News Archives - November 2010

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Update on 1099 legislation in health care reform bill

Senate pushing to repeal reviled IRS rule
By Charles Riley
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Lawmakers will get a chance Monday to undo a piece of health care reform that businesses big and small say will cost jobs.
The Senate is set to consider whether to repeal the new requirement that businesses notify the Internal Revenue Service of purchases over $600.
The provision was adopted in March as part of the massive health care reform law.
Starting in 2012, businesses will be required to issue 1099 tax forms not only to contracted workers (as they already do) but also to any individual or corporation from which they buy more than $600 in goods or services in a year.

G.M. Sells Parts Maker to a Chinese Company
By NICK BUNKLEY - NYTimes.com
DETROIT - General Motors said on Monday that it had completed a deal to sell a subsidiary that makes power-steering components to an affiliate of the Beijing municipal government.
The sale of the unit, Nexteer Automotive, to Pacific Century Motors represents China's biggest single investment in the global auto parts-making industry, the companies said. It also will turn Beijing into the largest private employer in Saginaw, Mich., where Nexteer's headquarters and centers for research and engineering have nearly 3,000 workers.

Obama proposes to freeze pay for federal workers
Phoenix Business Journal - by Kent H
President Barack Obama proposed Monday a two-year pay freeze for federal workers.
If Congress approves it, the pay freeze would go into effect Jan. 1 and continue through the end of 2012. It is projected to save the federal government more than $5 billion over these two years, and $60 billion over the next 10 years.
The pay freeze would not apply to military personnel.
White House officials said the pay freeze is the first of many steps that will be included in the president's fiscal 2012 budget proposal to rein in the federal deficit.
"Clearly this is a difficult decision," said Jeffrey Zients, deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget.

Senator introduces bill to extend jobless benefits
By Ben Rooney - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- A Democrat-sponsored bill to extend unemployment benefits by one year was introduced in the Senate Monday, but it is likely to face stiff opposition from Republicans.
The bill's sponsor, Senator Max Baucus, D-Mont., said in a statement that the proposed legislation would reauthorize benefits for nearly 800,000 out-of-work Americans who are about to exhaust their benefits next week.
It would also extend benefits for 2 million more Americans facing the same fate at the end of the year, he said.

Jobs outlook bearish, despite recent pickup
Jobs, manufacturing to key busy data week
By Steve Goldstein, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - October's payrolls data may have come in surprisingly strong, but economists on Wall Street haven't ditched their cautious view of the labor market.
Nonfarm payrolls grew by 151,000 in October, more than double the Street's prediction, and August and September figures were upwardly revised. (The miss of 78,000 wasn't actually that bad, considering the margin of error for the report is 100,000.)
But economists retain their bearishness, as a MarketWatch-compiled poll shows payrolls are expected to slow to 135,000 in November and for the unemployment rate to stay at a glum 9.6%.

More than 8 million drop out of credit card use
By EILEEN AJ CONNELY, AP - SanFrancisco Chronicle
More than 8 million consumers stopped using credit cards over the past year. The decline stems from a combination of consumer choices and bank actions.
An analysis by credit reporting agency TransUnion found that use of general purpose credit cards bearing MasterCard or Visa logos, or issued by Discover or American Express, fell more than 11 percent in the third quarter, compared with the July to September period last year.
About 62 million people now have an active card, compared with 70 million a year ago.

More employers offering paycards to workers instead of checks
Payroll debit cards can be a cheap alternative to issuing paper checks to employees who don't have bank accounts. But there can be downsides for recipients.
By Cyndia Zwahlen - ChicagoTribune.com
Paper or plastic - it's not a question just for the grocery store checkout line anymore. Now some employers are facing it when figuring out the most efficient way to pay workers.
These companies are trying to eliminate paper paychecks for employees who don't do direct deposit, and instead issue them payroll debit cards, also called paycards.
The cards, which are loaded electronically with workers' pay, are designed for employees who don't have bank accounts. About 8% of U.S. households don't have accounts in financial institutions, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

Senate takes up food safety legislation
By Clarissa Kell-Holland, Land Line staff writer
The U.S. House of Representatives passed its version of a food safety bill more than a year ago, and the U.S. Senate was scheduled to start debate on this issue on Monday, Nov. 29.
The Senate is expected to begin a series of votes on the Food and Drug Administration's Food Safety Modernization Act - S510 - seeking to reform the current food-safety system in the United States.
Joe Rajkovacz, OOIDA director of regulatory affairs, said that if this bill passes it would give the FDA mandatory recall powers, which he says are "clearly needed" in the food industry.

S.510: Bribery, Graft and Conflicts of Interest
Marti Oakley - PPJGazette
The Senate has convened and will vote again for cloture on S.510; at this moment Senator Tom Harkin is speaking about why the bill is so important. Echoing the drama of Senator Durbin, Harkin alludes to the "sick and dying" people in this country as a result of food borne illness. All the drama aside: neither Harkin, Durbin nor any other Senator will identify the true sources of food contamination arising from industrialized farming and ranching, self-inspecting processing plants, and contaminated food imports coming into the country uninspected.

Michael Moore & Wendell Potter Discuss The Insurance Industr
Vilifying Moore's Movie 'SICKO'

US Foreign Policy Meltdown
A Superpower's View of the World
By SPIEGEL Staff
251,000 State Department documents, many of them secret embassy reports from around the world, show how the US seeks to safeguard its influence around the world. It is nothing short of a political meltdown for US foreign policy.
What does the United States really think of German Chancellor Angela Merkel? Is she a reliable ally? Did she really make an effort to patch up relations with Washington that had been so damaged by her predecessor? At most, it was a half-hearted one.

Hillary's Diplomats or Spooks?

How US Diplomats Were Told to Spy on UN and Ban Ki-Moon
Spiegel.de
The US State Department gave its diplomats instructions to spy on other countries' representatives at the United Nations, according to a directive signed by Hillary Clinton. Diplomats were told to collect information about e-mail accounts, passwords and encryption keys, credit cards, biometric information and a whole lot more.
The subject line of the document sounds harmless. "Reporting and collection needs: The United Nations." But the secret dispatch dated July 31, 2009, is among the more explosive of the raft of embassy cables that have now been reported. In a total of 29 pages, the United States State Department calls on its diplomats to spy on the United Nations and its leaders.

Laughter in Rome, Denials in Berlin
The World Reacts to Massive Diplomatic Leak
Spiegel.de
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, depicted as a vain party animal in the US State Department cables disclosed by WikiLeaks on Sunday, "had a good laugh" upon learning of the revelations. Others aren't as sanguine. A US Representative wants to designate the Internet platform as a terrorist organization.
The dispatches from Rome were hardly complimentary. A cable from June 9, 2009 describes Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi as "feckless, vain, and ineffective as a modern European leader." The cable says he has an "overweening self-confidence" that has "made him deaf to dissenting opinion." A separate dispatch says that Berlusconi's "frequent late nights and penchant for partying hard mean that he does not get sufficient rest."

WikiLeaks: China weary of North Korea behaving like 'spoiled child'
By Tim Lister, CNN
(CNN) -- New documents posted on the websites of the Guardian and The New York Times suggest Chinese officials are losing patience with long-time ally North Korea. Senior figures in Beijing have even described the regime in the North as behaving like a "spoiled child."
According to cables obtained by WikiLeaks, South Korea's then vice foreign minister, Chun Yung-woo, said earlier this year that senior Chinese officials (whose names are redacted in the cables) had told him they believed Korea should be reunified under Seoul's control, and that this view was gaining ground with the leadership in Beijing.

Wikileaks cables reveal China 'ready to abandon North Korea'
Leaked dispatches show Beijing is frustrated with military actions of 'spoiled child' and increasingly favours reunified Korea
By Simon Tisdall - guardian.co.uk
China has signalled its readiness to accept Korean reunification and is privately distancing itself from the North Korean regime, according to leaked US embassy cables that reveal senior Beijing figures regard their official ally as a "spoiled child".
News of the Chinese shift comes at a crucial juncture after the North's artillery bombardment of a South Korean island last week that killed four people and led both sides to threaten war. China has refused to condemn the North Korean action. But today Beijing appeared to bow to US pressure to help bring about a diplomatic solution, calling for "emergency consultations" and inviting a senior North Korean official to Beijing.

U.S. and South Korea Reject Talks With North
By HELENE COOPER and SHARON LaFRANIERE - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - The United States, South Korea and Japan are all balking at China's request for emergency talks with North Korea over the crisis on the Korean Peninsula, as high-profile military exercises between South Korea and the United States in the Yellow Sea continued on Monday in a show of force.
Obama administration officials said that a return to the table with North Korea, as China sought this weekend, would be rewarding the North for provocative behavior over the past week, including its deadly artillery attack on a South Korean island and its disclosure of a uranium enrichment plant. Beijing called for emergency talks with North Korea, the United States, Japan, South Korea and Russia, participants in the six-party nuclear talks, which have been suspended indefinitely.

Regime Change Realistic? 'North Korea on Chinese life support'

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Monday 11.29.2010

World At A Boil With War And Economic Crisis
By Bob Chapman - TheInternationalForecaster.com
Koreas prepare for war, Fed beyond point of no return, silver manipulation charges, Ireland in economic collapse, pondering foreclosuregate, more Madoff fallout, TSA patdowns despised...
There is no question that the world is at a boil. Germany is drawing anger; N. Korea has attacked S. Korea; flaying about the FED's Mr. Bernanke blames China for America's sad economic and financial dilemma; five suits, class action and RICO, have been filed against JPMorgan Chase and HSBC for having manipulated silver prices and class actions are rumored to be in process for naked shorting, which has been rampant in the market for years, a felony hedge fund investigation of insider trading, which the SEC has absolutely refused to pursue. The US is still occupying Iraq and has a war raging in Afghanistan to protect the opium and marijuana crops, the largest in the world, which generate $300 billion in profits a year. Socialists, having recently relinquished power in the US House of Representatives are calling Republicans an axis of depression. The socialist, what they cannot control, they attempt to destroy. It reminds us of Italy's communists.

Iran Fortifies Its Arsenal With the Aid of North Korea
by William J. Broad, James Glanz and David E. Sanger - NYTimes.com
Secret American intelligence assessments have concluded that Iran has obtained a cache of advanced missiles, based on a Russian design, that are much more powerful than anything Washington has publicly conceded that Tehran has in its arsenal, diplomatic cables show.
Iran obtained 19 of the missiles from North Korea, according to a cable dated Feb. 24 of this year. The cable is a detailed, highly classified account of a meeting between top Russian officials and an American delegation led by Vann H. Van Diepen, an official with the State Department's nonproliferation division who, as a national intelligence officer several years ago, played a crucial role in the 2007 assessment of Iran's nuclear capacity.

China Envoy Seeks Urgent Talks on Korea
By GORDON FAIRCLOUGH And EVAN RAMSTAD - WSJ.com
SEOUL - China said mounting tensions on the Korean peninsula in the wake of a deadly North Korean artillery attack on the South are "worrying" and called Sunday for emergency consultations in Beijing, as the U.S. and South Korea started large-scale naval drills in the Yellow Sea.
Beijing's diplomatic initiative followed a hurried weekend visit to Seoul by China's top foreign-affairs official, State Councilor Dai Bingguo, and other Chinese officials, and appeared aimed at restarting a series of six-party talks that for years have sought to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear-weapons ambitions.

China proposes 'six-party talks' meeting amid Korean tensions
By the CNN Wire Staff
(CNN) -- China is proposing to convene an emergency consultation with members of the six-party talks amid growing tensions on the Korean peninsula, a Chinese official and an American official said Sunday.
"The Chinese side, after careful studies, proposes to have emergency consultations among the heads of delegation to the six-party talks in early December in Beijing to exchange views on major issues of concern to the parties at present," Wu Dawei, Chinese special representative for Korean peninsula affairs, told journalists.

The Irish "get it"
By: Michael T Bucci - MarketOracle.co.uk
The people of Ireland "get it". The people of Greece, Spain, and Portugal "get it". It's the American who doesn't. What do they "get"? They realize the austerities imposed upon them are to shield, protect and defend the profits of the bankers, the traders, the market speculators, hedge funds, bond holders and entire investment class who will suffer little if at all from their market loses - the people will bear their loses.
The American will blame the poor, the food stamp recipient, the welfare queen, the non-working non-taxpaying "bum" for conditions that have been perpetuated by the current and past administration in league with the wealth and multinational sectors. Their crimes are against all people and against the state, crimes that continue to go unchecked, immune from prosecution and concealed by America's ruling class and mass media who are now fully in the saddle after the elections of November 2.

Iceland Is No Ireland as State Kept Free of Bank Debt
By Jonas Bergman and Omar R. Valdimarsson
Nov. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Iceland's President Olafur R. Grimsson said his country is better off than Ireland thanks to the government's decision to allow the banks to fail two years ago and because the krona could be devalued.
"The difference is that in Iceland we allowed the banks to fail," Grimsson said in an interview with Bloomberg Television's Mark Barton today. "These were private banks and we didn't pump money into them in order to keep them going; the state did not shoulder the responsibility of the failed private banks."

Max Keiser: Teutonic Genie out of bottle,
America punches itself in face

Happy Holidays?
28 Hard Questions It Would Be Great If We Could Get Some Real Answers To
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Over the coming weeks, Americans will be wishing each other "happy holidays" millions upon millions of times. But are these really happy times? Record numbers of Americans are going to be going hungry and cold this winter. Millions upon millions of our fellow citizens would gladly give up all holiday celebrations in exchange for a decent job. The vast majority of us have plenty of examples of horrible personal tragedy all around us this holiday season, and much of that tragedy has been brought on by the deteriorating economic conditions. Meanwhile, we have a "control freak" government that wants to establish an even tighter grip over our lives and that now insists on either viewing our exposed bodies or groping our private areas before we can get on an airplane. Once upon a time in America the holiday season was a time to rejoice because we lived in a prosperous land where liberty and freedom were respected, but today we live in a nation with a highly centralized economy dominated by a federal government that is becoming more "totalitarian" by the day.

Bernanke Rolling the Dice: America's Financial Dilemma
By: Bob Chapman - MarketOracle.co.uk
There is no question that the world is at a boil. Germany is drawing anger; N. Korea has attacked S. Korea; flaying about the FED's Mr. Bernanke blames China for America's sad economic and financial dilemma; five suits, class action and RICO, have been filed against JPMorgan Chase and HSBC for having manipulated silver prices and class actions are rumored to be in process for naked shorting, which has been rampant in the market for years, a felony hedge fund investigation of insider trading, which the SEC has absolutely refused to pursue.
The US is still occupying Iraq and has a war raging in Afghanistan to protect the opium and marijuana crops, the largest in the world, which generate $300 billion in profits a year. Socialists, having recently relinquished power in the US House of Representatives are calling Republicans an axis of depression.

EU rescue costs start to threaten Germany itself
The escalating debt crisis on the eurozone periphery is starting to contaminate the creditworthiness of Germany and the core states of monetary union.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
Credit default swaps (CDS) measuring risk on German, French and Dutch bonds have surged over recent days, rising significantly above the levels of non-EMU states in Scandinavia.
"Germany cannot keep paying for bail-outs without going bankrupt itself," said Professor Wilhelm Hankel, of Frankfurt University. "This is frightening people. You cannot find a bank safe deposit box in Germany because every single one has already been taken and stuffed with gold and silver. It is like an underground Switzerland within our borders. People have terrible memories of 1948 and 1923 when they lost their savings."

Greece Ireland --> Portugal --> Spain --> Italy --> UK --> ?
Washington's Blog.com
It is now common knowledge that there is a potential domino effect of European sovereign debt contagion in roughly the following order:
Greece --> Ireland --> Portugal --> Spain --> Italy --> UK
While some people have been writing about this for well over a year, many others have joined the party late (there are now over 600,000 hits from a Google search discussing this topic.)
It is also now common knowledge that while Greece and Ireland have relatively small economies, there will be real trouble if the Spanish domino falls.

Ukraine Falls Into IMF's Trap
By: Pravda - MarketOracle.co.uk
Small businessmen protest against the new Tax Code in Ukraine. There are many flaws in the document indeed, but it was passed in a rush because Ukraine had to meet the requirements of the IMF. At present moment, the IMF is a savior for Ukraine - economic catastrophe is inevitable otherwise.
Lithuania's ex-President Valdas Adamkus visited Kiev several days ago, where he met Ukraine's ex-President Viktor Yushchenko, to celebrate the sixth anniversary of the orange revolution. This year, though, there were no massive celebrations in the country. On Kiev's central square one could see many demonstrators. However, the slogans, which they were carrying and chanting, had nothing in common with the events, which rocked the former Soviet republic six years ago. Spokespeople for Ukraine's small business gathered on Maidan to protest against the new Tax Code.

China, Russia, Iran Dumping Dollar For Gold
International Forecaster - SilverBearCafe.com
Something is going on that your government does not want you to know about. Very few journalists have written about it and little or nothing has appeared in the mainstream media. The story could be one of major stories of our time.
Western powers have tried to destroy gold as a backing for currencies for many years. Presently the major media won't touch the story and that is understandable.
Something we have been writing about for years is the Shanghai Cooperation Organization known as SCO. Few have been listening and few have been interested in what their mission is and what they have been up to.

pt 1/2 Gerald Celente on Goldseek Radio Nov 26th, 2010

pt 2/2 Gerald Celente on Goldseek Radio Nov 26th, 2010

Spain, Portugal to fuel gold price rise
By Geena Paul
LONDON (Commodity Online): Speculation is rife that Spain and Portugal will also be forced to follow Ireland to seek a bailout plan as the two countries are on the radar of economic collapse now. This uncertainty has added to the bullion market's buoyancy now.
Whenever there is a crisis in global economies gold is the first commodity which will benefit from it as investors rush to park their money in the safety of gold. The yellow metal is considered the best safe haven option for investors during crisis.
Recently the EU had announced an emergency bailout plan for Ireland. Following which the gold prices had scaled record levels anticipating further trouble in European economy.

The Gold Price Isn't About Gold!
By: Julian DW Phillips - MarketOracle.co.uk
Since 2000, the gold price has risen from $300 to $1,400 an ounce. There are several more important reasons than its being 'just a commodity.' The strongest driving force behind gold's rise in the last four years has been investment demand. As a commodity, it doesn't tarnish, it's a great conductor, and makes good looking jewelry. But these reasons are not the reasons why people invest in gold.
When they do buy gold, they lock it away. When they do keep it close, they take it out only occasionally to look at it. Most gold is never looked at or ever seen by its owners. It is stuck in a vault below ground. So if gold is not used or admired, why was so much of it bought so as to make the gold price multiply more than four times over this century and why will so much be bought in the future so as to make it likely to multiply a few times more in the future?

Gold may ride safe haven wave next week
LONDON (Commodity Online): Gold prices witnessed a fall towards end of the week with the dollar gaining strength following the Europe crisis.
However, with Spain and Portugal still in trouble gold may witness further safe haven demand in the coming week.
The price of gold plunged $22.35 to $1,353 per ounce on Saturday as the US dollar rally picked up steam. The US dollar index broke back above the 80 level, trading at 80.45 on the back of weakness in the euro.
Gold prices have risen in tandem with the broader commodity complex as well as the global equity market. Therefore, despite being a counter-cyclical asset class, the gold price is sinking as investors liquidate portfolio positions of any and all kind.

Silver money for China
By: Hugo Salinas Price - SilverSeek.com
We have been proposing the monetization of a silver coin in Mexico since 2001. According to our proposal a one-ounce coin of pure silver, with no engraved value, would be given a monetary value by the Mexican Central Bank. This coin would exist and circulate as money, in parallel with the paper money system of Mexico.
The monetary value would be superior to the bullion value of the silver ounce by about 15%. This margin would allow a profit, called "seigniorage", for the Central Bank. Since the coin would not have an engraved value, rises in the price of silver (which would tend to eliminate the seigniorage of the Central Bank) would be met with new, higher, Central Bank quotes for the monetary value of the coin.

Remonetization of Silver: At What Price?
Ryan Jordan - SilverBearCafe.com
Hugo Salinas Price is the head of the Mexican Civic Association Pro Silver and has been calling for the reintroduction of a silver coin in Mexico since 2001. According to Price's association, his proposal is gaining support. If you go to www.plata.com.mx, and can speak Spanish, you will find the report, "Moneda de Plata Para Mexico," where Sr. Price has found several supporters for silver coinage from across the political spectrum in Mexico. And Price not only advocates a small remonetization of silver for his own country: he recently penned an excellent article ("Silver Money for China" November 26) where he proposes that the Chinese begin to coin, essentially, a silver dime. The production of this dime, reckons Price, will be effective at draining excess liquidity away from speculative purposes and into a place where excess liquidity belongs: hard money. The connection between silver and China was not lost on me, since silver has played a much larger role in Chinese monetary history than has gold. And these days, as China goes, so goes the world.

Talk of Oil at $100 Returns as Options Bets Jump: Energy Markets
By Grant Smith and Mark Shenk
Nov. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Oil's return to $100 has become the biggest bet in the crude options market.
The price of options to buy December 2011 futures at $100 a barrel jumped 14 percent on Nov. 24, the largest one-day gain in three months, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. So-called open interest for the contract has risen 51 percent this year to 45,424 lots, the highest for any crude option on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Survey Shows U.S. Has Abundant Rare Earth Supplies
by David Gabel - OilPrice.com
In the headlines lately has been news of China's monopoly of rare earth elements (REE), adding to China's growing clout. It would increase their leverage should they choose to reduce exports, causing REE prices to soar. The United States imports almost all of its REE from China, putting it in a position of geopolitical weakness. In light of this circumstance, the US Geological Survey (USGS) has conducted a study to map out the presence of REE found domestically. It turns out that rare earth elements in the United States are not so rare.
Rare earth elements are a group of 17 metallic elements that are essential for high technology applications. They all have unique electrical, optical, and thermal properties that distinguish them from more common minerals. REE are composed of Scandium (#21 on the periodic table, Yttrium (#39), and lanthanides (#57-71) which include Lanthanum, Promethium, and Europium.

Jon Hykawy Sees Downstream Value in Rare Earths
GoldSeek.com
"Rare earth-equipped motors are the lightest, most efficient motors possible for powering these hybrid and electric cars in the future and that doesn't seem to be something that's going to change," says Jon Hykawy, who was part of a panel at the recent Forbes and Manhattan Resource Summit in West Palm Beach, Fla.
Joining Jon on the panel were REE specialist Dr. Tony Mariano and Ted Miller. Hykawy stressed that the weight-saving and heat-dissipating qualities of REEs are critical to building battery magnets and the light engines that travel the maximum distance on a single charge.

Global Debt Crisis Implosions,
Use Gold and Silver to Protect from The Big One, Coming Soon
By: DeepCaster LLC - Marketoracle.co.uk
"Attempts to bail out the Irish banking sector via multinational loans will only increase debt burdens in Europe and lead to a nightmarish scenario there, says New York University economist Nouriel Roubini.
There is too much private debt in Ireland, and aid from the International Monetary Fund, the European Union or whoever merely amounts to pushing the payday down the road and ultimately increasing the total amount owed in the end.

Gold shows its true metal
By Henry C K Liu - Asia Times
The US Federal Reserve continues to engage in serial quantitative easing to release more fiat dollars into the US banking system, with the aim of enlarging the money supply to try in vain to revive a gravely impaired economy that is already weighted down with excess debt and misdirected liquidity.
The express purpose is to lower long-term interest rates. At the same time, gold keeps rising in price as other commodities fall because gold is a monetary metal, not just an industrial commodity. Gold has not increased in value; only the dollar has declined in value as the price of gold rises.

Economic Boom, Bust, and Gold
By: Frank Shostak - MarketOracle.co.uk
In his interview with the CNBC on November 9, 2010, a highly regarded Wall Street economist, Nouriel Roubini, the cofounder and chairman of Roubini Global Economics, said that a gold standard is unlikely to stabilize the financial system. On the contrary, holds Roubini, such a standard can only make things much worse.
For instance, argues Roubini, an economy that is growing quickly would tend to overheat and this in turn is likely to lead to a higher inflation and asset bubbles.
In contrast, an economy that is growing more slowly would have a tendency toward deflationary pressure and recession.

Have you noticed trend reversal in Dollar and Gold?
By Jeb Handwerger - CommodityOnline.com
An important inverse inter-market relationship is continuing between the U.S. Dollar and Gold. They have both broken trendlines simultaneously and are threatening a counter trend move. Other than yesterday's spike on a conflict in Korea, the dollar and gold have moved inversely and one appears to be bottoming while gold threatens to make a topping pattern.
Most traders use trendlines to determine when a trend changes, but many forget to follow that important line after the break has occurred. Smart traders have been monitoring the extended trendline on the dollar and gold this past week. It will be used to determine if this trend reversal is confirmed or if there is a chance of a technical failure.

'Bank Run 2010' aims to end 'criminal, corrupt' financial system
By Daniel Tencer - RawStory.com
In what may be the most subversive reaction yet to global outrage over the financial crisis, a European soccer star has inspired an international "bank run" protest aiming to collapse the global financial system.
The organizers of "Bank Run 2010" have chosen December 7 as the day when protesters are meant to withdraw their money from the banks, which they hope will cause a run on the banks that could collapse financial institutions.
But critics of the move say it's futile: If the protest is successful, they say, it will only result in another taxpayer bailout of the banks.

Currency Crisis!
So What Happens If The Dollar And The Euro Both Collapse?
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Some analysts are warning that the U.S. dollar is in danger of collapse because of the exploding U.S. government debt, the horrific U.S. trade deficit and the new round of quantitative easing recently announced by the Federal Reserve. Other analysts are warning the the euro is in danger of collapse because of the very serious sovereign debt crisis that is affecting nations such as Greece, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Belgium and Spain. So what happens if the dollar and the euro both collapse? Well, it would certainly throw the current world financial order into a state of chaos, but what would emerge from the ashes? Would the nations of the world go back to using dozens of different national currencies or would we see a truly global currency emerge for the very first time?

The Day the Dollar Died [futuristic projection - fiction]

Narco-Dollars for Dummies
"How the Money Works" in the Illicit Drug Trade
Catherine Austin Fitts - SilverBearCafe.com
"The Latin American drug cartels have stretched their tentacles much deeper into our lives than most people believe. It's possible they are calling the shots at all levels of government."
- William Colby, former CIA Director, 1995
A Simple Framework: The Solari Index and the Dow Jones Index
The Solari Index is my way of estimating how well a place is doing. It is based upon the percentage of people in a place who believe that a child can leave their home and go to the nearest place to buy a popsicle and come home alone safely.

Money, Credit and the Federal Reserve Banking System - Part 3
Money, Credit and the Federal Reserve Banking System Conquer the Crash - By: EWI - MarketOracle.co.uk
How the Federal Reserve Has Encouraged the Growth of Credit
Congress authorized the Fed not only to create money for the government but also to "smooth out" the economy by manipulating credit (which also happens to be a re-election tool for incumbents). Politics being what they are, this manipulation has been almost exclusively in the direction of making credit easy to obtain. The Fed used to make more credit available to the banking system by monetizing federal debt, that is, by creating money. Under the structure of our "fractional reserve" system, banks were authorized to employ that new money as "reserves" against which they could make new loans. Thus, new money meant new credit.

Money, Credit and the Federal Reserve Banking System - Part 2

Money, Credit and the Federal Reserve Banking System - Part 1

The Importance of Sovereign Wealth Funds to the World Economy
by Diplomatic Courier - OilPrice.com
An Interview with Dr. Alexander Mirtchev on the Global Economic Security Significance of Sovereign Wealth Funds.
DC: What role do sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) play in the modern global economy?
Dr. Mirtchev: To begin with, SWFs are a modern iteration of economic power projection by states on the international scene. In one form or another, vehicles resembling SWFs have been around for a long time. Similar entities investing state funds, generated from reserves or trade surpluses (such as from natural resources), or utilizing substantial state support or privilege, could very well include conglomerates such as VOC (the Dutch East India Company) or the British East India Company. Another thing they appear to have in common with modern SWFs is that they were the pioneers in frontier markets, often creating regional trade beyond what the local governments and businesses were able to create. It should not be forgotten, however, that SWFs are often perceived to be driven by political, rather than economic, considerations. At the end of the day, they often are, which is only natural, as their shareholders are governments. Thus, the story is much more complex.

Why the Government Hates Deflation
By: Richard Daughty - GoldSeek.com
.... It got so bad around the end of the housing bubble that that changes in bank reserves were, literally, zero, as nothing was held against the banks literally lending out as much new money as they wanted, whether they had additional deposits or not! Infinite leverage!
It's not quite that way now, although bank reserves are still a piddly $68 billion, while the M2 money supply is up over $400 billion, to $8.76 trillion, from this time last year, which is an increase of about 4%.
And the Fed is already launching QE2 to create another $600 billion ($1.2 trillion annualized) so that the federal government can deficit-spend it in the next six months! I howl - Ahhooooohhh! - in outrage!

Obama debt commission: It's almost a wrap
By Jeanne Sahadi,
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- After working for eight months, the 18 members of President Obama's bipartisan deficit commission will finish their deliberations this week over how to reduce the nation's long-term debt.
Expectations are low that the panel, which holds its final public meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday, will get the 14 votes required to make official recommendations to Congress.
But even if the panel doesn't produce a unified report, the group's efforts may not have been in vain.

The shadow bailout of the commercial real estate industry - bailing out the Ritz, failed million dollar unit condo projects, and buying empty shopping malls. Why the Fed wants to destroy the US dollar and continue the failed bailouts of the banking sector.
by MyBudget360.com
It is amazing that so little information about commercial real estate has made it onto the mainstream media. Few in the public realize that commercial real estate (CRE) has actually fallen harder than residential real estate yet 99.9 percent of all media coverage has been strictly on residential real estate. The CRE market is enormous with over $3 trillion in CRE loans still outstanding and festering on the balance sheet of banks. At one point, CRE values reached over $6 trillion in the US with $3 trillion in loans. Today, CRE values are down to roughly $3.3 trillion yet the loan amount still hovers at $3 trillion. This is the disastrous end game of being underwater in real estate. While people fill the stores this holiday season consuming money they don't have (after all nothing says thank you America like buying imported goods) property values are still in the dark levels of the trough. The banking sector is doing a complicated shadow bailout through quantitative easing, ignoring missed payments, rolling over CRE loans, and ultimately trying to sucker taxpayers into paying the entire bill. Ultimately this shadow bailout has been going on for years and no one seems to even care.

Durbin Says Debate in U.S. Congress to Go Beyond Bush Tax Cuts
By Joshua Zumbrun
Nov. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the senate's No. 2 Democrat, said negotiations over extending the Bush-era tax cuts also will include prolonging emergency unemployment benefits and other tax credits.
"I want to put a couple other things on the table," Durbin said today on NBC's "Meet the Press." "We do have unemployment running out," he said, and "I also want to make sure the earned-income tax credit, the childcare tax credit, and the 'Making Work Pay' tax credit are part" of the discussion.

Lame-duck Congress has big tax-cut decision to make
By Adam Shell, USA TODAY
NEW YORK -The midterm elections may be over, but what decisions are made in Washington in coming weeks during the lame-duck session of Congress could determine the fate of a hoped-for year-end stock rally.
As 2010 winds down, there are still unresolved issues the current Congress has to deal with that have potential market-moving impact. The biggest uncertainty: Will lame-duck lawmakers extend the Bush-era tax cuts before they expire on Dec. 31?

Peter Schiff - Dollar rally, sovereign debt, black Friday

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Countrywide Documentation Disaster to Explode at Bank of America?
Ash Bennington - SilverBearCafe.com
The mortgage documentation mess keeps getting stickier.
The latest is this: Countrywide Financial, now owned by Bank of America [BAC Loading] , appears not to have properly transferred necessary mortgage documents when it sold loans to other banks, which then in turn created residential mortgage backed securities (RMBS) from the loans.
The documents Countrywide failed to provide are critical to the owners of the RMBS because without them homeowners can question the legal right of banks to foreclose on their homes.

Number of the Week: 492 Days From Default to Foreclosure
By Mark Whitehouse - WSJ.com
492: The number of days since the average borrower in foreclosure last made a mortgage payment.
Banks can't foreclose fast enough to keep up with all the people defaulting on their mortgage loans. That's a problem, because it could make stiffing the bank even more attractive to struggling borrowers.
In recent months, the number of borrowers entering severe delinquency - meaning they missed their third monthly mortgage payment - has been on the decline, falling to about 700,000 in October, according to mortgage-data provider LPS Applied Analytics. But it's still more than double the number of foreclosure processes started.

Home Sales Drop Once Again
EndOftheAmericanDream.com
Existing home sales in the U.S. are down again. New home sales in the U.S. are down again. What else is new? The U.S. housing industry just cannot seem to bounce back. Mortgage lenders have really, really tightened up lending standards and so now there are a lot fewer qualified buyers than there used to be. It is as if the big financial institutions have nearly shut off the flow of credit. But without credit, the vast majority of American families don't have a prayer of achieving the American Dream of owning a home. Even with mortgage rates close to record lows the housing market is still languishing. Unfortunately, it doesn't matter how low mortgage rates are if American families can't get home loans approved. With unemployment still staggeringly high and with incomes still declining, it appears that the U.S. housing market is going to continue to suffer for some time to come.

Some homeowners still owe after short sale
By Catherine Reagor, The Arizona Republic
PHOENIX - Some former homeowners who went through short sales to avoid foreclosure are finding they are still in debt to their lenders.
Because the short-sale concept, which allows people to sell their homes for less than they owe, is designed specifically to help homeowners avoid having to pay their lenders more money, some sellers have been careful to negotiate their deals so the lender, by contract, can't later seek payment. Those who haven't done so are at risk.

Recessions Are on the Margin
By: John Mauldin - GoldSeek.com
And the data out over the last few weeks tells us it is getting better. Does this take us out of the double-dip woods, even as the Fed is lowering its forecast? And what is a recession? Yes, we all know it's when the economy doesn't grow, but we are in a rather unique economic environment, this time. Maybe things are getting better, but is it enough to get us back on the road to full employment?
Let's start off with what is going right. We had a slate of news over the past few weeks that was good. The ECRI weekly Leading Index, after some ugly downtrends, is showing signs of turning around. We have had small increases each week since October 15, and the annualized growth rate of the index is now only -3.1%, having increased for 12 weeks. Its recent low was in July. Yes, I know that a large part of that growth is in the financial sector, as the stock market is up and interest rates are low, but it does suggest that 2011 should not be a recession year.

America's Standard of Living is About to Fall Off a Cliff
Bob Chapman - SilverBearCafe.com
The social net has become a bit more frayed. Soon extended unemployment benefits will cease and 2 million Americans will have to dip into their savings, if they have any. This is an outgrowth of the effects of free trade, globalization, offshoring and outsourcing. We have lost 8.5 million jobs over the last ten years to this destructive process. We have seen more than 42,000 manufacturing plants leave the country as well. There are now more than 17 million Americans unemployed and the U6 official government unemployment figures 17%. If you remove the bogus birth/death ration, the real figure is 22-5/8%. Over that ten-year period we have lost about 5.5 million manufacturing jobs or about 1/3rd of that labor force. As recent as 1985, 25% of output was in manufacturing, now it is close to 11%. America's physical infrastructure is in a shambles, so that transnational conglomerates can bring us cheap goods to suppress inflation and bring these companies mega-profits, which they keep stored offshore to bypass taxation. They presently have $1.7 trillion in such profits.

Bankruptcy Comes With Social Stigma
By Sara Murray - WSJ.com
Bankruptcy is still something of a scarlet letter even though a lot more Americans are seeking to shed their debts in court.
Some $588 billion in consumer loans were wiped out in the past two years - both in and out of bankruptcy - but the stigma of shedding debts in bankruptcy remains strong while the stigma from walking away from a mortgage appears to have eased.
A Society for Human Resource Management Survey showed a quarter of employers said a bankruptcy would make them unlikely to extend a job offer to a candidate. Just 11% said the same about a foreclosure.

The Social Security Deficit
By DAVID LEONHARDT - NYTimes.com
Several readers have taken issue with our deficit puzzle's description of Social Security's finances, arguing that the program does not have serious problems. This post explains the details behind our description.
The government pays Social Security benefits with the revenue collected from the payroll tax. For many years, the annual revenue coming in to the government has exceeded the amount it pays out. This extra money has been placed in a trust fund that earns interest.
There are at least two ways to think about the long-term deficit facing the Social Security system.

Black Friday 2010: why it matters to the rest of the world
Intriguing it certainly is that two families in Florida have been camping for a week at a Best Buy store to make sure they are first in the queue for the "Black Friday" sales - but why does it matter to the rest of the world?
By Emma Rowley - Telegraph.co.uk
The US's busiest shopping day of the year is, for analysts and investors, all about what insight it offers into how the world's biggest economy will perform over the key Christmas shopping period.
Put simply, the American consumer sneezes and we could all catch a cold.
Consumer spending represents an estimated 70pc of US economic activity - although some quibble with that figure - and drove global demand during the decade-long boom.

Black Friday: America's Running Of The Bulls
by Mac Slavo - SHTFPlan.com
In Spain they have an annual running of the bulls, often dangerous, sometimes deadly.
In America, we have our own version. It's called Black Friday, a day when seemingly calm humans are transformed into animals. They're predators that will stop at nothing to catch their prey - TV's, video game systems, clothes, jewelry, and anything that's on sale and not nailed down.
At times, it's as dangerous as the yearly San Fermin festival.
Videos of this year's Black Friday sales follow.

Next up: Cyber Monday, e-tailers' big day
By Parija Kavilanz
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Online sellers kick off the coming week with one of their biggest sales days of the year - Cyber Monday.
E-tailers consider it their version of Black Friday. It is the day that Web merchants furiously push big discounts, free gift cards, free shipping and any other gimmick they can think of to entice consumers to spend even more of their holiday shopping dollars online.
If pre-Black Friday sales are an indication, consumers are shopping more enthusiastically both in stores and online.

Employers Still Uncertain On Hiring New Graduates
By JOE LIGHT - WSJ.com
College graduates might find a better job market this academic year, but many employers are still uncertain if they will hire at all.
Thirty-six percent of companies that hired new graduates last year are either uncertain that they will hire or won't hire this year, according to a survey by the Collegiate Employment Research Institute at Michigan State University. Among employers who didn't hire new graduates last year, 76% said they won't hire or aren't sure.
"Companies whose sales haven't returned remain extremely uncertain," said CERI director Phil Gardner. "They don't want to make a commitment to hire when everything could still go foul on them."

Medical Schools Can't Keep Up
As Ranks of Insured Expand, Nation Faces Shortage of 150,000 Doctors in 15 Years
By SUZANNE SATALINE And SHIRLEY S. WANG - WSJ.com
The new federal health-care law has raised the stakes for hospitals and schools already scrambling to train more doctors.
Experts warn there won't be enough doctors to treat the millions of people newly insured under the law. At current graduation and training rates, the nation could face a shortage of as many as 150,000 doctors in the next 15 years, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.
That shortfall is predicted despite a push by teaching hospitals and medical schools to boost the number of U.S. doctors, which now totals about 954,000.

Embracing Incentives for Efficient Health Care
By ANNA WILDE MATHEWS - WSJ.com
Spurred by incentives in the federal health-overhaul law, hospitals and doctors around the country are beginning to create new entities that aim to provide more efficient health care.
But these efforts are already raising questions about whether they can truly save money, or if they might actually drive costs higher.
In Arizona, Tucson Medical Center is forming a company that the hospital will own jointly with local physicians' practices. The joint venture will aim to sign contracts with insurers and Medicare to earn financial rewards if it saves health-care dollars.

Your paycheck is about to shrink
By Blake Ellis
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Are you ready to give up $30 a month?
That's what may come out of your paycheck if -- as expected -- the Making Work Pay tax credit expires at the end of the year.
The credit was enacted last year as part of the Recovery Act to put more cash in people's pockets. For the past two years, it has boosted paychecks by up to $400 for single filers and $800 for joint filers by reducing the tax withheld and giving a credit for that amount. That's $33 or $67 a month.

99ers: The unemployed need help!
By Tami Luhby
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Unemployed workers of America Unite!
That's what the long-term jobless -- branding themselves "the 99ers" -- are doing to raise awareness of their plight.
Grassroots activist groups are springing up around the nation to petition lawmakers to extend unemployment benefits beyond the 99-week limit and to do more to create jobs. The jobless are conducting letter-writing campaigns and holding rallies.
The goal: Give a voice to the unemployed.
"It made sense that we all join together so when we contact elected officials, they know it's not just 20 people or 200 people, it's thousands and thousands and thousands of people," said Gregg Rosen, co-founder of The American 99ers Union, an alliance of 19 organizations.

Steve Jobs, global thinker
Posted by Philip Elmer-DeWitt
Shares the No. 17 spot on Foreign Policy's 2010 top 100 list "for reinventing reading"
You don't often hear Apple (AAPL) and Amazon's (AMZN) CEOs mentioned in the same breath, but there they are in the current issue of Foreign Policy, honored together for the contribution of their competing e-readers.
It's an odd pairing, given what Steve Jobs said about Jeff Bezos' Kindle in 2008:
"It doesn't matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don't read anymore," he told the New York Times. "Forty percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year. The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don't read anymore."
But that was before Apple released the iPad.

bad grass starves livestock and wildlife - ranchers and hunters see article and map below:

Medusahead: An Inedible Grass Threatens Western Rangeland
By BRUCE KENNEDY - DailyFinance.com
The plant contains a high level of the mineral silica, which makes it inedible. Its spiky head and seeds cut the mouths of animals attempting to graze on it -- from cattle to deer to rodents
Burmese pythons in Florida, zebra mussels in the Great Lakes, feral pigs and other mammals in Hawaii: These are just a few of the dozens of stories about animals introduced -- accidentally or deliberately -- in the U.S. that have ended up playing havoc on regional ecologies and economies.
But invasive species also extend to plant life. Residents of the South are well acquainted with kudzu, the fast-growing and disruptive vine originally intended as livestock feed and for erosion control. Purple loosestrife arrived in New England back in the 1800s as an ornamental plant, but now threatens to clog and dry out great areas of America's wetlands -- while reportedly costing communities across the country about $45 million a year in control efforts.

medusahead MAP- [in 17 Western states]
Taeniatherum caput-medusae (L.) Nevski
USDA PLANTS Symbol: TACA8
Invasive Plant Atlas

Website Closures Escalate U.S. War on Piracy
By DON CLARK - WSJ.com $$
A federal crackdown that shut more than 70 websites last week is the latest sign of an escalating war against counterfeit and pirated products, using legal tactics that may be closely scrutinized by civil-liberties groups.
Domain names of the affected sites - which offered such diverse goods as scarves, golf gear and rap music - were seized by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, part of the Department of Homeland Security, under court-approved warrants.

How the U.S. Government Guaranteed the Coming Global Food Crisis
By: DailyWealth - MarketOracle.co.uk
Porter Stansberry with Braden Copeland write: Over the last several years, I've written constantly on the growing likelihood of a global currency collapse.
The governments of Europe and the United States have accumulated debts so large they can't ever hope to repay them, except with currencies whose value will be inflated away by money-printing.
That's led me to recommend inflation hedges like railroads, gold, silver, and various forms of energy. Owning these "real assets" is the single best way to protect yourself from the inflationary crisis. But make sure you don't forget the most important inflation hedge of all: food.

While North And South Korea Exchange Artillery, China and Russia Fire A Warning Shot Against The Bernanke Bow
By Jeb Handwerger - SafeHaven.com
When time permits I like to relax with a good mystery story. One of my favorite masters of the genre is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Shirlock Holmes. A few days ago a story appeared on the front page of China Daily on 11-23-10, that is worthy in emulating the masters great classic: "The Dog That Did Not Bark."
He might have entitled today's story, "The Gold Trade That Did Not Rise." The photo reveals the Premier of China Jaibao and Russia's Putin exchanging firm handshakes and smiling broad cheshire grins.

Putin: Russia will join the euro one day
Louise Armitstead - SilverBearCafe.com
Vladimir Putin said it is "quite possible" that Russia will one day join the eurozone and create a currency that would eclipse the US dollar as the global reserve standard.
He said: "Yes, there are problems. But the economic policy of the European Central Bank and of the governments of leading European economies ... convinces me that the stability of the euro will be ensured."
He added: "We know there are problems in Portugal, Greece, Ireland and the euro is wobbling a bit. On the whole it is a solid, good currency and it should take its place, its role as a reserve currency."

WikiLeaks documents shed light on U.S.-Israel talks over Iran
By Tim Lister
(CNN) -- Diplomatic cables obtained by the website WikiLeaks show a continuous dialogue between Israel and the United States about the threat posed by Iran, with the Israeli defense minister and other Israeli officials suggesting that 2010 would be a critical year.
A cable dated June 2009 describes meetings between two congressional delegations and Israeli officials. It says that Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak "estimated a window between 6 and 18 months from now in which stopping Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons might still be viable."
After that, Barak's view was that "any military solution would result in unacceptable collateral damage," according to the cable.

Arab Leaders Urged U.S. to Stop Iran Bombs, NYT Says
By Miles Weiss
Nov. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Saudi Arabia and other Arab governments sided with Israel in urging the U.S. to stop Iran from developing a nuclear bomb, according to a New York Times account of 250,000 classified U.S. embassy cables released by WikiLeaks, the non-profit website.
In the documents, American officials say that Iran obtained 19 advanced missiles from North Korea, potentially giving the Islamic Republic the capability to attack Moscow and cities in Western Europe, the newspaper said in articles published online today. At the request of the Obama Administration, the New York Times agreed not to publish the text of the Feb. 24 cable that reported the Korean missile deal with Iran.

McCain Says China Not 'Behaving' Responsibly on North Korea
By Miles Weiss
Nov. 28 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Senator John McCain said China's response to North Korea's deadly shelling last week shows that the Beijing government isn't taking on the responsibilities of a world power.
China is not doing enough to restrain its ally North Korea following the Nov. 23 artillery attack on the island of Yeonpyeong that killed four South Koreans, McCain, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said today on CNN's State of the Union. China is North Korea's biggest trading partner.

11 Reasons Why North Korea Is The Most Bizarre Nation On Earth
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Is the United States about to go to war with the most bizarre nation on earth? A lot of Americans would actually welcome "the Korean War Part 2", but before people get too excited it is important to keep in mind that we have never been at war with a nation that actually possesses nuclear weapons. At this point it is unclear exactly how powerful North Korea's nuclear weapons are, but nearly everyone does agree that they are crazy enough to use them. North Korea reportedly has thousands of missile batteries that are capable to hitting the 10 million people that live in Seoul. The death and devastation that an all-out strike on Seoul could potentially cause is almost unimaginable. In fact, the 24.5 million people living either in or around Seoul make it the second largest metropolitan area in the world. The next conflict on the Korean peninsula will be extremely bloody. Nobody should be wishing for that.

Wayne Madsen & Alex Jones:
North Korea Attack Part Of RAND Plan For Total War? 1/2

Wayne Madsen & Alex Jones:
North Korea Attack Part Of RAND Plan For Total War? 2/2

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Wednesday 11.24.2010

George Winston - Thanksgiving

Black Friday: A Festival Of Greed
In The Midst Of A Sea Of Pain And Suffering
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Black Friday - the day after Thanksgiving when millions of Americans line up before the crack of dawn at retail stores across the nation hoping to find great deals on cheap plastic stuff made outside the United States. The Friday after Thanksgiving has become an "unofficial holiday" in recent years, and in fact in many ways it is starting to become as big as Thanksgiving itself. A recent search on Google News found over 31,000 stories about "Thanksgiving" and over 24,000 stories about "Black Friday". Almost every major news organization has been running stories about Black Friday for weeks now. Some of the biggest retailers, including Wal-Mart, Sears, Old Navy and Toys R Us, have had such success with Black Friday sales that they have decided to stay open for Thanksgiving now. You would think that we could all have one day off to spend with family and friends to give thanks for all that we have been blessed with, but apparently that is not going to be possible. Just like so many of our other holidays, the true purpose behind having a holiday called "Thanksgiving" is being totally obliterated by a tsunami of greed. Meanwhile, more Americans than ever are living in poverty this year and very few people even seem to notice.

Ron Paul:
Korea Conflict May Be Orchestrated Crisis To Boost Dollar

Ron Paul:
Korea Conflict May Be Orchestrated Crisis To Boost Dollar
RAND Corporation lobbied Pentagon for major war to reverse US economy
Paul Joseph Watson - Prison Planet.com
Congressman Ron Paul speculated on the Alex Jones Show today that the war footing between North and South Korea could be an orchestrated crisis to boost the dollar and reverse the US economy, paralleling the RAND Corporation's call two years ago for the United States to become embroiled in a major war as a means of preventing a double dip recession.
South Korea admitted that it fired the first shots prompting a North Korean retaliation that killed two South Korean Marines and set ablaze many homes on the Yellow Sea border island of Yeonpyeong.
Tensions are running dangerously high after North Korea's military vowed a "merciless military strike" and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak ordered his military to strike North Korea's missile base around its coastline artillery positions if the North made any further moves. Japan announced that it was preparing for "any eventuality" while Russia said the events represented a "colossal danger" to peace in the region.

