will be sold in the initial public offering or the price in a statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The automaker will not sell any common shares itself while offering preferred shares alongside the IPO, the filing showed. The government will sell some of the common shares it owns in GM, according to the filing.

General Motors back from the brink and set for $20bn flotation
Andrew Clark in New York - The Guardian
Share offer comes a year after filing for bankruptcy and will allow some of state loan to be repaid
America's biggest carmaker, General Motors, has taken the first step towards a stock market flotation barely a year after struggling through bankruptcy, in a move that will allow Barack Obama's government to win political capital by recouping some of the billions in public money pumped into the company.
GM last night filed an official application, called an S-1 document, with the Securities and Exchange Commission that paves the way for one of the largest public share offerings in US history. GM did not reveal the pricing of its shares, but the company is likely to seek to raise between $10bn (£6.4bn) and $20bn in capital.

General Motors Files for an Initial Public Offering
By NICK BUNKLEY and BILL VLASIC - NYTimes.com
DETROIT - General Motors filed Wednesday for a landmark public stock offering that would let the federal government begin selling off its stake in the automaker as well as raise money for G.M.'s turnaround.
G.M. said that it would offer both common stock and preferred stock in the offering, which could begin as early as October, when the Obama administration will be seeking to portray its aid to the auto industry as a success before midterm elections in November.
The common shares will be sold by G.M's current shareholders, the largest of which is the federal government. It exchanged about $43 billion in aid to G.M. for a 61 percent interest in the automaker.

Where adults must always buckle up
Half the states require that all adults in a vehicle wear seat belts. In all states, children must be in restraints. - [see map]
States expand seat belt laws to cover rear-seat riders
States are moving to close a deadly gap in seat belt laws that allows rear-seat, adult passengers in half the states to ride legally without buckling up.
Six states - Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, New Jersey and Texas - have expanded their seat belt laws to cover rear-seat occupants since 2007, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.
Twenty-five states and the District of Columbia require seat belts for all passengers. "The most important thing you can do in any vehicle at any time is wear your seat belt in all seating positions," says Michele Fields, general counsel at the Insurance Institute. "The gaps with regard to children younger than 16 have almost all been closed. But there are still gaps for adults."

Is the Web Dead? No. But It's at Risk
By SAM GUSTIN - DailyFinance.com
Want to kill the web? There's an app for that.
Wired magazine sure picked a good time to declare "the Web is dead" and herald the foreboding rise of the "Internet" -- by which it means a newly powerful, vaguely malevolent, premium-services-based online world with competing content fiefdoms, controlled by powerful corporate interests.
Wired's vision is prescient because it fits well with what Google (GOOG) and Verizon (VZ) seem to be proposing with their recently announced net neutrality compromise, if the worst of the pessimists' fears are realized. (Net neutrality is the basic concept that broadband providers can't pick winners and losers on the Web or discriminate against rival content.)

Florida May Seek Billion-Dollar BP Payment to Plug Budget Gap
By Jim Snyder
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Florida may ask BP Plc for an emergency payment of more than $1 billion to plug a hole in its budget after the largest U.S. oil spill, and neighboring Gulf Coast states are weighing their options.
Steve Yerrid, a Tampa lawyer chosen by Florida Governor Charlie Crist to advise him on legal issues concerning the spill, said the state may seek an initial payment in the "lower range" of billions of dollars to make up for lost tax revenue.
"We're hoping rather than jobs being sacrificed or services to Floridians being lost, that we can develop some type of dialogue to get interim relief until state claims can be properly calculated," Yerrid said in a phone interview yesterday.

Collapsing Marsh Dwarfs BP Oil Blowout as Ecological Disaster
By Ken Wells
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Claude Luke throttles down his 21- foot aluminum work boat. Off to the left, the snout of an alligator disappears near the mouth of a watery gash in the Louisiana marshland.
The 51-year-old Cajun crab fishermen is touring the epicenter of an unfolding environmental disaster that dwarfs the BP Plc spill and predates it by decades, according to state scientists and environmentalists. If unchecked, the destruction threatens to undermine the world's seventh largest estuary and one of the most important U.S. energy corridors.

Tea Party Border Rally Draws Mexican Observers
by Robert M. Engstrom - HumanEvents.com
Editor's Note:
Bob took a lot of great pictures at the rally. They are compiled here for easier viewing.
While Americans attending the United Border Coalition's rally at the border gathered in 100 degree temperatures on a ranch next to the Arizona/Mexican border Sunday, it was clearly visible that illegal border crossers have not been discouraged by SB 1070.
On a hillside less than a mile into Mexico, a group of observers appeared.
There was an earful for the English speakers in the group across the border. Former Rep. J.D. Hayworth and more than a dozen conservative political candidates and Arizona Sheriffs Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County and Cochise County's Larry Dever lambasted the Obama Administration's handling of border security and illegal immigration.

Drones Surge, Special Ops Strike in Petraeus Campaign Plan
By Spencer Ackerman - Wired.com
KABUL, Afghanistan - Ever since the Afghanistan war became a counterinsurgency fight, critics have charged that commanders' cautions about using force only inhibit the fight against the Taliban. But in the shadows, NATO Special Operations Forces are engaged in an intensely lethal war of their own.
According to information provided to Danger Room by Gen. David Petraeus, the top NATO commander in Afghanistan, in just the past 90 days these elite units have captured or killed 365 militant leaders, detained 1,335 insurgent foot soldiers and killed another 1,031 insurgents on top of that.

Where will China's long march end?
By Peter Foster - FT.com
China has gone past Japan to become the world's second largest economy, and is closing in on the United States. But it faces challenges ahead
It's official. Dice the data any way you please, China has now eclipsed Japan as the world's second-largest economy. And if it keeps up its current rate of double-digit, pell-mell growth, it will surpass the US as the world's largest economy by 2020.
Of course, these are artificial benchmarks: if you take into account China's "grey market", its economy passed Japan's some time back. But almost every day seems to provide more evidence of how far and how fast China's rise is reshaping the world, to offer more reasons to believe that China's emergence as a world power is inexorable and inevitable.

*****
Timely interview with Jeri Corsi on possible attack of Iran. Will the world stand at the brink of WWIII?

Coast to Coast AM - 1 of 3 Attack on Iran
George Noory interviews Jerome Corsi

Coast to Coast AM - 2 of 3 Attack on Iran
George Noory interviews Jerome Corsi

Coast to Coast AM - 3 of 3 Attack on Iran
George Noory interviews Jerome Corsi

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Archived Page Link
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Wednesday 08.18.2010

The Undoing of a Legislative President
By MATT BAI - NYTimes.com
Democrats in Washington are divided and somewhat puzzled over President Obama's fading popularity. They reject, of course, the Republican view that the president is basically a closet Socialist whose disdain for free enterprise has alienated voters. But that's about as far as the consensus goes.
In conversations over the past few weeks, some of the party's leading strategists told me that it all comes down to messaging, or - here’s that ubiquitous word again - "framing." The president who ran such a brilliant campaign, they argue, has utterly failed to communicate his successes. They cited factors like the president’s cool demeanor and suggested that he hadn’t used the right words or shown the proper empathy.

The Purpose Behind Engineered Economic Collapse
By Giordano Bruno - Neithercorp Press
"From now on, depressions will be scientifically created." - Congressman Charles A. Lindbergh Sr. , 1913
Everyone loves money. Even people like myself who abhor the abuse of money and commerce, who understand the fraudulent nature of the system we live in, still work hard and save so that we might attain a sense of stability within that system. Many people see money as a focal point to their existence. But is it really money that they are after, or is it something else entirely? In truth, money represents 'security' in the minds of the masses. Money affords us the ability to survive, and the more of it we have, the safer we all feel. Because we subconsciously associate the extension of our very life with the variable health of the economic structure in which we live, we tend to become unwitting devotees to its continued existence, even if it is corrupt and condemned to failure. We gullibly deny the system or the currency that supports it is doomed to the contrary of all evidence because, even though it has beaten us bloody, we have never known anything else.

DC Politicians Beware: Voters Want the Employment Crisis Fixed --
If You Mess with Social Security or Deficits, You're Toast
By Joshua Holland - Alternet.org
A new survey finds a huge majority of Americans are in agreement about our biggest problem. Obama and the Dems better listen up.
Even while the politicians and pundits keep telling us that the federal deficit is a huge and pressing problem, a new public opinion survey finds that a majority of American voters have their own view of what deficits mean to our economy, and how best to deal with our economic woes. They favor progressive strategies for bringing the deficit beast to heel, and a healthy majority rejects the Right's preferred course of balancing the budget on the backs of the elderly and infirm.

D.C.'s Idea of Fiscal Restraint
By Cong. Ron Paul
Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON, D.C. -
.... One such disaster-waiting-to-happen is one of the revenue generating provisions used to claim that the healthcare reform bill was "paid for". $17 billion in additional tax revenues is supposed to come from an onerous new IRS reporting requirement that any taxpayer with business income who spends over $600 in one year with one business will have to report those expenditures to the IRS.
Mind you, this is a cumulative total of $600 in transactions in one year. This will involve so much extra accounting and paperwork that the IRS claims it will be unable to deal with it effectively, and even the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (to whom it should be a boon) has come out against it!
Apparently they realize they will actually lose customers, especially small businesses, to bankruptcy because of this!
Gold dealers are especially alarmed by this provision, as most of their transactions easily top $600. This represents a significant outlay of time and paperwork and no additional revenue for businesses with which to hire people.

'Israel has days to strike Bushehr'
By HILARY LEILA KRIEGER - JPost.com
Bolton: Russia to load fuel into reactor on Saturday.
WASHINGTON – Israel has only mere days to launch an attack on Iran’s Bushehr nuclear reactor if Russia makes good on its plan to deliver fuel there this weekend, former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton warned Tuesday.
He said that once Russia has loaded the fuel into the reactor -- slated for Saturday – Israel would no longer be willing to strike for fear of triggering widespread radiation in an attack.
"This is a very, very big victory for Iran" Bolton told The Jerusalem Post. "This is a huge threshold."

Obama Bombing Iran? Don't Be Surprised
The Atlantic.com
This post is part of our forum on Jeffrey Goldberg's September cover story detailing the prospects and implications of an Israeli strike against Iran.
Jeffrey Goldberg's main subject is an Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear program, but in his final paragraphs he turns to whether President Obama might act instead. Jeffrey says he used to believe there was no chance -- but now he thinks there might be. I agree, for reasons political and philosophical.
Two years ago, in July 2008, Obama said this in Berlin:
Now is the time to join together, through constant cooperation, strong institutions, shared sacrifice, and a global commitment to progress, to meet the challenges of the 21st century .... This is the moment when we must renew the goal of a world without nuclear weapons. The two superpowers that faced each other across the wall of this city came too close too often to destroying all we have built and all that we love. With that wall gone, we need not stand idly by and watch the further spread of the deadly atom. It is time to secure all loose nuclear materials; to stop the spread of nuclear weapons; and to reduce the arsenals from another era. This is the moment to begin the work of seeking the peace of a world without nuclear weapons.

Ahmadinejad feels the heat at home
By Mahan Abedin - Asia Times Online
In a sure sign that Iran's factionalized politics is making a comeback, the right-wing and conservative forces that last year engineered the marginalization of the reformists, are slowly splintering. At the center of this latest bout of factional in-fighting is the divisive personality of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad.
While few people expected the political scene to be dominated by a unified conservative front for long, the speed at which the right-wing factions are dividing between pro- and anti-Ahmadinejad camps has caught many analysts by surprise.

Iran to test-fire new missiles on Aug. 22
Tehran Times Political Desk
TEHRAN - The Iranian armed forces will test-fire new missiles on August 22, which is the national Defense Industry Day.
The new generation of Qiam (Uprising) missiles and the third generation of Fateh (Conqueror) missiles will be tested on this day, Defense Minister Ahmad Vahid told reporters at a press conference in Tehran on Tuesday.
Iran will also unveil its first domestically manufactured long-range unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), called the Karrar, on August 22, Vahidi stated.
Iran inaugurated the production line of two reconnaissance UAVs in February.

This phoney finger-wagging won't talk Iran out of nukes
Lionel Shriver - guardian.co.uk
Drop the moral posturing, Hillary - US hypocrisy will be all too clear in Tehran. Only realpolitik can halt their nuclear ambitions
This weekend Russian specialists will begin loading low-enriched uranium fuel rods into Iran's Bushehr reactor, the initial step in getting its first nuclear power plant up and running. Though Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, has criticised the irreversible startup as "premature", Bushehr is in fact a long-delayed fiasco predating the Iranian revolution. By contract, the spent fuel rods, containing weapons-grade plutonium, are to be returned to Russia. Uneasy faith that Iran will keep its promise, if only because it still lacks the technology to process the rods at home, is the sole reason that America and its allies are not hysterical. Whether nominally safe or not, Bushehr foreshadows Iran's more ominous nuclear plans, which the Obama administration's hectoring and cajoling have signally failed to discourage.

22 cities in danger of a double-dip recession
By Hibah Yousuf,
[But not where you might expect]
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The chance of a national double-dip recession is hotly debated amid an increasing number of signs that the economic recovery is losing pace, but the risk is particularly troublesome on a local level.
A new report from Moody's Economy.com singled out 22 cities that are at risk of slipping back into a recession in as early as three months. To come to this conclusion, the economists considered dwindling progress in employment, housing starts, home prices and industrial production. (See the map above for the full list.)

US Says Bankruptcies Reach Nearly 5-Year High
By Reuters via CNBC.com
U.S. bankruptcy filings have reached the highest level since 2005, government data released on Tuesday show, as the economy slows and the unemployment rate hovers just below double digits.
There were 422,061 bankruptcy filings between April and June, according to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, up 9 percent from 388,148 in the prior three-month period, and up 11 percent from 381,073 a year earlier.

Gold, headlines, and hot money in inflation mode
Short-term investors shed deflation views, bonds differ
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- It only took producer prices rising for the first time in four months and news that another hedge fund was piling into a gold exchange-traded fund for inflation to make its big comeback -- at least in media headlines and, perhaps, at summer cocktail parties where the hot-money crowd gathers.
Eton Park Capital Management LP, a hedge fund, started us off on Monday with a regulatory filing that revealed it took a big stake in the SPDR Gold Trust ETF in June.
In many outlets, the move was portrayed as another hedge fund joining in the big inflation bet: All that government spending and currencies going down will have to lead to inflation eventually, right?

The Point of No Return
BY JEFFREY GOLDBERG - TheAtlantic.com
For the Obama administration, the prospect of a nuclearized Iran is dismal to contemplate- it would create major new national-security challenges and crush the president's dream of ending nuclear proliferation. But the view from Jerusalem is still more dire: a nuclearized Iran represents, among other things, a threat to Israel's very existence. In the gap between Washington's and Jerusalem's views of Iran lies the question: who, if anyone, will stop Iran before it goes nuclear, and how? As Washington and Jerusalem study each other intensely, here's an inside look at the strategic calculations on both sides - and at how, if things remain on the current course, an Israeli air strike will unfold.

Thomas Sowell:
Obama has already brought 'change' to America
By: Thomas Sowell - Washington Examiner
One of the few campaign promises that President Obama has kept was this: "We are going to change the United States of America!"
As in many other cases, those who were thrilled by the thought of "change" seldom seemed to consider whether it would be a change for the better or for the worse. True believers in the Obama cult assumed that it had to be a change for the better.
Now it is slowly dawning on more people that it is a change for the worse-- runaway government spending, under the banners of "stimulus" and "jobs," is not stimulating anything except political pay-offs to special interests. As for jobs, the percentage of the population with jobs keeps on declining, even as the administration points to all the jobs it is creating.

Federal Reserve's shift in policy doesn't change its basic outlook
By Neil Irwin - Washington Post Staff Writer
After the Federal Reserve's policy meeting last week, the drumbeat on Wall Street and among some economists for bold new steps to strengthen the economy got louder.
Don't hold your breath.
The Fed's move last week to make its monetary policy more supportive of growth was a reversal after a year in which the central bank backed away from unconventional steps to stimulate the economy.
Although last week's action reflects a deepening concern at the Fed over the sluggish pace of growth, policymakers remain reluctant to undertake broader efforts to stimulate the economy, viewing their policy tools as uncertain to be effective.

Monkeying Around
By Ralph R. Reiland - The American Spectator.org
Remember those stories about Nero playing the fiddle while Rome burned?
Actually, if he was really playing, it was probably a lyre, a small harp-like stringed instrument. Fiddles weren't around yet.
Well, showing how little the art of governance has improved, we're now borrowing money from China to buy cocaine for monkeys, calling it a jobs program, and running up the national debt to $14 trillion.
Or, perhaps worse, President Obama might get the money here at home for his failing jobs programs by grabbing even more money out of the pockets of America's key job creators.

Warning, bear market 2010: 11 'sells.' Only 6 'buys'
New Normal: Bankrupt nation. Deflation. Zeros. Junk. No jobs. Depression
By Paul B. Farrell, MarketWatch
ARROYO GRANDE, Calif. (MarketWatch) -- Yes, it's going to get worse, a whole lot worse ... Bill Gross warns this is the "New Normal. Forget 10% returns. Think 5%". ... Economist Larry Kotlikoff, author of The Coming Generational Storm, warns: "Let's get real. The U.S. is bankrupt. Neither spending nor taxing will help the country pay its bills" ... Economist Peter Morici warns: "Unemployment is stuck near 10%. Deflation coming. Stock market threatens collapse. The Federal Reserve and Barack Obama are out of bullets. Near zero federal funds rates, central bank purchases, a $1.6 trillion deficit have failed to revive the economy." ... Simon Johnson, co-author of 13 Bankers, warns: "We came close to another Great Depression, next time we may not be so lucky." Why? Because Wall Street's already well into the next bubble/bust cycle -- the "doom cycle."
Warning: More bad news ahead. Welcome to a bleak second half 2010, worse for 2011.

Rick Santelli asks Ron 'Who created the Federal Reserve?"
and mentions Jekyll Island

Gross Urges 'Full Nationalization' of Housing Finance
By Lorraine Woellert and Rebecca Christie
Aug. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Bill Gross, who runs the world's biggest bond fund at Pacific Investment Management Co., said the U.S. should consider "full nationalization" of the mortgage- finance system as the Obama administration plots the revival of a market that was at the center of the 2008 credit crisis.
"To suggest that there's a large place for private financing in the future of housing finance is unrealistic," Gross said today at a U.S. Treasury Department conference in Washington. "Government is part of our future. We need a government balance sheet. To suggest that the private market come back in is simply impractical. It won't work."

Bill Gross Discusses Financing of U.S. Housing Market [video]

Debt Virus Spreads During Make-Believe Recovery
Commentary by Matthew Lynn
Aug. 17 (Bloomberg) -- The euro area is growing again. The banking system has survived its stress tests. The Greeks have implemented their first austerity measures with some success.
The fevered predictions of the early summer that the euro was doomed, and that Europe's sovereign-debt crisis would rip through countries such as Spain and Portugal like a virus, have been forgotten. The crisis appears to be over.
Don't believe it. Under the surface, the cracks in the euro are getting worse. The imbalances in the euro area are growing all the time. The resistance to the bailout package will rise as the terms turn out to be immoral and absurd. And the big-deficit nations are locked in a downward economic spiral.

Our One-Term President
By Tom Bethell - The American Spectator.org
It's a good bet right now that Barack Obama will be a one-term president. The enthusiasm that once shielded this hyphenated American has dissipated. His supporters, although still numerous, have discovered that he lacks Bill Clinton's centrist instincts, and even his charm. The anti-Bush mania that swept the country from 2006-09 finally burned itself out.
It's always possible that the Republicans will nominate a dud. That has happened so often that it should even be considered likely. Not since 1980 has there been an outstanding GOP candidate. But at this stage it's too difficult to predict the 2012 nominee, so I'll drop that subject.

Layoff fears still grip one in four U.S. workers
LATimes.com
More than one-quarter of American workers still live in fear that they will be laid off from their jobs, and nearly 40% remain worried about possible cuts in their benefits, a new Gallup poll shows.
Those percentages are down from a year ago but still sharply higher than they were before the deep recession hit in 2008.
The poll of 1,013 full- and part-time workers, conducted Aug. 5 to 8, found that 26% are worried that they could lose their jobs in the near future.
By contrast, 31% of workers polled by Gallup in August 2009 were concerned about being cut. So the economy's recovery this year has reduced some Americans' fears of becoming jobless.

Forget the Hype: U.S.-Mexico Border Area Is One of Safest Regions in U.S. By Elena Shore - Alternet.org
Much of the fear of border violence comes from people who live away from the border. Those who live near it actually feel safer, an observation corroborated by a recent study.
Crime along the U.S.-Mexico border has been cited to justify everything from Arizona's new immigration law to Congress's decision Tuesday to spend another $600 million on border enforcement. Arizona Governor Jan Brewer has referred to "mayhem" and "headless bodies" found along the border, while Sen. John McCain said that the failure to secure the border "has led to violence -- the worst I have ever seen." And when asked why they supported Arizona's immigration law, SB 1070, many Americans cited security reasons and an increase in violent crime along the U.S. border.
But a new poll says that this is a myth. There has been no increase in violent crime on the U.S. side of the border. In fact, reports show that the U.S. border is getting safer.

Crude Oil, Equities likely to relief bounce
By Chris Vermeulen
Last week was exciting as investments rocketed higher or tank ... We saw Gold and the US Dollar pop while oil and equities dropped sharply with heavy volume.
Just to recap, Wednesday the market went into freefall mode sending traders and investors running for the door. This was obvious from looking at the large percent drop coupled with heavy selling. That day the NYSE showed panic selling with 37 shares sold for every 1 share purchased meaning pure panic. In my Wednesday night report "How to Take Advantage of Panic Selling for SP500 and Gold " I explained how to read these extreme market conditions and what to expect the following sessions.

Why China's Housing Bubble Will End Badly
By CHARLES HUGH SMITH - DailyFinance.com
Imagine that your local city and county controlled all land rights, and the only ownership a private builder or developer could secure was a long-term lease. Now imagine that 40% of the city and county's revenues come from the lease fees paid by developers. Next, imagine a giant real estate bubble has priced most residents out of the market, and that the local governments are reaping huge gains as the development rights and leases they sell are skyrocketing.
Can you say conflict of interest?

The worst bet in real estate today: Construction loans
By Paul Wiseman, USA TODAY
The biggest bank killer around isn't some exotic derivative investment concocted by Wall Street's financial alchemists. It's the plain old construction loan, Main Street banks' bread and butter for decades.
Deutsche Bank has called them "without doubt, the riskiest commercial real estate loan product." The Congressional Oversight Panel, a financial watchdog, has warned that construction loans have deteriorated faster and inflicted bigger losses on banks than any other real estate loans.

Fannie, Freddie should stay big, banking execs say
By Alan Zibel, AP Real Estate Writer
WASHINGTON - The Obama administration invited banking executives Tuesday to offer advice on changing the government's role in the mortgage market. Their response: Stay big.
While executives disagreed on the exact level of support needed, the group overwhelmingly advocated that the government should maintain a large role propping up the nearly $11 trillion market.
Bill Gross, managing director of bond giant Pimco, said the economic recovery required more government stimulus, particularly in the housing market. He suggested the administration push for the automatic refinancing of millions homes backed by mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Fannie Mac.

What's The Future For Fannie, Freddie, and Your Home Mortgage?
By Linda Stern - CBS MoneyWatch
The Federal government will continue to support housing in the future, but that support may be smaller than it was in years past, according to top Obama Administration officials. Their remarks came at a Treasury Department summit today on housing finance, convened as new data was released showing continued weakness in housing starts, building permits, and builder confidence.

Four Ways to Fix Fannie and Freddie
By: John E. Taylor - CNBC.com
As the Obama administration hosts a conference of a select group of housing experts on Tuesday to address the role that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will play in the housing market, we should remember that homeownership's promise was ruined by Wall Street's recklessness, not by federal policy.
On Monday, I told CNBC that homeownership is still a good investment for some and can be again for most Americans, if the housing market has adequate oversight.
That's because before Wall Street ravaged our economy by aggressively marketing bad loans and stuffing them into "innovative" products that they sold to investors and then bet against, homeownership was a good way for the middle class to build wealth and for lower-income families to move into the middle class.

FHA has become the new toxic lender of first resort
4 out of 10 loans made in expensive Southern California are FHA backed. FHA now backing apartments in Manhattan with a price tag of $820,000 to $3 million with a 3.5 percent down payment.
DoctorHousingBubble.com
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) was created in 1934 during the Great Depression to give low to moderate income Americans a chance at pursuing the American dream of homeownership. Even in the best of times, the FHA was only a small fraction of the mortgage market as it was never intended to be a big player. Today the FHA now backs 30 percent of all loans outstanding and is quickly burning through its reserves. You would think that the FHA would try going back to its core mission of helping those it initially set out to help. Instead, it is now being used as a backend tool to fund absurd mortgages that don't fit into any other current government loan programs.

We are subsidizing luxury apartments in Manhattan
Manhattan Luxury Condos Embrace FHA in 'Game Changer'
By Oshrat Carmiel
Aug. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Whitney Gollinger, marketing chief for a Manhattan condo building with an outdoor movie theater and panoramic city views, is highlighting a different amenity to spur sales: the financial backing of the federal government.
The Federal Housing Administration agreed in March to insure mortgages for apartments at the 98-unit Gramercy Park development, known as Tempo. That enables buyers to make a down payment of as little as 3.5 percent in a building where apartments are listed at $820,000 to $3 million.

Special report:
Flipping, flopping and booming mortgage fraud
By Nick Carey - Reuters.com
(Reuters) - The house on the 53rd block of South Wood Street in Chicago's Back of the Yards doesn't look like a $355,000 home. There is no front door and most of the windows are boarded up.
Public records show it sold in foreclosure for $25,500 in January 2009, then resold for $355,000 in October. In between, a $110,000 mortgage was taken out on the home, supposedly for renovations. This June, the property went back into foreclosure.
To Emilio Carrasquillo, head of the local office of non-profit lender Neighborhood Housing Services of Chicago (NHS), the numbers don't add up. He believes this is a case of mortgage fraud.

Gold hovers above $1225 on economic worries
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online) : Gold remained higher in Asian trade Tuesday, on global economic concerns, despite losing some of its gains in early trade.
Gold for immediate delivery was seen trading at $1225.18 an ounce at 12 noon Singapore time while U.S. gold futures for December delivery was at $1,226.7 an ounce on the comex division of Nymex.
Analysts said the precious yellow metal took advantage of weak economic growth around the world that might lead to deflation.

City of Bell lent employees, elected officials nearly $900,000
By Jeff Gottlieb, Kimi Yoshino and Ruben Vives, Los Angeles Times
Former assistant city manager received at least $200,000. Experts say such a city loan program for employees is unusual.
The city of Bell gave nearly $900,000 in loans to former City Administrator Robert Rizzo, city employees and at least two council members in the last several years, according to records reviewed by The Times.
The documents show that Bell's former assistant city manager, Angela Spaccia, received two loans of at least $100,000 each and that council members Oscar Hernandez and Luis Artiga received $20,000 loans. Rizzo, whose huge salary sparked a scandal that forced him and other city officials to step down, received two loans for $80,000 each, city officials said.

Auditors Say Colorado Pension Plan Recovering
CBSNews.com
Auditors Say Colorado Pension Plan On Road To Recovery After Cutting Cost-of-living Increases
(AP) DENVER (AP) - Colorado's pension fund is back on track toward solvency after state lawmakers became the first in the nation to cut retiree benefits to prevent its pension system from going broke, auditors said Monday.
The next few years may be bumpy, however, because of losses from 2008 that are still being absorbed by the pension fund.
Thomas Cavanaugh, an actuary for Cavanaugh Macdonald Consulting, told lawmakers that they would have to spend 40 percent of state payroll on retiree benefits if the pension system runs out of money.
"Your assets over 30 years would get to the point where it's fully funded. If there were no money at all, you'd be looking at 40 percent of payroll," Cavanaugh told lawmakers on the Legislative Audit Committee

'Vultures' Save Troubled Homeowners
By JAMES R. HAGERTY
Anna and Charlie Reynolds of St. George, Utah, were worried about losing their home to foreclosure last year. Then they got a lucky break - from an unlikely savior.
Selene Residential Mortgage Opportunity Fund, an investment fund managed by veteran mortgage-bond trader Lewis Ranieri, acquired the loan at a deep discount and renegotiated the terms with the Reynolds. The balance due was cut to $243,182 from $421,731, and the interest rate was lowered. That reduced the monthly payment to $1,573 from $3,464, allowing the family to stay in their home despite a drop in Mr. Reynolds' income as a real-estate agent. "It was a miracle," says Ms. Reynolds.

Geithner: Housing system needs government support
HUD chief Donovan urges reduced Washington involvement in mortgages By Ronald D. Orol, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Without government backing for the housing finance system, future economic downturns could be harsher, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said Tuesday at a conference on the future of housing finance.
"Without such support, the risk is that future recessions could be more severe because the financial system would not have the capital to support mortgage lending on an adequate scale," Geithner said.

Bank repossessions at record high
By Jay Heflin - TheHill.com
Bank repossessions of homes hit a record high during the second quarter, with over 260,000 properties returning to lenders, according to Foreclosure-Support.com, which analyzes home foreclosures.
The figure is up 5 percent from the previous quarter and up 38 percent from the second quarter last year.
Bank repossessions occur after a home has been in foreclosure for quite some time.

Nationwide foreclosure activity jumps by 12,000 from June to July. One in 397 received a foreclosure filing during the month of July.
DoctorHousingBubble.com
In a sign that things are slow going in the housing market, foreclosure notices jumped nearly 4 percent from June to July. Over 325,000 housing units received a foreclosure filing in the month of July. This elevated level demonstrates that the housing market is still far from any sort of reasonable recovery especially with numerous troubled mortgages floating out in bank balance sheets. Keep in mind this high elevated amount of foreclosure activity comes at a time when the government has stepped up programs to help people with paying their mortgages. Let us take a look at the last five years of foreclosure activity.

New home construction rises, but outlook weakens
By Julianne Pepitone
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- New home construction ticked higher in July, but indications of future building were weak, the government said Tuesday.
Housing starts rose 1.7% from June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 546,000 last month, the Commerce Department said.
Economists were expecting housing starts to rise to 555,000, according to a consensus estimate from Briefing.com.
On a year-over-year basis, starts fell 7% from July 2009.

Housing construction rises 1.7 percent in July; building permits fall
By MARTIN CRUTSINGER - AP via DailyReporter.com
WASHINGTON (AP) - A weak housing market received a tiny boost from apartment construction last month. But the overall outlook remained dim as applications for building permits fell to the lowest level in 14 months.
Construction of new homes and apartments rose 1.7 percent last month, the Commerce Department said Tuesday. Driving the increase was a 32.6 percent surge in apartment and condominium construction - a small fraction of the market.

Wichita home sales down 34 percent in July
WICHITA BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Chris Moon
Wichita-area home sales fell 34 percent in July, according to data released by the Wichita Area Association of Realtors.
New and existing home sales totaled 559 during the month, down from 847 in July 2009.
There were 517 sales of existing homes and 42 sales of new homes in July.
The numbers continue to paint the picture of a relatively mixed year in 2010 as the market absorbs new buyers prompted by the federal home buyer tax credits. That program effectively ended in June, which was the initial deadline for closings.

I Want Your Money Trailer (2010) HD

Interesting, Even Alarming, News from SoCal Mortgage Market
.... During the session, Norris-who is considered to be a top authority on the Southern California real estate market-shared some intriguing insights. He believes the region is in an artificial market and is concerned about the shadow inventory that could flood the market, forcing prices even lower. However, this isn't the shadow inventory of bank-owned homes you may have heard about; he refers to all the houses that may yet go into foreclosure. The problem will vary by region, but referring to Riverside County in Southern California, Norris presented some pretty alarming statistics:

• 23% of prime borrowers are not making payments
• 47% of non-prime borrowers are not making payments
• 90% of properties are upside down on value-to-loan (60% owe more than 150% of value)
• Many borrowers haven't made a payment in more than two years and have yet to receive a Notice of Default.

July housing starts rise less than expected
(Reuters) - U.S. housing starts rose but to a much weaker rate than expected in July, while permits for future home construction fell to their lowest level in more than a year, according to a government report on Tuesday that pointed to a weak housing market.
U.S. producer prices rose in July for the first time in four months, pulled by higher prices for food and consumer goods, a U.S. government report showed on Tuesday.

Housing Starts and the Unemployment Rate
by CalculatedRisk
This graph shows single family housing starts and the unemployment rate through July (inverted).
You can see both the correlation and the lag. The lag is usually about 12 to 18 months, with peak correlation at a lag of 16 months for single unit starts. The 2001 recession was a business investment led recession, and the pattern didn't hold.
Usually housing starts and residential construction employment lead the economy out of a recession, but not this time because of the huge overhang of existing housing units. After rebounding a little - mostly because of the home buyers tax credit - housing starts (blue) have moved mostly sideways (and down some recently).

Repeal Is Not Enough
By Robert M. Goldberg - The American Spectator.org
Republicans and assorted conservative policy organizations are beginning to consider how to address Obamacare in the wake of large Republican gains in Congress. In doing so they are careful not to confuse beating a discredited majority with actually governing. This should be particular concern with regard to healthcare. For many pundits and policy wonks, healthcare policy is all about repeal. The results of the Missouri ballot initiative about health reflected opposition not only to the federal mandate to buy coverage. It was an expression of concern that Obamacare is a massive shift of control over every aspect of medicine from individuals to government.

Our Only Existing Jobs Program Is the Military --
an Insane Way to Keep Americans Employed
By Robert B. Reich - AlterNet.org
"National security is a cover for job security. This is nuts."
Over 1,400,000 Americans are now on active duty; another 833,000 are in the reserves, many full time. Another 1,600,000 Americans work in companies that supply the military with everything from weapons to utensils. (I'm not even including all the foreign contractors employing non-US citizens.)
If we didn't have this giant military jobs program, the U.S. unemployment rate would be over 11.5 percent today instead of 9.5 percent.
And without our military jobs program personal incomes would be dropping faster. The Commerce Department reported Monday the only major metro areas where both net earnings and personal incomes rose last year were San Antonio, Texas, Virginia Beach, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. -- because all three have high concentrations of military and federal jobs.

Hilton to close California call center, cut 300 jobs
By Barbara De Lollis, USA TODAY
Hilton Worldwide on Oct. 6 will close its reservation call center in Hemet, Calif., - a move that will eliminate about 300 jobs.
The jobs paid workers between $9.50 and $12 an hour, according to the Press-Enterprise, which has been covering the story. In a statement to the paper, Hilton said the move was "a difficult decision."
Hilton announced the closure - rumored for months on Internet message boards, blogs and among employees - to city officials and employees earlier this month, says the paper, which also posted a short video about the news.

US matches Indian call centre costs
By James Lamont in New Delhi and Joe Leahy in Mumbai - FT.com
Call centre workers are becoming as cheap to hire in the US as they are in India, according to the head of the country's largest business process outsourcing company.
High unemployment levels have driven down wages for some low-skilled outsourcing services in some parts of the US, particularly among the Hispanic population.
At the same time, wages in India's outsourcing sector have risen by 10 per cent this year and senior outsourcing managers based in the country command salaries above global averages.

American Apparel Is Close to Defaulting on Loans
By SARAH WEINMAN - DailyFinance.com
Just a few years ago, American Apparel (APP) was held up as a model for American clothing retailers, thanks to hip marketing campaigns, profitable earnings, a high-flying CEO in Dov Charney, and products entirely made in the USA.
But now a series of financial troubles coupled with allegations of shoddy labor practices leaves the company's future in serious doubt, with signs they may go away sooner rather than later.

Bed Bug Infestation Is Scaring Millions Of Americans
By Anneli Rufus - Alternet.org
Outbreaks of bed bugs, soaring in the most unexpected places -- like CNN's headquarters -- stoke some of our deepest fears.
Peter Krask stepped out of his New York City apartment one day last year, shut the door, and walked away forever, leaving behind almost everything he owned.
He carried away only a few items of clothing, personal records, and his computer.
Krask's apartment was infested with bedbugs. Savoring warmth, they swarmed in his DSL port, light fixtures, carpets and furniture. They'd feasted on him nightly for a year - which he spent visiting doctors in an increasing state of panic over the rashes inflaming his buttocks and other body parts before finally ascertaining the cause.

It Takes a Tea Party to Start a Tax Revolution
Commentary by Caroline Baum
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Have you read the U.S. Constitution recently, especially the part where We, the People, give Congress the power to levy and collect taxes?
There's nothing in there about carving out special exemptions for certain individuals or groups; about using tax credits to achieve socially desirable outcomes, such as getting married and having children; or about doling out earmarks in an implicit exchange for campaign contributions.
How can we get Congress out of the tax-favor business?
We need new rules (a constitutional amendment), a new framework (independent commissions) or a new crop of lawmakers with the political will to look beyond the next election and solve the country's fiscal problems.

Obama's Islamic America
The Washington Times Editorial
What country is he talking about?
President Obama says Islam has always been part of America, which raises the question, does the president know something about American history that we don't?
It has become customary for presidents to offer greetings to various religious communities on the occasion of their most holy days. Presidents Ford and Carter both issued Ramadan messages, as did Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush. The Ramadan greeting became intensely political during Mr. Bush's tenure because he was seeking to dispel the charge that the war on terrorism was a crusade against Islam. But Mr. Obama has used the occasion of Ramadan to rewrite U.S. history and give Islam a prominence in American annals that it has not earned.

Military Base Closures and the Towns They Leave Behind
By BRUCE WATSON - DailyFinance.com
On Sept. 8, 2005, the Department of Defense's Base Closure and Realignment Commission (BRAC) gave President George W. Bush a list of 20 major military installations that it had determined were no longer necessary for the nation's defense. The president signed off on the list, and despite tepid opposition, it passed through the House of Representatives. By the end of the year, it was enacted, and a deadline was set: On or before Sept. 15, 2011, the 20 bases would shut their doors.
When a military facility closes, the ripple effect is felt throughout the surrounding community: Families lose their neighbors, businesses lose their customers and workers lose their jobs. In a thriving city, a closure can be an adrenalin shot to the local economy as hundreds of acres of land are suddenly made available for municipal growth and expansion.

[Bill] Clinton Denies White House Version of Jobsgate Scandal
By Jeffrey Lord - - The American Spectator.org
Uh-oh.
Former President Bill Clinton, campaigning this week for Pennsylvania Democratic Senate nominee Joe Sestak, has been caught on video contradicting the Obama White House official statement on the Jobsgate scandal.
Not once. Not twice. But three times.
The scandal involved a February allegation by Sestak that the Obama White House offered him a job if he would back off a challenge to incumbent Democratic Senator Arlen Specter. After months of silence and controversy swirling around the issue, the White House was forced to admit it had in fact not only offered a position to Sestak but offered a choice of three to Colorado Senate candidate Andrew Romanoff. Romanoff was preparing a bid against incumbent Democratic Senator Michael Bennet, a race he lost to Bennet on Tuesday.

Mississippi Sierra Club chief says oil spill far from over;
DMR chief says produce the evidence
Harlan Kirgan, Mississippi Press
Opening state offshore waters to fishing and winding down the cleanup effort on the coast is premature, said Louie Miller, state director of the Mississippi Sierra Club.
"We've got shrimpers out there saying there is oil out there," Miller said. "We had a meeting Wednesday night where we had over 150 shrimpers... who are saying there is oil out there and these underwater plumes are varying in size and shape. This stuff is obviously moving around out there."
William Walker, executive director of the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources, said, "It would be helpful, very helpful, if these folks who know where all this stuff is would call us and either take us on their boats or put themselves and whoever they want on our boats at our expense and take us to where it is. We'll sample it, check it out and have it analyzed and determine what it is."

dead fish all over the east coast, lack of oxygen from gulf disaster

Calls for better seafood testing as Gulf fishing begins anew
By the CNN Wire Staff
(CNN) -- A day after fall shrimping season began in the Gulf of Mexico and the state of Alabama reopened coastal waters to fishing, a major environmental watchdog group called for more stringent testing of seafood.
The National Resources Defense Council released a statement Tuesday saying it sent letters to the Food and Drug Administration and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, co-signed by almost two dozen Gulf coast groups, asking the government agencies to:

• ensure that there is comprehensive monitoring of seafood contamination.
• ensure public disclosure of all seafood monitoring data and methods.
• ensure that fishery re-opening criteria protect the most vulnerable populations, including children, pregnant women and subsistence fishing communities.

Oil Coats Sea Bottom In Gulf Of Mexico!
University Of Southern Florida

Gulf Oil Spill:
University Study Contradicts Government Estimates,
Up To 79% Of Oil Could Remain
AP/HuffingtonPost.com
A group of scientists say that most of that BP oil the government claimed was gone from the Gulf of Mexico is actually still there.
The scientists believe that roughly three-quarters of the oil (70% to 79%) still lurks under the surface. The research team, affiliated with the University of Georgia, said that it is a misinterpretation of data to claim that oil that has dissolved is actually gone or harmless. The report was based on an analysis of federal estimates, but the Wall Street Journal notes that it hasn't been published or peer-reviewed yet.

MSNBC:
Feds getting "tremendous pushback from scientific community"
over disappearing oil

The Government Lies to the American People
About the Safety of Gulf Seafood
Washington's Blog
The Centers of Disease Control (CDC) just announced:
For the seafood to pose a health risk, the food would have to be heavily contaminated with oil, and would therefore have a strong odor and taste of oil.
That is patently untrue.
As I pointed out in June: Crude oil contains such powerful cancer-causing chemicals benzene, toluene, heavy metals and arsenic.

ALERT Tsunami and corexit update from BP oil spill zone

Seafloor covered in oil 40 miles south of Panama City, FL
HEADING EAST
CNN, August 17, 2010 at 6:05 a.m. EDT:
The "news is not good"...
Chemical mix of oil and dispersant said to be highly toxic...
First time scientists have found such high levels of toxicity...
On seafloor, oil will not break down for a much longer time and will contaminate the area for a much longer time.

Corexit Is Being Sprayed at Night, Even Now
(According to BP Vessel of Opportunity Workers and Others)
Washington's Blog
The government and BP have said that no dispersants have been sprayed in the Gulf since the well was partially capped on July 15th.
However, local residents have been saying for weeks that Corexit is still being sprayed.
Admiral Allen wouldn't unequivocally deny this allegation as of August 9th.
On August 10th, the Destin Log reported:
Lt. Cmdr. Dale Vogelsang, liaison officer with the United State Coast Guard, told The Log he had contacted Unified Command and they had "confirmed" that dispersants were not being used in Florida waters. "Dispersants are only being used over the wellhead in Louisiana," Vogelsang said. "We are working with Eglin and Hurlburt to confirm what the flight pattern may be. But right now, it appears to be a normal flight."

AC Griffith's Take On The BP Oil Spill In The Gulf
Scalar Weapons and Haarp

Diseases intensify risks in Pakistan flood crisis
SUKKUR, Pakistan (Reuters) - Disease outbreaks pose grave risks to victims of Pakistan's worst floods in decades, aid agencies said on Friday, causing fresh concern about already complicated relief efforts.
The floods, triggered by torrential monsoon downpours, have engulfed Pakistan's Indus river basin, killing more than 1,600 people, forcing two million from their homes and disrupting the lives of 14 million people, or 8 percent of the population.
At a hospital in Mingora, the main town in Swat valley, an official who asked not to be named told Reuters one case of cholera was confirmed. A German humanitarian organization said there were also six suspected cases there.
An epidemic could create another disaster for Pakistan.

China and U.S. playing risky game on the high seas
By Ben Blanchard
(Reuters) - The game of military bluff that China and the United States are playing off the Chinese coast could erupt in full-fledged crisis hitting the arteries of global trade if Pentagon worries about missteps ever come true.
China has been investing big slices of its growing wealth in modernizing its military, and turning its once creaky navy into a blue water fleet that can project power far from its shores, with nuclear submarines and, maybe one day, aircraft carriers.
China is sending naval vessels further afield, to the waters off Somalia to fight pirates, and most recently through the southern Japanese islands, to Tokyo's angst.

Gerald Celente & Dr Deagle-BP Gulf Oil Spill, Collapse of US, WWIII, & No Gulf Stream Current 1

Gerald Celente & Dr Deagle-BP Gulf Oil Spill, Collapse of US, WWIII, & No Gulf Stream Current 2

Gerald Celente & Dr Deagle-BP Gulf Oil Spill, Collapse of US, WWIII, & No Gulf Stream Current 3

Gerald Celente & Dr Deagle-BP Gulf Oil Spill, Collapse of US, WWIII, & No Gulf Stream Current 4

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Archived Page Link
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Tuesday 08.17.2010

Recovery? How About "Relapse"?
By Gerald Celente - The DailyReckoning.com
08/16/10 Rhinebeck, New York - Three weeks later [after early June 2010] the celebrated property rebound, along with the stock market, ran out of bounce. After the hefty government tax credits that had propped up sales expired in April, May purchases of new homes fell 33 percent to a record low, the fewest sales since 1963. Note that the US population stood at 190 million in 1963, compared to 310 million in 2010 ... a 60 percent increase.
Rebound? In the first quarter of 2010, private business paychecks shrank to new lows, representing their smallest share of personal income in US history, while government provided benefits (social security, unemployment, food stamps, etc.) rose to record highs.

House of cards
Economic Rant - SilverBearCafe.com
"The economy is still in the gravitational pull of the Great Recession. All the booster rockets for getting us beyond it are failing. Home sales are down. Retail sales are down. Factory orders in May suffered their biggest tumble since March of last year. So what are we doing about it? Less than nothing." - Robert Reich (Labor Secy in Clinton Admin). Now Rubin can speak the truth since he isn't a bureaucrat anymore. He could have added endless other facts such as that 106 Banks have already failed this year. It's worse than the Great Depression. The Much Greater Depression started years ago; it's not going to start tomorrow. Housing peaked in 2005, and that was a major marker of this depression. Commercial real estate peaked three years later in 2008 and was another major marker. The U.S. dollar is toilet paper. The stock market is a house of cards. It's all right there in front of your face if you'll just look. Yes, you can see tomorrow if you just take a good close look at today.

Double Dippin'

The End of American Optimism
posted By John Frisby - LuxLibertas.com
[note: Zuckerman, a professing conservative (quisling?) has written speeches for Obama]
By MORTIMER ZUCKERMAN
Our brief national encounter with optimism is now well and truly over. We have had the greatest fiscal and monetary stimulus in modern times. We have had a whole series of programs to pay people to buy cars, purchase homes, pay off their mortgages, weatherize their homes, and install solar paneling on their roofs. Yet the recovery remains feeble and the aftershocks of the post-bubble credit collapse are ongoing.
We are at least 2.5 million jobs short of getting back to the unemployment rate of under 8% promised by the Obama administration. Concern grows that we are looking at a double-dip recession and hovering on the brink of a destructive deflation. Things are bad enough for Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke to have characterized the economic outlook late last month as "unusually uncertain."

An Argentina-like Economic Crisis
Scott Strzelczyk - SilverBearCafe.com
The United States' economic decline precariously resembles Argentina's economic collapse, which started in 1998 and landed Argentina in a depression by the end of 2000. What began in Argentina as a recession mushroomed into a full-fledged depression due to bad economic and monetary policy. The Obama administration and its congressional Democrat lackeys are on the precipice of following Argentina's disastrous economic and monetary policy decisions.

Subsidy As a Way of Life
In the U.S. it's 'work, work, work.' A rock drummer in France gets a state stipend.
By JAMES K. GLASSMAN - WSJ.com (free)
It's tough enough in the best of times, but right now, with a sovereign-debt crisis affecting Greece and threatening Italy, Spain, Portugal and Ireland, trying to make the case for the superiority of Europe's economic system is an exceptionally difficult task. Perhaps for that reason, Tom Geoghegan, who describes himself as a "union-side labor lawyer" and paints himself in this book as a vagabond in search of an alternative to the American way of life, makes only a half-hearted attempt.
Instead of rigorous argument, "Were You Born on the Wrong Continent?" offers a meandering stream of consciousness in which Mr. Geoghegan, an admitted nonexpert who spent a couple of months recently in Berlin, details various boring conversations he had with anonymous Germans and Frenchmen he bumped into, drops a few statistics, cites some books and comes to the conclusion that we Americans would lead richer lives if only we adopted European social and economic policy-especially the part about high taxes, lovely benefits and tight restrictions on the decisions that businesses are allowed to make concerning the people who work for them.

The Next Pension Bailout
New momentum to dump union retirement burdens on taxpayers.
Congress is gone for August - heaven be praised - but that hasn't stopped unions from quietly mobilizing to push through a big new priority this fall: a pension bailout. Big Labor is going Code Red on the issue, in the face of a looming accounting change that would force companies to confront the Ponzi-style nature of multi-employer pension plans.
We wrote in June about this class of some 1,500 union-run retirement vehicles, in which companies across an entire industry pay into a single pension pool. Hundreds of these multi-employer pools are badly underfunded, thanks to years of labor funneling money into new pay and benefits, rather than into the funds for retirees.

U.S. Economy: Factories Lose Orders, Builders Lose Confidence
By Courtney Schlisserman and Timothy R. Homan
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Orders and sales at New York manufacturers decreased in August for the first time in more than a year and U.S. homebuilders turned more pessimistic, indicating the economic slowdown is becoming broad-based.
The Federal Reserve Bank of New York's so-called Empire State factory index today showed bookings dropped for the first time since June 2009, while sales fell at the fastest pace since March 2009. The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo confidence index unexpectedly declined to a 17-month low.

Slavoj Zizek vs Marc Faber (going into hyperinflation; war)

Ron Paul on Washington's Idea of Fiscal Restraint
By Dr. Ron Paul - MarketOracle.co.uk
It has been months now since the new healthcare reform bill was passed into law. As is so typical, this massive piece of legislation was passed with a sense of urgency so acute that leadership declared America could not afford to wait until legislators, their staff and the general public had time to thoroughly read the bill.
The truth comes out eventually, however. Much like the recently discovered exemption from Freedom of Information Act requirements for the SEC that was slipped into the equally massive and "urgent" financial reform bill, we are finally seeing what other insidiousness has been hiding in the fine print of the healthcare reform bill. It seems that all provisions in this poorly written and poorly conceived monstrosity need to be repealed as soon as possible.

Treasury Fixing Home-Finance Juggles Limitless Bailout, Economy
By Lorraine Woellert
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Treasury Department, hosting a summit tomorrow on how to repair the mortgage-finance system, may get a blunt message from stakeholders in an industry tied to 15 percent of the country's economy: Don't screw it up.
The system's size and complexity mean that a wrong move by the Obama administration could restrict credit, drive down home prices, increase foreclosures and slow the economy, housing advocates and industry participants say. At the same time, some lawmakers say it's time to close government-controlled loan guarantors and halt limitless bailouts.

US pressure grows to extend tax cuts for rich
By James Politi in Washington - FT.com
Three of the most influential US business lobbying groups yesterday raised the pressure on the Obama administration to consider extending controversial tax cuts for wealthy Americans, calling it a "fool's error" not to do so in a weak economy.
The US Chamber of Commerce, the American Petroleum Institute - which represents the oil and gas industry - and the American Farm Bureau Federation - which lobbies for agricultural producers, held a joint press conference yesterday to argue that at least a temporary extension of tax cuts enacted under George W. Bush would help demand and spur investment.

It's Never the Right Time to Reform Fannie and Freddie
Peter Suderman - Reason.com
Formerly government-sponsored - and now government owned - mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are projected to add about $290 billion to America's taxpayer tab this year alone. You might think this would make them ripe for swift reform. But instead, the Obama administration stalled throughout the year, leaving out substantive changes to the two entities from its recent financial overhaul. Now, reports the Wall Street Journal, it looks like some of our nation's housing policy braniacs may be cooking up more excuses to delay action:

No Exit - Stage Left or Right
by Peter Schiff - LewRockwell.com
This week, national attention was fixated on JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater, whose bold, creative, and controversial exit strategy could revitalize his future prospects. Not nearly as noticed was the Federal Reserve's decision on Tuesday to avoid finding an exit strategy for its own never-ending career trap. Unfortunately, the Fed's choices affect our lives much more than Slater's.
Just a few weeks ago, pundits were asking how Ben Bernanke would shrink the Fed's bloated post-crisis balance sheet. But in its August 10th decision, the Fed signaled that it would "recycle" its debt holdings; in other words, there would be no exit strategy for the foreseeable future. Given the fact that monetary stimulus will not only fail to spark a genuine recovery, but create a never-ending need for successively larger doses, Bernanke should grab a few beers and head for the nearest available emergency slide.

The Connection Between Debt and Money Under Fractional Reserve Banking
By: Robert Murphy - MarketOracle.co.uk
Different groups often notice different aspects of the same phenomenon - this is the point of the famous tale of the blind men encountering an elephant. When it comes to the Federal Reserve, Austrians usually focus on how its tinkering with interest rates leads to the boom-bust cycle.
However, plenty of non-Austrians hate the Federal Reserve System too. For some of these critics, one of the most perverse features of our present monetary system is its basis in debt. Specifically, if Americans ever began seriously paying down their debts, the supply of dollars would shrink. In the present article I'll explain this strange fact.

The Dollar's Third and Final Act
Jeff Fisher - SilverBearCafe.com
.... The seeds of the Great Depression were planted during WWI and the 1920s.
The 1970s stagflation followed the credit boom of the 1950s and 1960s that were fueled by Johnson's Wars and Welfare State and the Federal Reserve's policy of not letting the money supply contract in the 1970s.
The Credit boom of the 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s is haunting the markets today.
The Dollar survived the first two credit deflations.
This writer believes that this credit crisis will be the Dollar's third and final act.

Max Keiser On the Edge with Stefan Molyneux (1/3)

Max Keiser On the Edge with Stefan Molyneux (2/3)

Max Keiser On the Edge with Stefan Molyneux (3/3)

'Mr. Yen' Says Japan Can't Stem Currency's Rise as U.S. Falters
By Yasuhiko Seki
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- The Japanese yen, the best performer among major currencies this year with a 7.9 percent gain against the dollar, may surge further as concern grows that U.S. efforts to boost economic growth will fail.
"What we are seeing is not appreciation of the yen but weakness of the dollar, reflecting concerns that the U.S. economy may falter," Eisuke Sakakibara, formerly Japan's top currency official, said yesterday on the Fuji television network. "There is a chance the yen will reach an all-time high and stay at that level for the time being."

The Trade Deficit Nightmare
The Economic Collapse -SilverBearCafe.com
When they hear the word deficit, most Americans immediately think of the U.S. government budget deficit which is rapidly spiralling out of control. But that is not the only deficit which is ripping the U.S. economy to shreds. In fact, many economists commonly speak of the "twin deficits" that are destroying the U.S. financial system. So what is the "other deficit" that they are referring to? It is the trade deficit. Every single month, we buy much more stuff from the rest of the world than they buy from us. That means that every single month there is a massive outflow of wealth from the United States. Every single day, America becomes just a little bit poorer as Americans continue to run out and fill up their shopping carts with cheap plastic crap from China and dozens of other emerging economies. Not that trade is a bad thing. Trade can actually be a very good thing. But the gigantic trade imbalances that the United States has been running for years are absolutely bleeding us dry. Unfortunately, our politicians have just stood idly by as each month we continue to transfer massive amounts of wealth out of the United States.

China Favors Euro to Dollar as Bernanke Shifts Course
By Candice Zachariahs and Ron Harui
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- China, whose $2.45 trillion in foreign-exchange reserves are the world's largest, is turning bullish on Europe and Japan at the expense of the U.S.
The nation has been buying "quite a lot" of European bonds, said Yu Yongding, a former adviser to the People's Bank of China who was part of a foreign-policy advisory committee that visited France, Spain and Germany from June 20 to July 2. Japan's Ministry of Finance said Aug. 9 that China bought 1.73 trillion yen ($20.1 billion) more Japanese debt than it sold in the first half of 2010, the fastest pace of purchases in at least five years.

China Threatened By Export Dependence After Surpassing Japan
By Bloomberg News
Aug. 17 (Bloomberg) -- China faces the threats of faltering demand for exports, rising wages and the risk of bad loans from record lending after surpassing Japan as the world's second- biggest economy last quarter.
The boost to China's "national pride" from the second- quarter milestone may not count for much if it fails to boost domestic consumption and reduce its reliance on exports and investment for growth, said Brian Jackson, an emerging-markets strategist at Royal Bank of Canada in Hong Kong.

Jim Rogers on rising China and falling America
BT: Jim, I know you're bullish on China. What economic benefits are there of moving there? Why shouldn't an American just have investment exposure to China?
Jim Rogers: In 1807, if you had moved to the U.K., you and your heirs would have been much, much better off for the next 100 years. If in 1907 you had moved to the U.S., you and your heirs would have been much better off for the next 100 years.
In my view, moving to Asia in 2007 means my heirs are going to be much better off in the next 100 years.
In 1907, if you had stayed in Poland or China, you would not have had a great future, nor your families. Had you moved to America, [your descendants] would have had a much better future. Who knew what they would do, if they would become doctors or what, in the next 100 years. But whatever happens to them, they were better off. They spoke English, which became the world's language.

John Browne - RECESSION-DEEPER SECOND WAVE COMING
We are in the eye of an economic hurricane. Things look calm and many talk of recovery. But, when the outlook for higher taxes and interest rates are taken into account combined with less government stimulus and more de-leveraging in retail and commercial real estate, the dark clouds of an even deeper recession come into view which threaten depression.

Pimco Cuts US Government-Related Holdings In Flagship Bond Fund
By Min Zeng Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--Bond fund giant Pacific Investment Management Co. cut the holdings of U.S. goverment-related holdings in its flagship bond fund in July after lifting the holdings over the previous three months.
The U.S. government-related holdings for Pimco's flagship Total Return Fund, the world's biggest bond fund with more than $200 billion in assets, fell to 54% in July from 63% in June--which was the highest share level since October 2009.
The share level is still higher than 51% in May and 36% in April, according to data available on the company's web site as of Friday afternoon. The fund is managed by Bill Gross, founder and co-chief investment officer of Newport Beach, Calif.-based Pimco.

Mortgage Bonds Slump on 'Mega-Refi' Concern
By Jody Shenn
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Government-backed mortgage bonds are underperforming Treasuries by the most this year, after reaching record high prices, amid concern refinancing will accelerate.
Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae securities have returned 0.24 percentage point less than U.S. debt this month, the worst relative results since December, Barclays Capital index data show. Fannie Mae's 6.5 percent bonds fell to 109.16 cents on the dollar even as Treasuries gained, from a record 109.94 cents on July 27, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Goldman Sachs undercuts rivals in GM IPO as it loses top role
By Jeffrey McCracken (c) 2010 Bloomberg News
Wall Street banks led by JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley stand to make a combined $120 million on General Motors Co.'s initial public offering. If it weren't for Goldman Sachs Group Inc., they could have made four times as much.
In a pitch to the U.S. Treasury in May, Goldman Sachs offered to accept a fee of 0.75 percent, according to people with direct knowledge of the matter. That's a fraction of the 3 percent banks typically charge on the largest IPOs and well below the 2 percent offered by Bank of America Corp. and other banks that presented to Treasury, said the people, speaking anonymously because the matter is private.

In Washington, It's the Money That Talks
Star Parker - TownHall.com
Washington's latest bailout of bleeding state governments, $26 billion worth, has gotten attention because, among other things, almost half the bailout is financed by cutting $12 billion from food stamps.
But isn't food stamps a signature program for the liberal Democrats who passed this spending bill? Isn't government money for the poor what Democrats are supposed to be about?
How, in these tough times, do Democrats who control congress decide who'll get funded and who not?

Obama Wins Low Yield as Markets Shrink Aiding Deficit
By Christine Richard and Susanne Walker
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Bond investors seeking top-rated securities face fewer alternatives to Treasuries, allowing President Barack Obama to sell unprecedented sums of debt at ever lower rates to finance a $1.47 trillion deficit.
While net issuance of Treasuries will rise by $1.2 trillion this year, the net supply of corporate bonds, mortgage-backed securities and debt tied to consumer loans may recede by $1.3 trillion, according to Jeffrey Rosenberg, a fixed-income strategist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York.

The Fed Can't Solve Our Economic Woes
posted By John Frisby - LuxLibertas - Light and Liberty
By GERALD P. O'DRISCOLL JR.
A policy of low interest rates is a textbook response of monetary authorities to the economic weakness brought on by deficient aggregate demand. The policy is justified by pointing to various ways in which money can promote economic activity-including by stimulating investment, discouraging savings, encouraging consumption spending, and allowing individuals to lower their debt burdens by refinancing existing debt. While these effects are theoretically plausible, this textbook policy does not apply to our present situation.
First, our lingering crisis and economic weakness was brought on not by a Keynesian failure of effective demand, but by a Hayekian asset boom and bust. Second, the textbook case for low interest rates treats the policy as one of benefits without costs. No such policy exists.

Dunce Geithner
By The Mogambo Guru - ATimes.com
Bill Bonner here at The Daily Reckoning draws attention to Tim Geithner, Secretary of the Treasury of the United States of America, and the now infamous "Welcome to the Recovery" piece he wrote for The New York Times, which I meant to read, and tried to read, but I could only get part way through it before getting visibly upset with such self-serving, lying, sophomoric qualitative excuse-mongering.
I also think I remember quickly scanning the article, but it was just, "Bah! More of the Same Old Crap (SOC)" about how the brave, handsome and beautiful brilliant Obama people (like Mr Geithner himself) and the brave, handsome and beautiful geniuses in congress courageously worked together in a glorious heroic effort to "save us" from the terrible fate of booms caused by inflationary increases in the money supply and the cancer of deficit-spending governments grown to grotesque proportions, by (oddly enough) providing more government grotesqueries by dint of outrageously more deficit-spending and even outrageously more money created by the outrageous Federal Reserve! Outrageous! How could I continue reading such crap?

Monopoly Money and the International Banking Cartel
Damon Vrabel - SiolverBearCafe.com
Federal Reserve System, Ivy League neoliberalism has been exposed for what it is
Some people have asked what I mean by "international banking cartel" and if it really exists. indeed it is very real and it has profound power over our lives. here are the details...
The Federal Reserve has been at the top of the news for a long time and it's getting a lot of attention now as it appears the next down cycle in the depression may be upon us. So what's the real reason the world listens so intently to an Ivy League bureaucrat like Bernanke? Of course, it has nothing to do with him. It's who he is accountable to - the international banking cartel

Fed: Small businesses find relaxed lending standards
By Martin Crutsinger, AP Economics Writer
WASHINGTON - Banks have eased lending standards for small businesses for the first time in nearly four years, the Federal Reserve said Monday .
In its latest survey of bank lending practices, the Fed found that the loosening of loan standards was occurring primarily at America's largest domestic banks.
Banks had been reporting relaxed credit standards for big corporations. But the survey marked the first indication that credit was beginning to ease for smaller companies.
That could be welcome news for small businesses. Many have complained since the recession hit that they were having more trouble borrowing money to keep operating.

Gold & Silver - A Pair Of Aces For A Winning Hand!
Lachlan Rattray - SilverBearCafe.com
"Every portfolio should have a 10% core holding of gold and silver as emergency money" was the simple and timeless message in Glen O. Kirsch conveyed 19 years ago in an article entitled: "What's in Your Core Holdings?" and such a message is even more appropriate today given the unsettling fiscal, economic and investment environment.
Kirsch went on to say that such "money" would be principally for protection, not profit, and function as insurance against a catastrophe, i.e. as your bridge across any social, political and economic abyss. It would be your ace in the hole that you hoped you would never have to use.

Gold Rallys to Retrace Last Months Sell Off
By: Adrian Ash - MarketOracle.co.uk
THE PRICE OF GOLD rose to its best level since the start of July in early trading on Monday, rising above $1226 per ounce as world stock markets sagged but commodity prices ticked higher.
Crude oil bounced from a 1-month low, and wheat futures rose again after dipping from this month's near-two year high - sparked by Russia banning exports amid its worst drought in five decades.
Silver prices edged up to $18.30 an ounce, some 2.6% above last Thursday's two-week low. So-called "safe haven" government bonds also rose following weak Japanese GDP data, nudging the 30-year US Treasury yield down to a 16-month low of 3.80%.

Gold Advances to Six-Week High on Signs of Faltering Recovery
By Nicholas Larkin and Millie Munshi
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Gold prices rose to a six-week high on signs the global economy is faltering, boosting demand for the metal as a protector of wealth.
Japan's economy grew at less than a fifth of the pace economists estimated last quarter, pushing it into third place behind the U.S. and China. Manufacturing in the New York region expanded less than forecast in August, a report showed today. Gold prices have gained for two straight weeks on demand for the metal as a haven.

Gold Still Burns Bright
By: The Gold Report - MarketOracle.co.uk
TGR: I noted in a recent article in Investor's Digest that you were talking about the M3. You said, "M3 in the first quarter was falling at a rate last seen during The Great Depression." We recently interviewed John Williams of ShadowStats, who noted that the M3 has had its sharpest ever year-over-year decline. He concluded that we will see a deepening recession with inflation/hyperinflation afterward. You are in the camp that believes hyperinflation will occur first, and then deflation will wipe out the remaining debt. What do you see in the numbers to indicate that?
John Embry: Well, I think I'm being misunderstood because I think we are in a highly deflationary situation as we speak. I don't really disagree with Williams. The basic problem is that the amount of debt in the system is extraordinarily deflationary. The only way to combat it without having the hard 1930s-style deflation is to print more money. The risk of doing that is hyperinflation. I think they will opt for that, but I'm not 100% convinced the economy will go that way. The economy could very well go Elliott Prechter's way and go into a hard deflation, but not without a huge effort from the authorities in the United States to prevent it.

Even Low-Cost Leader Wal-Mart Shows Signs of Inflation
By Rocky Vega - The DailyReckoning.com
08/16/10 Stockholm, Sweden - Good old "Save money. Live better." Wal-Mart may be choosing instead to surreptitiously raise prices, according to a JPMorgan Chase study. The company, well known by consumers for constantly lowering prices when possible, now appears to be moving in a different direction. In at least one Virginia store, Wal-Mart has recently increased its prices about six percent on average over a six-week period.
From DailyFinance:
"A JPMorgan Chase (JPM) study of a Walmart Supercenter in Virginia found that the world's largest retailer has raised prices by nearly 6% on average over the past six weeks," according to the New York Post. Reuters says it was the biggest sequential increase since JPMorgan started the study in January 2009.
"Some Prices Hiked Over 60%"

Mass Delusion - American Style
by Jim Quinn - LewRockwell.com
"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one." - Charles Mackay - Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds
The American public thinks they are rugged individualists, who come to conclusions based upon sound reason and a rational thought process. The truth is that the vast majority of Americans act like a herd of cattle or a horde of lemmings. Throughout history there have been many instances of mass delusion. They include the South Sea Company bubble, Mississippi Company bubble, Dutch Tulip bubble, and Salem witch trials. It appears that mass delusion has replaced baseball as the national past-time in America. In the space of the last 15 years the American public have fallen for the three whopper delusions:

1. Buy stocks for the long run
2. Homes are always a great investment
3. Globalization will benefit all Americans

Do State Governments Have the Authority to Enforce ObamaCare's Insurance Regulations?
Peter Suderman - Reason.com
As part of the new health care law, state governments are expected to enforce a host of federally defined regulations on health insurers. Just one problem: It seems that a number of states do not have the authority to enforce those regulations.
Insurance commissioners in about half the states say they do not have clear authority to enforce consumer protection standards that take effect next month.
Federal and state officials are searching for ways to plug the gap. Otherwise, they say, the ability of consumers to secure the benefits of the new law could vary widely, depending on where they live.

Unemployment compensation --
the new early retirement & 3rd rail of American politics

The worst bet in real estate today: Construction loans
By Paul Wiseman, USA TODAY
The biggest bank killer around isn't some exotic derivative investment concocted by Wall Street's financial alchemists. It's the plain old construction loan, Main Street banks' bread and butter for decades.
Deutsche Bank has called them "without doubt, the riskiest commercial real estate loan product." The Congressional Oversight Panel, a financial watchdog, has warned that construction loans have deteriorated faster and inflicted bigger losses on banks than any other real estate loans.

Banks to benefit most from White House program
to help fight foreclosures
By Vicki Needham - TheHill.com
Banks will get the biggest benefit from an Obama administration housing program designed to help unemployed homeowners escape foreclosure.
Housing experts expressed concern that banks, not homeowners, will be helped by the White House's $3 billion funding infusion - $2 billion from the Treasury Department and another $1 billion from the Housing and Urban Development Department - going to those states hit hardest by the housing market crash and unemployment.

The Fannie-Freddie turkey shoot
Colin Barr - Fortune.cnn.com
Can Washington bring itself to do something about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
The Obama administration will take its first stab at this vexing question Tuesday. Treasury's Conference on the Future of Housing Finance will bring together bankers, investors, housing experts and policymakers in search of a fix for the government-sponsored mortgage investors, which have consumed nearly $150 billion of taxpayer support since their September 2008 takeover.

Mortgage closing costs rise 36 percent
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
Mortgage closing costs jumped 36.6 percent as banks and lenders put in more work to get loans closed, according to the 2010 Closing Costs Study from Bankrate.com.
The average cost of origination and third-party fees on a $200,000 loan for a home purchase mortgage ($250,000 purchase price) was $3,741, up from $2,739 last year.
Origination fees charged directly by lenders increased 22.8 percent to $1,463, while fees charged by third parties for things like appraisals and title insurance surged 47.2 percent to $2,277.

Protest hits banks on foreclosures
By Dianne Mathiowetz - Workers.org
More than 200 union members, retirees and community activists mobilized by the Atlanta-N. Georgia Labor Council and the Atlanta Fighting Foreclosure Coalition held a public forum on the housing crisis on July 22. Following that, they protested outside the headquarters building of Wachovia Bank. The state of Georgia and the Atlanta metro area, in particular, rank among the highest in the nation for foreclosures and unemployment.

US builder slump deepens in August
By Alan Rappeport in New York - FT.com
Troubles in the US housing market are continuing to weaken homebuilders' confidence, as high unemployment and tight credit hit demand for new homes.
The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) said its measure of confidence had fallen unexpectedly this month, from 14 to 13 on its index, the lowest level since March 2009.
Homebuilders' confidence has now declined for three months running. Many housing analysts attribute this to a traditional summer lull, coupled with a "hangover" after the expiration of government incentives that pulled demand forward earlier this year.

Housing industry's economic output falls 80%
LATimes.com
Housing is a big business in California. Home builders employ hundreds of thousands of people, and other industries such as retail, manufacturing and restaurants benefit from the spending of those employees.
The slowdown in construction in California has muted those benefits. According to a report released Monday by the California Homebuilding Foundation and the Center for Strategic Economic Research, the economic output of the housing industry has fallen 80% since 2005.
Economic output includes the money spent on sectors that supply goods and services to the residential construction industry, as well as cash spent by construction industry employees.

US house mortgage arrears mount
By Aline van Duyn in New York and Anna Fifield in Washington
Mortgage delinquencies have risen in nearly all US congressional districts from the levels of the last election, highlighting the political pressure on US policymakers as they gather in Washington on Tuesday to tackle the housing crisis.
Tim Geithner, Treasury secretary, and Shaun Donovan, housing secretary, are meeting investors, bankers and public policy experts to discuss housing finance. Investors continue to shun private-sector mortgages, with most new home loans now financed through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the agencies taken over by the government in 2008.

Hypocrisy, Thy Name is Michelle
Allen Hunt - TownHall.com
Michelle Obama is a woman of her word. In July, she made a drive-by through the Gulf coast region and urged people to "do a few things [to] help this community." Emphasis on the word "few." She even recorded an ad inviting Americans to "come on down" to the Gulf as she herself then headed back to Washington to collect her family to head to a holiday in a national park in Maine. At least Maine is in America.
With her recent holiday junket to Spain, she has now officially spit in the eye of Gulf coast residents. Rather than vacation in the spill-ravaged region, her family headed overseas. Does Spain's economy need stimulating? Perhaps so.

Dems feel the heat from Obama's stand on mosque
By: Byron York - Chief Political Correspondent - Washington Examiner
"He expressed support for that project," says Salam Al-Marayati, president of the Muslim Public Affairs Council and a guest at the White House iftar dinner on Friday. The "he" to whom Al-Marayati refers is President Obama, and "that project" is the Ground Zero mosque. "Did we believe he supported the project?" Al-Marayati asks. "Yes."
"We felt that he was giving encouragement, that he was supporting the idea," says another guest, Imam Mohamed Hag Magid, head of Virginia's All Dulles Area Muslim Society. "I personally felt he was saying it is wrong to attack the building of the mosque."

For-profit colleges slammed by student loan repayment data
By Julia Love, Los Angeles Times
Investors react to a Department of Education report that shows nearly two-thirds of the schools' students aren't repaying their federal loans.
Reporting from Washington - Stock prices of for-profit colleges plummeted and calls for stronger government regulations mounted as investors and consumer advocate groups alike reacted Monday to an Education Department report that showed nearly two-thirds of the schools' students weren't repaying their federal loans.
The government data, released after the market closed Friday, focused on the 2009 loan repayment rates for more than 8,000 colleges and universities in the U.S. Such rates are used to gauge the potential effect of the department's proposed "gainful employment" rules, which would cut off federal aid to programs in which less than 45% of students are able to repay their loans.

Apple TV expected to get an overhaul
By Jefferson Graham, USA TODAY
The competition between Apple (AAPL) and Google
in the digital living room is about to intensify.
Tech analysts expect Apple soon to revamp its under-performing Apple TV gadget, which plugs into a TV so you can watch movies and shows via iTunes, in order to take on the new Google TV service when it launches this fall.
Google TV is a new way of watching Web content on televisions, via a Google operating system of sorts. Google is partnering with Sony, Logitech, Dish Network and others on the service, which will make its debut on a new set from Sony. No specific date has been announced.

Apple Hires Expert on Mobile Payments
By NICK BILTON - NYTimes.com
Over the past decade Apple has expanded into a number of industries besides computers, including music, mobile phones, movies and books. Now Apple could be going after something else: cash.
As first reported by Near Field Communications World, a trade publication, Apple recently hired Benjamin Vigier, an expert in the mobile payments industry who works with a technology called near field communication.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Mr. Vigier is now Apple's product manager for mobile commerce. Before joining Apple he worked with a company called mFoundry, developing mobile payment services for PayPal and Starbucks, and also worked on a project called the mobile wallet.

Will the iPhone Become Your iWallet?
By Brian X. Chen - Wired.com
A collection of recently published patents and a new hire at Apple suggest that future iPhones may carry built-in features to replace your credit cards.
Apple recently hired Benjamin Vigier as a product manager for mobile commerce. He's an expert in near field communication (NFC), a technology that enables devices to exchange information wirelessly over very short distances. It's the kind of technology that credit card companies have been touting (without much success) recently, where instead of swiping a credit card, you just wave a card or key fob in front of a reader. According to his LinkedIn profile, Vigier formerly directed and developed mobile payment solutions for PayPal and Starbucks.

Banker Builds a Candy Business in Bits and Pieces
By CHRISTINA S.N. LEWIS -WSJ.com (free)
"Something's burning," said Anita Zeldin. Alarmed, the 53-year-old former banking executive rushed from the tempering machine to the stove where her assistant was stirring a small pot of butter, vanilla and sugar.
Glancing down, Ms. Zeldin saw the mixture was still a foamy dark yellow, with none of the telltale dark brown streaks that would mean tossing the whole batch. False alarm.
"It's OK," she said, relieved.
Kitchen mishaps are a chief hazard in Ms. Zeldin's new line of work: candy maker.

Poll: Americans Don't Trust Newspapers, Television News
by Stephan Tawney - The AmericanPundit.com
You can't blame them. We're well-past the days, if those days ever existed, when reporters were only interested in the facts and their editors published the truth.
Every outlet has its own biases and uses its resources to push its agenda. People rally around those outlets which push their preferred agenda while opposing those outlets which push an opposing agenda. General trust in the newspaper or television establishment is almost non-existent, and for good reason.

As Cotton Prices Approach 15-Year High, Clothing Prices May Increase
By GIL RUDAWSKY - DailyFinance.com
The oft-ignored U.S. cotton market has been steadily gaining ground, and today cotton prices are nearing heights not seen in the last 15 years.
Natural disasters in top cotton-producing countries, coupled with an increase in demand for the commodity and a record crop year, spell good news for American cotton farmers. On Friday, the price per bale for December delivery hit $85 -- up from a $75 per bale price last month.

Judge Napolitano - Freedom Watch - 08/14/10 (part 1)

Judge Napolitano - Freedom Watch - 08/14/10 (part 2)

Judge Napolitano - Freedom Watch - 08/14/10 (part 3)

Dems may use food-stamp money to pay for Michelle Obama's nutrition initiative
By Russell Berman - theHill.com
Democrats who reluctantly slashed a food-stamp program to fund a state-aid bill may have to do so again to pay for a top priority of first lady Michelle Obama.
The House will soon consider an $8 billion child-nutrition bill that's at the center of the first lady's "Let's Move" initiative. Before leaving for the summer recess, the Senate passed a smaller version of the legislation that is paid for by trimming the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as the food-stamp program.

Longmont, Poudre Valley to build medical campus in Frederick
DENVER BUSINESS JOURNAL
Frederick is getting a new hospital and medical campus at I-25 and Colorado 52 in southwest Weld County.
Longmont United Hospital and Poudre Valley Health System said in a news release Monday that initial construction will begin later this year on an urgent care unit, with other facilities to follow under a master plan being developed by the two hospital companies.
A non-profit corporation, Carbon Valley Healthcare Holdings Corporation, is being created to carry out the project. Each hospital will have an equal stake in the non-profit entity.

Fishing legacy fades away from New England ports
Sunk by regulation
JAY LINDSAY, Associated Press Writer - timesunion.com
PLYMOUTH, Mass. (AP) - Mike Secondo remembers the days when Plymouth's docks outshone its rock.
Tourists swarmed the town pier in the 1970s and '80s, snapping pictures and bantering with commercial fishermen as they unloaded another shimmering haul for Secondo's company, Reliable Fish, to truck to points south.

Arizona Sheriff: Border Patrol Has Retreated from Parts of Border
Because It's 'Too Dangerous'
By Terence P. Jeffrey, Editor-in-Chief - CNSNews.com
(CNSNews.com) - Sheriff Larry Dever of Cochise County, Ariz., one of four Arizona counties contiguous with the U.S-Mexico border, said Friday that the U.S. Border Patrol has pulled back from parts of the border in his and neighboring counties because manning those areas has become too dangerous.
"And you frankly have Border Patrolmen--and I know this from talking to Border Patrol agents - who will not allow their agents to work on the border because it is too dangerous," Dever told CNSNews.com in a videotaped interview. "Now what kind of message is that for crying out loud?"