2nd Korean War?
South admits firing first shells in row with North Korea

Korean War Crisis: Brought To You By Uncle Sam
US military-industrial complex armed North Korea with nuclear weapons
Paul Joseph Watson - Prison Planet.com
Despite the fact that South Korea admits it fired the first shots that prompted the North to retaliate, the vast majority of the establishment press are feverishly blaming North Korea for a new escalation in the crisis, while failing completely to acknowledge the fact that the whole fiasco was generated as a direct result of Uncle Sam's policy through two separate administrations to ensure hereditary dictator Kim Jong-Il and his successors acquired the atom bomb.
As we have exhaustively documented, North Korea's nuclear belligerency was almost exclusively a creation of the U.S. government in that they armed the Stalinist state both directly and indirectly through global arms dealers under their control, namely Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan. While labeling North Korea as part of the "axis of evil," the U.S. government was enthusiastically funding its nuclear weapons program at every stage.

South vs North: 'Koreas clash could turn into Gulf War III'

S. Korea vows 'stern retaliation' against N. Korea's attacks
By Lee Chi-dong - YohHapNews.co.kr
SEOUL, Nov. 23 (Yonhap) -- President Lee Myung-bak ordered his military Tuesday to punish North Korea for its artillery attacks "through action," not just words, saying it is important to stop the communist regime from contemplating additional provocation.
"The provocation this time can be regarded as an invasion of South Korean territory. In particular, indiscriminate attacks on civilians are a grave matter," a stern-faced Lee said during a visit to the headquarters of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in central Seoul.
The North fired some 100 coastline artillery rounds across the western sea border onto Yeonpyeong Island Tuesday afternoon, killing two marines and wounding more than a dozen others. Three civilians on the small island, home to more than 1,600 residents, mostly fishermen and their families, and a marine corps base, were also wounded.

North Korea Fires Rockets at South
Brazen attack on island near disputed waters kills two marines,
prompts return fire as other nations call for calm
By EVAN RAMSTAD And JAEYEON WOO - WSJ.com
SEOUL - North Korea fired artillery at a South Korean island near a disputed western maritime border Tuesday, killing two South Korean marines in a surprise barrage that kindled global worries about worsening relations between the countries.
A South Korean military unit on the island returned fire, while South Korean military officials scrambled fighter jets. At least 16 marines were injured, military officials said. Three civilians were injured, and the island's 1,200 residents were sent scrambling for bomb shelters.
"The whole neighborhood is on fire," said, Na Young-ok, a resident of the island, called Yeonpyeong, from a bomb shelter about an hour after the shelling began.

North Korea fires artillery at South Korean island of Yeongpyeong
By Keith B. Richburg and William Branigin - Washington Post
BEIJING - North Korea launched a massive artillery barrage on a South Korean island Tuesday, killing two South Korean marines, wounding at least 19 other people and setting more than 60 buildings ablaze in the most serious confrontation since the North's sinking of a South Korean warship in March.
South Korea immediately responded with its own artillery fire and put its fighter jets on high alert, bringing the two sides - which technically have remained in a state of war since the Korean armistice in 1953 - close to the brink of a major conflagration.
In the United States, a White House spokesman said President Obama was "outraged" by North Korea's "provocative" action, adding that Americans stand by South Korea.

Currencies Move as North and South Korea Exchange Artillery
By Chuck Butler - The DailyReckoning.com
11/23/10 St. Louis, Missouri - Well... How do you feel about the roller coaster ride we went on yesterday? I know, it knocked the wind out of me, and the risk assetsÉ And yes, I did keep my arms and legs inside for the ride, but the whipping around was just too much for me! And the risk assetsÉ So, I'll stop beating around the bush, and get to the meat...
Front and center this morningÉ North Korea fired artillery at South Korea's Yeonpyeong island in the Yellow Sea off the countries' west coast, setting houses on fire. According to residents, the South returned fire. A spokesman for South Korea's Joint Chiefs-of-Staff confirmed the exchange but didn't have details except to say "scores of rounds" were fired by the North.
OK... Just what the world needs, right? Another war! I know, I'm getting ahead of myself here, as right now this is just the "exchange of pre-Christmas cards," right? NOT!

Gold back on track on Korea border firing
LONDON (Commodity Online) : Gold turned more volatile in early European trade Tuesday after border firings in the Korean peninsula boosted its appeal.
The precious yellow metal trimmed early losses as North and South Korea exchanged artillery fire but other commodities declined as the dollar also strengthened.
Gold for immediate delivery edged up briefly after falling as much as 0.6 percent to $1,357.7 earlier in the day. It was trading at $1,364.15 an ounce down 0.1 percent.

Gold vs. The Fed: The Record Is Clear
By Charles Kadlek - The DailyReckoning.com
11/22/10 There were no worldwide financial crises of major magnitude during the Bretton Woods era from 1947 to 1971. Lesson: Gold is a more efficient governor of monetary policy that the Federal Reserve.
When it last met, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) signaled its desire to increase the rate of inflation by providing additional monetary stimulus. This policy is based on a false - and dangerous - premise: that manipulating the dollar's buying power will lead to higher employment and economic growth. But the experience of the past 40 years points to the opposite conclusion: that guaranteeing a stable value for the dollar by restoring dollar-gold convertibility would be the surest way for the Federal Reserve to achieve its dual mandate of maximum employment and price stability.

Can gold replace dollar as new global currency
By David Lew - CommodityOnline.com
BEIJING: What happens if China, that has overtaken South Africa as the largest producer of gold, begins to put much of the country's foreign exchange reserves to buy the precious yellow metal?
As countries battle for currency supremacy, the question of China playing with its foreign exchange reserves - much of them held in the US dollar - is an interesting subject under discussion among analysts and economists the world over.
Here is an extract from an opinion that Martin Murenbeeld of Dundee Wealth Inc. shares on global foreign exchange reserves and the Chinese appetite for more gold.

Gold Rises as European Debt, Korea Tensions Boost Haven Demand
By Pham-Duy Nguyen
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Gold jumped the most in two weeks on demand for a haven amid Europe's sovereign-debt crisis and escalating tensions between North and South Korea.
The euro headed for the biggest drop since August against the dollar as credit markets focused on deficits in Spain and Portugal after Ireland sought a rescue package. North Korea lobbed artillery shells near South Korea's border in the worst attack in at least eight months. Gold has gained 26 percent this year, reaching a record $1,424.30 an ounce on Nov. 9.

Restore Gold Standard for price stability, employment
By Charles W. Kadlek - CommodityOnline.com
There were no worldwide financial crises of major magnitude during the Bretton Woods era from 1947 to 1971. Lesson: Gold is a more efficient governor of monetary policy that the Federal Reserve.
When it last met, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) signaled its desire to increase the rate of inflation by providing additional monetary stimulus. This policy is based on a false-and dangerous-premise: that manipulating the dollar's buying power will lead to higher employment and economic growth. But the experience of the past 40 years points to the opposite conclusion: that guaranteeing a stable value for the dollar by restoring dollar-gold convertibility would be the surest way for the Federal Reserve to achieve its dual mandate of maximum employment and price stability.

Keiser Report on Silver Revolt: 'Crash JP Morgan' Goes Viral!

Inflating the Debt Away
BY STEVE SAVILLE
In many economies the total quantity of debt has become so high that repayment is no longer possible using the current supply of money. This means that default on a grand scale is inevitable, the only unknown being the nature of the default. One possibility is that most debt defaults will be the direct kind, while the only other possibility is that enough new money will be created to enable most debts to be repaid using substantially depreciated currency units. The second possibility is often described as "inflating away the debt".

QE236: Engineering Higher Inflation
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
11/23/10 Baltimore, Maryland - First, what happened in the markets yesterday? Nothing. Mr. Market is playing it cool. Still not revealing his intentions...
In the meantime, everybody is watching inflation. At least, they're trying to watch inflation. Some people think they see it. Others don't see anything at all.
"Look, if you monitored consumer prices the way they used to," said colleague Chris Mayer yesterday, "you'd have an inflation reading of about 8%. But now, they've twisted the figures so much, they show no inflation when everyone knows prices are going up."
Prices are soaring - for many things. Tuition, for example. Our youngest son, Edward, is going to college next year. We're looking at colleges and universities. The price tags give us sticker shock.
A lot of other things are going up too - such as food. And gasoline.

Ireland should 'do an Argentina'
The Irish people expected to pay in austerity cuts for their banks' sins have another option. Reject the ECB and IMF, ditch the euro
By Dean Baker - guardian.co.uk
When a firefighter or medical team make a rescue, the person is usually better-off as a result. This is less clear when the rescuer is the European Central Bank (ECB) or the IMF.
Ireland is currently experiencing a 14.1% unemployment rate. As a result of bailout conditions that will require more cuts in government spending and tax increases, the unemployment rate is almost certain to go higher. The Irish people are likely to wonder what their economy would look like if they had not been rescued.

Ireland Hoists "For Sale" Sign Over Stricken Banks
Ireland's banks are up for sale, the country's central bank chief said, as the government seeks to cut them down in size after their reckless lending forced the country to seek an international bailout.
By Reuters - FinanceTech.com
DUBLIN, Nov. 23 - Ireland's banks are up for sale, the country's central bank chief said, as the government seeks to cut them down in size after their reckless lending forced the country to seek an international bailout.
"They are for sale as far as I am concerned," Patrick Honohan said on Tuesday. "I have been an advocate for a number of years for small countries to have foreign owners for their banks".
Dublin has already said it will intensify reform of the banks and surplus activities will have to be discarded.

Bust Is Better Than Bailout for Irish Patient
By Matthew Lynn - Bloomberg Opinion
It's not too late. The request for aid may have been made. The negotiations may have started. But Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen can still refuse a bailout from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.
It might sound like madness for a drowning man to refuse a lifebelt. But the decision the Irish make in the next few days will shape the future of their nation for a generation.
Ireland would be better off going bust than taking a loan. The conditions attached to a rescue aren't worth it: Once it takes EU money, it will never get off the hook. And the Irish banks aren't worth saving anyway. Defaulting on your debts is a far less scary prospect than usually portrayed.

Stick a Fork In It
By Dan Denning - DailyReckoning.com.au
--Well this should be interesting. The EU/IMF bailout of Ireland is not going off without a hitch. The UK's Telegraph reports that Green party, which currently supports Ireland's government, might withdraw that support and call for new elections in January. This would call into doubt the ability of the current government not only to execute a deal with the EU and the IMF but also to pursue its four-year austerity program.
--What a mess. We'll get to how Ireland and Australia are similar in a moment. But first, please recall the words of the great philosopher of the New York Yankees, Yogi Berra. He once said, "When you come to a fork in the road, take it."

Merkel Points to 'Serious' Bailout Risk as Spanish Bonds Drop
By Emma Ross-Thomas and Tony Czuczka
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the prospect of serial European bailouts was "exceptionally serious," sending the euro to a three-month low as officials estimated saving Ireland will cost 85 billion euros ($114 billion).
Irish bonds dropped and the premium that investors demand to hold Spanish debt over German counterparts jumped to a euro- era record as the relief rallies triggered by Ireland's Nov. 21 aid request evaporated. Traders are now betting the turmoil that started in Greece a year ago will spread to Portugal and Spain.

CrossTalk on Ireland: Killer Of A Debt

Irish Rescue Plan Shifts Focus to Portugal, Spain: Euro Credit
Emma Ross-Thomas - WashingtonPost.com
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Ireland's plan to seek a European rescue risks escalating, rather than alleviating, the sovereign debt crisis as investors turn their focus to the high budget- deficit nations of southern Europe, led by Portugal.
Ireland's Nov. 21 decision to request emergency aid from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund fueled a surge in Spain and Portugal's borrowing costs. The extra yield demanded to hold Portuguese 10-year debt rather than German bunds rose 27 basis points today to 434. The Spanish spread with Germany climbed 27 basis points to 236, a euro-era record, after the Treasury sold 3.26 billion euros ($4.4 billion) of bills. That was less than the maximum target.

Spain and Portugal under fire as bond spreads hit record
Borrowing costs for Portugal and Spain have surged to danger levels on fears that Europe's leaders are losing political control of the Irish crisis and have yet to agree on a coherent plan to tackle the eurozone's deeper debt woes.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
Yields on 10-year Portuguese bonds jumped to 6.9pc, replicating the pattern seen in Greece and Ireland just before they capitulated and turned to the EU and the International Monetary Fund.
Spreads on 10-year Spanish bonds rose to a post-EMU record of 233 basis points over Bunds, pushing the yield to 4.87pc. Spain's central bank governor, Miguel Angel Fenrandez Ordonez, said the contagion had spread rapidly to the eurozone periphery and "made itself felt" in the Spanish debt markets. He called on Madrid to accelerate fiscal reforms to persuade the markets the country really means to put its house in order.

China: Bull Market or Bubble? The Story Continues...
By Bill Bonner - DailyReckoning.com.au
The news last week followed the sun. It began with doubts about Ireland's solvency... then moved to fears that California would default... and ended on Friday with doubts about China. Word on the street was that the Middle Kingdom wanted to dampen down inflation. They were going to raise rates and tighten credit.
The Chinese blame Ben Bernanke for increasing the supply of dollars and causing inflation in emerging markets and commodities. Bernanke points his finger at the Chinese. Replying to charges of reckless endangerment, "they made me do it," he says. The Chinese wouldn't raise the yuan... so he has to lower the dollar.
That's what's nice about paper currencies - you can manipulate them. Which is exactly what the US is doing ... trying to manipulate its dollar downward... while simultaneously charging China with being a "currency manipulator."
Which just goes to show how little honor there is among central bankers.

Generation Y: The New Depression Generation?
In college, Matthew Bergh was ahead of the curve, working part-time at a local Starbucks and setting aside a few thousand dollars a year to do what his parents taught him to do -- invest.
By Reuters - FinanceTech.com
NEW YORK - In college, Matthew Bergh was ahead of the curve, working part-time at a local Starbucks and setting aside a few thousand dollars a year to do what his parents taught him to do -- invest.
In 2008 the markets crashed and the recession interrupted his financial dreams. "As of right now, I can't invest," Bergh said. "I'm saving."
Eighteen- to 30-year olds, known as "Generation Y," have taken a more conservative approach to managing their money -- stashing it in a savings account or under the proverbial mattress.

Bernanke Speech Marks Striking Shift in US Policy
By Richard Duncan - The DailyReckoning.com
11/23/10 Singapore, Singapore - Fed Chairman Bernanke's speech on Friday was his most important since his "helicopter money" speech of November 2002. In it he conceded the Dollar Standard is flawed. He said, "As currently constituted, the international monetary system has a structural flaw: It lacks a mechanism, market based or otherwise, to induce needed adjustments by surplus countries, which can result in persistent imbalances."
With that statement, the Fed revealed it has been won over by the logic expressed in my book, The Dollar Crisis (John Wiley & Sons, updated 2005). The first two lines of that book state: "The principal flaw in the post-Bretton Woods international monetary system is its inability to prevent large-scale trade imbalances. The theme of The Dollar Crisis is that those imbalances have destabilized the global economy by creating a worldwide credit bubble."

Judge Andrew Napolitano:
"It's Time to Change Our Government!!" 1/2

Judge Andrew Napolitano:
"It's Time to Change Our Government!!" 2/2

Fed lowers economic expectations for 2011
By Neil Irwin - WashingtonPost.com
Top Federal Reserve officials expect the unemployment rate to remain around nine percent at the end of next year and eight percent at the end of 2012, according to internal forecasts that drove the central bank to take new efforts to boost the economy three weeks ago.
The 18 top leaders of the central bank expect the U.S. economy to grow at a 3 to 3.6 percent pace next year, which by their calculations will be enough to bring joblessness, currently at 9.6 percent, down to the 8.9 to 9.1 percent range in late 2011. In projections made in June, the same officials had been more optimistic, forecasting 3.5 to 4.2 percent growth in 2011 and an unemployment rate that would decline to the 8.3 to 8.7 percent range.

U.S. Banks to Close 5,000 Branches by 2012
U.S. banks' declining profits and tighter profit margins will push them to close 5,000 branches nationwide within the next 18 months, bank analyst Meredith Whitney said in a research note on Monday.
By Reuters - FinanceTech.com
CHARLOTTE, N.C. - U.S. banks' declining profits and tighter profit margins will push them to close 5,000 branches nationwide within the next 18 months, bank analyst Meredith Whitney said in a research note on Monday.
Whitney, CEO of Meredith Whitney Advisory Group LLC, said that reduced consumer and corporate appetite to borrow, mixed with new regulations, have permanently changed what was once a key source of industry profits.
In turn, banks will be forced to shutter some of their branches. There were 83,320 U.S. commercial bank branches at the end of last year.

List of Problem Banks Grows
U.S. Banks Post $14.5 Billion Profit, Smallest Since 2009
Meera Louis - WashingtonPost.com
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. banks posted their smallest profit since the fourth quarter of last year after one of the nation's biggest lenders took a $10.4 billion writedown, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said.
Bank profits totaled $14.5 billion in the three-month period that ended Sept. 30, a decrease from $21.6 billion reported three months earlier, the FDIC said today in its third- quarter report.
"Problem" banks -- those at heightened risk of failure -- rose 3.7 percent to 860 in the third quarter, the most in 17 years. Banks on the confidential list had $379.2 billion in assets as of Sept. 30, the FDIC said.

Small banks, big problems
By Paul R. La Monica - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- When people start talking about problems in the financial sector, the conversation is often limited to the behemoths in the group.
But there is a vast world outside of New York -- the home base of Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. Ditto for San Francisco (headquarters of Wells Fargo and Charlotte (domicile of Bank of America.)
In fact, shares of big regional banks in the middle of the country have been pummeled lately. And that may not be a good sign for the economy or markets.

Fed Officials Differed Over Benefits of New Stimulus
By Scott Lanman
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve policy makers disagreed over expanding record monetary stimulus this month, with a majority seeing a boost to growth and employment and a minority concerned about risks to inflation and the dollar.
Most officials at the Nov. 2-3 meeting saw additional securities purchases as keeping interest rates low and boosting asset prices, the Fed said in minutes of the session released today in Washington. The Fed also said it's considering ways to improve communication with the public, such initiating press briefings by Chairman Ben S. Bernanke.

Fed's Tilt at Unemployment Puts Its Mandate in the Spotlight
By DAVID WESSEL - WSJ.com
With unemployment at 9.6% and inflation below the Federal Reserve's working definition of "price stability," this seems a strange moment for Congress to contemplate instructing the Fed to focus exclusively on fighting inflation.
But Sen. Bob Corker (R., Tenn.) wants to revive that notion, which has lain dormant for more than a decade because there has been so little inflation. "I am concerned about inflation down the road," he explains. "The time is right for us to bring clarity to the Fed." In the House, Paul Ryan (R. Wisc.) and Michael Pence (R., Indiana) agree. Mr. Pence argues that the Fed's quest to combat unemployment by buying $600 billion in U.S. Treasurys is a failure and threatens to "monetize our debt and trigger inflation."

Federal Reserve cuts US growth forecasts as recovery falters
America's economic recovery will be weaker than feared next year and do little to bring down unemployment until at least 2013, according to new forecasts from the Federal Reserve.
By Richard Blackden - Telegraph.co.uk
The world's biggest economy will grow between 3pc and 3.6pc, less than the Fed's June forecast of 3.5pc to 4.2pc. In turn, unemployment, currently 9.6pc, will only edge lower to between 8.9pc and 9.1pc next year. In June, the central bank had forecast it would dip below 9pc in 2011.
The new forecasts were revealed in the minutes of the meeting of the Fed's Open Market Committee, when it decided to inject a further $600bn (£509bn) into the economy. The decision proved controversial at home and abroad, where it was criticised by some as a reckless way to lift exports and inflation by weakening the dollar. The minutes acknowledged that the latest forecasts were based on a lower dollar, as well as higher share prices.

More firms pulled into insider-trading probe
SAC, Janus, Wellington Receive Inquiries on Insider Trading
By APARAJITA SAHA-BUBNA And MICHAEL ROTHFELD - WSJ.com
Money managers SAC Capital Advisors, Janus Capital Group Inc. and Wellington Management Co. have received inquiries in the ongoing insider-trading investigation on Wall Street.
SAC, a giant hedge-fund manager run by Steve Cohen, received an information request, according to a person familiar with the situation.
Janus Capital disclosed the inquiry on Tuesday in a filing.
Federal investigators also requested general information from money manager Wellington Management Co. on Monday afternoon, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The inquiries come as a three-year insider-trading investigation shifts into high gear.

***** read the details online:

8 Examples Of How The Government Is Attempting To Take Total Control Of Our Food, Our Health, Our Money And Even Our Dignity
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Over the past several decades, no matter which political party has been in power the government has continued to become a larger part of our lives. These days many people are speaking of the "nanny state" that we have created, but the reality is far worse than that. The truth is that the government has become a gluttonous, out of control behemoth that is gobbling up everything in sight and that is attempting to exert full spectrum dominance over our lives. Today, the government seems to have an insatiable hunger to watch us, track us and control us. Now they even want to feel our private parts before we get on an airplane. No matter what politicians we send to Washington D.C., it just seems to get worse and worse. Anyone who still believes that we live in "the land of the free" is completely and totally delusional.

Taking Total Control Of Our Food - S. 510 "The Food Safety Modernization Act" ...
Taking Total Control Of Air Travel - The Dehumanizing Full Body Scanners And "Enhanced Pat-Downs" ...
Taking Total Control Of Our Health Care - The Loss Of Our Health Freedom ...
Taking Control Of Our Money - Multiplying Taxes ...
Taking Control Of Our Businesses - Thousands Of Ridiculous Regulations ...
Taking Control Of Our Environment - The Green Police ...
Taking Away Our Independence - The Exploding Welfare State ...
Taking Away Our Patriotism - We Are Even Losing The Freedom To Be Proud Of America ...

Betting In The Endgame
Darryl Robert Schoon - GoldSeek.com
There is a difference between betting in the endgame and betting on the endgame. The former is a fool's avocation whereas the latter is a once in a lifetime opportunity.

The endgame of capitalism is a uniquely different environment where investors find themselves faced with increasingly dangerous options. In the endgame, proven strategies are improvident, buying and holding becomes a time bomb and speculators are favored over investors because of excessive liquidity and volatility.
Capitalism, a system of credit and debt that produced 300 years of growth is now dying. The bankers' debt-based money has created such levels of debt that even 0 % credit can no longer induce growth. In the endgame, the problem is not the lack of credit - it's the excessive amount of debt.

Existing Home Sales Decrease More Than Forecast
By Timothy R. Homan
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Sales of existing homes fell more than forecast in October as foreclosure moratoriums and a lack of credit disrupted the U.S. housing market.
Purchases decreased 2.2 percent to a 4.43 million annual rate from 4.53 million in September, the National Association of Realtors said today in Washington. Economists projected sales would decline to a 4.48 million pace, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey. The median price fell 0.9 percent from a year earlier.

Freddie Mac Raises Mortgage Fees as It Seeks Adequate Payments
By Jody Shenn - Bloomberg News
Freddie Mac, the mortgage-finance company under U.S. control, will boost fees it charges lenders selling it riskier home loans.
The changes, which take effect March 1, will raise some of the upfront fees by as much 0.75 percent of loan balances and add costs for consumers using additional home loans as part of their borrowing, the McLean, Virginia-based company said today in a memo posted on its website.
"The changes help to ensure that we are adequately compensated for the continued provision of essential liquidity to the mortgage market, and are able to continue our support for affordable lending while being diligent stewards of taxpayer funding," Patricia J. McClung, vice president of offerings management at Freddie Mac, said in the memo.

Freddie Mac Raises Mortgage Fees as It Seeks Adequate Payments
By Jody Shenn
Nov. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Freddie Mac, the mortgage-finance company under U.S. control, will boost fees it charges lenders selling it riskier home loans.
The changes, which take effect March 1, will raise some of the upfront fees by as much 0.75 percent of loan balances and add costs for consumers using additional home loans as part of their borrowing, the McLean, Virginia-based company said today in a memo posted on its website.

Housing Inventory Enormous- Both Seen And Unseen
HousingDoom.com
There's a vacant house just down the street from me. The owners just picked up and left several months ago. About two months ago the lender sent out landscapers to clean the yard up. Since then, the house has just sat there.
There are other houses out there like my neighbor's former residence. Lots and lots of them. [Thanks L!]
CoreLogic, a leading provider of consumer, financial and property information and business services, reported today that shadow inventory of residential property as of August 2010, reached 2.1 million units, or eight months worth of supply, up from 1.9 million, or a five-months' supply, from one year earlier. With visible inventory remaining flat at 4.2 million units, the change in shadow inventory increased the total supply of unsold inventory by 3 percent.

Medical Loss Ratios:
A "Novel" Way For the Government to Intervene
in the Health Insurance Industry
Peter Suderman - Reason.com
Yesterday, the Department of Health and Human Services certified a new rule requiring most health insurance companies to spend either 80 or 85 percent of their premiums on so-called "clinical services" - i.e., medical expenses-starting in 2011. The rule, which deals with health industry medical loss ratios, has been the subject of much controversy recently, and it will likely have a significant impact on the shape of the industry for years to come. As a result of the new rule, according to The Washington Post, "the government will reach in novel ways into the workings of the insurance industry to try to drive down bureaucracy, profits and executives' pay."

The Majoritarians
If "progressive" Democrats have their way,
repealing ObamaCare may be easier.
By JAMES TARANTO - WSJ.com
The Hill reports that a trio of "progressive" Democrats in the Senate say they'll seek to weaken the filibuster:

Sens. Tom Harkin (Iowa), Mark Udall (Colo.) and Tom Udall (N.M.) all told The Hill this week they are not backing down from their effort. The Senate's rules--which are based on tradition, not the Constitution--have frustrated Democrats for the past several years as GOP leaders have required a 60-vote majority even for procedural motions.
Sen. Tom Udall said he will force a motion on the first day of the next Congress to have Vice President Joe Biden adopt new rules for the two-year session. Then, Udall said, he will seek consensus among senators from both parties to lower the 60-vote threshold for procedural motions. Only a simple majority of 51 votes would be necessary for such a move, and Udall said he expects support from some Republicans.

"Many analysts believe nothing will come of the effort," the report adds. The Udall cousins were both elected in 2008, so they have experienced the filibuster only as members of the majority. Still, some "veteran lawmakers," who have been in a position to use the filibuster as well as been frustrated by it, back the move, including New York Democrat Chuck Schumer. Republican Dan Coats, the former and future junior senator from Indiana, has also urged colleagues "to remove the 60-vote rule for bringing a bill to the floor," in an interview with "The Journal Editorial Report."

Dependents Under Scrutiny
Health-Care Worries Prompt Rise in Audits;
DynCorp, Others Expect Savings
By DANA MATTIOLI - WSJ.com
More employers are scrutinizing employees' health-insurance dependents in order to weed out ineligible beneficiaries.
Employers are looking to cut costs amid a sputtering economy and worries that health-care reform will accelerate rising corporate health-care expenses.
So some companies are conducting audits to verify dependents' eligibility, to make sure they aren't paying for people they shouldn't be.

Health insurers face new federal rules on medical spending
By Amy Goldstein - Washington Post
The Obama administration issued far-reaching rules Monday to carry out a controversial promise that the new health-care law makes to consumers: insurers must spend at least $4 out of $5 they collect through premiums on direct medical services and other means to improve Americans' health.
Under the rules to take effect in January, the government will reach in novel ways into the workings of the insurance industry to try to drive down bureaucracy, profits and executives' pay.
For the first time, health plans will have to disclose many details about how they allot their money, calculate the portion of their spending that promotes good health, and - if they devote too much income to the wrong purposes - give customers refunds.

22 Incredibly Revealing Quotes
About Enhanced Pat Downs And TSA Groping
EndOfTheAmericanDream.com
At what point will Americans finally stop losing more liberty and freedom? With each passing year, the iron grip of the government gets even tighter, and each time it does we are told that it is either for "our safety" or for "national security". One can only imagine what is going to happen the next time there is any kind of "terror incident" on an airplane. They are going to point to all those Americans who are complaining about "enhanced pat downs" and TSA groping as the reason why security is not tough enough. So where does all this end? Will we eventually all have to go through a body cavity search just to get on an airplane? Will they start groping us at school, at work and at sporting events? Are we going to have to "lock down" America from coast to coast to ensure that no terrorist ever is able to harm any American?

Smile, You're on Candid Scanner
The public no longer blindly submits to authority-and that's progress. -- By PETER FUNT - WSJ.com
I've never worked for the TSA. But once I spent a day putting airline passengers through what they believed was a full-body scanner, and I learned a few things about the American psyche. I also got sued, but we'll get to that later.
It was 2001, just a few months before 9/11. We were doing a sequence at the airport in Bullhead City, Ariz., for "Candid Camera" that was designed to parody the passenger screening process.
Pre-9/11 airport "security," you may recall, was far different than it is today. Indeed, the very lapses that prompted me to do such a satire were undoubtedly clear to Osama bin Laden as well.
With the help and encouragement of airport officials, I posed as a security guard. As passengers entered the boarding area, I examined them and their carry-on bags. I claimed that the metal detector wasn't working properly, and instructed passengers to lie down on the conveyor belt so they could ride through the X-ray machine along with their bags.

Ron Paul: Crotch Groped by TSA, Calls for Boycott of Airlines
Kurt Nimmo - Infowars.com
Appearing on the Alex Jones Show today, Texas Congressman Ron Paul expressed his outrage and disgust with the TSA and its unconstitutional naked body scanners and genital groping under the transparent pretense of protecting the American people from terrorists in distant caves.
"If we tolerate this," Paul said, "there's something wrong with us." He added that the American people deserve to be humiliated and demeaned by the government if they refuse to stand up and resist.
Paul predicted Americans will eventually boycott the airlines to put an end to the intrusive searches and the unconscionable use of dangerous backscatter radiation naked body scanners. "Maybe the Congress will get off their duffs and do something in January," he said, "and insist we reign in the TSA."

Ron Paul: Crotch Groped by TSA, Calls for Boycott of Airlines

Disband the TSA
By Mark Hyman The American Spectator.org
It is September 11 that immediately comes to mind when most Americans think of terrorism. Although the 9/11 attacks were indeed horrific terrorism's first big heyday may have been the 1980s.
More than 300 were killed in the 1983 bombings of the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon. A U.S. Navy diver was killed during the 1985 Hezbollah hijacking of TWA flight 847. The same year a wheelchair-bound American was killed during a take-over of the Mediterranean cruise ship Achille Lauro.

Tea Parties Turn to Local Issues
By JENNIFER LEVITZ - WSJ.com
HAMILTON, Ga. - The Harris County Tea Party near the Alabama border campaigned far and wide in this month's midterm elections. Donations were mailed to tea-party candidates in Nevada and Alaska. There were multiple overnight bus trips to rallies in Washington, D.C.
The next stop, however, is closer to home: the local school board.
"Don't get me wrong, we're still going to engage in Washington, but now we're going after what is here locally. Our focus is turning to our community," said Kathy Ropte, the group's founder, over cola at a Blimpie sub shop, a popular local tea-party meeting spot off the town square. Aware that education consumes a big chunk of local property taxes, group members are combing through the salaries of every county school employee from the superintendent down.

Velma Hart, woman who said she was 'exhausted'
by Obama's policies at town hall, loses her job
BY SEAN ALFANO - DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
The woman who told President Obama that defending his plans to fix the battered U.S. economy "exhausted" her now finds herself among the 9.6% of Americans who are unemployed.
During a town-hall meeting carried by CNBC in September, Velma Hart, the chief financial officer for Am Vets, gave the President an earful, saying she was tired and upset of waiting for the change Obama promised when he was elected.
"Quite frankly, I'm exhausted. Exhausted of defending you, defending your administration, defending the man for change I voted for, and deeply disappointed with where we are right now," she said.
On Monday, Hart told the network she became another casualty of the stagnant economy.
"Of course I'm afraid. Everybody's a little afraid," she said.

Unemployment in States Remains High
By Phil Izzo - WSJ.com
Unemployment rates were little changed in most states in October, as a recovery in the labor market remained sluggish across the country.
The Labor Department reported that 19 states and Washington DC experienced jobless-rate decreases, while the rate rose in 14 regions and was unchanged in 17.
States hardest-hit by the housing bust, such as Florida and California, continue to struggle with double-digit unemployment rates. Nevada remained the state with the highest unemployment rate in the nation - 14.2% - more than percentage point higher than the 12.8% recorded in second-place Michigan. In all, 13 states had rates above the 9.6% national figure released earlier this month.

Woman who told Obama her financial fears has lost her job
By Michelle Singletary - Washington Post
Nobody is safe.
Velma Hart, who burst onto the media scene after telling President Obama she was scared about her financial future, has been laid off. Hart was let go as the chief financial officer for Am Vets, a nonprofit Maryland-based veteran services organization.
Hart has become another casualty of the tough economy in which so many people have lost their jobs.
"It's not anything she did," said Jim King, the national executive director of Am Vets. "She got bit by the same snake that has bit a lot of people. It was a move to cut our bottom line. Most not-for-profits are seeing their money pinched."
King would not say whether the organization had had other layoffs.

Farrell, Barr Leaving Obama Administration's Economic Team
By Nicholas Johnston
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Diana Farrell, deputy director of President Barack Obama's National Economic Council, and Assistant Treasury Secretary Michael Barr are leaving the administration, adding to the turnover in the ranks of the White House economic team that worked on the government's response to the worst financial crisis in more than 70 years.
Farrell will leave by the end of the year and Barr's last day at Treasury will be Dec. 3. Both played key roles in shaping Obama's financial regulatory overhaul plan, which was signed into law in July.

Did South Carolina have a Constitutional right to secede?
By Craig Symonds - WashingtonPost.com
Professor Emeritus at the United States Naval Academy
South Carolinians pointed out that to become a part of the Union, each State had to ratify the Constitution -- and do so voluntarily. Ratification did not take place by State government action -- the States had to call conventions to do so. Thus approval came not from the States, but from the people of those States. The southern argument was that since each State (or the people thereof) had voluntarily ratified the Constitution, they could also voluntarily UN-ratify it -- which is what the secession ordinance did. Advocates of secession argued that when that happened, the States re-assumed the status they had held prior to ratification -- as independent sovereignties. That is why South Carolina held a Secession Convention: to undo its earlier act. Presumably if ratification by convention is legal, then UN-ratification by convention is also legal.

*****
China and Russia - where the real game is being played

China Allows Yuan to Start Trading Against Ruble
By Bloomberg News
Nov. 22 (Bloomberg) -- China started allowing the yuan to trade against the Russian ruble from today in the interbank market as policy makers promote the currency's use in global trade and finance.
The move will help "facilitate bilateral trade between China and Russia and help develop yuan trade settlements," said a statement published on the website of the China Foreign Exchange Trade System, a subsidiary of the People's Bank of China. The ruble traded at 4.6711 per yuan as of 5:30 p.m. in Shanghai, according to CFETS data. It was little changed from yesterday at 4.6712, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
"The pace of internationalizing yuan is accelerating," said Zhao Qingming, a senior analyst in Beijing at China Construction Bank Corp., the country's second-largest lender. "The direct trading between yuan and ruble will help expand trade settlements in the two currencies."

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Tuesday 11.23.2010

TSA now needs false flag security incident to convince Americans
to accept obscene pat-downs
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
(NaturalNews) With the grassroots backlash over the TSA's obscene pat-downs growing by the day, it's becoming fairly obvious that the only way the U.S. government is going to get the public to accept these Fourth Amendment violations is if there is another "terrorist incident" that's stopped by the TSA and its naked body scanners.
So far, the TSA is molesting children, teens and grannies without being able to demonstrate that this gross violation of Americans' Fourth Amendment rights is having any effect whatsoever on improving air travel safety. But if there's anything to be learned from 9/11, it's that the sheeple are always willing to give up their rights if they can be scared into doing so.

Administration Is Setting Us Up For An "Event"
So Obama Can Say "I Was Trying To Protect You"

Beck: Obama Will Blame Terror Attack On TSA Resistance
Paul Joseph Watson - Infowars.com
In little noticed comments made during an appearance on Judge Andrew Napolitano's show on Fox News, Glenn Beck warned that the Obama administration wouldn't hesitate to exploit a terror attack targeting airliners to blame the event on people protesting naked body scanners and TSA groping in airports.
The Fox News host said that the government was deliberately provoking the American people to rise up so they could squelch the growing resistance with an iron fist, noting that Obama has failed to give a single speech addressing the TSA revolt even amidst the biggest holiday travel period of the year.

TSA Searches: Are Trains and Subways Next?
Kurt Nimmo - Infowars.com
John Pistole, the TSA boss, has implored activists to rethink their "opt-out" protest this week. Pistole warns that the national protest against naked body scanners and intrusive pat downs at airports would be a mistake and will only serve to "tie up people who want to go home and see their loved ones," according to the Associated Press.
"I understand people's frustrations," said president Obama from Lisbon over the weekend. Obama said at present naked body scanners and pat down searches bordering on sexual molestation are the best way to prevent Muslims in caves from attacking the American people. Secretary of State Clinton told Meet the Press on Sunday that "everyone, including our security experts, are looking for ways to diminish the impact on the traveling public" and that "striking the right balance is what this is about."

Bullets In The Back: How Boomers & Retirees Will Become Bailout, Stimulus & Currency War Casualties
By Daniel R. Amerman, CFA
Overview
Currency wars have their victims, much like military wars. What differs is who the victims are and what the casualty rate is. In a military war, the casualties are usually under age 25. Even in a deadly campaign, most soldiers are not victims because they are in support capacities.
The age of the casualties in a currency war is upside down compared to military war, because the worst of the damage is inflicted on those above age 50. Moreover, it is not just a few, but almost everyone who is on the front lines, and thus almost all become a casualty.
The latest financial headlines may seem arcane, with a vocabulary that is difficult to grasp, but the bottom line is unavoidable - the United States government and the Federal Reserve, in a belated defense of the fundamentals of the US economy, have effectively declared their intention to destroy the life savings of older Americans and devastate their future standard of living. It is the necessary "collateral damage" and all.

28% Plunge In Our Standard Of Living
Amerman explains the trade deficit and currency manipulation by China
from October, 2009

A DIFFERENT KIND OF DEFLATION
by Clif Droke - FinancialSense.com
There's a wealth of wisdom to be found in ancient Chinese proverbs. Not uncommonly one can find answers to the most complex problems today by reading the simple yet elegant epigrams found in any collection of ancient sayings.
One of the themes that runs like a thread in any book of Chinese proverbs is the honor the Chinese confer to the elderly. One such proverb advises anyone who is considering a new venture to "consult at least there older people before proceeding, then you will succeed." Another one puts it much more succinctly: "The elderly: a national treasure."
In the past few months I've been blessed to have encountered no less than four remarkable individuals who are past the age of 90. Each one of them is a rare specimen of physical health and mental acuity given their advanced age. Whenever I meet someone who is old enough to remember the Great Depression I can't resist asking them how their recollection of the Depression days compares to today's "Great Recession." When I put the question to these four unique individuals I was surprised at the divergence of their answers. The answers were evenly divided into two categories: 1.) the Great Depression was far worse than anything we're experiencing today; and 2.) today's extended economic recession is actually worse than the Great Depression.

Crony America and The Bill of Rights
Written by Cognitive Dissonance
Artwork by WilliamBanzai7
ZeroHedge.com
I could make a coherent and convincing argument that the "Great American Experiment" was precisely that, an experiment to test a new business model on a nationwide basis. The plan was designed to create an entirely new economic and social control system and it was implemented with the full backing and active participation of key American and European financial elite. This experimental social order was constructed to achieve higher levels of business exploitation and productivity that revolved around using the definitive natural resource (the common slave, indentured servant and agricultural working class man) in new and creative ways.

Why China is Already a Superpower
Written by Rajeev Sharma - OilPrice.com
China's declared ambition is to become the world's superpower by 2025. It can reach there much sooner. In many ways, it is already there. In terms of development, India is a good 50 to 60 years behind, if not more. Here are some of the lesser known nuggets of information on China that demonstrate why China is already a formidable power.
China has a ten-year supply of oil and gas energy booked at the lowest market point ($34 to $40 per bbl) of any nation. It is rapidly converting 10 percent of its energy sources to alternative forms much higher than the very small 1 to 2 percent achieved by most of Western Europe thus far.

Seeing the U.S. through Asia's eyes
Many leaders from Asia's growing economies believe the U.S. is in a state of denial. It's time to stop bickering and put our house in order. -- By Glenn Hutchins, contributor - Fortune
Shortly after election day in the United States, I toured through the capitals of Asia and came away with a stark and chilling perspective. Our nation is perceived as an economic "failed state" which is attempting to export the consequences of decades of mismanagement and excess in every sphere of our economy, public and private.
There is an emerging judgment across Asia that the United States is not in a decline but rather an accelerating tailspin. We are perceived to lack the political will and collective toughness to confront our ills and swallow the bitter remedies that are prescribed. Our domestic politics are regarded as bewilderingly detached from anything even vaguely calculated to address our systemic flaws. Many Asian elites believe they must protect themselves from the American contagion.

A Full Body Scan of American Corruption
By Gonzalo Lira
In the United States, if a policeman stops you for a traffic violation, and you offer him a $20 bill to forget about the whole thing, you'll likely end up in jail.
But if you leave your Federal government job and go work as a consultant to the very industry you used to regulate, you won't go to jail - you'll grow rich. Very rich. Michael Chertoff is the poster boy for this institutionalized corruption going on in America today. He is not unique. He is not an outlier of any bell curve. If anything, Chertoff's form of corruption is average - it's ordinary. It's what everyone is doing: Everything within the law, everything that the law says he ought to be doing - yet the net effect is a blatant corruption that is personally despicable, and socially disastrous.

Irish to Shrink and Merge Banks As Part of EU-IMF Rescue Package
By Shawn Pogatchnik, Associated Press - CNSNews.com
Dublin (AP) - Ireland's banks will be pruned down, merged or sold as part of a massive EU-IMF bailout taking shape, the government said Monday as a shell-shocked nation came to grips with its failure to protect and revive its banks under its own powers.
Finance Minister Brian Lenihan said Ireland's banks have become wholly dependent on loans from the European Central Bank and looks likely to be frozen out of normal credit markets for at least a year.
He stressed that Ireland has no plans to force senior bondholders of Ireland's five state-supported banks to absorb losses, as German Chancellor Angela Merkel says will eventually start to happen when new European Union crisis-management rules are enacted in 2013.

Irish Debt Crisis Forces Collapse of Government
By LANDON THOMAS Jr. - NYTimes.com
DUBLIN - The Irish government faced imminent collapse on Monday, only a day after it signed off on a $100 billion bailout, setting the stage for a new election early next year and injecting the threat of political instability into a European financial crisis that already has markets on edge.
Confronted with high-level defections from his governing coalition, Prime Minister Brian Cowen said he would dissolve the government after passage of the country's crucial 2011 budget early in December.
His announcement capped a grim day for Ireland, as protesters tried to storm the Parliament building in Dublin, and Moody's Investors Service, the ratings agency, lowered the rating on Irish debt by several notches.

In Ireland, Call for Election and Warning From Moody's
By LANDON THOMAS Jr. and MATTHEW SALTMARSH - NYTimes.com
DUBLIN - Ireland's decision to accept a rescue package worth more than $100 billion prompted a call Monday for early elections and a warning from a major ratings agency that the bailout could prove to be a "credit negative" for the country.
European Union officials, who had been pushing Ireland to accept help, quickly agreed to the request late Sunday, committing a significant amount of money to an ailing member for the second time in six months. The total amount was not announced, but several officials said it would be 80 billion to 90 billion euros, or $109 billion to $123 billion. Last spring, Europe disbursed 110 billion euros to Greece to save it from default.

Portugal next as EMU's M‡quina Infernal keeps ticking
The Portuguese seemed baffled - and pained - that investors should link their country in any way with Greece or Ireland. I am afraid they must come to terms very soon with some unpleasant facts. -- By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
So must Europe's leaders, who comfort themselves that Greece is a special case because it cheated, and that Ireland is a special case because it allowed its "Anglo-Saxon" banks to go berserk. They have yet to acknowledge the deeper truth that monetary union has insidiously destabilised much of Europe and trapped a ring of largely innocent countries in depression.
In my experience it is hazardous for English-speaking journalists to write about Portugal without being accused of betraying the Aliança Velha, or pursuing a perfidious Palmerstonian agenda.

Crisis of Fiat Currencies: US Dollar Surpluses Converted into Gold
Bob Chapman - The International Forecster
Something is going on that your government does not want you to know about. Very few journalists have written about it and little or nothing has appeared in the mainstream media. The story could be one of major stories of our time.
Western powers have tried to destroy gold as a backing for currencies for many years. Presently the major media won't touch the story and that is understandable.
Something we have been writing about for years is the Shanghai Cooperation Organization known as SCO. Few have been listening and few have been interested in what their mission is and what they have been up to.

Gold Bubble Expands as ETPs Hold 9 Years of U.S. Output
By Nicholas Larkin and Pham-Duy Nguyen - Bloomberg News
Gold's 23 percent surge this year to a record is proving no deterrent to George Soros, John Paulson and Paul Touradji, whose investments signal more gains for the longest winning streak in at least nine decades.
Securities and Exchange Commission filings this month by Soros Fund Management LLC, Paulson & Co. and Touradji Capital Management LP listed investments in gold as their biggest holdings. Exchange-traded products own 2,088 metric tons, equal to nine years of U.S. mine supply, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Precious metals will produce the best commodity returns in the next year, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said in a Nov. 9 report.

Silver to steal the show this year
LONDON (Commodity Online): Even as the world is going ga-ga over the gold and its soaring prices, the yellow metal's cousin - silver - is all set to hog the limelight this year.
Now, silver production worldwide can't keep up with world demand, and the need for silver is growing daily. This is all set to cause a huge price gain for silver in the coming days. Reasons for this are many.
Unlike gold, silver is consumable in most industrial uses. In 1942, the US government had over 3 billion ounces of silver, but they ran completely out several years ago and over 90% of all the silver mined in the past 5,000 years has been used up, and is gone forever.

The Day The Silver Suppression Stopped
Tuesday November 9, 2010 -
How To Navigate The New Silver Market
Harold Goodman - SilverBearCafe.com
Tuesday was a landmark day in Silver Metal Trading in the United States. Trading action this day clearly indicates to those attuned to the Silver Market that the long term price manipulators have finally lost control over the price of Silver Futures Contracts on the COMEX, and thus over Physical Silver Metal as well. Who are these manipulators? The largest are undoubtedly JP Morgan Chase and HSBC who have recently been indicted in a class action suit in connection with an alleged conspiracy to manipulate silver futures and options contracts on the COMEX. Unfortunately, this will probably only result in a slap on the wrist for these powerful banks, if that.
Fed Rescues Bear Stearns From Chapter 11 to Obscure Its Huge Silver Short Position From The Public Eye

Widespread Silver Bar Shortages
By Patrick A. Heller - Coin Update News
As of today, there are no longer any regular wholesale supplies of the 1 ounce through 100 ounce silver rounds and bars available for immediate delivery. It may be possible to locate incidental quantities of some product, but most wholesalers are now promising two to four weeks delivery to allow time for the silver to be fabricated.
As a result of the shortages, premiums have started to rise. So far, the increases have been modest, on the order of 0.5-2%. However, if the shortage grows, expect to see further and larger premium increases in the coming weeks. We could see a repeat of the late 2008 gold and silver buying frenzy, where product availability got as slow as 1-4 months after payment.

Curious case of inflation and deflation
By Anthony J. Stills
There is so much going on out there that it's difficult to pick a starting point. China, Ireland, quantitative easing and even Greece pop in and out of the news like a cork bobbing around on rough seas. One day everybody is selling everything due to deflationary fears and the very next day they are buying everything because of the threat of inflation.
Then the next day deflation back on the tip of everybody's tongueÉ The press is neurotically trying to attribute every minor fluctuation in share price to something that just happened somewhere, and it is annoying to say the least. If you know anything about the markets, you know that 99% of the time they are reacting to something that will occur five or six months out into the future. Of course if the folks on Bloomberg had to make some intelligent comments on what could possibly be coming six months down the road, the air waves would be filled with a lot of silence.

HOLLOW ECONOMY RECIPE FOR HYPERINFLATION
by Captain Hook - FinancialSense.com
In case you are trying to put two and two together about what's going on out there to make gold, silver, everything that's not nailed down soar in price these days, let me clear things up for you. It's our hollowed out economy, and the money that needs to be pumped into it so that it doesn't implode. And make no mistake about it, it's bad out there despite what you will hear in the mainstream media, with Friday's Employment Report a glaring example of this, featuring deliberately misleading propaganda set against an increasingly dismal reality. The idea is out comes the printing press to paper over all the problems. The only real problem with our present Keynesian experiment is however this approach doesn't work, evidenced with the poverty that just keeps getting more profound.

The Fed Is Saying One Thing But Doing Something Very Different
Washington's Blog
Ben Bernanke has said that the Fed is trying to promote inflation, increase lending, reduce unemployment, and stimulate the economy.
However, the Fed has arguably - to some extent - been working against all of these goals.
For example, as I reported in March, the Fed has been paying the big banks high enough interest on the funds which they deposit at the Fed to discourage banks from making loans. Indeed, the Fed has explicitly stated that - in order to prevent inflation - it wants to ensure that the banks don't loan out money into the economy, but instead deposit it at the Fed:
Why is M1 crashing? [the M1 money multiplier basically measures how much the money supply increases for each $1 increase in the monetary base, and it gives an indication of the "velocity" of money, i.e. how quickly money is circulating through the system]
Because the banks continue to build up their excess reserves, instead of lending out money:

Michael Dell Shows Ben Bernanke Is Impotent
By William Pesek - Bloomberg News
Suspicions that the Federal Reserve's moves won't save the U.S. are often based on events in Tokyo. Round Rock, Texas, may be a better place to look.
That's where the computer empire Michael Dell created in 1984 is based. As Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke pumps a new burst of stimulus into the economy, he hopes to spur businesses to hire, spend and help avoid a second recession.
It's no longer so simple. In September, Dell Inc. sold $1.5 billion in 3-, 5- and 30-year notes. In regulatory filings, Dell said the proceeds were for "capital expenditures, advancements to or investments in our subsidiaries, and acquisitions of companies and assets." Nine days later, Dell said it will spend more than $100 billion in China during the next decade.

Lehman Pays Advisers $1.1 Billion in 25 1/2 Months
By Linda Sandler
Nov. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. paid its lawyers and managers $42.1 million in October, bringing total advisers' fees to $1.1 billion after 25 1/2 months in bankruptcy, according to a court filing.
Restructuring firm Alvarez & Marsal LLC, which runs the defunct investment bank through its co-founder, Bryan Marsal, led recipients with $369.8 million in fees through October for "interim management," according to today's filing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court. Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP of New York has collected $245.8 million for acting as the lead bankruptcy law firm.

Banks 'Back in Bed' With Companies Lend $10 Billion
By Isabell Witt
Nov. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Wind Telecomunicazioni SpA, Deutsche Post AG and Premier Oil Plc marketed $10 billion of loans to cut their borrowing costs as bond markets were gripped by concerns over Europe's fiscal crisis.
Italian mobile operator Wind Telecom took advantage of loan demand to boost the size of a deal by 500 million euros ($684 million) to 3.93 billion euros last week, scaling back a bond issue by the same amount. Premier Oil cut its borrowing costs by more than half to 2 percent in a deal that refinanced debt two years before it's due. Deutsche Post is seeking its first loan, for 1.5 billion euros, as it shifts away from bonds.

Homebuyers say no to distressed properties thanks to foreclosure mess
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
Prospective homebuyers steered clear of distressed properties last month thanks to the ongoing robosigner scandal, according to the latest Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance Monthly Survey of Real Estate Market Conditions released today.
Survey results revealed that 12 percent of closings scheduled for October were delayed or canceled due to REO title issues, while 24 percent were delayed/canceled due to issues with short sales.
In all, distressed properties accounted for 44.3 percent of transactions last month, down from 47.5 percent in September.

Will We Have A Merry Christmas?
By Jeff Harding, The Daily Capitalist
Retailers are counting on holiday sales this year but on the other hand they are rather pessimistic. It remains to be seen if holiday sales will improve substantially this year. The latest Gallup survey on Christmas sales showed sales expectations were lower than 2009:

SENATE BILL 510 VOTE DELAYED UNTIL AFTER THANKSGIVING
TAKE ACTION NOW TO OPPOSE FOOD TYRANNY
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
(NaturalNews) If there's one thing to give thanks for this year, it's the fact that the Senate floor vote on the so-called "Food Safety Modernization Act" has been delayed until after the Senate's Thanksgiving recess. This gives all of us -- the commonsense opponents of S.510 who don't want the FDA having authority over raw milk, seeds and backyard gardens -- another week to flood the offices of U.S. Senators with calls, faxes and emails that express opposition to the bill.
The jury is still out on the Tester-Hagan Amendment which would exempt small farmers from some of the more tyrannical requirements under the law. If this amendment were adopted, it would substantially improve the bill, but even with this amendment, the bill is just another overreaching expansion of Big Government into yet another area of incompetence. (If the government can't run health care worth a darn, how are they supposed to manage the entire food supply?)

Senate Bill 510 Food Safety?
The FDA has killed far more people than contaminated eggs or lettuce
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
(NaturalNews) Proponents of Senate Bill 510 -- the Food Safety and Modernization Act -- keep trying to claim that we need the FDA to protect us from tainted eggs, lettuce, onions and spinach. On the surface, it seems like a reasonable argument: No one should ever die from unsafe food in America, right?
But to accomplish a net reduction in deaths, you'd need to grant power over the food supply to some organization that actually respects human life... and the FDA is not that organization. In fact, as we have documented here on NaturalNews over the last seven years, the FDA is responsible for far more deaths of Americans than all the terrorist events in the history of the world -- combined!
How is that so?

America: In the midst of a hostile takeover
By Marti Oakley - PPJ Gazette
It appears the American public is finally beginning to wake up. Many are beginning to look beyond the hyped hysteria of the District of Criminals, the phony political posturing and the all too convenient crisis's that magically appear just prior to some rights robbing, government expansion piece of legislation being introduced or passed, and see that what is happening is not accidental or incidental, but was all pre-planned.
We saw this process at work just prior to the first attempt to shove S.510 (the hostile takeover of agriculture) through the Senate. Magically, mysteriously, out of nowhere ... terrorist eggs threatened the entire nation. Supposedly, had we had S.510 in place this wouldn't have happened. Well, of course not. Never mind FDA knew way back last March that a problem had surfaced in Oregon related to the terrorist eggs and, never mind that they had been given new authority over eggs as this manufactured crisis was allowed to reach epic proportions so that it could be used to terrorize the public into submitting to the fake food safety bill just a week before the Hannibal Lechter of the Senate, Harry Reid, brought s.510 that fake food safety bill up for a vote.

H.R. 3808: Interstate Recognition of Notarizations Act of 2010
111th Congress
To require any Federal or State court to recognize any notarization made by a notary public licensed by a State other than the State where the court is located when such notarization occurs in or affects interstate commerce.
Nov 17, 2010: The House of Representatives attempted to override the President's veto of this bill, but failed, by roll call vote. The totals were 185 Ayes, 235 Nays, 13 Present/Not Voting.

Obama Won't Run ... His Work Is Done
by Joan Swirsky - CapitolHillCoffeeHouse.clom
The drivel the media are blathering about Obama's 2012 race for reelection is absolute baloney! All those talking heads and print [so-called] journalists should be ashamed of themselves for prattling on about this unserious subject while studiously avoiding the urgent issues that threaten the very life of our country.
These are issues that a maniacal Nancy Pelosi, as House Minority Leader in the lame-duck session, is intent on cramming down the already-gagging throats of American voters who loathe her fetish with Marxism so much that on November 2 they decisively returned the House she had appropriated back to We the People. As columnist Ralph R. Reiland writes, it was "... the greatest defeat for a newly elected president in a midterm since ... 1922."

The Road Ahead: Tax and Spend or Cut and Save?
By Ken Connor - CNSNews.com
As Congress' lame duck session gets underway, the nation is watching to see if the Democrats will attempt to capitalize on their last few weeks of hegemony before a huge shift in power occurs. Foremost on the agenda are the soon-to-expire Bush tax cuts. Happily for the middle class, there appears to be universal agreement that those cuts should be extended. The real contention lies with the question of whether or not to extend tax cuts to those Americans earning over $250,000 a year.
Aside from the obvious political implications of using the lame duck session to ram through a tax increase that would undoubtedly fail if put forward under the new Congress, there are two key issues at the heart of this debate. They represent different sides of the same coin: Taxing and Spending.

Health insurers: Pay more for medical care or give refunds
By Parija Kavilanz
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- New rules issued to health insurers Monday mandate that they spend more on health care, and force them to refund consumers if they don't meet the requirements.
Beginning in 2011, insurance companies have to spend 80% to 85% of premiums on medical care instead of toward their own profits and overhead costs, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.
This spending allotment is known as the "medical loss ratio" and was a key provision of the health care reform law enacted by Congress in the spring.

Long-term care insurance worries Baby Boomers
By Sandra Block, USA TODAY
Kathy Kozakiewicz, 59, of Phoenix, decided to buy long-term care insurance after her father-in-law was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. He had to wait 18 months until space opened at a local Veterans Affairs nursing home, and during that period, the family was responsible for his care. Kozakiewicz and her husband, both retired federal workers, were determined to spare their children from that experience.
But now, the Kozakiewiczes fear that their insurance could become unaffordable. John Hancock, which has a contract with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to provide long-term care insurance for federal employees, recently asked state regulators for an average rate increase of 40% on most of its non-federal long-term care insurance policies. "This makes me worry when the five-year deal that OPM struck with them has to be renegotiated, that our rates will skyrocket as well," Kozakiewicz says.

It's Official: Rich Declare War on the Middle Class
Robert Freeman - FourWinds10.com
For the past thirty years the rich have been waging war on the middle class. It's been astonishingly effective, partly because it has been undeclared. But even that pretense is now being abandoned. The President's National Deficit Commission has effectively declared that the rich will now go after what is left of working and middle class wealth and will take whatever steps are necessary to seize it. If allowed to succeed, their plan will reduce Americans to a state of serfdom.
Ronald Reagan began the war on the middle class with his "supply-side" economics. Its very purpose, according to David Stockman, Reagan's Budget Director, was to transfer wealth and income upwards. It cut the marginal tax rate on the highest income earners from 75% to 35% while dramatically expanding spending for war. The results were two-fold: massive federal debt and an astonishing rise in the share of income and wealth going to those who were already the wealthiest people in the world.

No Rest for the Weary:
Unemployment to Remain High Through 2011 and Beyond
BY DON MILLER, Associate Editor, Money Morning
Stocks are up nearly 70% from their bear market lows. Corporate profits are rising. And the economy is expanding. Yet the unemployment rate continues to hover around 10%.
Neither President Barack Obama's $787 billion stimulus program, nor the U.S. Federal Reserve's quantitative easing has generated enough good news to convince companies to hire meaningful numbers of new workers.
Of the 8.7 million people who lost their jobs during the recession, more than 7.3 million are still without work. There are still nearly five job seekers for every job opening. In fact, adding in workers who are working part time but looking for full-time work and those who have given up looking all together brings the "real" unemployment rate to a staggering 17% compared to 16.5% last year, the latest government report shows.

Unemployed to the point of disabled?
Posted by Nin-Hai Tseng, reporter
One of the lesser-noticed realities of America's jobless problem is the surge in people applying for disability insurance.
Like it or not, when times get tough, Americans tend to turn to the government for help. More people file for disability claims whenever the economy suffers a setback, but the implications this time around could be much greater than previous downturns as high unemployment is expected to linger for years to come.
In fiscal 2010, applications for disability insurance totaled 3.2 million, up from 2.6 million amid the height of the recession in 2008, according to the U.S. Social Security Administration, which administers and approves applications. High unemployment and anemic economic growth has been a key factor, agency officials say. What's more, the percentage of applications approved since 2008 has roughly stayed steady at about 35% to 37%.

Another hit to states: Interest payments to Uncle Sam
By Tami Luhby
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The Great Recession has forced states to borrow $41 billion from a federal fund to cover unemployment checks for their jobless residents.
Now the bill is coming due.
Some 31 states will have to shell out an estimated $1.4 billion in interest payments on these loans next year. They had been spared this expense because of an obscure provision of the 2009 Recovery Act that expires on Dec. 31.
The burden to cover this cost will fall mainly on businesses, who will see their unemployment taxes rise. But states will be hit too since the increased expense will likely deter companies from hiring new employees.

Volt Fraud at Government Motors
Investors.com
Green Technology: Government Motors' all-electric car isn't all-electric and doesn't get near the touted hundreds of miles per gallon. Like "shovel-ready" jobs, maybe there's no such thing as "plug-ready" cars either.
The Chevy Volt, hailed by the Obama administration as the electric savior of the auto industry and the planet, makes its debut in showrooms next month, but it's already being rolled out for test drives by journalists. It appears we're all being taken for a ride.

New American Oil
by Brian Westenhaus - New Energy and Fuel
The rapidly getting famous Bakken Shale of the Williston Basin that stretches across a large portion of central North America is what most people consider as the latest great American oil field. But the Bakken is just one of the reservoir formations in the Williston.
There are more.
The Williston Basin is a vastly prolific area, one of the most prolific concentrations of onshore oil discoveries in all of North America. It covers an area of about 600,000 square miles. There are at least 11 different producing formations, including the Bakken, and others are now getting some scrutiny to see which ones are best and will get developed next.

Report: Would-Be Plane Bombers Post Attack Details
By Kimberly Dozier, Associated Press - CNSNews.com
Washington (AP) - Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula is promising more small-scale attacks like its attempts to bomb two U.S.-bound cargo planes, which it likens to bleeding its enemy to death by a thousand cuts, in a special edition of the Yemeni-based group's English on-line magazine, Inspire.
The editors boast that what they call Operation Hemorrhage was cheap, and easy, using common items that together with shipping, cost only $4,200 to carry out.

Security Protest Could Disrupt Thanksgiving Travel
By Michael Tarm, Associated Press - CNSNews.com
Chicago (AP) - As if air travel over the Thanksgiving holiday isn't tough enough, it could be even worse this year: Airports could see even more disruptions because of a loosely organized Internet boycott of full-body scans.
Even if only a small percentage of passengers participate, experts say it could mean longer lines, bigger delays and hotter tempers.
The protest, National Opt-Out Day, is scheduled for Wednesday to coincide with the busiest travel day of the year.

'Sexual Bedlam at Airports, Mystery Missile off California:
Anyone Heard from BHO?'
ObamaNation item by John W. Lillpop - CapitolHillCoffeeHouse.com
As Janet Napolitano and her minions at TSA work to transform travel-by-air into an XXXX-rated experience, that launching of a "mystery" missile off the coast of California continues to make news, owing to the fact that the event is, to date, unexplained.
Not surprisingly, while genital groping, fondling, naked body scanners, and the like run rampant at airports all across America, and missiles originating with unknown sources rock the horizon of California, America's Ditherer-in-chief has yet to utter a peep with regard to either matter.
Of course, it is quite possible that those issues simply do not rise to the level of importance needed to justify presidential attention.

TSA's Bait and Switch Airport Security Trap
By John C. Wohlstetter - The American Spectator.org
As public outrage grows over the Transportation Security Agency's new, more aggressive screening procedures -- scanners that reveal body silhouettes, aggressive pat-downs touching intimate body parts -- the reasons why travelers are upset need to be examined, and better ways found to protect us.
First let's find the rules, or can we? TSA's "For Travelers" website subpage shows no hint of what lies in store for passengers. TSA rules are in their "Research Center" subpage. Trolling through various headings and sub-menus yielded no guidance whatsoever. Not that you are safe being unable to find the rules. TSA has a standard line of defense available to any regulatory body: the ancient maxim that ignorance of the law is no excuse. It dates from when laws were rules everyone knew: do not kill the King, violate the Queen, desecrate the Church, steal your neighbor's land or his cow. The modern regulatory state gives us tens of thousands of pages of statutes and regulations enacted pursuant to complex, barely readable laws. Not even attorneys general or Supreme Court justices can know more than a tiny fraction of the whole. Yet the maxim stands, a monument to how fiction trumps reality in today's byzantine legal maze.

Editorial Boards to the Little People Complaining About the TSA:
Bend Over and Take it Like a Man!
By Matt Welch - Reason.com
More evidence for Radley Balko's thesis that the media is more statist than liberal (and for my contention that the unsigned newspaper editorial should go the way of the dodo bird):

Los Angeles Times:
Shut up and be scanned ...

Baltimore Sun:
'Don't touch my junk'
Our view: Public outrage over airport security procedures proves ill-time and ill-considered ...

Boston Globe:
Airport screening: Patdown or perish ...

Springfield Republican:
TSA airport scanners a necessary hassle...

Santa Fe New Mexican:
Face it: Flying's not for fun ...

Sacramento Bee:
Tougher screening is price for air safety ...

Spokane Spokesman-Review:
Discomfort a small price for security on airplanes ...

IHTM bids fond farewell to TSA employees:
Napolitano to block websites with "controversial opinions"
iHateTheMedia.com
Can you imagine the din that would have arisen if Bush Director of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff had issued an order banning "controversial websites"?
Yet that's exactly what happened when Director of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano issued new censorship rules late on Friday afternoon, hoping her edict would slip through unnoticed over the long holiday weekend. Looks like that ploy didn't work, Jan.
CBS News risks being banned, we assume, by reporting the news:
The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is blocking certain websites from the federal agency's computers, including halting access by staffers to any Internet pages that contain a "controversial opinion," according to an internal email obtained by CBS News.

Why the Battle Against TSA Groping and Body Scanners is Justified
FourWinds10.com
Featuring Interviews with Rutherford Institute President John Whitehead and Pilot Michael Roberts, Who are Suing Homeland Security
The Transportation Security Administration's (TSA) new procedures for airport security, which include the body scanners (referred to as "porno-scanners" my citizens groups opposed to the machines) and "pat-down" or grope of passengers, continue to infuriate Americans. Stories of TSA agents violating people as they pass through security checkpoints are being amplified, which means the percentage of people who do get the "pat-down" are making certain they register complaints with civil liberties groups, TSA, their congressmen or by posting their experience to websites on the Internet.
Some of the latest news in regards to TSA involves four New York City councilors backing legislation "that would ban the TSA's full-body scanners from airports inside New York City." New Jersey state legislature is "considering a resolution on the TSA to stop using the body scanners." And, in Florida, the CEO of the Sanford Airport Authority, Larry Dale, has been authorized by his board to hire a private screening firm instead of TSA employees.

TSA Pat-Down Leaves Michigan Man Covered in Urine
By Staff, Associated Press - CNSNews.com
Romulus, Mich. (AP) - A bladder cancer survivor from Michigan who wears a bag that collects his urine says he was patted down roughly by a security agent at Detroit Metropolitan Airport, causing the bag to spill its contents on his clothing.
Tom Sawyer told MSNBC.com the experience earlier this month left the 61-year-old retired special education teacher humiliated and in tears before catching a flight to Orlando, Fla.

Climate Talks Echo 50-Year 'Bretton Woods' Process
as Clean Energy Slips
By Alex Morales - Bloomberg News
It took decades for negotiators to write treaties that curb nuclear warheads and settle trade disputes between nations, and by that measure, efforts to limit global warming may just be getting started.
United Nations climate talks starting in Mexico next week will resemble "sitting in Bretton Woods in 1944," said Harvard University Environmental Economics Director Robert Stavins, referring to meetings that devised a new world financial system and envisioned an agency governing international trade.

Washington Post: Judeo-Christian Ethic Is a 'Problem' to Be Solved
By John R. Guardiano - The American Spectator.org
A Washington Post article this morning about openly gay military service inadvertently reveals the intellectual intolerance and closed-mindedness of the Left. The article also exposes the Left's true agenda, which is to stamp out real diversity and to force everyone to submit to its "progressive" agenda.
Think I'm exaggerating? Think again. The Post's article is entitled, "The few. The proud. The problem: Can the Corps' warrior ethos accept openly gay Marines?"
The article is written by an openly gay female instructor, Tammy S. Schultz, at the U.S. Marine Corps War College in Quantico, Virginia. The article is sympathetic to the Marines, but assumes that the Marines' opposition to open homosexuality within the ranks is a problem to be solved rather than a virtue to be embraced.

As NATO Wraps Up A Deal on Missile Defense,
the Threat Remains Unnamed
By Patrick Goodenough
(CNSNews.com) - The Obama administration is highlighting its achievement in getting NATO partners to agree to a joint Europe-based missile defense shield, while remaining vague about the source of the threat making it necessary in the first place.
At the NATO summit in Portugal, Iran - at the insistence of Turkey - was not publicly named as the nation that poses a potential missile threat.

Knesset set to pass Jerusalem-Golan land referendum bill
By JPOST.COM STAFF Legislation would require either referendum or supporting vote of 80 MKs in event that Israel agreed to hand over areas under its sovereignty.
The Knesset on Monday is expected to pass on its second and third reading a bill requiring a national referendum before relinquishing land in Jerusalem and the Golan Heights.
Submitted by Knesset House Committee chairman Yariv Levin (Likud), the legislation would require either a national referendum or a supporting Knesset vote of 80 MKs in any instance in which Israel agreed in diplomatic talks to hand over areas under Israel sovereignty (i.e., in Jerusalem beyond the Green Line or on the Golan Heights).

Jews have no right to Western Wall, PA 'study' says
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH Official paper by published by PA Ministry of Information claims Al-Buraq Wall, as it is known to Muslims, constitutes Waqf property owned by an Algerian-Moroccan Muslim family.
The Western Wall belongs to Muslims and is an integral part of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Haram al-Sharif [the Noble Sanctuary], according to an official paper published on Monday by the Palestinian Authority Ministry of Information in Ramallah.
The paper, which has been presented as a "study," was prepared by Al-Mutawakel Taha, a senior official with the PA Ministry of Information to "refute" Jews' claim to the Western Wall.

Obama's 'War Czar' Says U.S. Will Make 'Enduring Longer-Term Commitment' to Maintaining Forces in Afghanistan
By Edwin Mora
(CNSNews.com) - At the NATO summit beginning Friday the United States will endorse turning over security responsibilities in Afghanistan to Afghan forces by the end of 2014--but also commit to "an enduring longer-term commitment," President Obama's "war czar" said this week.
During a conference call press briefing Tuesday previewing the NATO summit in Lisbon, Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, Obama's special assistant for Afghanistan and Pakistan, spoke about transitioning security tasks to Afghan forces by 2014.

Surprise: North Korea Is Enriching Uranium!
By Doug Bandow - The American Spectator.org
North Korea is nothing if not predictable. It has unveiled a new nuclear enrichment plant. The U.S. and its allies are now scrambling to respond.
Surely the latest development in the so-called Democratic People's Republic of Korea surprises no one.
If the issue weren't so serious, it would be a comedy routine. The Obama administration came into office hoping to put the North on the back policy burner. Last year Pyongyang staged another nuclear test to remind America that it was still around.

South Korea Digests News of North's Nuclear Site
By MARK McDONALD - NYTimes.com
SEOUL, South Korea - Revelations of a uranium enrichment facility that recently went operational in North Korea apparently caught the South Korean government and nuclear experts here by surprise.
"If this information is true, then this is a serious problem," an official with the Defense Ministry said on Monday, referring to the enrichment facility that was seen this month by an American nuclear scientist on a visit to North Korea. The defense official and other government officials spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the issue and because the South Korean government was still formulating a response.

North Korea Calls U.S. Sanctions Bluff With Latest Nuclear Plant Display
By Bomi Lim - Bloomberg News
North Korea stunned U.S. scientists on a tour of its latest nuclear plant this month, showcasing technological advances that highlight the failure of sanctions to force Kim Jong Il's regime back to disarmament talks.
"The control room was astonishingly modern," Stanford University professor Siegfried S. Hecker wrote in his Nov. 20 report of the visit eight days earlier to the main reactor site at Yongbyon. "We saw a modern, clean centrifuge plant of more than a thousand centrifuges," he said, a reference to the high- speed spinning devices that enrich uranium.

Could Stuxnet Mess With North Korea's New Uranium Plant?
By Kim Zetter and Spencer Ackerman - Wired.com
The Stuxnet worm may have a new target. While security analysts try to figure out whether the now-infamous malware was built to sabotage Iran's nuclear program, North Korea has unveiled a new uranium enrichment plant that appears to share components with Iran's facilities. Could Pyongyang's centrifuges be vulnerable to Stuxnet?
While U.S. officials are trying to figure out how to respond to North Korea's unveiling of a new uranium enrichment plant, there are clues that a piece of malware believed to have hit Iran's nuclear efforts could also target the centrifuges Pyongyang's preparing to spin.
Some of the equipment used by the North Koreans to control their centrifuges - necessary for turning uranium into nuclear-bomb-ready fuel - appear to have come from the same firms that outfitted the Iranian nuclear program, according to David Albright, the president of the Institute for Science and International Security and a long-time watcher of both nuclear programs. "The computer-control equipment North Korea got was the same Iran got," Albright told Danger Room.

North Korea's Nuclear Claims Are More Provocative Than Surprising
By Kelly Olsen, Associated Press - CNSNews.com
Seoul, South Korea (AP) - The U.S. special envoy for North Korea said Monday that Pyongyang's claim of a new uranium enrichment facility is provocative and disappointing but not a crisis or a surprise. Washington, he vowed, will keep working closely with its regional partners in response.
Stephen Bosworth's comments, following a meeting with South Korean Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan, came as the United States and the North's neighbors scrambled to deal with Pyongyang's revelation to a visiting American nuclear scientist of a highly sophisticated, modern enrichment operation that had what the North says are 2,000 recently completed centrifuges.

*****

TSA Tactics Find Ominous Parallel in Nazi Germany
Kurt Nimmo - Infowars.com
The TSA is part of a larger effort to implement a slow motion surveillance and high-tech police state control grid in America. It is an element of the "alternative geography" of the military-corporate-intelligence establishment, an aspect specifically designed to acclimate Americans to the prospect of an ever encroaching police state. The tight integration of the corporate-government aspect of this alternative geography is demonstrated by the relationship the government has with the Chertoff Group, a public relations firm pushing naked body scanners founded by Michael Chertoff, the former boss of the Department of Homeland Security.

TSA Tactics Find Ominous Parallel in Nazi Germany
Alex Jones Tv Sunday Edition 1/5

TSA Tactics Find Ominous Parallel in Nazi Germany
Alex Jones Tv Sunday Edition 2/5

TSA Tactics Find Ominous Parallel in Nazi Germany
Alex Jones Tv Sunday Edition 3/5

TSA Tactics Find Ominous Parallel in Nazi Germany
Alex Jones Tv Sunday Edition 4/5

TSA Tactics Find Ominous Parallel in Nazi Germany
Alex Jones Tv Sunday Edition 5/5

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Monday 11.22.2010

Three more banks go under
Total bank failures rise to 149 for the year
By Kristen Gerencher, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) - Three banks based in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Florida are closing up shop and going into receivership, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. announced late Friday, bringing the total number of bank failures to 149 since the start of the year.
Regulators closed First Banking Center of Burlington, Wis., on Friday. It had $664.8 million in total deposits as of Sept. 30, the FDIC said. The bank's failure will cost the federal deposit-insurance fund an estimated $142.6 million.
Allegiance Bank of North America of Bala Cynwyd, Penn., also closed. As of Sept. 30, it had $92 million in total deposits, according to the FDIC. Its failure will cost the federal deposit-insurance fund an estimated $14.2 million.

The Game Is Over
From Knight Research via ZeroHedge.com
The simple story is this: We believe the structural and cyclical terms of global trade have finally reached their tipping point. This will catalyze a wholesale change in sentiment and a historic repositioning of risk assets. The emerging market global growth story is over.

In meetings with clients throughout October, we began emphasizing our growing concerns about the nearly ubiquitous confidence the financial markets - and for that matter, global leaders and their body politic - have in China; and by extension, the rest of the emerging market story, commodities, and the direction of foreign exchange cross-rates.
Not surprisingly, our concerns were met with varying degrees of resistance; but the overall consensus clearly favored a very bullish, asymmetric outcome over both the near and intermediate terms. When pressed as to our own sense of timing and specific catalysts for broad-based trend reversal, candidly we were unclear. Our sense then, was that the higher and faster the commodity markets pushed, the sooner the reversal would occur. But we have now clarified our view.
In just the past several weeks, we believe the data and government actions out of China, the back-up in US interest rates, the Fed's emphatic commitment to QE2, intensifying pressures across the EU, broadly rising commodity prices, government efforts to control hot money flows, have finally pushed the global terms of trade to their tipping point.

Economic Implosion Sets The Blame Game In Motion
By Giordano Bruno - Neithercorp Press
When a child bounds about the house and breaks his mother's favorite flower vase or creepy 'Precious Moments' figurine, he usually blames the dog before he blames himself. We tend to learn the value of scapegoats at a very early age. Many people eventually outgrow this terrible habit and begin to take responsibility for their actions, while others never do. The ability to divert justice is frowned upon by those of us who value conscience, but in some circles, such "talent" is prized above all else. There are some in this world who derive great joy from creating destruction and allowing innocent men or guiltless groups to take the fall.

U.S. in Late Stages of Trading Inquiry
By PETER LATTMAN - NYTimes.com
Federal authorities are at an advanced stage of insider trading investigations that could result in criminal charges or significant civil fines against Wall Street traders and executives, a government official said Saturday.
"We are far along in investigations of insider trading," said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the inquiry was incomplete.
It was unclear whether the government was conducting one sweeping investigation or looking into various smaller instances of what they suspected was insider trading.

U.S. in Vast Insider Trading Probe
By SUSAN PULLIAM, MICHAEL ROTHFELD,JENNY STRASBURG and GREGORY ZUCKERMAN - WSJ.com
Federal authorities, capping a three-year investigation, are preparing insider-trading charges that could ensnare consultants, investment bankers, hedge-fund and mutual-fund traders and analysts across the nation, according to people familiar with the matter.
The criminal and civil probes, which authorities say could eclipse the impact on the financial industry of any previous such investigation, are examining whether multiple insider-trading rings reaped illegal profits totaling tens of millions of dollars, the people say. Some charges could be brought before year-end, they say.

IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn urges leaders to cede more sovereignty to EU
European nations need to cede more of their sovereignty and hand greater powers to the centre to avoid future crises, the head of the International Monetary Fund has said.
By Philip Aldrick - Telegraph.co.uk
In what are likely to prove controversial proposals, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the IMF managing director, called on the European Union to move responsibility for fiscal discipline and structural reform to a central body that is free from the influences of member states.
In a speech in Frankfurt addressing the sovereign debt crisis engulfing Europe once again, he said: "The wheels of co-operation move too slowly. The centre must seize the initiative in all areas key to reaching the common destiny of the union, especially in financial, economic and social policy. Countries must be willing to cede more authority to the centre."

Ireland Update: Bank Run and Bailout
by CalculatedRisk
First an update on the bank run from the Irish Times: AIB loses €13bn in deposits due to Irish debt fears
ALLIED IRISH Banks has lost about €13 billion in deposits since the start of the year due to concerns about the financial difficulties of the Government and the banking system, the bank said in a trading statement yesterday.
Some €12 billion of the lost deposits were withdrawn, mostly by institutional and corporate depositors, since the end of June.
This is about 17% of deposits.
And on the bailout from Bloomberg: Irish Talks on Aid Plan Intensify as Banks Lose Deposits, Cowen Campaigns

Europe Welcomes Irish Request for Assistance
By LANDON THOMAS Jr. - NYTimes.com
DUBLIN - After months of trying to persuade bond investors and Europe as a whole that it could survive its financial crisis without outside aid, Ireland buckled on Sunday and formally applied to the European Commission and the International Monetary Fund for a multibillion-euro rescue package.
Brian Lenihan, the Irish finance minister, did not specify the amount but officials said that the aid would be less than €100 billion and would enable Ireland to avoid borrowing money in the bond markets for as much as three years.

Europe's next two dominos
After Ireland, spotlight on Portugal, Spain
Lisbon vulnerable to vigilantes, but Madrid may put up a fight
By William L. Watts, MarketWatch
LONDON (MarketWatch) - The Irish rescue isn't about Ireland.
Any deal between the Irish government and the European Union and International Monetary Fund to resolve Ireland's financial crisis is ultimately aimed at cutting short the turmoil in sovereign bond markets that policy makers fear could one day price Portugal or even Spain out of global credit markets.
Portugal, which like Ireland is a small economy with a relatively illiquid debt market, is seen as the next country likely to find itself in the sights of bond traders.

Gerald Celente on Fox and Friends 21 November 2010

Debt Panel Convenes, Still Lacks Consensus
By DAMIAN PALETTA And JANET ADAMY
WASHINGTON - The bipartisan commission examining how to cut the federal debt ended three days of closed-door meetings Thursday without a firm agreement among its 18 members, with several saying the panel was still at odds over how to contain the ballooning costs of health care.
"The most difficult thing to deal with is the health-care accounts," Sen. Kent Conrad (D., N.D.) said after emerging from a 90-minute meeting. "That is the 800-pound gorilla in the room."
The White House created the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform in February, and the group has until Dec. 1 to vote on a plan for the White House and Congress to consider.

Congress Takes Vigorous Steps
to Look Like it's Planning to Reduce Deficit
By Rocky Vega - The DailyReckoning.com
11/20/10 Stockholm, Sweden - Erskine Bowles, President of UNC, and former Wyoming Senator, Alan Simpson, the co-chairmen of President Obama's National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, are getting political leaders caught up with the obvious reality of the US' precarious financial stateÉ that the budget deficit is quickly hurtling the nation toward a debt crisis not unlike Greece, but on a much larger scale.
Yet, even with annual interest payments alone already totaling roughly $200 billion, there is little political will to make the kind of cuts necessary to have an impact on the deficit. Policy makers and citizens alike want action to be taken, but the required sense of taking personal responsibility - with fewer public services, higher taxes, or reduced welfare - is still lacking.

Gary Shilling: We're in an Age of Deleveraging
By Anupam Kathpalia - SeekingAlpha.com
Renowned economist Gary Shilling last week released his book The Age of Deleveraging: Investment Strategies for a Decade of Slow Growth and Deflation. Upon release of his new book, the economics doctorate sat down with Daily Finance discussing his big picture take on the economy.
In summarizing his economic viewpoints, Shilling argues that we shouldn't be worried about inflation, but rather focus on adapting to a period of slow growth, worrying about deflation. As consumers and businesses continue to deleverage, the economy will be facing excess capacity, putting a downward pressure on prices as Americans save more and cut back on discretionary big tickets items.

Shilling Says Devaluations Aim to Replace U.S. Consumer - video

Gary Shilling On How to Invest
In the Age of Deleveraging and Deflation, Part I

Gary Shilling On How to Invest
In the Age of Deleveraging and Deflation, Part II

Gold bullion is in a long-term bull market
CommodityOnline.com
Dundee Wealth Inc. Chief Economist Martin Murenbeeld is long on opinion and the gold market. "Gold bullion is in a long-term bull market. And that's going to go on for a number of years," he predicted during the recent Forbes & Manhattan Resource Summit in West Palm Beach, Fla. Analysts David Keating, Mackie Research Capital Corp., and Paolo Lostritto, Wellington West Capital Markets, also participated in this Gold Report exclusive, giving candid views of the global gold markets and plenty of reasons to be a gold bull.
"Gold bullion is in a long-term bull market. And that's going to go on for a number of years," Martin predicted during a recent presentation at the first annual Forbes & Manhattan Resource Summit in West Palm Beach, Florida. His remark was included as one of a handful of reasons to be bullish about gold and commodities.

Gold coin sales increase by 400%
BBC.co.uk
Sales of gold coins have soared by 400% so far this year compared with 2009, according to the Royal Mint.
With the price of gold hitting record levels, the Mint says commemorative coins are in strong demand.
Sales of silver coins have also risen, though by a comparatively modest 20%.
"In these days of economic uncertainty people look for something they can see as being a bit more secure," Dave Knight, director of commemorative coins at Royal Mint, told the BBC.

Gold bull market not yet over - Richard Russell
But, be warned, we've hit an all round mega-bubble, he says, in everything that is tradable and it will continue until someone, purposely or by mistake, pulls the plug
Author: Prieur du Plessis - MineWeb.com
Richard Russell, famous market analyst and writer of the Dow Theory Letters, is one of the investment world's doyens, his knowledge of the history of the market is truly unmatched. At the age of 86, he is one of the few men able to speak firsthand about the Great Depression and how similar today's economy feels.
Like any investor, Russell was not always right with his market forecasts. While he was dead wrong on equity markets for most of the bull market since March last year, he was one of the few commentators who were spot on with their predictions of the great bull market in gold right from the starting blocks in 2001.

Gold falls, but outlook firm
By Debbie Carlson - CommodityOnline.com
(Kitco News) - Gold prices ended lower on the week after a stronger dollar put pressure on precious metals prices, but the markets managed to hold above key support levels which should give support into next week's action.
Futures prices for the week on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange dipped for gold, with the December down 1% at $1,352.30 an ounce. December silver meanwhile, rose 4.8% at $27.179 an ounce.

Sun is shining on silver market
By Allen Sykora - CommodityOnline.com
(Kitco News) - The sun is adding some shine to the silver market. One of the growing industrial uses for silver is photovoltaic cells in solar panels as the world seeks alternative forms of energy, metal consultancies said. There has been a jump in such demand in recent years, and analysts said millions more ounces of silver may be consumed for this over the next decade.
"Solar panels will probably be one of the leading industrial uses," said Jessica Cross, CEO of VM Group.
Use of the long-established photovoltaic technology, referred to as PV, "really took" off in the last half decade, helped by government subsidies, said Philip Newman, research director for GFMS.

Is the intrinsic value of dollar driving gold?
By Michael Pento
The continued bull market in the price of gold has been one of the staple discussions in the financial media for the better part of a decade. But, in that time, almost no consensus has emerged to explain the phenomenon. If you ask ten Wall Street pundits to explain the upward movement, you will most likely get nearly ten different answers.
While most logically identify global currency debasement as a primary cause, others say that gold is driven by: fear of economic uncertainty, central bank gold hording, international political conflict, or the ebb and flow of the Indian wedding season. The truth is the main drivers for the price of gold are the level and direction of real interest rates and the intrinsic value of the dollar.

Peter Schiff - Gold & Silver, the Dollar, Inflation

After the Fed's Action, Watching Inflation's Trajectory
By FLOYD NORRIS - NYTimes.com
THE core rate of inflation fell to a record low in the United States last month, rekindling fears of deflation and warnings that the Federal Reserve might have to take even more aggressive steps to keep inflation as high as it wants it to be.
"In the short run, disinflationary forces in Western economies, especially the U.S., appear too powerful to be overwhelmed by the recent loosening of monetary policy," said Richard Batty, an investment strategist at Standard Life Investments, a Scottish firm.
Since the collapse of the housing market in the United States and the beginning of the global financial crisis, the Federal Reserve has made avoiding deflation a major priority, recalling the experience of Japan after its bubble burst in the early 1990s. The Fed has set an annual inflation target of 2 percent or a little lower, but is not getting it.

Number of the Week: Talking Turkey on Inflation
By Mark Whitehouse - WSJ.com
35%: The increase in the price of whole turkeys, from their pre-recession level
Consumer prices in the U.S. are broadly stable. But for people prone to worry about inflation, this could be a harrowing Thanksgiving.
Thanks to rising feed costs, falling stockpiles and developing-world consumers' growing demand for meat, the price of a whole turkey has taken flight. The U.S. city average stood at $1.68 per pound in October, according to the Labor Department. That's up 13.3% from a year earlier, and 35.1% from three years earlier, before the recession hit.
The case of turkey prices illustrates an important point at a time when the debate over inflation and the Federal Reserve's monetary policy has been heating up: There can be a difference between what matters for the Fed and what any given individual experiences. And because of the way consumers tend to perceive inflation, politicians who complain about it will almost always find plenty of people who agree with them.

Printing Money Causes the Wrong Kind of Inflation
By Bill Bonner -The DailyReckoning.com.au
The Great Correction...still in business...
The latest news suggests that we've been right all along. Housing starts are down a surprising 12% - with house prices still soft or falling in most areas.
Jobs? Forget it. Joblessness continues to be a major headache...with no significant relief in sight.
And both consumer and producer prices are flatter than expected. In fact, the core CPI reading is at a record low. For all the talk of 'inflation' - there isn't any. Ben Bernanke is right, at least about 'core' inflation. Prices for people who neither eat, nor travel, nor heat their houses are flat.

Before Hyperinflation Dollar to Become World's "Weakest Currency"
By Rocky Vega
11/19/10 Stockholm, Sweden - Yesterday, JPMorgan & Chase Co. reported its anticipated impact of $600 billion in additional quantitative easing on the dollar, which will be devastating. JPMorgan finds it likely loose monetary policy could cause the dollar to collapse below 75 yen and become the weakest of planet's most-traded currencies.
According to Bloomberg:
"The U.S. central bank, along with those in Japan and Europe, will keep interest rates at record lows in 2011 as they seek to boost economic growth, said Tohru Sasaki, head of Japanese rates and foreign-exchange research at the second-largest U.S. bank by assets. U.S. policy makers may take additional easing steps following the $600 billion bond-purchase program announced this month depending on inflation and the labor market, he said.

The Madness of Inflating Away the Debt Burden
By The Mogambo Guru
11/19/10 Tampa, Florida - I get really tired of hearing how "inflation reduces the burden of debt," which I say is a Gigantic Load Of Hooey (GLOH). And the fact that I say it with a loud, arrogant voice should convince you that I am absolutely correct, beyond the fact that I am obviously some kind of weirdo lunatic in a manic phase of some kind, in which case it would be dangerous to disagree with me about anything.
You can tell that I am scornfully dismissive of anybody who says that "inflation reduces the burden of debt," because such a scheme only works for a debtor whose income keeps up with inflation AND who pays down the old debts with cash.
Otherwise, I can't imagine how it would work, and nobody has ever explained it to me, as I would really, really, really like to know how I can borrow money at 5%, and then "reduce the burden of my debt" by borrowing money at 10% (interest rates having gone up in response to the inflation) to pay off the 5% debt just because inflation is high! Wow! Must be part of the "new math"!

Bernanke Takes Off the Gloves After Becoming Global Target
By: Albert Bozzo - CNBC.com
You could call it Ben Bernanke's, "Speak softly and carry a big stick" speech.
The Fed Chairman known as a student of the Great Depression, may have taken a page out of President Teddy Roosevelt's foreign-policy manual Friday when he responded to foreign critics of his controversial monetary easing strategy and reminded them how important a healthy U.S. economy is to world trade.
"The best way to continue to deliver the strong economic fundamentals that underpin the value of the dollar, as well as to support the global recovery, is through policies that lead to a resumption of robust growth ... in the United States," Bernanke said in a speech to a conference at the European Central Bank in Frankfurt.

Bernanke Defends Fed Move, Criticizes China's Currency Policy
By Scott Lanman
Nov. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke defended his monetary stimulus to fellow central bankers, saying it will aid the world economy, and made some of his strongest criticism of China's weak-currency policy.
The best way to underpin the dollar and support the global recovery "is through policies that lead to a resumption of robust growth in a context of price stability in the United States," Bernanke said in a speech in Frankfurt today. Countries that undervalue their currencies may eventually inhibit growth around the world and risk financial instability at home, he said.

Why Bernanke's Gambit May Be Checkmated
By Lee Adler - Wall Street Examiner
The Fed completed the first full week of its pumping campaign under QE2 this week with the purchase of $31 billion in Treasury notes, bonds, and TIPS. The total schedule for the first month calls for purchases of $105 billion. The initial round of purchases had limited impact, with the markets little changed from where they were before the program was implemented. Part of that was due to $42 billion in Treasury settlements on Monday 11/15, but the market's tepid response after that raises questions. Thursday saw a bit of a meltup but Friday quieted down again. More cash is coming on Monday. If there is again little or no response from the market it would suggest that the bucket into which the Fed is pouring liquidity is full of holes.

Why Bernanke Is Dead Wrong, And What It Means for Investors
By Perry D. - SeekingAlpha.com
Fed chairman Ben Bernanke's big speech brought the world a big step closer to an everybody-loses, all-out economic Cold War between the U.S. and China long in the making. Even worse, his policy leaves U.S. policymakers off the hook and their focus further away from the free-market reforms within their control to make -- the policy changes that would do much more to save what's left of the U.S. economy than anything China might do.
Bernanke would have been more constructive taking direct and sustained aim at U.S. policymakers in both parties -- it's their bad policy moves and avoidance of tough decisions over more than 30 years that's responsible for America's economic underperformance.

Bernanke on Perilous Ground for Fed Chairman
By Paul Wiseman, Jeannine Aversa, Associated Press
Washington (AP) - Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is taking some highly unusual steps to counter widespread opposition to his $600 billion plan to jump-start the economy. He's pressing China to let its currency rise and pushing Congress to pass more stimulus aid.
Yet as he veers into these political debates, Bernanke may be putting at risk the Fed's strongest tools - its credibility and independence.
Bernanke has been under fire since Nov. 3, when the Fed announced a bold plan to buy $600 billion in Treasury bonds. The bond purchases are intended to lower long-term interest rates, lift stock prices and encourage higher spending to energize the weak economy.

China's criticism of QE is just a diversion
for the huge challenges it faces
There has been a hostile reaction by China, Brazil and Germany, among others, to the Federal Reserve's decision to resume quantitative easing.
By George Magnus - Telegraph.co.uk
This undermined the slim chance that G20 leaders, meeting in Seoul last week, might agree a credible plan to address rising currency, trade and capital account protectionism.
China alleges that the Fed's actions will damage the global recovery and destabilise the world's monetary system, but this is to deflect attention away from a complex problem, a substantial part of which lies in Beijing, not Washington DC.
The financial crisis has shocked the US and the UK, among other indebted nations, into a protracted economic restructuring, in which the destruction of debt and higher savings are inevitable.

China Move Could Counter Fed's Efforts
By KEITH BRADSHER - NYTimes.com
HONG KONG - China's central bank unexpectedly announced on Friday night that it would require commercial banks to set aside a bit more money. It was the second such move by Beijing this month and the clearest sign yet that China means to counter the Federal Reserve's monetary easing in the United States.
Commercial banks were ordered to transfer an additional 0.5 percent of their assets by Nov. 29 to very low-yielding accounts at the central bank, the People's Bank of China. The central bank relies mainly on these reserves for the renminbi to buy about $1 billion a day worth of dollars, euros and other currencies - purchases that prevent the renminbi from appreciating.

Marc Faber - (Nov-2010)(1-2)
The Global Economy Gloom, Boom or Doom

Marc Faber - (Nov-2010)(2-2)
The Global Economy Gloom, Boom or Doom

Geithner Says Obama Opposes Depriving Fed of Employment Mandate
By Ian Katz
Nov. 20 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said the Obama administration would oppose any effort to strip the Federal Reserve of its mandate to pursue full employment and warned Republicans against politicizing the central bank.
"It is very important to keep politics out of monetary policy," Geithner said in an interview airing on Bloomberg Television's "Political Capital with Al Hunt" this weekend. "You want to be very careful not to take steps that hurt our credibility."
The Republican congressional leadership, including John Boehner, nominated as the next House speaker, has criticized the Fed's plan to buy $600 billion in assets, saying it would fuel inflation and asset bubbles. Senator Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican who serves on the Banking Committee, said he favors confining the Fed's mandate to promoting price stability.

Legal Uncertainty Layers New Risks on Mortgage Investing
By Christopher Papagianis - SeekingAlpha.com
Two distinct but related legal issues have emerged in the housing markets over the past few weeks that, if left unresolved, could undermine future private-sector participation in the U.S. mortgage markets. First, faulty documentation practices threaten to void thousands of foreclosures, or have them delayed by the courts. The results would be billions of dollars of losses for banks seeking to seize and sell the underlying collateral on mortgage loans that had gone bad. Second, investors in mortgage-backed securities (MBS), including the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, recently wrote to Bank of America (BAC), demanding that it repurchase $47 billion in mortgage loans securitized and sold by Countrywide (which was acquired by BoA in 2008). The contention is that the loans sold into MBS pools were "marketed with misstatements about quality" that is tantamount to fraud. Specifically, the investors charge that Countrywide relied on false appraisals of the properties financed by those mortgages.

Home loan bank sues major lenders
Suit aims to recoup $3B invested in mortgage-backed securities
Indiananapolis Star
America's biggest names in banking have been slapped with a fraud lawsuit in Indianapolis by a home loan bank trying to recover $3 billion.
In a hangover from the 2000s' easy-money spree, the Federal Home Loan Bank of Indianapolis filed the lawsuit on Monday in U.S. District Court.
The lawsuit claims investments bought from 37 banks, including Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan, are based on home loans whose paperwork is riddled with inaccurate appraisals and other flaws.

So Who Benefits From Protracted Foreclosures? Servicers!
NakedCapitalism.com
One of the many themes being used to cultivate class warfare in foreclosure-land is the idea that people who are losing their homes are getting an unfair break. Many of them have learned that banks are moving very slowly on foreclosures and so they stay put until the sheriff evicts them. One culprit is crowded court dockets, which are often blamed on borrowers who are gumming up the works by fighting foreclosures. But that's an exaggeration; the vast majority of borrowers don't contest foreclosure filings. And as we have heard at some length in Congressional testimony this week, borrowers that do seek to stay in the home typically fall into one of three categories. First is that they are in a mod program (and became delinquent at the urging of the bank) but find the foreclosure is moving apace, despite the bank saying otherwise. Second is that they believe that they are not in arrears, that the bank has been charging unwarranted fees. Third is that they filed for a Chapter 13 bankruptcy (meaning they are holding all their creditors at bay while working out a repayment plan) and the bank is still improperly trying to take their house.

Obama Lost National Debate Over Government
Run Health Care Even as He Won Congressional Passag
of Obamacare, According to New Gallup Data
By Terence P. Jeffrey
(CNSNews.com) - President Barack Obama lost the national debate over government-run health care in the first 22 months of his presidency even as he persuaded a Democrat-majority Congress to enact legislation that forces Americans to purchase government-approved health insurance plans as of 2014 and that subsidizes that purchase for people earning less than 400 percent of the poverty level.
In a newly released poll conducted Nov. 4-7--just days after voters removed Obama's party from its majority in the U.S. House of Representatives--Gallup asked 1,021 American adults: "Which of the following approaches for providing health care in the United States would you prefer: a government run health care system, or a system based mostly on private health insurance?"