Robert Gates announces plan to step down
as US defence secretary next year
Veteran politician who performed same role under George Bush will retire next year despite sense of crisis in Afghanistan
Ewen MacAskill in Washington - guardian.co.uk
The US defence secretary, Robert Gates, who served under George Bush before performing the same job for President Barack Obama, is planning to stand down next year despite the mounting sense of crisis in Afghanistan.
In an interview with the Washington-based Foreign Policy magazine, Gates stopped short of giving a date when he would step down, but said that with another presidential election due in 2012, he would not make life difficult for Obama by staying on too long.

BP Spill Claims From 50 States Confront Administrator Feinberg
By Jim Snyder
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Claims from all 50 U.S. states confront Kenneth Feinberg as he prepares to tap BP Plc's $20 billion escrow account for victims of the company's Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
"The farther away you are from the Gulf and the Gulf shore the less likely it is that you will have a valid claim," Feinberg, administrator of the fund, said Aug. 13 in a telephone interview. "But I will take a look at each claim."

Unallayed by tests, fishermen greet start of gulf shrimp harvest with suspicion
By David A. Fahrenthold and Juliet Eilperin - Washington Post Staff Writer
On Monday, Louisiana's shrimpers could shrimp again. On the first day of the state's fall season, boats began unloading their catch at bayou-side docks, and processors began peeling, freezing and packaging the shellfish for the long trip to America's dinner plates.
Federal officials said it was safe. They had allowed states to reopen harvest areas, they said, only after tests on fish and shrimp showed no signs of oil or dispersants. In fact, federal officials said, they did not turn up a single piece of seafood that was unsafe to eat -- even at the height of BP's oil spill.

Economic powerhouse China focuses on its military might
By John Pomfret - Washington Post Staff Writer
China is quickly modernizing its military and has set its sights on extending its influence deep into the Pacific and Indian oceans now that the military balance with its longtime nemesis, Taiwan, is tilting in its favor, the Defense Department reported Monday.
In its annual report to Congress on China's military, the Defense Department said that the People's Liberation Army is advancing across the board commensurate with China's burgeoning economic power. Coincidentally, the report was issued a day after China's economy was recognized as the world's second biggest, eclipsing Japan's in size during the second quarter of this year.

China targets U.S. troops with arms buildup
By Bill Gertz - The Washington Times
Pentagon cites 'anti-access' missiles in report
China is aggressively building up military forces to strike U.S. forces in the western Pacific and elsewhere as part of what the Pentagon calls an array of high-tech "anti-access" missiles, submarines and warplanes in its latest annual report.
The report to Congress on China's military power, released Monday, also warned that China's military is extending its global military reach beyond a weapons buildup to wage regional war with Taiwan and the United States. The report also questioned U.S.-China military exchanges, noting that Beijing is using the visits and meetings for political influence operations and intelligence gathering.

N.Korea warns of 'severest punishment' for war games
SEOUL (AFP) - North Korea's military threatened Sunday to launch the "severest punishment" against South Korea for staging massive joint war games with the United States this week.
The North's army and people will "deal a merciless counterblow" to the allies "as it had already resolved and declared at home and abroad", a spokesman for the country's army General Staff said in a statement published by state media.

John Bolton: Russia's Loading of Nuke Fuel Into Iran Plant Means Aug. 21 Deadline for Israeli Attack
By: David A. Patten - NewsMax.com
News that Russia will load nuclear fuel rods into an Iranian reactor has touched off a countdown to a point of no return, a deadline by which Israel would have to launch an attack on Iran's Bushehr reactor before it becomes effectively "immune" to any assault, says former Bush administration U.N. Ambassador John R. Bolton.
Once the fuel rods are loaded, Bolton told Fox News on Friday afternoon, "it makes it essentially immune from attack by Israel. Because once the rods are in the reactor an attack on the reactor risks spreading radiation in the air, and perhaps into the water of the Persian Gulf."

Iran Announces Construction of New Nuclear Site
By Staff, Associated Press - CNSNews.com
Tehran, Iran (AP) - Iran said Monday it will begin building a new site to enrich uranium by March, moving ahead with a plan that defies international efforts to curb its nuclear development.
Uranium enrichment factories are used to create fuel for nuclear power plants but can also, if taken to extremes, produce the material for weapons.
The planned plant is among 10 new sites that Iran approved last year in what would be a dramatic expansion of its controversial enrichment program. The announcement on state TV said the locations for the sites have been determined but gave no details.

From Australia: Please, Please Be Careful America

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Monday 08.16.2010

Happy Birthday, Joe!!

Regulators seize Chicago-area bank in 110th closing of the year
by Chris Carey - BailOutSleuth.com
Regulators closed another Chicago-area bank, Palos Bank and Trust Co., on Friday, bringing the total number of failures since the start of the year to 110.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. arranged for First Midwest Bank to take over the failed institution's five branches, along with its $467.8 million in deposits and $493.4 million in assets.
Palos Bank, based in Chicago's southwest suburbs, is the 14th Illinois bank to fail this year.
First Midwest Bank, of Itasca, Ill., agreed to pay a premium of 1 percent for the deposits. First Midwest and the FDIC will share in the losses on $343.8 million of Palos Bank's assets.

Is a Crash Coming? Ten Reasons to Be Cautious
By BRETT ARENDS - WSJ.com (free)
Could Wall Street be about to crash again?
This week's bone-rattlers may be making you wonder.
I don't make predictions. That's a sucker's game. And I'm certainly not doing so now.
But way too many people are way too complacent this summer. Here are 10 reasons to watch out.

1. The market is already expensive.
2. The Fed is getting nervous.
3. Too many people are too bullish.
4. Deflation is already here.
5. People still owe way too much money.
6. The jobs picture is much worse than they're telling you.
7. Housing remains a disaster.
8. Labor Day is approaching.
9. We're looking at gridlock in Washington.
10. All sorts of other indicators are flashing amber.

World economy coming in for a landing
By Sol Sanders - The Washington Times
There's little good news these days for the world economy. The Federal Reserve is now warning of a slowed U.S. recovery, if not a double-dip recession. The euro is again under pressure from its debt-ridden members. Britain is undertaking serious but politically dangerous surgery on its welfare state. Germany continues to pump out subsidized exports as though there were no tomorrow. Although still growing rapidly, India faces increased inflationary pressures. And Dubai's collapse may be the forerunner of other misadventures in the gluttonous Persian Gulf states.
But events in China might prove to be the most dangerous for a world scene already crowded with perils. Not least is Beijing's refusal to cooperate with the U.S., Japan and the European Union in reining in the drive by the erratic tyrannies in North Korea and Iran to move toward nuclear weapons. But the economic situation is no less worrisome.

US Economic Outlook Only Facing One Direction
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
08/13/10 Ouzilly, France - Another week gone by. Nothing has been learned. Nothing has been proven. Nothing has been decided.
In the markets, we mean. It looks like the stock market is finally rolling over. After a big drop on Wednesday, the Dow followed up with a modest drop yesterday - down another 58 points.
Is the market really headed down? We've been wrong about it before. About the timing, that is. But we still have little doubt that this market is headed down. Why? That's just the way it works. After hitting extraordinary highs, we must have extraordinary lows in the forecast. Winter follows summer, no?

The great American un-recovery:
Banking failures and swindling the wealth from working and
middle class Americans.
MyBudget360.com
Household assets off by $11 trillion from 2007 peak.
The economic profession and bankers on Wall Street have taken a hit to their credibility with missing the biggest recession since the Great Depression. It is understandable for the average person on the street to miss something as nuanced as a tiny recession but for a group of professionals whose mission statement involves understanding the economy and then to miss the biggest economic headwinds in a century is just inexcusable. This is no tiny recession. We have witnessed the unfortunate destruction of trillions of dollars and untold damage to the American working and middle class. Yet we are told from these same professionals that we are in a recovery. There is plenty of room to remain skeptical about this group.

Libertarian Legend Thomas Sowell on Property Rights

Double Dip? A Tipping Point May Be Near
By JEFF SOMMER - NYTimes.com
LIKE a car spinning its wheels, the American economy hasn't been getting much traction. Many financial indicators are issuing worrisome signals, millions of people are still out of work, and growth is slowing.
Will the economy pick up momentum or slip back into recession? Unfortunately, the answer is very much in doubt.
"We are at a very critical moment in the business cycle," said Lakshman Achuthan, the managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute, a private forecasting group with an excellent track record. After the economy began to recover last summer, in his estimation, "growth has definitely slowed." But he said he wouldn't have enough data until at least the fall to know "whether we're dipping back into recession."

Keith McCullough: US Economy Near Point of No Return
By: Dan Weil - MoneyNews.com
The Federal Reserve's decision to expand its quantitative easing by purchasing more Treasuries is a dangerous one, says Keith McCullough, CEO of research firm Hedgeye.
"That could lead the country to the brink of collapse," he wrote in a Fortune magazine column.
McCullough agrees with economists Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff, who recently wrote that government debt in excess of 90 percent of GDP pulls down economic growth.
"It's a point from which it's almost impossible to return," McCullough wrote.
Government debt will reach 62 percent of GDP by Sept. 30, the Congressional Budget Office predicts.

How an Economy Grows and Why it Crashes
Peter Schiff - 321Gold.com
No Exit - Stage Left or Right
This week, national attention was fixated on JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater, whose bold, creative, and controversial exit strategy could revitalize his future prospects. Not nearly as noticed was the Federal Reserve's decision on Tuesday to avoid finding an exit strategy for its own never-ending career trap. Unfortunately, the Fed's choices affect our lives much more than Slater's.

Frank Holmes Says "Buy Gold"
By Dave Gonigam - The DailyReckoning.com
08/13/10 Baltimore, Maryland - Gold is sitting tight at $1,212 this morning. It popped up from $1,200 yesterday the moment that first-time jobless claims numbers came out ... and hot money fled for safety.
So what's the outlook from here?
"If history is any guide," says US Global Investors chief and Vancouver favorite Frank Holmes, "gold is about to get even more attractive because we are heading into the fall and winter gift giving season." The Muslim holy month of Ramadan is just around the cornerÉ followed by India's Diwali festival, Christmas in Europe and the Americas and then Chinese New Year.

Gold Market is not "Fixed", it's Rigged
By: Adrian Douglas - GoldSeek.com
In 1919 the major London gold dealers decided to get together in the offices of N.M. Rothschild to "fix" the price of gold each day. While this was notionally to find the clearing price at which all buying interest and all selling interest balanced the possibility for market manipulation and self-dealing is inherently systemic in such a cozy arrangement. This quaint anti-competitive procedure continues to this day. In no other market in the world do the major players get together each day and decide on a price. Imagine if Intel, AMD and Samsung were to meet each day to "fix" the price of microchips, or if the major oil companies were to meet each day to "fix" the price of crude oil; wouldn't there be a public outcry and a flurry of antitrust violation lawsuits? The "fix" is not open to the public, there are no published transcripts of each fixing, and there is no way to know what the representatives of the bullion banks discuss between each other.

Gold and Financial Crisis
By: Clif Droke - GoldSeek.com
At what point does a market crash translate to a lengthy bear market and/or an economic recession? This question was taken up by a celebrated historian of the early 20th century, one Otto C. Lightner.
In 1922, Lightner chronicled nearly every major economic depression in the known history of the Western world in a 400-page volume entitled "The History of Business Depressions." Lightner's comprehensive chronicle of business depressions contains much that is applicable to today's economic situation following the credit crisis. (It must be noted that before the Great Depression of the 1930s, the word "depression" was used without distinction to describe what could either be considered a mild recession or a major depression.)

Mark Tapscott on MSNBC's Daily Rant:
Government is the problem

Fed's Hoenig: Keeping Rates Too Low 'Dangerous Gamble'
By: Reuters - CNBC.com
The Federal Reserve is undertaking a "dangerous gamble" by keeping rates at near zero for so long, and must start raising rates or risk damaging the nascent U.S. recovery, a top Federal Reserve official said on Friday.
"To be clear, I am not advocating a tight monetary policy," Kansas City Reserve Bank President Thomas Hoenig said in the text of a speech to the Lincoln, Nebraska, Chamber of Commerce. "I am advocating a policy that remains accommodative but slowly firms as the economy itself expands and moves toward more balance."

Fed's Hoenig doubts deflation diagnosis
Colin Barr - Fortune
The Fed's most vocal hawk questioned the now-popular notion that the U.S. economy faces a deflationary bust.
Thomas Hoenig, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, renewed his call for the Fed to end its promises to hold down interest rates.
He said in a speech Friday that the Fed's promise to keep its short-term interest rate target near zero isn't aiding the economic recovery, which he contends is stronger than commonly believed.

Growth Prospects Dim With Retail Sales, Trade Reports
By Timothy R. Homan
Aug. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Prospects for U.S. economic growth took a hit this week after reports showed the trade deficit swelled and consumers reined in spending.
Economists at Morgan Stanley reduced their estimate for third-quarter consumer spending following a report showing retail sales rose less than forecast in July. A record jump in the trade gap for June capped figures that indicated the world's biggest economy grew at least a percentage point less than the 2.4 percent pace the government estimated last month.

Geithner's Delusional Recovery
By The Mogambo Guru - The DailyReckoning.com
08/13/10 Tampa, Florida - Bill Bonner here at The Daily Reckoning writes that Tim Geithner, Secretary of the Treasury of the United States of America, is the author of the now-infamous "Welcome to the Recovery" piece he wrote for The New York Times, which I meant to read, and tried to read, but I could only get part way through it before getting visibly upset with such self-serving, lying, sophomoric qualitative excuse-mongering.
I also think I remember quickly scanning the article, but it was just, "Bah! More of the Same Old Crap (SOC)" about how the brave, handsome and beautiful brilliant Obama people (like Mr. Geithner himself) and the brave, handsome and beautiful geniuses in Congress courageously worked together in a glorious heroic effort to "save us" from the terrible fate of booms caused by inflationary increases in the money supply and the cancer of deficit-spending governments grown to grotesque proportions, by (oddly enough) providing more government grotesqueries by dint of outrageously more deficit-spending and even outrageously more money created by the outrageous Federal Reserve! Outrageous! How could I continue reading such crap?

BofA Shuns Private Equity to Focus on Direct Stakes
By David Mildenberg
Aug. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Bank of America Corp., facing new U.S. curbs on where it can invest, plans to bypass private- equity firms and acquire more direct stakes in companies to boost returns.
The bank, which inherited most of its private-equity investments through the 2009 purchase of Merrill Lynch & Co., sold about $3 billion of them this year, said Jim Forbes, global principal investments executive. Direct stakes can come with board seats, giving Bank of America more influence than as a limited partner in others' funds, Forbes, who previously worked at Merrill Lynch, said in a telephone interview.

Wall Street's Asset-Grab
Written by Jeff Nielson - BullionBullsCanada.com
A recent Bloomberg article should have filled every American with rage. "Morgan Stanley's $11 Billion Makes Chicago Taxpayers Cry", proclaimed Bloomberg. As is often the case when these media outlets (partially) "shine a light" on the activities of the Wall Street Oligarchs, this was a case of gross understatement.
The article discusses how a "Morgan Stanley led partnership" will haul in more than $11 billion in parking revenues - thanks to a long-term lease agreement with the City of Chicago. As is to be expected, Bloomberg attempted to cover-up this taxpayer outrage through its intentional use of deceitful euphemisms.

The 'Hindenburg Omen' Is Seen. Will a Stock Crash Follow?
By DAILYFINANCE STAFF - DailyFinance.com
Wall Street is whispering about the "Hindenburg Omen." It's an ominously named technical indicator that is supposed to signal an upcoming stock market crash. "Its creator, a blind mathematician named Jim Miekka, said his indicator is now predicting a market meltdown in September," reports The Wall Street Journal.
The S&P 500 completed on Friday the biggest three-day decline since July 1. The wobbly stock market has investors worried and searching for clues on the market's direction.

The Rise, Fall, and Rise of Disaster
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
08/13/10 Ouzilly, France - The US Department of Agriculture may have some usefulness. Projecting future prices isn't one of them. In 2005, it looked five years ahead and saw a bushel of wheat selling for $3.50. Last week, the price rose to more than twice that much.
Why? God himself is to blame. Not since 1880 has Russia been so dry. And not since Napoleon's invasion has Moscow suffered so much soot. The government banned wheat exports and prices shot up to their highest point in 51 years. In the curious way that one thing lead to another, Napoleon's Russian Campaign grew out of the French Revolution like a forest fire out of a careless barbecue. The revolution stirred up enemies on all France's frontiers. When Napoleon had finished with them all, he had to reach farther - all the way to the banks of the Moskva River - to get his fingers burnt.

Gerald Celente on Jeff Rense Show 12 Aug 2010
homesteading - trend for 2011?

Federalism strikes back
By Gregory L. Schneider - The Washington Times
10th Amendment resurgence should have come sooner
We're seeing a re-emergence of constitutional principles and federalism across the country. It's a major issue in the health care reform debate, as Tea Party activists and others have refocused attention on the long-dormant principle concerning the individual mandates to purchase insurance and excessive spending by the federal government.
The idea that powers not explicitly delegated in the federal Constitution "are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people," as stated in the 10th Amendment, is a powerful one. Given the overreach of Washington and public disgust with politicians' disregard for the people's will, a healthy dose of state sovereignty and a reaffirmation of federalism is a good thing.

Another Threat to Economy: Boomers Cutting Back
By MARK WHITEHOUSE - WSJ.com (free)
America's baby boomers - those born between 1946 and 1964 - face a problem that could weigh on the economy for years to come: The longer it takes for the economy to recover, the less money they'll have to spend in retirement.
Policy makers have long worried that Americans aren't saving enough for old age. And lately, current and prospective retirees have been hit on many fronts at once: They have less money, they earn less on what they have, their houses aren't rising in value and the prospect of working longer to make up the shortfall has dimmed significantly in a lousy job market.

U.S. Home Resales Due for New Low, Citigroup Says:
By David Wilson
Aug. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Home resales in the U.S. may have tumbled to a record low in July as the expiration of federal tax credits dragged down the housing market, according to Josh Levin, a Citigroup Inc. analyst who follows homebuilders.
The CHART OF THE DAY shows how his estimate for last month, an annual rate of 4.1 million units, compares with the monthly totals since the National Association of Realtors consolidated sales figures for single-family homes and condominiums in 1999.

Gerald Celente on Freedom Watch 10 Aug 2010

Crowds Chase Scarce Housing Vouchers
By VALERIE BAUERLEIN - WSJ.com (free)
From Atlanta Suburbs to Chicago, Economic Woes
Lead to Surge in Applicants for Waiting Lists to Receive Federal Subsidy
EAST POINT, Ga. - The weak economy has expanded the ranks of people chasing the limited number of federal housing vouchers, leading to a surge in applications nationwide and chaotic scenes here this week.
Sixty people were taken to hospitals Wednesday in this Atlanta suburb after a lengthy wait and an angry mob scene in a sweltering shopping-center parking lot. Those treated for heat exposure and injuries from scuffles were among 30,000 people who had lined up for a waiting list for just 455 vouchers to cover part of their rent.

FHA Gets Tougher on Mortgages
By JENNIFER WATERS - WSJ.com (free)
Consumers looking for home loans backed by the Federal Housing Administration will face tougher hurdles and higher costs under new legislation and new rules that could take effect as soon as this month.
Higher monthly fees, larger down payments and better credit scores are among the new initiatives intended to ensure that the FHA stays solvent. Its reserves, which are used to cover bad loans, plummeted to $3.5 billion at midyear from $19.3 billion in September 2008, according to a report from the FHA's parent, the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Reforming Fannie and Freddie: Is Now the Right Time?
By: Diana Olick - CNBC Real Estate Reporter
In response to criticism by many in Congress that it should have added GSE reform to the financial reform bill, the Obama administration has repeatedly said the housing and mortgage markets are simply too fragile right now to weather the inevitable storm that debate would entail.
Still, next Tuesday, financial industry leaders, academics, economists and dozens of TV cameras will meet in a room at the Treasury Department for the first public forum on reforming the two mortgage giants which have been bleeding cash while still controlling 70 percent of today's mortgage market.

Jobs for middle class expansion are long gone
MyBudget360.com
The struggles to create jobs that will create a vibrant middle class have vanished under the foot of banking dominance.
Most Americans realize that having a job is a prerequisite to gaining entrance into the middle class. If you work hard enough, chances are you would have access to some of the things promised to the middle class; access to affordable housing, a good education, and the ability for some sort of retirement. That ideal has been thrown out the window over the last few decades while the expansion of banking has created a cycle of boom and bust bubbles. The American labor force has been weakened from every angle while banking profits have soared beyond the rate of inflation (or any other measure for that matter). In fact, over the past decade average Americans are doing much worse adjusted for inflation. The defined contribution plan or pensions has given way to 401k/403b plans that push people into gambling on the casino known as Wall Street. Job protection is weaker than we have seen since the end of the Great Depression. Yet we are told that the economy is good without a solid job market?

Gerald Celente on Goldseek Radio 14 Aug 2010

Denver School System Defends Interest-Rate Swap Deal
By Michael McDonald and Michael Quint
Aug. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Denver's public schools saved money by borrowing $750 million to close a pension deficit and to refund debt even after the interest-rate swaps it used with the financing backfired, officials said.
The 2008 bond sale saved more than $20 million because the system used about $400 million of the proceeds to fill the pension deficit, avoiding an annual penalty of 8.5 percent, or $34 million, that it would have had to pay when it merged its plan with the state's, according to a document posted on its website.

Scissors, Glue, Pencils? Check. Cleaning Spray?
By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD - NYTimes.com
When Emily Cooper headed off to first grade in Moody, Ala., last week, she was prepared with all the stuff on her elementary school’s must-bring list: two double rolls of paper towels, three packages of Clorox wipes, three boxes of baby wipes, two boxes of garbage bags, liquid soap, Kleenex and Ziplocs.

Pension check may not be in the mail
by Dennis Byrne - ChicagoTribune.com
Illinois public employees who think the state constitution guarantees that they'll get all their pension benefits may have another think coming.
Politicians' and public labor unions' assurances aside, there's another, not-well-publicized school of thought that says if the pension funds go bust, the state has no obligation to step in to pay the benefits. This runs contrary to the popular view that the Illinois Constitution, on its face, guarantees that all public employee pension benefits will be fully paid.

Obama pledges to defend Social Security
By Richard Serrano, Los Angeles Times
Privatizing the retirement system, as some Republicans want, would be reckless, he says on the 75th anniversary of the program.
Reporting from Washington - On the 75th anniversary of the signing of the Social Security law, President Obama pledged Saturday to protect it from some Republicans who he said want to privatize the retirement account system and "place bets with Social Security on Wall Street."
That, the president said in his weekly radio and Internet address, would be a reckless move as the nation's economy struggles to recover from a recession, noting that President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security measure into law in the depths of the Depression.

Obama Says Private Accounts Would Endanger U.S. Social Security
By Kate Andersen Brower
Aug. 14 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama said Republican proposals to have people invest Social Security benefits in private accounts would increase the U.S. budget deficit and put retirement money at risk to "the whims of Wall Street traders."
In his weekly address on the radio and Internet, Obama marked the 75th anniversary of President Franklin Roosevelt's signing of the Social Security Act, and said he would fight if Republicans try to convert the entitlement program to private investment accounts.

Woes of 'Continuing Care' Centers
By TOM LAURICELLA - WSJ.com (free)
As the effects of the 2008 financial crisis and the recession linger, there are more reminders of the care retirees should take when choosing to move into a continuing-care retirement community.
CCRCs provide a range of housing aimed at enabling seniors to "age in place." They usually offer independent living, assisted living and nursing care and allow residents to move from one stage to the next as they age.
But some retirement communities took a direct hit from the collapse of the real-estate market. Most notably, Erickson Retirement Communities, a developer of 20 CCRCs in 10 states, filed for bankruptcy last year.

Tea party activists rally on Arizona-Mexico border
HEREFORD, Arizona (AP) - Conservative tea party activists converged on a remote section of the U.S.-Mexico border on Sunday to show support for Arizona's controversial new immigration law.
More than 400 people gathered about 70 miles west of Nogales on a private ranch where the steel posts of the Arizona-Mexico border wall are set closely together to prevent people from crossing the border.
Demonstrators attached hundreds of U.S. flags with messages about curbing illegal immigration to the posts and chanted, "U-S-A," after a handful of spectators gathered on the Mexico side of the border.

Arizona Sheriff: Border Patrol Has Retreated from Parts of Borde
Because It's 'Too Dangerous'
By Terence P. Jeffrey, Editor-in-Chief
(CNSNews.com) - Sheriff Larry Dever of Cochise County, Ariz., one of four Arizona counties contiguous with the U.S-Mexico border, said Friday that the U.S. Border Patrol has pulled back from parts of the border in his and neighboring counties because manning those areas has become too dangerous.
"And you frankly have Border Patrolmen--and I know this from talking to Border Patrol agents-who will not allow their agents to work on the border because it is too dangerous," Dever told CNSNews.com in a videotaped interview. "Now what kind of message is that for crying out loud?"

'Three Sides' to the Sestak Story:
[Bill] Clinton Denies White House Claim That He Intervened
in U.S. Senate Race
By Fred Lucas, Staff Writer
(CNSNews.com) - Reigniting a political controversy, former President Bill Clinton this week contradicted the Obama White House, telling a Pennsylvania TV station that he never encouraged U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak to drop out of Pennsylvania's U.S. Senate race - as the White House claimed in May.
On Tuesday, Aug. 10, as Clinton campaigned for Sestak in Scranton, Pa., a reporter with the NBC affiliate in Wilkes-Barre asked Clinton why he was in Pennsylvania campaigning for Sestak if he had once tried to get him to drop out of the Senate race.

Corn Starch--The New 'Terrorist' Weapon
by Roger Young - StrikeTheRoot
The powers-that-be in Dallas are in a tizzy after several locations around the area received envelopes of white powder determined to be corn starch. The popular cooking ingredient was said to be accompanied by a"chilling note." A spokesman reported that the note said "something to the effect of 'Al-Qaeda in the USA.'"Gasp! The Horror! A cold, chilling wave of fear and dread just penetrated my entire body!
It's interesting that the message was only described in vague terms, rather than the exact text that was written. That tells me the note was some rambling, cryptic, hand scribbled message or that there was no note at all. The reporter shows his incompetence by not insisting on the exact text of the message.

PRESIDENT OBAMA'S RAMADAN GREETING: "ISLAM HAS ALWAYS BEEN PART OF AMERICA"
BY PAUL L. WILLIAMS, PH.D. - thelastcrusade.com
To commemorate the onset of Ramadan, President Barack Hussein Obama issued this statement:
"Ramadan is a time when Muslims around the world reflect upon the wisdom and guidance that comes with faith, and the responsibility that human beings have to one another, and to God."
"This is a time when families gather, friends host Iftars, and meals are shared. But Ramadan is also a time of intense devotion and reflection - a time when Muslims fast during the day and pray during the night; when Muslims provide support to others to advance opportunity and prosperity for people everywhere."

Obama defends right to build mosque near 9/11 site
BBC.co.uk
President Obama was speaking at a Muslim Iftar dinner at the White House
US President Barack Obama has staunchly defended controversial plans to build a mosque near Ground Zero in New York.
Opponents have protested against the construction of an Islamic cultural centre and mosque several hundred feet away from the site of the Twin Towers.
Mr Obama acknowledged "sensitivities" surround the 9/11 site, but said Muslims have the same right to practise their religion "as anyone else".
"Our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakeable," Mr Obama said.

Afghanistan's Deadline May Change, Petraeus Says
By William McQuillen and Kelly Riddell
Aug. 15 (Bloomberg) -- General David Petraeus said the July 2011 deadline for the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan is "conditions based" and could change depending on his assessment of progress.
"This is a date when a process begins, that is conditions based," Petraeus said in an interview on NBC's "Meet the Press" today. "And as the conditions permit we transition tasks to our Afghan counterparts and the security forces and in various governmental institutions and that enables a, quote, responsible drawdown of our forces."

Iran Attack This Week?
Kurt Nimmo - Infowars.com
Former interim U.N. ambassador and leading neocon John Bolton went on Fox News on Friday and sounded the alarm bells over Russia's pending delivery of nuclear fuel to Iran’s Bushehr reactor. If Israel plans to attack Bushehr, Bolton said, it must act now because allowing the Russians to load nuclear fuel rods at the site will make Iran "essentially immune from attack by Israel. Because once the rods are in the reactor an attack on the reactor risks spreading radiation in the air, and perhaps into the water of the Persian Gulf"

Alabama files suit against BP, oil spill firms
HOUSTON BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Casey Wooten REPORTER
The state of Alabama has filed a lawsuit against companies related to the Gulf oil spill.
Troy King, the state's attorney general, said in a statement Friday that he felt the need to move quickly on the suit.
"Some will, no doubt, sound the alarm that the lawsuit is premature. As Alabama's lawyer, I say that if, anything, based on BP's broken promises, their history of saying one thing and doing another, and now, new information that they have been secretly working to gain a legal advantage, further delay can only further damage our people," he said.

Davis willing to be arrested if it keeps oil fighting assets in place
by Doug Mouton / Eyewitness News - wwltv.com
ST. TAMMANY, La. -- St. Tammany Parish President Kevin Davis said Wednesday he's willing to be arrested, if that's what it takes to keep oil fighting assets in place.
"I'll go ahead and go on over to the jail, and they can come over and get me," Davis said.
The root of the disagreement is an executive order Kevin Davis issued on July 22. Davis ordered that no oil fighting assets be removed from his parish.
On Aug. 4, the federal on-scene coordinator, U.S. Coast Guard Rear Adm. Paul Zukunft, sent a letter to Davis. In that letter, Zukunft urged Davis to rescind that order and wrote, "Interference with personnel acting at the direction of the federal on-scene coordinator is a federal offense."

Louisiana official willing to go to jail
in fight against federal Government!!

Local man who cleaned oil spill says he's sick (see video)
CUMBERLAND COUNTY (WTVD) -- A Spring Lake man who went to the Gulf of Mexico to help fight the oil spill is now fighting for some medical attention.
Jackie Roach says a Fayetteville based environmental company, Contaminated Control Incorporated, sent him to Venice, Louisiana untrained and without protective gear.
Roach says while he was there, he was accidentally sprayed with clean-up chemicals that made his leg swell like a balloon.
"The next morning, I couldn't even put my boots on because my legs were swollen overnight. I mean puffed up. And they were burning, and it was real sore and itching," Roach said. "Personally, it's affecting me a whole lot and it hurts, the fact that they turned their backs on me, and they know what happened down there."

BP Oil - 1/3 - Matt Simmons(RIP) - Static Kill Diversion
Interview with Matt Simmons whom was murdered for his knowledge on the BP oil spill!

BP Oil - 2/3 - Matt Simmons(RIP) - Static Kill Diversion

BP Oil - 3/3 - Matt Simmons(RIP) - Static Kill Diversion

Scalise discusses the gulf oil spill with MSNBC
Congressman Steve Scalise discusses the impacts of the gulf oil spill with MSNBC host Dylan Ratigan.

Feds: Risk of BLOWOUT near wellhead is focus of internal meetings

Hundreds of Thousands of DEAD FISH on NEW JERSEY SHORE
AUG 12 2010 - BP Gulf Oil Spill ?

Diagrams of the Sinking of the Deepwater Horizon (Macondo Prospect) Proposed by BK Lim
Posted on August 14, 2010 by concernedcitizensofflorida
And What They Represent Concerning The Well In Question & BP Narrative
BK Lim has done it again. He presents here an alarming analysis of the events prior to and after the sinking of the Deepwater Horizon on top of the Macondo Prospect in the Gulf of Mexico. We very much appreciate this great revelatory work by BK Lim.
As always, we leave it to our readership to continue to ferret out the real story behind this Crime and Coverup of the Millennium. Our challenge, clearly, is that BP and the US Federal Government have locked down the crime scene known as the Gulf of Mexico with extraordinary police powers. How so? The US appointed BP, a foreign, multi-national corporation, as the lead entity in a unified command structure which was created as the official and legal response to the BP Gulf Oil Spill. Therefore, BP was empowered by our government to effectively enforce martial law in US territorial waters in the wake of BP's perpetration (with US Federal Government aid and assistance) of an unprecedented series of crimes. Can it get any more bizarre and kafkaesque than this?! We certainly hope not.

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Friday 08.13.2010

The stunning decline of Barack Obama:
10 key reasons why the Obama presidency is in meltdown
Nile Gardiner - Telegraph.co.uk
The last few weeks have been a nightmare for President Obama, in a summer of discontent in the United States which has deeply unsettled the ruling liberal elites, so much so that even the Left has begun to turn against the White House. While the anti-establishment Tea Party movement has gained significant ground and is now a rising and powerful political force to be reckoned with, many of the president's own supporters as well as independents are rapidly losing faith in Barack Obama, with open warfare breaking out between the White House and the left-wing of the Democratic Party. While conservatism in America grows stronger by the day, the forces of liberalism are growing increasingly weaker and divided.

Post-Anti-Americanism
by Howard Fineman - Newsweek.com
Europe can't even be bothered to hate America any more.
You can still buy an American newspaper at the kiosk in Rome's Piazza Colonna, but you have to ask the lady behind the counter. She turns from the window, paws through a stack on the floor, and produces an International Herald Tribune, holding it at arm's length like a day-old fish. It's the same availability and tone in Venice, the Greek islands, and Istanbul. The implicit question in the transaction is always the same: why would you want to read that thing about that place at this time?

What made America great is now killing her!
By Gordon T Long - GoldSeek.com
What made America great was her unsurpassed ability to innovate. Equally important was also her ability to rapidly adapt to the change that this innovation fostered. For decades the combination has been a self reinforcing growth dynamic with innovation offering a continuously improving standard of living and higher corporate productivity levels, which the US quickly embraced and adapted to. This in turn financed further innovation. No country in the world could match the American culture that flourished on technology advancements in all areas of human endeavor. However, something serious and major has changed across America. Daily, more and more are becoming acutely aware of this, but few grasp exactly what it is. It is called Creative Destruction.

Dow fall highlights government failure

China's Cunning Plan to Destroy the US Dollar
JESSE'S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
This economic paper might have been funny if it had appeared in The Onion, or on Fox News, and not in a serious journal of economic thought.
This rather clever argument proposes that China is 'destroying the dollar' because they are jealous and hate the US for its happiness and freedom. It is not completely new, but I have not seen it in print. Someone that I know who sometimes spreads spin and stories which they get from highly placed contacts in the banking cartel told me about this diabolical plot about five months ago as I recall.

Fed Effort to Aid Recovery Fails to Calm Investors
By Scott Lanman and Joshua Zumbrun
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve's first attempt to bolster the flagging U.S. recovery shows no sign of dispelling investor concerns the world's largest economy may slide back into a recession.
The Standard & Poor's 500 Index fell for a third straight day today after paring losses in the hours after the central bank's Aug. 10 announcement it would sustain its assets at the current level. A subsequent decline in 10-year Treasury yields hasn't yet filtered through to corporations now paying higher premiums.

Mis-Judging the Gold Market
Written by Dave Forest - OilPrice.com
Gold is so misunderstood.
My colleagues and I often joke about how gold is the "all-weather" investment. When the economy is good, pundits claim gold will rise because of inflation. When the economy turns bad, gold bugs claim it will soar on safe-haven buying. According to conventional wisdom, there is no losing scenario for the yellow metal.
We saw more mis-judgement on the gold market yesterday.

Goldman Goes Goo-Goo For Gold:
Gold market poised for a rally as US real rates head lower
by Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
Goldman dedicates 9 pages to a regime change in which it goes openly bullish on gold. The report is attached, which we present without commentary but as always, if there is one flashing red light saying the peak price for any asset has been hit, it is a Strong Buy signal by Goldman. The report will likely result in a brief pop in spot over the next 24 hours as the idiot money rushes into the latest Goldman trap. Alas, it also means that GS is now offloading. Be very wary of market dynamics over the next month.

Gold recovers despite strong dollar
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online) : Gold rebounded in thin Asian trade Thursday despite a strong dollar while palladium dropped nearly four percent.
Gold for immediate delivery was seen trading at $ 1199.17 an ounce at 12.00 noon Singapore time while US gold futures for December delivery was at $1202.2 an ounce.
Analysts said the precious yellow metal advanced on bargain hunting after a drop the previous day while falling stock markets could still prompt investors to sell bullion to cover losses.

Gold rises as world spirals toward deflation
By MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- With deflation looking to be on the way, it's interesting to see gold rallying 1.5%, just as global stocks and some commodities such as crude oil sink on the realization that U.S. growth, and likely global growth as well, really is slowing.
Gold is known as a hedge against inflation, but, given the context, it sounds like Thursday's action reflected its broader classic safe-haven play -- just another symptom of the dominant risk-on, risk-off trading theme of the past two years. See Thursday's Metals Stocks.

Gold Rises Most in Eight Weeks on Haven Demand; Platinum Gains
By Nicholas Larkin and Millie Munshi
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Gold futures rose the most in eight weeks on demand for a store of value amid signs that the global economic recovery is slowing. Platinum climbed, snapping the longest slump since July 2008.
U.S. equities declined after American jobless claims unexpectedly jumped to a five-month high. The Federal Reserve on Aug. 10 said "the pace of economic recovery is likely to be more modest in the near term than had been anticipated" in the U.S. Gold reached a record $1,266.50 an ounce on June 21.

A Two-Front War On Gold
by Gary North - LewRockwell.com
Politics makes strange bedfellows. In the person of Ben Bernanke, three streams of American politics have come together: Progressivism, Populism, and Populism's replacement, right-wing crackpot monetary theory.
There is a third front: Chicago School economics, sometimes called monetarism. It is anti-gold standard, but it is represented by Bernanke only by default, not in theory. Chicago School economists, in their terror of deflation and their pragmatism, remained silent or grudgingly supportive when the Federal Reserve doubled the monetary base in October of 2008. They committed intellectual suicide. They accepted in fact what in theory monetarism denies: Federal Reserve tinkering with the monetary base. This was no 3% to 5% increase per annum.

Gold May Rally to Record $1,300, Goldman Predicts
By Kim Kyoungwha
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Gold may rally to a record $1,300 an ounce in six months, driven by low interest rates and the prospect of renewed quantitative easing in the U.S., according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
"The recent selloff has left speculative long positions in gold oversold relative to U.S. real interest rates," analysts David Greely and Damien Courvalin, wrote in a note yesterday. This has "set the stage for a rally to our six- month gold-price target of $1,300 an ounce," they wrote.

Let's get real, the US is bankrupt
A recent article published in Bloomberg states that the United States is bankrupt, as the US continues to fall further into debt what will the outcome be? Neither spending more nor taxing less will help the country pay its bills. It's a bold statement from professor of economics at Boston University Laurence Kotlikoff.

Dollar Set for Postwar Low of 79.75 Yen, Barclays, JPMorgan Say
By Shigeki Nozawa
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- The dollar may extend declines toward a record against the yen after sliding to a 15-year low as the Federal Reserve said it would maintain bond holdings, Barclays Bank Plc and JPMorgan Chase & Co. said.
The only target left for the dollar is 79.75 yen, which was reached in April 1995, said Masafumi Yamamoto, chief currency strategist at Barclays in Tokyo. The level was the weakest since Japan scrapped the yen's peg of 360 against the dollar in 1971.