Boehner: GM Bailout Hurt 'Tens of Thousands' of Americans
By Dan Joseph
Washington (CNSNews.com) - On the same day that President Obama made comments suggesting that the federal government's 2009 bailout of General Motors was on the path to being a success, House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) said that the bailout had been an example of government overreach and had hurt many Americans.
"The government's reaction to General Motors and the bailout from the government I think could have been handled in a more orderly way from a bankruptcy judge, without the heavy hand of the federal government in the midst of it," Boehner said in a Thursday press conference at the Capitol.

Unions Yield on Wage Scales to Preserve Jobs
By LOUIS UCHITELLE - NYTimes.com
MILWAUKEE - Organized labor appears to be losing an important battle in the Great Recession.
Even at manufacturing companies that are profitable, union workers are reluctantly agreeing to tiered contracts that create two levels of pay.
In years past, two-tiered systems were used to drive down costs in hard times, but mainly at companies already in trouble. And those arrangements, at the insistence of the unions, were designed, in most cases, to expire in a few years.
Now, the managers of some marquee companies are aiming to make this concession permanent. If they are successful, their contracts could become blueprints for other companies in other cities, extending a wage system that would be a startling retreat for labor.

ATM Fraud Gets Even More Brazen
By Karen Blumenthal - WSJ.com
Fraud involving debit cards and personal-identification numbers is on the rise as criminals go where the cash is - even targeting banks' own automated teller machines.
Techniques such as "skimming," in which criminals capture card information and personal-identification numbers, have existed for years, often on a small scale. Though the dollar losses still are relatively modest, organized gangs now are pulling off more-sophisticated attacks.
They also are targeting bigger players: Whereas most of the fraud in previous years took place at independent ATMs or at retail points of sale, fraud at bank-owned ATMs made up more than 80% of the breaches in the first six months of this year, says Fair Isaac, which provides fraud-detection software.

Gov't Audit Finds Lax Security at US Courthouses
By Alicia A. Caldwell, Associated Press
Washington (AP) - Security training at some federal courthouses is so ineffective that it took almost eight years for some security officers to learn how to turn on X-ray machine software that would detect guns and explosives, a Justice Department audit of courthouse security operations said Friday.
In the meantime, fake bombs hidden in packages and at least one gun stashed in a lawyer's bag went unnoticed at security checkpoints last year.
The security lapses and potential threats, the Inspector General audit said, are largely due to a lack of training on basic equipment, including X-ray machines and metal detectors, and lax oversight of security programs by the U.S. Marshals Service, which oversees courthouse security.

T.S.A. Grants Pilots an Exception to Screenings
By RON NIXON - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - At least one group of air travelers will get a break from the body scans and pat-downs that have provoked a national outcry.
On Friday, the Transportation Security Administration announced that it would let uniformed airline pilots skip the screenings, reversing an earlier policy that everyone had to go through the screenings as part of the agency's efforts to prevent terrorist attacks. Pilots who are traveling out of uniform or not on official business will still be subject to searches, the agency said.
The full-body scans and pat-downs being performed at a number of airports have angered travelers, many of whom said the searches were invasive and likened them to virtual strip searches. Passengers have also raised concerns about the long-term effect of radiation exposure from airport scanners.

Senator Rockefeller To TSA Chief John Pistole:
"I Think You're Doing A Terrific Job"
EndOfTheAmericanDream.com
The backlash against new TSA airport screening procedures has reached a deafening crescendo, and so you would think that the politicians in Washington D.C. would be getting the message. But so far, most of them seem to be just as supportive of the TSA as ever. For example, what did the chairman of the Senate committee overseeing air travel, Jay Rockefeller, have to say to TSA chief John Pistole during a Senate hearing on these new security procedures the other day? "I Think You're Doing A Terrific Job." Yes, you read that correctly. Senator Rockefeller had nothing but praise for Pistole and the new screening procedures. Apparently Rockefeller thinks that TSA officials feeling up the genitals of U.S. air travelers with the fronts of their hands is a wonderful thing. It is even being reported that in some instances TSA officials are actually reaching down the pants of men and up the skirts of women during these enhanced pat-downs. Not only is this totally criminal, but considering the fact that TSA officials do this countless times without changing their gloves it is also a serious health hazard. But most of our "leaders" in Washington D.C. continue to insist that we should stop protesting because this is all being done "for our own good".

Ron Paul: It's Incredible What We Put Up With at the Airport!

Standing Up to the TSA
by Becky Akers - LewRockwell.com
Almost overnight, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has gone from national joke to national nightmare. Passengers used to laugh when screeners so inept they missed 60-75% of the fake bombs undercover investigators smuggled past them nonetheless proclaimed themselves gods. No one's laughing now, though, as the TSA ogles us with carcinogenic technology and sexually assaults anyone who objects.
Over 300 of the agency's "naked" scanners lurk in 60-some airports nationwide, with more on the way; eventually, the agency will irradiate every passenger on every flight. These gizmos peer through clothing to photograph bodies in graphic detail. The TSA makes much of offering a "choice": if you dislike posing nude for the government, its perverts will grope you instead - "prob[ing]," "prodding" and pushing "up your thighs and between your legs until we meet resistance" (and they don't mean a slap in the face). You also suffer this indignity, even if you submit to the scan, should it reveal "anomalies" such as piercings or prostheses.

TSA: Airport Security Pat-Downs Are Here to Stay
By EVAN PEREZ - WSJ.com
Uncomfortable and "invasive" airport security pat-downs are here to stay, the top U.S. transportation security official said Sunday.
The Transportation Security Administration has triggered a public outcry with wider use of graphic full-body scanners, or full-body pat-downs for those who decline the scans or who require secondary screening. The security measures come in response to the attempted airline bombing last Christmas, when a Nigerian passenger allegedly hid a bomb in his underwear and failed to detonate it properly.

44 Ways to Say TSA: What do the initials "TSA" really stand for?

Fighting investment fraud - at the doctor's office
New program trains doctors to spot warning signs
By Yewon Kang of Medill News Service
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - State securities regulators are teaming up with doctors to fight elder investment fraud by training medical professionals how to identify vulnerable seniors.
The program will launch in 22 states, plus Washington and Puerto Rico, but will need more federal funds to expand, experts said Wednesday. The pilot program, started at the Baylor College of Medicine last year, helps teach doctors and social workers how to identify vulnerable seniors.
About 7.3 million older Americans - one out of five citizens over the age of 65 - have been victimized by financial abuse, according to a survey earlier this year by Investor Protection Trust, a Washington-based nonprofit that promotes financial education. Read more about the survey on the IPT's site.

Senate Fails to Vote on Food-Safety Bill
By BILL TOMSON
WASHINGTON - The Senate failed to vote as planned Thursday on passage of a bill to overhaul the nation's food-safety system and grant new powers to the Food and Drug Administration, a delay that may threaten the legislation.
Sen. Tom Harkin (D., Iowa) blamed the delay on the insistence of Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) that the Senate consider an amendment to ban spending earmarks. Mr. Coburn demanded that senators publicly vote on the issue of earmarks, controversial legislation that lawmakers tuck into laws to pay for pet projects.
"This is not the time or the bill to debate on earmarks," Mr. Harkin said. "I hope he'll relent on this."
The delay resulted in the clock running out on the 30-hour time period senators had to debate and vote on the food-safety bill. The Senate then voted Thursday evening to pass another 30-hour period in which to vote.

Reid stalls out S.510 fake food safety bill until Monday as backroom dirty deals are struck
By Marti Oakley - PPJ Gazette
In a quick announcement as the Senate convened, Harry Reid, Senate majority leader said that the vote on S.510 fake food safety bill would take place Monday evening, the 29th, at 6:30 PM, CST and that no voting would occur today. According to Reid, all the dirty deals intended to criminalize and sell out American farmers and ranchers and our food supply, were still being worked on behind closed doors, although I believe he referred to them as amendments.
Reid also made some idiotic statement about how the American people were desperate to get this bill passed and that it was the first modernization of the system in 100 years. Neither statement has even a grain of truth in it. But then, Reid has shown a consistent tendency to simply say whatever he feels is necessary to promote his cause, the facts be damned.

Oregon Senator Wyden effectively kills Internet censorship bill
By Stephen C. Webster - The RawStory.com
It's too early to say for sure, but Oregon Senator Ron Wyden could very well go down in the history books as the man who saved the Internet.
A bill that critics say would have given the government power to censor the Internet will not pass this year thanks to the Oregon Democrat, who announced his opposition during a recent committee hearing. Individual Senators can place holds on pending legislation, in this case meaning proponents of the bill will be forced to reintroduce the measure and will not be able to proceed until the next Congress convenes.
Even then, its passage is not certain.

FCC moves to ensure 'net neutrality'
By Stephanie Kirchgaessner in Washington and Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson in New York - FT.com
The Federal Communications Commission is expected to announce plans next week for regulations that would forbid internet service providers from blocking or favouring content online.

Northern Mexico's State of Anarchy
Residents Abandon a Border Town as Vicious Drug Cartels Go to War
By NICHOLAS CASEY And JOSÉ DE CÓRDOBA - WSJ.com
MIGUEL ALEMÁN, Mexico - Ciudad Mier, a picturesque colonial village on the Texas border, was a sleepy tourist attraction until February, when two rival drug cartels turned it into a slaughterhouse.
Caravans of armored SUVs crammed with gunmen firing automatic rifles prowled the streets. Parents pulled terrified children from schools. The town of 6,000 went dark every time the combatants shot out the transformers. In May, a man was hung alive from a tree in the central plaza and dismembered while town folk heard the screaming from behind shuttered doors.

Who fed the tiger?
By patrick J. Buchanan - WND.com
Missiles fired from the Chinese mainland could destroy five of the six major U.S. air bases in the Far East. So states a new report of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, adding:
"Saturation missile strikes could destroy U.S. air defenses, runways, parked aircraft, and fuel and maintenance facilities. Complicating this scenario is the future deployment of China's anti-ship ballistic missile, which could hold U.S. aircraft carriers at bay outside their normal operating range."
Opposite Taiwan, China's missile force has reached 1,600.
Beijing is also building rockets, submarines and surface fleets to extend her dominance out to the third chain of islands, enabling the People's Liberation Army to strike U.S. carriers and bases as far away as Guam.

The Growing Importance of the U.S., Central Asia Partnership
Written by Joshua Kucera - OilPrice.com
The United States intends to expand security cooperation with Central Asian states, US diplomats say. One means to do so, they add, is increasing the capacity of the Northern Distribution Network, which ships military cargo bound for US and NATO forces overland through Central Asia to Afghanistan.
The United States now can ship over 1,000 containers per week to Afghanistan via the NDN, said David Sedney, deputy assistant secretary of defense for Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia. “And we expect to increase this figure even further in the coming months,” he added. About 98 percent of that traffic passes through Uzbekistan, he said November 17 at a hearing of a House of Representatives hearing, titled The Emerging Importance of the U.S.-Central Asia Partnership.

Scientist: NKorea Has 'Stunning' New Nuke Facility
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS - NYTimes.com
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - North Korea's claim of a new, highly sophisticated uranium enrichment facility could be a ploy to win concessions in nuclear talks or an attempt to bolster leader Kim Jong Il's apparent heir.
But whatever the reason for the revelation, which a seasoned American nuclear scientist called "stunning," it provides a new set of worries for the Obama administration, which is sending its special envoy on North Korea for talks with officials in South Korea, Japan and China this week.

Arms Bid Seen in New N. Korea Plant
By DAVID E. SANGER and JOSEPH BERGER - NYTimes.com
American defense officials said Sunday that the revelation of North Korea’s new uranium enrichment facility confirmed longstanding suspicions that the country was seeking a second route to build atomic weapons. They dismissed the North’s claim that it was simply trying to build nuclear power plants denied to them by the West.
The description emerging of the new facility at Yongbyon, the North’s main nuclear plant, raised a number of critical questions that American and Asian intelligence agencies were struggling to answer.

North Korea Report Validates Concern, Mullen Says
By JOSEPH BERGER - NYTimes.com
Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Sunday that a report by a visiting American scientist that North Korea has built a new plant to enrich uranium lends "very visible life" to his simmering worries about that country's nuclear ambitions.
He said that American leaders have long assumed that North Korea continued "to head in the direction of additional nuclear weapons," and a report in The New York Times on Sunday that Siegfried S. Hecker, a former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, was recently allowed to view a new and sophisticated plant for enriching uranium bolstered that assumption.

NATO Agrees to Extend Missile Shield
By STEPHEN FIDLER and ADAM ENTOUS - WSJ.com
LISBON - Leaders of the 28-nation North Atlantic Treaty Organization agreed at a summit meeting Friday to expand a U.S.-led missile-defense system to cover all of the alliance's territories in Europe.
Late Friday, NATO released its first strategy document in a decade, which will guide the alliance over the next 10 years on how it deals with old and new threats including cyberattacks, terrorism and ballistic-missile attacks.
The leaders' missile-shield agreement was touted as an important victory by officials from the Obama administration, which suffered a setback at its last major effort at summit diplomacy this month at the Group of 20 meeting in Seoul.

Obama Urges Congress To Pass Arms-Reduction Treaty
By JARED A. FAVOLE - WSJ.com
WASHINGTON --President Barack Obama called on Congress to end gridlock over an arms-reduction treaty, saying not passing the legislation this year threatens the country's national security and imperils progress against Iran.
Mr. Obama, invoking former President Ronald Reagan several times, said it is imperative to pass the legislation quickly and he vowed to modernize the country's weapons arsenal with an $85 billion injection. Such arms-reduction treaties, dating back to Mr. Reagan, have generally garnered bipartisan support, Mr. Obama said during his weekly radio address Saturday.
The new START Treaty, as it is called, would cut U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear weapons deployments by about one-third and restore weapons inspections that stopped nearly a year ago.

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Friday 11.19.2010

Tent Cities, Homelessness And Soul-Crushing Despair:
The Legacy Of Decades Of Government Debt
And Mismanagement Of The Economy
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
For decades, our politicians have been deeply addicted to government debt, they have stood idly by as millions of our jobs have been shipped overseas and they have passed countless business-crushing regulations and they never thought that it would catch up with us. Well, it has. America has been living in the biggest debt bubble in the history of the world, and now that bubble is starting to pop. There has never been such an extended period of unemployment in the United States since the Great Depression, and millions of Americans are losing their homes. Homelessness is skyrocketing, tent cities are popping up everywhere and countless numbers of American families are experiencing the soul-crushing despair that comes from desperately trying to hang on for month after month after month.

America Surrenders
Barry Ferguson - SilverBearCafe.com
The sad tale of the greatest country in the world unwilling to fight.
I always wondered what it would feel like. A collective will is broken. A great people are humbled. Concessions are made. The symbolic white flag is raised. Surrender is offered. Control is conceded. Power is transferred. A new era begins. 'America' surrenders. It is not a good feeling.
Her people have been demoralized and humiliated by the turnstiles of indiscriminate personal invasion at airports. They have been bullied and intimidated by government regulators wielding authoritarian power. They have had their land and property seized. Their currency has long been hijacked. Skyscrapers have been imploded, military engagements have been fallaciously deployed, and financial promises have been rescinded. American ingenuity and courage have been supplanted by ignorance and cowardice. America can't control her borders, can't control her currency, can't control her economy, can't control her debt, and now entertains words of defeat - 'default' and 'bankruptcy'. America has been through war and she is tired. She surrendered to the Federal Reserve Bank with the acceptance of QE2.

Bernanke Faults China for 'Persistent Imbalances'
By SEWELL CHAN - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, plans to argue Friday that currency undervaluation by China and other emerging markets is at the root of "persistent imbalances" in trade that "represent a growing financial and economic risk."
Mr. Bernanke is expected to warn that a "two-speed global recovery," with the richest countries lagging behind fast-growing emerging markets like China and India, is hampering the cooperation the worldwide recovery needs, echoing a main point the Obama administration made - with limited success - when leaders of the Group of 20 economic powers gathered last week in South Korea.

Is Europe Coming Apart Faster Than Anticipated?
By Gonzalo Lira
The sky is black with PIIGS coming home to roost: I was going to write my customary long and boring think piece - but the simmering crisis in the Eurozone just got the heat turned up: Things are boiling over there!
So let's take a break from our regularly scheduled programming, and give you a run-down of this late-breaking news:
The bond markets have no faith in Ireland - Greece has been shown up as having lied again about its atrocious fiscal situation - and now Portugal is teetering-

Gerald Celente: Currency Wars + Trade Wars = Real Wars

European Central Bank tightens screw on Ireland, Portugal and Spain
The European Central Bank (ECB) has issued a clear warning that it will press ahead with plans to raise interest rates and withdraw lending support for banks despite the eurozone debt crisis, even if this risks pushing Ireland, Portugal and Spain into deeper trouble.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
"The central bank must guard against the danger that the necessary measures in a crisis period evolve into a dependency as conditions normalise," said Jean-Claude Trichet, the ECB's president.
Luxembourg's ECB governor, Yves Mersch, echoed the warnings, saying the bank could not continue "cleaning up" in crises. "If rates are low for too long, this leads to a higher risk appetite. We will pay the price if we fail to confront these inevitable dangers," he said.

Obama Sets Aside Only Two Hours to Meet With European Leaders at NATO Meeting in Portugal
By Patrick Goodenough
(CNSNews.com) - Nine months after disappointing European leaders with a decision not to attend a scheduled United States-European Union summit, President Obama will meet with E.U. leaders on the sidelines of the NATO gathering in Lisbon this weekend.
Two hours reportedly have been set aside for the meeting on Saturday afternoon, with a crammed agenda topped by economic issues and including security - especially in the light of recent terrorism alerts in Europe - trade, development aid and climate change.
Obama's trip to Europe will be over in less than 48 hours during which, according to unconfirmed Russian media reports, time will be found for a separate meeting between Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

Deliberate Run on EU Banks called for Dec 7th

Man U Player Of The Century Eric Cantona Appeals For Peaceful Revolution Against Banks, Calls For Europeans To Pull Their Money
Submitted by Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
A few weeks ago we noted that December 7 is becoming a grass roots "banker mutiny" day, in which citizens across Europe will pull money from their banks and thus force a pan-European bank run on what is already a bankrupt financial system, which survives each day only at the expense of the continent's increasingly indebted citizens, their life of increasing austerity, and of course, the US Federal Reserve and its final backstop. In some ways we discounted the potential reach of this movement. Enter Eric Cantona - just ask any sport afficionado who the most entertaining, flamboyant and skillful football player of 1990's Manchester United was and 9 out of 10 times you will hear that name. The icon (both in England and France) whose on field antics were only matched by his kung fu skills, and who has a massive popular following, has been recorded agitating viewers (many of them), to enact a bloodless revolution against French banks: "We don't pick up weapons to kill people, to start the revolution... the revolution is really easy to do nowadays.

Ireland Turns to EU as Trichet Says ECB Aid Limited
By Dara Doyle
Nov. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Ireland said it may ask for an international bailout as European Central Bank President Jean- Claude Trichet signaled debt-laden nations can't rely on him to keep their financial systems afloat forever.
Finance Minister Brian Lenihan said in Dublin he would welcome the creation of "substantial contingency capital funding" for Irish banks, as they became "unmanageable for the state itself." In Frankfurt, Trichet said in a speech that policies first used to fight the global credit crisis can't "evolve into a dependency as conditions normalize."

The trap of the Federal Reserve's dual mandate
By George F. Will - WashingtonPost.com
This lame-duck Congress - its mandate exhausted, many of its members repudiated - should merely fund the government for a few months at current spending levels with a "continuing resolution," then apologize for almost everything else it has done and depart. If, however, the 111th Congress wants to make amends, it should repeal something the 95th did.
In 1977, Congress gave the Federal Reserve a "dual mandate." Although the central bank is a creature of Congress, it is, in trying to fulfill this mandate, becoming a fourth branch of government.

Karl Denninger Sees Dow at 3,000 Next Year
John Thomas - SilverBearCafe.com
Karl Denninger of Market Ticker thinks there is a secondary banking crisis around the corner that will trigger a cascading collapse in the stock market, and another government bailout. TARP 3 anyone? We could reach 3,000 in the Dow and 300 in the S&P 500.
This is one of many controversial and incendiary opinions about the state of the global financial markets Karl voiced to me in a wide ranging interview on Hedge Fund Radio. Karl says the idea that we are going back to an S&P 500 earnings of $105-$110 a share in the face of the soaring cost input factors is totally laughable.

Bernanke Defends Fed as Republican Criticism Rises
By Craig Torres and Scott Lanman
Nov. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke defended his expansion of record monetary stimulus in a meeting with Senators as top Republican lawmakers stepped up their criticism of the central bank chief's policies.
Bernanke, in a closed-door meeting yesterday, said the Fed's plan to buy $600 billion in assets would spur job growth while keeping inflation under control. John Boehner, the presumptive House speaker, and three other Republicans sent Bernanke a letter expressing "deep concerns" about a policy they said risked weakening the dollar and fueling asset bubbles.

Gerald Celente:
America is Turning Into One Gigantic Hellhole! - Alex Jones Tv 1/2

Gerald Celente:
America is Turning Into One Gigantic Hellhole! - Alex Jones Tv 2/2

Bernanke defends Fed action, calls for unity
By Ben Rooney - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Ben Bernanke defended the Federal Reserve's recent plan to spur economic growth, saying the strategy has worked in the past and could help reduce unemployment in the United States.
He also argued that nations need to work together to correct global imbalances as the world economy recovers at an uneven pace, according to written remarks the Fed chairman is scheduled to deliver early Friday at a banking conference in Frankfurt, Germany.

The Coming Sell-Out to the Super Rich and
What It Means for the Rest of Us
By MICHAEL HUDSON - CounterPunch.org
Now that President Obama is almost celebrating his bipartisan willingness to renew the tax cuts for the super-rich enacted under George Bush ten years ago, it is time for Democrats to ask themselves how strongly they are willing to oppose an administration that looks like Bush-Cheney III. Is this what they expected by Obama's promise to rise above partisan politics - by ruling on behalf of Wall Street, now that it is the major campaign backer of both parties?

The Limits of Incompetence
Dmitry Orlov - SilverBearCafe.com
Our social instincts compel us to think well of our fellow man. In spite of much evidence to the contrary, we think him competent to cast votes, to decide how to spend and borrow money, and how to bring up his own children. We persist in this conviction even as the manifest lack of competence at every level of American society causes it to careen toward ruin. We recoil at the thought of government bureaucrats separating the competent from the incompetent, making those who are incompetent, along with their children, wards of the state, remedying their incompetence through strict discipline when possible, and consigning the rest to a lifetime of manual labor in service of society. Many of us quite justifiably think that the government bureaucrats are themselves incompetent, or worse. Those who no longer trust the competence of either the government or our fellow man instead put their faith in corporations or in churches or even in bloggers and internet newsgroups (pathetic, I know). They may preserve their sanity by doing so, but it does nothing to change the big picture. Presumably, it is better to be a competent observer of collapse than an incompetent one.

A Note from your Editor:
Johnny Silver Bear - SilverBearCafe.clom
If I made the statement that, in a sense, there are only two kinds of people in the world, those that own silver bullion and those who don't, that would seem logical. Overly simplistic, but true. If I said all those who own silver bullion would like the price of silver to rise and those that don't own silver bullion couldn't care less, that too, would seem logical but it is, unfortunately, untrue. There are many that own silver bullion and use it in manufacturing that are terrified that, if the price of silver was left to seek its natural price level, their bottom lines would be adversely affected. There are others that don't own any silver bullion, but have resorted to criminal activity in order to manipulate the price of silver lower, for illicit gains (greed).

Max Keiser: Crash JP Morgan - Buy Silver!

Keiser Report: 'Crash JP Morgan' Special
96th Episode is a special 'Crash JP Morgan' edition of the Keiser Report. This time Max Keiser and co-host, Stacy Herbert, look at the call from Eric Cantona to withdraw money from the banks and at the viral 'Crash JP Morgan Buy Silver' campaign by Max Keiser. In the second half of the show Max talks to Alex Jones about Google bombs, naked body scanners and 'Crash JP Morgan Buy Silver'.

Silver likely to top $30/oz in 2011 amid investment demand
By Allen Sykora of Kitco News
(Kitco News) - Silver is likely to trade above $30 an ounce in 2011 mainly due to investors' growing appetite for the metal, also helped by a further recovery in industrial demand, said the consultancy GFMS in its Interim Silver Market Review released late Wednesday.
GFMS forecast the metal will average $19.94 an ounce for 2010, a 36% increase from the prior year. For the first 10 months so far, the average based on London fixes is $18.61, which does not include the early-November spike to $28.55. Next year, silver should "easily" surpass the annual average all-time high of $20.98 from 1980, the consultancy said.

How Gold Performs During Periods of Deflation, Disinflation, Runaway Stagflation and Hyperinflation
By Michael J. Kosares - SeekingAlpha.com

Amid the global crisis in confidence, investors seem to be rediscovering the fact that gold has been used as money for thousands of years. In periods where black swans are no singular occurrences but are practically coming in flocks, the status of gold as a safe haven has yet again proven its worth. - Ronald-Peter Stoferle, The Erste Group

A few years ago I did an appraisal for a client who was pledging his gold as collateral in a commercial real estate transaction. In the course of doing the appraisal, I was struck with the large gain in value. His original purchase in 2002 was in the seven figures when gold was still trading in the $300 range. His holdings had appreciated 50% after a roughly three-year holding period. (Since that appraisal, the value has risen another three times.) I asked his permission tell his story at our website as an example how gold can further one’s business plans.

Gold recovers as dollar rally ends
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online): Gold advanced in Asian trade Thursday, for the first time this week after the greenback eased against major currencies while physical demand also helped the precious metal.
Gold for immediate delivery was seen trading at $1349.10 an ounce at 1.00 p.m Singapore time while US gold futures for December delivery was at $1,348.50 an ounce on the Comex in New York.
The dollar dropped from a seven-week high against the euro before a report today that is forecast to show U.S. jobless claims gained.

Bernanke to defend Fed's bond-purchase plan, call for more stimulus
The Federal Reserve chairman will speak Friday in Germany. His prepared remarks include his most forceful case to date that Congress must provide more stimulus aid.
Associated Press - LATimes.com
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is seeking to defuse rising criticism of the Fed's $600-billion bond-purchase plan by arguing that it's needed to bolster the economy and reduce unemployment. But, he warns, the Fed's program can't succeed on its own.
In his first speech since the Fed announced the bond-buying program Nov. 3, the Fed chief is to make his most forceful case to date that Congress also must provide more stimulus aid.
Without more stimulus, high unemployment could persist for years, he is to say. But in making that argument, Bernanke risks heightening complaints that he's plunging the Fed into partisan politics.

The Federal Reserve and the Pathology of Power
By Charles Hugh Smith - OfTwoMinds.com
The Federal Reserve is an example not just of run-of-the-mill hubris but of the far more profound Pathology of Power.
The rule of law has been supplanted in the U.S. by self-serving propaganda campaigns serving State and financial Elites: this is the Pathology of Power. The Federal Reserve is an instructive example because it is so blatant.
Despite the dearth of evidence that goosing the stock market actually generates a "wealth effect" which "trickles down" from the top 10% who own the vast majority of equities to the bottom 90%, the Fed has waged a ceaseless propaganda campaign claiming this policy goal is now essential for the nation's well-being.

Markets, inflation, China, Buffett, GM

Desperate Men Do Desperate Things
Captain Hook - SilverBearCafe.com
If there were a truism to fit a broad cross-section of behaviors in our society today, the catchphrase 'desperate men do desperate things' fits well, for sure. This is because you can see it everywhere on an increasing basis as economies of all shapes and sizes disintegrate. And it spreads like a disease, reaching all quarters of our society(s), in one way or another, propagated at the core by greedy money-center bankers and their political oligarchs hopelessly attempting to prevent a collapse of the larger fiat currency economy, hegemony economics, and US Dollar ($) supremacy. Here, it's important to understand that when the US can no longer print the money to pay its bills the present game of musical chairs will cease and centralization will quickly reverse into regionalism, returning us to more primitive but sound economies.

Levitin Addresses Elephant in the Room:
Regulators Don't Want to Fix the Foreclosure Crisis
By: David Dayen - FDL News Desk
Georgetown U.'s Adam Levitin has become something of a rock star during the foreclosure fraud crisis. He had some of the best and most biting commentary in the Senate Banking Committee hearings on the issue, and he also appeared today at the House Financial Services Committee hearings. And under questioning from Rep. Brad Miller (D-NC), he let loose, and said what everyone has been thinking about the foreclosure crisis.
First off, he lamented the fact that we have been holding hearings like this since 2007. "Every year we have another set of hearings, and you can add 2 million foreclosures" to the bottom line. Nothing gets fixed, despite all kinds of documented evidence that the banks and servicers have committed fraud. Levitin's position is that the servicers should be banned from the loan modification business entirely, because they don't have any interest in it except as a profit-maximization scheme, and they have massive conflicts of interest that cut against doing right by the borrowers (and even the investors for whom they work).

Hearing brings more censure for handling of foreclosures
By Stephanie Armour, USA TODAY
Bankers, housing regulators and members of Congress agreed on this much in the week's second congressional hearing on foreclosure problems: The system needs fixing.
Some bank officials Thursday told a House subcommittee that their efforts to help borrowers in default were stymied by investors who require that foreclosures keep moving forward even as the borrowers are trying to get a modified mortgage to lower their monthly payments.
"It can be extremely confusing," said Rebecca Mairone, Bank of America's default servicing executive. "It continues to be a problem. We are directed by investor requirements to do so."

Mortgage credit pendulum too tight
By Al Yoon - Reuters.com
(Reuters) - Mortgage credit has become too tight as lenders reacted to the U.S. housing bust, but chances that those terms will ease soon are remote, William Emerson, chief executive officer of online lender Quicken Loans Inc., said on Thursday.
Tight credit has frustrated even the most credit-worthy borrowers this year as banks, burned by faulty loans they made, clamped down on underwriting guidelines. Some banks have made standards tougher than Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- whose programs fund most loans -- would require, Emerson noted.

Max Keiser: Congress Will Try -- By Secret Vote -- to Retroactively Legalize Foreclosure Fraud 1/2

Max Keiser: Congress Will Try -- By Secret Vote -- to Retroactively Legalize Foreclosure Fraud 2/2

House fails to extend unemployment benefits
By Tami Luhby - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The House failed Thursday to pass a bill that would have given the unemployed three more months to file for extended jobless benefits.
The legislation would have extended the deadline to file for federal unemployment benefits to Feb. 28, sparing 4 million people from falling off the rolls. The deadline is currently Nov. 30.
Federal jobless payments, which last up to 73 weeks, kick in after the state-funded 26 weeks of coverage expire. These federal benefits are divided into tiers, and the jobless must apply each time they move into a new tier.

More Americans filing for unemployment
By Anally Cents - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The number of Americans filing for first-time unemployment benefits rose by 2,000 in the latest week, pointing to continued weakness in the job market, the government reported Thursday.
The number of initial filings rose to 439,000 in the week ended Nov. 13, the Labor Department said. The number was slightly better than the 442,000 economists surveyed by Briefing.com had expected, but higher than the revised 437,000 initial claims filed the week before.
Overall, the weekly number has been treading water since last November, hovering in the mid to upper 400,000s and even ticking slightly above 500,000 in mid-August.

S.510, Food Control (aka, People Control) for Dummies
Robert Palmer - SilverBearCafe.com
"Monsanto," one of the most powerful multi-national corporations in the world, and arguably a major player in The New World Order conspiracy aimed at controlling millions via the food they eat, probably needs no introduction.
The Powers That Be (TPTB, a non-conspiracy acronym) has been trying to get control of our food since 1970. [1]
Any idea who is stopping them? Answer: You
You and I have been doing a great job for years, but Houston, we have a problem.
Today, 11/17/2010: the greatest threat to our food sovereignty in history, the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2010 (S.510), is on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and the food activists are sitting on the side lines ignoring the pleas for help.

Senate tries to protect doctors from Medicare rate cuts
By Tami Luhby - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Doctors will see their federal Medicare reimbursement rates hold steady in December, under a bipartisan bill introduced Thursday in the Senate.
The $1 billion measure would block a scheduled 23% cut in physician payments. The so-called doc-fix legislation was introduced by Senators Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat, and Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican.
A 1997 law requires that doctors' Medicare rates be adjusted each year based on the health of the economy, with the goal of keeping the program in the black. Rate cuts have now been blocked 10 times in the last eight years, including four times this year.

California employers' healthcare costs rose 8.4% this year
That tops the 6.9% increase nationwide for companies that offer health insurance benefits, according to a Mercer study.
By Duke Helfand, Los Angeles Times
California employers that provide health insurance benefits for their workers have seen their costs rise 8.4% this year, outpacing increases for businesses nationally, and fees could climb 11.4% next year, a study showed Wednesday.
Employers in California are spending an average of $9,960 per worker on healthcare in 2010. Nationally, companies that offer health insurance are spending $9,562 per employee, a 6.9% increase over 2009, according to a survey by Mercer, the benefits consulting firm that conducted the national survey of more than 2,800 employers.

BBB Stops Payment for Top Ratings Scheme
Business group changes ratings system
HARTFORD, Conn. - The Better Business Bureau says it's abandoning a rating system that awarded rating points simply because a business was accredited.
The Arlington, Va., group was criticized by Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal for the system that he called pay for play.
The business group also said Thursday it will hire an independent third party to help review its accrediting procedure and make other changes.

Gasoline prices may climb back to $3 a gallon nationally
Pump prices are expected to soar even higher in California, but experts say the increase won't last as the cost of crude oil comes down.
By Ronald D. White, Los Angeles Times
Just in time for the holidays, consumers may see the average price of a gallon of gasoline climb back to $3 nationally and as high as $3.25 a gallon in California, experts said Wednesday.
Pump prices have been rising steadily. Just last month, only four states averaged more than $3 a gallon, according to the Oil Price Information Service, which tracks prices at about 100,000 retail outlets. Three of those were the states that often have the dubious distinction of being the only states above $3 a gallon - Alaska, Hawaii and California.

Sears Loss Widens as U.S. Shoppers Shun Appliances
By Ian Thomson - WashingtonPost.com
Nov. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Sears Holdings Corp., the largest U.S. department-store chain, said its third-quarter loss widened as consumers remained cautious amid high levels of unemployment.
The net loss was $218 million, or $1.98 a share in the quarter ended Oct. 30, compared with $127 million, or $1.09, a year earlier, the Hoffman Estates, Illinois-based company said today in a statement. Excluding some items, the loss was $1.71 a share, compared with the $1.11 average estimate of four analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
Sears, led by interim Chief Executive Officer W. Bruce Johnson, has seen its appliances and home-improvement categories suffer since the expiration of tax credits for first-time U.S. homebuyers in April. Total sales dropped 5 percent to $9.7 billion in the quarter as shoppers stayed away from appliances, seasonal apparel and electronics.

Texas Borrows $1.1 Billion for Unemployment Costs: Muni Credit
By Darrell Preston and William Selway
Nov. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Texas, the second most-populous U.S. state, borrowed $1.1 billion to reimburse the federal government for jobless benefits, cutting its credit cost by more than a third.
The Texas Workforce Commission, which administers the state's unemployment insurance program, borrowed at yields below 3 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That compared with the 4.5 percent it expected the government to charge, according to September estimates as the sale was being prepared.

California Raises Yields on $10 Billion Sale Amid Supply Glut
By Michael B. Marois and Brendan A. McGrail
Nov. 18 (Bloomberg) -- California was forced to raise yields on $10 billion of short-term notes it sold and had to offer rates on taxable debt that exceed those on some lower- rated corporate bonds amid a surge in municipal issuance.
The state today sold $2.25 billion of notes due in May with a yield of 1.5 percent and $7.75 billion that mature in June at 1.75 percent, both 0.25 percentage point higher than quoted to investors yesterday, Treasurer Bill Lockyer said. The state also began offering $3.275 billion of taxable debt today, including Build America Bonds quoted to yield 3.3 percentage points more than comparable-maturity Treasuries, according to a person familiar with the marketing. The size was initially $2 billion.

Small Farms Would Be Exempt from Food Safety Regs
By Mary Clare Jalonick, Associated Press via CNSNews.com
Washington (AP) - Some small farms would be exempt from government efforts to prevent foodborne illness under a Senate agreement on food safety legislation announced Thursday.
The food safety bill now pending in the Senate would give the FDA more authority to recall tainted products, increase inspections of food processors and require producers to follow stricter standards for keeping food safe. Operators of smaller farms and advocates for locally produced food have worried that the bill's requirements could force small farms out of business.
An agreement brokered by Democratic Sen. Jon Tester of Montana would attempt to allay those concerns, allowing farmers who make less than $500,000 a year in revenue and sell directly to consumers, restaurants or grocery stores within their states or within 275 miles of their farms to avoid expensive food safety plans required of larger operations. State and local authorities would still have oversight over those farms.

"Resistance to Tyranny is Obedience to God"
GeorgeWashington's Blog
I've previously written that real men stand up to fascists:
The fascists' view of masculinity is that -- to be a real American man -- you have to rally around the "strong leader", you have to talk tough about the "war on terror", you have to get pleasure out of watching "our team" (the sole superpower) beat the stuffing out of a bunch of third-rate armies like Iraq and Afghanistan.
Are they right? Well, psychologists tell us that rallying around the authoritarian leader is actually a very infantile way to affirm one's masculinity.

Government gropers at airports a ruse
for body scanners coming to schools and malls
By Doug Hagmann - CanadaFreePress.com
Naked Scanners paid for by Stimulus; George Soros holds financial interest in company
Perhaps one of the most controversial topics today is the use of “naked” body scanners at airports by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), a branch of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). As this investigation found, it is indeed a matter deserving of such controversy and further investigative focus.
Using the attempted Christmas Day 2009 bombing of Northwest Airlines Flight 253 by 23-year-old “underwear bomber” Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab as “Exhibit A” for needing the ultra-intrusive “naked” body scanners, the TSA, under the direction of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, stepped up their purchases and deployment of the scanners to U.S. airports.

Instead of a TSA airport search, he'll take the train
By Ashley Halsey III - Washington Post
Kyle Whitney is headed home for the holidays next week, but unlike 1.6 million Americans who say they plan to fly, he's taking the train.
"I thought about flying, but it doesn't seem right that you have to submit to a strip search in order to fly," said Whitney, who works for XM Radio in the District.
So instead of a one-hour flight to Hartford, Conn., he'll spend about seven hours on the train.
For millions of Americans the delicate balance between anti-terrorism security needs and personal freedoms seems to have been tipped by new airport security methods to employ revealing full-body scanners and require "enhanced pat-downs" of those who refuse the scan.

Ron Paul’s Anti-TSA Legislation
Posted by Lew Rockwell on November 17, 2010 05:13 PM
Ron Paul introduces HR 6416, the American Traveler Dignity Act:

Mr. Speaker, today I introduce legislation to protect Americans from physical and emotional abuse by federal Transportation Security Administration employees conducting screenings at the nation’s airports. We have seen the videos of terrified children being grabbed and probed by airport screeners. We have read the stories of Americans being subjected to humiliating body imaging machines and/or forced to have the most intimate parts of their bodies poked and fondled. We do not know the potentially harmful effects of the radiation emitted by the new millimeter wave machines.

Ron Paul to TSA: Enough is Enough!

Senate Democrats back TSA 'virtual strip searches'
by Declan McCullagh - CNet.com
Foes of the Transportation Security Agency's new air-screening procedures, including law enforcement-style pat-downs and what have been called "virtual strip searches," had hoped that today's Senate hearing would lead to a privacy outcry on Capitol Hill.
Not quite. The hearing quickly cleaved along partisan lines, with Democratic senators applauding the Obama administration and Republicans offering only modest criticism.
"Mr. Pistole, you're doing a great job," Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat and chairman of the Senate committee overseeing air travel, told TSA chief John Pistole, a former FBI agent who's had the job since July. For emphasis, Rockefeller added a few minutes later: "I think you're doing a terrific job."

TSA Abuse Opens the Door to Resistance
By Daniel Taylor - OldThinkerNews.com
September 11th, 2001 marked the beginning of a decade of fear and trembling, and the people of the United States were drawn to the ever expanding federal government for protection. Homeland Security was created and new security measures were imposed, both largely accepted by the populace. Today, nearly a decade after the tragic events of 9/11, resistance has been sparked by the outrageously intrusive security measures on part of the Transportation Security Administration.
The TSA's "enhanced patdowns", which have entailed putting hands down passengers pants, have caused wide-spread outrage. Airports are recognizing the extent of the discontent, as Florida's Sanford airport is opting out of TSA screening, choosing instead to use a private security firm.

DA Now Sending Deputies to SF Airport to Investigate Felony Groping
Kurt Nimmo Infowars.com
Appearing on the Alex Jones Show today, current chief deputy DA and incoming DA of San Mateo County Steve Wagstaffe said his office will prosecute TSA employees who engage in lewd and lascivious behavior while conducting Homeland Security mandated patdowns at the San Francisco International Airport in San Mateo County.

Sanford Airport to opt out of TSA screening
By Marva Hinton - WBDO
Reporter: Ken Tyndall
The backlash continues over those new TSA screening measures, and now one Central Florida airport has decided to go with a private security screening firm.
Orlando Sanford International Airport has decided to opt out from TSA screening.
"All of our due diligence shows it's the way to go," said Larry Dale, the director of the Sanford Airport Authority. "You're going to get better service at a better price and more accountability and better customer service."
Dale says he will be sending a letter requesting to opt out from TSA screening, and instead the airport will choose one of the five approved private screening companies to take over.

Lawmakers Move to Eject Nude Scanners From New York Airports
By Kevin Poulsen - Wired.com
A New York City lawmaker on Thursday introduced legislation to prohibit the TSA from using its advanced body scanners at New York airports, including JFK, the busiest international airport in the country.
Democratic councilman David Greenfield says six fellow council members have signed onto the proposal, which comes amid growing unease over the so-called Advanced Imaging Technology scanners, which allow airport screeners to see beneath a traveler’s clothes.

Airport Security Firestorm Ignored by President, Cabinet
Jim Kouri, CPP - FamilySecurityMatters.org
Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano and the rest of President Barack Obama's cabinet are either evasive or silent about their latest public relations fiasco: invasive security measures at U.S. airports.
It appears that in an effort to protect traveling Americans, while at the same time adhering to the liberal-left orthodoxy, on domestic and international commercial airline flights, new state-of-the-art body-scanners are now in use at airports throughout the nation. These admittedly intrusive devices leave nothing to the imagination when a man or woman is scanned, and should travelers resent being subjected to a full-body scan, they may opt to be "manually" frisked by airport security officers.

The TSA is out of control

The Obama Administration in Your Pants
By Ben Shapiro - CNSNews.com
Are Barack Obama's poll numbers up, or is Janet Napolitano just happy to see us?
This week, the TSA began installing full-body scanners in airports across the country. TSA employees will be viewing us in our birthday suits each time we fly. Pregnant women and children will not be subjected to these scans due to low doses of radiation; frequent fliers, however, will soon be glowing in the dark.
If we opt not to participate in such full-body scans, we will be subjected to Paris Hilton-style pat-downs by members of the same gender (TSA employees will be baffled by Chaz/Chastity Bono). The TSA has announced that pat-downs, in fact, are not enough - screeners will utilize a "hand-sliding motion" to examine passengers' genitals, buttocks and breasts. In some cases already, TSA employees have been sticking their hands down the pants of passengers.

Airports Can Legally Opt-Out, Kick TSA Program to the Curb, and Instead Hire Private Security Screeners
Airports are not required to have TSA screeners checking passengers at security checkpoints and can instead opt to hire private security screeners.
By Ms. Smith - NetworkWorld.com
Did you know that U.S. airports could choose to kick the TSA program to the curb? According to the 2001 law that created the TSA, after two years of using TSA screeners to check passengers at security checkpoints, airports have a right to opt-out of the TSA program and instead hire private screeners.
According to Washington Examiner, Rep. John Mica wrote to heads of more than 150 U.S. airports, reminding airports that they have a choice and suggesting that they opt-out of TSA screening. Mica will soon be chairman of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. He wrote, "When the TSA was established, it was never envisioned that it would become a huge, unwieldy bureaucracy which was soon to grow to 67,000 employees. As TSA has grown larger, more impersonal, and administratively top-heavy, I believe it is important that airports across the country consider utilizing the opt-out provision' and use private screening."

PETITION TO STOP
'ENHANCED' AIRPORT SCREENING TECHNIQUES NOW!
To: Barack Obama, Janet Napolitano and all members of the U.S. Congress:
Whereas, the Transportation Security Administration recently commenced "enhanced" airport screening procedures that include invasive and humiliating full-body scans that result in the display of a graphic image of each passenger's naked body to be scrutinized by a TSA agent – a virtual strip search;

ENTERING: THE CROSSROADS TSA-Body Scanners or God?
A Choice Before Us All
SteveQuayle.com
Wickedness or Righteousness: Darkness or Light The time to choose has come The wait – is over

"It also gives us a very special, secret pleasure to see how unaware the people around us are of what is really happening to them." ~ Adolph Hitler

We as a nation of diverse peoples have come to a major time sensitive crossroad of our own making. What you see pictured above is a representation of the world, but more so the nation in which we live. A nation once so great and blessed by God, now bespeaks of darkness and decay, isolation and helplessness, indecision and abandonment – the judgment of a Holy God. Yes – God has abandoned this nation and that is our judgment as a nation, because its people first abandoned Him.

Opt-out Ode to the Beltway TSA and Their Airline CEO Cronies:
Take Your Planes and Shove 'Em
End Times Hoax
Take your planes and shove 'em, I ain't flyin' here no more
My freedoms done left and took the digni-ty I was working for
Ya better not try, and stand in my way
Cause I'm Optin', out the door
Take your planes and shove 'em, I ain't flyin' here no more
Well, I been buyin' your boogeyman scam, for goin' on ten years
All this time, I watched my freedom dyin' in a pool of tears
And I've seen good folks abused thinkin' freedom's, a cost we gotta pay
I can't wait to see your faces when I get the nerve to say...

Worm Was Perfect for Sabotaging Centrifuges
By WILLIAM J. BROAD and DAVID E. SANGER - NYTimes.com
Experts dissecting the computer worm suspected of being aimed at Iran's nuclear program have determined that it was precisely calibrated in a way that could send nuclear centrifuges wildly out of control.
Their conclusion, while not definitive, begins to clear some of the fog around the Stuxnet worm, a malicious program detected earlier this year on computers, primarily in Iran but also India, Indonesia and other countries.
The paternity of the worm is still in dispute, but in recent weeks officials from Israel have broken into wide smiles when asked whether Israel was behind the attack, or knew who was. American officials have suggested it originated abroad.

Rockefeller Wants Government to Shut Down Fox and MSNBC
Kurt Nimmo - Infowars.com
Senator Jay Rockefeller, great-grandson of John D. Rockefeller and nephew of David Rockefeller, wants to yank both Fox News and MSNBC off the air.
"There is a bug inside of that wants to get the FCC to say to Fox News and MSNBC ... out, off," he said during a hearing on retransmission negotiations between broadcasters and cable providers. "We have journalism that is always ravenous for the next rumor, but insufficiently hungry for the facts that can nourish our democracy."
"I hunger for quality news, I'm tired of the right and left," Rockefeller said.
He failed to mention that both networks are cable television channels and the FCC has little if any regulatory power over their content.

FCC chief working on net neutrality proposal
By KIM HART - Politico.com
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski is putting together a net neutrality proposal and plans to take action on the controversial issue as early as next month, according to several sources with knowledge of the situation.
Details of the proposal being developed by Genachowski's office are unclear, but sources say it could be similar to the deal stakeholders tried to reach with Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) earlier this fall.
The long-running net neutrality debate centers around rules that would require Internet service providers to treat all web traffic equally. Internet companies like Google and Skype want net neutrality rules applied to both wireline and wireless networks, but network operators including AT&T, Verizon and Comcast say they need flexibility to manage web traffic on their lines.

Senate Committee OKs Domain-Name Seizure for Pirate Websites
By David Kravets - Wired.com
The United States inched a procedural step closer Thursday to becoming the world’s internet piracy policeman.
The Senate Judiciary Committee, voting 19-0, approved legislation that would let the Justice Department seek U.S. court orders against piracy websites anywhere in the world, and shut them down through the sites’ domain registration.
However, it was not likely the measure (.pdf) would reach the lame-duck Senate floor before year’s end, when the legislative session terminates. And the bill’s fate in the House is unclear, if it ever gets that far under a new Republican-controlled chamber.

Jim DeMint: Leading the Right's Rebel Brigade
By Michael Crowley and Jay Newton-Small - Time.com
On Nov. 15, a band of Tea Party activists gathered near the Capitol, waving signs that read "Don't Just Stand There, Undo Something" and "Stop Spending, You Are Stealing MY Future!!!" A guy in a Captain America costume hoisted, for reasons unclear, a giant Marine Corps flag. In the middle of it all stood a man whom the crowd cheered as if he were a conquering hero: South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint. And in a way he was. DeMint's early support - sometimes in defiance of the GOP establishment - helped elect several Tea Party candidates, including Marco Rubio of Florida and Rand Paul of Kentucky. Now DeMint, 59, was hailing a new political era. "Power has been wrested out of the hands of the politicians and into the hands of the American people," he told the crowd. "Everything has changed here in Washington!"

Obama Forces Showdown With G.O.P. on Arms Pact
By PETER BAKER - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - Just two weeks after an election that left him struggling to find his way forward, President Obama has decided to confront Senate Republicans in a make-or-break battle over arms control that could be an early test of his mettle heading into the final two years of his term.
He is pushing for a vote on a signature issue despite long odds, daring Republicans to block an arms-control treaty at the risk of disrupting relations with Russia and the international coalition that opposes Iran's nuclear program. If he succeeds, Mr. Obama will demonstrate strength following the midterm election debacle. If he fails, he will reinforce the perception at home and abroad that he is a weakened president.

FDR Wasn't FDR ... Until His Hand Was Forced By Civil Disobedience
George Washington's Blog
Progressives are disappointed that - contrary to the hype - Obama is no FDR.
But FDR himself wasn't who we think of as FDR until he was forced by protests, strikes and other forms of civil disobedience.
As historian Howard Zinn wrote in March 2008:
In 1934, early in the Roosevelt Presidency, strikes broke out all over the country, including a general strike in Minneapolis, a general strike in San Francisco, hundreds of thousands on strike in the textile mills of the South. Unemployed councils formed all over the country. Desperate people were taking action on their own, defying the police to put back the furniture of evicted tenants, and creating self-help organizations with hundreds of thousands of members.

Terror detainee largely acquitted
By Peter Finn - WashingtonPost.com
The first former Guantanamo Bay detainee to be tried in federal criminal court was found guilty on a single conspiracy charge Wednesday but cleared on 284 other counts. The outcome, a surprise, seriously undermines - and could doom - the Obama administration's plans to put other Guantanamo detainees on trial in U.S. civilian courts.
After deliberating for five days, a jury of six men and six women found Ahmed Ghailani, 36, guilty of conspiracy to damage or destroy U.S. property but acquitted him of multiple murder and attempted-murder charges for his role in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa.

Just for the fun of it ...

Wooden Bike Like Riding a Perfect Piece of Furniture
By Mark McClusky - Wired.com
At first, it’s odd, hopping on a bike frame made entirely of wood. After all, I’m used to high-tech composite framed made of carbon-fiber nanotubes impregnated with exotic resins, molded to tolerances of a thousandth of an inch. How could bamboo and hardwoods compare?
Actually, quite well. Renovo sent me its R4, a beautiful work of art, all swoopy lines and stunning finish work. It’s a little bit like riding a perfect piece of furniture — you can really get a sense of the fact that a human being spent a massive amount of time making this thing.

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Thursday 11.18.2010

Is America In Danger Of Turning Into One Gigantic Hellhole?
EndOfTheAmericanDream.com
What in the world is happening to America? Are there still places in America where liberty and freedom are respected, where taxes are low, where regulations are not suffocating, where the people are friendly and where Americans can be free to live an independent lifestyle? In a previous article entitled "What Is The Best U.S. State To Move To If You Want To Insulate Yourself From The Coming Economic Meltdown?", I asked readers what they thought were some of the best places in America to move to for people wishing to ride out the coming economic collapse. Well, the response was overwhelmingly negative. Readers were even highly negative about states that have been very popular for "independent thinking" Americans to move to such as Montana, Idaho, Alaska, Washington and Colorado. So are there any "good" places in America left? Or is America in danger of turning into one gigantic hellhole?

Soros: China Uses Currency to Transfer Wealth to its Government
By Rocky Vega - The DailyReckoning.com
11/17/10 Stockholm, Sweden - George Soros, famous billionaire investor and currency speculator, was being honored as "Globalist of the Year" earlier this week and took the opportunity to describe China's rising influence, how it's been accomplished it, and the uncertainty of how it'll use its new-found power. The most interesting part is how the nation leverages its trade surplus to accumulate wealth to the government.
From The Wall Street Journal:
"....China continues to function effectively and achieve a large trade surplus, Soros said in a speech Monday. "The crisis there was purely external and the system unscathed," he said. Current systems of global governance are on the brink of breaking down as the G20 group of advanced and emerging economies falls prey to internal tensions, he said. China has become the 'motor' of the global economy and political instability there would have global consequences, he said ...

Prospect of Ireland bailout drives dollar up, Dow down
By Patrice Hill - The Washington Times
Worries about the European debt crisis boiled over in world markets Tuesday, this time triggered by the prospect of debt-strapped Ireland becoming the second country to need a bailout.
Renewed turmoil in Europe sent investors fleeing into safe-haven U.S. dollars and Treasury bonds, spurring the dollar to a six-week high against the euro. Stock indexes in Britain, France and Germany plunged by 2 percent to 2.6 percent in tumultuous trading.
The Dow Jones industrial average dived more than 200 points to less than 11,000 before recovering some to end the day down 178 points at 11,023. The Dow and the Standard & Poor's 500 index each lost 1.6 percent after a string of more minor losses last week prompted in part by the renewed crisis in Europe.

Ireland bailout: the likely options
Eurozone ministers are sending a joint European-IMF mission to Ireland that could prepare the way for a bailout if Dublin decides to ask for aid. We look at the options.
Reuters
WHAT IS AVAILABLE?
The European Union safety net consists of the European Financial Stability Mechanism (EFSM), which can lend up to Û60bn and the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), which is backed by Û440bn worth of eurozone government guarantees.
On top of that, the International Monetary Fund can lend additional money and the IMF has said it was ready to provide up to 50pc of what Europe was providing.
WHO WOULD LEND FIRST?
If Ireland asks for and is granted a financing package, it is likely to come from all three sources.
Money from the EFSM would be paid out first, but EFSF cash and the IMF would also be involved, because the EU wants to avoid a situation where one country uses up all the funds available under the EFSM.

Greek rescue frays as Irish crisis drags on
The eurozone bail-out for Greece has begun to unravel after Austria suspended aid contributions over failure to comply with the rescue terms, and Germany warned Athens that its patience was running out.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
The clash caught markets off-guard and heightened fears that Europe's debt crisis may be escalating, with deep confusion over the Irish crisis as Dublin continues to resist EU pressure to request its own rescue.
Olli Rehn, the EU economics commissioner, said escalating rhetoric in Europe was turning dangerous. "I want to call on every responsible European to resist the centrifugal tendencies and existential alarmism."
Swirling rumours hit eurozone bond markets, while bourses tumbled across the world. The FTSE 100 fell 2.4pc to 5681.9, and the Dow dropped over 200 points in early trading. The euro slid two cents to $1.3460 against the dollar as the US currency regained its safe-haven status.

Elton John:
America Is A 'Very Uncomfortable Place To Be At The Moment'
By Nicholas Ballasy
CNSNews.com) - Sir Elton John, who has residences in Atlanta, London and Venice, said that "America is an uncomfortable place to be at the moment" whether it's with politics, sexuality or religion because people are "standing and screaming" in the country and "not talking to each other."
"It seems to be in America at the moment that people are standing and screaming at each other and are not talking to each other and there's a lot of spite, whether it's with politics, sexuality, religion, whatever. It's a very uncomfortable place to be at the moment. It's not the America I came to in 1970 and I find that really disappointing," John told reporters before the World TeamTennis annual charitable exhibition, held this year in Washington which raised more than $500,000 to fight HIV and AIDS through Sir Elton John's AIDS Foundation.

The Washington Post Runs "Five Myths About The Federal Reserve" Authored By Economist Linked To The Rothschilds
EndOfTheAmericanDream.com
There have been so many attacks on the Federal Reserve recently that the mainstream media now feels almost forced to try to defend their actions. The most blatant example of this recently was an article in the Washington Post entitled "Five Myths About The Federal Reserve". The article was authored by Greg Ip, the U.S. economics editor of The Economist. According to Wikipedia, the Rothschild banking family is a partial owner of the firm that operates The Economist. You would have thought that they would have gotten someone a whole lot less obvious to produce this propaganda piece, but apparently they did not think anyone would notice. Of course an economics editor of The Economist is going to defend the Federal Reserve. He would be fired if he didn't. The Economist is well known to be a mouthpiece for the international central banking establishment. But what is really sad is how poor a job Greg Ip did in defending the Fed. If these are the best intellectual arguments they can come up with then they are in huge trouble.

Why True Prosperity Doesn't Come from a Printing Press
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
11/17/10 Baltimore, Maryland - Ooooh ...
Bad, bad day yesterday. Municipal bonds took a big hit. California is going broke. The Dow finished down 178 points. Gold up $30.
Did you pay attention to our "Crash Alert" flag, dear reader? Hope so. This market is dangerous. Because it is built on a lie - that EZ money from the Fed's printing press will cause stocks to rise, interest rates to go down, and the economy to revive.
It ain't gonna happen.
Never in history has it worked that way. Ben Bernanke maintains that what he is doing is merely an extension of normal monetary policy. It's not. It's a daredevil maneuver in which the Fed funds about 100% of the US government's borrowing needs over the next 8 months.

The World Shorts the Dollar
by Ron Paul - LewRockwell.com
A remarkable confluence of recent events has brought unprecedented but very welcome attention to both U.S. monetary policy and the global political economy in general.
First, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke recently announced that the Fed would embark upon another round of monetary easing by purchasing $600 billion worth of U.S. Treasury debt. This amounts to an admission that markets have run out of patience with our profligacy, and therefore our own central bank literally must serve as the buyer of last resort for Treasury debt.

Dollar to Become World's 'Weakest Currency,' JPMorgan Predicts
By Shigeki Nozawa
Nov. 18 (Bloomberg) -- The dollar may fall below 75 yen next year as it becomes the world's "weakest currency" due to the Federal Reserve's monetary-easing program, according to JPMorgan & Chase Co.
The U.S. central bank, along with those in Japan and Europe, will keep interest rates at record lows in 2011 as they seek to boost economic growth, said Tohru Sasaki, head of Japanese rates and foreign-exchange research at the second-largest U.S. bank by assets. U.S. policy makers may take additional easing steps following the $600 billion bond-purchase program announced this month depending on inflation and the labor market, he said.

The Fed will kill the dollar! Eventually!
By Paul R. La Monica - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- It's hard to find someone that isn't criticizing the Federal Reserve these days. I keep expecting to see a press release from Lady Gaga in my inbox about why she thinks quantitative easing is the financial equivalent of a bad romance.
The big concerns among all the Fed-haters was that QE2 would keep long-term interest rates too low for too long and further weaken the already puny dollar.
But now that two weeks have passed since the Fed's oft-lampooned decision to buy $600 billion in long-term Treasuries, it's worth pointing out that the worst-case fears have yet to be realized. Bond yields are higher and the dollar has gotten stronger.

US bullion dealers challenge Sec 9006
LOS ANGELES (Commodity Online): The Gold and Silver Political Action Committee (PAC) has challenged Section 9006 of the health-care legislation requiring US bullion and coin dealers to file a Form 1099 with the Internal Revenue Service when ever they make transactions paying out $600 a year to another party beginning January, 2012.
The Gold and Silver PAC was formed by premier providers of gold bullion, numismatic gold coins and Precious Metals IRAs, along with a former U.S. Mint director, other rare coin and bullion dealers, and state and government relations experts.
Section 9006 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is a portion of the healthcare legislation which has been opposed by U.S. bullion and coin dealers due to the tremendous reporting burdens created by the legislation on dealers as well as collectors and investors. The creation of the Gold and Silver PAC was prompted by the enactment of the IRS Form 1099 reporting requirements included in the bill.

Trend in The Dollar and Gold Under Pressure
By: Jeb Handwerger - SafeHaven.com
Last week I warned that the U.S. Dollar was reaching three year lows and to expect a dollar bounce. The dollar has bounced higher as risk aversion has returned with Ireland on the verge of needing a bailout and China raising interest rates to combat rising inflation. There are growing concerns of the Fed needing to raise interest rates ahead of schedule. The previous euphoria in commodities appears to be waning and the technicals are demonstrating the fundamental challenges facing commodities.
There are negative divergences of momentum and price on both the dollar and gold to indicate counter trend reversals may be developing. I have alerted to readers to be a 100% defensive since the November 9th high volume reversal.

Gold price correction? Back up the gold truck!
Are the falls in the gold and silver prices the signs of the end of the bull run, or merely an inevitable correction? The odds are probably on the latter.
Author: Lawrence Williams - MineWeb.com
Gold and silver have had a torrid few days, with gold down over 6% from its peak at one time and silver, living up to its reputation for greater volatility on the way up and on the way down, fell over 13%. The market has probably not been helped by even a number of pro-gold analysts predicting a correction, but in reality has anything really changed? Is this the bursting of the bubble beloved by many commentators, or is it just a blip in the ongoing bull run?
In assessing the situation, let's start with a quote from Bill Bonner at The Daily Reckoning.
"Gold is probably beginning a serious correction. If not now... soon. - A serious correction will take the price down 10%... or 20%... or 50%.

What should you do if gold goes down 10%? Buy it!
And what if it goes down another 10%? Buy more!
And what if it goes down 50%? Back up the truck!"

Gold's Allure Tied to Interest Rates
By: Michael Pento - SafeHaven.com
The continued bull market in the price of gold has been one of the staple discussions in the financial media for the better part of a decade. But, in that time, almost no consensus has emerged to explain the phenomenon. If you ask ten Wall Street pundits to explain the upward movement, you will most likely get nearly ten different answers.
While most logically identify global currency debasement as a primary cause, others say that gold is driven by: fear of economic uncertainty, central bank gold hording, international political conflict, or the ebb and flow of the Indian wedding season. The truth is the main drivers for the price of gold are the level and direction of real interest rates and the intrinsic value of the dollar.

Buying Gold for Buoyancy as US the Credit Rating Sinks
By The Mogambo Guru - The DailyReckoning.com
11/17/10 Tampa, Florida - Alvaro Vargas Llosa is quoted in The Independent Institute's newsletter, The Lighthouse, as saying that the new "$600 billion in 6 months" QE2 program (and $900 billion with re-investments) of the evil Federal Reserve is, "The biggest load of stinking monetary policy crap in the history of the United States, and we should all follow the lead of the Incredible Mogambo Guru (IMG) and buy gold, silver and oil in those few, rare moments when we are not Screaming Our Guts Out (SOGO) in anger at the Federal Reserve for its treachery, and likewise not Screaming Our Guts Out (SOGO) in fear of the inflationary horror that is guaranteed - guaranteed! - to befall us because this Federal Reserve monetary insanity is to - as ridiculous as it sounds - enable the despicable federal government to monstrously deficit-spend $2 trillion a year, every year from here on out, to enlarge its suffocating self and expand its long roster of dependents which total, currently, half the freaking population of the Whole Freaking Country (WFC), and thus will be constantly expanding the money supply as this new money pours into the economy at rates of growth even beyond the horrifying 14% rate that is happening right now, which is the raw feedstock of the 'inflationary horror' mentioned earlier in this very wonderful sentence of mine."

John Paulson's high-performance Gold strategy
By Andrew Mickey - CommodityOnline.com
John Paulson almost single-handedly made gold "cool" again on Wall Street.
The man who made billions betting against subprime debt put the spotlight on gold when his firm revealed in May 2009 that he was betting on gold in a big way.
Since then gold has climbed 45% and major gold stocks (as tracked by the Market Vectors Gold Miners ETF - NYSE:GDX) have climbed more than 70%.
Paulson's largest gains in gold, however, have come from using a unique strategy which reduces risk, increases gains, and you can use to truly maximize the gold bull market.

World Gold Council: 3Q Identifiable Gold Demand Up 12% YOY To 921.8 Metric Tons
By Allen Sykora of Kitco News
(Kitco News) - Third-quarter identifiable global gold demand rose 12% from the year-ago period to 921.8 metric tons, the World Gold Council said Wednesday in its quarterly trends report.
However, the Council said, demand was down 10% from the second quarter, largely due to a retreat from the "exceptional levels" of investment demand seen during the April-June period.
Identifiable demand includes jewelry, industrial and dental uses and investment. It does not include central banks, with net purchases or sales in any given quarter instead listed as a plus or minus number under supplies.

Gold's Rise Re-Crafts Jewelry
Designers Buy in Bulk,
Switch to Silver So Keepsakes Don't Become Too Dear
By LIAM PLEVEN And ANN ZIMMERMAN
For jewelers, all that glitters this year isn't necessarily gold.
Big jewelry chains are scrambling to cope with the rising price of bullion while striving to keep their baubles affordable for consumers still cautious in their spending.
Some are cutting back on the amount of gold in their products and turning to less expensive metals from silver to tungsten. Jewelers also are buying precious metals in bulk at fixed prices to hedge the risk of further spikes.

Ron Paul & Rand Paul on Freedom Watch with Judge Napolitano

Treasuries Fall Before Reports on Economic Outlook, Factories
By Wes Goodman
Nov. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Treasuries fell for a second day as analysts said reports will show increases in an index of U.S. leading economic indicators and Philadelphia-area manufacturing.
Five-year yields approached a two-month high as the U.S. prepared to announce the sizes of three Treasury sales scheduled for next week. The government will auction $35 billion of two- year notes, $35 billion in five-year debt and $29 billion of seven-year securities over three days starting Nov. 22, based on forecasts in a Bloomberg News survey of primary dealers.

Boom! Crack! Crash!
by Murray N. Rothbard - LewRockwell.com
Things have come to a pretty pass when we have to hail economists for writing in clear, understandable English, for deigning to communicate with the public in an intelligible fashion. These days, of course, removing the veil of obscurantist jargon and mathematical charts and equations beloved by the economics guild is considered to be "unscientific" if not downright humanistic. As a distinguished economist expostulated when he found himself in a conference discussing the question of freedom, "What is this 'freedom'? I can't measure it!" There are no brownie points or National Science Foundation grants to be obtained by being understandable to the average reader.

Bernanke Defends Fed Stimulus in Closed-Door Talk With Senators
By Scott Lanman and Craig Torres
Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke met with U.S. senators today to defend his expansion of record monetary stimulus, saying it would aid job growth and the central bank would control any inflation.
Bernanke said that he and his colleagues "remain absolutely committed to not letting inflation or inflationary expectations get out of control," Senator Evan Bayh, an Indiana Democrat, told reporters after the 40-minute closed-door session on Capitol Hill.

Bernanke's 'Cheap Money' Spurs Corporate Investment Outside U.S.
By David J. Lynch
Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Southern Copper Corp., a Phoenix- based mining company that boasts some of the industry's largest copper reserves, plans to invest $800 million this year in projects such as a new smelter and a more efficient natural-gas furnace.
Such spending sounds like just what the Federal Reserve had in mind in 2008 when it cut interest rates to near zero and started buying $1.7 trillion in securities to spur job growth. Yet Southern Copper, which raised $1.5 billion in an April debt offering, will use that money at its mines in Mexico and Peru, not the U.S., said Juan Rebolledo, spokesman for parent Grupo Mexico SAB de CV of Mexico City.Rothbard

Bank of America Must Return $500 Million to Lehman
Linda Sandler - WashingtonPost.com
Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Bank of America Corp., a lender to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. in September 2008, must return $500 million of deposits it seized in violation of bankruptcy law, a judge ruled.
"BOA's seizure of the deposited funds was an unauthorized and impermissible setoff in violation of the automatic stay in LBHI's bankruptcy case," U.S. Bankruptcy Judge James Peck in New York said yesterday in a written decision.
The case is one of several involving big banks such as Barclays Plc and JPMorgan Chase & Co. that Peck is considering as Lehman, which filed the biggest bankruptcy in U.S. history two years ago, sues to recover money to pay creditors. The defunct firm has said creditors stand to get an average of 15.8 cents on the dollar.

Judge slaps BofA for Lehman cash grab
Posted by Colin Barr - Fortune
Troubled homeowners aren't the only ones having their issues with Bank of America.
A federal bankruptcy judge ruled Tuesday that BofA (BAC) must return $500 million in collateral it seized without cause from Lehman Brothers two years ago, just after the investment bank collapsed in the biggest-ever U.S. bankruptcy.
Bank of America's actions were "brazen ... unauthorized and impermissible," U.S. bankruptcy judge James Peck wrote in a ruling Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reports.
BofA forced Lehman to post the collateral in August 2008 as questions started to mount about the investment bank's health. There's nothing unusual there, as rivals such as Citi (C) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM) did the same.

Gov't probes officials at failed banks; will stress-test big banks
By Associated Press - USAToday.com
WASHINGTON - The federal government has opened criminal investigations into approximately 50 executives and directors of U.S. banks that have collapsed during the financial crisis.
Deputy Inspector General Fred Gibson says the inspector general's office at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. has been probing the role of the executives in bank failures around the country.
The criminal investigations are separate from civil lawsuits against some 80 bank executives, employees and directors. The lawsuits are seeking to recover about $2 billion and were authorized by the FDIC's board.

Congress members' personal wealth grew 16% amid downturn
By Dan Eggen - Washington Post
Times might be tough for most Americans, but not for the well-heeled lawmakers in Congress.
The personal wealth of members of Congress collectively increased 16 percent between 2008 and 2009, even as the broader economic downturn eliminated thousands of jobs for ordinary Americans, according to a study by the Center for Responsive Politics released Wednesday.
In the House, the study found, median wealth grew to $765,010, up from $645,503 in 2008. In the Senate, median wealth grew from $2.27 million in 2008 to $2.38 million in 2009.

GATE RAPE and panty pat-downs!

The TSA wants to see your T and A!
by Dean Obeidallah - HuffingtonPost.com
The Transportation Security Administration wants to see you naked! That's right, the TSA wants to see your T and A -- in fact, I think that's what the "T" and "A" now stands for in TSA.
As I'm sure you have heard, many people are upset with the new full body scanners at the airport which will enable security to see you naked -- yep, they can see all your "junk" on the monitor. And if you say "no" to the naked body scan, you will be subjected to a very thorough pat down by TSA.

TSA Hit With Lawsuits As Revolt Explodes
Paul Joseph Watson - Infowars.com
The TSA has been hit with a number of lawsuits as the revolt against Big Sis, naked body scanners, and invasive groping measures explodes, with one case involving a woman who had her blouse pulled down in full public view by TSA goons who then proceeded to laugh and joke about her exposed breasts.
Nationwide outrage against the TSA is not only bringing to light new cases of airport abuse, it's throwing fresh attention on previous incidents that have been going on for years.
One of the most disturbing, which is subject to an ongoing lawsuit, involved a 21-year-old college student from Amarillo Texas. The woman was passing through security at Corpus Christi airport on May 29 2008 when she was subjected to "extended search procedures" by the TSA.

The American People Are Taking A Stand Against Naked Body Scanners And TSA Groping
EndOfTheAmericanDream.com
An amazing thing is happening. Americans from every walk of life and from across the political spectrum are standing up and are saying "NO" to naked body scanners and TSA groping. It isn't as if we are against airport security. For decades, the vast majority of us have been more than happy to walk through metal detectors in order to get on an airplane. But when the government wants to look at our naked bodies and fondle our wives and our children that is just too much. The truth is that these new "enhanced pat-downs" would be considered sexual assaults if they were committed out on the street. Horror stories have been pouring in from airports across the United States and the American people have had enough.

TSA Administrator: 'No Exceptions' to Full Body Pat Downs--
For Religious or Any Other Reasons
By Eric Scheiner
(CNSNews.com) - Transportation Security Administration Chief John S. Pistole told a Senate committee yesterday that air passengers selected by the TSA for enhanced screening who decline to undergo either a full-body scan or a full body pat down will not be allowed to board planes in the United States.
There will be no exceptions, Pistole said, even for people who cite religious reasons for refusing to undergo the scan or pat down.

We Do Not Consent to Warrantless 'Porno-Scanning' in Airports
by Kevin Gosztola - LewRockwell.com
"We Won't Fly" Campaign Organizer Talks TSA Pat-Downs, Body Scanners & Opt-Out Day
Jim Babb and George Donnelly have started a campaign called "We Won't Fly" to encourage people to "act now" and "travel with dignity." They are asking people to understand that Americans should not be "treated like criminals" when going through airports and are opposed to the new full-body backscatter x-ray airport scanner machines that have been put into airports over the past few months.

States, mortgage lenders in talks over fund for borrowers in foreclosure mess
By Ariana Eunjung Cha and Brady Dennis - WashingtonPost.com
State attorneys general and the country's biggest lenders are negotiating to create a nationwide fund to compensate borrowers who can prove they lost their home in an improper foreclosure, state and industry officials said.
The fund would present a solution for both sides, helping banks avoid lengthy and costly court challenges from homeowners and aiding state investigators in their efforts to seek relief for homeowners who were wronged, the officials said.
Discussions are continuing over the size of the fund, who would administer it and what kind of proof homeowners would have to present to get access to the money. But there is a consensus between the lenders and state officials that some sort of financial remedy is necessary to avoid the turmoil that could result from homeowner challenges.

Housing Starts in U.S. Drop 12%, More Than Forecast
Courtney Schlisserman - WashingtonPost.com
Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Builders in the U.S. began work on fewer homes than forecast in October as the industry remained mired near the depths reached during the recession.
Housing starts fell to a 519,000 annual rate, the fewest since a record low reached in April 2009 and down 12 percent from a revised 588,000 in September that was less than previously estimated, Commerce Department figures showed today in Washington. Work on multifamily units, which is often volatile, plunged 44 percent, swamping a 1.1 percent drop in single-family homes.

Home Buying Gets Tougher as Lenders Restrict FHA Loans
By Jody Shenn and John Gittelsohn
Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Home ownership may be falling out of reach for more Americans as lenders toughen their standards for Federal Housing Administration-insured loans beyond what the agency itself requires.
Mortgage lenders including Wells Fargo & Co. and Bank of America Corp., the two largest, have raised the minimum credit score on FHA-insured loans that they will buy to 640 from 620. About 6.3 million people fall within that range, according to FICO, which created the formula for the ratings.

Homeowners in foreclosure case could see loan modifications
By Julie Schmit and Stephanie Armour, USA TODAY
More homeowners may get home loan modifications under a potential settlement being discussed between banks and state investigatorsprobing improper foreclosures, but big hurdles remain, real estate experts say.
The 50 state attorneys general are investigating whether loan servicers used faulty documents to justify tens of thousands of foreclosures. News of preliminary settlement talks between banks and the investigators broke earlier this week, but Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, who's heading the probe, says any settlement may be months away.

2010-11-17 Foreclosure Hearing

Chamber of Commerce leader pledges to fight health-care law, financial overhaul -- By Brady Dennis - Washington Post
The leader of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday scolded the Obama administration for the "regulatory tsunami" its policies have created, which he called "the biggest single threat to job creation" in the country.
"We have never seen anything on this scale before. It defies all logic and common sense," Chamber President Thomas J. Donohue said in a speech to the group's board of directors. He vowed to fight many of the new rules outlined in the health-care reform law and the financial overhaul bill. "We cannot allow this nation to move from a government of the people to a government of the regulators."

Republican Senator Challenges Medicare Director Who Called for Redistribrution of Wealth on His Recess Appointment
By Matt Cover
(CNSNews.com) - Donald Berwick, President Obama's Medicare and Medicaid administrator, told a Senate panel Wednesday that he accepted his recess appointment because he "wanted to serve his country," regardless of the controversy surrounding his appointment.
Republican Sen. Jim Bunning of Kentucky asked Berwick why he accepted the appointment when his original nomination never came up for a vote in the Senate.
Because "the President asked me," Berwick responded. He noted that he didn't have a choice in how he was appointed, and he said he took the opportunity that was presented to him.

The History of Health Tyranny: Codex Alimentarius, part 1
Brandon Turbeville -- Activist Post
Contrary to popular belief Codex Alimentarius is neither a law nor a policy. It is in fact a functioning body, a Commission, created by the Food and Agricultural Organization and the World Health Organization under the direction of the United Nations. The confusion in this regard is largely due to statements made by many critics referring to the "implementation" of Codex Alimentarius as if it were legislation waiting to come into effect. A more accurate phrase would be the "implementation of Codex Alimentarius guidelines," as it would more adequately describe the situation.
Codex is merely another tool in the chest of an elite group of individuals whose goal is to create a one world government in which they wield complete control. Power over the food supply is essential in order to achieve this. As will be discussed later, Codex Alimentarius will be "implemented" whenever guidelines are established and national governments begin to arrange their domestic laws in accordance with the standards set by the organization.

Drug Maker Roche to Cut 4,800 Jobs, Mostly in U.S.
By Frank Jordans, Associated Press
Geneva (AP) - Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche will cut 4,800 jobs over two years, mostly in the U.S., to help save 2.4 billion Swiss francs ($2.4 billion) by 2012, the company said Wednesday.
The cuts amount to six percent of its 82,000-strong global work force and will mainly affect positions in sales, marketing and manufacturing, Basel-based Roche Holding AG said in a statement.
A further 1,500 jobs will be transferred to other locations within the company or outsourced, meaning that a total of 6,300 positions will be affected.

Medicare Chief Berwick Ducks Question of Whether Obamacare Redistributes Wealth
By Matt Cover
(CNSNews.com) - Dr. Donald Berwick, the head of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), declined to answer a reporter's question on Wednesday about whether the health-care law signed in March redistributes wealth, something that Berwick in the has insisted is a necessary element of any "just" health care system.
In 2008, Berwick gave a speech in which he said a "just" and "humane" health care funding plan "must redistribute wealth from the richer among us to the poorer and the less fortunate."

AT&T Still Seeking Exclusive Devices as IPhone Deal's End Looms
By Jonathan Browning
Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- AT&T Inc., the sole U.S. wireless carrier for Apple Inc.'s iPhone, is looking for additional exclusive partnerships with device manufacturers, as its iPhone deal is said to end.
Verizon Wireless, the largest U.S. wireless company, will start selling the iPhone early next year, two people familiar with the company's plans said in June. Exclusive partnerships are still required for carriers, Glenn Lurie, who's responsible for AT&T's tablet devices and partnerships, said today in an interview at a Morgan Stanley conference in Barcelona.

Verizon Rethinks Pricing
Executives Say 4G Shift Creates Option to Charge More for Faster Wireless Transfers
By ROGER CHENG And SHAYNDI RAICE - WSJ.com
Top executives at Verizon Communications Inc. are exploring ways to charge consumers based on the speed of their wireless data connection in addition to the amount of data they use.
Chief Executive Ivan Seidenberg said in an interview that such a pricing change would be made possible by the carrier's migration to a fourth-generation, or 4G, network. The network, which promises higher top speeds, will be available in 38 cities by year end. Mr. Seidenberg said, however, the carrier hasn't committed to any plans yet.

Google TV: No Need to Tune In Just Yet
By Walt Mossberg - WSJ.com
The quest to bring the full range of Internet video to your TV in a simple way continues, but it isn't going well. The latest team to try - Google, Logitech and Sony - has made an admirably bold effort, but, like others before, it has missed the mark, at least in its first effort.
Google TV - software built into hardware made by Logitech and Sony - is very different from competing products, such as Apple TV and Roku. Unlike the others, it aims to merge Web video and regular TV in one simple interface, via one box, with one easily usable controller. Also, unlike the others, it isn't limited to just customized channels that bring specific Web-video services to the screen. It lets you browse to almost any website with video, and play it on the TV.

Virtual cash cow - free game maker earns billions ...
making money by selling virtual goods; virtual world seems more stable than real world

Zynga sees new 'CityVille' building on 'FarmVille' success
By Jon Swartz, USA TODAY
SAN FRANCISCO - Move over, Apple, Google, Facebook and company. Silicon Valley's hottest start-up could soon join the tech pantheon.
Few tech companies are hotter - or provoke more comments - than Zynga.
The social-gaming behemoth that brought FarmVille and FrontierVille to tens of millions of people is valued at a gaudy $5.5 billion, besting industry icon Electronic Arts. In the next few weeks, it will roll out what it expects to be its next blockbuster game, CityVille. Yahoo just made Zynga titles available on its site, and Google is expected to follow. Zynga is readying a move next year to palatial new digs here, after hiring 863 people this year.

Viewers pull plug on US cable television
By Matthew Garrahan in Los Angeles
The number of people subscribing to US cable television services has suffered its biggest decline in 30 years as younger, tech-savvy viewers lead an exodus to web-based operations, such as Hulu and Netflix.
The total number of subscribers to TV services provided by cable, satellite and telco operators fell by 119,000 in the third quarter, compared with a gain of 346,000 in the third quarter of 2009, according to SNL Kagan, a research company.

GM says its IPO will be priced at $33 a share
By Jia Lynn Yang
General Motors said that it will price its stock at $33 a share for its initial public offering on Thursday, setting it up to be one of the biggest IPOs in history in a remarkable turnaround for the beleaguered auto giant.
The total offering size could be as large as $23.1 billion, according to GM in an announcement late Wednesday afternoon. At that amount, counting sales of preferred shares, the GM IPO would be the largest ever in the world.
"As we prepare to enter the equity markets, all of us at GM are excited about this historic milestone," said GM vice chairman and chief financial officer Chris Liddell. "We are especially appreciative of those who stood by us through the toughest times, and we are dedicated to creating value for all of our stakeholders."

White House Says Warren Buffett To Get Presidential Medal Of Freedom -- On The Same Day He Praises Bailouts In NYT
HuffingtonPost.com
The White House announced that Warren Buffett will be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, America's highest civilian honor, reports Reuters. The announcement, which had likely been planned for weeks, comes on the same day that the New York Times published a glowing op-ed by Buffett, in which the legendary investor referred to himself as Uncle Sam's "grateful nephew" and praised the government's rescue of the financial system.
Buffett, no fan of dynastic wealth, has pledged much of his fortune to charity. He will join Henry Ford II, Alan Greenspan, management legend Peter Drucker, Estee Lauder and Walt Disney among business titans who've received the award.

Obama to award Medal of Freedom to H.W. Bush, Buffett, Lewis, Merkel
USAToday.com
President Obama will award the Presidential Medal of Freedom to one of his predecessors, George H. W. Bush.
Super investor Warren Buffett, civil rights pioneer (and U.S. Rep.) John Lewis, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and basketball great Bill Russell are also among the 15 people who will receive Presidential Medals of Freedom at a White House ceremony early next year.
Among other recipients of the nation's top civilian honor: Poet Maya Angelou, disabilities advocate Jean Kennedy Smith, baseball Hall of Famer Stan Musial, labor leader John Sweeney, civil rights advocate Sylvia Mendez, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, and artist Jasper Johns.

Pelosi wins Democratic leadership fight
By the CNN Wire Staff
Washington (CNN) -- House Democrats voted Wednesday to make Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, their leader for the 112th Congress, overcoming objections from moderates who argued that she was partly responsible for the party's overwhelming defeat at the polls two weeks ago.
Republicans, who won a net gain of at least 61 seats in the elections, will control the House next year. They unanimously chose to be led once again by veteran Ohio Rep. John Boehner, now in line to inherit the speaker's gavel from Pelosi.
Pelosi turned back a challenge from North Carolina Rep. Heath Shuler, a member of the party's diminished centrist "Blue Dog" faction, in a 150-43 vote. The speaker -- now set to be House minority leader in January -- retained the solid support of party liberals, who have noted her fundraising prowess and past ability to lead congressional Democrats to power, among other things.

Arizona sheriff Arpaio forms armed 'immigration posse' with Hollywood actors -- By Jerry Seper - The Washington Times
"America's toughest sheriff," Phoenix's Joe Arpaio, is creating a new armed "Immigration Posse" to combat illegal immigration, and Hollywood actors Steven Seagal and Lou Ferrigno, along with Dick Tracy and Wyatt Earp, have signed up.
Fighting Justice Department allegations that his office discriminated against illegals during arrests, Sheriff Arpaio says the new civilian posse of more than 50 members gives citizens a chance to fight the illegal immigration problem that inundates their border state. "Law enforcement budgets are being cut and agencies are losing personnel and yet the battle to stop illegal immigration must continue," said the sheriff, who heads the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office. "Arizona is the busiest port of entry for people being smuggled in from Mexico, Latin and South America. So asking for the public's help in this endeavor makes sense, especially given the success the posses have experienced over the years." Fifty-six new Immigration Posse members from various professions were sworn in by the sheriff on Wednesday as "illegal immigration fighters."

GOP governors already looking to 2012 election
By LIZ SIDOTI - AP - WashingtonPost.com
SAN DIEGO -- The 2010 elections barely over, nearly three dozen current and incoming Republican governors already are looking to the next election, aiming to capitalize on victories in presidential battlegrounds while working to shed the GOP's white-guy image.
Still a full two years away, the 2012 contests - and who should lead the party during the next election cycle when President Barack Obama will be up for re-election - hung heavily over the Republican Governors Association's annual conference.
No fewer than four potential presidential candidates, including outgoing RGA Chairman Haley Barbour and Vice Chairman Tim Pawlenty, and a slew of GOP rising stars were among the 34 governors and governors-elect attending the two-day gathering.

Sarah Palin poised to run for president in 2012
Republican critics and Tea Party loss in Alaska Senate vote are the main obstacles to Sarah Palin's presidency hopes
Chris McGreal in Washington - guardian.co.uk
Sarah Palin has given her clearest sign yet that she intends to run for president in two years' time by saying that she is consulting her family about the decision.
But the former Alaska governor's strategy to build a national following received a setback when the near completion of the count in the Senate race in her home state pointed to a clear victory for the write-in candidate, Lisa Murkowski. She beat Tea Party contender, Joe Miller, who was strongly supported by Palin.

China Protests U.S. Green-Energy Probe
By SIMON HALL - WSJ.com
BEIJING - A Chinese trade organization Wednesday said a U.S. government investigation into subsidies China provides for its renewable energy companies was baseless and would hurt China-U.S. cooperation.
The China Chamber of International Commerce, in a letter to U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk dated Nov. 12, said Washington shouldn't ignore the huge potential offered by new energy cooperation and should change its stance "before this issue further jeopardizes the U.S.-China trade relations."

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Wednesday 11.17.2010

Europe stumbles blindly towards its 1931 moment
Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - SilverBearCafe.com
It is the European Central Bank that should be printing money on a mass scale to purchase government debt, not the US Federal Reserve.
Unless the ECB takes fast and dramatic action, it risks destroying the currency it is paid to manage, and allowing a political catastrophe to unfold in Europe.
If mishandled, Ireland could all too easily become a sovereign version of Credit Anstalt - the Austrian bank that brought down the central European financial system in 1931, sent tremors through London and New York, and set off the second deeper phase of the Great Depression, the phase when politics turned ugly.

Max Keiser: Irish govt slaves to IMF terror machine!

Could The Financial Crisis Erupting In Ireland, Portugal, Greece And Spain Lead To The End Of The Euro And The Break Up Of The European Union?
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
The Irish banking system is melting down right in front of our eyes. Ireland, Portugal, Greece and Spain are all drowning in debt. It is becoming extremely expensive for all of those nations to issue new debt. Officials all over Europe are begging Ireland to accept a bailout. Portugal has already indicated that they will probably be next in line. Most economists are now acknowledging that without a new round of bailouts the dominoes could start to fall and we could see a wave of debt defaults by European governments. All of this is pushing the monetary union in Europe to its limits. In fact, some of Europe's top politicians are now publicly warning that this crisis may not only mean the end of the euro, but also the end of the European Union itself.

Greek deficit much bigger than estimate
Greek deficit for 2009 was 15.4% of GDP, not 13.6%, says EU statistics agency Portugal warns of debt contagion across Europe Comment: Germany in eurozone driving seat
By Helena Smith in Athens - guardian.co.uk
Greece's goal of reducing its gargantuan debt received a fresh blow today when the EU statistics agency announced that the country's 2009 budget deficit was much worse than first thought.
Six months after Athens received €110bn (£93bn) in emergency loans from EU nations and the International Monetary Fund to prop up its near-bankrupt economy, Eurostat revealed that Greece's budget deficit reached 15.4% of GDP last year, substantially higher than its previous estimate of 13.6%.
In April, Eurostat had estimated the debt-to-GDP ratio would reach 115.1%. The revised data meant that Greece's debt ratio has eclipsed those of every other EU state, officials said. By the end of 2009, its debt is projected to account for 126.8% of GDP.

Weaker Dollar Seen as Unlikely to Cure Joblessness
By MOTOKO RICH and JACK EWING - NYTimes.com
A weakening currency traditionally helps a country raise its exports and create more jobs for its workers. But the declining value of the dollar may not help the United States increase economic growth as much as it might have in the past.
Though a weakened dollar would help exports to some degree, business executives and economists said that because of the ways American multinational companies operated, it was uncertain whether it would cause much of an increase in hiring.

The Great Weaponless Conquest of America
NARLO.org via PPJ Gazette

"Conquerors never, never conquer a nation to bring freedom. They conquer a nation to control the masses." Ernst Zundel

"America will fall without a shot being fired. It will fall from within." Nikita Krushchev

From the dawn of civilization ambitious men have
set out to rule the masses by the sword, the spear and the arrow. The lust to rule is buried deep inside the neurons of those who carry the gene that drives them to seek absolute power by any means. The reason for their butchery and savagery is irrelevant, be it religion, land, or resources, or just plain insanity. It is just the exercise of raw power for the sake of ego.
In the name of conquest, kings, despots and dictators have taken the lives of more people and shed more blood than most of the dreaded diseases that have decimated cultures since the early Egyptians. And now, man's capacity to kill hundreds of thousands or even millions, lies within his grasp upon cracking the unimaginable power of the atom.

The Choice of an 'Accounting Yardstick'
BY STEVE SAVILLE
In which currency are your assets denominated?
The answer to the above question is: whatever currency you like. An asset is what it is, and its value can be measured in terms of any currency or any other asset. For convenience and possibly for tax-related reasons, someone who lives in the US is likely to express asset values in terms of US dollars and someone who lives in France is likely to express asset values in terms of euros; however, the US-based person could choose to calculate in euros and the France-based person could choose to calculate in US dollars. The point is that the currency in which a person chooses to denominate their assets is solely a function of how the person does their accounting. The assets themselves are not inherently denominated in any particular currency.
We'll further explain using the examples of gold and gold mining companies.

James Turk: Gold $8000, Hyperinflation sure, Prohibition possible
By Michael Mross - SilverBearCafe.com
Gold is in a 2nd stage of a bull market. We will see a more rapid price appreciation than in the past years. Price target until 2015: 8000 Dollar. Price manipulation has come to an end. Gold as natural alternative to currencies. Chances of hyperinflation 100%. Gold prohibition possible.
For James Turk its quite clear, that the price of gold is manipulated. "By doing so it makes the Dollar look better because gold is the only natural competitor towards the Dollar. If you keep the gold price low it makes the Dollar look better then it really is".
According to Turk, the capping of gold won't last for ever. Just like the gold capping in the 60ies finally gave way in the 70ies its quite clear to him that the gold price capping of the past several years if giving way here. Thats why the gold price is starting to rise so rapidly.

Republican Bill Would Require Federal Reserve to Focus Solely on Inflation -- By Susan Jones
(CNSNews.com) - Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) says he's introducing a bill on Tuesday that would require the Federal Reserve to focus solely on inflation.
The bill would strike the "dual mandate" in the Federal Reserve Act of 1977, which directs the Fed to promote stable inflation and maximum employment.
"The Fed's dual mandate policy has failed," Pence said Monday. "For a record 18th straight month, the nation's unemployment rate is at or above 9.4 percent. It's time for the Fed to be solely focused on price stability and not the recently announced QE2, which will monetize our debt and trigger inflation."

Roubini: 'Inflation Is Not a Problem'
By: Ash Bennington - CNBC.com
Despite a huge program by the Federal Reserve intended to provide monetary stimulus to the economy, Nouriel Roubini doesn't think we need to worry about inflation.
In fact, he argues that people who take the position that the Fed should curtail its easing policies do not really understand inflation.
In the first two parts of my interview with economist Nouriel Roubini we discussed two issues: Why Professor Roubini believes a gold standard is no longer a viable option for modern economies, and second why monetary easing is a necessary evil.
So let's take a deeper look at Roubini's theory of inflation.

Core Producer Prices Fall, Fanning Disinflation Fears
By: Reuters - via CNBC.com
U.S. core producer prices unexpectedly fell in October to post their largest decline in more than four years, according to a government report on Tuesday that underscored the Federal Reserve's concerns about the low inflation environment.
The Labor Department said the core producer price index, which excludes food and energy costs, fell 0.6 percent - the biggest drop since July 2006 - after edging up 0.1 percent in September. Economists polled by Reuters had expected core PPI to gain 0.1 percent in October.
The headline PPI index rose 0.4 percent last month, well below economists' expectations for a 0.8 percent increase, after gaining 0.4 percent in September.

Under Attack, Fed Officials Defend Buying of Bonds
By SEWELL CHAN - NYTimes.com
With the Federal Reserve under attack at home and abroad, it is making an unusual public bid to keep itself away from the political crossfire.
After a barrage of criticism over the last week - including from foreign leaders, Congressional officials, economists and Alan Greenspan, the former Fed chairman - the Fed came out to explain its efforts to inject $600 billion more into the sagging economy.
One worry of Fed watchers as well as its defenders is that some of the domestic criticism may have the subtext of challenging the Fed's traditional independence in deciding monetary policy without political interference.

Treasuries Rise as Fed Officials Voice Support for Asset Buying
By Susanne Walker
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Treasuries rose, recovering from the biggest two-day decline in almost two years, as Federal Reserve officials reinforced support for the $600 billion asset purchase program.
Benchmark 10-year yields jumped 31 basis points during the previous two trading days, the most since a back-to-back surge of 33 basis points in January 2009. Fed St. Louis President James Bullard said the Fed may not buy all $600 billion in assets it targeted Nov. 3 for quantitative easing while Bank of Boston President Eric Rosengren said he expects the central bank to buy the entire amount of Treasuries a bid to reduce unemployment. The central bank today bought $5.4 billion of Treasuries maturing from July 2012 to May 2013, according to its website.

China Boosts Treasury Holdings in September
By: Reuters - via CNBC.com
Overseas investors bought fewer long-term U.S. securities in September, though top U.S. creditors China and Japan both added to their holdings of U.S. government debt, the U.S. Treasury Department said Tuesday.
The United States attracted a net long-term capital inflow of $81 billion in September, compared to a $128.7 billion inflow the prior month.
Net overall capital inflows, which include short-term instruments such as Treasury bills, rose to $81.7 billion, from a downwardly revised $11.2 billion in August.

Fundamentals for Gold to remain unchanged
By David Levenstein - CommodityOnline.com
After making recent record gains, the price of gold tumbled by around $40 an ounce on Friday. Most markets reacted to rumours that China is likely to hike interest rates in order to cool growth and inflation which topped 4.4% year-on-year in October. This prompted a broad global sell-off in equities and commodities and 3% seemed to be the magic number. Practically all commodities dropped by more than 3% on Friday. The sell-off impacted the prices of gold, silver, platinum, palladium, oil, natural gas, wheat, corn, soybeans and sugar that lost more than 11%.
Even if growth in China moderates slightly, the underlying fundamentals that have been driving the gold price will not really change. At the moment, gold is reacting to a combination of issues which are the debasement of the US dollar, more currency volatility as well as instability possibly leading to an all-out currency war, future inflation and the possibility of a sovereign default.

Gold is a tangible asset that preserves purchasing power
CommodityOnline.com
Ian McAvity: Despite people thinking that with all of the bailouts and everything else in the last year somehow the crisis is over, I think basically that the crash of 2007 through 2009 was only the first half of a much larger problem. I don't want to say the worst is yet to come, but the second half may not be any more pleasant. The housing, banking and financial industry situations have not changed at all. The accountants changed the reporting rules so you just don't see all the toxic paper still in the banks, and they don't have to report it.
Since 1971 the dollar has lost something like 3.7% per annum against the Japanese yen. The Japanese continue to buy long-term U.S. Treasury bonds with a coupon of less than 3.7%. That's a hell of a business. In the '90s, the argument as to why the Japanese were still buying bonds in spite of the currency losses was that they didn't have to mark the currency losses to market in their banking system. This is one of the reasons why the Japanese banks went on to have some problems. I like to use that example to point out that we don't really know what's going on inside the banks anywhere because they have their own accounting rules. What's off balance sheets? What's on balance sheets? What's the flavor of the month and what flavor do we want to ignore this month? It's scary.

Gold eases as euro zone worries boost dollar
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online) : Gold prices eased Tuesday in Asia after the dollar gained momentum from euro zone debt worries.
Gold for immediate delivery was seen trading at $1356.81 an ounce at 1.00 p.m Singapore time while Gold for December delivery lost 0.7 percent to $1,359 an ounce on the Comex in New York.
Meanwhile silver for immediate delivery gained 0.8 percent to $25.6712 an ounce while palladium for immediate delivery was little changed at $673 an ounce, and cash platinum climbed 0.2 percent to $1,673 an ounce.

Stocks plunge on fear about Asia inflation, Ireland's debt
By Adam Shell, USA TODAY
NEW YORK - The Dow Jones industrial average fell below 11,000 for the first time in nearly a month Tuesday as worries mounted about inflation in Asia and as European leaders met to discuss a bailout of Ireland.
The Dow dropped nearly 200 points in midday trading, with the Travelers Companies Inc. leading the way. Only two of the 30 stocks that make up the Dow rose. Home Depot Inc. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. both posted gains after reporting better results.
The Dow sank 178 points, at one point falling below 11,000 for the first time since Oct. 20.
Asian markets started a global sell-off in stocks after South Korea's central bank raised interest rates to curb inflation. Shares also fell in Shanghai and Hong Kong as speculation spread that China will take more steps to rein in its red-hot economy, which would dampen global demand for industrial goods.