THUMBS DOWN FOR THE FED
by Chris Martenson PhD - FinancialSense.com
There were a number of quite interesting developments in the market Wednesday, August 11th and I want to focus on those instead of my usual macro view.
The stock market sold off heavily yesterday presumably in response to the Fed's recent statement, which admitted two things: (1) US economic growth is weaker than they previously thought (dollar negative) and (2) They were going to renew their efforts at monetizing US government paper (dollar negative).
Anybody following yesterday's non-sensical markets knows what happened next: the dollar rallied. A lot.

TARP Billions Shipped Overseas Can't Halt Global Slowdown
By: David A. Patten - NewsMax.com
Economists and conservatives reacted sharply Thursday to reports that tens of billions in TARP bailout money flowed out of the United States and into the coffers of big banks in France, Germany, and other nations during the government rescue of the U.S. financial system.
That news came as the U.S. economic picture continued to worsen, with rising unemployment claims and a surge in U.S. homes lost to foreclosure.
CATO Institute budget analyst Tad DeHaven tells Newsmax: "The economy has become increasingly global, so it's not shocking that TARP bailout money ended up at foreign financial institutions. Nonetheless, bailing out U.S. financial firms was bad enough - that foreign institutions also benefited from the largesse just adds insult to injury."

Bridging the Fiscal Gap of Unfunded Liabilities
By Bill Bonner - DailyReckoning.com
08/12/10 Ouzilly, France - The stock market took a tumble yesterday. The Dow fell 265 points after investors had a chance to ruminate about the Fed's latest action.
It wasn't what the Fed did or said that discouraged investors. It was what it didn't say and what it didn't do. It didn't say, for example, that it was going to "crank up the printing presses" and deliver trillions of new dollars to the economy.
We didn't think it would.

Keiser Report No 68:

Japanese style Deflation Strikes Global Bond markets
By Gary Dorsch, Editor, Global Money Trends - GoldSeek.com
The US-economy has not experienced sustained deflation since the Great Depression of the 1930's, when consumer prices fell 10% between 1929 and 1933. But Japan has been battling falling prices since 1995, - triggered by the bursting of the Nikkei-225 equity bubble, and a unrelenting slide in land prices. Central bankers and macro-economists from all corners of the earth have been studying Japan's descent from its giddy economic prosperity in the 1980's, and into the deflation trap in the 1990's, that Tokyo's financial warlords have still been unable to remedy.

Taleb Says Government Bonds to Collapse, Avoid Stocks
By Renee Bonorchis and Miles Weiss
Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who warned that unforeseen events can roil markets in "The Black Swan," said he is "betting on the collapse of government bonds" and that investors should avoid stocks.
"I'm very pessimistic," he said at the Discovery Invest Leadership Summit in Johannesburg today. "By staying in cash or hedging against inflation, you won't regret it in two years."

MBIA Unit Asks Judge to Make Bankrupt Vallejo Use Fees for Debt
By Michael B. Marois
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- MBIA Inc.'s municipal-bond insurance unit is asking a bankruptcy court judge to order Vallejo, California, to make good on promises to pay investors in case of default by using money from vehicle registrations.
Debtor protection doesn't pre-empt a state law that requires the use of the license fees to pay off city debts, National Public Finance Guarantee Corp. said in a motion filed Aug. 10 with U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michael McManus. The income derived from the registration payments was used as a type of secondary pledge to back a $4.8 million bond issue in 1999.

We Want Our IOUs
NBCLosAngeles.com
California to Resume IOUs
State Controller John Chiang said Tuesday that without a state budget, California's government would be unable to pay its bills in late August (or maybe early September). That means issuing IOUs to some people. Possible dates for IOUs could be either Aug. 27 or Aug. 31, when big payments to schools are due, according to this schedule on the controller's website.

Unemployed 99ers march on Wall Street

'Overpaid' Pensions Being Seized
By ELLEN E. SCHULTZ - WSJ.com (free)
Ralph Yore, a retired aircraft inspector, found out the hard way what happens when companies make pension errors.
Mr. Yore, 73 years old, received a letter earlier this year saying the pension he had been receiving in retirement was too large. The pension would be cut by two-thirds, to $967 a month, the letter said - and he had to repay $100,000.
His former employer - Vought Aircraft Industries Inc., now a division of Triumph Group Inc. - says retirees don't have a right to keep excess benefits paid to them erroneously, and that the pension plan is required to correct such mistakes.

More Americans Than Forecast File Claims for Jobless Benefits
By Courtney Schlisserman and Tim Homan
U.S. Jobless Claims Unexpectedly Climb to Five-Month High as Firings Rise
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- More Americans than forecast filed applications for unemployment benefits last week, showing firings accelerated on signs the economy slowed.
Initial jobless claims rose by 2,000 to 484,000 in the week ended Aug. 7, the highest level since mid February, Labor Department figures showed today in Washington. The number of people receiving unemployment benefits dropped, while those getting supplemental benefits surged by 1.34 million reflecting the government's extension of eligibility.

Jobs, stimulus, dollar, more bailouts

"Fixing" the Housing Market
By Dave Gonigam - DailyReckoning.com
08/12/10 Baltimore, Maryland - Sometime early next year, the Obama administration will propose how to revamp the US mortgage market. Next Tuesday, the White House will hold a "summit" on the issue.
It's safe to guess that none of the invitees will suggest the government should simply get the heck out of the mortgage market ... so this morning, we're left to speculate which options are more likely to be tried, and to tease out the resulting investment implications.

Prices reduced on 25 percent of listed homes
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
One in four property listings on the market as of August 1 have experienced at least one price reduction, according to real estate search service Trulia.
That marks the fourth straight month of increases in price reduction levels, thanks to a lack of qualified (or motivated) buyers, record low mortgage rates and all.
The total dollar amount slashed from home prices in America's 50 largest cities was a staggering $30.1 billion, and the average discount on a price-reduced home was 10 percent off the original list.
"If buyers are unqualified to buy, it doesn't matter how low interest rates are or how discounted a home is," said Pete Flint, co-founder and CEO of Trulia, in a release.

Homes Lost to Foreclosure Rose 9% in July
By HUGH COLLINS - DailyFinance.com
The number of homeowners who lost their properties to foreclosure jumped 9% in July as lenders moved to repossess a glut of homes with past-due mortgages.
A total of 92,858 homes were repossessed in July, according to foreclosure listing firm RealtyTrac. That's 9% higher than in June and 6% higher than the figure for July 2009. July was the eighth straight month to post a year-on-year rise in homes lost to foreclosure.

Mortgage defaults down, bank repos up
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
Default notices continued to slide in July as bank repossessions hit near-record levels, according to foreclosure listing site RealtyTrac.
"Declines in new default notices, which were down on a year-over-year basis for the sixth straight month in July, have been offset by near-record levels of bank repossessions, which increased on a year-over-year basis for the eighth straight month," said RealtyTrac CEO James J. Saccacio, in a release.
A total of 97,123 properties received a default notice last month, a one percent increase from the previous month, but a 28 percent decline from a year earlier.

30-year mortgage at lowest rate since 1971
By Hibah Yousuf,
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Mortgage rates continued to decline this week, plunging to the lowest level in decades, according to surveys from Freddie Mac and Bankrate.
Freddie Mac's weekly report said the 30-year fixed rate slipped to 4.44% for the week ended Thursday, the lowest since the government-backed lender began tracking the rate in 1971. Last week's rates stood at 4.49%, and a year ago it was at 5.29%.

Lender Liability at the FHA?
Submitted by Bruce Krasting - ZeroHedge.com
Lender liability is a tricky legal question. Above my grade. The case law is pretty clear that when a lender uses unscrupulous or illegal methods to get a borrower to sign a piece of paper the lender loses his rights. There is a grey area in this where the lender may also lose their rights to repayment if a fiduciary relationship can be established between borrower and lender. In this later example the lender has a responsibility or an Obligation to not do things that conflict with the best interests of the borrower.

Debts Rise, and Go Unpaid, as Bust Erodes Home Equity
By DAVID STREITFELD - NYTimes.com
PHOENIX - During the great housing boom, homeowners nationwide borrowed a trillion dollars from banks, using the soaring value of their houses as security. Now the money has been spent and struggling borrowers are unable or unwilling to pay it back.
The delinquency rate on home equity loans is higher than all other types of consumer loans, including auto loans, boat loans, personal loans and even bank cards like Visa and MasterCard, according to the American Bankers Association.

Continuing-Care Retirement Communities: Weighing the Risks
By Kelly Greene - WSJ.com (free)
Increasing numbers of older Americans are seeking out the security and comfort of a continuing-care retirement community. But a new report from the federal Government Accountability Office warns that such assurances often come at a steep price and "considerable risk."
So-called CCRCs - which typically offer fine dining, health clubs and on-site long-term care - have grown in popularity along with the aging of the population, particularly among the upper-middle class and affluent, and are now a multibillion-dollar industry. At least 745,000 older adults live in such communities, according to the American Association of Homes and Services for the Aging. And those numbers are expected to rise as baby boomers near their 70s.

America: A new way forward
By Robin Harding and James Politi - FT.com
W?hen Vicki Gerbino, a native of upstate New York, was deciding two years ago whether to move to Wichita, Kansas, the Midwestern city did not seem like a model for the future of the US economy.
"My image was Wyatt Earp and the Chisholm Trail," she says, referring to the unruly frontier town of the late 19th century that served as the final destination for cattle being driven north from Texas to meet rail lines crossing the American plain.
But the head of the Greater Wichita Economic Development Coalition says she found a place filled with art, theatre and "smart people" - many linked to the aviation industry. "Everybody and their brother flies or knows someone who flies," Ms Gerbino says.

Google and Facebook battle over Internet control
By David Goldman
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Facebook and Google, two of the world's biggest and most influential online companies, are duking it out in a very public battle over who should control the Internet.
That war of words continued on Thursday, when Google wrote a rebuttal to responses on its joint policy proposal with Verizon about an open-Internet standard known as "Net neutrality." The rebuttal comes a day after Facebook said it disagreed with the substance of Google and Verizon's pact.

Internet majors largely silent on Google-Verizon plan
Search giant says it hasn't 'sold out';
Facebook offers a differing view
By John Letzing, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Google Inc.'s Internet industry peers have largely met the company's joint policy proposal with Verizon Communications Inc. for so-called network neutrality with a resounding silence, even as their own businesses stand to be affected should the plan gain influence among regulators.
Representatives from Microsoft Corp., which has invested heavily in its relatively young Internet business, Yahoo Inc. and AOL Inc. all declined to comment on the proposal published Monday by Google and Verizon.

What is net neutrality?[see image with above article]
In the scenario on the left, which adheres to network neutrality, all applications and traffic on an operator's network are treated equally, and users have equal access to them. In the scenario on the right, which does not adhere to network neutrality, the network operator provides a wider berth for services that have paid their way, so users may be limited to those options.

Rancher claims Mexican cartels takeover Texas ranch
Police blotter confirms story is not a hoax
San Diego County Political Buzz Examiner - Kimberly Dvorak
After 16 days of denials by Laredo law enforcement and local officials regarding a Mexican drug cartel takeover of a Laredo area ranch, a Texas police blotter proves the alleged incident did in fact happen and that multiple agencies responded to the scene of a seized U.S. ranch.
Think about it for a moment.
One of the most brutal drug cartels operating in Mexico crossed the U.S. border and took a ranch from its lawful owner.
Intimidation has arrived along the southern border.

Border sheriff shares views at local town hall meeting
By COREY L. TURNER - Houston Community Newspapers Online
According to Sigifredo Gonzalez, the sheriff of Zapata County, the battle on the Texas border is best described as "domestic terrorism."
"How many more police officers have to die? The border is not owned by the United States or Mexico - it is owned by the drug cartels," Gonzalez said to the crowd at Congressman Ted Poe's town hall meeting at Lone Star College-Kingwood July 31. It was the second town hall meeting of the week for the District 2 congressman.

Only 29 Percent of Americans Approve
of Obama's Handling of Immigration, Says Gallup
By Terence P. Jeffrey, Editor-in-Chief - CNSNews.com
(CNSNews.com) - As the Senate reconvened on Thursday, taking a rare break from its August recess to pass a $600-million bill to fund border security provisions that had passed in a specially-reconvened-session of the House on Tuesday, new numbers from the Gallup Poll showed that only 29 percent of Americans approve of the way Obama is handling the immigration issue.

Senate Passes Obama's $600 Million Border Security Bill
By SAM GUSTIN - DailyFinance.com
The U.S. Senate passed a $600 million border security bill Thursday that would beef up armed patrols and increase funding for unmanned drones hunting for illegal immigrants crossing the border between Mexico and the U.S.
President Barack Obama had pushed for the measure, which he hopes will blunt the concerns of critics who are angry about rampant illegal border crossings and rising drug-related crime encroaching into Arizona and Texas.

Will BP Skip the Relief Well, Declare Mission Accomplished,
and Abandon Ship Without Permanently Killing the Oil Leak?
Washington's Blog
Yesterday, I pointed out that - while everyone is claiming that the oil well has been capped - it hasn't really been capped.
AP reported last night: BP, U.S. mull whether to skip 'bottom kill'
***
The federal government and BP have recently raised the possibility that they won't need to perform the operation at all, since the well was plugged last month with mud and cement pumped in through the top.
(Bottom kill is, of course, just another phrase for relief wells.)

Oiled crabs stoke fears spill is tainting food web
By JOHN FLESHER - AP via MSNBC.com
BARATARIA, La. - To assess how heavy a blow the BP oil spill has dealt the Gulf of Mexico, researchers are closely watching a staple of the seafood industry and primary indicator of the ecosystem's health: the blue crab.
Weeks ago, before engineers pumped in mud and cement to plug the gusher, scientists began finding specks of oil in crab larvae plucked from waters across the Gulf coast.

BP Solves One Tiny -- $50.4 Million -- Legal Headache
By JONATHAN BERR - DailyFinance.com
BP Plc. (BP), which has claimed responsibility for the worst oil spill in U.S. history, today resolved one of its many legal challenges, agreeing to pay a $50.6 million fine for failing to fix safety problems after a deadly 2005 fire at its Texas City, Texas refinery. It also plans to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on upgrades at the plant.
At issue are 270 of the 709 Occupational Safety and Health Administration citations against the company for failing to make promised fixes.in the wake of the accident, which killed 15 and injured 170 oil workers. Media reports and investigations found that the company put profits over safety. Tony Hayward was named BP CEO after that accident and promised to focus on safety "like a laser." Hayward was replaced recently by Bob Dudley, who has promised to do the same after the Gulf disaster.

BP Considering Not Completing Macondo Relief Well
By Katarzyna Klimasinska and Jim Polson
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- BP Plc may not finish drilling a relief well to its Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico, National Incident Commander Thad Allen said during a conference call today.
The relief well, which for months has been touted by the U.S. government as the ultimate solution to stopping the flow from Macondo -- a process known as "killing" the well -- may not be needed after all, Allen said.

Barack Obama 'may be prepared to meet Iranian president'
By Robert Winnett in Washington - Telegraph.co.uk
Barack Obama's national security adviser, Gen James Jones, has indicated the President may be prepared to meet Mahmoud Ahmadinejad if the regime resumed negotiations over its nuclear programme.
The retired general also indicated that the return of three American hikers held in Iran for the past year would be an "important gesture".
Earlier this month, Mr Ahmadinejad requested face-to-face talks with Mr Obama during the UN General Assembly meeting in New York. The White House had appeared to rule out any meeting.
However, in an interview with CNN, Gen Jones said "the door's open" if the Iranians agree to resume talks with the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The threat of the 'fake fishermen':
How BP may be paying out millions in oil spill compensatio
to fraudsters
By MAIL FOREIGN SERVICE - DailyMail.co.uk
BP could be paying millions in compensation to 'fake fishermen', it has been revealed.
So far BP has paid $308million to those whose livelihood has been threatened by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
But to receive compensation, fishermen must display a valid fishing licence - and applications for such licenses have spiked by nearly 60 per cent, despite most fishing grounds being closed by the disaster.

Iraq's Top General:
'The U.S. Army Must Stay
Until the Iraqi Army is Fully Ready in 2020'
By Patrick Goodenough, International Editor - CNSNews.com
(CNSNews.com) - The White House reiterated Wednesday that the plan to end the U.S. combat mission in Iraq in three weeks' time is "on target."
The confirmation came despite recent setbacks in the country, including ongoing violence, a five-month delay in forming a new government, and reports this week of al-Qaeda trying to bribe disaffected Sunni militia to change sides.

Iraq: The Conflict Over Power
Written by Mohammed Hussainy - OilPrice.com
The current political impasse in Iraq is damaging to all parties involved. A UN-sponsored National Salvation Government may be the only way forward.
The "Non-Dialogue" dialogue is still going on among the Iraqi political powerhouses in their attempt to form or rather "un-form" the government. As the election results were inconclusive in that they gave significant weight to all major stakeholders involved in the formula, forming the government in Iraq has become even more difficult as time goes by. At the time when everyone was talking about a Maliki-Allawi competition over the office of prime minister, new details surfaced only to render an already complex situation even more complicated. All sides now play a major role – in other words, they do not play any role since they all have a major role! The political agreements and disagreements among the winning blocs led to a political stalemate accompanied by deterioration in security and living standards.

China Steps Up Its Nuclear Program
Written by Mad Hedge Fund Trader - OilPrice.com
The Middle Kingdom currently has 12 operational plants generating 12 gigawatts accounting for 2.3% of the country’s power. Another 23 are currently under construction. It plans to add ten a year for the next decade, taking them up to 70 Gigawatts by 2020, and a staggering 400 gigawatts by 2050.
That’s nearly the total power generated in China today. This will make China the world’s largest consumer of yellow cake (U3H8) for fuel. Canadian, American, and Australian uranium miners please take note.

Interesting perspective on world affairs . . . (non-Christian world view)

The Anglo-Saxon Mission, explained by Bill Ryan

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Archived Page Link
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Thursday 08.12.2010

Look What Surprises They Snuck Into The Financial Reform Bill
Economic Collapse
Even just a decade ago, major pieces of legislation in the U.S. Congress would be just a few dozen pages long. But today, it seems like every time Congress passes an important bill it ends up being over a thousand pages long. In fact, the final version of the new financial reform law was over 2,300 pages. Overall, as we wrote about extensively in a previous article, this much-ballyhooed new law does a whole lot of nothing, but it turns out that lobbyists and special interests were able to insert a few nasty surprises that we are just now finding out about. But it was the same thing with the health care reform law. It was only after it was passed that most of us learned that it contained a provision that will force U.S. small businesses to collectively produce millions more 1099 tax forms each year. Now small businesses from coast to coast are screaming bloody murder about that provision but it is too late - the law has already passed. Unfortunately, there are some surprises in the recently passed financial reform law that are nearly just as bad.

U.S. Is Bankrupt and We Don't Even Know It
Commentary by Laurence Kotlikoff
Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Let's get real. The U.S. is bankrupt. Neither spending more nor taxing less will help the country pay its bills.
What it can and must do is radically simplify its tax, health-care, retirement and financial systems, each of which is a complete mess. But this is the good news. It means they can each be redesigned to achieve their legitimate purposes at much lower cost and, in the process, revitalize the economy.

America Is 'Bankrupt Mickey Mouse Economy': CIO
By: Patrick Allen - CNBC Senior News Editor
America is a "Mickey Mouse economy" that is technically bankrupt, according to Jochen Wermuth, the Chief Investment Officer (CIO) and managing partner at Wermuth Asset Management.
"America today looks like Russia in 1998. Consumers, companies and the government are all highly indebted. America as a result is a bankrupt Mickey Mouse economy," Wermuth told CNBC.
The comments followed news that the Fed was extending its quantitative easing program following what the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) described as a fall in the pace of growth in output and employment.

Second-Quarter Growth Looking Even Worse
By Phil Izzo
The U.S. trade deficit widened in June, and the new numbers released this morning indicate that second-quarter growth was even more anemic than the originally reported 2.4% annual rate.
Last week, updated figures on inventories indicated that gross-domestic-product growth in the second quarter would be revised lower - to around 1.7%. Today's data on trade suggest the revised figure may be closer to 1%, or even as low as 0.3%.
The goods deficit in the trade report came in at $62.032 billion, compared to the $58.2 billion estimated in the first GDP reading for second quarter. That has led most economists to pull down their estimates for the revision.

Peter Schiff: "We're in the Early Stages of a Depression"
By Jennifer Schonberger - The Motley Fool
In August 2006, Peter Schiff, president of Euro Pacific Capital, offered what many considered to be an outlier prognosis for the economy: The exuberance would end, real estate prices would crash back down to earth, and consumers would revert to saving from spending. In short, a deep recession was in the works.
As outlandish as he may have sounded at the time, he was right. Four years and the worst recession since the Great Depression later, Schiff stands alone again with a bleaker diagnosis for the economy: an inflationary depression.

The Fed Can Print More Money, But It Can't Print Jobs
By: Larry Kudlow - CNBC Anchor
Did the Fed choose stimulus over dollar stability? The greenback fell and gold rose after the FOMC signaled today that it would keep its balance sheet steady by reinvesting the proceeds of mortgage bonds into Treasurys. This is the first Fed policy shift in about a year. It comes in response to a slower economy and disappointing job numbers, with the Fed downgrading its economic outlook in its FOMC statement.
By itself, this is a modest move. But it could be the start of something bigger. If recovery conditions continue to slow, the Fed could be more aggressive by monetizing more Treasury debt and expanding the balance sheet to print money. If it does that, the dollar will depreciate more and gold will rise more. A lot more.

Peak Obama
By Peter Ferrara - The American Spectator.com
Thirty-one months after the start of the recession, last week's jobs report for July was a fiasco. The Labor Department reported yet another 131,000 jobs lost in July. The Department also revised the June report downward to show 221,000 jobs lost that month from 125,000. The unemployment rate remained at 9.5% only because 181,000 additional discouraged workers left the work force, and so were not counted as unemployed. That makes one million who have fled the work force since April.
As this column has repeatedly noted, the historic data recorded by the National Bureau of Economic Research shows that the average recession since World War II has lasted 10 months, with the longest previously being 16 months. What is President Obama's excuse for still losing hundreds of thousands of jobs 31 months after the recession began?

Is a New Eurotax Coming?
theTrumpet.com
The European Union is considering creating a new EU-wide tax, imposed on member states by Brussels. On August 9, EU Budget Commissioner Janusz Lewandowski told the Financial Times Deutschland that he would unveil plans for the tax in September.
"[T]he present structure of the revenue of the EU does not reflect the spirit of [EU] treaties," said Lewandowski, adding that the current situation, where the EU is given most of its budget from member nations, "was not the intention of the founding fathers" of Europe.
"If the EU had more of its own revenues, then transfers from national budgets could be reduced. I hear from several capitals, including important ones like Berlin, that they would like to reduce their contribution," he said.

15 Economic Statistics That Just Keep Getting Worse
Econimic Collapse
A little over a week ago, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner penned an article for the New York Times entitled "Welcome To The Recovery" in which he touted the great strides that the U.S. economy was making. But with unemployment still dangerously high and with foreclosures and personal bankruptcies continuing to set all-time records, should we really be talking about a "recovery"? The truth is that the numbers don't lie, and statistic after statistic shows that the economic fundamentals continue to get progressively worse. The U.S. government can continue to try to pump up with economy with more debt, but the reality is that there is not going to be a legitimate "recovery" until consumer spending rebounds. Consumer spending makes up the vast majority of U.S. GDP. But without good jobs, consumers are not going to be able to spend money. Unfortunately, our jobs base continues to be erode as millions upon millions of middle class jobs are shipped over to China, India and dozens of third world nations by the global predator corporations that now dominate the world economy.

11 Reasons Why The Federal Reserve Is Bad
Econimic Collapse
Millions of Americans are waking up to the fact that the Federal Reserve is bad, but very few of them can coherently explain why this is true. For decades, an unelected, privately-owned central bank has controlled America's currency, run our economy and has driven the U.S. government to the brink of bankruptcy. It operates in great secrecy, it has never been subjected to a comprehensive audit and yet the actions it takes have an impact on every single American. It is an institution designed to drain wealth from the U.S. government (and ultimately from the American people) and transfer it to the ultra-wealthy. Have you ever wondered why a sovereign nation such as the United States has to borrow United States dollars from anyone? Have you ever wondered why a sovereign nation such as the United States does not even issue its own currency? Have you ever wondered why we allow a group of unelected private bankers to run our economy?

Could Fed's Move Against Deflation End Up Backfiring?
By: Albert Bozzo - CNBC.com
If you weren't worried about deflation, you may be now - thanks to the Federal Reserve's latest move to jumpstart the languid economy.
In fact, some economists think the central bank's implicit concern about falling prices could help bring about the very situation the Fed is trying to avoid.
"This gets to be a gamesmanship situation," says economist A. Gary Schilling. "On the surface, the Fed is reacting to the threat of deflation and a weak economy. Does it have deflationary implications? I think it does because it says the Fed is concerned. They're obviously preparing more and more for it. People say, 'Maybe I ought to prepare for it?'"

Stocks plunge after Fed grows more cautious; Dow drops 265
By Matt Krantz, USA TODAY
The quicksand-like stock market Wednesday pulled investors back into the hole for the year.
The three major U.S. stock market indexes each sank back into the red for the year, following a market sell-off sparked by worries the global economy recovery is sputtering.
The pullback, which yanked the Dow Jones industrial average down 265.42 points, or 2.5%, to 10,378.83 is especially hard to take since investors were starting to see improvement.

Bargain hunting, Fed moves push up gold
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online): Gold prices moved up in Asian trade Wednesday mainly on bargain hunting triggered by Fed moves to revive US economic recovery.
Gold for immediate delivery was seen trading at $1203.18 an ounce at 12.00 noon Singapore while U.S. gold futures for December delivery was at $1,205.4 an ounce.

What Ever Happened to the Constitution? | Andrew Napolitano

Thank God, even Fed can't halt gold boom
By Geena Paul
LONDON (Commodity Online): The worried and hassled world of bullion investors heaved a sigh of relief following the release of US Federal Reserve report this week following which the gold prices showed signs of gains.
US Federal Reserve announced plans to boost a flagging economy by reinvesting money from maturing mortgage bonds in government debt. The move did not come as a complete surprise to the market but it marked a policy shift for the Fed, which only a few months ago debated how to start winding down some of its monetary stimulus programmes. The Fed's pledge to maintain asset purchases and shift to Treasuries does suggest it may boost the size of its already massive $2.3 trillion balance sheet if the economy loses momentum.

Gold Consolidates Near $1,200 as Economic Concerns Grow
MarketOracle.co.uk
Gold rose yesterday in the intermediate aftermath of the worse than expected US trade deficit figures ($49.9 billion - exports down 1.3%; imports down 3%). Gold has maintained those gains despite weakness in equity markets and in US futures.
Risk aversion is back on after the Federal Reserve expressed concerns about the recovery. The pessimistic tone of their communication has led to increased concerns of a double dip recession. In this environment, investors should remain defensive and continue to diversify into gold.

Steve Wynn Takes On Washington

Welcome to the Recovery
By TIMOTHY F. GEITHNER - NYTimes
THE devastation wrought by the great recession is still all too real for millions of Americans who lost their jobs, businesses and homes. The scars of the crisis are fresh, and every new economic report brings another wave of anxiety. That uncertainty is understandable, but a review of recent data on the American economy shows that we are on a path back to growth.
The recession that began in late 2007 was extraordinarily severe, but the actions we took at its height to stimulate the economy helped arrest the freefall, preventing an even deeper collapse and putting the economy on the road to recovery.

US Treasury Secretary a True Believer in Economic Recovery
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
"Welcome to the recovery," says the headline in The New York Times.
What is this? Some kind of joke? No, it's America's Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Timothy GeithnerÉ
When we first read the headline, we thought it was tongue-in-cheekÉor outright sarcasm. But Mr. Geithner at least sets out on the right foot:
The devastation wrought by the great recession is still all too real for millions of Americans who lost their jobs, businesses and homes. The scars of the crisis are fresh, and every new economic report brings another wave of anxiety.

Fed Reverses Exit Plan With $2 Trillion Holding Floor
By Craig Torres and Vivien Lou Chen
Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve reversed plans to exit from aggressive monetary stimulus and decided to keep its bond holdings level to support an economic recovery it described as weaker than anticipated.
Central bankers meeting yesterday adopted a $2.05 trillion floor for their securities portfolio, pivoting toward a quantitative target for monetary policy. Treasuries surged and stocks pared losses as some investors judged the decision opened the door to a resumption of large-scale asset purchases.

The Fed's New Round of Quantitative Easing Is Like Tryin
to Patch Leaking Pipes by Pumping in More Water
Washington's Blog
Bernanke announced additional quantitative easing yesterday, primarily in the form of buying treasuries to monetize the U.S. debt.
Jeff Harding points out that those worried about deflation within the Fed won out over the scared-of-inflation camp:
The Fed Open Market Committee voted today to roll its holdings of maturing Fannie and Freddie debt into longer term Treasurys. This represents a significant change in Fed policy and it appears that the anti-deflationist wing of the Fed, led by James Bullard, president of the St. Louis Fed, won over the anti-inflationists led by Thomas Hoenig, president of the Kansas City Fed.

Shiller sees significant likelihood of double dip [audio file]
Robert Shiller tells MarketWatch News Break that the Federal Reserve may now lack the power to end the gloom and doom

Pimco Calls Fed Rate Policies 'Good for Risk Assets'
Won't Reduce Unemployment
By Wes Goodman and Susan Li
Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve's decision to buy Treasuries and keep interest rates low will support "risk assets" without bringing down unemployment, said Anthony Crescenzi at Pacific Investment Management Co.
"Low volatility tends to be good for the interest-rate climate," said Crescenzi, who is based in Newport Beach, California at Pimco, manager of the world's biggest bond fund. "It does push investors out the risk spectrum generally. That tends to be good for risk assets."

Ariz. lawmakers advance anti-union ballot measure
By JONATHAN J. COOPER - AP - MSNBC.com
PHOENIX - Arizona lawmakers have given preliminary approval to an anti-union ballot measure, beating back proposed Democratic amendments and advancing a resolution designed to undercut potential federal "card check" legislation.
The House and Senate on Tuesday approved the Republican-backed measure by a voice vote, setting the stage for final passage on Wednesday before lawmakers adjourn their single-issue special session.
Gov. Jan Brewer called lawmakers back to the Capitol this week to refer the measure to the Nov. 2 ballot. If approved by lawmakers as expected Wednesday, Arizona voters would be asked to decide whether to require a secret ballot for workers voting on whether to join a labor union.

Gerald Celente on Freedom Watch 10 Aug 2010

Boise judge orders Seattle mortgage company to pay $1 million
IdahoStatesman.com
A judge in Boise has ordered a Seattle mortgage company to pay more than $1 million in penalties and restitution because of fraud and other illegal practices, the Idaho Department of Finance said Wednesday.
Access Mortgage Co. was ordered to pay $1 million in penalties and $27,322 on behalf of an Idaho couple.
"The court's findings ... send a clear message to the mortgage industry that financial fraud and unlawful practices will not be tolerated in Idaho," said Gavin Gee, the Department of Finance's director.

Mortgage applications nearly flat last week
WASHINGTON (AP) - Applications for home loans were almost flat last week even though mortgage rates fell to the lowest level in decades.
The Mortgage Bankers Association says that overall applications rose 0.6% from a week earlier. Applications to refinance home loans increased 0.6%, while those taken out to purchase homes rose 0.3%. The numbers are adjusted for seasonal factors.
Mortgage rates have been at or near the lowest levels in decades since mid-April. Investors have poured money into safer U.S. Treasury bonds over concerns about European debt problems. That has lowered the yield on Treasurys. Mortgage rates tend to track that yield.

Feds rethink policies that encourage home ownership
By Paul Wiseman, USA TODAY
Just how much should Uncle Sam do to help Americans buy their own homes?
For 70 years - and for the last 15 in particular - the answer has been: Whatever it takes.
Now, policymakers are pausing to reconsider. In the next few months, they'll weigh whether there can be too much of a good thing when it comes to helping families finance the American Dream.
The rethink could mean a shake-up for a mortgage market addicted to government subsidies.

Obama Administration to Provide $3 Billion in Housing Aid
AP - The Obama administration is providing $3 billion to unemployed homeowners facing foreclosure in the nation's toughest job markets.
The Treasury Department says it will send $2 billion to 17 states that have unemployment rates higher than the national average for a year. They will use the money for programs to aid unemployed homeowners. Some of those states have already designed such programs.

HUD Offers Interest-Free Loans to Reduce Foreclosures
By Lorraine Woellert and Kathleen M. Howley
Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- The Obama administration will offer $1 billion in zero-interest loans to help homeowners who've lost income avoid foreclosure as part of $3 billion in additional aid targeting economically distressed areas.
The Department of Housing and Urban Development plans to make loans of as much as $50,000 for borrowers "in hard hit local areas" to make mortgage, tax and insurance payments for as long as two years, according to a statement released today. The Treasury Department will also provide as much as $2 billion in aid under an existing program for 17 states and the District of Columbia, according to the statement.

Economists Cut U.S. Growth Forecasts as Companies Limit Hiring
By Timothy R. Homan and Alex Tanzi
Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- A lack of jobs will shackle consumer spending and restrain the U.S. recovery more than previously estimated, according to economists polled by Bloomberg News.
Gross domestic product will expand at an average 2.55 percent annual rate in the last six months of 2010, according to the median of 67 estimates in a survey taken July 31 to Aug. 9, down from the 2.8 percent pace projected last month. Household purchases will climb at a 2.25 percent rate, compared with a 2.6 percent gain previously forecast.

Small-Business Sentiment Deteriorates Again
By Michael S. Derby - WSJ.com (free)
Optimism over the economic outlook held by small business leaders fell in July as worries about the future mounted, a report Tuesday said.
The National Federation of Independent Business said that its index of small business optimism fell 0.9 point to 88.1 for last month, as worries over the longer-run outlook mounted. The report said the July reading was "a very disappointing outcome" and added that business leaders see "sub-par growth in the second half" of the year.

Unemployment drives more home sellers to cut price
By Lynn Adler
(Reuters) - Owners cut prices on one-quarter of U.S. homes listed for sale in July, a fourth straight monthly rise, as job market fallout trumped record low mortgage rates, real estate website Trulia.com said on Wednesday.
Sellers in the 50 largest cities slashed $30.1 billion from prices on houses on the market as of August 1, up from $27.3 billion in the prior month, San Francisco-based Trulia said in a report provided to Reuters before official release.
Unemployment near 10 percent, wage cuts, restrictive lending practices and home values that have fallen below their mortgage balances have left many potential buyers unable to take advantage of low rates.

Student-Loan Debt Surpasses Credit Cards
By Mary Pilon - WSJ.com (free)
Consumers now owe more on their student loans than their credit cards.
Americans owe some $826.5 billion in revolving credit, according to June 2010 figures from the Federal Reserve. (Most of revolving credit is credit-card debt.) Student loans outstanding today - both federal and private - total some $829.785 billion, according to Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of FinAid.org and FastWeb.com.
"The growth in education debt outstanding is like cooking a lobster," Mr. Kantrowitz says. "The increase in total student debt occurs slowly but steadily, so by the time you notice that the water is boiling, you're already cooked."

It's A Great Time To Be A New College Graduate:
High Unemployment, Crappy Service Jobs
And Crippling Student Loan Debt
Economic Collapse
Today, America's best and brightest are graduating from college full of hopes and dreams, but cold, hard economic reality is rapidly crushing many of them. Record numbers of college graduates cannot find jobs. Hordes of others have been forced to take very low paying service jobs. At the same time, student loan debt loads have become more crushing than ever. The truth is that it is a really, really bad time to be a fresh college graduate. After spending tens of thousands of dollars and investing four (or more) years of their lives in an education, millions of recent college graduates find themselves waiting tables, tending bar, delivering pizzas and working next to (or subordinate to) people who never even went to college. At one time, a college degree was an automatic ticket to the middle class, but now for many Americans all a college degree means is crushing loan payments, sleepless nights and mind-numbing frustration.

With many still in dark, groups shed light on health care law
By Richard Wolf, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON - True or false: The new health care law will cut Medicare benefits for seniors. It will slash Medicare payments to doctors. It will ration health care.
In three polls conducted last month, large percentages of Americans answered "true" to each statement. All three are false.
Six weeks before the nation's health care delivery system begins a huge transformation, confusion reigns. For example: The debunked idea raised by opponents during congressional debate that "death panels" could make end-of-life decisions is seen as real by nearly half of those surveyed.

New Yard Sale Restrictions in Hazle Township
By Peggy Lee - WNEP.com
Residents in one community in Luzerne County will have new rules to follow when holding yard sales.
Monday night officials in Hazle Township approved a new ordinance to regulate such sales.
When it comes to yard sales, it's like the old saying, "One man's trash is another man's treasure."
In Hazle Township several homeowners were taking advantage of just that, setting items out on their lawns, hoping a curious passer-by will lead to a satisfied customer.
Ray Starrick is trying to sell a couch and love seat he no longer needs and said he's offering a better deal than any store out there. "It's just that the idea is to get rid of the stuff and help the people out. Nowadays everything is expensive," said Starrick.

Feds' $26B aid package finances thousands of Missouri, Kansas jobs
KANSAS CITY BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Suzanna Stagemeyer STAFF WRITER
A $26 billion aid package President Obama signed into law Tuesday is expected to bring about $398 million for Missouri and $179 million for Kansas - financing that leaders of both states said was vital to preserving jobs and staying within budget.
The money is for purposes such as education jobs and more federal medical help for states; the legislation - HR 1586 - also limits the use of foreign tax credits by U.S. companies that have foreign operations.

30,000 line up for housing vouchers, some get rowdy
By Craig Schneider - The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thirty thousand people showed up to receive Section 8 housing applications in East Point Wednesday, suffering through hours in the hot sun, angry flare-ups in the crowd and lots of frustration and confusion for a chance to receive a government-subsidized apartment.
The massive event sometimes descended into a chaotic mob scene filled with anger and impatience. Some 62 people needed medical attention and 20 of them were transported to a hospital, authorities said. A baby went into a seizure in the heat and was stabilized at a hospital. People were removed on stretchers and when a throng of people who had been waiting hours in a line were told to move to another line, people started pushing, shoving and cursing, witnesses said.

Florida immigrant crackdown aims to outdo Arizona laws
Ed Pilkington - guardian.co.uk,
State attorney general Bill McCollum promises harshest anti-illegal immigration legislation yet
Florida's attorney general today promised to introduce laws emulating - and exceeding - the draconian clampdown on undocumented immigrants recently attempted by Arizona.
The proposed legislation would put the sunshine state at the forefront of the anti-immigrant moves rapidly sweeping across the US.
Architects of the plans boast they will be the harshest anti-illegal immigration laws yet, a claim that could have an incendiary effect in Florida given the state's high proportion of Latinos.

Obama and Holder taking on Arizona's SB1070

Protests spew over Montana-Gulf pipeline plan
By John S. Adams, USA TODAY
Environmental groups and landowners, upset by last month's oil spill in Michigan, are urging the Obama administration to deny a proposal for an oil pipeline that would go from the Montana-Canada border to refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast.
Alberta-based TransCanada's proposed 1,661-mile Keystone XL pipeline would link up with its existing 2,151-mile Keystone pipeline, which began operations in June, and go through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.