G-20: World Gangs Up on America
The dollar's days as reserve currency are numbered.
The Trumpet.com
The richest and most powerful nations descended on South Korea last Thursday. It was the biggest G-20 summit of all time-with nearly 10,000 of the world's most influential politicians, ceos of international organizations and corporate business barons in attendance. Although several items made it onto the official agenda, the big, all-encompassing issue was what to do about the U.S. dollar.
At the heart of the problem is America, the world's biggest economy, accused of executing a "beggar thy neighbor" policy to poach trade and boost economic growth. Other nations have adopted America's strategies too.
Tempers are flaring. The world is up in arms.
The problem is enormous: America's trade partners can either knuckle under, letting their currencies appreciate and risking severe recession - or they can stage a dollar revolt. This would upend the global economic system.

The Stench of American Hypocrisy ... Eyes Only on Burma
Paul Craig Roberts - SilverBearCafe.com
Ten years of rule by the Bush and Obama regimes have seen the collapse of the rule of law in the United States. Is the American media covering this ominous and extraordinary story? No the American media is preoccupied with the rule of law in Burma (Myanmar).
The military regime that rules Burma just released from house arrest the pro-democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. The American media used the occasion of her release to get on Burma's case for the absence of the rule of law. I'm all for the brave lady, but if truth be known, "freedom and democracy" America needs her far worse than does Burma.

Riots in France a Symptom of Declining Western Wealth
By Byron King - SilverBearCafe.com
The French nation was hobbled by strikes, rolling strikes, street violence and other protests. It sprung from the proposal of French Pres. Sarkozy to raise the minimum retirement age to 62, by 2018 - or so the newspapers tell us. Let's think about it, though.
As a long-time follower of the world oil industry, I was immediately struck by how one key target of the rioters and protesters was France's petroleum distribution system. Clearly, the protesters understand the ideas of the 19th Century military theorist Karl von Clausewitz, who advanced the concept of finding the opponent's "center of gravity," and then bringing force to bear on that point.

Obama's Overture to Business Gets Wary Reception From CEOs
By Elizabeth Williamson, Joann S. Lublin and Siobhan Hughes - WSJ.com
The Obama administration's effort to reboot its relationship with the business community ran into a tough crowd Tuesday.
A parade of administration officials - including Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, National Economic Council head Larry Summers, Education Secretary Arne Duncan and White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee - sought to reassure about 100 corporate leaders gathered at The Wall Street Journal CEO Council in Washington that they were eager for business leaders' ideas to revive the economy.

Bernanke and the Financial Crisis
By George W. Bush - TownHall.com
"Mr. President, we are witnessing a financial panic."
Those were troubling words coming from Ben Bernanke, the mild-mannered chairman of the Federal Reserve, who was seated across from me in the Roosevelt Room. Over the previous two weeks, the government had seized Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two giant housing entities. Lehman Brothers had filed the largest bankruptcy in American history. Merrill Lynch had been sold under duress. The Fed had granted an $85 billion loan to save AIG. Now Wachovia and Washington Mutual were teetering on the brink of collapse.
With so much turbulence in financial institutions, credit markets had seized up. Consumers couldn't get loans for homes or cars. Small businesses couldn't borrow to finance their operations. The stock market had taken its steepest plunge since the first day of trading after 9/11.

Stocks, Commodities Drop on China Inflation Steps, Irish Debt
By Rita Nazareth and Stephen Kirkland
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Global stocks fell for a seventh day, the longest streak since January, and commodities slid on concern China will act to slow its economy and speculation grew that the debt crisis in Ireland, Greece and Portugal is worsening. U.S. Treasuries snapped a two-day decline.
The MSCI World Index lost 2 percent at 2:09 p.m. in New York. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index sank 1.5 percent and the Shanghai Composite Index tumbled 4 percent. Ten-year Treasury yields fell seven basis point to 2.89 percent following the biggest two-day gain in almost two years. The Irish 10-year yield rose 28 basis points to 8.24 percent, the first gain in three days. The Dollar Index added 1 percent to the highest level since September. Nickel and wheat led commodities lower.

Is the Deficit Commission on to Something?
The jaws of debt are about to devour America. If you want to escape the financial carnage, get ready to run.
BY ROBERT MORLEY - TheTrumpet.com
Think antelope-type intensity! The lion has roared. His breath is hot, his teeth like razors - and if you don't move, you are dead. Run! Now!
You have all seen a lion in chase, and how the adrenaline-pumping antelope bursts into flight. It runs like its life depends on it - because it does. This is the type of intensity you need now to get your financial house in order and prepare for the looming economic collapse. And you need to move now, before you get crushed by the herd.
Collapse is coming - and like a roaring lion - it is going to devour a lot of people. You don't have to be one of them.
Last week, President Obama's bipartisan deficit commission released a draft report on fixing America's budget problems. The Examiner called it "shock therapy" for America. cnn said it was a "call for action."

The end of growth
By Richard Heinberg - SilverBearCafe.com
Introduction: The New Normal
The central assertion of this book is both simple and startling: Economic growth as we have known it is over and done with.
The "growth" we are talking about consists of the expansion of the overall size of the economy (with more people being served and more money changing hands) and of the quantities of energy and material goods flowing through it.
The economic crisis that began in 2007-2008 was both foreseeable and inevitable, and it marks a permanent, fundamental break from past decades - a period during which most economists adopted the unrealistic view that perpetual economic growth is necessary and also possible to achieve. There are now fundamental barriers to ongoing economic expansion, and the world is colliding with those barriers.

Pressure Builds Over Loan Modifying
By VANESSA O'CONNELL and VICTORIA MCGRANE - WSJ.com
State attorneys general are intensifying pressure on lenders to fix the system they use to modify mortgages as part of a potential settlement in their multistate investigation of the foreclosure problems.
The attorneys general are scrutinizing whether home-loan servicers violated state laws against deceptive practices by using "robo signers" to submit affidavits and foreclosure documents without confirming the paperwork's accuracy. But the states' investigation, which could lead to civil charges, already has expanded to include other issues, such as the fees charged by servicers.
State attorneys general have taken the lead in investigating banks over paperwork problems. Many feared banks and investors might have to shoulder huge costs if the problems led them to reduce the principal of tens of thousands of mortgages. While principal reduction isn't being ruled out, some attorneys general appear willing to settle for a more transparent loan-modification system.

State AG Robosigning Settlement Brewing
By: Diana Olick - CNBC Real Estate Reporter
Sources on both sides of the 50-state attorney's general investigation into so-called "robo-signing" foreclosure practices tell me they are nearing a settlement. As Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase and Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller square off today before the Senate Banking Committee, the framework of a deal is taking shape.
While sources say there is no universal solution to shoddy foreclosure practices at some of the nation's largest mortgage banks/servicers, the three largest, BofA, JPM and Wells Fargo, may be agreeing to the same solution.
First, banks would pay into a fund used to compensate borrowers who have claims after their home has been sold in foreclosure. The borrowers would have to prove they were wronged in the process, and the attorney's general would allocate the funds. In other words, the AGs would be the administrators. The amount of said fund is still undetermined, and likely still in negotiation. Each bank could settle on its own amount, or there could be a joint agreement.

Foreclosure Probe Settlement Needed: BofA CEO
By: Reuters and CNBC
Bank of America Chief Executive Brian Moynihan said on Tuesday a quick settlement of the 50-state attorneys general probe of the foreclosure crisis is the best solution for all involved.
"It is in everyone's best interest to get this settled and behind us," said Moynihan, speaking at the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Financial Services conference in New York.
Moynihan said the industry and lawmakers need to look at streamlining foreclosures. He said the current system is a "difficult process" for homeowners to navigate.

BofA in 'Hand-to-Hand Combat' Over Putbacks, CEO Says
By Hugh Son and David Mildenberg
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Bank of America Corp. Chief Executive Officer Brian T. Moynihan said resolving investor demands for refunds over faulty mortgages is a battle that will last at least several more quarters.
"It's a day-to-day, hand-to-hand combat," Moynihan said today during an investor conference held by the lender in New York. "It's manageable in the context of who we are, but we're not going to spend your money unwisely."
Moynihan's comments highlight the tensions between Bank of America, the biggest U.S. lender, and clients who bought its mortgages or bet on securities backed by home loans. The Charlotte, North Carolina-based company faces demands to repurchase almost $13 billion of loans that may have failed to document required data such as income and home values.

US Foreclosure Mess Impact Could Be Severe
By: Reuters - via CNBC.com
Widespread problems in how U.S. lenders documented foreclosures could spark a wave of legal challenges resulting in massive losses to banks and serious new troubles for the housing market, a federal watchdog warned on Tuesday.
The Congressional Oversight Panel, the overseer of the government's Wall Street bailout, in its latest report laid out a range of possible outcomes for the foreclosure paperwork mess that emerged in September.
In the best-case scenario, the watchdog said, concerns about the paperwork mess are "overblown" and banks would be able to proceed with foreclosures as soon as invalid court documents were replaced with proper paperwork.

LNG Is the Future of Energy -
And North America is the "New Saudi Arabia"
BY KENT MOORS, PH.D., Contributing Writer, Money Morning
Sometimes the most important impact on a raw material commodity comes less from its actual extraction and more from how product is introduced into new markets.
Indeed, that is becoming the next major development in North American natural gas. The expansion in liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports may well hold the key to turning a glut into advancing profit.
The LNG process cools gas into a liquid form, allowing it to be stored and transported via tanker. The liquid is then "regasified" on the other end and injected into existing pipeline systems. This provides for the development of genuine spot markets, since the movement of gas is no longer limited by how far pipelines extend.

$4.00 A Gallon Gasoline By The End Of 2010?
Economic Collapse - SilverBearCafe.com
How In The World Are Average Americans Going To Make Ends Meet If This Keeps Up?
Gas prices are on the rise again. In many areas of the U.S. gas prices are already hovering around $3.00 a gallon. In fact there are some areas where people are paying as much as $3.50 a gallon, and many experts are predicting that gasoline could hit $4.00 a gallon by the end of 2010. If this nonsense keeps up, how in the world is the average American family supposed to make ends meet? Not only is filling up our tanks going to cost a lot more, but the price of gasoline factors into so many other things. The U.S. economy just cannot handle a major increase in transportation costs at this point. These increasing gasoline prices come at a time when U.S. consumers are already stretched to the max.
But it isn't just gasoline prices that are going up. The price of food is really starting to rise as well. Rising demand and reduced supply drove supermarket prices for 16 basic foods up 6.2% in the first quarter of 2010.

Home Prices Will Continue to Decline
By: JeeYeon Park - CNBC News Associate
Homebuilder sentiment climbed for the second month in November, according to the NAHB survey released Tuesday, although levels remained at historically low levels. Where does the sector go from here? Daniel Oppenheim, homebuilder analyst at Credit Suisse, and Cameron Findlay, chief economist at LendingTree.com, shared their insights.
"It's still a very difficult environment - we've seen a couple of indicators suggesting that home prices are continuing to decline," Findlay told CNBC.

Problems abound for vacant homes' neighbors
Especially for residents sharing walls with abandoned properties, issues can mount quickly
By Jamie Smith Hopkins, The Baltimore Sun
The abandoned rowhouse next door to Wendy and Brian Malaney has been a nightmare of a neighbor.
The rowhouse's roofing material blew off, and water seeped through the Malaneys' adjoining walls. Later the pipes burst in the neighboring property, flooding their basement. The air they and their two young daughters breathe is now heavy with the noxious stink of mold.
Abandoned buildings are a perennial problem in Baltimore - a city where many residents share connecting walls. Nearly one-third of the city's 16,000 uninhabitable properties are near occupied homes, city officials say. And a key part of Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake's new plan to attack vacancies is ratcheting up code enforcement on blocks where many residents still live, issuing fines more quickly.

Hamtramck seeks state permission to file for bankruptcy
Mike Wilkinson and Paul Egan / The Detroit News
The city of Hamtramck, desperate for cash, has asked the state for permission to take an unprecedented step: filing for bankruptcy.
City Manager Bill Cooper said the city of roughly 20,000 people is staring at a $3 million deficit, fueled by a dispute with Detroit. Unless Hamtramck files for bankruptcy, it won't be able to pay its nearly 100 employees or 153 retirees, he said.
The city sent a letter to the state Department of Treasury last week asking for approval to seek bankruptcy protection. It has not received a reply, Cooper said.
"I'm going to run out of money Jan. 31," Cooper said. Bankruptcy would allow the city to stave off creditors and force its unions to consider concessions.
Many Michigan municipalities are under severe financial pressure following a crippling recession that has seen tax revenues plummet. The Detroit Public Schools considered bankruptcy last year but opted against it.

CALIFORNIA WILL DEFAULT ON ITS DEBT, Says Chris Whalen
By Henry Blodget - BusinessInsider.com
We had Chris Whalen on TechTicker today. He says there's no bailut coming for California--or, for that matter, any of the other bankrupt states. And that means big losses for muni-bond holders...
Municipal bonds have plummeted in recent days, as investors have suddenly focused on huge state and city budget deficits that there's no easy way to fix.
Nowhere has this collapse been more visible than California, which faces a massive $25 billion shortfall and red ink for as far as the eye can see.
After years in which every looming financial crisis has been met with a government bailout, you might think that the same solution awaits California, as well as all the other states that have huge obligations that they can't afford to meet.
But this time that may not happen, says Chris Whalen, a financial industry analyst and Managing Director of Institutional Risk Analytics.
In fact, Whalen thinks that California will default on its debt--hammering all the pension funds and other investors who have loaded up on apparently safe state bonds.

A mosque building boom
Muslim community leaders say plans for new facilities are a response to demand
By ZAIN SHAUK - HOUSTON CHRONICLE
Forty years ago, the thought of granite counter tops, marble floors and indoor basketball gyms at Houston mosques seemed unthinkable.
But after decades of growth, the Muslim community is expanding and building new facilities at an unprecedented pace, with features and amenities that rival five-star hotels, leaders say.
Multimillion-dollar plans for major mosque expansions and constructions are moving forward throughout the Houston area, coming on the heels of recently finished developments.
A community in Katy is pushing forward its long-awaited plan to develop a $10 million mosque, community center and school, and a group in Spring is working on a $10 million expansion at a recently built $2.5 million mosque.

Government Employees Owe Billions in Delinquent Taxes
By: Eamon Javers - CNBC.com
Need a quick three billion dollars, Uncle Sam? How about looking in your own pockets?
Deficit cutters struggling to make ends meet in Washington are eyeballing an unusual pot of potential revenue: back taxes owed to the government by federal employees themselves.
According to an IRS study last year, those employees and federal retirees owed a staggering $3.3 billion dollars in delinquent tax payments to the government.

Prices for used cars hit a record high
By Doron Levin - CNNMoney.com
FORTUNE -- New or used? Burdened by a weak economy, U.S. carbuyers are choosing the latter option more and more, helping to drive used-car prices to a record high while holding back new-vehicle sales that are sputtering at roughly two-thirds of the pre-recession level.
Economists have a word for it: Substitution.
According to Karl Brauer, an analyst for automotive website Edmunds.com, those preferring used cars over new fall into two categories: buyers who are forced to economize and others who can afford new but decide to hold off because "there's a bit of a stigma to spending."
Or, as Tom Webb, chief economist for Manheim Auto Auctions, put it: "It's cool to be frugal."

Doctors: Congress should act fast on Medicare pay
By Charles Riley
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Just back from recess, Congress is staring at a deadline that will result in a dramatic cut in Medicare payments to doctors if no action is taken.
Lawmakers have implemented the so-called "doc fix" 10 times in the past eight years, four times this year alone. But what has become a routine event still attracts a swarm of lobbyists.
The American Medical Association (AMA) is planning to flood Congressional phone lines and take out ads in Washington newspapers Wednesday in hopes of pressuring lawmakers to move quickly on the fix.
"Everyone in Congress knows that this cut will cause problems for seniors, and the AMA is working to turn that concern into action before time runs out this month," AMA President Cecil Wilson said in a statement.

Hospital care fatal for some Medicare patients
By Rita Rubin, USA TODAY
An estimated 15,000 Medicare patients die each month in part because of care they receive in the hospital, says a government study released today.
The study is the first of its kind aimed at understanding "adverse events" in hospitals - essentially, any medical care that causes harm to a patient, according to the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Inspector General.
Patients in the study, a nationally representative sample that focused on 780 Medicare patients discharged from hospitals in October 2008, suffered such problems as bed sores, infections and excessive bleeding from blood-thinning drugs, the report found. The federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality called the results "alarming."

Medical mistakes plague Medicare patients
By Daniel R. Levinson - USAToday.com
Today's hospitals are modern-day marvels of healing, and we expect them to be models of patient safety as well. But a just-released report from my office shows that medical care is falling short for too many hospitalized Medicare patients. A decade after an Institute of Medicine study placed preventable medical errors among the leading causes of death in the United States, our latest study found that a disturbing number of hospitalized patients still endure harmful consequences from medical care, 44% of them preventable. These instances, which the report calls "adverse events," include infections, surgical complications and medication errors.
Such occurrences are not always preventable, particularly since many Medicare patients are elderly and have complicated health problems. But enough patient harm is avoidable to make a strong case for action. Hospitals must improve, but they need the help of lawmakers, medical professionals and patients to do so.

Chief of Staff, Susan Sher to leave first lady's office after the new year
WhoRunsGov.com
Michelle Obama's office announced Tuesday that chief of staff Susan Sher will head back to Chicago when the new year begins.
Sher, who was vice president for legal and government affairs at the University of Chicago Medical Center before moving to DC, joined the White House as a member of the Counsel's Office in January 2009 and moved to the East Wing in mid-2009 after Mrs. O's first chief of staff, Jackie Norris, left to become a senior adviser to the Corporation for National and Community Service. But Sher and Michelle Obama go way back, to their days working together in Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley's (D) office in the early 1990s.

Democrat Charles Rangel convicted of financial misconduct by US Congress
House of Representatives panel found long-standing member guilty on 11 counts, which also included fundraising misconduct
Chris McGreal in Washington - guardian.co.uk
Congress has convicted one of its longest-standing members, Charles Rangel, a Democrat from New York, on 11 counts of financial and fundraising misconduct.
An eight-member House of Representatives ethics panel said there was "clear and convincing evidence" that Rangel, 80, was guilty of all but two of the 13 charges he faced.
Rangel's convictions include improperly soliciting millions of dollars from private firms and lobbyists doing business with the committee he chaired to fund a centre in his name at a New York college, failing to disclose hundreds of thousands of dollars in income and assets and failing to pay income tax on rental income from a villa he owns in the Dominican Republic. He was also found to have improperly accepted the use of a rent-controlled flat from a New York developer.

The end of America's farms?
This could be the future of farming under S.510
By Paul Griepentrog - PPJ Gazette
S 510 passed the lame duck session of Congress, and moved toward the promulgating of rules regarding various provisions. The FDA, HHS, and HLS all drunk with new power moved quickly to garner their corporate comrades to the positions of power, to deliver a predetermined outcome. Despite Coburn's failed efforts having, through wilful intent or depraved indifference, failed to notice the massive assault on the due process rights, and freedom from illegal search and seizure.

Senate Bill S 510 Food Safety Modernization Act vote imminent:
Would outlaw gardening and saving seeds
By Mike Adams
(NaturalNews) Senate Bill 510, the Food Safety Modernization Act, has been called "the most dangerous bill in the history of the United States of America." It would grant the U.S. government new authority over the public's right to grow, trade and transport any foods. This would give Big brother the power to regulate the tomato plants in your backyard. It would grant them the power to arrest and imprison people selling cucumbers at farmer's markets. It would criminalize the transporting of organic produce if you don't comply with the authoritarian rules of the federal government.

Farmer Jim & Reports on HR 875 and Senate Bill S 510

Adolescent Weight Control Registry - [the "Fat Police" Database]
Teen who lost weight included in new national registry
By Nanci Hellmich, USA TODAY
At age 13 and 60 pounds overweight, Meagan Blanchette of Coventry, R.I., decided she was fed up with being too heavy.
But today, at age 16, after losing all that extra weight and keeping it off for more than two years, she is among the first teens included in the Adolescent Weight Control Registry, a new research project being announced today.
Meagan and her mom, Lisa, are sharing what they learned about Meagan's weight loss in the new registry, which will compile data from those ages 14 to 20 who have lost at least 10 pounds and kept it off one year.
Weight gain is a serious issue for teens and young adults. Heavy teenagers often experience huge weight gain in their 20s, according to a study out last week.

Illegal immigrants can qualify for in-state college tuition, court rules
Critics say the California law that state Supreme Court justices upheld conflicts with a federal ban on undocumented immigrants getting college benefits based on residency. An appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court is expected.
By Maura Dolan and Larry Gordon, Los Angeles Times
Illegal immigrants who graduated from state high schools can continue to receive lower, in-state tuition at California's public universities and colleges, the California Supreme Court decided unanimously Monday.
The ruling is the first of its kind in the nation. California is one of 10 states that permit undocumented immigrants to receive in-state tuition, which can save them $23,000 a year at the University of California.
"Throughout the country, the California court decision will have reverberations," said Daniel J. Hurley, director of state relations and policy analysis for the American Assn. of State Colleges. He predicted that it would discourage challenges to similar policies in other states.

Body scanners prompt 'opt-out' protest on peak air travel day
By JENNIFER SORENTRUE - Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
A protest sparked by a single website, urging travelers to refuse a body scan at airport checkpoints across the country next week, has blossomed into a national revolt against security measures.
Travel experts are warning that the "National Opt-Out Day" protest set for Nov. 24, one of the busiest travel days of the year, could lead to checkpoint delays at Palm Beach International Airport.
A website is urging air travelers not to go through new, high-tech body scanners the day before Thanksgiving, which means they'll have to undergo pat downs if they want to board. Those who consider the scanners too invasive, however, may learn that the traditional pat down has been replaced by a more intensive one.

Leaked Body Scanner Images Do Not Show The Whole Picture
Airport machines store high resolution, detailed images of genitals -- Steve Watson - Prisonplanet.com
The footage of images taken and stored by a full body imaging machine that have leaked online only tell part of the story as to why the machines constitute such a threat to privacy.
The Drudge Report today linked to a story by Gizmodo.com which highlights the fact that the TSA and Janet Napolitano's assertion that the imaging machines cannot store, transmit or print images is not true.
The images seen in this report (above) were obtained earlier this year via a FOIA request by the privacy watchdog group The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC).
As reported by Declan McCullagh of CNET at the time, "The U.S. Marshals Service admitted this week that it had surreptitiously saved tens of thousands of images recorded with a millimeter wave system at the security checkpoint of a single Florida courthouse."

Hero Hudson 'Sully' joins opposition
to heightened airport security measures
(CNN) -- Hero pilot Capt. Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger on Tuesday joined the opposition to heightened airport security procedures that critics have called invasive and intrusive.
Sullenberger, who landed a crippled US Airways jet on the Hudson River last year, said the use of full-body pat-downs and advanced imaging scanners for airline personnel "just isn't an efficient use of our resources."
Federal transport authorities say the machines are both safe and a necessary security precaution, especially following recent airline terrorism attempts.
Sullenberger argued that transport authorities should trust pilots and flight attendants because "we're trusted partners" who are already "thoroughly screened."

TSA Now Putting Hands Down Fliers' Pants
Big Sis turns up the heat: New super-enhanced pat-down more invasive
Paul Joseph Watson & Alex Jones - Prison Planet.com
The TSA's invasive new screening measures include officers literally putting their hands down people's pants if they are wearing baggy clothing in a shocking new elevation of groping procedures that have stoked a nationwide revolt against privacy-busting airport security measures.
Forget John Tyner's "don't touch my junk" experience at the hands of TSA goons in San Diego recently, another victim of Big Sis was told by TSA officials that it was now policy to go even further when dealing with people wearing loose pants or shorts.
Going through airport security this past weekend, radio host Owen JJ Stone, known as "OhDoctah," related how he was told that the rules had been changed and was offered a private screening. When he asked what the procedure entailed, the TSA agent responded, "I have to go in your waistband, I have to put my hand down your pants," after which he did precisely that.
Stone chose to conduct the search in public in the fear that the TSA worker would be even more aggressive in a private room.

TSA NOW PUTS HANDS DOWN PANTS: PART OF NEW SCREENING

Napolitano: 'Adjustments,' 'More to Come'
on Women in Hijabs Undergoing Airport Full-Body Pat-Downs
By Nicholas Ballasy
(CNSNews.com) - When asked today if she will insist that Muslim women wearing hijabs must go through full body pat downs before boarding planes, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano did not say yes or no, but told CNSNews.com there will be "adjustments" and "more to come" on the issue.
"On the pat downs, CAIR [the Council on American-Islamic Relations] has recommended that Muslim women wearing hijabs refuse to go through the full body pat downs before boarding planes," CNSNews.com asked Napolitano at a Monday press conference. "Will you insist that they do go through full body pat downs before boarding planes?"

TSA head in for grilling on security measures
By Jordy Yager - TheHill.com
Lawmakers are expected to grill the head of TSA on Tuesday over increased security measures at U.S. airports that have sparked public fury.
John Pistole, the head of the Transportation Security Administration, is expected to be hit with questions about new pat-down techniques that air passengers have complained are invasive. He is scheduled to testify before the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee about air-cargo security measures put in place since an attempted terrorist attack from Yemen.

Pope Benedict: Bible Cannot Be Taken Literally
In his latest treatise, Pope Benedict XVI reverts to medieval teaching. -- By Ron Fraser - TheTrumpet.com
Hard on the heels of the recent Vatican statement declaring that the Jews have no scriptural claim to the Promised Land comes another papal shocker.
It is contained in the pope's most recent "apostolic exhortation," Verbum Domini ("The Word of the Lord"), issued on November 11.
In this lengthy "exhortation," the pope "has issued a lofty and impassioned plea for everyone in the church to rediscover the Bible" (cna/ewtn News, November 11). But it's more than an "impassioned plea" from this pope to his parishioners. It's a direct attack on all who believe the inerrancy of the literal Scriptures as inspired by God!

Kandahar: The Latest Casualty of an Invisible War
By Juan Cole - TruthDig.com
Not only is it unclear that the U.S. and NATO are winning their war in Afghanistan, the lack of support for their effort by the Afghanistan president himself has driven the American commander to the brink of resignation. In response to complaints from his constituents, Afghanistan's mercurial President Hamid Karzai called Sunday for American troops to scale back their military operations. The supposed ally of the U.S., who only last spring petulantly threatened to join the Taliban, astonished Washington with this new outburst, which prompted a warning from Gen. David Petraeus that the president was making Petraeus' position "untenable," which some speculated might be a threat to resign.

Chinese missiles can ravage U.S. bases
Report cites 5 sites in Asia
By Bill Gertz - The Washington Times
China's military can destroy five out of six U.S. bases in Asia with waves of missile strikes as the result of its large-scale military buildup that threatens U.S. access and freedom of navigation in East Asia, according to a forthcoming congressional report.
"The main implication of China's improved air and conventional missile capabilities is a dramatic increase in the [People's Liberation Army's] ability to inhibit U.S. military operations in the region," a late draft of the report by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission concludes.
The U.S. government has growing concerns over what the report says are "China's improving capabilities to challenge the U.S. military's freedom of access in East Asia."

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Tuesday 11.16.2010

How In The World Did We Get To The Point Where The Federal Reserve Is Printing Money Out Of Thin Air Whenever It Wants?
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Ben Bernanke and the rest of the folks over at the Federal Reserve did not just wake up one day and decide that they wanted to start printing hundreds of billions of dollars out of thin air. The truth is that the economic forces that have brought us to this point have taken decades to develop. In the post-World War 2 era, when the U.S. economy has fallen into a recession, either the Federal Reserve would lower interest rates or the U.S. government would indulge in even more deficit spending to stimulate the economy. But now, as you will see below, both of those alternatives have been exhausted. In addition, we are now rapidly reaching the point where there are simply not enough lenders out there to feed the U.S. government's voracious appetite for debt. So now the Federal Reserve is openly printing hundreds of billions of dollars that will enable them to finance U.S. government borrowing, and (they hope) stimulate the U.S. economy at the same time. Unfortunately, the rest of the world is not amused. Nations such as China, Japan and many of the oil-exporting nations of the Middle East have accumulated a lot of U.S. dollars and a lot of U.S. Treasuries and they are not pleased that those investments are now being significantly devalued.

China Offers No Chance of Revaluation Before 2012
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- The Group of 20 meeting in Seoul was a debacle in many respects. But it had a big winner: China.
This was the summit where the world was supposed to come together to unwind global imbalances. There are many of them at the moment, but the most important is China's persistent trade surplus. This has led to the accumulation of foreign-exchange reserves of $2.65 trillion, a stash more than twice as large as any other country's. The government in Beijing recycled its reserves into foreign markets, and this resulted in the excess liquidity that contributed to the global slump in 2008.

Diverging Fortunes Put China and the U.S. on a Collision Course
By VISHESH KUMAR - DailyFinance.com
Not too long ago, booming trade relations between the U.S. and China had the two countries being touted as a model partnership between two powerhouses. The fast-rising Asian juggernaut provided the U.S. with cheap goods and ample credit, while U.S. consumption of China's goods helped fuel a rapidly expanding Chinese middle class.
The term "Chimerica," coined by Harvard historian Niall Ferguson, helped thrust this supposedly symbiotic and ever-closer relationship into the public sphere. But the seemingly cozy relations between the two countries have been coming apart fast in the wake of the financial crisis.

China's 'State Capitalism' Sparks a Global Backlash
By JASON DEAN, ANDREW BROWNE And SHAI OSTER - WSJ.com
BEIJING - Since the end of the Cold War, the world's powers have generally agreed on the wisdom of letting market competition - more than government planning - shape economic outcomes. China's national economic strategy is disrupting that consensus, and a look at the ascent of solar-energy magnate Zhu Gongshan explains why.
A shortage of polycrystalline silicon - the main raw material for solar panels - was threatening China's burgeoning solar-energy industry in 2007. Polysilicon prices soared, hitting $450 a kilogram in 2008, up tenfold in a year. Foreign companies dominated production and were passing those high costs onto China.

Measuring America's Default From World Leadership
By William Tucker - The American Spectator.org
President Obama came away from the Korean trade negotiations last week looking much diminished. "U.S. Wields Less Clout at Summit" was the typical headline in the Wall Street Journal.
All this was attributed to many factors -- the slow recovery of the economy, the failure of Keynsian spending, Obama's election losses or the Federal Reserve's egregious attempts to promote trade advantages by weakening the dollar. Meanwhile, the Koreans refused to be cowed, saying the fault lay with the U.S., which hadn't given them enough to review the revisions made in the original agreement struck with President Bush.

IMF Sets New Currency Weights in SDR Basket;
Dollar, Yen Reduced
By Candice Zachariahs
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- The International Monetary Fund reduced the weighting of the U.S. dollar and the yen and increased that of the euro in its Special Drawing Rights valuation basket after its regular five-year review.
The value of the SDR, which the IMF created in 1969 to supplement its member countries official reserves, will continue to be based on a basket of currencies comprised of the dollar, euro, yen and pound, the fund said in an e-mailed statement. UBS AG, the world's second-largest foreign-exchange trader, said in June that the fund may include the Australian and Canadian dollars in the SDR basket this year, boosting demand for the commodity-backed currencies.

IMF Reveals New SDR Weighting Tied to the "Big Four" In Rebuff to BRICs -- JESSE'S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
The 'Washington-based' IMF chose the status quo, merely tinkering slightly with the dollar-euro-pound-yen balance in its SDR. The Anglo-American financiers threw a bone to the Europeans with a slight increase. Japan retained its place in the colonial powers club. I find it almost incredible that the UK remains a financial power to the exclusion of the BRICs.
I cannot imagine that Russia and China will be pleased with this rebuff to their concerns, although they were granted more of the trappings of power at the G20.

Euro Dominos Will Fall Until Currency Is Split
Commentary by Matthew Lynn
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Who's next? First Greece went bust. Now Ireland is on the brink of a bailout from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.
When it happens, we'll hear plenty of soothing words about how contagion has been stopped, the euro area has been put on a firmer footing, and the single currency saved. There will be a lot of grand rhetoric about the importance of the European project. Stern condemnations of the speculators will ring out across the continent.
Don't listen to a word of it. The euro has turned into a bankruptcy machine. Once the markets have finished with Ireland, they will simply move on to Portugal and Spain, and after that to Italy and France.

Currency Wars
Mises Daily: by Robert P. Murphy
When my book on the Great Depression came out - shortly after Obama's inauguration - I told radio interviewers that our current economic crisis was the start of the Second Great Depression. The Federal Reserve and the government implemented the same types of policies after the housing crash as they did in the 1930s after the stock-market crash.
Another parallel to the Great Depression is the possibility of a massive trade war. Back then, the United States government passed the infamous Smoot-Hawley Tariff, which in turn led to reciprocal trade barriers by other governments.

Currency War Watch: Ultimately No Real Winners
By Clive Corcoran - SeekingAlpha.com
The current clash over monetary policy / currency debasement or manipulation may well be a zero sum game, or to cite other terminology, the US might win but it will be a Pyrrhic victory. It has even been suggested that the US policy of QE is a shrewd tactic which will reduce the burden of the national debt by enabling it to be "repaid" in dollars which have diminishing purchasing power.
There is almost certainly not a simple winner / loser dialectic at work here. There are both direct and external costs to a currency war where both sides will win some battles and lose others, but the "war" will end in an economic stalemate or-- looking at the worst outcome-- a depression culminating possibly in military conflict and / or a breakdown in the rule of law.

Euro under siege as now Portugal hits panic button
By Bruno Waterfield and Robert Winnett, The Daily Telegraph
The euro is facing an unprecedented crisis after another country indicated on Monday night that it was at a "high risk" of requiring an international bail-out.
Portugal became the latest European nation to admit it was on the brink of seeking help from Brussels after Ireland confirmed it had begun preliminary talks over its debt problems.
Greece also disclosed that its economic problems are even worse than previously thought.
Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, raised the spectre of the euro collapsing as she warned: "If the euro fails, then Europe fails."

Gold Standards, the World Bank, and Fiscal Responsibility
By James West - GoldSeek.com
Since World Bank president Robert Zoellick put forth the idea for a new global currency that was influenced by the price of gold, the global media has pounced on his remarks, and completely misconstrued them to report that he was advocating for a 'return to the gold standard'.
First of all, (and I do apologize Mr. Zoellick if I myself misinterpret some of your statements inadvertently), what was most noteworthy about his statement was not so much that the new monetary instrument would be linked to gold, but that we need a new currency. He's openly advocating for the replacement of the U.S. dollar as the official instrument of trade for the world, which is, in reality, the first meaningful step in repairing the global financial system and returning to a state of economic health. Small wonder it was the U.S. mainstream financial outlets that dominated the assault on Zoellick.

Gold Investing: A Bet Against the Idiocy of Money Creation
By The Mogambo Guru - The DailyReckoning.com
11/15/10 Tampa, Florida - I was delighted by the humor of Su Wei, a Chinese climate-change negotiator at the international climate change conference, calling the United States "a pig preening before a mirror." Hahaha! It's funny because it's true! Hahaha!
Of course, he meant in the context of carbon emissions and all of that "green" stuff, but it perfectly describes the fiscal policies of the Obama administration, too, but not our monetary policies.
No, I envision that Mr. Wei (or Mr. Su, I never can remember which is which, and for whom it works and for whom not) would describe the foul actions of the despicable Federal Reserve in creating So Freaking Much (SFM) money so that the odious Obama administration could deficit-spend us into an additional $3.5 trillion of national debt over the last two years as, "An idiotic counterfeiting pimp preening before a mirror, who stupidly prints money for massive Congressional deficit-spending, thus screwing the dollar, where inflation in prices pillages up and down the country, everything turning into crap until everything is in ruins, and misery and suffering abound."

Gold Price Plummets as China Applies the Economic Brakes
By Chuck Butler
11/15/10 St. Louis, Missouri - Gold received some roughshod treatment on Friday from traders and investors who once horded the shiny metalÉ And all because of rumors going that China MAY raise their interest rates to cool their economyÉ That's called applying the brakesÉ But will it apply the brakes on global growth, or even growth in China to the degree that called for a $43 dollar slide in gold on Friday? I don't think so! But, that's what happened, so you go to the ropes, do the rope-a-dope, and try to get through the round, right?
SoÉ I guess the thought that China is trying to slow down (HEY! This would not be their first rate hike, or other method to slow down their economy!), is just too much for the commodity guys. Just look at the Reuters/Jefferies CRB Index of 19 raw materialsÉ It lost more ground on Friday that it had in any trading day in 18 months! So, is this the end of the commodity bull market? I hardly think so, folksÉ Haven't we seen sell-offs in gold in the past 10 years, during its bull market run? Yes, siree Bob, we have! And didn't they eventually become tiny items in our rear view mirror? Yes, siree Bob!

The Great "Depression"
By Howard S. Katz - GoldSeek.com
The One-handed Economist took a new position in its letter of Sept. 17, 2010 shifting its commodity holdings from gold to silver. Another change of position is in a special bulletin issued Nov. 10, 2010. However, since this is so recent, in order to learn the contents a subscriber must cross my palm with silver.
Today I would like to continue my discussion of the (so-called) Great Depression as this is the giant lie which is behind most of the other economic lies which have deceived so many people and cost them so much money.

Who needs dollars when we have gold?
The Fed's irresponsible policies have led to serious discussion of a return to a gold-based monetary system. It's about time.
By Bill Fleckenstein - MSN Money
Major currencies throughout history have had periods of ascension, dominance and fall from grace.
"Sound as the pound" was a phrase coined, as it were, during the days of the British Empire. "The almighty dollar" might be the U.S. version of that sentiment, although it connotes a sense of the mercenary aspect of the American dream, along with the dollar's status as the world's reserve currency.
The dollar's position has for generations been thought unassailable, but the war of words against it has increased as other countries have started to realize what our central bank is actually up to and how it will affect them.

Can gold prevent hyper-inflation?
Lessons from the Rentenmark The suggestion that gold could be used as a reference point for currencies brings on memories of how Germany ended hyperinflation in 1923.
Author: Julian D. W. Phillips - MineWeb.com
Below right you see a one billion Mark note that was among the last printed notes of the Weimar Republic which saw the dreadful hyperinflation from the First World War's end to August 1923. Next to it was a currency that replaced it and which helped terminate the hyperinflation that infested Europe, but was at its worst in Germany.
This was at a time when gold was completely accepted as money internationally. Due to the economic crises in Germany after the Great War there was no gold available to back the currency. Therefore the Rentenbank in November 1923 issued the Rentenmark, a currency backed by mortgaged land and industrial goods worth 3.2 billion Rentenmark. The Rentenmark was pegged to the U.S. Dollar at a rate of 1 Dollar: 4.20 RM. At the end of the First World War, the Deutschmark was valued at 4.63 to the U.S $. The rate of the Rentenmark to the Papiermark was 1:1,000,000,000,000 (1 trillion Papiermark). The Rentenmark was only a temporary currency and was not legal tender. It was, however, accepted by the population and effectively stopped the inflation. The Reichsmark became the new legal tender on 30 August 1924, equal in value to the Rentenmark.

The Gold Standard Is No Silver Bullet
By James Picerno - SeekingAlpha.com
Calls for a return to the gold standard are in vogue these days. Tying the value of the dollar and other currencies to the precious metal is considered a monetary salve that will soothe the economic ills that harass us. It's an idea whose time has comeÉagain, we're told. The World Bank's president last week suggested that the world should embrace, in part, a gold-based monetary system. And in yesterday's New York Times, financial writer James Grant eloquently pined for the gold standard of yore. "The classical gold standard, the one that was in place from 1880 to 1914, is what the world needs now," he writes.
Grant delivers a stirring brief for the precious metal as a monetary foundation. In advancing the agenda, he focuses on the benefits. But like so many gold bugs, Grant ignores the challenges. Those challenges are significant. Indeed, there are fundamental reasons why gold was abandoned as a monetary standard. Those reasons weren't trivial, nor would they be resolved in the 21st century. A gold standard, quite simply, is a wonderful thing ... until it's not.

The Problem With the Return to the Gold Standard
By David Friedman
James Grant, of Grant's Interest Rate Observer, argues for a return to the gold standard:
The classical gold standard, the one that was in place from 1880 to 1914, is what the world needs now. In its utility, economy and elegance, there has never been a monetary system like it.
It was simplicity itself. National currencies were backed by gold. If you didn't like the currency you could exchange it for shiny coins (money was "sound" if it rang when dropped on a counter). Borders were open and money was footloose. It went where it was treated well. In gold-standard countries, government budgets were mainly balanced. Central banks had the single public function of exchanging gold for paper or paper for gold. The public decided which it wanted.

Why Gold and Silver are portfolio favorites
By Jerry Western - CommodityOnline.com
Silver has had quite a run the last couple months so it's no surprise that it has gained much attention and interest from investors - even more so than gold. It is extremely volatile, however, and tends to rise or fall in spurts so I'd like to focus on its attributes as compared to gold, make a case for holding some, and discuss some ultimate price possibilities.
Gold is known as the ultimate form of money; the king of money. Silver is generally thought of as gold's little brother or 'Poor Man's Gold'. It is said that:

Gold is the money of Monarchs,
Silver is the money of Gentlemen,
Barter is the money of Peasants, and
Debt is the money of Slaves.

Gold, oil and stocks to remain under dollar influence
By Chris Vermeulen - CommodityOnline.com
Over the past few months it seems as though everything has been tied to the dollar. Simple inter-market analysis makes it obvious that almost everything in the financial market eventually has an affect on stocks and commodities in some way. But recently trading has really been all about the dollar. If you watch the SP500 and gold prices you will notice at times virtually every tick the dollar makes directly affects the price and direction of gold and the SP500 index.
Let's take a look at some charts to see the underlying trends and what they are telling us ...
As you can see the trend is clearly down. Currently the dollar is trying to find a bottom as it bounces and pierces the previous high. The question everyone wants to know is if the dollar is about to rally and reverse trends or was Friday's pierce of the October high just a shake out before the next leg down?

U.S. Dollar Once Again at an All-Time Low
SeekingAlpha.com
The latest data from the Fed show that the dollar has once again - for the fourth time since the early 1970s - hit bottom. It is now as effectively weak as it was in Oct. '78, Jul. '95, and Apr. '08. Put another way, a U.S. tourist traveling around the globe today would find that his dollar has never bought less. For that matter, a dollar today has never bought less gold, fewer industrial commodities, or a smaller basket of consumer goods and services.

Deficit Worries Could Trigger a Bond Market Crisis, Greenspan Says
By MELLY ALAZRAKI - DailyFinance.com
The U.S. must act to rein in its massive budget deficits or face the risk of a bond market crisis, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said on NBC on Sunday, Reuters reported.
"We've got to resolve this issue before it gets forced upon us," Greenspan said. The deficit, which hit $1.3 trillion this year, may begin to frighten the bond market, he said. As that happens, interest rates would move up, which could undermine the recovery, causing the dreaded double-dip recession.

How the Market Really Feels About Bernanke's Money Printing
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
11/15/10 Baltimore, Maryland - As you remember, dear reader, we decided to hoist our old, tattered "Crash Alert" flag up last week. About mid-week, as we recall.
Not that we had any inside information. Mr. Market doesn't talk to us directly. We just read the papers - just like everyone else.
But what we noticed last week was that the Fed had given stocks, bonds commodities, and gold the biggest push in recorded historyÉ$600 billion was coming into the market. It was long. It was going to stay long. And if it didn't do the jobÉthere was plenty more where that came from.
Plenty more. Because this money came from nowhere. And if you can get money out of nowhereÉyou can get a lot of it.
In effect, Ben Bernanke gave the market the Mother of All Puts. Stocks go down? Put them to the Fed. They'll buy anything.

Inflation Is Coming! Inflation Is Coming!
By Chris Mayer - The DailyReckoning.com
11/15/10 Gaithersburg, Maryland - If Paul Revere were around, maybe he'd get on his horse and start yelling, "Inflation is coming! Inflation is coming!" I think it is coming. In fact, in many ways, it's already here, just not yet widely recognized. The deflationists still hold sway in the bond market, where investors happily accept puny yields.
The deflationists argue that the dollar will buy more tomorrow than it does today. It is inflation's opposite. When most people talk about inflation and deflation, this is what they mean. This definition would pain the old economists who were more careful in their use of language.

Inflation Expectation Tuesday:
Europe Takes Bernanke's "Cash is Trash" Message a Little TOO Literally
Submitted by Phoenix Capital Research - ZeroHedge.com
As the whole financial world now knows, Ben Bernanke wants to actively foster inflation by trashing the US Dollar. Setting aside the fact that this is absolute insanity (inflation has already hit the US), Bernanke's made it clear that he wants to trash cash to keep stocks up.
The only problem for our esteemed Fed Chairman is that Europe's banking system appears to be even MORE adept at currency destruction than Bernanke's money printing trigger finger.

Citigroup Hires 200 Bankers to Target Small Business
By Bradley Keoun
Nov. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Citigroup Inc. Chief Executive Officer Vikram Pandit, who for the past two years has championed the U.S. bank's "globality," may be getting a new mantra: locality.
Citigroup, which claims 2,500 of the world's 3,000 largest corporations as clients, now says it also is targeting U.S. companies with less than $20 million of annual sales, and plans to hire about 200 bankers by the end of 2011 to court them. That would bring the number of small-business bankers to about 500, or one for every two North American branches.

Pimco Cuts Government Debt, Adds Mortgages in October
By Susanne Walker
Nov. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Bill Gross, who runs the world's biggest bond fund at Pacific Investment Management Co., cut holdings of government-related debt to the lowest level since July 2009 and bought more mortgages in October.
The $256 billion Total Return Fund's investment in government debt fell to 28 percent of assets, from 33 percent the previous month, according to data on Newport Beach, California-based Pimco's website. The fund boosted mortgages to 39 percent of assets, from 28 percent, the highest since July 2009. Pimco doesn't comment directly on monthly changes in portfolio holdings.

The Will Robinson Signal
Submitted by thetechnicaltake - ZeroHedge.com
With investors extremely bullish and company insiders extremely bearish and with the indicator constructed from the trends in gold, crude oil and yields on the 10 year Treasury flashing extremes, I am once again reminded of the robot from the hit 1960's TV show, "Lost In Space". When the boyish Will Robinson was in peril, the robot would fling his arms up and down and announce in robot voice: "Danger,Will Robinson, danger!" Historically, these set of market conditions should not be ignored. If the market hasn't topped out already, it should do so within a couple of percent of the recent highs. Rallies should be sold and stops tightened up. The market is prone to sudden sell offs. There will be better risk adjusted opportunities to buy in the future.

Why Bernanke's "Quantitative Easing" Isn't Fooling Anyone
By Eric Fry - The DailyReckoning.com
11/15/10 Laguna Beach, California - According to the financial commentary of the moment, Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke is either a genius or a moron. But your California editor would offer a slightly different perspective; he believes Bernanke to be a geniusÉengaged in moronic behavior.
He is "too clever by half," as the old saying goes.
The erudite Federal Reserve Chairman is an accomplished academic in possession of a 99th percentile vocabulary. He knows his way around a thesaurus as well as he knows his way around the esteemed monetary theories of past and present. But therein lies the problem. When a refined vernacular cavorts with monetarist musings they produce a bastard child like "quantitative easing."

Banks escaping big foreclosure class actions
By Dan Levine
(Reuters) - Lenders snarled in the legal thicket over shoddy U.S. foreclosure procedures have so far avoided national class action lawsuits from homeowners, largely because borrowers cannot demonstrate economic harm, according to plaintiff lawyers.
Several large plaintiff firms circled around banks when reports of problems with foreclosure affidavits snowballed in late September.
But as servicers like Bank of America Corp, Ally Financial and JPMorgan Chase attempt to resolve a 50-state probe into their practices -- and other legal challenges -- big class action lawyers have taken a pass on diving into the mess.

Israel's Fischer Says Bernanke Correct on Easing
By Steve Matthews and Thomas R. Keene
Nov. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fischer said Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke is correct to ease policy in unconventional ways with the U.S. central bank's target interest rate near zero.
"This is a standard monetary policy action," Fischer said in an interview today on "Bloomberg Surveillance" with Tom Keene. "You can't now reduce interest rates so you have to expand monetarily some other way."
The Fed on Nov. 3 said it would buy an additional $600 billion of Treasuries through June, expanding record stimulus to try to reduce 9.6 percent unemployment and keep inflation from dropping.

Suffocated By Red Tape -
12 Ridiculous Regulations That Are Almost Too Bizarre To Believe
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Even with all of the massive economic problems that the United States is facing, if the government would just get off our backs most of us would do okay. In America today, it is rapidly getting to the point where it is nearly impossible to start or to operate a small business. The federal government, the state governments and local governments are cramming thousands upon thousands of new ridiculous regulations down our throats each year. It would take a full team of lawyers just to even try to stay informed about all of these new regulations. Small business in the United States is literally being suffocated by red tape. We like to think that we live in "the land of the free", but the truth is that our lives and our businesses are actually tightly constrained by millions of rules and regulations. Today there is a "license" for just about every business activity. In fact, in some areas of the country today you need a "degree" and multiple "licenses" before you can even submit an application for permission to start certain businesses. And if you want to actually hire some people for your business, the paperwork nightmare gets far worse. It is a wonder that anyone in America is still willing to start a business from scratch and hire employees. The truth is that the business environment in the United States is now so incredibly toxic that millions of Americans have simply given up and don't even try to work within the system anymore.

Why Can't Chuck Get His Business Off the Ground?

Sichuan Borrows as California Combats Muni Crisis: China Credit
By Bloomberg News
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- While California pays the price for its fiscal emergency on the other side of the Pacific, companies linked to China's local governments may match their record for bond sales even after regulators added curbs to reduce risk.
Sichuan Development Holding Co., an arm of the Chinese province, sold 8 billion yuan ($1.2 billion) of notes on Nov. 8, adding to offerings by the cities of Maanshan and Shangrao, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Southwest Securities Co. in Beijing forecasts municipal borrowers will raise 250 billion yuan from bonds this year, equaling their all-time high in 2009.

S&P predicts more home price declines through 2011
by JON PRIOR - HousingWire.com
Standard & Poor's analysts believe home prices will drop between 7% and 10% through 2011, erasing any improvements prices have recently made.
Home sales, which plummeted after the homebuyer tax credit expired in April have continued to lag. Pending home sales, which preclude existing home sale data, dipped 1.8% in September before the market goes into a winter many expect to be bleaker than usual. With this lack of demand, inventories should grow, according to S&P, while prices drop.

How Do You Keep Homeowners In Their Home
When They Are Already Gone?
HousingDoom.com
Once more Congress is trying to legislate the un-legislatable [It's not a word, but it ought to be.] They want to force lenders to keep borrowers in homes:
WASHINGTON/CHARLOTTE, North Carolina (Reuters) - Banks under fire over their foreclosure practices face twin hearings in Congress this week, at which they will come under renewed pressure to find ways to keep borrowers in their homes.
The hearings on Tuesday and Thursday will include the first appearances by executives from major lenders like Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase since the furor over sloppy foreclosure paperwork erupted in September.

Fixed mortgages account for more than 95 percent of refinance loans
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
Fixed-rate loans accounted for more than 95 percent of all refinance transactions in the third quarter, according to government mortgage financier Freddie Mac.
The popular 30-year fixed-rate mortgage was the most preferred loan program chosen by both those who were in the 30-year before and those with adjustable-rate mortgages.
But shorter-term fixed mortgages also gained steam, with many borrowers opting for 15-year and 20-year terms as well, thanks to the record low mortgage rates on offer.
"The share of borrowers shortening their amortization terms remains high," said Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac VP and chief economist, in a statement.
"There is always a discount for shorter terms but the payments are often about 50 percent higher than a 30-year amortizing payment and thus are unaffordable to many homeowners. What we're seeing now is that the level of the 15-year payment is becoming more affordable to more borrowers."

California Kicks Off $14 Billion in Bond Sales
By MELLY ALAZRAKI - DailyFinance.com
California is set to begin sales of about $14 billion worth of debt today, the Financial Times reported, as the fiscally struggling state hopes that investors concerns over its troubles will be offset by their desire for yield.
The municipal bond market has generally been perceived a safe place to invest, but worries of possible increasing defaults and a reassessment of risk in the $2.8 trillion market are changing all that. Last week, muni bonds sold off because of these concerns and as federal subsidies, which have boosted the market, are coming to end and likely won't be extended with Republican gains in midterm elections.

Ford to Introduce Electric Focus in Key U.S. Markets in Late 2011
By DAVID SCHEPP - DailyFinance.com
Ford Motor (F) plans to start selling an all-electric version of its Ford Focus compact late next year, beginning in 14 major metropolitan areas in the U.S., the company said Monday.
The markets chosen for initial sale of the Ford Focus Electric were based on several criteria, including commuting patterns and existing hybrid purchase trends, Ford said in a statement. The model will be first made available for sale in: Atlanta; Houston and Austin, Texas; Boston; Chicago; Denver; Detroit; Los Angeles; San Francisco; San Diego; New York; Orlando, Fla.; Phoenix and Tucson, Ariz.; Portland, Ore.; Raleigh and Durham, N.C.; Richmond, Va., Seattle, and Washington, D.C.

Keeping 'Overqualifieds' on Board
Recruiters Say Desperate Workers in a Down Economy Now Seek Greener Pastures
By JOE LIGHT - WSJ.com
Employers who snapped up top talent on the cheap in the depth of the recession should start worrying about defections, recruiters and management watchers say.
Companies that continued to hire during the slump found they were able to nab talented but recently laid-off workers at bargain salaries, or into jobs for which they were overqualified. Now, as the job market slowly loosens up - and those overqualified hires become more frustrated - some of them are considering greener pastures.

Spending Worries Put Jobless Benefits at Risk
By JANET HOOK And SARA MURRAY - WSJ.com
Congress is unlikely to agree to extend jobless benefits for two million unemployed workers by the time the program begins to lapse in two weeks, as lawmakers struggle with a packed lame-duck session and voter antipathy toward government spending.
But cutting off benefits could drag on a fragile economic recovery by reducing consumer spending, economists say, and Democrats are looking for a compromise that could put the program back on track before Christmas.

California kicks off $14 billion debt sale
By Hibah Yousuf
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Cash-strapped California kicked off a $14 billion debt sale Monday, amid weakening demand for municipal bonds as investors fret that ballooning deficits could trigger cities and states to default on their debt payments.
Yields on municipal bonds have been rising in recent weeks as state and local governments issue debt to boost liquidity as they struggle to trim deficits and balance budgets, said Matt Fabian, managing director at Municipal Market Advisors.

Federal report: U.S. hunger remains at highest levels in 15 years
By the CNN Wire Staff
(CNN) -- The number of Americans fighting off hunger stayed level last year, though food insecurity rates remain the highest they have been since the federal government began keeping track 15 years ago, a Department of Agriculture report released Monday found.
About 14.7 percent of U.S. households were "food insecure" in 2009, meaning they had difficulty feeding one or more of their members at some point last year due to a lack of financial resources, according to the report. That equates to 17.4 million households total, or roughly 45 million people.

Gap, Wal-Mart Clothing Costs Rise on 'Terrifying' Cotton Prices
By Bloomberg News
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Gap Inc., J.C. Penney Co. and other U.S. retailers may have to pay Chinese suppliers as much as 30 percent more for clothes as surging cotton prices boost costs.
"It's a little terrifying to deal with cotton suppliers now," said Vicky Wu, a sales manager at Suzhou Unitedtex Enterprise Ltd., a closely held, Jiangsu province-based clothes maker that counts Gap and J.C. Penney among its clients.
Cotton futures in China have surged more than 70 percent this year and were at a record earlier as the global economy emerged from recession, allowing people to spend more on clothes. Production of the fiber in China, the world's biggest user and importer, is forecast to lag behind demand for a 12th year, cutting its stockpile to the smallest since 1995, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Supercomputers Fuel Competition
By DON CLARK - WSJ.com
China's installation of the world's fastest supercomputer is galvanizing efforts by U.S. government agencies and companies to restore American leadership in the technology, a key tool in such fields as climate research, product design and weapons development.
Participants hope to outrace Chinese engineers in bringing a thousand-fold acceleration of today's most powerful machines - replaying a crusade in the past decade that leapfrogged a supercomputer in Japan that briefly held the world speed crown.

Apple Finally Snares Beatles
By ETHAN SMITH - WSJ.com
Steve Jobs is nearing the end of his long and winding pursuit of the Beatles catalog.
Apple Inc. is preparing to disclose that its iTunes Store will soon start carrying music by the Beatles, according to people familiar with the situation, a move that would fill a glaring gap in the collection of the world's largest music retailer.
The deal resulted from talks that were taking place as recently as last week among executives of Apple, representatives of the Beatles and their record label, EMI Group Ltd., according to these people. These people cautioned that Apple could change plans at the last minute.
Spokesmen for Apple and EMI declined to comment.

Comcast Unveils iPad App for Mobile Video
By KEVIN KINGSBURY
Comcast Corp. unveiled an application for Apple Inc.'s iPad that allows its customers to watch videos, program their digital video recorders and more, as pay-television providers look to keep eyeballs on their offerings, whether in the home or not.
With its iPad application, Comcast joins a growing list of video streaming products from big-name media companies, including Dish Network Corp., Netflix Inc., Hulu and ABC, trying to catch the attention of a new generation of consumers, looking for content they can stream from the Internet to their new portable media devices.

S.510: The fake food safety bill scheduled for another vote
From: Downsizer Dispatch - The PPJ Gazette
Quote of the Day: "Given sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine." - Woody Page, Denver sports columnist
S. 510 will make your food more expensive and less safe. It will drive many small farms out of business. The leaders of the "lame duck" Congress want to pass this falsely named "food safety" bill NEXT WEEK, but ...
They'll need 60 votes to break Sen. Coburn's "hold" on the bill.
That means we can defeat S.510 with just 40 votes, but we must apply the pressure now!

Post-Election Advice For Desperate Dems
Dump Pelosi, Dump Obama, Stop Foreclosures, Tax Wall Street
By Webster G. Tarpley
The results of last Tuesday's election must be interpreted as a repudiation of the Obama presidency, and also as a vote in favor of divided government. Voters wanted to end one-party rule in Washington, and this has been accomplished. Voters were more than willing to accept a couple of years of gridlock, since they are not inclined to hand a blank check to the unacceptable and incompetent agendas of either major political party. There certainly was no mandate for the raving reactionary policies put forward by the Republican Party.
A Vote Against Obama and for Divided Government, not in Favor of the GOP.

Coming Soon to an Airport Near You:
Prison-style strip searches?
Reason.com
You've heard about the passenger who opted out of a full-body scan (a.k.a. "a virtual strip search") and was subjected to an intrusive and humiliating pat down. "If you touch my junk, I'll have you arrested," passenger John Tyner told Transportation Security Administration workers in San Diego.
Well, rest easy, John - and other passengers offended by both full-body scans and hands-on searches.
TSA won't touch your junk - or your breasts or buttocks. If they begin to strip search passengers as if they're prison inmates, they'll do just what correctional officers do: They'll make you do all the nasty work.
What follows is an excerpt from a training video for prison guards on how to make sure that inmates aren't hiding contraband.

Just Stay Home
By Jed Babbin - The American Spectator.org
The trade association of U.S. airlines -- the Air Transport Association -- says that it expects that about 24 million Americans will take to the air over the Thanksgiving holiday. That would be about 3 percent more air travelers than flew last Thanksgiving. I hope they are wrong. Travelers should drive, take the train, bicycle, walk or just stay home. Just don't fly. If we stay on the ground, the message may finally get through to our government: stop harassing us and concentrate on finding the bad guys.

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Monday 11.15.2010

Bank Failures #144 & 145: Georgia
From the FDIC: Ameris Bank, Moultrie, Georgia, Acquires All of the Deposits of Two Georgia Institutions
As of September 30, 2010, Tifton Banking Company had total assets of $143.7 million and total deposits of $141.6 million, and Darby Bank & Trust Co. had total assets of $654.7 million and total deposits of $587.6 million.

Arizona bank is 146th U.S. failure of 2010
By John Letzing
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Copper Star Bank was closed by regulators Friday, marking the 146th U.S. bank failure of the year so far. Copper Star Bank had $190.2 million in deposits as of Sept. 30, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. The bank's failure will cost the federal deposit-insurance fund $43.6 million, the FDIC said

3 Banks Closed on Nov. 12
Latest Tally: 168 Failures So Far in 2010 [note: includes credit unions]
Federal and state banking regulators closed three banks on Friday, Nov. 12. These failures raise the total number of failed institutions to 168 so far in 2010.
These are the latest closures: Tifton Banking Company, Tifton, Ga., Darby Bank & Trust Co., Vidalia, Ga.
Tifton Banking Company, Tifton, Ga., and Darby Bank & Trust Co., Vidalia, Ga., were closed by the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) was appointed receiver. Ameris Bank, Moultrie, Ga. will acquire the banking operations including all the deposits of the two failed banks, which were not affiliated with each other.

MAP - Failed Banks and Credit Unions, 2010 (as of Nov 8, 2010)

Meredith Whitney Discusses States at Risk, Mortgage Fraud,
Housing & Banking Crises; Decades of Lawsuits

G-20, APEC Yield Little to Fix Imbalances, Stem Inflow Concerns
By Daniel Ten Kate and Sachiko Sakamaki
Nov. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Leaders of the world's biggest economies ended four days of talks without taking decisive measures to address the global imbalances that have fueled asset bubbles and risk leading to a protectionist backlash.
Asia-Pacific leaders yesterday in Japan pledged to take "concrete steps" toward creating a regional free-trade agreement without setting a target for achieving that goal. Their meeting followed the Nov. 11-12 Group of 20 summit in Seoul that "opposed protectionist trade actions" while failing to agree on a remedy for trade and investment distortions.

U.S. Pushes China to Show Yuan Progress Before Hu's January Trip
By Daniel Ten Kate and Kathleen Chu
Nov. 14 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. called on China to let the yuan rise before President Hu Jintao's planned January trip to Washington, setting a deadline for results after Group of 20 leaders failed to reach a broad agreement on currencies.
Hu's U.S. visit "will be an important time to look at exactly what the quantum of progress has been" on China's currency reforms, National Security Adviser Thomas Donilon told reporters today in Yokohama, Japan. The pace of the moves is a "sovereign decision" and the U.S. "will certainly be looking."

Chinese missiles can ravage U.S. bases
Report cites 5 sites in Asia
By Bill Gertz - The Washington Times
China's military can destroy five out of six U.S. bases in Asia with waves of missile strikes as the result of its large-scale military buildup that threatens U.S. access and freedom of navigation in East Asia, according to a forthcoming congressional report.
"The main implication of China's improved air and conventional missile capabilities is a dramatic increase in the [People's Liberation Army's] ability to inhibit U.S. military operations in the region," a late draft of the report by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission concludes.
The U.S. government has growing concerns over what the report says are "China's improving capabilities to challenge the U.S. military's freedom of access in East Asia."

Europe stumbles blindly towards its 1931 moment
It is the European Central Bank that should be printing money on a mass scale to purchase government debt, not the US Federal Reserve.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
Unless the ECB takes fast and dramatic action, it risks destroying the currency it is paid to manage, and allowing a political catastrophe to unfold in Europe.
If mishandled, Ireland could all too easily become a sovereign version of Credit Anstalt - the Austrian bank that brought down the central European financial system in 1931, sent tremors through London and New York, and set off the second deeper phase of the Great Depression, the phase when politics turned ugly.

US Lost Every Round At G20 Meeting
Elaine Meinel Supkis - SilverBearCaffe.com
My son was reminiscing last night at dinner, the 1999 Seattle event which was the first US riot against 'globalisation'. He was working in the center of the city and got tangled up in the riots trying to get to and from his job. Seattle's WTO riots were loud - and ineffective mostly because the left is very divided on this issue due to a long, long history going back to Marx about 'the International'. Ever since Seattle, the W20 leaders had to hold their conspiratorial meetings in remote places or where there is severe police state suppression. Meanwhile, they boast that their policies are popular and helping the greater mass of humanity.

Ron Paul on The Dylan Ratigan Show 11/10/10

Inflation divides Bank of England
The extent of the divide among Bank of England policy makers has been laid bare after the publication of the central bank's Inflation Report showed a range of views over the future direction of the UK economy.
By Jonathan Sibun - Telegraph.co.uk
The Bank said that the "prospects for inflation remained highly uncertain" and consequently so did the Monetary Policy Committee's (MPC) future economic policy.
Unveiling the November Inflation Report, Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England, said: "Given the quantitative importance of the different influences buffeting the economy at present, it is hard to judge how inflation will evolve in the medium term and there are sizable risks in both directions."

The Euro Back Under the Microscope, PIIGS Debt Crisis Round3
By: Bryan Rich - MarketOracle.co.uk
Investors, politicians and the media have had tunnel vision for the better part of the past five months. And it's been directed squarely on the United States.
The world has been transfixed on the dollar. Experts have tirelessly surmised how the Fed's recent decision to launch another round of quantitative easing was reckless. And they've claimed this action will do irreparable damage to the buck - the world's primary reserve currency.

The Beginning of the End of The United States of Europe
While all eyes are on the United States of America and its difficulties with the G20, QE2, et al, the United States of Europe is showing signs of falling apart. As the European Union grows and grows the cost of membership for countries such as Britain increases at an exponential rate and civil unrest hits the streets as students invade the Conservative Party Head Quarters, smashing windows in an ugly protest about increased tuition fees.
Two years ago the United Kingdom were paying three billion pounds a year to the EU.
Now its six billion pounds a year
Next year it rises to eight billion pounds a year
the year after its ten billion pounds a year
by the year 2013 it will cost the Britain THIRTEEN billion pounds a year.

Ireland has been betrayed by its EU 'friends'
The country is now effectively bust - its brutal cuts will have been in vain By Jeremy Warner - Telegraph.co.uk
When politics and economics collide, it is often said, the economics always ends up winning. The curiosity of the euro is that it has managed to defy this otherwise universally applicable rule; the politics somehow continues to triumph over the single currency's self-evidently flawed economics.
For how much longer can this continue? Events in the bond markets this week make it more or less inevitable that Ireland is going to have to follow Greece in seeking support from the European Union's new bailout fund. Unlike Greece, Ireland is fully funded through to the middle of next year, so there is no immediate danger of a liquidity crisis. All the same, markets aren't waiting around to find out: some kind of denouement seems to be fast approaching.

Global Currency War May Miss Cash-Starved East Europe
By Agnes Lovasz
Nov. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Eastern Europe is struggling to attract capital even as record-low interest rates in major economies force emerging nations in Asia and Latin America to fend off a flood of money from investors seeking higher yields.
While Group of 20 policy makers are debating ways to prevent so-called hot money from creating asset bubbles in countries from China to Brazil, east European nations need capital to finance budget and trade deficits after receiving more than $100 billion of bailouts during the global recession.

Silver Could Spike to $50 Because of Huge Short Interest
By Robert Lenzner - Forbes columnist -HuffingtonPost.com
Ananthan Thangavel of Lakshmi Capital is long silver futures and call options for his clients, and will add to his silver positions on any pullback. He knows there are huge short positions in silver; CFTC records show that 44.1% of the gross short position in silver is held by the 4 largest traders. And he reports in a comment on the silver market on Lakshmi's website ("A Twist on the Silver Market") that, "Some traders I have spoken with are targeting the 40-50 level within 4 months." A chart of silver prices shows that silver in recent weeks has outshone the rise in gold prices by jumping 50 percent from around $18 to nearly $30 and then backed off to $27.16 Saturday. This extraordinary increase in the price of silver suggests that short covering might explain part of the gain.

Silver: Still The Investment Of A Lifetime
By Giordano Bruno - Neithercorp Press - 11/12/2010
Silver is the common man's currency. It always has been, and it always will be. While gold holds its place in history as the great stabilizer of economies and the shield against hyperinflation, its shine and its safety should not distract us from its brother, silver, whose uses are numerous and whose value is often more attainable for those seeking a solid investment outside of precarious paper securities.
Gold's unprecedented upsurge in price the past year alone is now becoming the stuff of legend, and it is also something we at Neithercorp have been predicting for a while now:

Gold Drops Most in Four Months on Concern China to Boost Rates
By Pham-Duy Nguyen and Nicholas Larkin
Nov. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Gold futures tumbled the most in four months on speculation that China will raise interest rates to cool the economy, eroding demand for commodities. Silver also declined.
Equities fell worldwide on bets the People's Bank of China is preparing to raise borrowing costs to fight inflation, which topped a two-year high last month. Every price in the Thomson Reuters/Jefferies CRB Index of 19 raw materials fell today, sending the gauge down the most in 18 months. On Nov. 9, gold rose to a record $1,424.30 an ounce.

Economic Recovery - A Crisis of Confidence
by JOHN MARIOTTI - Forbes
After one of the largest election upheavals in decades, the question still remains: what will improve the job outlook in the USA, which is really asking what improves chances of a recovery, and of improved consumer spending and economic growth. In a word: confidence.
People have confidence in leaders because they perceive that leaders have three characteristics: 1) Courage - to face tough challenges and deal with them; 2) Character - to "walk the talk" and say what they'll do and then do what they said; and 3) Competence - to have the know-how and experience to correctly identify problems, devise solutions and execute them. Then they look at results to see how things came out.

Is the American Dream Over?
America has long been a country of limitless possibility. But the dream has now become a nightmare for many. The US is now realizing just how fragile its success has become -- and how bitter its reality. Should the superpower not find a way out of crisis, it could spell trouble ahead for the global economy.
By SPIEGEL Staff
It was to be the kind of place where dozens of American dreams would be fulfilled -- here on Apple Blossom Drive, a cul-de-sac under the azure-blue skies of southwest Florida, where the climate is mild and therapeutic for people with arthritis and rheumatism. Everything is ready. The driveways lined with cast-iron lanterns are finished, the artificial streams and ponds are filled with water, and all the underground cables have been installed. This street in Florida was to be just one small part of America's greater identity -- a place where individual dreams were to become part of the great American story.

Obama Says Fed Easing Wasn't Aimed at Affecting Dollar
By Nicholas Johnston and Hans Nichols
Nov. 12 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama said the U.S. Federal Reserve's second round of quantitative easing is designed to boost growth, not affect the value of the dollar, rebuffing charges that America is seeking a weaker exchange rate.
"This decision was not one to have an impact on the currency, on the dollar," Obama said a day after former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan said the nation was "pursuing a policy of currency weakening" in a Financial Times opinion piece. "It was designed to grow the economy," the president said.

Alert: QE II Has Lit the Fuse
Chris Martenson - SilverBearCafe.com
For a very long time, I have been calling for, expecting, and otherwise anticipating the day that the Federal Reserve would begin openly monetizing government debt. Intellectually knew the day would come, but in my heart I hoped it wouldn't. But with the Fed's recent decision to directly monetize the next eight months of federal deficit spending, that day has finally arrived. I have to confess, while my prediction has proven accurate, I'm still stunned the Fed actually did it.
In this report I examine the risks that this new path presents, what match(es) may finally ignite the decades-old pile of dry fuel, what the outcomes are likely to be, and what we can and should be doing in preparation.
How is this Quantitative Easing (QE) different from the prior QE?

from March, 2009 ... same unanswered questions remain
Congresswoman Questions Geithner on Constitution

Goldman Sachs Boss Complains About 'Only' Making $9 Million
If Only We Had Problems Like That
AlterNet / By Jim Hightower
The annual bonuses paid to Wall Street's top bankers keep rising, even with the economy in the tank.
I've seen some truly amazing feats of magic, but here's one that beats them all. Right before your eyes, this thing rises into the air on its own, with no wires or mechanical devices giving it lift. And it hovers there effortlessly.
But it's not magic, for magic is an illusion, and this gravity-defying phenomenon of perpetual levitation happens to be real. What is this "it" that keeps floating up, up, up? The annual bonuses paid to Wall Street's top bankers.

What Are The Elites Holding Over Us?
by Bill Sardi - LewRockwell.com
What is it that the elites hold over the average American citizen?
Answer: financial literacy
The elite class in America knows the language of finance, banking, currency and economics. Because American schools leave students financially illiterate, even after graduating from college, they cannot properly manage their money and must rely upon the often self-interested misdirection of financial advisors, stock brokers, and bankers.
For example, most financial counselors recently advised their clients against withdrawal of funds from their 401(k) tax-deferred accounts, given that there are penalties for early withdrawal. The result: most 401(k) accounts lost 30% or more of their money. Now withdraw your money from those tax-deferred accounts, taking a 10-20% penalty, and you have sliced your retirement fund in half.

Bernanke's worst nightmare: Ron Paul
By Chris Isidore
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Ben Bernanke has had his hands full since his first day on the job as Federal Reserve chairman nearly five years ago. It's about to get even tougher.
His harshest critic on Capitol Hill, Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, is about to become one of his overseers.
With the Republicans coming to power, Paul, who would like to abolish the Fed and the nation's current monetary system, will become the chairman of the House Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy.

Ron Paul on Supervising the Fed

Are Obama and Congress Set To Screw American Counties, Homeowners and Give Wall Street Mortgage Banksters a Retroactive Immunity Bailout?
By: bmaz - empty wheel
There are rapidly emerging signs the Obama Administration and Congress may be actively, quickly and covertly working furiously on a plan to retroactively legitimize and ratify the shoddy, fraudulent and non-conforming conduct by MERS on literally millions of mortgages.
"When Congress comes back into session next week, it may consider measures intended to bolster the legal status of a controversial bank owned electronic mortgage registration system that contains three out of every five mortgages in the country.
The system is known as MERS, the acronym for a private company called Mortgage Electronic Registry Systems. Set up by banks in the 1997, MERS is a system for tracking ownership of home loans as they move from mortgage originator through the financial pipeline to the trusts set up when mortgage securities are sold."

Stiglitz: We Have To Throw Bankers In Jail
Or The Economy Won't Recover
George Washington - SilverBearCafe.com
As economists such as William Black and James Galbraith have repeatedly said, we cannot solve the economic crisis unless we throw the criminals who committed fraud in jail.
And Nobel prize winning economist George Akerlof has demonstrated that failure to punish white collar criminals - and instead bailing them out- creates incentives for more economic crimes and further destruction of the economy in the future.

Jamie Dimon and Robert Rubin:
Evasive on "Fraud as a Business Model"
By Janet Tavakoli - HuffingtonPost.com
Foreclosure fraud isn't about losing paperwork or having incorrect paperwork. It is about committing fraud and trying to manipulate the U.S. legal system. No one -- not even a bank -- can show up in court with phony evidence.
State Attorneys General decry foreclosure fraud, because among other things, people signed affidavits making representations that were untrue. This is fraud on the court. All of these foreclosures may be vacated.

US Treasuries or Asian Stocks?
An Interview with Dr. Marc Faber

Bank of America Is in Deep Trouble, and
There May Be Financial Disaster on the Horizon
Its stock value has dropped 40 percent since April, and the bank is mum on what losses it's hiding on its $2.3 trillion balance sheet.
AlterNet / By Joshua Holland
Will Bank of America be the first Wall Street giant to once again point a gun to its own head, telling us it'll crash and burn and take down the financial system if we don't pony up for another massive bailout?
When former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson was handing out trillions to Wall Street, BofA collected $45 billion from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) to stabilize its balance sheet. It was spun as a success story -- a rebuke of those who urged the banks be put into receivership -- when the behemoth "paid back" the cash last December. But the bank's stock price has fallen by more than 40 percent since mid-April, and the value of its outstanding stock is currently at around half of what it should be based on its "book value" -- what the company says its holdings are worth.

Money, Mud & Hyperinflation.
TRAC Financial Group | Research
Since World War II, inflation has been engrained in Western society. It is embedded in our expectations and written into our legislation. Inflation is the culture of the Baby Boomer generation. Society expects prices to go up, and is convinced something is wrong if they do not.
The general fear of deflation is unfounded. Under the global fiat monetary system, to inflate or deflate is largely a policy makers decision. Amongst developed economies, deflation is invariably Public Enemy Number One.
The historically proven antecedents to hyperinflation currently exist to an overwhelming extent. Banking crises have been shown to ordinarily precede currency crashes. Currency crashes result in high to hyper-inflation.

Paychecks for CEOs Climb
By JOANN S. LUBLIN - WSJ.com
The chief executives of the largest U.S. public companies enjoyed bigger paydays in their latest fiscal year, as share prices recovered and profits soared amid the country's slow emergence from recession.
At these 456 companies, the median pretax value of CEO salaries, bonuses and long-term incentives, such as grants of stock and stock options, rose by 3% to $7.23 million, according to an analysis of their latest proxy filings for The Wall Street Journal by consulting firm Hay Group.
Investors made out well, too, with total shareholder return (based on the change in stock price plus reinvested dividends), coming in at 29%. The companies' total net income doubled from a year earlier to $510.9 billion.

*****

Quantitative Easing Explained

Amazon.com will hire 15,000 to fill orders
USAToday.com
SEATTLE (AP) - Amazon.com is hiring more than 15,500 people to fill temporary holiday jobs at shipping centers around the country, more than last year.
The online retail giant said Friday it will hire more than 5,000 people in Phoenix and Goodyear, Ariz., and 4,000 in Pennsylvania at locations including Allentown, Hazelton and Lewisberry.
In Indiana, it will hire more than 2,500 people in Whitestown and Plainfield, and in Hebron, Ky. and Fernley, Nev., it will hire more than 2,000 people at each location.
The Seattle company says it is hiring more people this year but didn't say how many more.

Land Becomes Cash Crop in Farm Belt
By LAUREN ETTER and SCOTT KILMAN - WSJ.com
Prices for irrigated cropland soared 9.6% in the third quarter across the western swath of the Farm Belt amid booming demand for U.S. crops, according to a survey released Friday by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
The quarterly survey of the region known as the 10th District, which covers western Missouri, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Wyoming, Colorado and northern New Mexico, found that farmland prices rose for the fourth consecutive quarter since a drop in the third quarter of 2009, which is when the livestock sector was contracting in face of the steep recession.

Get Ready for the Great MERS Whitewash Bill
By: John Carney - Senior Editor, CNBC.com
When Congress comes back into session next week, it may consider measures intended to bolster the legal status of a controversial bank owned electronic mortgage registration system that contains three out of every five mortgages in the country.
The system is known as MERS, the acronym for a private company called Mortgage Electronic Registry Systems. Set up by banks in the 1997, MERS is a system for tracking ownership of home loans as they move from mortgage originator through the financial pipeline to the trusts set up when mortgage securities are sold.

Housing Woes Not Nearing an End
by Gary Shilling - BloggingStocks.com
With mortgage refinancing applications up recently and house prices on the rise in recent months, some might believe there is reason to be optimistic about the struggling housing sector. I don't subscribe to this belief. Instead, I look for delinquencies and foreclosures to spike in the slow economic growth, high unemployment quarters that probably lie ahead.
Already, real estate owned (REO) by lenders due to foreclosures -- perhaps the most hated term among bankers -- is climbing. Estimates are that a major share of the 7 million houses that have delinquent mortgages or are in some stage of foreclosure, as well as those yet to come, will be dumped on the market, adding to the already huge excessive inventory glut. Some 4.5 million loans are now in foreclosure or at least 90 days delinquent.

The 20 Cities With The Most Underwater Homes
By Gus Lubin - BusinessInsider.com
The scariest number for anyone invested in the real estate market is this: 23.2%.
That's the record-high share of mortgages that are now underwater, as estimated by Zillow.
Negative equity is the prime factor driving a record number of mortgage holders into delinquency. Delinquencies will lead to foreclosures, which will drive down home prices, creating more negative equity -- a very dangerous cycle.

Odd Foreclosure Phenomenon May Be Telling of Bank Tactics
By: Diana Olick - CNBC Real Estate Reporter
Foreclosure filings were reported on 332,172 properties in October, according to RealtyTrac.
That's a 4 percent drop from the previous month and unchanged from October of 2009.
While notices of default, the initial stage of the process, fell about 2 percent, the big drop was in bank repossessions, down 9 percent from the previous month.
This was thoroughly expected; in fact I expected a bigger drop, of course, because of the big bank foreclosure freezes.

Home Prices Fall in Half of US Cities in Downward Trend
AP - CNBC.com
Home prices edged up in just half of U.S. cities in the third quarter as the weak economy dulled buyer interest.
The National Association of Realtors says the median sales price for previously occupied homes rose compared with last year in 77 out of 155 metropolitan areas tracked in the July-to-September quarter.
That compares with 100 out of 155 cities in the April-to-June quarter. Eleven cities had double-digit price increases.

White House Sending Mixed Messages on Tax Cuts

Bush tax cuts: What nobody is talking about
By Jeanne Sahadi
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- There will be a lot of noisy static between now and Thursday about possible compromises over the extension of the Bush tax cuts, which are set to expire Dec. 31.
Thursday is the day when President Obama and the Democratic and Republican leadership on Capitol Hill meet to formally kick off negotiations on the issue.
The starting points in the negotiations are well known: President Obama wants to make the tax cuts permanent on income up to $250,000 and let the cuts on income higher than $250,000 expire. The Republicans want to the tax cuts to be made permanent for everyone.

Secret Walmart Survey Shows Inflation Already Here
By: John Melloy - CNBC.com
There might not have been a second round of quantitative easing, if Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke shopped at Walmart.
A new pricing survey of products sold at the world's largest retailer showed a 0.6 percent price increase in just the last two months, according to MKM Partners. At that rate, prices would be close to four percent higher a year from now, double the Fed's mandate.
The "inaugural price survey shows a small, but meaningful increase on an 86-item grocery basket," said Patrick McKeever, MKM Partners analyst, in a note. Most of the items McKeever chose to track were every day items like food and detergent and made by national brands.

The NYT Doesn't Know That We Have 15 Million People Unemployed
By: Dean Baker - FireDogLake
That is the only thing that readers can conclude from its heroic efforts to balance the budget in 2030. This exercise is utterly mind-boggling. We have more than 25 million people unemployed, underemployed, or who have given up work altogether. This is a real crisis. Furthermore, it is worth noting that these people are largely suffering as a result of the incompetence of the budget balancers. (The budget balancers were the same people who dominated economic debate in the years before the crash and could did not see the $8 trillion housing bubble that wrecked the economy and gave us the huge deficits that now have them so obsessed.)

Poverty in America, The Big Picture
By: Mike Stathis - MarketOracle.co.uk
In America's Financial Apocalypse, a book that has been banned by the media, I discussed the many flaws in the calculation of poverty levels within the U.S. First, let's have a look at some excerpts from the book.
"In August 2004, the U.S. Census Bureau reported a poverty rate of 12.7 percent. This was the rate used by government economists and politicians to determine expenditures for numerous government programs.
However, the Census Bureau added that this rate could be as high as 19.4 percent or as low as 8.3 percent depending on how income and basic living expenses were treated.
I for one feel that the real poverty rate in America is much closer to the 19.4 percent figure (and most likely even higher) due to the unwillingness of Washington to update its criteria for poverty levels.

Obama White House Hands Out 111 Obamacare Waivers-
Hides It on Website

Who Will Stand Up to the Superrich?
By FRANK RICH - NYTimes.com
IN the aftermath of the Great Democratic Shellacking of 2010, one election night subplot quickly receded into the footnotes: the drubbing received by very wealthy Americans, most of them Republican, who tried to buy Senate seats and governor's mansions. Americans don't hate rich people. They admire and often idolize success. But Californians took a hearty dislike to Meg Whitman, who sacrificed $143 million of her eBay fortune - not to mention her undocumented former housekeeper - to a gubernatorial race she lost by double digits. Connecticut voters K.O.'d the World Wrestling groin-kicker, Linda McMahon, and West Virginians did likewise to the limestone-and-steel magnate John Raese, the senatorial hopeful who told an interviewer without apparent irony, "I made my money the old-fashioned way - I inherited it."

The United States Has Too Much Natural Gas
By: Pravda - MarketOracle.co.uk
The U.S. is starting to supply gas to Europe. The surplus of domestic production and the active procurement of LNG in Qatar allowed the country to re-export gas using the so-called arbitrage transactions which means transferring purchased gas to new buyers. The first gas transport will come to the UK this weekend.
The re-export of gas to Europe from the U.S. indicates that shale gas is having an increasing impact on the global gas market. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the excess supply may cause gas suppliers to reduce prices.
In February, Gazprom postponed the project of the production of LNG at the giant Shtokman field in the Barents Sea, and one of the reasons for it was the fact that the target market - United States - does not need additional supplies.

Postal Service reports $8 billion in losses
By Jim McElhatton - The Washington Times
The U.S. Postal Service on Friday reported more than $8 billion in losses for the 2010 fiscal year while noting that mail volume continues to drop.
The postal service's chief financial officer, Joe Corbett, said despite $9 billion in cost savings over the past two years and the elimination of more than 100,000 jobs, fundamental changes are needed in how the mail system works.
"We will continue our relentless efforts to innovate and improve efficiency," he said. "However, the need for changes to legislation, regulations and labor contracts has never been more obvious."
Among the changes the Postal Service is seeking is the ability to cut Saturday mail delivery.

China to play role in General Motors IPO
By SHARON SILKE CARTY - AP WashingtonPost.com
DETROIT -- Among the banks helping General Motors with its initial public stock offering next week are two identified by initials only: ICBC and CICC.
Americans uncomfortable with U.S. government ownership of General Motors may want to hear more: One of those banks is the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, one of China's four big central government banks. The other, China International Capital Corp., is a joint venture run primarily by Central Huijin Investment Ltd., an arm of the state, and Morgan Stanley.

Meet The Man Who Just Made A Cool Half Million
From The Sale Of Virtual Property
By Oliver Chiang - Forbes
Many people might balk at the idea of paying even a dollar for virtual cow in a game like Farmville. But Jon Jacobs has just sold a virtual space station he's spent the past five years managing for a whopping $635,000 in total, making over half a million dollars. Who would devote so much time and investment into something that doesn't exist in the real world?
Make no mistake, Jacobs isn't your stereotypical gamer geek. An actor, filmmaker, cyber-celebrity and entrepreneur, Jacobs deals with movie and music moguls, running a business out of a 6,900 square-foot office in the heart of Hollywood, in the historic El Capitan Theatre building on Hollywood Boulevard, with windows overlooking the Kodak Theatre. Jacobs has a penchant for flamboyant dress. He has his own theme song. Jacobs' story is a larger-than-life tale that blurs the line between real-life and virtual-life fame and fortune.

U.S. Virtual Goods Market Will Pass $2 Billion In 2011, Study Reports
By Oliver Chiang - Forbes
Total sales of virtual goods in the U.S. will reach $2.1 billion in 2011, says a report released by research firm Inside Network, an increase of half a billion dollars from $1.6 billion in 2010. The firm released the results of the annual report, "Inside Virtual Goods Market 2010 - 2011? on Tuesday morning.
"Next year is the first time the U.S. virtual goods market will cross the $2 billion mark and become a multi-billion dollar industry," says Justin Smith, co-author of the report. "It's a market that's grown quickly over the past few years."

One and done: To be a great president,
Obama should not seek reelection in 2012
By Douglas E. Schoen and Patrick H. Caddell - WashingtonPost.com
President Obama must decide now how he wants to govern in the two years leading up to the 2012 presidential election.
In recent days, he has offered differing visions of how he might approach the country's problems. At one point, he spoke of the need for "mid-course corrections." At another, he expressed a desire to take ideas from both sides of the aisle. And before this month's midterm elections, he said he believed that the next two years would involve "hand-to-hand combat" with Republicans, whom he also referred to as "enemies."
It is clear that the president is still trying to reach a resolution in his own mind as to what he should do and how he should do it.

Ann Coulter on Bush, Economy

Matricula Consular ID card
The Mexican Matricula Consular ID card is an ID card issued to Mexican foreign nationals in the United States. The matricula consular is useful in the United States only for illegal aliens, because legal immigrants by definition have legal U.S. government-issued documents.
After 9/11, the Mexican Government realized that they could not gain another U.S. amnesty for illegal aliens. Instead, they launched a lobbying campaign to gain acceptance of the ID at state and local levels and from U.S. banks.
U.S. Congressman Tom Tancredo said, "The only people who benefit from having such an ID are those who have come illegally and have broken our laws." This ID card is essentially a back door attempt at a stealth amnesty and a direct challenge to the jurisdiction of Congress over U.S. immigration policy. Roberto Rodriguez Hernandez, director of the Mexican card program was quoted as saying "It's necessary to push the need for an amnesty at all levels."

DHS funded fusion centers
By Cynthia Hodges - Examiner.com
Since the creation of fusion centers throughout the country, they have been more like "confusion" centers. Fusion centers are controversial due to the massive amount of personal information secretly collected and shared. Without oversight, members of the public that pose no threat to national security unknowingly are entered into a database as terrorist threats.
What information is entered into the database is at the discretion of the analyst. Just two of many examples include in Virginia, the state's historic black colleges were labeled as a "possible threat." In Wisconsin, a fusion center analyst targeted abortion protestors as a threat to public safety.

State of Liberty - Scott Davis

Gazprom Sells First Foreign Bond in 16 Months: Russia Credit
By Denis Maternovsky
Nov. 15 (Bloomberg) -- OAO Gazprom starts canvassing investors today as the world's biggest gas producer prepares to sell bonds abroad for the first time in 16 months to take advantage of record-low borrowing costs for Russian companies.
Gazprom will meet fund managers until Nov. 17, a banker with knowledge of the transaction said. Average yields on Russian dollar bonds fell to 5.26 percent on Oct. 13, the lowest since JPMorgan Chase & Co. began tracking them in May 2002, and were at 5.63 percent on Nov. 12, down from 7.35 percent May 25.

New Chinese subs raise questions
By J. Michael Cole - TaipeiTimes.com
Recent media interest about new types of submarines being developed by the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) could provide important clues about China's naval capabilities and intentions, a specialist on China said in a recent article.
"Whereas the development and deployment of the Chinese navy's surface fleet have been prominently displayed in unprecedented scale in recent naval exercises both in the South and East China Sea, the expansion of China's subsurface fleet appears to have been slowed in recent years," Russell Hsiao, editor of the China Brief, a publication of the US-based Jamestown Foundation, wrote in the publication's latest edition.

Afghanistan's three parallel wars
In the battle for Kandahar, gunships bomb the desert at night. By day, the 101st Airborne patrol the villages. But the real fight is to persuade the Afghan people to back a coalition force that they know will soon leave
Peter Beaumont in Talukan - The Observer
For the soldiers, it is a short walk from the centre of Talukan, a village of some 1,500 people in southern Afghanistan, to the hamlet beyond its edge. From their outpost, it is just a few hundred metres across the cannabis fields to the first buildings.
But there is no such thing as a short walk in the battle for Kandahar. Direct routes are avoided for fear of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) armed with pressure plates and trip wires designed to take off the legs. So on Thursday, when men of the 3rd Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division were ordered to clear the hamlet, they skirted the fields by clambering over walls and, when there was no other safe path, through the houses, crossing over the mud roofs or walls breached by explosive charges to avoid walking along the main road.

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Friday 11.12.2010

Our Political Insanity in Three Headlines: Tax Breaks for the Rich, More War, and Cuts to Social Security
By: Jon Walker - FDL Action
To understand how ridiculous the "serious" people are in Washington, and how broken our political debate is, let me draw your attention to the three biggest political stories of the day. Together, they make the clear case that all this so-called concern about the "deficit" is simply a justification the powerful use to attack the middle class.
Tax Cuts for the rich must be extended
We learn the Democrats and President Obama are likely going to fold to Republican demands and extend all the Bush tax cuts. A move that will cost the government hundreds of billions. From the Huffington Post, "White House Gives In On Bush Tax Cuts":
President Barack Obama's top adviser suggested to The Huffington Post late Wednesday that the administration is ready to accept an across-the-board, temporary continuation of steep Bush-era tax cuts, including those for the wealthiest taxpayers.

*****

Government as Window Breaker:
Hazlitt's Lesson Reapplied [Lew Rockwell]

America's Devolution Into Dictatorship
Paul Craig Roberts - Prisonplanet.com
The United States Department of Justice (sic) routinely charges and convicts innocents with bogus and concocted crimes that are not even on the statutes book. The distinguished defense attorney and civil libertarian, Harvey A. Silverglate, published a book last year, Three Felonies A Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent, which conclusively proves that today in "freedom and democracy" America we have punishment without crime.
This same Justice (sic) Department, which routinely frames and railroads the innocent, argued in Federal Court on November 8 that the US government, if approved by the president, could murder anyone it wishes, citizens or noncitizens, at will. All that is required is that the government declare, without evidence, charges, trial, jury conviction or any of the due process required by the US Constitution, that the government suspects the murdered person or persons to be a "threat."

"The Collapse Of Europe Has Begun,
The Euro Will Trade Like The Lira In A Few Months"
submitted by Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
Fasten Your Seatbelt
By John R. Taylor, Jr. - Chief Investment Officer, FX Concepts
Now that Ben Bernanke has re-introduced quantitative easing (QE2) to a mostly incredulous world and, across the ocean, the Eurozone has begun unraveling again, our thoughts should turn to the parlous state of the world and the risks ahead. These are amazing times and seem to grow more so every day. Policy errors are popping up everywhere and are likely to multiply dramatically as the political problems are serious, answers hard to find, and the decision makers are not up to the task. Bernanke has proven that he is more a college professor and less a trader, which will cost the world dearly. Sometime between June and August Bernanke lost his stomach for the "exit strategy," probably influenced by his predecessor's summer announcement that the US economy had 'hit an invisible wall." While it can be argued that QE1 has been a success due to the liquidity crisis, it did not expand the Fed's balance sheet and came when the economy was still reeling. This new edition dramatically expands the balance sheet, actually funding the entire projected government deficit over the next few months. Although the world believes that QE2 is there to push the dollar sharply lower, Bernanke argued that his goal was something else. On the day after the Fed's move, he wrote in a Washington Post editorial piece that QE2 would push up the equity market, bonds, and other risky securities thereby stimulating consumption and economic activity.

Gold climbs as jitters over euro zone debt intensify
IBTTimes.com
Gold rose as much as 1 percent in Europe on Thursday as concerns over sovereign debt in some peripheral euro zone economies intensified, boosting interest in the precious metal as a safe store of value.
The markets are nervous over a meeting of Group of 20 leaders this week, at which currency imbalances may be addressed. Worries over the stability of the foreign exchange markets has been a key support for gold this year.

Max Keiser & Alex Jones:
Alan Greenspan's Jekyll island Confession
on The Fleecing of America! - 1
.... how America will loose its sovereignty, in exchange for getting out of our unpayable national debt

Max Keiser & Alex Jones:
Alan Greenspan's Jekyll island Confession
on The Fleecing of America! - 2
the amount of tyranny we tolerate, is the amount we live with

Obama's Trade Strategy Runs Into Stiff Resistance
By SEWELL CHAN, SHERYL GAY STOLBERG and DAVID E. SANGER - NYTimes.com
SEOUL, South Korea - President Obama's hopes of emerging from his Asia trip with the twin victories of a free trade agreement with South Korea and a unified approach to spurring economic growth around the world ran into resistance on all fronts on Thursday, putting Mr. Obama at odds with his key allies and largest trading partners.
The most concrete trophy expected to emerge from the trip eluded his grasp: a long-delayed free trade agreement with South Korea, first negotiated by the Bush administration and then reopened by Mr. Obama, to have greater protections for American workers.

Obama's defense of Fed action a tough sell to G-20
China, Germany, Brazil not placated by assurance
By Patrice Hill - The Washington Times
President Obama defended efforts to revive faster growth in the U.S. economy as the Group of 20 summit of world leaders got off to a testy start in South Korea Wednesday with little prospect for resolving simmering trade and currency disputes.
In a letter to other world leaders, Mr. Obama proclaimed that "a strong recovery that creates jobs, income and spending is the most important contribution the United States can make to the global recovery"- his latest rebuttal to widespread global criticism of the Federal Reserve's campaign to buy up U.S. Treasury debt to nurture faster growth.

Politicians and Executives Confront Each Other at the G-20
By SEWELL CHAN - NYTimes.com
SEOUL, South Korea - Corporate titans and political leaders exchanged views, and occasional disagreements, on the problems holding back the global economy Thursday in a series of closed-door discussions with world leaders that generated a number of unusual encounters.
Stephen A. Schwarzman, the U.S. private equity magnate, shared his misgivings about financial regulatory overhauls with the German chancellor, Angela Merkel.
Argentina's president, Cristina Fern‡ndez de Kirchner, still mourning the death of her husband (and predecessor) two weeks ago, listened to Citigroup's chief executive, Vikram S. Pandit, fret about the backlash against financiers.

Global Fiat Currency will be Derailed by Free Markets and Nationalism

U.S. Hit by Trade Setback
Hang-Up With South Korea on Autos,
Beef Dashes Obama Plan to Boost Exports
By BOB DAVIS And ELIZABETH WILLIAMSON - WSJ.com
SEOUL - The presidents of the U.S. and South Korea were unable to overcome disputes over cars, cattle and domestic politics, potentially killing the biggest bilateral trade deal the U.S. has taken up in more than a decade.
The failure to resolve issues by Barack Obama's self-imposed deadline was a blow to the president, who has put export growth at the center of his jobs agenda and had invested political capital in getting a deal by the Group of 20 summit in Seoul.

Government Spending: A Lesson in How to Go Bankrupt
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
11/11/10 Paris, France - As an institution matures, more people get a good grip on it. And take advantage of it. Typically, it is corrupted by its own custodians. Instead of serving its original purpose, it serves to enrich its managers and employees.
The wage slaves become the masters. The zombies take over. USA Today has the report:
The number of federal workers earning $150,000 or more a year has soared tenfold in the past five years and doubled since President Obama took office, a USA TODAY analysis finds.
FEDERAL WORKERS: Earning double their private counterparts
Federal salaries have grown robustly in recent years, according to a USA TODAY analysis of Office of Personnel Management data. Key findings:

Commission leaders say cutting deficit will hurt
By ANDREW TAYLOR - AP - MSNBC.com
WASHINGTON - Voters who last week sent Washington a message to wrestle the spiraling debt under control have gotten a message back from the leaders of a White House budget commission: It will hurt.
A proposal released Wednesday by the bipartisan leaders of President Barack Obama's deficit commission suggested cuts to federal Social Security pension benefits, deep reductions in federal spending and higher taxes for millions of Americans to stem a flood of red ink that they said threatens the country's very future.