LA Will Be Bankrupt by 2014: Former Mayor
By: Nicole Lapin - CNBC.com
Unless city officials make drastic changes, Los Angeles will be bankrupt by 2014, former LA Mayor Richard Riordan told CNBC.
By this time next year, the cost of retirement pensions in Los Angeles will have jumped from $500 million to nearly $1.25 billion. This coupled with an unemployment rate of 12.3 percent - higher than the 9.6 percent national unemployment rate - has led some city officials, and Riordan, to fear for the worst.
"The stimulus has hardly created a single private job," Riordan said. "It's all public jobs, most of which won't last very long because they're going to finish a bridge or a tunnel, or whatever they're working on. And if you've heard other things, ridiculous things that that money has been used for."

How electric cars could pull the plug on U.S. highway funding
By Larry Dignan - SmartPlanet.com
The U.S. Department of Transportation has a faulty business model when it comes to funding highways. And the problem will only get worse as electric cars start hitting the road in 2011 and more efficient automobiles proliferate.
Assuming cars like the Chevrolet Volt and Nissan Leaf - not to mention a bevy of electric vehicles coming after those two automobiles - become successful the Highway Trust Fund is going to have big problems.

Proposed Law Would Put Video Cameras In Cars
Jonas Tichenor - CBS13.com
Lawmakers are considering controversial new legislation this week that would allow vehicles to be equipped with dashboard cameras to record the moments leading up to accidents.
The proposed law, AB1942, would promote safer driving habits and reduce accidents by permitting video recorders to be installed on the windshield.
The bill currently allows devices to record video, audio, how fast and which direction the vehicle is traveling, a history of where your car has been, steering and brake performance and seat belt usage.

Vending Machines Of The Future
BY LUKE FUNK
MYFOXNY.COM - Your thumbprint might soon be the key to an afternoon candy bar. A Massachusetts based vending machine company is joining the growing ranks of companies that are field-testing new technologies.
Next Generation Vending and Food Service is experimenting with biometric vending machines that would allow a user to tie a credit card to their thumbprint.

Dead From the Internet
By Daniel J. Flynn -The American Spectator.org
. . . . Reading is the most obvious casualty of the digital age.
People generally don't read online. They skim. Since the Internet increasingly serves as the source of newspaper, magazine, and even book reading, the differences between reading from a screen and reading from a book are profoundly important. Researcher Jakob Nielsen studied the eye patterns of web users, discovering that web surfers generally scan the text in an "F" pattern. For every 100 words added to a web page, surfers will spend an extra 4.4 seconds. This is enough time to grasp very few words -- even for a speed reader. Nielsen advised his clients that surfers will read less than 20 percent of the posted words. It's not called a web "browser" for nothing.

Alex Jones: Big brother is watching you

Confirmed: State Dept. Sending Ground Zero Mosque Imam
on Middle East Junket
Your tax dollars at work.
BY JOHN MCCORMACK WeeklyStandard
Claudia Rosett was first to report on Friday that Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the man spearheading the Ground Zero Mosque initiative, is about to take a month-long trip through the Middle East sponsored by the U.S. government:
Ultimately, in response to repeated questions, a member of Rauf's New York Cordoba Initiative foundation e-mailed me Friday, saying that Rauf's trip to the Middle East, "in the near future," will be hosted by the U.S. government as part of an outreach program to "bring the message of moderation, peace and understanding."

Estimate: two years and $100 million to "Internet Armageddon"
By Dan Nosowitz - SmartPlanet.com
Charlie Miller, a five-year veteran of the National Security Agency's computer espionage department, was tasked with finding the cost and time it would take to bring down America's cyber infrastructure.
That cyber infrastructure isn't well-defined, but it would certainly include vital elements like the smart grid, the banking system, and communications - a vague attack, but one that would essentially cripple the entire country's networked presence

BP oil spill evidence to be collected by suspects
By Agence France-Presse - RawStory.com
Key evidence on one of the world's worst oil spills could soon be in the hands of the leading suspects as BP and partner contractors are set to start salvaging the wreckage of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig.
The US government is leading what could become a criminal investigation into the disaster. But it does not have the technical expertise to gather evidence some 5,000 feet (1,500 meters) below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico.

Oil sands pipeline to cost Canada over 36,000 jobs: union
By Geoff Dembicki -
One of Canada's biggest unions estimated more than 36,000 jobs would be lost if a proposed oil pipeline from Alberta to Texas gets U.S. approval.
"The thousands of kilometres of new pipeline being proposed reveal a radical restructuring of the way oil and gas are being delivered on this continent," reads a Toronto Star op-ed by Dave Coles, President of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers union. "For Canadians, the consequences have been crushing."
Calgary-based TransCanada proposes to build a 3,200 km pipeline capable of moving oil sands crude to Gulf Coast refineries. Opposition has grown steadily during past months.

China's Rise Stirs Southeast Asian Countries to Build Up Militaries
August 10, 2010 | From theTrumpet.com
If China's cultural cousins recognize the danger of its ascendancy, how clear should the threat be to the West?
China's ascendancy and Beijing's claims to the entire South China Sea have prompted the countries of Southeast Asia to shore up their defense forces to record levels, and to bolster their security ties with the United States.
A modernized Chinese Navy has compounded its presence throughout the 1.3 million-square-mile sea, and for the past three years has threatened international oil firms operating there. In recent months, an increasingly aggressive China has dispatched several warships to the region, issued unilateral bans on fishing in disputed waters, seized 22 or more Vietnamese fishing boats, conducted unprecedentedly large-scale military exercises in disputed waters, and carried out seismic exploration activities in disputed island territories. Beijing has also broadcast an unceasing torrent of state-controlled media commentary reiterating its claim to all of the South China Sea.

Russia deploys air defence missiles in Abkhazia
AFP - RawStory.com
Russia has deployed sophisticated air defence missiles in Georgia's pro-Moscow rebel region of Abkhazia, the air force commander said Wednesday, in a move that risks stoking tensions with Tbilisi.
"We have deployed the S-300 system on the territory of Abkhazia," air force commander-in-chief General Alexander Zelin said in a statement carried by Russian news agencies.
"Its role will be anti-aircraft defence of the territory of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, in cooperation with the air defence systems of the army," he said.

USA arming Iran with weapons and has lost nuclear material
FALSE FLAG ALERT

Iran Offers to Help Lebanese Army After U.S. Suspends Military Aid
Amid Concerns About Hezbollah's Role
By Patrick Goodenough, International Editor
(CNSNews.com) - Iran's ambassador in Beirut met with the head of Lebanon's national army on Tuesday and offered Tehran's help, a day after a senior U.S. lawmaker placed a temporary hold on U.S. assistance to the Lebanese force.
Ambassador Ghazanfar Roknabadi and LAF commander Gen. Jean Kahwaji discussed "recent Israeli aggression against Lebanese territory," Iran's official IRNA news agency reported.

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Wednesday 08.11.2010

joke of the day . . . not very funny

How the Great Recession Was Brought to an End
BY ALAN S. BLINDER AND MARK ZANDI1
The U.S. government's response to the financial crisis and ensuing Great Recession included some of the most aggressive fiscal and monetary policies in history. The response was multifaceted and bipartisan, involving the Federal Reserve, Congress, and two administrations. Yet almost every one of these policy initiatives remain controversial to this day, with critics calling them misguided, ineffective or both. The debate over these policies is crucial because, with the economy still weak, more government support may be needed, as seen recently in both the extension of unemployment benefits and the Fed's consideration of further easing.

Economy needs more help, Fed says
Reinvesting maturing bonds not much, but it's something
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The U.S. economy needs more help, the Federal Reserve said Tuesday.
The Federal Open Market Committee announced it would reinvest the proceeds of its investments in mortgage-backed securities as they mature into Treasurys. By reinvesting the principal, the Fed prevents its balance sheet from shrinking, but the move does little to provide new financing to the economy. See full story on the FOMC meeting.

Fed decision: Recovery losing steam
By Chris Isidore, senior writer
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The U.S. economic recovery is weakening, the Federal Reserve warned at the conclusion of its meeting Tuesday, its most bearish outlook in more than a year.
"The pace of recovery in output and employment has slowed in recent months," the Fed said in its statement. It said while it still expects the economy to grow, the improvement will be "more modest in the near term than had been anticipated."
The Fed also announced its plan to buy additional long-term Treasurys. The purchase was seen as moving "one step closer to reinstituting a more aggressive policy," according to a note from Deutsche Bank economists.

Implementation of Financial Overhaul Gets Off to Rocky Start
By MICHAEL R. CRITTENDEN - WSJ.com
WASHINGTON - U.S. bank regulators' efforts to implement sweeping financial-overhaul legislation got off to a rocky start on Tuesday, as officials suggested Congress might have to make changes less than three weeks after President Barack Obama signed the bill into law.
Regulators meeting at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. expressed concern about a requirement restricting the use of private credit ratings by federal agencies that was included in the Dodd-Frank legislation. The requirement has forced regulators to put on hold a proposal setting capital standards for thousands of banks, particularly smaller institutions. Regulators complained that they were now left with few attractive alternatives and that the changes they could be forced to make might cause more harm than good.

Unusual uncertainty clouds Fed meeting
By Greg Robb, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Federal Reserve officials started their meeting Tuesday amid unusual uncertainty about what steps they might take in response to the downshift in economic growth over the past two months.
The Fed meeting began at the unusual hour of 8 a.m. Eastern because it is a one-day meeting, officials said. A policy statement is expected to be released at about 2:15 p.m.
In late July, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke went before Congress and said that Fed officials were having trouble figuring out where the economy was headed. While the Fed was preparing for an exit strategy from its easy monetary policy, "we also recognize that the economic outlook remains unusually uncertain," Bernanke said at the time.

Many U.S. money funds were at risk during crisis
By Mark Jewell - Washington Post
At least three dozen money-market mutual funds were at risk of failing during the financial crisis, Moody's Investors Service said in a report Tuesday that highlighted how shaky the nearly $3 trillion money-fund industry was after Lehman Brothers' September 2008 downfall.
Around the time that a soured Lehman investment triggered the demise of the $64 billion Reserve Primary Fund, Moody's said, at least 36 other U.S. money funds were also at risk of "breaking the buck" -- failing to ensure that clients could get back at least a dollar for each dollar they put in.

Fed Control Cheats Main Street
Bob Chapman -SilverBearCafe.com
It was only a month ago that the Dow closed at 9686. From there it started to move back up again as insiders learned of the Fed's plan to inject $5 trillion into the economy over the next two years. The result has been a run up to 10,674. We figured out what the Fed was up to, but most everyone else did not.
During that period, almost unnoticed, was the fall in the value of the dollar. On the USDX it has fallen from 86.12 to 80.58.
This is a very good example of the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department feeding inside information to their friends on Wall Street. This has gone on for 60 years or more, and it puts many professionals and the public at a vast disadvantage. If you then include the market intervention and cross manipulation of the President's Group on Financial Markets," you have a totally stacked deck. Needless to say, the SEC and the CFTC are nowhere to be found. That is because they are an integral part of the manipulations, just by looking the other way.

Feds rethink policies that encourage home ownership
Just how much should Uncle Sam do to help Americans buy their own homes? By Paul Wiseman, USA TODAY
For 70 years - and for the last 15 in particular - the answer has been: Whatever it takes.
Now, policymakers are pausing to reconsider. In the next few months, they'll weigh whether there can be too much of a good thing when it comes to helping families finance the American Dream.
The rethink could mean a shake-up for a mortgage market addicted to government subsidies.

Elizabeth Warren Uncovered What the Govt. Did
to 'Rescue' AIG, and It Ain't Pretty
The Nation / By William Greider - AlterNet.org
The government's $182 billion bailout of insurance giant AIG should be seen as the Rosetta Stone for understanding the financial crisis and its costly aftermath.
The government's $182 billion bailout of insurance giant AIG should be seen as the Rosetta Stone for understanding the financial crisis and its costly aftermath. The story of American International Group explains the larger catastrophe not because this was the biggest corporate bailout in history but because AIG's collapse and subsequent rescue involved nearly all the critical elements, including delusion and deception. These financial dealings are monstrously complicated, but this account focuses on something mere mortals can understand - moral confusion in high places, and the failure of governing institutions to fulfill their obligations to the public.

Jim Rogers on The Federal Reserve

QE2 Will Sink Us
Gonzalo Lira
Ben Bernanke and the Federal Reserve are preparing for QE2 - a second round of Quantitative Easing.
The rationale is that the United States' economy is circling the deflationary drain - something Bernanke and the Fed are absolutely terrified of. Certainly deflation is hitting the U.S. economy full bore, but it's yet to be proven that this deflationary trough has twisted itself into a self-reinforcing vicious cycle. I would argue that the chances of the U.S. economy twisting into a deflationary death spiral has yet to be made. But be that as it may, it doesn't matter if the economy is in a deflationary death spiral - Bernanke and Co. think that that's the imminent danger. And they're the ones with their finger on The Big Red Money-Making Button.

Major Structural Changes in One Year
Jim Willie, CB
A theme of frequent mention has been the Paradigm Shift in the financial world. It refers more specifically to the global shift away from a USDollar-centric alignment. The major industrialized nations of the world, along with major energy producers, struggle to develop a monetary and commercial system that is not based upon the crippled fraudulent bloated USDollar. The challenge is daunting, since expertise on financial structures, even in an honest legitimate fashion, is somewhat lacking outside the Anglo world. Changes indeed come. Many observers, investors, and participants in the global economic and financial world who had held firm to much hope of bonafide structural improvements and of improved prices in valuable unblemished assets find themselves slowly fading in that hope.

U.S. House Sends $26 Billion State Aid Bill to Obama
By Brian Faler
Aug. 10 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama signed into law legislation providing $26 billion in aid to cash-strapped state governments amid fears the U.S. economy is stalling just months before this year's midterm elections.
The House, taking a one-day break from the campaign trail, returned to Washington today to approve the measure 247-161 before lawmakers adjourned once again for their August recess.
The bill, designed to prevent thousands of layoffs of teachers and other public service employees, cleared the Senate last week after a pair of Republicans joined Democrats in breaking a filibuster.

Productivity falls and Fed mulls stimulus
By Glenn Somerville
(Reuters) - U.S. business productivity fell for the first time in 1-1/2 years in the second quarter and labor costs hardly rose, according to government data that underlined the halting pace of economic recovery.
Productivity declined by an annual rate of 0.9 percent after rising at a revised 3.9 percent rate in the first quarter, a Labor Department report showed on Tuesday. Falling output per worker implies the economy is operating less efficiently because overall production is below its potential.
It was the first time since the fourth quarter of 2008 output per worker declined.
Other data showed consumers growing increasingly gloomy about the economic outlook while business inventories increased and sales slumped.

The "Road to Serfdom"
By Dan Amoss - The DailyReckoning.com
08/10/10 Jacobus, Pennsylvania - The stock market still has further to fall to catch up with the slowing economy. US GDP will keep decelerating - likely approaching a zero percent growth rate by 2011 - for the following reasons:

1. The long-term trend back towards consumer frugality and higher savings rates remains in full force. This will dampen consumer spending.
2. A double dip in housing prices is likely, because subsidies are ending and the backlog of foreclosure resolutions is about to accelerate.
3. The impact of the Obama administration's stimulus plan is fading, and is not leading to any real "multiplier" effects because most of it went to plug holes in state government budgets.

Federal Reserve to buy U.S. debt,
switching policies as recovery slows
By Neil Irwin - Washington Post Staff Writer
With the recovery losing momentum, the Federal Reserve moved Tuesday to try to boost growth, an about-face by a central bank that has spent most of the last year winding down its aggressive measures to support the economy.
The Fed pledged to keep the amount of assets it holds unchanged at $2 trillion rather than allow the level to taper off over time. The decision should help keep long-term interest rates, such as those for home mortgages and corporate loans, a bit lower than they otherwise might have been, though the direct economic impact is likely to be modest.

Stimulus Pushers
The latest bailout for public unions and spendthrift states.
WSJ.com - To treat Washington's spending addiction, the November elections are the taxpayer's best chance to stage an intervention. But until then, President Obama and the Democratic Congress are determined to keep pushing strung-out state governments to take one more fix.
Witness yesterday's 247-161 largely party-line House vote to approve a Senate bill shovelling another $26.1 billion out to state education and Medicaid programs. The White House has promoted the bill as emergency assistance for strained state budgets. But this unique brand of therapy drives states to spend more, not less. The "assistance" is so expensive that several governors were begging for relief even before Mr. Obama signed it into law.

Fed to buy new Treasuries to keep interest rates low
By Paul Davidson, USA TODAY
The Federal Reserve, offering its most dour economic outlook in months, said Tuesday it will take a modest step to keep borrowing costs low by preventing its bloated balance sheet from shrinking.
The Fed said it will reinvest proceeds from maturing mortgage bonds in new Treasuries instead of allowing its portfolio to shrink. Its aim: to keep long-term interest rates from rising.

Fed Will Keep Holdings Stable in Bid to Boost Growth
By Scott Lanman
Aug. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve officials made their first attempt to bolster the economy in more than a year, saying they will maintain their holdings of securities to stop money from draining out of the financial system.
The central bank will reinvest principal payments on mortgage assets it holds into long-term Treasuries after judging that "the pace of economic recovery is likely to be more modest in the near term than had been anticipated," the Federal Open Market Committee said in a statement after meeting today in Washington.

Treasury 10-Year Notes Rise for 2nd Day as Fed Prepares to Buy
By Wes Goodman
Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Treasury 10-year notes gained for a second day as the Federal Reserve prepared to start buying longer-maturity U.S. debt after announcing the purchases to spur the slowing economy.
The benchmark 10-year yield approached a 16-month low as the central bank said "the pace of recovery in output and employment has slowed in recent months" and the economic recovery will be "more modest" than anticipated. The Treasury is scheduled to auction $24 billion of the securities today, the second of three sales this week totaling $74 billion.

Judge Andrew Napolitano: The Government Lies to You!!!

Dow/Gold & Summer Doldrums
Richard (Rick) Mills - SilverBearCafe.com
As a general rule, the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information.
Central banks money printing is out of control. The constant printing of all the world's currencies is just another way for countries to default on their debt - the repayment of a creditor occurs using a currency whose purchasing power has been reduced. Gold's price will continue, has to continue, too rise in value against all depreciating paper currencies

China Enters the Gold Market
By The Mogambo Guru - The DailyReckoning.com
08/10/10 Tampa, Florida - There was an editorial power struggle at Mogambo News Service over whether it was Big, Big News (BBN) or if it was Big Freaking News (BFN), or even if it was The Biggest Freaking News Of Your Life (TBFNOYL) that China has, officially through the People's Bank of China, said that they have "seen the light" as concerns gold, and they see how gold is the only true money, and how worthless paper monies and computer blip monies are the Wrong Way To Go (WWTO), as evidenced by the Chinese merely looking at us Americans and what happened! Hahaha!

Buy Gold Calls, Bank Puts Before Fed Meeting, Macro Risk Says
By Jeff Kearns and Nikolaj Gammeltoft - BusinessWeek.com
Investors should buy bullish gold options and bearish bank puts before Federal Reserve policy makers signal today whether the economy needs more stimulus, Macro Risk Advisors LLC said.
The options advisory and brokerage firm, which predicted Europe's debt crisis, recommended a strangle strategy that pairs buying this week's August $118 calls on the SPDR Gold Shares exchange-traded fund and August $15 puts on the Financial Select Sector SPDR ETF. The contracts expire on Aug. 13.

Gold will approach $1,375 by year-end
CommodityOnline.com
John Licata: I think this is a great time to get back into the gold market. The recent slide is a buying opportunity. We are still facing a very challenging economic environment as evidenced by recent remarks by various U.S. Federal Reserve speakers, including Chairman Ben Bernanke. I think the concerns regarding deflation are completely overblown. The fact that we're seeing higher energy prices is an inflationary tidbit that's getting left on the sidelines by investors. Higher inflation will definitely lift gold prices, and the renewed strength in the euro vs. the dollar is a bullish factor for gold prices too. And we're quickly approaching Indian wedding season, which starts in September; that has historically been a bullish time for gold prices. And, in recent years, many of the gold producers have not really had any big finds, which also bodes well for gold because there is less gold to go around.

Ready, Set, Gold! Best Months Are Just Ahead
By Frank Holmes - The DailyReckoning.com
08/09/10 San Antonio, Texas - Global economic conditions are now favorable for gold as a safe-haven investment. The U.S., Western Europe and Japan are close to buckling under the weight of their sovereign debt loads, government budget deficits remain large and persistent and, as a result, faith in major paper currencies is low.
On top of this, China - the world's No. 1 gold producer and No. 2 gold consumer - is encouraging gold investing by its rapidly growing middle class, and will likely have to increase imports to meet this new demand.

So Little Gold: Why So Cheap?
By Arnold Bock - DailyMarkets.com
Gold, the precious metal most often thought of as money, is in short supply. In fact, the existing above ground horde is so small one has to question whether it is realistic to think of it as having a serious role as money in the future. The fact is there just isn't enough of it and - once institutional and private investors realize that the supply is so disarmingly and alarmingly insignificant - prices are likely to go parabolic.

Silver bull run to continue
LONDON (Commodity Online): Silver is unlikely to lose its charm in the coming days even as analysts predicted that the metals is expected to remain bullish this week, supported by technical indicators, a weak dollar and weaker China economic data.
The bearish pattern in the dollar will likely continue from the past week, but could be limited this week due to the Michigan confidence index, falling jobless claims, and rising retail sales. A weak dollar will continue to spur the demand for silver, along with the yellow metal. Silver could see some lively sessions this week on the Fed's decision to ease money supply, thus undermining confidence in the US dollar.

U.S. Dollar Now Ripe For Catastrophic Devaluation
Giordano Bruno - SilverBearCafe.com
Normally when I cover subjects in the economy, I try to take a "macro" approach, giving an overall view of various financial elements around the world and how they are clearly connected to one another in a greater synchronous social force. That is to say, in Chinese domestic consumption, or European debt obligations, or Russian gold reserves, and in many other factors, is encoded the very future of our own American economy. Showing others how to decipher that code is my primary mission.

On Deleveraging, the Collapse of the Dollar and Rise of a 'Lost Decade'
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
Daily Bell: Thank you for sitting with us down with us again. We interviewed you last September, and you were not especially upbeat about Western economies generally. Let's get right to it. Where are we today? Is it inflation, or are we moving into a deflationary depression?
Bill Bonner: It's clearer today that the West is deleveraging and that it's continuing.
Daily Bell: Define deleveraging, please.
Bill Bonner: It's a natural phenomenon that comes after a great credit boom. First there's credit expansion in a business cycle, because people want to live better and they tend to test the limits of the credit. So they borrow more and more and more, until they have borrowed too much. Now usually there are mechanisms in place to prevent people from borrowing too much. This is why business has credit checks and other safeguards. But once in a while, you have a situation where those barriers disappear. Then you get people doing things that they shouldn't be doing, and that's what happened in America between 1980 and 2007, a nice long stretch of 27 years in which credit just got greater and greater.

VCs give more money to women, Asians
By Carl Gaines - Crain's NY Business
Asians, women and people with less than a college degree fare better than white men who hold advanced degrees, according to CB Insights report; youth also a factor in funding decisions.
Got a great online business idea but need funding? Factors like your age and ethnic background might predict the likelihood of success in getting venture capital. Gender also plays a role.
Simply put, when it comes to getting the most money, Asians, women and people with less than a college degree fare far better than white men who hold advanced degrees, according to a report released Tuesday by CB Insights, an information services company that tracks corporate data.

Independent retailers face challenges that chains don't
By Jillian Berman, USA TODAY
The recession has left its impression on Joya Helmuth's stationery store. The owner of the South Bend, Ind.-based Spark Fine Stationery says that with consumers cutting back on wedding invitations and stationery, she's been forced to consider carrying cheaper products or cutting costs in other ways.
But Helmuth says she's lucky. In 2009 she saw a 12% drop in custom item sales, which make up 30% of her business, but she's fared better than some of her neighbors. Three out of the seven independent businesses on her street have closed or moved as a result of the downturn.
"It only takes a couple of bad months, and you can be recovering for a year or two, and that's if we recover," says Helmuth, who opened her store in March 2007.

Small business program vulnerable to fraud, federal auditors say
Fake applications are approved and millions of dollars in contracts go to companies already deemed ineligible for the program, the General Accounting Office reports.
By Sharon Bernstein, Los Angeles Times
It's way too easy to get the Small Business Administration to approve fraudulent applications from companies seeking government contracts, federal auditors say.
Fake applications to a program meant for companies in economically distressed areas - including one from a firm claiming as its address the Alamo in Texas - sailed easily through the SBA's vetting process after they were submitted by investigators, the Government Accounting Office said in a new report.

Fiatocracy
Peter Souleles B. Com. LLB. - SilverBearCafe.com
"It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity."
The words of Einstein rang true then and ring even truer today as the world's "fiatocracy" employs mechanical and electronic printing presses to produce currencies that are backed only with the promise of economic and financial oblivion, and a moral bankruptcy which will culminate in wars with uncertain outcomes.
Capitalism, communism, socialism and fascism are marketed, financed and modified by the invisible puppeteers who manipulate these -isms as tools for the furtherance of their control agenda as they see fit depending on time, place and circumstances. In the meantime the ignorant masses are divided by these -isms and in the process of clinging to them they are conquered through the use of force, propaganda, addictions, bribery, blackmail or debt.

US whistleblowing incentives set to spark flurry of allegations
(Source: Irish Times) - iStockAnalyst.com
NEW US whistleblowing incentives that could net informants multimillion dollar payouts are likely to generate a surge in allegations against US-listed companies and Wall Street banks, according to lawyers representing the companies.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is expecting a sharp increase in tip-offs from senior employees and third parties prompted by potential seven-figure bounties.
"The scale of the awards reflects the high quality of whistleblower we hope to get - people within a company, broker or other regulated firm that we might not have heard from before," said Stephen Cohen, an SEC official.

Obama Facing Bill Clinton by Proxy in Colorado Senate Primary
By John McCormick
Aug. 10 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama's influence among Democrats will be tested today in a primary in Colorado, where his party is fighting to keep a U.S. Senate seat likely critical to its control of the chamber.
No other Democratic contest this year has drawn as much involvement from Obama, who is backing Senator Michael Bennet. The incumbent's opponent, former Colorado House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, is supported by former President Bill Clinton.

The Obsolescence of Barack Obama
The magic of 2008 can't be recreated, and good riddance to it.
By FOUAD AJAMI
Not long ago Barack Obama, for those who were spellbound by him, had the stylishness of JFK and the historic mission of FDR riding to the nation's rescue. Now it is to Lyndon B. Johnson's unhappy presidency that Democratic strategist Robert Shrum compares the stewardship of Mr. Obama. Johnson, wrote Mr. Shrum in the Week magazine last month, never "sustained an emotional link with the American people" and chose to escalate a war that "forced his abdication as president."
A broken link with the public, and a war in Afghanistan he neither embraces and sells to his party nor abandons - this is a time of puzzlement for President Obama. His fall from political grace has been as swift as his rise a handful of years ago. He had been hot political property in 2006 and, of course, in 2008. But now he will campaign for his party's 2010 candidates from afar, holding fund raisers but not hitting the campaign trail in most of the contested races. Those mass rallies of Obama frenzy are surely of the past.

Is it enough?
President Obama signs $26 billion jobs bill to aid state payrolls
By Lori Montgomery and Nick Anderson - Washington Post Staff Writer
President Obama approved a final spurt of spending Tuesday to shore up the sluggish recovery, signing into law a $26 billion plan to save the jobs of thousands of teachers and other government workers. The measure brings total direct federal spending on the economy to nearly $1.2 trillion since the nation descended into recession in late 2007.
With economic growth faltering and unemployment stuck at 9.5 percent, some economists are urging additional action. But senior Democrats and administration officials said the package of state aid is likely to be the last major effort at economic stimulus -- at least until after November congressional elections, for which the soaring national debt has become a major issue.

The jobless recovery won't go further without jobs
Productivity drop shows an American worker stretched to the limit
By MarketWatch.com
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Has the productivity of the American worker finally hit its apex?
That's one interpretation of news showing that nonfarm productivity fell 0.9% in the second quarter.
Ordinarily, one might treat a decline in productivity as bad news, seeing as it could lead to declines in corporate profitability and, therefore, companies' willingness to hire.
But these aren't ordinary times. Earnings per share grew 43% for the 450 members of the S&P 500 that have reported second-quarter results, according to FactSet Research data.

*****

Why I'm Not Hiring
When you add it all up, it costs $74,000 to put $44,00
in Sally's pocket and to give her $12,000 in benefits.
By MICHAEL P. FLEISCHER - WSJ.com (free)
With unemployment just under 10% and companies sitting on their cash, you would think that sooner or later job growth would take off. I think it's going to be later - much later. Here's why.
Meet Sally (not her real name; details changed to preserve privacy). Sally is a terrific employee, and she happens to be the median person in terms of base pay among the 83 people at my little company in New Jersey, where we provide audio systems for use in educational, commercial and industrial settings. She's been with us for over 15 years. She's a high school graduate with some specialized training. She makes $59,000 a year - on paper. In reality, she makes only $44,000 a year because $15,000 is taken from her thanks to various deductions and taxes, all of which form the steep, sad slope between gross and net pay.

House Passes $26-Billion US Jobs Bill
Lisa Ferdinando | Capitol Hill - VOANews.com
The U.S. House of Representatives met in an emergency session on Tuesday to pass a $26-billion bill aimed at saving the jobs of more than 300,000 teachers, police and public service employees, and helping states cover the cost of the federal-state health care program for the poor, Medicaid. After a day of partisan debate, the bill passed by a 247 to 161 margin.
Hours before the vote and flanked by two teachers who might lose their jobs, President Barack Obama called for passage of the bill, saying the legislation he will sign into law would save the jobs of critical public sector employees - teachers, police, firefighters, nurses and emergency first-responders - during the coming year.

Judge blocks Schwarzenegger from implementing furloughs
Roughly 150,000 state workers could avoid the unpaid furlough days set to begin Friday. The governor's office said it would appeal the ruling by an Alameda County Superior Court judge.
By Shane Goldmacher, Los Angeles Times
Roughly 150,000 state workers could avoid unpaid furlough days set to begin Friday after an Alameda County Superior Court judge issued a temporary restraining order on Monday blocking Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger from forcing the mandatory time off.
Schwarzenegger ordered the furloughs in late July, four weeks after the fiscal year began with no state budget in place. The governor said the move was necessary to conserve cash, at least until state legislators approve a spending plan.

Subprime lenders targeting students for auto loans
by Bobby Coles - Helium.com
Sub-prime lenders are targeting students for auto loans in an attempt to wrestle more money out of unsuspecting clients. Students, especially those in college or university, wish to have the means of travel, and convenience that a car can offer. The reality of the situation, however, is the debt that will accrue as a result of these auto loans.
Car loans are tricky, and they can come at the cost of hurting your credit rating score while you are still in school, which will severely impact your purchasing power once you get out of school. A bad credit rating will leave you with no options but to pay exorbitant interest rates, since you will be considered a high risk. This is how the cycle of debt continues.

FHA Insured Mortgages, a Disaster in the Making?
by Keith Jurow - RealEstateChannel.com
.... The Danger Awaiting the FHA In the Near Future
Currently, there are 555,000 FHA-insured homes which are delinquent 90 days or more. This figure has been rising steadily for three years. Loan Performance tracks the cure rate for delinquent mortgages in its massive loan database. The cure rate for seriously delinquent mortgages has plunged to roughly 1%. This means that 99% of these delinquent mortgages are headed for default and then either foreclosure or short sale. The chart below says it all.

Gov't likely to keep big mortgage market role
By ALAN ZIBEL - The Associated Press - WashingtonPost.com
WASHINGTON -- Keeping Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in business will cost taxpayers billions. But getting the federal government out of the mortgage business would cost home buyers dearly, in the form of higher interest rates.
The Obama administration will begin tackling this dilemma next Tuesday at a public conference on the future of the mortgage system. Fannie and Freddie lost a combined $9 billion in the April-to-June quarter and have needed more than $148 billion to stay afloat since the government rescued them nearly two years ago.

Gov't likely to keep big mortgage market role
By ALAN ZIBEL - The Associated Press - WashingtonPost.com
WASHINGTON -- Keeping Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in business will cost taxpayers billions. But getting the federal government out of the mortgage business would cost home buyers dearly, in the form of higher interest rates.
The Obama administration will begin tackling this dilemma next Tuesday at a public conference on the future of the mortgage system. Fannie and Freddie lost a combined $9 billion in the April-to-June quarter and have needed more than $148 billion to stay afloat since the government rescued them nearly two years ago.

Majority of mortgages now adjustable-rate
iStockAnalyst.com
Aug. 10, 2010 (The Yomiuri Shimbun) -- With the Bank of Japan sticking to its ultralow interest rate policy, there has been a sharp increase in the number of people taking out adjustable-rate mortgages.
Some financial institutions are offering products with annual interest rates starting at 1 percent or less, apparently in an attempt to jump on the bandwagon by shifting their focus from fixed-rate loans.
However, this sort of lending policy could prove risky for home buyers in that if the central bank's interest rate takes an upward turn, an adjustable-rate mortgage would weigh more heavily on borrowers than would the fixed-rate type.

Florida Attorney General Launches Investigation into Foreclosure Mills Fraud - StopForeclosureFraud.com
On Tuesday the Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum's office announced an investigation of Three South Florida law firms.
The firms are identified as The Law Offices of Marshall C. Watson in Fort Lauderdale; Shapiro & Fishman, which has offices in Boca Raton and Tampa; and the Law Offices of David J. Stern, P.A. in Plantation.
It is alleged that the firms, which were hired by loan servicers to begin foreclosure proceedings when homeowners were behind on their mortgages, may have fabricated mortgage assignments in order to speed up the foreclosure process.

California City With $800,000 Manager Gets Rating Cut
By Martin Z. Braun
Aug. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Bell, the Los Angeles suburb that paid its city manager almost $800,000 a year, had its credit cut five steps to junk by Standard & Poor's on concerns about the city's ability to refinance or pay debt due Nov. 1.
S&P lowered Bell's general-obligation and pension bond ratings to BB, two levels below investment grade, from A-, and put it on a watchlist for potential further downgrade. The credit-rating company cited the resignations of top city officers amid a scandal over how much they were paid, and media reports about the decline in value of property financed with municipal debt in 2007 as reasons for the downgrade.

Federal workers earning double their private counterparts
By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY
At a time when workers' pay and benefits have stagnated, federal employees' average compensation has grown to more than double what private sector workers earn, a USA TODAY analysis finds.
Federal workers have been awarded bigger average pay and benefit increases than private employees for nine years in a row. The compensation gap between federal and private workers has doubled in the past decade.
Federal civil servants earned average pay and benefits of $123,049 in 2009 while private workers made $61,051 in total compensation, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The data are the latest available.

Boomers wanting to work past retirement age find limited options
By Christine Dugas, USA TODAY
Baby Boomers approaching retirement age are in for a rude awakening.
Many want to keep working, knowing that they likely will live well into their 80s and 90s, stay healthier than previous generations and need more cash to keep paying the bills.
However, for Boomers - those 79 million Americans born from 1946 through 1964 - "the new retirement reality may be a messy proposition," says Alicia Munnell, director of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.

The Violent American Future
Marc Faber sees social unrest and riots on the US horizon.
Article by Mac Slavo - LewRockwell.com
Marc Faber: Protect Your Property with High Voltage Fences, Barbed Wire, Booby Traps, Military Weapons and Dobermans
Investment guru and publisher of The Gloom, Boom and Doom report, Marc Faber, regularly discusses investment strategies for protecting and building wealth during times of economic distress. He has recommended purchasing gold, silver and foreign assets because of what he perceives to be an impending economic catastrophe in the United States.

Don't Worry About RFID Tags in Your Underwear: No Reason to Panic
But the ones in your identity papers are a real threat
by Mark Nestmann - LewRockwell.com
Lots of things concern me. Wal-Mart's recent announcement that it would begin inserting radio-frequency identification devices (RFIDs) to tag certain clothing items isn't one of them.
Perhaps it was an unfortunate choice that Wal-Mart decided it would begin inserting what it calls "smart tags" on underwear. What, exactly, does Wal-Mart want to track in your pants? Nothing at all, it turns out. All that it plans to do with the tags is keep better control over its inventory.

Chicago leads largest cities in sales tax
By Mary Ellen Podmolik
It's another dubious honor for Chicago.
Just as Illinois touts its first sales-tax holiday, a new report highlights Chicago as having among the highest retail sales tax rates of the nation's largest cities. At 9.75 percent once county, mass transit and city taxes are added to the statewide 6.25 percent sales tax, Chicago's tax rate is equal to that of Los Angeles.

Owner that lost Okla. mall to foreclosure to have Colo., Ark. malls
managed by Chicago company
MURRAY EVANS - Associated Press Writer - Chicago Tribune
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) - A company that lost an Oklahoma City mall to the federal government in foreclosure said Monday it has hired a management firm to try and prevent the same fate for two other malls.
Midwest Mall Properties LLC of Little Rock, Ark., said Chicago-based Urban Retail Properties LLC would provide management and leasing services for the Northwest Arkansas Mall in Fayetteville, Ark., and The Citadel Mall in Colorado Springs, Colo.

Rangel: 'Don't leave me swinging in the wind'
By LARRY MARGASAK (AP)
WASHINGTON - A combative Rep. Charles Rangel told the House on Tuesday he's not resigning despite 13 charges of wrongdoing and demanded the ethics committee not leave him "swinging in the wind."
Rangel, who is 80, spoke without notes in an extraordinary, often emotional 37-minute speech that defied his lawyers' advice to keep quiet about his case.
The New York Democrat and 40-year House veteran had a sharp message in dismissing fellow Democrats who, worried about election losses, want him to quit: "If I can't get my dignity back here, then fire your best shot in getting rid of me through expulsion."

Charlie Rangel on the Floor
[Nothing said on the floor of the House can be used against him]

Magazine circulation keeps falling
Fewer titles, recession's impact and more free online content help to contribute to a 2.3% decline in the first half of 2010.
By Emily Laermer - Crain's NY Business
Magazine circulation has again decreased since the middle of last year.
Total circulation is down 2.3% for the first half of the year, according to a report by the Audit Bureau of Circulation, partly because of the high costs associated with printing additional issues, as well as the fewer titles on shelves. Changes in consumer behavior - such as less disposable income - and increases in free digital content have also contributed to the decline, publishers say. This year's decrease is about equal to what occurred in the first half 2009.

Fingerprint Sharing Led to Deportation of 47,000 Illegal Immigrants
By Suzanne Gamboa, Associated Press
Washington (AP) - Records show that about 47,000 people have been removed or deported from the U.S. after the Homeland Security Department sifted through 3 million sets of fingerprints taken from bookings at local jails.
About one-quarter of those kicked out of the country did not have criminal records, according to government data obtained by immigration advocacy groups that have filed a lawsuit. The groups plan to release the data Tuesday and provided early copies to The Associated Press.

Cloned cattle in the human food chain:
officialdom talks a lot of bull
Gerald Warner - Telegraph.co.uk
There are few more familiar and pathetic spectacles than British bumbledom, caught red-handed in some grotesque piece of incompetence, burbling its denials of accountability. Now that the public has become aware that both milk and meat from cloned cows and their numerous offspring are apparently coursing freely through the human food chain, the stampede for alibis has begun among officialdom.
In the front line is the Food Standards Agency, set up 10 years ago in panic reaction to the provoked by the BSE scare. For 48 hours the FSA stoutly maintained that no milk or meat from cloned animals or their offspring had ever entered the food chain. This stance has now been modified (ie totally discredited), with Tim Smith, the FSA chief executive, admitting that the agency does not know how many cloned embryos have entered Britain and that a three-year-old bull derived from a cloned animal was slaughtered, sold and eaten last year.

The Government is Dealing with the Oil Spill
Like the Soviets Dealt with Chernobyl
George Washington's Blog
The Soviet Union was famous for covering up its environmental disasters. . . .
But it's not just the communist Soviets ...
The U.S. also has a long history of covering up environmental and health disasters, as shown by the following examples.
The Bush administration covered up the health risks to New Orleans residents associated with polluted water from hurricane Katrina, and FEMA covered up the cancer risk from the toxic trailers which it provided to refugees of the hurricane.
The Centers for Disease Control - the lead agency tasked with addressing disease in America - covered up lead poisoning in children in the Washington, D.C. area.

A Conversation With Matt Simmons
Nichole Williamson - SilverBearCafe.com
.... MarEx: Are you saying there may be criminal implications from BP's actions?
Simmons: Absolutely! First they rounded up all 12 ROVs in the Gulf, which is the only way anyone can see underwater. Then they began sending out misinformation about there only being two or three cracks in the drilling riser, which was creating the spill. It was all lies. The drilling riser is 22-1/2 inches in circumference and two-thirds of it is elastomeric, so it's a mile-long, tightly packed column of condensate. BP said the oil was coming out of the riser and stationed the ROVs on the leak. The ROVs only have one eye that looks straight ahead with a limit of about 25 feet or so of strobe, and it's icy black down there.
Now remember the riser is only 22-1/2 inches in diameter and there was a three-to-four-foot plume of condensate, and this surely couldn't have caused that massive fire on the rig. When the government began sending a few university-operated research vessels with unmanned submarines to the area, they discovered plumes of oil. Meanwhile, BP said adamantly there were no plumes and keep these vessels away because "they're distracting us from fixing the leak."

BP Suspends Drilling of Relief Well on Storm Threat
By Jim Polson and Brian K. Sullivan
Aug. 10 (Bloomberg) -- BP Plc suspended drilling of a relief well that aims to permanently plug the source of the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history as a storm approached site in the Gulf of Mexico.
The precaution will delay interception of the damaged Macondo well by two to three days, to Aug. 15 or Aug. 16, National Incident Commander Thad Allen said in a conference call with reporters today. The drilling rig will remain as London- based BP prepares pressure tests it expects will aid the effort to kill the well, Allen said.

Ron Paul: We Must Break the Vicious Circle of Violence!

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Tuesday 08.10.2010

Eyes on the skies over Iran's reactor
By Marsha B Cohen - Asia Times
MIAMI - Iran's light water nuclear power plant at Bushehr is preparing to go "live" - again.
Iranian and Russian nuclear scientists and officials have announced Bushehr's reactor will soon be receiving its first shipment of nuclear fuel 36 years after construction first began on the project.
This claim may be quietly fueling speculation that a military strike on Iran by Israel - or the United States - may be imminent.
The Persian-language news site Mardom Salari reported on August 3 that members of the Iranian armed forces had been transferred to Bushehr to evaluate the security of the air space above the site. Three drones were said to have been shot down over Bushehr the previous day as part of an exercise to test Iranian readiness for an aerial attack, intercepted by the defense systems of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).

U.S. Economy Between a Rock and a Hard Place Facing Dire Options
By: Lorimer Wilson - MarketOracle.co.uk
"The U.S. is in an untenable position - between a rock and a hard place - in an inescapable debt trap - where the options are, at best, dire - either hyperinflation or a deflationary depression! It would seem that all we can do is ride out the storm in a boat laden with gold" said Jeff Nielson (BullionBullsCanada.com) in a recent speech* going on to say:
The U.S.'s severe debt problems are exacerbated by its $70 trillion in unfunded liabilities to fund the social 'entitlements' of the mass of baby boomers who will be retiring by the tens of millions in the next few decades and there is absolutely NO likelihood of the U.S. government ever reducing those entitlements. Any attempt to do so would cause severe economic disruptions and civil unrest."
Nielson maintained that there are numerous practical reasons why the U.S. will make no attempt to alleviate the dire situation.

Hyperinflation or Deflation? The debate continues. . .

Hyperinflation Warning
By: Howard Katz - MarketOracle.co.uk
One hears much discussion of hyperinflation on the gold web sites. It is a worst case scenario and used to alarm and excite. It is used to designate a period when prices are rising very rapidly, the favorite example being Germany of 1914-23, and during this time prices rose by very close to one trillion times. That is, a piece of bread which started off costing 1 mark ended costing one trillion marks. So it is not merely in today's world that we are using numbers above 1 trillion. But it is an instructive period of history, and we must always keep in mind that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

Fed Shifting Its Debate to Deflation
By SEWELL CHAN - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - The Federal Reserve will meet on Tuesday faced with a pivotal decision about whether to abandon its presumption that the economy is gradually picking up steam and begin to consider new steps to keep the recovery from sputtering out.
A string of developments, including the weak jobs report last Friday, has altered the sentiment within the central bank, leading Fed policy makers to stop worrying for the moment about the increasingly remote prospect of inflation. Instead, they are increasingly focused on the potential for the economy to slip into a deflationary spiral of declining demand, prices and wages.

Fighting a Double Dip: What Weapons Does the Fed Have Left?
By CHARLES WALLACE -DailyFinance.com
When Chairman Ben Bernanke and the Federal Reserve's rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meet Tuesday and Wednesday, they'll face some daunting challenges. The economy is unquestionably weaker -- the U.S. Labor Department reported a net loss of 131,000 jobs in July -- and the threat of deflation is getting scarier. Faced with these concerns, what's the Fed likely to do? Actually, what can it do?
The Fed's options are somewhat limited because it has already adopted a zero-interest rate policy because the rates it charges banks are already set at their lowest possible point of between 0% and 0.25%. Interest rates can't go any lower, so further easing of rates isn't an option.

Raise taxes now -- the elders of the economy say so
By Lex Haris, managing editor
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- First it was Greenspan. Now one by one other elders of the economy are speaking out against deficits, and they're making the surprising argument for higher taxes.
Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan was first and has taken the most extreme position, arguing that all of the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 should be allowed to expire.

The Horrific Derivatives Bubble
That Could Destroy Entire World Financial System
MarketOracle.co.uk
Michael Snyder writes: Today there is a horrific derivatives bubble that threatens to destroy not only the U.S. economy but the entire world financial system as well, but unfortunately the vast majority of people do not understand it. When you say the word "derivatives" to most Americans, they have no idea what you are talking about. In fact, even most members of the U.S. Congress don't really seem to understand them. But you don't have to get into all the technicalities to understand the bigger picture.

Market Data Firm Spots the Tracks of Bizarre Robot Traders
Alexis Madrigal - TheAtlantic.com
Mysterious and possibly nefarious trading algorithms are operating every minute of every day in the nation's stock exchanges.
What they do doesn't show up in Google Finance, let alone in the pages of the Wall Street Journal. No one really knows how they operate or why. But over the past few weeks, Nanex, a data services firm has dragged some of the odder algorithm specimens into the light.

Federal Reserve Magically Erasing Debts and Liabilities
By: Richard Daughty - MarketOracle.co.uk
Hossein Askari is a professor of international business and international affairs at George Washington University, and Noureddine Krichene is an economist with a PhD from UCLA, which I mention to establish their credentials, since some bozo from the Federal Reserve created a stir when he said, with a sniff of condescension and smugness, that nobody should comment about economics unless they have a PhD in economics from a "proper" university, because we unwashed huddled masses are "dangerous" and a "threat to society."

Investors worldwide await Fed meeting results
Reuters - MSNBC.com
Central bank will likely discuss way to offer more stimulus to economy
WASHINGTON - Even with U.S. interest rates already near zero, Federal Reserve policymakers will still spend much of a meeting on Tuesday discussing ways to offer more rather than less monetary stimulus to the economy.
The problem is that despite the most aggressive rate-cutting campaign in the central bank's history and Fed purchases of nearly $1.5 trillion in mortgage and Treasury bonds, U.S. growth prospects still look shaky.

Massive Wealth Shift From West to Emerging Markets in Full Swing
By: Martin D Weiss - MarketOracle.co.uk
One year ago, in our 2009 Global Forum, we forecast a massive shift of wealth - from the United States, bogged down with huge deficits and chronic, long-term unemployment ... to emerging markets, enjoying the most rapid growth on the planet.

Merrill's Risk Disclosure Dodges Are Unearthed
By LOUISE STORY - NYTimes.com
It was named after a faint constellation in the southern sky: Pyxis, the Mariner's Compass. But it helped to steer the mighty Merrill Lynch toward disaster.
Barely visible to any but a few inside Merrill, Pyxis was created at the height of the mortgage mania as a sink for subprime securities. Intended for one purpose and operated off the books, this entity and others like it at Merrill helped the bank obscure the outsize risks it was taking.

Gold Get Ready, Set, the Best Months Are Just Ahead
By: Frank Holmes - MarketOracle.co.uk
Global economic conditions are now favorable for gold as a safe-haven investment. The U.S., Western Europe and Japan are close to buckling under the weight of their sovereign debt loads, government budget deficits remain large and persistent and, as a result, faith in major paper currencies is low.
On top of this, China - the world's No. 1 gold producer and No. 2 gold consumer - is encouraging gold investing by its rapidly growing middle class, and will likely have to increase imports to meet this new demand.

Gold to scale up on safe haven buying
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online) : Gold prices remained steady in Asian trade Monday as the dollar dropped further amid safe haven buying by investor's.
Gold for immediate delivery was at $1203.45 an ounce while U.S. gold futures for December delivery were hardly changed at $1,205.5 an ounce.
Analysts said the precious yellow metal took advantage of a weak dollar and worries about the health of the U.S. economy that spurred bargain hunting, but sales of scrap were likely to cap gains.

US financial elite destroy the dollar
Max Keiser - PressTV
The value of the US dollar is crashing intentionally as the Federal Reserve has been printing money without tangible reserves for several decades. President Barack Obama has helped the bankers to come out ahead in every possible situation while pushing the middle class into poverty.
The following is a transcription of an interview with Economist specialist Max Keiser who talks about the US economy's downfall and how the answer to fix it is easy.

Huckleberries of America, . . . UNITE!

Grady Warren On Illegal Immigration.

Americans want radical Muslims out of the U.S..

Barack the angry negro.

Freddie Mac requests $1.8 billion in aid after loss
AP - LATimes.com
WASHINGTON - Government-controlled mortgage buyer Freddie Mac is asking for $1.8 billion in additional federal aid after posting a larger loss in the second quarter.
Freddie Mac said Monday it lost $6 billion, or $1.85 per share, in the April-to-June period. That takes into account $1.3 billion in dividends paid to the Treasury Department. It compares with a loss of $840 million, or 26 cents a share, in the second quarter a year ago.

1% SALES TAX on home sales (home resale fees)

New home sale fee unites divergent groups in opposition
By Kenneth R. Harney - LATimes.com
"it's a pretty slick way to make money, but it's bad public policy and bad for consumers."
Foes want the Obama administration to ban a 1% 'private transfer' charge - assessed every time a property is sold for 99 years - paid to investors who backed the home's original builder.
Can you name a housing controversy that pulls Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, consumer advocates, labor unions representing transport workers and government employees, the title insurance industry, the National Council of La Raza, libertarian and property rights groups and the National Assn. of Realtors all together into a protest coalition demanding quick action from the Obama administration?
A more unlikely collection of real estate bedfellows is hard to imagine. Yet at the end of July, 11 groups with widely divergent agendas and memberships formed something called the Coalition to Stop Wall Street Home Resale Fees.
The target of their protest: private transfer fees being attached as liens on homes and requiring successions of property owners to pay a fee every time the house or lot resells during the coming 99 years. . .

States Raising Cigarette, Gas and Sales Taxes to Cover Shortfalls
By MATTHEW SCOTT - DailyFinance.com
Consumers don't have to wait for the Bush tax cuts to be repealed in order to pay higher taxes. Individual states are hiking tax rates on the sale of retail items, gasoline and cigarettes. Over the last year, 11 states have hiked taxes on cigarettes, five have increased their gasoline tax and five have increased their state sales taxes, according to a recent survey of state consumption taxes.
"From the increases in consumer taxes, it's evident that many states are trying to shore up revenue shortfalls," said Daniel Schibley, senior state tax analyst for CCH, a subsidiary of tax and accounting services firm Wolters Kluwer (WTKWY) which conducted the survey. "Many other states have not yet increased taxes, but may."

More sales taxes coming your way . . .

H.R.5660
Title: Main Street Fairness Act
Sponsor: Rep Delahunt, Bill [MA-10] (introduced 7/1/2010)
Cosponsors (5)
Latest Major Action: 7/1/2010 Referred to House committee.
Status: Referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary.

Democrats push for new Internet sales taxes
by Declan McCullagh - CNet News
The halcyon days of tax-free Internet shopping will, if Rep. Bill Delahunt gets his way, soon be coming to an abrupt end.
Delahunt, a Massachusetts Democrat, introduced a bill on Thursday that would rewrite the ground rules for Internet and mail order sales by eliminating the option for many Americans to shop over the Internet without paying state sales taxes.

Federal 'Main Street Fairness Act'
Taxation without representation
By Curtis J. Barry - Fosters.com - Concord, NH
In the first week of July, U.S. Rep. William Delahunt, D-Mass.) introduced yet again legislation in Congress known as the "Main Street Fairness Act" (H.R. 5660), related to the "Streamlined Sales Tax Agreement (SSTA)." This effort has been tried and failed a number of times but this year it could garner more support.
This legislation would require some retail businesses that engage in remote sales (taking orders via telephone and Internet and sending to another state) to collect the sales and use tax and remit it to the state to which an item was sent or from which the order was placed. This would address the U.S. Supreme Court's Quill v. North Dakota decision that declared that a business must have business activity in the other state in order for that state to require collection of its sales tax; proponents of Delahunt's bill believe that the "Quill" decision left the door open for Congress to act in this way.

Main Street Fairness Act
law.onecle.com
If truth in advertising laws applied to Congress, the so-called Main Street Fairness Act would be renamed as the Main Street Tax Act because it has absolutely nothing to do with fairness for main street. The unstated premise is that our current tax laws that treat online, out-of-state purchases different from offline purchases at bricks-and-mortar stores is unfair to Main Street businesses. However, the bill is all about collecting more sales tax and offers no help to Main Street businesses.

Main Street Fairness Act wants to tax online purchases
by Josh Smith - WalletPop.com
Congress is once again considering legislation that would force online retailers to collect sales tax for all purchases. The Main Street Fairness Act, introduced by U.S. Rep. William Delahunt, would change the current law, which only requires sales tax be charged on purchases when the retailer has a physical presence in the state.

Main Street Fairness Act
New Rules Project
Sponsored by Rep. William Delahunt and introduced in July 2010, the Main Street Fairness Act would allow states, provided they have met certain conditions, to require large internet and mail-order retailers to collect state and local sales taxes.
To exercise this authority, a state must sign on to the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement (SSUTA ) and adopt legislation implementing its provisions. This multistate agreement requires states to, among other things, adhere to uniform product definitions, adopt uniform requirements for filing sales tax returns, administer both state and local sales tax collection through a single state office, and allow retailers to register through a centralized, one-stop multistate registration system.

Proponents of Streamlined Sales Tax Legislation
Remain Unwilling To Pursue Genuine Simplification,
While Exaggerating The Amount Of Uncollected Use Tax
on eCommerce Sales
Earlier this month, Massachusetts Congressman Bill Delahunt introduced H.R. 5660, "a Bill to promote simplification and fairness in the administration and collection of sales and use tax, and for other purposes." H.R. 5660 represents the latest effort by Congressional allies of the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement ("SSUTA") to promote legislation that would overturn the substantial nexus standards that limit states' power to impose sales and use tax collection obligations on out-of-state sellers, as reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in Quill v. North Dakota.

Gold and silver bullion is generally exempt from sales tax, but regulations vary from state to state, so check with your state revenue department for sales tax details that pertain to you.

Is Washington's tax exemption on bullion a gold mine?
By Jim Brunner - Seattle Times staff reporter
OLYMPIA - Ending special-interest tax breaks is an increasingly popular rallying cry for Democrats in the Legislature as they search for cash to plug a $2.6 billion shortfall and avoid deep cuts to government services.
But, as lawmakers have discovered before, it's much easier said than done.
Take one emblematic example, the sales-tax exemption enjoyed by gold-bullion dealers, one of more than 500 tax breaks scattered throughout the state's tax code.

DMA Files Lawsuit Against the State of Colorado
Over Internet Sales Tax Law
Washington, DC, June 30, 2010 - Today, the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court in Colorado challenging the constitutionality of a new Colorado notice and reporting law (HB 1193) that requires out-of-state retailers to turn over to the Department of Revenue (DOR) confidential purchasing history information regarding their Colorado customers, and even certain customers in other states. This legislation constitutes an unprecedented invasion of consumer privacy and also unfairly discriminates against interstate commerce, as the law is targeted solely at out-of-state retailers.
"The new law and the regulations implementing it are an unconstitutional and blatant violation of Colorado consumers' privacy," said Jerry Cerasale, Senior Vice President, Government Affairs. "The law may have been passed in the hope of balancing the state budget through increased use tax reporting by Colorado residents, but it has serious adverse consequences for consumers and businesses."

Northeast of Silicon Valley, recession's effects are magnified
By Alana Semuels, Los Angeles Times
East of San Francisco, jobless rates go up to 20% and home prices are down as much as 75%.
Sixty miles northeast of the sleek corporate campuses of Google Inc. and Intel Corp., housing tracts sit vacant. Factories are closed and job centers are packed with people looking for work.
Think Southern California's Inland Empire is suffering? By some measures, the inland region east of San Francisco has it just as bad.

Pentagon to cut thousands of jobs, defense secretary says
By Craig Whitlock - Washington Post Staff Writer
Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Monday that the Pentagon will cut thousands of jobs, including a substantial chunk of its private contractors and a major military command based in Norfolk, as part of an ongoing effort to streamline its operations and to stave off political pressure to slash defense spending in the years ahead.

Social Security in the red this year
By Stephen Dinan - The Washington Times
Social Security will pay out more this year than it gets in payroll taxes, marking the first time since the program will be in the red since it was overhauled in 1983, according to the annual authoritative report released Thursday by the program's actuary.
Meanwhile President Obama's health care overhaul has given Medicare's basic Hospital Insurance an extra 12 years of financial stability, though it did not solve all of the program's long-term challenges.

Some forced into retirement take Social Security early
By Matt Sedensky - Associated Press Writer
Forced to retire, some workers tap benefits early
MIAMI - Paul Skidmore's office is shuttered, his job gone, his 18-month job search fruitless and his unemployment benefits exhausted. So at 63, he plans to file this week for Social Security benefits, three years earlier than planned.
"All I want to do is work," said Skidmore, of Finksburg, Md., who was an insurance claims adjuster for 37 years before his company downsized and closed his office last year. "And nobody will hire me."

Social Security, the trust fund and funny money
There's real money, then there's funny money -- stuff that looks real but isn't. By Allan Sloan - WashingtonPost.com
Today, let's talk about one of the world's biggest piles of funny money -- the $2.54 trillion Social Security trust fund. It matters now because Social Security revealed plans last week to tap the fund for $41 billion this year and will begin tapping it on a regular basis in less than five years.
This year's cash deficit, the first since the early 1980s and the biggest ever, means the government will have to borrow money to redeem some of the Treasury securities in the trust fund. Even at a time when Uncle Sam is borrowing $1.5 trillion a year to keep his checks from bouncing, $41 billion is real money.

The $2.5 trillion slush fund
By Maya MacGuineas, CNNMoney guest columnist
The Social Security trustees released their updated projections last week detailing the financial health of the nation's retirement system.
Bottom line: The program is running a deficit this year, and is projected to run growing deficits after 2015. But it will have money in the trust funds to pay full benefits until 2037.
Some maintain that the findings reinforce the claims that Social Security is basically on sound footing -- no need to rush to make changes and nothing a few minor tweaks won't fix. Others say the need to make changes has grown even larger.

The Return of the $1,000 Down Mortgage
Fannie Mae and State Housing Agencies Are Offering Little-Money-Down Mortgages. But Why?
By ANNIE LOWREY - The Washington Independent
"Buy new with $1,000 down," the advertisement says, the words resting atop a trim green clapboard house offset by a bright blue sky. "The time has come. Stop wasting rent check after rent check and start building equity in your own home. And with only $1,000 down, affordable monthly payments and no private mortgage insurance required, the dream is closer than you think."

An uninhabited or rented home gets different insurance coverage
by Sandra Block CNNMoney.com
In many neighborhoods around the country, "for sale" signs outnumber telephone poles, and some of those signs are looking awfully weather-beaten. Even owners of oceanfront properties are having trouble finding buyers, at least at a price that will cover the amount they owe on the home.
One way around this problem is to stay put until the economy turns around and the housing market recovers.
But if you've lost your job and need to move to find employment, that's not an option. Even if you're lucky enough to find a buyer, closing the deal could take weeks or even months.

U.S. electricity blackouts skyrocketing
By Thom Patterson
(CNN) -- New York's Staten Island was broiling under a life-threatening heat wave and borough President James Molinaro was seriously concerned about the area's Little League baseball players.
It was last July's Eastern heat wave and Consolidated Edison was responding to scattered power outages as electricity usage neared record highs.
So, authorities followed Molinaro's suggestion to cancel that night's Little League games, which were to be played under electricity-sucking stadium lights.

Google, Verizon detail arrangement on 'network neutrality'
Status of 'future services,' wireless service unclear;
plan panned by critics
By John Letzing, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Google Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. on Monday called for a nationwide Internet policy that would prevent network operators from blocking YouTube and other bandwith-heavy services.
But their joint proposal on "network neutrality" also leaves room for operators - including Verizon - to selectively sell enhanced access to premium levels of service in the future.

Senate Passes Video Accessibility Act
Captioning will be required for all video content that has been shown on television.
By Troy Dreier - StreamingMedia.com
The Senate was working late last night and the results will have a lasting impact on the online video industry. That's because the Senate passed the Twenty-First Century Video Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010.
The House has already passed a version of this bill on July 26. Since the two versions have differences, they now need to be reconciled in conference. Or, one house could adopt the others' version of the bill. After that, the president will need to sign the bill for it to become law.
[sounds good, but wait . . . will this cut out media clips on YouTube?]

H.R.3101
Title: Twenty-first Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010 (Engrossed in House [Passed House]

S.3304
Title: Equal Access to 21st Century Communications Act
Status: Passed Senate with an amendment by Unanimous Consent.

Why Did Mark Hurd, HP's Disgraced Ex-CEO,
Get $37 a Million Payoff?
By CHARLES WALLACE - DailyFinance.com
When Mark Hurd resigned as chief executive of Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ) last week, he got something few workers receive when they quit their jobs: a big payoff. Now, some corporate governance experts wonder if he was really entitled to that fat golden handshake.
Hurd resigned Friday in a scandal that began when a former actress and outside marketing consultant named Jodie Fisher accused him of sexual harassment. While HP said an investigation showed that Hurd hadn't violated the company's harassment policies, it did reveal that Hurd had submitted inaccurate expense reports. The sum involved was reported to be around $20,000.

Sheriff Arpaio's office warned
of possible Justice Dept. lawsuit after August 17
By: Adrian Courtenay - GNSNews.com
U.S. Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez warned attorneys for Sheriff Joe Arpaio, of the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office (MCSO) in Arizona, in a letter dated August 3, that unless Arpaio voluntarily cooperates by August 17 with an investigation by the Justice Department's civil rights division into allegations that Arpaio's office has engaged in "unlawful searches and seizures, discriminatory police conduct, and failure to provide basic services to individuals with limited English proficiency," the Justice Dept. "will file a Title VI civil action to compel access to the requested documents, facilities and personnel."

The Enduring Middle East Strategic Framework
Begins to Emerge as Iran Surges, and the US Resiles
Written by Yossef Bodansky - OilPrice.com
The lingering impact of August 3, 2010, clash on the Israeli-Lebanese border lies in the greater context of, and wider strategic dynamics in, the Middle East. These aspects were highlighted by HizbAllah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah in his speech later that day.
Overall, the issue dominating the overall situation in the Middle East is the reaction by the local powers to the emerging new grand strategic reality: namely, the demise of the United States as the dominant regional power. This is a dramatic reversal of a concentrated US policy of more than half a century.

Adnan Shukrijumah, believed to be the new head
of global operations for Al Qaeda, FBI says
BY SEAN ALFANO AND CORKY SIEMASZKO - NY DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS
Osama Bin Laden's new chief planner of terror attacks knows his enemy well - he's even got a green card.
Adnan Shukrijumah, whose dad was a Brooklyn imam and who was raised for 15 years in a Miami suburb, takes his orders directly from Bin Laden.
"He's making operational decisions is the best way to put it," Brian LeBlanc, the FBI's lead investigator into Shukrijumah, told the Associated Press.
"He's looking at attacking the U.S. and other Western countries. Basically through attrition, he has become his old boss."

A Coup in Saudi Avoided or Iranian Disinformation?
Written by Claude Salhani - OilPrice.com
Did King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia narrowly avoid being overthrown by a close member of his own royal family? That seems to be a rumor circulating around some political and intelligence circles in Washington as well as in the Middle East. A Saudi official however denied the allegations saying it was most likely Iranian disinformation.
Indeed, there have been reports -- all unconfirmed -- that Prince Bandar bin Sultan bin Abdel Aziz, a nephew of the king and former Saudi ambassador to Washington had attempted a coup and has since been under house arrest. Other sources said Bandar was detained in a Saudi prison. A Saudi official however told this reporter that the whole story was part of an Iranian disinformation campaign.

Iran vows to support Lebanon against Israeli 'aggression'
by Dudi Cohen - YNetNews.com
Foreign Minister Mottaki says Israel reached dead end, 'Zionist regime' desperate in joint press conference with Lebanese counterpart
Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Sunday that the Islamic Republic will stand by Lebanon and Syria should Israel attack them.
"The Iranian government and nation are willing to support Lebanon and Syria against any possible Israeli aggression," Mottaki said in a joint press conference in Tehran with his Lebanese counterpart Ali Al Shami.

Iran launches four new home-made mini submarines
Reuters - France24.com
Iran launched four 120-tonne mini submarines with "excellent shallow-depth performance" on Sunday, according to local TV reports. Tehran said the subs would boost Iran's defence at a time it faces international pressure over its nuclear programme.
REUTERS - Iran showed off four new domestically made small submarines on Sunday that Tehran said would bolster its defence capability as it vows to confront any military threat from countries opposed to its nuclear programme

----- BP; not over yet, for the Gulf------

Matt Simmons, the oil-expert and BP critic, is DEADat age 67.

Matt Simmons Dead -- Oil Man Who Predicted the End of Oil
Jack Hidary - HuffingtonPost.com
Matt Simmons passed away today from a heart attack. Matt was the founder of Simmons and Company -- on of the leading energy investment banks in the world. Based in Houston, he was a well-respected member of the oil and gas community having brokered hundred of key transactions in the sector.
His book Twilight in the Desert detailed his research into the planet's actual remaining oil reserves concluding that we are soon to reach the peak of oil production. He encouraged policy makers to move away from oil dependence.

Energy expert Simmons dies in North Haven
By Tux - Kennebec Journal
Matthew Simmons, an international oil expert who most recently focused on developing renewable energy from the waters off Maine, died Sunday night of an apparent heart attack, his office is reporting. He was 67.
Simmons founded the Ocean Energy Institute in 2007, hosting a grand opening of its new office last month in Rockland. The goal of the think tank and venture capital fund was to attract investment in research to make Maine a global leader in offshore wind and other ocean energy sources.

Matt Simmons apparently drowned at his home Sunday night
Krister Rollins, Producer - WLBZ2.com
NORTH HAVEN, Maine (NEWS CENTER) - The Rockland area is mourning the loss of the man who had hoped to make the city the heart of a new energy industry. Matthew Simmons, a longtime summer resident of Rockport, died Sunday night at a summer house on North Haven island. He was 67 years old. According to the Medical Examiner's office, Simmons drowned. A statement earlier in the day from the Ocean Energy institute in Rockland, which Simmons created, said Simmons suffered a heart attack while using his hot tub. The Medical Examiner's office says Simmons was suffering from heart disease, which may have been a contributing factor in the drowning.

The Crime of the Century:
What BP and US Government Don't Want You to Know
by Alexander Higgins -
Environmental activist Jerry Cope has spent the last few weeks traveling along the Gulf Coast and experiencing firsthand the contamination in the air and water. In an article published on Huffington Post, Cope argues that instead of celebrating the allegedly vanishing oil, we should be concerned about the disappearance of marine life in the Gulf. He describes the Gulf as a "kill zone" and looks into where the marine animals have gone, given that BP has reported a relatively low number of dead animals from the spill.

Environmental Activist Jerry Cope:
"What BP and U.S. Government Don't Want You to Know"

'Death Gyre' in the Gulf
Karl Burkhart - MotherNatureNetwork
Firsthand accounts and leaked photos of a secret BP processing facility -- possibly for dead animals -- point to a massive cover-up in the Gulf. An exclusive report. [see video]
June 10th was a strange day. In a surprising move, the Coast Guard instituted a dramatic expansion of the "no-fly" zone over the Gulf, preventing major media outlets like the New York Times and even scientists with top government clearance from accessing the area. This caused a wave of journalistic uproar and bewilderment on the part of researchers like Edward E. Clark of the Wildlife Center (above) who had been invited to study the impacts just prior to the media blackout.

oil spill Matt Simmons is right!! part 1

oil spill Matt Simmons is right!! part 2

oil spill Matt Simmons is right!! part 3

oil spill Matt Simmons is right!! part 4

Did BP cap the well that was NOT leaking, while we weren't looking?

A Tale of Two Wells (Dedicated to Matt Simmons R.I.P.)

Land Surveyor proves Simmons right. TV well sham.
Deborah Dupre' - Examiner.com
Ammunition fired from the petrochemical-military industrial complex (PMIC) Disinformation non-lethal weapon aimed at the American public and the world has been blocked at least momentarily by one man, a former land surveyor demonstrating Matt Simmons has been correct about the TV Gulf reporting sham and two wells. The surveyor presents the most damning evidence that the operation has been planned and orchestrated with expertise, as AC Griffith publicly stated this week.
The well that the reader sees on TV reports about the oil capping and other scenes are illusions. What the reader hears most talking heads say about the catastrophe is pacification and distraction. The surveyor calls it a "dog and pony show."

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Monday 08.09.2010

wars, . . . and rumors of wars

North Korea Fires Artillery Near Disputed Waters
By CHOE SANG-HUN - NYTimes.com
SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea fired 110 artillery rounds at waters near a disputed western sea border with the South on Monday, escalating tensions already raised to a high pitch by aggressive South Korean naval exercises and the North's seizure of a squidding boat.
About 10 shells landed near Byeongryeong, a South Korean border island, followed by an additional 100 rounds falling near another border island, Yeonpyeong, said a spokesman of the Office of Joint Chiefs of Staff in Seoul, who insisted on anonymity until there was a formal government announcement.

Four armies on alert, Khamenei takes charge of Lebanese crisis
DEBKA.com
Tehranthrew all its weight behind Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah ahead of his contentious speech Monday, Aug. 9, by declaring that "Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan are Iran's security belt," and sending its National Security Council Director Saeed Jalili, who is also lead nuclear negotiator, to Beirut Sunday to strengthen his hand. This is reported by DEBKAfile's Iranian sources.
Upon arrival, the NSC head went into conference with Nasrallah and the spiritual leader's special aide Ali Akbar Velayati, who arrived in Beirut last Thursday, Aug. 5 after the Lebanese-Israeli border clash, and is still there.

Castro returns with apocalyptic warnings
By Marc Frank in Havana - FT.com
. . . . The most recent UN sanctions on Iran would trigger a nuclear holocaust if the US inspected the country's ships come September, as called for in the June resolution. Only world pressure on US President Barack Obama could avert the conflagration that would bring all leading economies to a stand still, he warned.
The leader of CubaÕs revolution, who retains his parliamentary seat and the post of first secretary of the Communist party, emerged in July from four years of seclusion, preaching his apocalyptic views to small gatherings of Cuban economists, diplomats, war veterans, intellectuals and artists, his recorded activities repeatedly broadcast by state-run media.

Chicago Bank Fails, 2010 Tally Hits 109
Philip van Doorn - TheStreet.com
CHICAGO (TheStreet) -- After four consecutive weeks of multiple bank failures, regulators closed just one institution Friday, bringing the total number of U.S. bank failures in 2010 to 109.
The Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation took over Ravenswood Bank of Chicago and appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. receiver. Ravenswood Bank had two offices and $265 million in total assets.

Undercapitalized Banks - 2010 Bank Watch List

Unofficial Problem Bank list increases to 811 institutions
by CalculatedRisk
Note: this is an unofficial list of Problem Banks compiled only from public sources. . .
This graph shows the number of banks on the unofficial list. The number of institutions has more than doubled since we started the list in early August 2009 - even with all the bank failures (failures are removed from the list). The number of assets is up 50 percent over the last year.
On August 7, 2009, we listed 389 institutions with $276 billion in assets, and now the list has 811 institutions and $416.5 billion in assets.

Banking in the Coming Decade
Larry LaBorde - SilverBearCafe.com
Banking in the United States is undergoing a change. Out of over 8,000 banks in this country the top 4 (Morgan-Chase, Citi, Bank of America and Wells Fargo) control 55% of all banking assets. The top 100 banks control over 75%. The FDIC's watch list of troubled banks is now over 700 and growing every quarter. If the big four had to mark all their assets to market it is doubtful they would survive as viable banks. The government has deemed them too big to fail. They are insolvent but can not be shut down. They are the walking dead or zombie banks. suppose it is hoped that they can plod along until the economy recovers and the non-performing assets begin to perform again. Or maybe the plan is for their more profitable divisions such as the credit card sector to make enough profit over the coming years to cover the losses as they slowly allow the dead bodies to float to the surface. Of course feeding them a steady diet of failed banks (after removing all the bad loans) helps as well.

Commodity spike queers the pitch for Bernanke's QE2
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
Don't be fooled: a food and oil price spike is not and cannot be inflationary in those advanced industrial economies where the credit system remains broken, the broad money supply is contracting, and fiscal policy is tightening by design or default.
It is deflationary, acting as a transfer tax to petro-powers and the agro-bloc. It saps demand from the rest of the economy. If recovery is already losing steam in the US, Japan, Italy, and France as the OECD's leading indicators suggest - or stalling altogether as some fear - the Eurasian wheat crisis will merely give them an extra shove over the edge.
Agflation may indeed be a headache for China and India, where economies have over-heated and food is a big part of the inflation index. But the West is another story.

Markets Look to the Fed
By: Patti Domm - CNBC Executive Editor
A weak jobs picture is raising expectations that the Fed may take new measures to cure the economy's ills.
The Fed's one-day meeting Tuesday trumps everything else for markets in the week ahead, as the earnings season winds down. Retail sales, trade and inflation data are also on the calendar, but the Fed's perception of the economy and any hint it may reconsider quantitative easing have the markets on edge, particularly after Friday's disappointing July jobs report.

THE MOTHER OF ALL BUBBLES
Jim Quinn - TheBurningPlatform.com
In the latest issue of The Casey Report Bud Conrad does a fantastic job analyzing the truth about Asia. Japan is a ticking demographic time bomb. The Chinese government has created the mother of all bubbles and when it pops, it will be felt around the world. The China miracle is not really a miracle. It is a debt financed bubble. Sound familiar?
I picked out 4 charts from Bud's article that paint the picture as clearly as possible. The chart below shows that compared to the real estate bubble in Japan during the late 1980s and the current bubble in China, the US housing bubble looks like a tiny speed bump. The US has 20% to 30% more downside to go. For those looking for a housing recovery, I'd like to point out that Japan's housing market has fallen for 20 years with no recovery. I wonder if the National Association of Realtors will be running an advertisement campaign in 2025 telling us it is the best time to buy.

Marc Faber on CNBC 8/3/10:
Fed's Printing Press to Create Final Crisis

Is the U.S. Economy Toast?
By: Brian Bloom - MarketOracle.co.uk
Marc Faber thinks the US economy is toast. Richard Russell's interpretation of the technical behaviour of the US market is that we might just be entering a new Primary Bull phase. (Although he remains wary because of the generous P/E ratios that still prevail).

Financial Markets Instability
Personal and Corporate Bankruptcies Soar
By: Bob Chapman - MarketOracle.co.uk
It was only a month ago that the Dow closed at 9686. From there it started to move back up again as insiders learned of the Fed's plan to inject $5 trillion into the economy over the next two years. The result has been a run up to 10,674. We figured out what the Fed was up to, but most everyone else did not.
During that period, almost unnoticed, was the fall in the value of the dollar. On the USDX it has fallen from 86.12 to 80.58.

Fed set to downgrade outlook for US
By James Politi in Washington - FT.com
The Federal Reserve is set to downgrade its assessment of US economic prospects when it meets on Tuesday to discuss ways to reboot the flagging recovery.
Faced with weak economic data and rising fears of a double-dip recession, the Federal Open Market Committee is likely to ensure its policy is not constraining growth and to use its statement to signal greater concern about the economy. It is, however, unlikely to agree big new steps to boost growth.

Why Today's Deflation Won't Kill Gold
Abigail Doolittle - SeekingAlpha.com
With all of the attention given to deflation recently, I thought it would be interesting to think about how this scenario might affect gold. After all, gold is thought to be the ultimate investment in a time of inflation. Does this mean that deflation could destroy the value of gold?
More interesting than the question, in my view, is the road to the potential answer because there simply isn't a clear one. However, based on everything I've read and researched, the outcome is closer to no: today's deflation will not topple gold.

The Golden Decade
Peter D Schiff - SilverBearCafe.com
As gold hovers near $1,200 an ounce and pundits speculate about a 'gold bubble', it's important for investors to remember that a mere decade ago the picture was very different. In the year 2000, gold sat at an unimpressive annual average of $279 an ounce - a two-decade low. At that time, most analysts thought gold was finished as a monetary metal. They said its price would never recover and only kooks with tin hats would invest in it. I was one of the very few financial commentators publicly saying that gold was not only viable, but entering a long-term uptrend.

The Days Of Silver Manipulation By The Bullion Banks
Are Coming To An End
David Levenstein - SilverBearCafe.com
During July, silver prices were severely tested for support. And, even though the long-term 200 day moving average as well as the key support level at $17.50/oz were both breached a few times, the price of silver managed to crawl back above this level and close the month at above $18/oz level. On numerous occasions I have mentioned that even though I am extremely bullish on silver, prices can be very volatile as the silver market is prone to manipulation by the US bullion banks (large commercials).

On the Edge with Max Keiser and Danny Schechter (1/2)

On the Edge with Max Keiser and Danny Schechter (2/2)

The Death of the Dollar
By Vasko Kohlmayer - AmericanThinker.com
Nothing can save our financial system in the long run. It is doomed to collapse. This is inevitable, because our government controls and manages its very foundation -- the dollar.
The federal government began its takeover of the dollar in 1913 when it established the Federal Reserve Banking System. Prior to that, the dollar was a real store of value. In the period from 1783 to 1913, there was a long period of currency stability with virtually no inflation. If you saved one dollar in 1800, your great-grandchild could buy roughly the same amount of goods with the same dollar one century later.

The New Push for a Global Currency
by Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr. - Mises Daily
You surely didn't think that the governing elites would let this economic crisis pass without pushing some cockamamie scheme for control. Well, here is the cloud no bigger than a man's hand, a revival of a 60-year-old idea of a global paper currency to fix what ails us.
The IMF study that calls for this is by Reza Moghadam of the Strategy, Policy, and Review Department, "in collaboration with the Finance, Legal, Monetary and Capital Markets, Research and Statistics Departments, and consultation with the Area Departments." In other words, this paper shouldn't be ignored.

If the U.S. Dollar were to fall how important is gold to the States?
By: Julian D. W. Phillips - GoldSeek.com
Since the demise of the Gold Standard, monetary authorities have tried as many ways as possible out there to sideline gold as part of the monetary system. Since the early eighties they have succeeded to some extent, but this was by discrediting it and by emphasizing the benefits of paper currencies. Paper money in a paper system was working very well and everybody felt that much more prosperous, so ignored gold's departure. Since then the developed world has had a full twenty-five year long growth period. Then began the real rise of the east! Then, in mid-2007, a 'credit crunch' knocked the stuffing out of the solidness of that system. Seven years before that crunch, when boom times were enriching the developed world the most, the gold price started to rise, when it was realized that central banks were not keen to sell all their gold at all. Only small amounts were sold and the bulk retained in the vaults of central banks. So why is it still in the system?

Afraid of Deflation? Try Some Medicine
By PAUL J. LIM - NYTimes.com
AS chatter has grown about the possibility of a double-dip recession, so, too, have fears about another "D" word: deflation.
Late last month, Jeremy Grantham, the chief investment strategist at GMO, an investment firm based in Boston, issued a warning about deflation after worrying for months that inflationary pressures were brewing. Mr. Grantham told GMO clients recently that as the recovery has slowed, "downward pressure on prices from weak wages and weak demand seems to me now to be much the larger factor."

The Inflation and Deflation Debate Deconstructed
JESSE'S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
'What most people call reason is really rationalization. Given a new set of data, most people will search through it only for those examples that support their existing beliefs. Their beliefs are really opinions, a tenuous collection of myths, anecdotes, slogans, and prejudices based largely on justifying personal fear and greed. This is what makes modern propaganda so powerful; people do not bother to think critically and objectively and act for the greatest good. And in their ignorance they can find the will to do increasingly monstrous things, and rationalize them.' Jesse

Fed may resist market pressure for bond buys
Will seek to jawbone market that it is alert to downside risks
By Greg Robb, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Confronted with a U.S. economy that appears to be decelerating, the Federal Reserve may ratchet up cautionary language but many expect the central bank will refrain from buying more bonds to bolster growth.
"I am sure they are going to do nothing," said Bill Cheney, chief economist at John Hancock in Boston.
"The whole question" will surround the language of the statement, he said, where the central bank will want to stress it is "on the job and aware of downside potential," Cheney said.

Secret Creditors On Track
to Own 10 Percent of U.S. Government Debt
Tim Cavanaugh - Reason.com
Mark McHugh at Across the Street asks a question that has been the topic of some hushed speculation around here: Who is actually buying all the government's new debt? McHugh makes a game effort to dope out the identities of the "other investors" from Treasury Department's Treasury's 2010 Q1 Bulletin ("incomplete, as I'm sure most of Secretary Tim Geithner's homework assignments were") and the Federal Reserve's Flow of Funds report ("an exercise in convolution"). But he ends up making a plea for some distributed intelligence in tracking down what should be readily available data:
By the end of 2010, Other Investors will own more than 10% of the US public debt (1.5 Trillion or so). They bought more than 45% of the new debt in Q1. At what point does this kind of opacity become unacceptable? Why can't the Treasury fill out its own bulletin with information already available? Why do we have to wait five months for information that is so vague, you can't even call it information with a straight face?

NTEB: Obamageddon Is Coming

We Have Met the Enemy and He is Us
Ted Nugent - SilverBearCafe.com
Barack Hussein Obama did not sneak into power. An army of clueless, disconnected, ignorant Americans invited him to bring his Marxist, glaringly anti-American jihad into our lives. This president's overtly destructive, clear-and-present-danger agenda is surpassed in transparency only by his ultra-leftist public voting record and overall lifetime conduct of consorting with the enemy as a child and student of Marxism, socialist and racist community organizer, congregant of the blatant America-hating black-theology- and social-justice-spewing Rev. Jeremiah Wright and close personal friend of convicted communist terrorists like Bill Ayers, and by his unflinching appointment of an array of communist czars, including Van Jones, Cass Sunstein, Anita Dunne, et al. So let me get this straight: You claim your intentions were noble because you simply wanted to get your child a puppy but somehow didn't notice that it was foaming at the mouth, and now you're shocked that your child has rabies? I think not. That is not a mistake. It is negligence -- dangerous, life threatening and, I am convinced, downright criminal negligence.

SOMETHING IS HAPPENING
Jim Quinn - TheBurningPlatform.com
I observed what I considered a hopeful sign this morning at Wal-Mart. No matter what you think of Wal-Mart, they are the best run retailer in the world. They are a gorilla. They know what sells and they react immediately to demand. I was walking down their book aisle. They carry books that sell. I was shocked to see a an entire section prominently displaying these books:

• Orwell's 1984
• Orwell's Animal Farm
• Fahrenheit 451
• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Catcher in the Rye
• Huxley's Brave New World

There weren't just a few books, there were rows of these novels. There were clearly many that had been bought, as there were substantial gaps in the rows. Wal-Mart is not the retailer to the rich. This means that average middle class Americans are reading books that will awaken them to the reality of America today. This is happening below the surface.

Newsweek columnist says US funding mosque construction
Lee DeCovnick - AmericanThinker.com
Truth, even in the tightly controlled prison of the Obama media complex, occasionally bursts forth like a swordfish cavorting on the waves of a golden August afternoon.
Newsweek, the Washington Post's former progressive stepchild, published an op-ed by Fareed Zakaria, the in-house lapdog for the Administration, extolling the virtues of building the Ground Zero Mosque. A couple of sentences demand a great deal more explanation.

To that end, early in its tenure the Bush administration began a serious effort to seek out and support moderate Islam. Since then, Washington has funded mosques, schools, institutes, and community centers that are trying to modernize Islam around the world.
We should be encouraging groups like the one behind this project, not demonizing them. Were this mosque being built in a foreign city, chances are that the U.S. government would be funding.

Ailing public sector leads in layoffs
By Patrice Hill - The Washington Times
Congress heeds pleas for states
State and local governments this summer gained the dubious distinction of being the nation's biggest source of job losses - a trend that likely helped to break a stalemate in Congress last week over providing states with additional aid.
Facing budget shortfalls estimated at more than $60 billion for the fiscal year that started July 1, state and local governments laid off a whopping 48,000 of their staff in education and other areas last month - by far the biggest layoff of permanent workers among any of the major sectors that employ Americans, according to a Labor Department report released Friday.

U.S. lost 131,000 jobs in July
By Christopher S. Rugaber - AP WashingtonTimes.com
WASHINGTON (AP) - Private employers hired workers at a weak pace for the third straight month, making it likely that economic growth will slow further in the coming months. The jobless rate was unchanged at 9.5 percent.
Companies added a net total of 71,000 jobs in July, far below the roughly 200,000 needed each month to reduce the unemployment rate.
Overall, the economy lost a net total of 131,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department said Friday, mostly because 143,000 temporary census jobs ended.

Unemployment Report: Spin, Baby, Spin
James Quinn - SeekingAlpha.com
Rather than listen to or read the MSM version of the unemployment report, I prefer to go right to the source. This is the link (.pdf : http://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea3.pdf) to the data. Here are my observations:

• The employable population of the country went up by 200,000 over last month, but for some strange reason the labor force declined by 181,000. The civilian labor force as a percentage of the population has now declined to 64.6%. This is the lowest in decades.
• The number of employed persons declined by 159,000 over last month and has fallen 3 months in a row. I thought Obama said we were adding jobs.
• The number of employed people is 138,960,000. The number of employed people in January 2009 when the Savior took office was 139,877,000. If I'm correct, there are 917,000 less employed people after spending $800 billion. ...

***** Important! *****

Michael Coffman, PhD:
Rescuing A Broken America - Alex Jones Tv 1/3

Michael Coffman, PhD:
Rescuing A Broken America - Alex Jones Tv 2/3

Michael Coffman, PhD:
Rescuing A Broken America - Alex Jones Tv 3/3

Even the liberal Seattle Times questioning Obama's 'lavish' vacations
Rick Moran - AmericanThinker.com
I did a double take when I saw this on Memeorandum this morning. The Seattle Times criticizing President Obama and the First Lady for their expensive tastes in vacations?
Critics portrayed the foreign getaway as tone deaf to the economic anxiety back home. Earlier in the week, the first lady was photographed walking through the streets of the Costa del Sol region wearing a one-shouldered Jean Paul Gaultier top.
Every first family takes vacations. The criticism aimed at Michelle Obama is that she chose to visit a foreign country rather than remain in the United States and support its fragile economy.
Well, not quite. The criticism is that she is spending scads of taxpayer dollars just so that she can vacation in the lap of luxury. Why one of the most expensive resort cities in the world? The answer is simple; the Obama's like the idea of living high off the hog on someone else's dime.

Lavish Obama vacation in time of economic turmoil raises eyebrows
First lady Michelle Obama is on a five-day trip to a luxury resort along with a handful of friends, her younger daughter, Sasha, aides and Secret Service personnel.
By Peter Nicholas and Katherine Skiba - Tribune Washington bureau
WASHINGTON - As the U.S. economy endures high unemployment and a jittery stock market, President Obama has preached sacrifice and fiscal discipline. But the pictures coming out of a sunsplashed Spanish resort this week may be sending a different message.
First lady Michelle Obama is on a five-day trip to a luxury resort along with a handful of friends, her younger daughter, Sasha, aides and Secret Service personnel. Her office said the first family will pay for personal expenses, but declined to reveal the taxpayer cost for the government employees. The president stayed home in the United States, as did daughter Malia, 12, who is at camp.

Michelle Obama lunches with Spain's royal family as backlash
over her extravagant holiday continues back home
By MAIL FOREIGN SERVICE
U.S. First Lady Michelle Obama and her younger daughter lunched with Spain's King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia today at the royal summer residence on the Balearic island of Majorca.
Mrs Obama, nine-year-old Sasha and their entourage flew into the Majorcan capital of Palma from the glitzy Mediterranean resort of Marbella, where they have been staying since Wednesday at a deluxe hotel.
The lunch is Mrs Obama's last engagement in Spain before flying home to Washington DC, where she has come under fire for her lavish break on the Costa del Sol with 40 friends, which has been estimated at costing U.S. taxpayers £50,000 a day.

Look at Macy's:
U.S. tax code encourages companies to rack up huge debt
By David Cho - Washington Post Staff Writer
Macy's has become the great American department store, with 850 locations scattered across all but four states. And it has gotten there the great American way, by running up huge debts and flirting with default, or worse.
Like other U.S. corporations, it also has had a uniquely American incentive for its borrowing habits: the nation's tax laws.
These rules offer extensive tax breaks to companies that borrow money and penalize those that raise cash in safer ways, such as issuing stock. Yet despite the recent financial crash, which exposed the perils of excessive borrowing, the rules are likely to persist in federal law because nearly all businesses in America would oppose eliminating these tax deductions, lawmakers say.

Foreclosures keep climbing; June sets record
By CINDY KIBBE - New Hampshire Business Review
CONCORD - As the recession drags on, foreclosures in New Hampshire have continued to climb, reaching record levels.
According to the New Hampshire Housing Finance Authority, 377 foreclosed deeds were recorded in June - a 45 percent increase over June 2009.
It was a record for the month of June and the second highest since 2005.
Foreclosure auction notices were also up in June, with 867 notices posted, an increase of 12 percent from 774 in May.
June 2010's numbers were only 1 percent higher than those of June 2009.

Real Estate: The Worrying Numbers Behind Underwater Homeowners
By CHARLES HUGH SMITH - DailyFinance.com
By the end of the first quarter of 2010, the number of mortgaged residential properties with negative equity had declined slightly to 11.2 million, down from 11.3 million at the end of 2009, according to a report issued by real estate analytics firm CoreLogic.
The bad news: Those 11.2 million loans make up roughly 24% of all U.S. mortgages. Add the 2.3 million borrowers who are close to slipping underwater (those with less than 5% equity), and the numbers rise to 13.5 million -- 28% of mortgages.

Long-Term Joblessness Takes Emotional, Spiritual Toll on '99ers'

Goldman Sachs: Unemployment is Going Back to 10%
After this morning's lackluster jobs numbers, Goldman Sachs' economics crew cut its forecasts for 2011 U.S. GDP and took a bit of a victory lap for their slow growth call. In a note out about 11:40 a.m., Goldman writes:

Over the past two to three months, the U.S. economic recovery has lost a considerable amount of its momentum. As a result, our forecast of a significant slowing in US growth in the second half of 2010 - widely regarded as implausible just three months ago - is now increasingly accepted as the baseline.

Goldman continues to expected real GDP growth to arrive at an average annual rate of 1.5% in the second half of 2010. However, Goldman econowonks cut their views on how fast U.S. output would gain speed in 2011 "largely due to heightened congressional resistance to extending various measures of fiscal stimulus."

The Jobs Number
by Peter Schiff - LewRockwell.com
Today's disappointing payroll report reveals that the U.S. economy has failed to respond to the massive fiscal and monetary stimuli that have flooded the nation over the past two years. Not only is the news bad for job seekers and political incumbents, but it's also a strong signal for traders to flee the U.S. dollar.
The malaise in the U.S., where stimulus is still the word of the day, stands in contrast to active recoveries in Europe and Asia, where governments are actively removing stimulus. As a result, we are now headed for the eighth consecutive weekly decline in the Dollar Index.

U.S. Job Market Loses Steam
Private Sector Expands Slightly, but Governments Cut Jobs; Treasury Yields Dip
WSJ.com - The government's latest snapshot of the job market was bleak, a sign the economic recovery is running out of steam with 14.6 million Americans still searching for work.
Job growth proved anemic in July as governments cut jobs and private-sector employers barely expanded.
The economy shed 131,000 jobs, as 143,000 temporary Census workers fell off federal payrolls. Private-sector employment grew by 71,000 in July after a downwardly revised 31,000 in June. Government employment, not counting Census workers, fell by 59,000.
The unemployment rate held steady at 9.5% largely because people gave up hope of finding work and left the labor force.

FCC ends talks for deal on net neutrality
By Cecilia Kang - Washington Post Staff Writer
The Federal Communications Commission on Thursday called off its closed-door meetings with big Internet companies aimed at reaching agreement on protecting consumer access to the Web, after drawing criticism for attempting to broker a deal with limited public input.
The breakdown of the talks followed news of a separate agreement between Verizon and Google that would let Verizon give priority to certain Web content on its fixed-line networks. The deal between the two companies -- which are partners in the Android wireless phone platform -- does not apply to Verizon's mobile networks.

Invisible Empire A New World Order Defined

Police State 4: The Rise of FEMA Full Length

The Maxine Waters Investigation:
What is Iran Doing in this Picture?
Katherine Smith - The MarketOracle.co.uk
The timing of an investigation by the House Ethics Committee, which on August 2, 2010 formally brought a case against Congresswoman Maxine Waters, one of America's most enduring liberal and fierce Anti War politicians, and the WikiLeaks of tens of thousands of Army documents related to the war in Afghanistan may be connected.
Speculation by bloggers, including John Young of Cryptome.com, and an expose at The Intel Hub that the WikiLeaks is part of a disinformation operation, and that the documents themselves could even be fake, should put every left leaning American on Yellow alert.

The Key Lesson of the BP Oil Spill? Don't Panic
by Rob Lyons - LewRockwell.com
Over the past few days, it has become increasingly clear that the worst of the BP Gulf oil spill is now over. The accident on the Deepwater Horizon in April was a very serious one, causing the deaths of 11 workers and costing billions of dollars to clean up, work which will continue for some time to come. But as spiked predicted, the accident and its aftermath has simply not lived up to its billing by President Barack Obama as 'the worst environmental disaster America has ever faced'

U.S., Saudis in F-15 Talks
Fighter Jets in Proposed $30 Billion Sale Won't Include Features Israel Opposes By ADAM ENTOUS
WASHINGTON - The Obama administration plans to sell advanced F-15 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia but won't equip them with long-range weapons systems and other arms whose inclusion was strongly opposed by Israel, diplomats and officials said.
The proposed $30 billion, 10-year arms package, which would be one of the biggest single deals of its kind, has been a source of behind-the-scenes tension during months of negotiations. Israeli officials have repeatedly conveyed their concerns in private that the U.S. risks undermining its military advantage by equipping regional rivals with top-flight technologies.

South Korea: North Korea seized fishing boat
(CNN) -- A South Korean fishing boat in the Sea of Japan and its seven crew members are being held by North Korea, according to reports in South Korea.
North Korean state media is reporting that the crew was "detained."
There are few details which have emerged from the incident; but it comes amid mounting tensions following the March sinking of a South Korean warship. Forty-six sailors died, and South Korea blamed it on a North Korean submarine attack. The North calls the accusation "a fabrication."

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Archived Page Link
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Friday 08.06.2010

America Is at Risk of Boiling Over
Peggy Noonan - WSJ.com $$
And out-of-touch leaders don't see the need to cool things off.
It is, obviously, self-referential to quote yourself, but I do it to make a point. I wrote the following on New Year's day, 1994. America 16 years ago was a relatively content nation, though full of political sparks: 10 months later the Republicans would take the House for the first time in 40 years. But beneath all the action was, I thought, a coming unease. Something inside was telling us we were living through "not the placid dawn of a peaceful age but the illusory calm before stern storms."
[non-subscribers' tip: copy & paste full title into Google search, to access full article]

JIM QUINN WRESTLED TO THE GROUND BY SECRET SERVICE
by James Quinn - TheBurningPlatform.com
Well I did it. Is anyone looking to hire a 47 year old overweight balding bombthrower who runs an anarchist website? About two hundred people attended Neal Wolin's speech today, including the Dean, Deputy Dean, Vice Deans, my boss, the CEO of the University and various other honored attendees. He took about 10 questions after the speech. Mine was the 7th question. Here it is verbatim:
"Mr. Wolin, thanks for taking my question. The American taxpayers own Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They have lost $145 billion of taxpayer funds so far, with losses expected to reach $400 billion. The Federal Reserve has purchased $1.2 trillion of mortgages, guaranteed by the US Treasury. Isn't this a backdoor bailout of the Wall Street banks by the American taxpayers?"

[note: Neal Wolin is the US Deputy Treasury Secretary. James Quinn is a senior director of strategic planning for a major university. James has held financial positions with a retailer, homebuilder and university in his 22-year career. Those positions included treasurer, controller, and head of strategic planning. He is married with three boys and is writing these articles because he cares about their future. He earned a BS in accounting from Drexel University and an MBA from Villanova University. He is a certified public accountant and a certified cash manager.]

Instant replay, in case you missed it
(possibly adding to why Secret Service was so upset):

The Ruling Elite Called [satire!]
Jim Quinn - SilverBearCafe.com
I just got off the horn with the Ruling Elite. We had an emergency conference call and to tell you the truth, they ain't happy. You little people are not responding the way you are supposed to. A significant portion of you are not getting more optimistic because they tell you to. Instead of just reading the headline on Bloomberg that durable goods orders skyrocketed in June, you actually read the details that said durable goods orders plunged. It is getting difficult for the ruling elite to keep the masses sedated and dumbed down. These damn bloggers, with their facts and critical thinking, are throwing a wrench into the gears. Obama and his crack team are working round the clock to lock down the internet, but it will take time. Not that they are totally dissatisfied. They've been able to renovate their penthouses and purchase new mansions in the Hamptons with the billions in bonuses you supplied through TARP. The $1.2 trillion supplied by your children and grandchildren to buy up toxic mortgages off their balance sheets was a godsend. They will never call you suckers, to your face.

JOHN PAULSON WILL BE WRONG THIS TIME [about housing prices]
by James Quinn - TheBurningPlatform.com
We have arrived at critical juncture in the ongoing financial crisis. Have the government actions of the last year successfully spurred the animal spirits of Americans, resulting in a self-sustaining recovery?
The Obama administration and most of the mainstream media would answer yes. GDP has been positive for the last four quarters. Consumer spending has increased in five consecutive months. Corporate profits have been relatively strong. The country has stopped losing jobs. The missing piece has been a housing recovery.
No need to worry. Famous or infamous (depending on your point of view) $15 billion man John Paulson has assured the world that house prices will rise 8% to 10% in 2011. His basis for this forecast is that California prices have rebounded 8% to 10% in the last year, and this recovery will spread to the rest of the nation.

THE BIGGER THE LIE
James Quinn - TheBurningPlatform.com
I'm really starting to gain respect for Marketwatch.com. They already allow Paul Farrell to write the truth on a weekly basis. Now they have unleashed Bret Arends. He destoys the lies being spouted by CNBC and the rest of the MSM that corporations have gobs of cash and are in awesome financial condition. It is an outright lie. Non-financial companies are buried under trillions of debt. The most debt in history. If interest rates were to normalize, corporate America would crumble before our very eyes. These figures don't include the banks. The mega criminal banks are Zombies on Federal Reserve Life support. Their true indebtedness, which is being fraudulently covered up, is beyond calculation as derivatives intertwine and stangle them.
It is essential for the ruling elite to keep the masses convinced that their lies are really the truth. Joey Goebbels would be proud of their efforts thus far. But we all know what happened to Joey and his fun loving bunch of Nazis.

The biggest lie about U.S. companies
Healthy balance sheets? They owe $7.2 trillion, the most ever
By Brett Arends
BOSTON -- You may have heard recently that U.S. companies have emerged from the financial crisis in robust health, that they've paid down their debts, rebuilt their balance sheets and are sitting on growing piles of cash they are ready to invest in the economy.
You could hear this great news pretty much anywhere -- maybe from Bloomberg, which this spring hailed the "surprising strength" of corporate balance sheets. Or perhaps in the Washington Post, where Fareed Zakaria reported that top companies "have accumulated an astonishing $1.8 trillion of cash," leaving them in the best shape, by some measures, "in almost half a century."

The Alien in the White House
By DOROTHY RABINOWITZ - WSJ.com
The distance between the president and the people is beginning to be revealed.
The deepening notes of disenchantment with Barack Obama now issuing from commentators across the political spectrum were predictable. So, too, were the charges from some of the president's earliest enthusiasts about his failure to reflect a powerful sense of urgency about the oil spill.
There should have been nothing puzzling about his response to anyone who has paid even modest critical attention to Mr. Obama's pronouncements. For it was clear from the first that this president - single-minded, ever-visible, confident in his program for a reformed America saved from darkness by his arrival - was wanting in certain qualities citizens have until now taken for granted in their presidents. Namely, a tone and presence that said: This is the Americans' leader, a man of them, for them, the nation's voice and champion. Mr. Obama wasn't lacking in concern about the oil spill. What he lacked was that voice - and for good reason.

Economic Deflation: The Blood on Bernanke's Hands
By Bill Bonner - DailyReckoning.com.au
We left off yesterday wondering what stock market investors were thinking. They bought stocks heavily on Monday. Then, yesterday, they sold them a bit - the Dow fell 38 points.
Yesterday was largely uneventful. Gold rose a dollar. Oil climbed to $82.
Maybe stock market investors are not really expecting to get rich. Maybe they're trying to avoid getting poor. They may figure that the real risk is being in cash...not in stocks.
If so...they may have a point.
Here's the low-down...

Fed will print and print and print until the final crisis
BusinessIntelligence Middle East
INTERNATIONAL. Marc Faber the Swiss fund manager and Gloom Boom & Doom editor said the US Federal Reserve will create a "final crisis" by continuing to print money because it is underestimating the strength of the economy which shows no signs of strengthening but signs of weakening everywhere in the world.
Speaking to CNBC Worldwide Exchange Tuesday in a live interview from Zurich, Faber said: " They will print and print and print until the final crisis wipes out the entire system."
Investors should have listened to me already six months ago when I wrote that the Fed will continue to monetize. They will never let up", Faber said.

It's Official: Social Security System Now in the Red
By DAVID SCHEPP - DailyFinance.com
It was only a matter of time, but it's finally happened: The nation's Social Security system will pay out more than it takes in this year and next, as aging baby boomers begin entering retirement. The milestone marks the first time in nearly 30 years that the system is in the red, according to a report issued Thursday by federal officials overseeing the program.
The shortfall has been exacerbated by the recession and high employment, which have reduced payroll tax revenues. Long term, however, Social Security's finances stand to improve slightly, the trustees report said. A new tax on pricey health plans, part of recently passed health-care overhaul legislation that goes into effect in 2019, will result in more revenues.

Bullion - The ultimate refuge of a dark economy
By Chris Blasi - CommodityOnline.com
The success of the multi-year machinations of the U.S. Government and the Federal Reserve's attempts to manage the fiscal crisis can best be summarized in a single word - and that word is ephemeral - yes, ephemeral! This beautifully succinct word, ephemeral, is defined as "lasting for only a short period of time and leaving no permanent trace." Yes, indeed, what better word is there to describe the Government's so-called rescue plan than ephemeral - here today and gone tomorrow - and without a trace of lasting benefit!
While I tend to be short on words and to the point trying to achieve both accuracy and brevity on this subject was difficult to achieve but what follows should provide a reasonably fair and complete assessment.

Gold stays up on bargain hunting
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online) : Gold prices edged up in Asian trade Thursday but holdings on the ETF fell marginally.
Gold for immediate delivery was seen trading at $1194.77 an ounce at 12.00 noon Singapore time while U.S. gold futures for December delivery was at $1,196.5 an ounce on the comex division of Nymex.

Gold Meltdown or Mania - Batten Down the Hatches
by Louis James, Senior Editor, Casey's International Speculator
As Doug Casey said recently, we expect things to come unglued soon. With the ongoing madness in Europe, it seems to me that things are starting to look visibly less well glued already.
In contemplating the possibility of another stock market meltdown, it seems important to me that in spite of the exuberance with which investors rushed back into the market over the last year, the memory of 2008 remains vivid, tempering enthusiasm with caution. For example, the market still has relatively little appetite for early-stage, grassroots exploration projects; by our latest estimates, Mr. Market is willing to pay on the order of ten times more for Proven & Probable ounces in the ground than for less certain resource categories. With this evidence of caution in mind, and the great unwinding of the broader credit markets well underway, it seems likely that our sector is less leveraged than it was before the crash of 2008.

Gold Alternative To Debt and Market Manipulation
by Bob Chapman - The InternationalForecaster.com
The Keynesians are on the edge of implementing more quantitative easing (QE) as we predicted they would.
No sooner had the ECB President Trichet proclaimed that "stimulate no more - it is now time to tighten," when the President of the St. Louis Fed informed us that to avoid the Japanese outcome we must extend the QE program through the purchase of treasury securities. It looks like Europe's Illuminists want to take a different tact than those in the US. After 15 months of reducing money and credit from plus 17% to minus 9.6%, the Fed now believes they have plenty of room to run those numbers back up to 17% again. One of the more interesting aspects of Mr. Bullard's commentary is that call to have the Fed buy more treasuries, when in fact he knows all about the Fed's buying of Treasuries and Agencies for the last 18 months clandestinely. People like Bullard must think we are dumb. In addition this is exactly what the Japanese did. They engaged in QE. The difference is they borrowed in yen domestically rather than on the world market. Most of Japan's debt is owed to Japanese citizens.

The New Push for a Global Currency
by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
You surely didn't think that the governing elites would let this economic crisis pass without pushing some cockamamie scheme for control. Well, here is the cloud no bigger than a man's hand, a revival of a 60-year-old idea of a global paper currency to fix what ails us.
The IMF study that calls for this is by Reza Moghadam of the Strategy, Policy, and Review Department, "in collaboration with the Finance, Legal, Monetary and Capital Markets, Research and Statistics Departments, and consultation with the Area Departments." In other words, this paper shouldn't be ignored.

Stiglitz Says U.S. Faces 'Anemic Recovery,' Needs More Stimulus
By Michael Heath and Rishaad Salamat
Aug. 6 (Bloomberg) -- Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz said the U.S. economy faces an "anemic recovery" and the government will need to enact another round of "better designed" stimulus measures.
The Obama administration took "a big gamble and it doesn't look like it's paying off," Stiglitz told Bloomberg TV in an interview in Sydney yesterday. "The recovery is so weak that it is not strong enough to generate new jobs for the new entrants in the labor force, let alone to find jobs for the 15 million Americans who would like a job and can't get one."

Private Enterprise Does It Better
Why freedom and responsibility triumph over regulation and central planning
John Stossel - Reason.com
In Myths, Lies and Downright Stupidity, I bet my readers $1,000 that they couldn't name one thing that government does better than the private sector.
I am yet to pay.
Free enterprise does everything better.
Why? Because if private companies don't do things efficiently, they lose money and die. Unlike government, they cannot compel payment through the power to tax.
Even when a private company operates a public facility under contract to government, it must perform. If it doesn't, it will be "fired"-its contract won't be renewed. Government is never fired.

An August Surprise from Obama?
James Pethokoukis - Rueters.com
Main Street may be about to get its own gigantic bailout. Rumors are running wild from Washington to Wall Street that the Obama administration is about to order government-controlled lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to forgive a portion of the mortgage debt of millions of Americans who owe more than what their homes are worth. An estimated 15 million U.S. mortgages - one in five - are underwater with negative equity of some $800 billion. Recall that on Christmas Eve 2009, the Treasury Department waived a $400 billion limit on financial assistance to Fannie and Freddie, pledging unlimited help. The actual vehicle for the bailout could be the Bush-era Home Affordable Refinance Program, or HARP, a sister program to Obama's loan modification effort. HARP was just extended through June 30, 2011.

An Argentinaville Stimulus?
WSJ.com - (free)
Wall Street comes to life with rumors of a back-door stimulus.
It's August, so one expects the vapors to fill with humid and overripe rumors. But the ride given yesterday to rumors that the Obama Administration is planning an "August Stimulus Surprise" was remarkable even by the sodden standards of this summer.
A wire service put out the story that Wall Street was abuzz that the Administration might lower Fannie Mae's and Freddie Mac's mortgage refinancing standards or trim mortgage balances for homeowners, thereby putting billions of dollars overnight into the pockets of benefiting consumers, thereby producing a "free stimulus," estimated by one Morgan Stanley analyst at $46 billion. And this stimulus "spending" would be achieved without a moment spent passing it through the Congressional appropriations process. A "slam dunk stimulus" is how the overheated Morgan Stanley commentator described it.

INSTALOANFORGIVENESS
from Tyler Durden at Zero Hedge.
"It will make you want to vomit. If Obama tries to pull this off before the election, there will be blood in the streets." - Jim Quinn
As if the main rumor of the prior week, that the government was going to automatically push rates on all mortgages down to market rates (which as of today hit a fresh record low of 4.49%) was not enough, today James Pethokoukis reports that the latest iteration in the "let's make Fannie and Freddie broker than ever" rumor mill is that the "Obama administration is about to order government-controlled lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to forgive a portion of the mortgage debt of millions of Americans who owe more than what their homes are worth." As readers will recall, we highlighted a few days ago that the number of underwater mortgages is at least 14.7 million (and likely far more), and amounts to just about $770 Billion in underwater equity. In other words, if the rumor is true, the US taxpayers are about to subsidze over three quarters of a trillion in underwater equity (and bail out banks on the hook for over $2 trillion in impaired debt). There is no indication if the "instarefi" plan contemplated by Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch has been scrapped, but what is certain is that the two plans target two very distinct beneficiary groups: the former plan would mostly benefit middle and upper class mortgage holders who are likely preoccupied to bother with a 200-300 bps refi differential.

Treasury: no homeowner bailout coming
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
A Treasury spokesman today put to rest rumors government mortgage financiers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were set to forgive mortgage debt for millions of American homeowners.
There had been speculation the pair would soon offer principal balance reductions to underwater borrowers, those who owe more on their mortgages than the current value of their homes, so they could refinance and take advantage of the record low mortgage rates.
But Treasury spokesman Andrew Williams told Reuters "the administration is not considering a change in policy in this area."

Voters to Obama: Your Priorities Stink!
A Democracy Corps poll run won't cheer up the Obama White House.
By JOHN FUND - WSJ.com (free)
The latest report from the liberal Democracy Corps poll run by former Bill Clinton advisers James Carville and Stan Greenberg won't do anything to cheer up the Obama White House or Democrats in Congress.
"Democrats are lagging further behind Republicans on which party can best deal with the economy," Messrs. Carville and Greenberg report in their new survey of 1,000 voters who cast ballots in 2008. Among these voters, the GOP now enjoys a 49% to 36% edge on which party can best handle the economy. A striking 54% of these voters also believe President Obama's policies have done nothing to reduce the impact of the recession. Only 39% think Mr. Obama's efforts averted an even worse crisis.

Senate approves Kagan for high court
By Bill Mears, CNN Supreme Court Producer
Washington (CNN) -- Solicitor General Elena Kagan was easily confirmed Thursday as the next associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, completing the 50-year-old native New Yorker's climb to the peak of the American legal profession.
The 63-37 vote was mostly along party lines. Five GOP senators backed Kagan, and only one Democrat -- Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska -- opposed her. Republican leaders offered spirited floor opposition to the nominee, but were unable to muster a prolonged delay or filibuster of the vote.

Fed dilemma on fresh monetary easing
By Aline van Duyn, Michael Mackenzie and Suzanne Kapner - FT.com
One way to increase the spending power of US consumers has, in the past, been to cut the rates of interest paid on mortgages.
With $10,000bn of mortgage debt outstanding, lowering these interest costs can make a dramatic difference to the amount of money US consumers have available to spend.
As economic indicators in the US on consumer spending and housing point to renewed gloom and raise fears of a "double dip", markets are expecting the Federal Reserve to step in again to ease credit - lowering rates at which companies and consumers borrow - to boost the economy.

Legacy of the 'Flash Crash': Enduring Worries of Repeat
BY TOM LAURICELLA AND SCOTT PATTERSON - WSJ.com $$
In the days leading up to the May 6 "flash crash," some stock-market veterans were picking up disturbing rumblings.
Philip Vasan, who heads the Credit Suisse prime-brokerage unit catering to hedge funds, began hearing from fund managers who were ratcheting back on trading because, they told him, stocks were behaving strangely. The funds were acting like "a dog that growls before an earthquake," Mr. Vasan told several clients.

Fannie Mae Seeks $1.5 Billion in Aid as Loss Narrows
By Lorraine Woellert
Aug. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Fannie Mae, the mortgage-finance company operating under federal conservatorship, is seeking $1.5 billion in aid from the U.S. Treasury Department after a 12th straight quarterly loss.
A decline in costs from bad loans helped narrow the second- quarter loss to $1.2 billion from $14.8 billion in the same period a year earlier, the Washington-based company said today in a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission. Fannie Mae has accrued more than $148 billion in consecutive losses since 2007, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

NY Fed Looks to Require Lenders to Take Back Bad Mortgages
by DIANA GOLOBAY -HousingWire.com
The New York Federal Reserve Bank may require mortgage lenders to repurchase loans from within portfolios of securitizations.
The assets are located in the Maiden Lane (ML) portfolios, created to buy troubled assets including residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) and collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) from Bear Stearns and American International Group (AIG) as part of the government's bailout of financial firms.

FHA annual mortgage insurance premium to rise
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
The Senate late last night unanimously approved legislation to grant the FHA authority to raise the annual mortgage insurance premium from 0.55 percent to 1.55 percent.
However, FHA officials only expect to raise the premium to 0.9 percent, while lowering the upfront mortgage insurance premium.
Earlier this year, the upfront mortgage insurance premium was increased from 1.75 percent to 2.25 percent.
The result would mean borrowers taking out a $170,000 loan at five percent would pay just $38 more each month.

General Motors to File for IPO 'As Soon As Possible'
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS - DailyFinance.com
Eager to get out from under government control, GM expects to sell its stock in one swoop when it offers shares to the public sometime later this year, its CEO said Thursday.
Some experts had expected General Motors to sell only a partial stake at first, followed by several smaller sales, but Ed Whitacre told reporters at an auto conference Thursday, "Our anticipation is we'd roll it out there all at once."

Do Medicare's Trustees Believe Their Own Report?
Peter Suderman - Reason.com
Check out early news stories on this morning's Medicare Trustees report and you'll find glowing headlines touting the claim that the new health care law will extend the flagging Medicare trust fund by 12 years. So is ObamaCare going to give Medicare live a longer, fiscally healthier life? Don't bet on it.
There are two problems with this claim. The first, as I noted earlier this week when Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius made a similar claim, is that it requires double counting. If the money is used to extend the program's trust fund, then it can't be used elsewhere.

Medicare gets lifeline from health care reform
By Tami Luhby, senior writer
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The newly passed health care law will boost the financial strength of the nation's massive Medicare program, the government said Thursday.
The controversial law extends the life of the Medicare Trust Fund by 12 years, to 2029, according to the annual report from the trustees who oversee Medicare. At that time, Medicare will only be able to cover 85% of beneficiaries' hospital costs.

Social Security: More going out than coming in
By Annalyn Censky, staff reporter
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- It's official: Social Security will reach its tipping point this year.For the first time in nearly 30 years, the system will pay out more benefits than it receives in payroll taxes both this year and next, the government officials who oversee Social Security said on Thursday.

Recession-battered states cuts funding for the disabled
By Marisol Bello, USA TODAY
Blane Beckwith wants to keep living at home with his mother and younger brother in Berkeley, Calif.
For that to happen, Beckwith, 54, who has spinal muscular atrophy and uses a wheelchair, relies on an aide paid by the state to get him in and out of bed, bathe him, feed him, dress him and do everything he can't do for himself.

Confusing "Employment" With "Productivity"
By Joel Bowman - The DailyReckoning.com
08/05/10 El Paso, Texas - The Dow rose 44 points yesterday. Gold gained 8 bucks. What to make of it?
One of the advantages of being on the road is that you don't get a whole lot of time to check the news. As the inimitably quotable Mark Twain famously observed, "If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you're misinformed."
By the time you receive this reckoning, for instance, the Federal Government will have released another in an endless stream of entirely meaningless figures. This particular one has to do with jobs. We use the word "meaningless"because trusting the government to present a stationary target is like asking a monkey to pen a Shakespearian sonnet. Not only is the task impossible, but it serves the monkey no purpose anyway. If a 4 can be revised to a 5, or a 3 massaged into an 8, then the value of the information is not merely questionable, but dangerously so. Misinformation leads to misallocationÉand misallocation leads to booms, followed by busts of equal and sometimes greater proportion.

Long-Term Unemployed Americans Face Challenges as Skills Lapse
By Timothy R. Homan and Zachary Tracer
Aug. 5 (Bloomberg) -- To understand the potential consequences of long-term unemployment, consider the job prospects of Sheldon Fisher and Douglas Lawson.
In January, Fisher, 53, was dismissed from a software company in Washington State. Lawson, 34, lost his job in October with a builder in South Carolina.

Obama Says U.S. Couldn't 'Walk Away' From Auto Jobs
Aug. 5 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama defended government aid to the U.S. auto industry, telling workers at a Ford Motor Co. plant in Chicago that they are a vital part of the economy.
"I refuse to walk away from this industry and American jobs," Obama said after touring a factory where Dearborn, Michigan-based Ford, the only Big 3 U.S. automaker that didn't take bailout money, will begin assembling the new 2011 Explorer later this year. "I have put my money on the American worker."

Weekly Jobless Claims Rise More than Expected, to 479,000
by DIANA GOLOBAY - HousingWire.com
Initial unemployment insurance claims rose 19,000 in the week ending July 31, marking a departure from market expectations of a small decline last week.
Jobless claims rose to a seasonally adjusted 479,000 from the previous week's downwardly revised figure of 460,000, according to new data today from the US Department of Labor. The four-week moving average rose 5,250 to 458,500.

Some manufacturing heads back to USA
By Paul Davidson, USA TODAY
Faced with rising costs, General Electric is moving production of its new energy-efficient water heater halfway around the world. The country it's leaving? China. The one it's bringing 400 jobs and a newly renovated factory? The United States.
A small but growing band of U.S. manufacturers — including giants such as General Electric (GE), NCR (NCR) and Caterpillar (CAT)— are turning the seemingly inexorable offshoring movement on its head, bringing some production to the U.S. from far-flung locations such as China. Others that were buying components overseas are switching to U.S. suppliers.

GM donates $41,000 to lawmakers' pet projects
By T.W. Farnam - WashingtonPost.com
When General Motors went through bankruptcy last year, it suspended its political donations. Now that it's owned by the U.S. government, it's donating to lawmakers' pet projects again.
The carmaker gave $41,000 to groups associated with lawmakers, the vast majority of it -- $36,000 -- to the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, the company reported on a disclosure form last week. The CBC Foundation is a charity with 11 members of the Congressional Black Caucus on its board.

Retail sales tepid as frugality returns
By Phil Wahba
(Reuters) - Retailers posted July sales below analysts' expectations in the latest sign that skittishness about high unemployment and the economy in general are causing consumers to cut spending and focus on essentials.
Some retailers that did manage to eke out gains, including several department stores, did so by taking customers from rivals, rather than from an increase in overall spending.
The 28 retailers tracked by Thomson Reuters reported a 2.9 percent rise in July sales at stores open at least one year, missing Wall Street forecasts of 3.1 percent. Of those, 17 reported lower-than-expected sales, while nine beat estimates.

Post Office Loses $3.5 Billion as 2011 Cash Crunch Looms
By MATTHEW SCOTT - DailyFinance.com
The United States Postal Service delivered bad news on Thursday, reporting a $3.5 billion loss for its fiscal third quarter due to lower revenues from the continuing drop in mail volume and increased costs from retiree health benefit expenses.
The USPS lost $1.1 billion more than it did during the third quarter of 2009, and has now posted net losses in 14 of its last 16 quarters. Operating revenue fell to $16 billion, $294 million less than during the same period last year, while operating expenses increased to $19.5 billion, $789 million higher than last year. Officials are projecting that the postal service could run out of cash in 2011 unless relief it is seeking from Congress is approved.

Gambling California
Place Your Bet, Help the Debt
BY JASON AUSTELL - NBC SanDiego
The state of California continues to struggle with debt ($19 billion and counting), has slashed many state jobs, furloughed many of the others, and has no budget in place because the Republicans and Democrats in the legislature can't agree on what's best. You have to wonder if they could agree on the color of orange juice.
More cuts are out. Gov. Schwarzenegger wants more, but the Dems won't let him do it. The governor has cut just about everything he possibly could and he's considering slashing even more school programs and programs for the elderly. In November, voters will go to the polls to decide whether marijuana should be legalized and taxed by the state. The grim economic reality is making for possible changes that would have seemed unimaginable a few years ago.

Raytheon Dodges Budget Ax With 'Avatar'3-D Training
By Gopal Ratnam
Aug. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Raytheon Co., the world's biggest missile maker, is girding for slower growth in the U.S. weapons budget by training soldiers with technology from the movie "Avatar" and helping educate General Motors Co. mechanics.
Those programs are part of the Technical Services unit that led Raytheon's first-half sales increases even as Defense Secretary Robert Gates called for ending a "gusher" of military purchases. The 11 percent gain was almost three times as much as at the division building Patriot missiles.

Critics Decry 'Secret Deal' as AT&T, Google Huddle With FCC
By Todd Shields
Aug. 3 (Bloomberg) -- Google Inc., AT&T Inc., and Verizon Communications Inc. executives are meeting behind closed doors with U.S. officials in talks that critics say reduce the public's voice in keeping the Internet open.
The companies sought a compromise, in a rare Saturday session last weekend at the Federal Communications Commission, on rules proposed by Chairman Julius Genachowski to regulate how phone and cable companies handle Web traffic such as Google's YouTube videos.
"These kinds of meetings where the substance isn't being revealed go against the chairman's promise of an open, transparent and inclusive agency," said Gigi Sohn, president of Public Knowledge, a Washington-based advocacy group, in an interview today.

Google Denies 'Devil's Pact' With Verizon on Tiered Services
By NIKHIL HUTHEESING - DailyFinance.com
Public interest groups and the media were up in arms Thursday over news reports that Google (GOOG) and Verizon (VZ) have been discussing a tiered-service agreement, which would allow deep-pocketed content providers such as Google, to pay more to broadband providers such as Verizon to give their content priority and faster network speeds on Verizon's networks. But both tech giants are denying the reports.
If such a deal were to take place, Google could pay for one of its YouTube videos to take precedence over, say, a video from a Web start-up that's unable to pay the sort of fees Google can afford. The plan would be in direct opposition to the concept of "net neutrality," a policy supported by the Federal Communications Commission and consumer advocates, which calls for Internet service providers to treat all legal Web traffic equally and to not discriminate against content that originates with a provider's rivals.

FCC stops closed-door Internet policy meetings as Google, Verizon strike side deal
by Cecilia Kang - WashingtonPost.com
Under criticism for its handing of closed-door discussions with certain companies on broadband policy, the Federal Communications Commission announced Thursday the meetings with Verizon, AT&T, Google and Skype were unsuccessful and that it would stop holding them.
The announcement comes amid an apparent agreement between Verizon and Google on so-called net neutrality ground rules that would allow certain prioritization of Web sites on fixed wire networks and no rules on wireless networks. Sources familiar with the discussions at the FCC said reports Wednesday of a deal between Verizon and Google on net neutrality upset participants in the meeting, who were moving closer to agreement on stronger rules against blocking and slowing traffic on wireless and fixed-wire networks.

FCC ends talks for deal on net neutrality
By Cecilia Kang - Washington Post Staff Writer
The Federal Communications Commission on Thursday called off its closed-door meetings with big Internet companies aimed at reaching agreement on protecting consumer access to the Web, after drawing criticism for attempting to broker a deal with limited public input.
The breakdown of the talks followed news of a separate agreement between Verizon and Google that would let Verizon give priority to certain Web content on its fixed-line networks. The deal between the two companies -- which are partners in the Android wireless phone platform -- does not apply to Verizon's mobile networks.

A Cakewalk Against Iran
by Philip Girald - AntiWar.com
Everyone who is concerned that yet another war in the Middle East could wreck what remains of the United States economy and probably strip away even more of our liberties should be troubled by the numerous calls for war against Iran. No one believes that Iran is anything but a nation that is one small step away from becoming a complete religious dictatorship, but the country has a small economy, a tiny defense budget, and, as far as the world's intelligence services can determine, neither nuclear weapons nor a program to develop them. Labeling the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as a new Hitler and describing the regime as "Islamofascist" is convenient but hardly conveys the reality of the complex political interaction taking place inside today's Iran. Ironically, the animus directed against Tehran relates not so much to what it is doing as to what its government might do, hardly an adequate pretext for going to war and a standard of behavior that many countries in the world would fail.

Pentagon Demands WikiLeaks Unrelease Classified Docs
Says All Files Should Be Deleted, Returned
by Jason Dit - AntiWar.com
At a press briefing today Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell demanded that WikiLeaks "do the right thing" and remove all copies of the classified documents released on their website two weeks ago, and to also return all other classified documents they might hypothetically have.
Exactly what they expect the deletion to accomplish is unclear, as WikiLeaks would have no way of removing the data from everyone else's personal computer, nor of unpublishing all the newspapers in the world which have exposed the various secrets about the Pentagon's mismanagement of the war in Afghanistan.

BOMBING CAN COMMENCE - WWIII TO FOLLOW
Posted on 5th August 2010 by JimQuinn - The Burning Platform
The sabers are rattling. Propaganda is being blared from the loudspeakers. The MSM is issuing the fearmongering alerts. Israel has activated their bought off Congressmen. The Greater Depression is upon us. Elections are only 3 months away. How will the ruling elite distract the American people from their economic plight? I wonder.

Preparing for World War III, Targeting Iran
Part I: Global Warfare
by Michel Chossudovsky
Humanity is at a dangerous crossroads. War preparations to attack Iran are in "an advanced state of readiness". Hi tech weapons systems including nuclear warheads are fully deployed.
This military adventure has been on the Pentagon's drawing board since the mid-1990s. First Iraq, then Iran according to a declassified 1995 US Central Command document.
Escalation is part of the military agenda. While Iran, is the next target together with Syria and Lebanon, this strategic military deployment also threatens North Korea, China and Russia.
Since 2005, the US and its allies, including America's NATO partners and Israel, have been involved in the extensive deployment and stockpiling of advanced weapons systems. The air defense systems of the US, NATO member countries and Israel are fully integrated.

Doug Casey: War Is Coming
(Interviewed by Louis James, Editor, International Speculator)
I have a bad feeling he is right. I found two other articles I was going to post that support his view. - Jim Quinn
L: Doug, last time we conversed, you said: "Let's talk about what Clausewitz called 'the extension of politics' next time - I think the odds are increasing that we may see war rear its ugly head again soon."
There's been a lot in the news lately about Israel blockading the Gaza strip and about the potential for the Middle East to boil over. Is that what you had in mind?
Doug: I just got back from a trip to the Middle East - Iraq, actually. There's a feature article on what I found there in this month's Casey Report. Doing country studies has long been a specialty of mine, and I've got to say that most of what most people think they know about the place just ain't so. But yes, I do think there is a very significant chance that we are headed for something that might vaguely resemble WWIII.
L: That's going to be a pretty shocking statement to a lot of people - too much cognitive dissonance for most to let themselves think about it. Many readers might say that folks in the Middle East have been squabbling for years without the world going up in flames. Did you have a guru moment while there? Why now?

Israel: The Tension Builds
by Brad MacDonald - theTrumpet.com
That Israel is gravitating toward war is an inescapable reality.
After a summer so far of relative peace, tensions are once again ratcheting up between Israel and its radical Islamic enemies.
In regard to the fragile state of affairs in and around Israel, the International Crisis Group (icg), a respected mediation organization with access to regional decision makers, reported this week that it is "exceptionally quiet and uniquely dangerous" (emphasis mine throughout). For the moment, the icg says, Israel and its enemies are in a stand-off, with all parties refraining from pulling the trigger out of fear that an "all-out war ... would spare neither civilians nor civilian infrastructure ...." The thing about stand-offs, however, is that they do not last forever.

BP's Oil on Louisiana's Barrier Islands,
Bubbling Up From Below The Beach!!!

NOAA: Oil-contaminated fish are "safe to eat" within a few weeks!

BP, Feds mislead on cleanup to be protecte
from people who get "sicker and sicker"

Professor: 40-45% of oil still there in undersea PLUMES;
Not going to disappear

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Archived Page Link
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Thursday 08.05.2010

Missouri Voters Reject Key Provision of New Health Care Law
By David A. Lieb, Associated Press
Jefferson City, Mo. (AP) - Missouri voters on Tuesday overwhelmingly rejected a key provision of President Barack Obama's health care law, sending a clear message of discontent to Washington and Democrats less than 100 days before the midterm elections.
About 71 percent of Missouri voters backed a ballot measure, Proposition C, that would prohibit the government from requiring people to have health insurance or from penalizing them for not having it.

The Ruling Elite Called [satire!]
Jim Quinn - SilverBearCafe.com
I just got off the horn with the Ruling Elite. We had an emergency conference call and to tell you the truth, they ain't happy. You little people are not responding the way you are supposed to. A significant portion of you are not getting more optimistic because they tell you to. Instead of just reading the headline on Bloomberg that durable goods orders skyrocketed in June, you actually read the details that said durable goods orders plunged. It is getting difficult for the ruling elite to keep the masses sedated and dumbed down. These damn bloggers, with their facts and critical thinking, are throwing a wrench into the gears. Obama and his crack team are working round the clock to lock down the internet, but it will take time. Not that they are totally dissatisfied. They've been able to renovate their penthouses and purchase new mansions in the Hamptons with the billions in bonuses you supplied through TARP. The $1.2 trillion supplied by your children and grandchildren to buy up toxic mortgages off their balance sheets was a godsend. They will never call you suckers, to your face.

August Forecast: Cloudy With a Chance of Mayhem
Keith Johnson - SilverBearCafe.com
Revolt of the Plebs
July may have gone out with a whimper, but August may very well come in with a BANG!
The eighth month on the Gregorian calendar has a notoriously violent past. World War I kicked in to high gear on August 4, 1914 when Great Britain declared war on Germany (after they refused to withdraw from Belgium). World War II went up in smoke on August 9th, 1945 when the U.S. dropped its 2nd nuclear bomb - on the people of Japan - at Nagasaki. Will August 10th, 2010 go down in history as the beginning of World War III?
Indulge me.

Preparing for World War III, Targeting Iran
Part I: Global Warfare
Michel Chossudovsky - SilverBearCafe.com
Humanity is at a dangerous crossroads. War preparations to attack Iran are in "an advanced state of readiness". Hi tech weapons systems including nuclear warheads are fully deployed.
This military adventure has been on the Pentagon's drawing board since the mid-1990s. First Iraq, then Iran according to a declassified 1995 US Central Command document.
Escalation is part of the military agenda. While Iran, is the next target together with Syria and Lebanon, this strategic military deployment also threatens North Korea, China and Russia.

Bilderburg Group gave GREEN LIGHT for WAR with Iran !!
Interview with Dr. Paul Craig Roberts - June 23, 2010
[Recycling taxpayer money into political campaigns, etc.]
War with Iran has already been decided by the powers that be and the modern-day quasi-declaration happened last Thursday. Using the same legislative and propaganda playbook that led to the Iraq War, the U.S. Government has just officially declared War on Iran. Reuters reported "Congress on Thursday approved tough new unilateral sanctions aimed at squeezing Iran's energy and banking sectors, which could also hurt companies from other countries doing business with Tehran. The House of Representatives passed the bill 408-8 and sent it to President Barack Obama for signing into law. The Senate had approved it 99-0 earlier in the day."

Wall Street Weighs New Economic Data
By CHRISTINE HAUSER - NYTimes.com
Shares in the United States edged higher on Wednesday after new data about the economy was slightly better than expected.
Two days ahead of the closely watched monthly jobs report, data released by ADP, a payroll processing company, showed a gain of about 42,000 jobs among private employers in July, up from 13,000 in June.

Gold price to cross $4,000/oz
Ian Gordon INterview - CommodityOnline.com
"We're not going into a double dip. We're going into a depression. I'm convinced of that," claims renowned Market Forecaster Ian Gordon. Using his sharpest tools, Gordon has determined that the biggest market crash in our lifetime is coming sooner than most expect. But he is using a three-pronged strategy to limit the damage and even make money in the dark times ahead. You will learn why Gordon believes gold, and gold equities in particular, will perform when nothing else does in this exclusive interview ...

China unveils gold revolution
BEIJING (Commodity Online): Slowly China is beating India in gold business and the Dragon land is making considerable progress in the yellow metal trade. As part of its strategy to expand the gold business, China has allowed more banks to import and export gold.
This is a signal that the country plans to loosen restrictions on trading of the yellow metal. The People's Bank of China issued an industry guide to further develop its gold market. China is the fifth-largest holder of gold in the world. China will allow more commercial banks to import and export the metal, the central bank said.

Gold flourishes on China move
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online) : Gold prices climbed in Asian trade Wednesday after reports said China, the world's largest gold producer, decided to expand its market.
Spot gold was seen trading at $1192.01 an ounce at 12.00 noon Singapore time while December-delivery futures was at $1195.30 an ounce on the Comex division on Nymex.
Silver for immediate delivery climbed 1 per cent to $18.5625 an ounce, platinum advanced 0.7 per cent to $1593.70 an ounce, and palladium rose 0.8 per cent to $505.40 an ounce.

Celente US oligopoly is a big lie RT Interview 03 Aug 2010

Huge Jump in US Crude Oil Imports
Written by Dave Forest - OilPrice.com
Wednesday, 04 August 2010 14:26
U.S. crude oil imports. Huge jump in the week ended July 23, with total imports up to 11.15 million barrels daily.
This is the highest weekly level of oil imports since the financial crisis broke late in 2008.

Gasoline prices rise after recent rally in oil
By SANDY SHORE - The Associated Press - WashingtonPost.com
-- The recent rise in oil prices is translating into higher prices at the pump.
The national average for a gallon of regular unleaded rose 2.1 cents to $2.747 a gallon, according to AAA, Wright Express and Oil Price Information Service. Oil has traded above $82 for two straight days. It was around $77 a week ago.
Motorists are paying about 3 cents more than they were two weeks ago and 18.6 cents more than a year ago.

How Zombie Banks are Ruining the Future
James Wesley, Rawles - SilverBearCafe.com
The banks of the world are in a mess, but thankfully they are sorting out their problems.
Except that they're not
In the boom years, banks gave out more and more mortgages to riskier and riskier home owners, with the understanding that if things turned really bad, these mortgages would be terrible loans that would lose a fortune.
So when things did turn bad and the home owners could no longer pay for the mortgages, these mortgages bankrupted the banks that gave them out.
Except they didn't

Citigroup Says Dollar to Fall After Breach
By Mary Childs
Aug. 4 (Bloomberg) -- The dollar's close below its 200-day moving average yesterday means it has further to fall, according to Citigroup Inc.
The Dollar Index closed yesterday at 80.60, below the 200- day moving average of 80.713. That means the dollar will extend its downward trend, according to a note today by technical analysts Tom Fitzpatrick in New York and Shyam Devani in London.
"Further losses are still likely," they wrote. "A breach of the 80.40-79.92 area, especially on a weekly close basis, would be a significant development suggesting further losses for the U.S. dollar over an extended period down to below 75."

Keiser Report No.65:

Reality sets in for states on Real ID
Driver's licenses must meet rules
By Shaun Waterman - The Washington Times
Like it or not - and many in the Obama administration don't - Real ID is coming to a driver's license near you.
Having failed to get Congress to revise the tough new security rules for state-issued licenses in the Real ID Act, the Department of Homeland Security says it is working out how to implement the law.
But critics fear Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano plans to gut the intent of the legislation's authors.
There is broad agreement among those following the issue on Capitol Hill and in statehouses across the country that Pass ID, the legislative alternative to Real ID that the Obama administration was pushing last year, is dead in the water.

AFL-CIO president urges unions to step up for Dems
By Sam Hananel - MSNBC.com
WASHINGTON - The head of the nation's largest labor federation on Tuesday urged union leaders to step up support for Democrats in the November elections, despite some frustration with the pace of gains on labor's agenda.
AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka said he wants unions to recapture the sense of enthusiasm that helped propel President Barack Obama into office two years ago.
"We know you're angry," Trumka said in a speech to the federation's leaders and political staff. "We know you're frustrated. We know we haven't achieved everything that we worked for. But we've made progress and we have to keep it going."

Obama Promises Labor Leaders He'll Pursue Union-Friendly Agenda
By Roger Runningen and Holly Rosenkrantz - (c) 2010 Bloomberg News
Obama told the executive council of the AFL-CIO he is committed to getting legislation making it easier for unions to organize workers and enforce labor provisions in trade agreements.
"I'm here to tell you we are not giving up and we are not giving in," Obama said in his remarks at the Washington Convention Center to the group, which includes the presidents of 56 major labor unions.

Empire Bank reports counterfeit checks
ST. LOUIS BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Kelsey Volkmann
Empire Bank in Springfield, Mo., said counterfeit cashier's checks bearing the institution's name are in circulation.
The counterfeit items display the routing number 086518477, which is assigned to Empire Bank, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said Wednesday.
The fake checks are very similar to authentic cashier's checks but the real ones have double-lined borders, the FDIC said.

U.S. Consumer Bankruptcies May Exceed 1.6 Million
By Edvard Pettersson
Aug. 4 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. consumer bankruptcies, after rising 9 percent last month from June, might exceed 1.6 million this year, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute.
The 137,698 bankruptcy filings in July also represent a 9 percent increase from a year earlier, the institute said yesterday in a statement posted on its website, citing data from the National Bankruptcy Research Center.

Superman Comic Saves Family Home From Foreclosure
Unexpected Find of Action Comics No. 1 Could Fetch
Upwards of a Quarter of a Million Dollars at Auction
By RAY SANCHEZ - ABCNews.com
A struggling family facing foreclosure has stumbled upon what is considered to be the Holy Grail of comic books in their basement - a fortuitous find that could fetch upwards of a quarter million dollars at auction.
A copy of Action Comics No. 1, the first in which Superman ever appeared, was discovered as they went about the painful task of packing up a home that had been in the family since at least the 1950s. The couple, who live in the South with their children, asked to remain anonymous.

FHA tells Congress: Mortgage insurance claims are down;
home prices a concern
By Dina ElBoghdady - Washington Post Staff Writer
Mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration have performed better than expected so far this fiscal year, though the improvements could be overturned if home prices sink, according to a report the agency submitted to Congress this week.
The report analyzed the FHA's loan portfolio from October through June and compared the results to the projections in an independent audit released late last year.

FDIC flashes SOS
1,000 bank failures before recession is over
FDIC not too far away from tapping into U.S. Treasury $500 billion taxpayer lifeline.
Georgia leads the pack with 40 bank failures since 2008.
MyBudget360.com
By the end of the recession, there will be approximately 1,000 bank failures. Does this sound extreme? It should but the numbers don't cover the entire story. Since 2008 the number of bank failures has reached 269 and this doesn't include consolidations done through the FDIC where bigger banks ate up smaller banks before they officially failed. Last week, 7 banks failed. At that pace, we are looking at 364 bank failures per year and the actual number of closings per week has consistently gone up. The FDIC is in a precarious situation. The Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) is technically speaking, broke. They have added additional cash reserves by front loading premiums on surviving banks but this can only stunt the financial bleeding for so long. The problems in the banking system run deep and many of the smaller regional banks are failing because of commercial real estate loans going bad.

Does the Housing Industry Need a Bailout?
By NIKHIL HUTHEESING - DailyFinance.com
Does the housing industry need a bailout? Michael Feder, CEO of the New York-based real estate analyst firm Radar Logic, says it may. An oversupply of distressed inventory will have to be cleaned up before the housing market can come back, and that means large numbers of debt modifications will be needed, requiring lenders to take losses on their loans.
But Feder says the government itself may be in the worst position, since it has underwritten or guaranteed almost every new mortgage written since the financial crisis began. A great deal of that distressed housing inventory has been financed by loans that are, essentially, the assets of the American public.

For Rent: The New Normal For Residential Housing
SeniorHousingNews.com
Change is coming to the home mortgage market and the philosophy of homeownership next year. The changes will be debated in Washington over the coming months and the conversation will spark intense debate by both parties, the Administration, Wall Street and most importantly the American homeowner. Last week, the Administration announced a summit on August 17 entitled, "Conference on the Future of Housing Finance" that will address the future of the housing finance market. The conference will begin to address what actions will be required to restructure the housing finance market, namely the role of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the future of affordable rental housing.

New Counseling Procedures Released For Reverse Mortgages
SeniorHousingNews.com
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), after nearly 2 years of studying and revisions, recently published new procedures governing the process for seniors who are counseled for federally insured Home Equity Conversion Mortgages (HECMs). The new procedures provides more detailed information which must be provided ahead of the counseling session, what must be covered, who must attend and covers topics that the counselor can and cannot discuss with the prospective borrower.

NCOA pdf on reverse mortgages
Use Your Home to Stay at Homeª
A Guide for Older Homeowners Who Need Help Now

Galbraith: Expand Social Security and Medicare
Economist's View
Jamie Galbraith says the talk about cutting entitlements is all wrong. These programs should be expanded, not trimmed back:
James K. Galbraith Champions The Beast Manifesto, by James K. Galbraith: In the Great Crisis, the United States lost about eight million private jobs. ... Very few lost jobs have been replaced... Two million of the lost jobs are in construction, which faces a long slump. Three million were lost in manufacturing, which is down 40 percent since 2000, and those jobs likely won't ever return. Unemployment rates for Black, Asian, and Latino workers have all doubled. The average duration of unemployment has risen to an astonishing 35 weeks, with nearly half of all unemployed out of work for almost a year.

Obama Depopulation Policy Exposed

Obama Depopulation Policy Exposed!

California Democrats Seek Higher Income Tax, Oil Levy
By Michael B. Marois
Aug. 3 (Bloomberg) -- California Democrats unveiled a plan to erase the state's $19.1 billion budget deficit with higher income taxes and a new levy on oil producers to offset wholesale spending cuts proposed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The plan from Democrats in the state Legislature would bring in $1.8 billion by increasing income-tax rates 1 percentage point on all but the wealthiest Californians. It would cut spending by $8 billion and raise $1.5 billion by increasing vehicle-registration fees, $600 million by taxing oil wells and $2 billion by suspending corporate tax breaks.

New Democratic strategy for creating jobs focuses on a boost in manufacturing
By Lori Montgomery and Brady Dennis - WashingtonPost.com
President Obama and congressional Democrats -- out of options for another quick shot of stimulus spending to revive the sluggish economy -- are shifting toward a longer-term strategy that promises to tackle persistently high unemployment by engineering a renaissance in American manufacturing.
That approach, heralded by Obama last week in Detroit and sketched out in a memo to House Democrats as they headed home for the August break, is still evolving and so far focuses primarily on raising taxes on multinational corporations that Democrats accuse of shipping jobs overseas.

Aid package aimed at saving state jobs passes key hurdle in Senate
By Lori Montgomery and Jenna Johnson - Washington Post Staff Writer
An emergency plan to save the jobs of tens of thousands of public school teachers and other government workers overcame a key Senate hurdle Wednesday, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would summon lawmakers back from their August break to finish work on the measure.
Two Republicans crossed party lines to advance the $26 billion package, handing President Obama a victory in his campaign to bolster the shaky economy. With many governors struggling to close gaping budget deficits, administration officials feared a fresh round of state layoffs or tax increases could knock the nation's wobbly recovery off-course.

Senate OKs vote on cash to states
2 Republicans thwart filibuster
By Stephen Dinan and Seth McLaughlin - The Washington Times
Congress is poised to extend a taxpayer-funded lifeline to cash-strapped states after the Senate on Wednesday advanced another round of $26 billion in stimulus spending for teachers and health care, and House Democrats said they will break their six-week summer vacation to return to Washington to vote on it next week.
Facing pressure from public employee labor unions and state budget officials, Democrats are rushing to get the money in the pipeline before the school year begins, and have painted the new stimulus spending as a key ingredient to fight unemployment.

Billionaires to give away fortunes
Half of money will go to charity
By Hillary May - The Washington Times
When your worth is measured in billions, the money can lose its purpose: How many Ferraris can one man use? Donald Trump once said that money was never a big motivation for him, "except as a way to keep score."
Now, 40 of America's billionaires have decided to walk off the court. Or at least shave points.
They have answered a call from investor Warren Buffett and Microsoft founder Bill Gates to give 50 percent or more of their fortunes to charity, either during their lifetimes or upon their deaths.

More Workers Face Pay Cuts, Not Furloughs
By STEVEN GREENHOUSE - NYTimes.com
The furloughs that popped up during the recession are being replaced by a highly unusual tactic: actual cuts in pay.
Local and state governments, as well as some companies, are squeezing their employees to work the same amount for less money in cost-saving measures that are often described as a last-ditch effort to avoid layoffs.
A new report on Tuesday showed a slight dip in overall wages and salaries in June, caused partly by employees working fewer hours.

[Conscription military and non-military - up to age 42;
government solution for high unemployment and homeless?]
H.R. 5741: Universal National Service Act
This is an actual bill introduced by embattled congressman Charles Rangel. The age for the apparent draft has increased to age 42 in this bill. Instead of being "drafted" into military service, a person can be drafted into other national service entities. The President would be given a great deal of power if this thing becomes law.

Married to the Clinton Mob
By Robert Scheer
Out of respect for privacy, even concerning famous people, I wasn't going to write about the marriage of Chelsea Clinton to a Goldman Sachs alum and budding hedge-fund hustler with the resources to buy a $4 million loft so soon after graduating from Stanford. Hopefully Marc Mezvinsky won't follow in the footsteps of his financier father, "Fast-Talkin' Eddie," as they called him back in Iowa, a former Democratic House member who just completed a five-year federal sentence for dozens of fraud felonies.
Anyway, Chelsea also worked at a hedge fund, her mother dabbled in banking shenanigans in her Whitewater days and father Bill's radical deregulation made it a lot easier for financial plunderers to stay on the right side of the law. So the Clintons and the Mezvinskys have a lot in common. I hope their children will do better, and I was going to simply wish them well until I read Tina Brown's paean to power, "Why America Needed Chelsea's Wedding," in the trend-chasing Daily Beast, which she edits.

[Bad twist to the jist . . . by Alex Jones?]
The Brain Eating Vaccine Conspiracy
By Jonah Lehrer - Wired.com
This blog post makes me sad. It's about a story I wrote and how it was horribly twisted into a dangerous nugget of right-wing paranoia. Last week, my profile of Robert Sapolsky was posted online. While most of the story is about the dangerous effects of chronic stress, the last several hundred words explore a new research project being undertaken by Sapolsky and others, which is often referred to as a "stress vaccine":
After several years of genetic engineering - it's not easy to substitute all the dangerous genes with their therapeutic replacements - Sapolsky began introducing the modified herpes virus into rodent brains. Then he induced a series of tragedies, such as a massive stroke or an extended seizure, which would trigger the release of glucocorticoids. (Chronic stress is like a slow-motion stroke.) Within minutes, the modified herpes virus began pumping out neuroprotective proteins, which limited the extent of cell death. As a result, the damage was contained. For instance, rats given the herpes treatment were able to stave off practically all cell loss, while control rats lost nearly 40 percent of neurons in a given region. In the hippocampus, neuronal death was reduced substantially. "To be honest, I'm still amazed that it works," he says. "It's not going to help anybody soon" - the research is still years away from clinical trials - "but we've proved that it's possible. We can reduce the neural damage caused by stress."

Computer Hackers Trying to Take Over Power Plants,
Prompting Action From Homeland Security Department
By Lolita C. Baldor, AP - CNSNews.com
Washington (AP) - Computer hackers have begun targeting power plants and other critical operations around the world in bold new efforts to seize control of them, setting off a scramble to shore up aging, vulnerable systems.
Cyber criminals have long tried, at times successfully, to break into vital networks and power systems. But last month, experts for the first time discovered a malicious computer code -- called a worm -- specifically created to take over systems that control the inner workings of industrial plants.

Google, CIA, invest in 'future predicting' startup
Jameson Berkow - FinancialPost.com
When the world's largest web search company and the world's largest spy service both invest in the same company, at the same time, chances are that company is working on something pretty big.
But predicting the future?!? That is still the stuff of science fiction films right? Well no longer.
Last week, a Wired exclusive detailed a Massachusetts web startup called Recorded Future. The name leaves little to the imagination in describing what the 16-person firm does, clearly it 'records the future'. What requires some creative thinking, however, is learning exactly how the company learns what is going to happen before it happens.

Google, CIA Invest in 'Future' of Web Monitoring
By Noah Shachtman - Wired.com
The investment arms of the CIA and Google are both backing a company that monitors the web in real time - and says it uses that information to predict the future.
The company is called Recorded Future, and it scours tens of thousands of websites, blogs and Twitter accounts to find the relationships between people, organizations, actions and incidents - both present and still-to-come. In a white paper, the company says its temporal analytics engine "goes beyond search" by "looking at the 'invisible links' between documents that talk about the same, or related, entities and events."

Cheating scandal at U.S. Open rocks bass-fishing community
By: Pete Thomas, GrindTV.com
A professional angler found to have stuffed lead sinkers down the throats of fish he submitted for weigh-ins during a prestigious bass-fishing tournament has been banned for life from that and other competitions in a scandal that has rocked the tight-knit and passionate bass-fishing community.
Mike Hart, a successful Southern California pro whose career earnings total more than $200,000, was accused of cheating in this manner during the recent $100,000 U.S. Open held at sprawling Lake Mead on the Nevada-Arizona border. An official with the Western Outdoor News bass tour said Hart confessed after he was caught virtually red-handed.

Little League World Series Expands Replay Usage
By Erik Malinowski - wired
Little League World Series officials are expanding the sport's now-limited use of video-replay challenges, starting with the kickoff of the 64th annual tournament Aug. 20. The rule changes will now allow team managers the opportunity to challenge disputed plays, much like the National Football League.
Introduced in 2008, the Little League World Series' original mechanism for initiating replays operated with a system similar to that of professional hockey or baseball, where it's solely up to the discretion of the on-field umpire as to whether specific calls -- like a home run that may have been foul - should be overturned.

The Five Most Crime-Ridden U.S. Judicial Districts
Are All on the Mexican Border
By Terence P. Jeffrey - CNSNews.com
When measured by the number of criminal defendants charged with federal crimes by U.S. attorneys, the top five U.S. judicial districts for fiscal 2009 were all on the U.S.-Mexico border.
In fact, these five judicial districts are the only five on the U.S.-Mexico border-covering its entire expanse from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean.
There are 94 federal judicial districts covering the area of all 50 states, plus Guam, the North Mariana Islands, the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

[Yeah, sure . . . maybe you'd like to buy a bridge, as well!]
BP oil spill: three-quarters of oil 'eliminated'
Telegraph.co.uk
The US government is expected to announce that three quarters of the oil that has leaked out of the Deepwater Horizon well into the Gulf of Mexico has already dispersed or evaporated.
A government report into environmental damage caused by the biggest oil spill in the country's history has found that the remaining oil is so diluted that it poses little risk of harm.
While 26 per pent of the leaked crude was still in the water or on the coast, where it threatens birds and wildlife, it is rapidly breaking down, the report found.

Pelosi Blocks Oil Spill Investigation
by Connie Hair - HumanEvents.com
The latest version of the CLEAR Act is slated for a floor vote in the House this week as Democrats look for ways to use the Gulf oil spill as a means to pass elements of their unpopular energy agenda.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) stripped out authorization for an independent investigation into the Gulf disaster.
The Natural Resources Committee unanimously passed the amendment in committee markup July 14 offered by Rep. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) that would establish a bipartisan, independent, National Commission on Outer Continental Shelf Oil Spill Prevention.

Geologist Offers a New Theory
Gulf's Evolution Makes the Shakes
The New Madrid seismic zone in Missouri has long intrigued scientists because, according to conventional geologic theory, large earthquakes clustered in a tectonically quiet region are difficult to understand.
But at least one AAPG member is challenging the crowd.
New Orleans independent geologist Jack M. Reed believes the origin of the earthquakes lies beneath the Gulf of Mexico.
That's not all.
Reed, a retired Texaco geologist-geophysicist who has been studying the region's geology for over 40 years, says the accepted theory of a quiet geologic evolution of the Gulf of Mexico Basin is fundamentally flawed and needs to be revised.

Info Louisiana Quake, New Madrid Fault line
Jack Reed's "missing links to New Madrid' right over or nearby that quake...
If I had a hammer, I would hit over the collective heads of all the geologists who are connected to Big Oil and won't speak to the issues involved in "petrochemical" drilling/subsidence, et al and how it relates to many quakes in these areas according to USGS itself!
The new faultlines that Jack Reed suspects are related to the New Madrid are in yellow in the above graph.

Old New World Order Goal, World Empire
Szandor Blestman -SilverBearCafe.com
The New World Order is not new. It is actually controlled by very old, very wealthy families. It is likely at least partially the brainchild of European royalty that should have faded into the sunset a long time ago, along with their central banking agents. Somehow, these royal families have managed to keep their wealth and their political influence in spite of decades, even centuries, of various political movements that should have cast them down and made them pariahs of the human race. Somehow they have managed to escape the wrath of the common folk in spite of wars and revolutions that should have targeted them and their agents.

President Zardari is right: we have lost the Afghan War
and Dave is pathetically in denial
By Gerald Warner - Telegraph.co.uk
When the president of what is virtually a failed state, with a recent record of military dictatorship, a disaffected intelligence service, an ominous nuclear capacity, currently suffering a major natural disaster and under imminent threat of succumbing to jihadist subversion is telling the plain, unvarnished truth, while the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom is talking delusional and dishonest rubbish, that is a measure of the deficit of trust that now exists between Government and the public in Britain today.

Jihadi Animated Clip Shows Sword Decapitating
Obama [Gates, Petraeus, and Pope Benedict]
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu - IsraelNationalNews.com
New jihadi anti-American incitement features an animated clip of a sword beheading U.S. President Barack Obama. Other candidates for beheading in the clip are U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, U.S. General David Petraeus and Pope Benedict.
The website's message, translated by Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), was posted Monday by someone calling himself "Sama Baghdad," who described himself as "a student at the Al-Fallujah Islamic University," meaning a member on the website's Islamic jurisprudence forum.

Ahmadinejad convoy not attacked; fireworks set off
By ASSOCIATED PRESS -Jerusalem Post
TEHERAN - Iran's official news agency said Wednesday that an explosion near the president's convoy was just an excited fan setting off fireworks, denying earlier reports of an assassination attempt President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Iran Claims to Have Long-Range S-300 Surface-to-Air Missiles
By Ali Akbar Dareini, Associated Press
Tehran (AP) - Iran has obtained four S-300 surface-to-air missile systems despite Russia's refusal to deliver them to Tehran under a valid contract, a semiofficial Iranian news agency claimed Wednesday.
The Fars news agency, which has ties to Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard, Iran's most powerful military force, said Iran received two S-300s from Belarus and two others from another unspecified source.

Obama Warns Abbas: 'Start Talks or Else'
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu - IsraelNationalNews.com
A secret 36-page memo based on Obama administration statements indicates that the president warned Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to start direct talks with Israel or risk losing American support for the recognition of the PA as a country.
The Associated Press reported it has possession of the document, under the letterhead of the Palestinian Negotiations Department, and that it indicates the warning came from President Barack Obama via U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell.

Peres, Mubarak discuss direct talks
By HERB KEINON - Jerusalem Post
Both men agree window of opportunity for peace agreement is open.
Three days after the Arab League gave a reluctant Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas a green light to begin direct talks with Israel - if he so decided - Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak met President Shimon Peres in Cairo on Sunday and agreed that the current "window of opportunity" should not be missed.
Peres's office released a statement after the two-hour meeting, saying both the Israeli president and Mubarak "fully supported direct peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians and emphasized that the element of time was critical, and that the sides should not miss the window of opportunity that now exists."

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