Gerald Celente: Scenario set up for next war

Global tensions are on the rise
Commentary: An unfortunate needle points to war
By Todd Harrison
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) - I'll be the first to admit I'm no geopolitical expert; to be honest, I've got my hands full trying to map our next steps as the rules of engagement continue to change.
Evolving socioeconomic strife was, however, one of my primary themes for 2010. Read Minyanville's "Ten Themes for 2010."
As discussed in early January:
The Tricky tri-fecta
"In 2007, we previewed the deterioration of the middle class and the friction between the 'haves' and 'have nots.' In 2008, we forecast percolating societal acrimony and last year, we spoke of the migration towards social unrest and geopolitical conflict.

Crunch time approaches for world economy
There was a belated admission from Mervyn King on Wednesday; ignore the Inflation Report, he seemed to be saying, because its forecasts may amount to no more than tomorrow's chip paper.
By Jeremy Warner - Telegraph.co.uk
OK, so of course he didn't use those exact words, but rarely has the Bank of England's Governor hedged his quarterly update with so many conditions and caveats.
Given the record, which for the past three years has pretty consistently seen the Bank miss both its inflation and growth forecasts, you might think him wise to do so.
In any case, "uncertainty" of outlook was the Governor's preferred message du jour. Looking at the range of challenges faced by both the domestic and world economy, few would fault his diagnosis. Markets took the slightly higher forecasts for both inflation and growth to mean there was now less chance of further quantitative easing, but that wasn't what Mr King was trying to say.

Germany rebuffs Obama on trade gap
China shuns fixing imbalance
By Patrice Hill - The Washington Times
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday rejected a U.S. proposal to try to cap global trade imbalances while the world's other export powerhouse, China, shunned U.S. calls for speedier economic reform.
In one-on-one meetings with the heads of the U.S.'s biggest nemeses on trade issues at a Group of 20 economic powers meeting in Seoul, President Obama pressed his case for trying to curb ballooning trade deficits and surpluses to help prevent another financial collapse like the one that toppled the world economy in 2008.

Specter of trade war looms as G-20 nations gather
By JEAN H. LEE and PAUL WISEMAN - Associated Press
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- The world's economies stand on the brink of a trade war as leaders of rich and emerging nations gather in Seoul.
A dispute over whether China and the United States are manipulating their currencies is threatening to resurrect destructive protectionist policies like those that worsened the Great Depression. The biggest fear is that trade barriers will send the global economy back into recession.

Dagong: US Solvency on the Brink of Collapse
By Rocky Vega - The DailyReckoning.com
11/11/10 Stockholm, Sweden - Founded in 1994, Beijing-based Dagong Global Credit Rating Co. is making headlines once again ... this time for downgrading US debt from its already world's lowest, if not most credible, assessment of double-A, to a lower by one level A+ with negative outlook.
The lowered rating is mainly due to round two of Fed quantitative easing. Among other problems, Dagong highlights "serious defects in the US economy," including lowered "national solvency," and "long-term recession." In this process, the China-based credit rating agency is of course also describing, in a backhanded way, how its own home nation's biggest foreign reserve holding, US bonds, is deeply flawed.

Reversal Tuesday, jobs, Fed critics, Bernanke, SchiffRadio.com

Korean-U.S. trade pact stalls
By Sarah Turner and Steve Goldstein, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - A highly anticipated trade pact between the United States and South Korea failed to be sealed by a self-imposed deadline, raising doubts whether the U.S. will be able to promote trade at a time when protectionist voices are increasingly being heard.
U.S. President Barack Obama didn't give up, however, on a deal, saying Thursday the sides would continue to work to finalize an agreement in "weeks."
"We will work tirelessly in the coming days and weeks to get this completed and are confident that we will do so," Obama said at a joint press conference with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak at the opening day of the Group of 20 summit in Seoul.

U.S. Wields Less Clout at Summit
Obama Sees Diminished Heft in Seoul Due to Slow Economy, Election Setback
By JONATHAN WEISMAN and DAMIAN PALETTA - WSJ.com
SEOUL - President Barack Obama limped toward the close of the Group of 20 summit, weakened by an anemic economic recovery and an election drubbing that have left world leaders questioning U.S. authority.
In private meetings with Mr. Obama on Thursday, Chinese President Hu Jintao resisted his pressure on currency revaluation. Mr. Obama also failed to secure a free-trade agreement with South Korea by a deadline he set for Thursday, a blow to a president who has pledged to double U.S. exports over the next five years.

The 1099 Democrats
The Democrats decoupled from business - and lost the election.
By Daniel Henninger - WSJ.com
Calvin Coolidge once said, "The chief business of the American people is business." The Democrats just lost America because they forgot that.
On second thought, you can't forget what you never knew. The Democrats running things the past two years proved they have no clue about the business of business. In their world, the real world of the private economy is an abstraction, a political figment.
Exhibit A: Along the road to ObamaCare, the party's planners inserted into the bill the now- famous 1099 provision, requiring businesses to do an IRS report for any transaction over $600 annually. No member of Congress, White House staffer or party flunky thought to say, "Oh, wow, this 1099 requirement will crush people running their own businesses. Are we sure we want to do this?" Yes, and that 1099 fiasco is a metaphor now for the modern Democratic Party.

When the Markets Wise Up
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
.... Surveys show investor sentiment more bullish than it has been at any time since '06/'07 - that is, since the peak of the bubble years.
And now the Fed has just entered the market with the biggest wad of cash investors have every seen. The Fed's pockets bulge with $600 billion. It says it will spend $105 billion next month alone. The Fed is all bid. No ask. And everyone knows it.
How come the stock market isn't soaring? How come it didn't soar yesterday? And how come gold fell yesterday?
Is all this buying power already priced in?
True, the Fed is buying bonds, not stocks. But where does the money go? Into the hands of the bondholders. What do they do with it? Why don't they buy stocksÉas the underbid, underpriced, underappreciated risk asset?
What's going on?
We don't know. But we raised our "Crash Alert" flag yesterday. Anything could happen. And "anything" is usually not good.

Doug Casey on Gold's New High, the Fed, and the Greater Depression
L: Good evening Doug. The Fed's new $600 billion liquidity injection pushed gold to new records, at least in current dollars, topping our $1400 target for this year. Our gold stocks are up even more. Even the World Bank is suggesting that a return to some sort of gold standard might be worth considering. Does the market feel "toppy" to you? What do you make of the latest numbers?
Doug: Well, first, it's fascinating that the head of the World Bank is actually talking about gold. That signifies a huge sea change. Especially in that the IMF has been a huge seller of gold, and the world's central bankers have the lowest percentage of their assets - ever - in gold.
I've long said, bull markets have three phases. This is classic market theory, nothing unique to me. There's the Stealth Phase, when prices are extremely cheap and everyone hates the investment - or if they don't hate it, they've forgotten about it. That's long gone for gold, this time. There's the Wall of Worry Phase, when people know it exists, and it seems likely to go higher, but people deny it, or find all sorts of reasons to believe that every correction along the way up means the market has peaked. I think we're in the late stages of this market phase, and heading into a real Mania for gold - manias being the third phase of classic bull markets.

Ron Paul: Bernanke and Krugman are Destroying the Dollar

Why You Must Own Gold
By: Tom Brennan - CNBC.com
The Federal Reserve is flooding the world with dollars as a way to keep American exports competitive, Cramer said Thursday. With the trade barriers keeping many of our products out of our trading partner's countries, while at the same time imports from overseas keep flooding into the US, Chairman Ben Bernanke may think he has no choice.
His plan has been the topic of discussion at this week's G-20 meeting, as other countries complain about the move. Regardless of the strategy's merits, though, it's doing a number on the greenback's value, which is why Cramer thinks investors should own another currency as a hedge.

Precious Metals Prices to Rise Further
By: JeeYeon Park - CNBC News Associate
Gold prices gave up early gains Thursday to dip below $1,400 an ounce, as the euro extended losses against the dollar amid worrying debt problems in the euro zone. Frank McGhee, precious metals trader at Integrated Brokerage Services, shared his outlook on the precious metal.
"A number of people have been looking for a major pullback, but I just don't think the gold market is going to give it to you at this point," McGhee told CNBC.
"We went from quantitative easing to reconcentrating on the situation in Europe, and as it starts to look like Ireland's going to need a bailout, it's going to do nothing but propel gold up higher."

Rush to cash in gold attracts tarnish
SHIRLEY WON, PAUL WALDIE - Globe and Mail
The gold frenzy has sparked a rush to sell everything from tooth fillings to old rings from ex-beaus, but it has also spawned a new type of gold digger.
As people rush to profit from a booming gold price - heading to gold parties, cash-for-gold stores and pawn shops - authorities are issuing warnings about seamier outfits luring consumers, through the Internet, to mail in jewellery.

Is the World Ready for a New Reserve Currency? Meet the Mondo
By PETER COHAN - DailyFinance.com
As the G-20 meets to discuss the world's economic problems -- with many of its members unhappy about the Federal Reserve's efforts to stimulate the U.S. economy by boosting its money supply -- ideas are floating around about new monetary systems. For a host of reasons, leaders of other countries would love to free their economies from the stranglehold of the U.S. dollar's influence.
World Bank President Robert Zoellick recently called for the world to index its currencies to gold. In his proposed system, major currencies in the world such as the dollar, the euro, the yen, the pound and the yuan would move towards adopting a modified gold standard. The precious metal would be used as a reference point that would guide currency movements based on market expectations of inflation, deflation and future currency values.

Banks Exploit Loophole in Volcker Rule with Longer-Term Bets
By DANNY KING - DailyFinance.com
U.S. investment banks continue to work around recently instituted regulations restricting them from putting their own capital into short-term investments: The institutions are sidestepping the so-called Volcker Rule by making direct purchases of securities, companies and properties, which are considered longer-term investments, the Financial Times reported.

On the Edge with Max Keiser-Increasing US Debt
11-05-2010-(Part1)

On the Edge with Max Keiser-Increasing US Debt
11-05-2010-(Part2)

On the Edge with Max Keiser-Increasing US Debt
11-05-2010-(Part3)

Deficit Chairmen Call Washington's Bluff
By GERALD F. SEIB - WSJ.com
Perhaps you don't want to play poker with Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles.
Mr. Simpson, the Republican and former Senator from Wyoming, and Mr. Bowles, the Democrat and former White House chief of staff, are chairmen of the federal deficit-cutting commission charged with devising a way to reduce the red ink Washington is producing. They oversee an 18-member, bipartisan panel that is supposed to come up with a plan by Dec. 1, provided they can get 14 of the 18 commission members to agree on something.

Regional Bank Profits to Get Hit by New Regulations: Whitney
By: Jeff Cox - CNBC.com Staff Writer
Regional banks are going to become less profitable because of tighter financial regulations and are likely to close thousands of bank branches to cut costs, analyst Meredith Whitney told CNBC.
Even though the Republican election has raised hopes that increased regulatory efforts will slow down now, the climate for regional institutions has become too difficult and those institutions have become overvalued, she said.
Whitney said she is selling regional bank stocks.
"Basic retail banking becomes a lot less profitable ... so I think we're going to have at least 5,000 branches cut," said Whitney, president of Meredith Whitney Advisory Group. "That's going to be disruptive to the entire banking community. You're going to see the banking community shrink because they have to because the profits have gone down so much."

The Haggling Begins for Troubled Assets
BY JULIE CRESWELL - NYTimes.com
It is the biggest rummage sale in Wall Street history - what one investment company calls "the Great Liquidation."
Two years after Washington rescued Wall Street, hundreds of billions of dollars of bad investments - in many cases, the same ones that poisoned banks and then the economy - are going up for sale.
Entire financial businesses are being put on the block too, as the giants of finance try to slim down.
The question is what this stuff is worth. Sensing opportunity, hedge funds and private equity firms are lowballing the banks. The haggling has only just begun.

Courts Helping Banks Screw Over Homeowners
Retired judges are rushing through complex cases to speed foreclosures in Florida
By Matt Taibbi - RollingStone.com
The foreclosure lawyers down in Jacksonville had warned me, but I was skeptical. They told me the state of Florida had created a special super-high-speed housing court with a specific mandate to rubber-stamp the legally dicey foreclosures by corporate mortgage pushers like Deutsche Bank and JP Morgan Chase. This "rocket docket," as it is called in town, is presided over by retired judges who seem to have no clue about the insanely complex financial instruments they are ruling on - securitized mortgages and labyrinthine derivative deals of a type that didn't even exist when most of them were active members of the bench. Their stated mission isn't to decide right and wrong, but to clear cases and blast human beings out of their homes with ultimate velocity. They certainly have no incentive to penetrate the profound criminal mysteries of the great American mortgage bubble of the 2000s, perhaps the most complex Ponzi scheme in human history - an epic mountain range of corporate fraud in which Wall Street megabanks conspired first to collect huge numbers of subprime mortgages, then to unload them on unsuspecting third parties like pensions, trade unions and insurance companies (and, ultimately, you and me, as taxpayers) in the guise of AAA-rated investments. Selling lead as gold, shit as Chanel No. 5, was the essence of the booming international fraud scheme that created most all of these now-failing home mortgages.

Eviction backlog piling up
Foreclosure mess prompts growing number of public officials to slow down process
By Ariana Eunjung Cha - Washington Post
One month ago, the city of Chicago and the surrounding suburbs of Cook County became a foreclosure-free zone. It wasn't the banks or judges that instituted the moratorium, because they were still moving cases forward at a rapid clip. The holdup was elsewhere: at the sheriff's office.
Sheriff Thomas J. Dart, whose office is responsible for physically evicting delinquent homeowners, on Oct. 19 announced that his deputies would "no longer be doing the banks' work for them anymore."
"I can't possibly be expected to evict people from their homes when the banks themselves can't say for sure everything was done properly," he explained.

Keiser Report No. 93: Markets! Finance! Scandal!

General Electric says it will buy 25,000 electric vehicles by 2015
The conglomerate, which its CEO noted makes technology that 'touches every point of the electric-vehicle infrastructure' said its strategy represented the largest-ever electric-vehicle commitment by a company or organization.
By Jerry Hirsch, Los Angeles Times
General Electric Co., saying it wants to help spark the electric vehicle industry, said Thursday it would purchase 25,000 electric vehicles for its fleet by 2015.
The Fairfield, Conn., company said its strategy represented the largest-ever electric-vehicle commitment by a company or organization. The plan includes buying 12,000 Chevrolet Volts, which General Motors Co. will start selling by year-end.

Obama-Boehner Rift Looms Over Washington
By PATRICK O'CONNOR
WASHINGTON - If there is a relationship that matters most in Washington in coming months, it may be the frosty one between President Barack Obama and Ohio Rep. John Boehner, the Republican poised to become the next speaker of the House of Representatives.
They have known each other as partisan foes, not personal friends, and have regularly traded rhetorical body blows. The congressman has accused the president of advancing a "job-killing agenda." Mr. Obama has said the lawmaker is "scaring the hell out of business," and even publicly ridiculed Mr. Boehner's appearance.

*****

Alex Jones: Glenn Beck Says Government Will Stage
False Flag Terror to Discredit Opposition!!

Glenn Beck: Government Preparing To Stage Terror
Fox News host warns Obama administration is planning to exploit crisis to demonize political opposition
Paul Joseph Watson & Alex Jones - Prison Planet.com
In an unprecedented outburst on his Fox News show earlier this week, Glenn Beck identified the threat that we have been warning about for over a year, that the powers behind the Obama administration are preparing to stage a false flag event that will be blamed on its political opposition to derail the movement against big government.

Watchdog Planned for Online Privacy
By JULIA ANGWIN - WSJ.com
The Obama Administration is preparing a stepped-up approach to policing Internet privacy that calls for new laws and the creation of a new position to oversee the effort, according to people familiar with the situation.
The strategy is expected to be unveiled in a report being issued by the U.S. Commerce Department in coming weeks, these people said. The report isn't yet final and could change, these people said.
In a related move, the White House has created a special task force that is expected to help transform the Commerce Department recommendations into policy, these people said. The White House task force, set up three weeks ago, is led by Cameron Kerry, the brother of Sen. John Kerry (D., Mass.) and Commerce Department general counsel, and Christopher Schroeder, assistant attorney general at the Department of Justice.

Republicans Repeal Health Care at Their Peril
By Joe Conason - Truthdig.com
Overstating the importance of a midterm election is understandably tempting for politicians and pundits, especially when the partisan turnover reaches historic proportions, as it indisputably did on Nov. 2. It is a temptation to which Republicans and conservatives seem particularly vulnerable.
When their party won the first George W. Bush midterm in 2002, Karl Rove crowed that his political team had made history, which was true enough - and then went on to claim a partisan realignment that would put Republicans in charge for decades if not centuries. They lost control of Congress and the White House within the following six years, not least because of false assumptions about the meaning of their victories.

Webster Tarpley: Globalization is failing

Darpa Wants to Sniff Your City's Distinct Chemical Scent
By Spencer Ackerman - Wired.com
Don't panic. But there's a nontrivial chance terrorists will launch a chemical-weapon attack on U.S. soil. So the far-out researchers at Darpa are thinking about an unorthodox detection method: breathing in your city's chemical bouquet. You've heard of racial and ethnic profiling? Here's chemical profiling. Just imagine the privacy concerns.
In theory, chemical attacks can be detected before they happen. Even trace amounts of chemicals give off specific signatures that tools like sorbent tube samplers can register. But in order to figure out if dangerous chemicals are stockpiled somewhere or are floating through the air, the government's going to have to know the baseline level for those chemicals wafting near your trash receptacle.

California Missile Launch
Did China send us a message?
Let's assume that everything we have read/heard about the supposed missile launch of the California coast is factual (no NOTAMs filed, not a military launch, no FAA or NORAD track). We are then left to deduce what it could have been. So called experts have written it off as a contrail, implying that an aircraft was responsible (note that missiles leave contrails too); but I disagree as the FAA would have tracked the aircraft (via a transponder: mode-A, S or C or ADS-B). Also, as a former China Lake (Naval Air Warfare Center) scientist I have seen missile launches and the news video I saw sure looked like a missile launch. So what could it have been?

more on missiles ...

Just in Alert
.... Anyway, what I saw in the recent video concerning the object 30 miles off the coast of CA. Is blatently a foreign made, Large Cruise or ICBM missile, being launched by a sub-surface aquatic platform. First I know its a large missile because it did not exhibit the typical "corkscrewing" trajectory of a beam riding missile as it trys to aquire the targeting beam. This tells me its a Big Boy with a complete guidence system installed in it, what is nicknamed a "fire and forget" missile, as once its launched its internal guidance system takes over and there is no real need for external guidance.
Secondly, I'm fairly confident its not one of ours, as the vapor trail appears "dirty" it looks brownish. I have personally been involved in (5) SM2 missile launches, and (2) ASROC missile launches, and have been on safety observation for at least 15 more launches of Harpoons, Tomahawks and other missiles. We put a lot of sweat and money into our "birds" and part of that is the fuel cells, they burn very clean, a whitish-blue in fact, not a dirty blackish brown. That missile had rather crude fuel cells, which tells me its not one of ours.

Bombshell: FEMA Camps Confirmed

Democrats angry over Obama tax deal talk
By CARRIE BUDOFF BROWN - Politico.com
For almost a decade in Democratic politics, there was little disagreement: If you were running for office, you wanted do away with the Bush tax cuts for high-end earners.
Now, in the eyes of liberal and moderate Democrats alike, President Barack Obama has blinked - even before the new House Republican majority takes office.
Between Obama's weekly address Saturday and comments Wednesday by his senior adviser David Axelrod, the White House has made clear that it intends to compromise - ceding to Republican demands to extend the high-end tax cuts temporarily in exchange for renewing the middle-class tax cuts due to expire at year's end.

The Elites Are Having a Tea Party
By Moshe Adler - Truthdig.com
According to Glenn Beck, "On one side, we have the elites, and on the other side, we have the regular people." And now that many of the representatives of the "regular people" won the midterm elections and the elites lost, it is important to know who's who.
In a recent Washington Post article, Charles Murray, co-author of "The Bell Curve," explains that the new elites are made up of people who got top-quality educations in Ivy League colleges and universities. Although entry into these schools is based on merit, the elites are nevertheless self-perpetuating, Murray argues, because only one in 20 Ivy League students comes from a family that is not at the top of our society in terms of income, education or occupation.

Is your boss spying off the clock?
G.W. SCHULZ - CenterForInvestigativeReporting.com
Remember that hazy trip to Cabo San Lucas with old friends a few years ago? Those margaritas were huge. You just had to post photos of them on Facebook, along with a few other Kodak moments. Then you mostly forgot about them.
Even if you don't recall all of the sordid details from that weekend of debauchery, your employer may know all about it. That's because a new company called Social Intelligence billing itself as a social media private eye will observe your Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other online accounts on behalf of employers to make certain you're not a liability.
Background checks involving criminal records and credit histories are typical and even expected of many major employers responsible for children, nursing homes or public safety.

[globalist multi-billionaire] Bill Gates:
mobile health technology will save lives, help overpopulation
By Melanie D.G. Kaplan - SmartPlanet.com
WASHINGTON - Bill Gates, co-chair and trustee of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, gave a keynote address yesterday at the mHealth Summit, an annual gathering that focuses on improving health care through mobile technology.
Gates told an audience of more than 2,000 that if we could register every worldwide birth on a cell phone, we could ensure that children receive the proper vaccines. He also said the key to controlling population growth is to save the lives of children under 5; and the next big thing in technology is robots.

Clinton Announces Aid to Palestinian Authority, Meets with Egyptian Counterpart
VOA News
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced new funding to the Palestinian Authority and held talks with Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit on Wednesday, a day before her scheduled meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York.
Clinton said that she and her Egyptian counterpart discussed several issues here in Washington, ranging from Israeli-Palestinian issues to the international tribunal investigating the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Outspoken Chinese Risk Confinement in Mental Wards
By SHARON LaFRANIERE and DAN LEVIN - NYTimes.com
LOUHE, China - Xu Lindong, a poor village farmer with close-cropped hair and a fourth-grade education, knew nothing but decades of backbreaking labor. Even at age 50, the rope of muscles on his arms bespoke a lifetime of hard plowing and harvesting in the fields of his native Henan Province.
But after four years locked up in Zhumadian Psychiatric Hospital, he was barely recognizable to his siblings. Emaciated, barefoot, clad in tattered striped pajamas, Mr. Xu spoke haltingly. His face was etched with exhaustion.
"I was so heartbroken when I saw him I cannot describe it," said his elder brother, Xu Linfu, recalling his first visit there, in 2007. "My brother was a strong as a bull. Now he looked like a hospital patient."

1/4 STEVE QUAYLE! MAIN STREET IS DEAD

2/4 STEVE QUAYLE! MAIN STREET IS DEAD

3/4 STEVE QUAYLE! MAIN STREET IS DEAD

4/4 STEVE QUAYLE! MAIN STREET IS DEAD

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Thursday 11.11.2010

Veteran's Day
History.com
On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, an armistice, or temporary cessation of hostilities, was declared between the Allied nations and Germany in the First World War, then known as "the Great War." Commemorated as Armistice Day beginning the following year, November 11th became a legal federal holiday in the United States in 1938. In the aftermath of World War II and the Korean War, Armistice Day became Veterans Day, a holiday dedicated to American veterans of all wars.

Dover AFB

Dignified Transfer:
United States Army, Dover Air Force Base

Dignified Transfer:
United States Air Force, Dover Air Force Base

Dignified Transfer:
United States Marine Corps, Dover Air Force Base

Dignified Transfer:
United States Navy, Dover Air Force Base

G-20 Nears Pact but Tensions Still Fester
By DAMIAN PALETTA, JOHN LYONS And JONATHAN WEISMAN - WSJ.com
SEOUL - World leaders gathered for the Group of 20 summit neared an agreement that appears to paper over many of the differences that have roiled discussions and financial markets in recent days, but one that's unlikely to end tension over currency and trade policies.
The agreement will likely reaffirm earlier language hashed out by finance ministers on letting markets determine foreign-exchange rates, without yielding specific new commitments from China to let its currency rise. It will pledge efforts to close the gap between countries with big trade surpluses and those with big deficits, but will likely stop short of numeric targets pushed by the U.S.

G-20 Nations Wrangle Over Strengthening Pledge on Currencies
By Eunkyung Seo and Michael Forsythe
Nov. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Group of 20 nations failed to resolve differences over currency policies blamed for distorting global trade and investment,</a> hours before their leaders gather, a South Korean official said.
"The negotiators are working to advance agreement over currencies from the Gyeongju accord," announced by finance chiefs last month, G-20 committee spokesman Kim Yoon Kyung told reporters in Seoul today. They have so far failed to narrow differences on either exchange rates or the commitment to avoid sustained imbalances in trade and capital flows, he said.

The Wall Street TARP Gang Wants to Take Away Your Social Security
By Dean Baker - TalkingPointsMemo.com
Just over two years ago, the Wall Streeters were running around Congress and the media saying that if they don't immediately get $700 billion the world will end. Since they own large chunks of both, they quickly got their money.
Even more important than the hundreds of billions of loans issued through the TARP was the trillions of dollars of loans and guarantees from the Fed and the FDIC. This money came with virtually no strings attached. It kept Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, and Bank of America and many others from collapsing. As a result, folks like Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein are again pocketing tens of millions a year in wages and bonuses, instead of walking the unemployment lines. Instead, 15 million ordinary workers are being told to just get used to being unemployed; it's the "new normal."

Is China's Renminbi Already The New World Reserve Currency?
By: Global Research via marketOracle.co.uk
Tyler Durden writes: With the dollar tumbling overnight, many were scratching their heads as to what caused the move in the dollar. Citi's Stephen Englander provides a useful explanation, which fits perfectly with the commentary from PBoC advisor Li's earlier that the dollar's position as a reserve currency is now "absurd": namely that more and more in the world are starting to look at the CNY as the new reserve currency. And as we pointed out earlier, its fixing surge of over 0.5% overnight caused many to blink. Is China finally pushing to aggressively force the dollar out?

Economic Irony: Creating Bubbles to Maintain Stability
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
11/10/10 Paris, France - "Global Backlash Grows," says The Wall Street Journal. This is the backlash against Ben Bernanke's crackpot money-printing scheme.
The foreigners don't like it. Because the US is flooding the world with "hot money." This fast cash chases oil, commodities, collectibles, farmland - just about everything.
It creates bubbles. It distorts markets. And it will certainly lead to busts and bankruptciesÉand maybe to hyperinflation, too.
So, sit back and enjoy the show, dear reader. It's the greatest show on earth. Yes, it will most likely lead to embarrassment and poverty in the US. Yes, the US dollar will cease being the world's reserve currency. And yes, America's leading economists - many of whom have won Nobel prizes - will be shown to be hapless goofballs.

World Bank Head Calls for Monetary System Linked to Gold
By: Barry Grey - MarketOracle.co.uk
In the run-up to the G20 summit of leading economies, to be held Thursday and Friday in Seoul, the president of the World Bank has published a column in the Financial Times calling for a fundamental revamping of the global currency system involving a lesser role for the US dollar and a modified gold standard. The Financial Times underscored the significance of the column by making it the subject of its front-page lead article on Monday.
In his column, World Bank chief Robert Zoellick, a former US Treasury official, points to the crisis conditions prompting his proposal. He begins by observing: "With talk of currency wars and disagreements over the US Federal Reserve's policy of quantitative easing, the summit of the Group of 20 leading economies in Seoul this week is shaping up as the latest test of international cooperation."

Will G20 Take a Collective Stand on Capital Controls?
MarketOracle.co.uk
Kavaljit Singh writes: Leaders of the G20 will meet in Seoul on Nov. 11 and 12 to discuss a myriad of issues concerning global financial stability and economic recovery. In many ways, the G20 Seoul Summit is significant because for the first time it is hosted by a non-G8 nation and one in Asia too.
The two-day Seoul summit covers an expansive agenda, ranging from global safety nets to new rules on bank capital and liquidity requirements to reforming the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
It remains to be seen how much of this agenda could be accomplished given the sharp differences among G20 member countries on key issues.

U.S., South Korea Extend Trade Talks
By EVAN RAMSTAD and JONATHAN WEISMAN - WSJ.com
SEOUL - The U.S. and South Korea missed a self-imposed deadline to revive a stalled free-trade deal, but leaders of the two countries said negotiators will keep working on it as they attend two major summit meetings during the next three days.
Trade negotiators from the two countries have been working all week to resolve the disputes before a lunch meeting on Thursday between U.S. President Barack Obama and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak.

G20: David Cameron eyes China's heartland
To have good business relations with China, you won't be surprised to learn, it is first necessary to have rock solid political relationships. For all its adoption of free market practice, China is still a centrally-planned economy and, without access to the political establishment, progress will be hard.
By Jeremy Warner - Telegraph.co.uk
David Cameron's first official visit to China, which begins with a meeting on Tuesday with the Chinese premier, Wen Jiabao, therefore takes on a significance which goes way beyond that of any old trade mission.
Contrary to received wisdom, which has it that Britain has neglected the business opportunities presented by the world's fastest-growing major economy, the UK already enjoys a relatively strong trading relationship with China.
China is Britain's biggest export market outside the US and the EU. Exports continued to grow through the downturn and in the first eight months of this year were up 44pc.

Gold Finds Bargain Buyers in China, Silver Rallies After 10% Plunge on US Margin-Hike
By: Adrian Ash - MarketOracle.co.uk
THE PRICE OF GOLD AND SILVER recovered early in London on Wednesday following sharp overnight falls sparked by a 30% hike in the margin down-payments required for leveraged traders in US silver futures contracts.
Major-economy government bonds slipped further after the Bank of England forecast above-target inflation throughout 2011, and losses on Irish government bonds pushed 10-year yields to a fresh post-Euro record of 8%.
Commodity prices held flat. World stock markets extended Tuesday's drop on Wall Street, with the Shanghai index losing 0.7% after Chinese banks were ordered again to raise the ratio of depositors' money kept back in reserve.

Gold Standard Manifesto
By: Jordan Roy Byrne - MarketOracle.co.uk
A great quote from William Osler typifies the evolution of our current monetary system. He said: "The philosophies of one age have become the absurdities of the next, and the foolishness of yesterday has become the wisdom of tomorrow."
Decades and centuries ago, no one would have done without a hard money standard. The founders wrote in the Constitution that only Gold and Silver could be legal tender. Today our fiat monetary system is firmly in place. Although it has wrecked a once healthy economy, you'd be considered a pagan in mainstream academia if you wanted to abolish it in favor of the gold standard.

What QE2 means for Inflation & Gold, Silver prices
By Chris Mack
Many investors are struggling to understand the ramifications of the recently announced quantitative easing (QE) plan. The bottom line is that QE2 has major future implications for inflation and the price of gold and silver.
Just What is QE?
QE, or more simply known as money printing, is a dilution transaction similar to issuing more shares for a stock. The dilution has two primary affects: a decrease in the value of the initial shares and a redistribution of wealth from the original owners to the new owners.

Gold and Silver Continue to Soar as the World Loses Faith in Currencies
The Housing Time Bomb - SeekingAlpha.com
Gold and silver continue to soar as the world continues to lose faith in currencies. When you look at the chart below why wouldn't they?
As you can see above, our financing needs vs. GDP are now worse than Greece's. If it wasn't for the Fed buying Treasuries we probably would be seeing near double digit interest rates over here.
Japan's debt issues are startling to say the least. What's crazy is their currency continues to soar despite their awful balance sheet. Sometimes things just don't make any sense. There is a lot of hedge fund action that's driving the JPY/USD currency trades according to what I have read.

Going Back to a Gold Standard?
By: Adrian Ash - SafeHaven.com
Three reasons you need your own private Gold Standard, rather than waiting on "sound money" from government...
DID GOLD's first foray over $1,400 mean we're going back to a Gold Standard?
Nope. Not in the West, nor anytime soon anywhere, and for three simple reasons.
First, gold prices aren't high enough. Second, modern governments don't hold enough of the stuff - not for their tastes, at least. And third, the pace of physical monetization, out of jewelry and mined ore into coin and large-bar form, just isn't great enough. Yet.

Silver Explodes, Gold Surges Higher on Fed Money Printing Firestorm
By: Larry Edelson - MarketOracle.co.uk
The precious metals markets are going wild even as I write these words.
This is precisely what we recommended investing in with our online presentation that so many investors are rushing to view right now. And right now, on the spot markets ...

Silver has exploded to $29.03 per ounce, up a full $1.60 - a massive rise of 5.8% just today alone.
Gold has surged as high as $1,424 per ounce, its highest prices of all time.
Platinum has been as high as $1,805 per ounce, closing in on the $2,000 level for the first time in the history of any precious metal.

But now, it's no longer just Bernanke's $600-billion-money-printing scheme that's spooking the markets. It's also the ...
International Furor and Blind Rage He's Triggering Around the World!

Silver Margin Hike Underscores Need For Bullion Ownership
By: Jeff Berwick - MarketOracle.co.uk
.... This Time It's Different - Rise of the Dollar Vigilante
There is a big difference between 1980 and 2010. Today it isn't just two rich brothers who are moving out of US dollars and other fiat currencies it is the entire population of the world - and it will only increase from here as people like Ben Bernanke continue to push their currencies into hyperinflation via programs deftly named, "Quantitative Easing".
Just as bond vigilantes brought the near hyperinflation of the 1970s to an end by selling government debt, today it is "dollar vigilantes", 6 billion people around the world who are slowly awakening to the mugs game of fiat currencies and central banking and are casting their own vote to sell dollars in favor of real assets such as gold, silver, agriculture and energy.

Silver market fall sheds light on importance of margin
By Debbie Carlson of Kitco News
(Kitco News) - When silver futures prices on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange fell sharply on Tuesday because of higher margin requirements, it underscored an important part of futures trading.
Margin requirements, also known as performance bonds, are different in futures markets than they are in other markets, like equities. To trade in futures, an individual needs to only put up a fraction of the total value of a futures contract. How much margin is required depends on each contract because of the value of the commodity and the type of trader. A speculative trader must put up more margin than a hedger. There is the initial amount of margin individuals must put down, but they also have a set amount of money available to maintain the trade.

The age of the dollar is drawing to a close
Currency competition is the only way to fix the world economy
By Jeremy Warner - Telegraph.co.uk
Right from the start of the financial crisis, it was apparent that one of its biggest long-term casualties would be the mighty dollar, and with it, very possibly, American economic hegemony. The process would take time - possibly a decade or more - but the starting gun had been fired.
At next week's meeting in Seoul of the G20's leaders, there will be no last rites - this hopelessly unwieldy exercise in global government wouldn't recognise a corpse if stood before it in a coffin - but it seems clear that this tragedy is already approaching its denouement.

Fed Pushing U.S. Dollar Closer to Collapse
By: LewRockwell - MarketOracle.co.uk
Jeff Fisher writes: Every day the US Dollar moves closer to collapse.
International investors, unlike most Americans, are aware of the risk, and are nervously watching Gold and Silver march higher.
As the primary reserve asset on central bank balance sheets, the US Dollar is a major risk for central banks and their solvency.
How will central banks deal with this balance sheet risk?
First, it is clear that no central bank can sell Dollars and buy their own fiat money which is a balance sheet liability.
If they did, it would be a direct deflation of their banking reserves and highly disruptive to their own domestic credit system.
Therefore, a central bank must sell dollars for anything but their respective currency.

Prepare for Mass Inflation
By: Richard Daughty - GoldSeek.com
The thing that has sent me into Mogambo Panic Mode (MPM) over the terrifying inflationary implications is the latest outrage from the Federal Reserve, reported at Bloomberg.com as, "The Federal Reserve will buy an additional $600 billion of Treasuries through June, expanding record stimulus and risking its credibility in a bid to reduce unemployment and avert deflation."
It turns out that the announced $600 billion, in six measly months, as perfectly horrific as it is, is not the whole story, as we later find out when Bloomberg later in the article reports, "Including Treasury purchases from reinvesting proceeds of mortgage payments, the Fed will buy a total of $850 billion to $900 billion of securities through June, or about $110 billion per month, the New York Fed said in accompanying statement."

How the Fed Keeps Feeding the Financial Crisis
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
11/10/10 Paris, France - Wow! Is this fun, or what? We are so lucky, we can scarcely believe it. We're getting to live through something most people only read about in the history booksÉa monetary meltdown.
Last week, our own central bank - the US Federal Reserve - announced that it would print up another $600 billion. This will bring the total to $2.3 trillion added in just a bit over 24 months.
Is this crazy? Is it foolish? Is it stupid? Yes! It is all of those things and more - vain, pigheaded, destructive, reckless ...
... supply your own adjective!
Intervention on this scale is risky. So, you might expect that the Fed has some sort of computer program - trusted, reliable, tested and proven - that tells it exactly how much money to put into the system via its QE program ... and when.

The NYT Times Has Problems With Arithmetic, Economics and Editorializing
Center for Economic Policy research
In introductory economics students learn that in a system of floating exchange rates (like the one we have), trade deficits and surpluses are eliminated through changes in the exchange rate. That is the point of the float. This means that if a country has a trade deficit, like the United States, then we should expect its currency to fall.
This means that when countries that complain about the U.S. trade deficit complain about the decline in the value of the dollar, as the NYT claims is the case with Germany, China, and Brazil, these countries are saying that they don't understand economics. In this case, the news is that major economic powers are being governed by people who don't know economics.

Why QE2 INCREASES the Risk of Deflation
Tim Waring writes: Markets lapped it up!
QE2 was met with rapture by commodity and stock markets as traders and investors continue the easy money ride of a sinking dollar. The effect on the real economy is unknown but common sense rather than models suggests this extra $600billion is a mistake.
GDP growth at the stroke of a pen?
In order to have GDP growth, the US will have to continue to do what it is best at, namely attract the brightest talent globally to its universities, retain a significant proportion of this talent, and be at the cutting edge of innovation development. As Alan Greenspan once said, developed nations have no one to borrow technology from. Their GDP growth is low as humans are not smart enough to develop technology any quicker. You can not magic growth out of a hat but try telling that to the Fed.

Is a Monster Reversal In Stocks, Commodities, and the US Dollar in the Works? - By: Mac Slavo - SHTFPlan.com
The last couple of weeks have been quite eventful for economists and world leaders. First, Ben Bernanke announced the much anticipated next phase of US strategy to get the economy back on its feet, even though the recession has been over for many months and recovery is purported to be in full swing. The Bernanke Plan, to no one's surprise, entails more monetization of US debt and further injections of liquidity into the system. To the chagrin of Nobel Prize winning economists like Paul Krugman, the announced $600 billion just isn't going to be enough.

Ben Bernanke: The Chauncey Gardiner of Central Banking
By Frederick Sheehan - The DailyReckoning.com
11/10/10 North Weymouth, Massachusetts - "[H]igher stock prices will boost consumer wealth and help increase confidence, which can also spur spending. Increased spending will lead to higher incomes." -Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, Washington Post, November 4, 2010
In Ben Bernanke's Washington Post elucidation of Fed policy, "What the Fed Did and Why: Supporting the Recovery and Sustaining Price Stability," the Fed chairman cut-and-pasted misleading paragraphs from earlier misleading speeches. He did not discuss the two most important aspects of his money experiment. Bernanke did not address, first, the real economy or, second, the rest of the world. It will be the first of these lapses that will be discussed below.

Bernanke's Money Printing Monetary Policy Is Doomed!
By: Claus Vogt - MarketOracle.co.uk
Last week Ben Bernanke wrote an article for The Washington Post to justify the Fed's decision of another round of quantitative easing. Here's his core argument:
"Easier financial conditions will promote economic growth. For example, lower mortgage rates will make housing more affordable and allow more homeowners to refinance. Lower corporate bond rates will encourage investment.
"And higher stock prices will boost consumer wealth and help increase confidence, which can also spur spending. Increased spending will lead to higher incomes and profits that, in a virtuous circle, will further support economic expansion."

Inflation divides Bank of England
Inflation Report: Bank of England policymakers divided
The extent of the divide among Bank of England policy makers has been laid bare after the publication of the central bank's Inflation Report showed a range of views over the future direction of the UK economy.
By Jonathan Sibun - Telegraph.co.uk
The Bank said that the "prospects for inflation remained highly uncertain" and consequently so did the Monetary Policy Committee's (MPC) future economic policy.
Unveiling the November Inflation Report, Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England, said: "Given the quantitative importance of the different influences buffeting the economy at present, it is hard to judge how inflation will evolve in the medium term and there are sizable risks in both directions."

China may be bigger economy than US within two years
By Jeremy Warner - Telegraph.co.uk
Here's a finding that will have any red-blooded American spluttering into his cornflakes. According to the Conference Board, a highly respected economic research association, China will overtake the US as the world's biggest economy by 2012, or within two years.
OK, so in dollar terms, that's obviously not going to be the case. It will be a lot longer than two years before China overtakes the US on that measure. But in terms of purchasing power parity, according to the Conference Board's latest world economic outlook, China is already nearly there, and by 2020 will have reached a size of output which is nearly half as big again as the US.

China's Faster Inflation, Credit Upgrade Build Pressure on Yuan
By Bloomberg News
Nov. 11 (Bloomberg) -- China's inflation rate jumped to a two-year high and the nation's debt rating was raised by Moody's Investors Service, boosting pressure for a stronger currency as Group of 20 leaders meet to discuss exchange rates.
Consumer prices rose a more-than-forecast 4.4 percent from a year earlier, a statistics bureau report showed in Beijing today. Moody's separately said it boosted China's rating one step to Aa3, the fourth-highest grade.

Obama 'Running the Risk of Being the Last President of This Nation'
By: Mac Slavo -SHTFPlan.com
If you've been paying attention to the US dollar, commodities, stocks and precious metals lately, you've likely noticed some big moves. Karl Denninger implies that Ben Bernanke and the policies of The Federal Reserve may have just kicked the currency war into high gear.
Bloomberg reports that China is now taking measures to protect itself from mass amounts of capital inflows in order to prevent asset bubbles resulting from too many dollars being printed and sent overseas.
It looks like the whole world, including Germany, Brazil, China and many other nations realize what's going to happen if they don't stop the flow of depreciating dollars into their economies - exported inflation and rising prices.

Response to deficit plan - tepid to 'unacceptable'
By JOHN MAGGS & JAKE SHERMAN - Politico.com
Faced with a partisan deadlock, the two leaders of President Barack Obama's commission on reducing the massive federal debt released a surprise proposal of their own Wednesday, calling for cuts in discretionary federal spending by $200 billion and raising taxes by about $100 billion between now and 2015.
Elements of the draft proposal by Co-chairmen Erskine Bowles, President Bill Clinton's former chief of staff, and former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.) will appeal to both Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill and are likely to become part of the budget debate that is expected to dominate the incoming Congress in the coming year.
But the package of spending cuts, tax reforms and adjustments in Social Security - including a proposal to raise the retirement age to 69 for the next generation of workers - got a tepid reaction from the White House and Republicans, and sharp response from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a testament to the politically dangerous territory into which Bowles and Simpson ventured.

Wall Street Takes $4 Billion From Taxpayers as Swaps Backfire
By Michael McDonald
Nov. 10 (Bloomberg) -- The subprime mortgage crisis isn't the only calamity Wall Street created that's upending the finances of U.S. states and cities.
For more than a decade, banks and insurance companies convinced governments and nonprofits that financial engineering would lower interest rates on bonds sold for public projects such as roads, bridges and schools. That failed promise has cost more than $4 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, as hundreds of borrowers from the Bay Area Toll Authority in Oakland, California, to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, quietly paid Wall Street to end agreements since 2008.

New U.S. fiscal year began with $140-billion deficit
Third-highest October deficit on record
By Robert Schroeder, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - The U.S. government began fiscal year 2011 in the red, posting a budget deficit of $140 billion in October, the Treasury Department reported Wednesday.
The monthly red ink was down 20% from a year ago, but was still the third highest deficit for October on record. A year ago in October, the deficit hit $176 billion, the record high for the month.
Receipts were $146 billion in October, the Treasury said in its monthly budget report, while the government spent $286 billion in the month.

Giving small banks a chance to thrive
By ELIZABETH WARREN - Politico.com
On my first day of work helping set up the new consumer agency, I met with community bankers from Oklahoma. We talked about a lot of things - three of us had gone to the same high school, and many of their banks were located in towns where I still have family. But the most engaging part of our conversation was about how the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau could become a strong partner with community banks.
Since that day, I have met regularly with community bankers - in Ohio, in California and here in Washington. I come away from each meeting more convinced that small banks and credit unions face unique challenges in today's environment. And I come away even more convinced that the new consumer agency's push toward transparency in financial products can serve families and small financial services providers alike.

Bank of America talks with state officials about foreclosures
Second meeting with investigators over foreclosure practices.
By Rick Rothacker - CharlotteObserver.com
Bank of America Corp. executives on Tuesday were in Des Moines, Iowa, meeting with officials investigating foreclosure practices at major lenders, a source familiar with the situation said.
It's the second such meeting the bank has had with the group of 50 state attorneys general and other officials examining problems that led Bank of America and other banks to temporarily halt foreclosure sales, the source said.
Noelle Talley, a spokeswoman for the N.C. attorney general's office, confirmed North Carolina had a representative at the meeting. Bank of America continues to have "active discussions" with the state attorneys general and is "working cooperatively to address the concerns they have expressed," bank spokesman Dan Frahm said.

Your Tax Dollars at Work: Redistribution in Washington Today
By Dean Baker - TalkingPointsMemo.com
We all know that redistribution of income is supposed to be a dirty word, but we saw a big display of it yesterday in our nation's capital. Investment banker Peter Peterson, who personally pocketed tens of millions of dollars from the fund managers tax break, announced a huge $6 million ad campaign.
The ad campaign of course is intended to promote more redistribution. It is about taking away the Social Security benefits that ordinary workers have already paid for in order to keep down the taxes paid by the Peter Peterson Wall Street banker types.

Zillow: Home Price Decline to Surpass Great Depression
By Cullen Roche - SeekingAlpha.com
More bad news out of the housing market today as Zillow, a leading online real estate marketplace, released their third quarter report and it largely echos what we saw in yesterday's Clear Capital report - the housing market is double dipping. Home values fell an average -4.3% in the third quarter. Stan Humphries, the Chief Economist at Zillow says the housing market decline is likely to surpass the Great Depression's decline and that prices are unlikely to recover before next summer:
While not unexpected, the unceasing declines in home values signal that we're in for a long, bleak winter of continued troubles for the housing market. The length and depth of the current housing recession is rivaling the Great Depression's real estate downturn, and, with encouraging signs fading, will easily eclipse it in the coming months.

As Foreclosure Crisis Deepens, Another Servicer Scam Exposed
By: David Dayen - Firedoglake.com
To hear the big banks tell it, the crisis in foreclosure fraud has abated. They've checked and double-checked their documents, replaced the forms where necessary, and are now ready to move forward with the conveyor belt to evictions. If that's the case, why is another top mortgage servicer suspending foreclosures?

Goldman Sachs' mortgage servicing unit has suspended evictions and foreclosures in some states, according to a regulatory filing Tuesday.
Goldman has been reviewing the practices of its Litton Loan Servicing unit after regulators and states attorneys general asked for information about its practices, as part of an industry-wide probe into banks' foreclosure practices, the firm said.

Foreclosure notices greet many trying to modify their loans
By Rick Rothacker - CharlotteObserver.com
Union County homeowner Barry Lancett signed two agreements with Wells Fargo this year to modify the terms of his mortgage but still received a disturbing piece of paperwork: a foreclosure notice.
"A deputy comes to your door and delivers it in front of the community," said Lancett, who later avoided foreclosure but is still dealing with lingering issues. "It was humiliating, to say the least."
His experience is one of the biggest frustrations for struggling homeowners - getting hit with a foreclosure proceeding at the same time a loan modification is being worked out with a bank.

SRS contractor laying off 1,400 at S.C. nuclear site
By MEG KINNARD - AP - CharlotteObserver.com
COLUMBIA, S.C. The company that manages South Carolina's former nuclear weapons complex says it's laying off 1,400 contractors next year.
Savannah River Nuclear Solutions President Garry Flowers said Wednesday in a memorandum to employees that the company is offering severance packages to people who volunteer to leave or retire starting next week.

Wal-Mart Says 'Try This On': Free Shipping
By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD and CLAIRE CAIN MILLER - NYTimes.com
For years, Wal-Mart has used its clout as the nation's largest retailer to squeeze competitors with rock-bottom prices in its stores. Now it is trying to throw a holiday knockout punch online.
Starting Thursday, Wal-Mart Stores plans to offer free shipping on its Web site, with no minimum purchase, on almost 60,000 gift items, including many toys and electronics. The offer will run through Dec. 20, when Wal-Mart said it might consider other free-shipping deals.

FCC Investigating Google Data Collection
By AMY SCHATZ And AMIR EFRATI - WSJ.com
The Federal Communications Commission is investigating whether Google Inc. broke federal laws when its street-mapping service collected consumers' personal information, joining a lengthy list of regulators and lawmakers probing what Google says was the inadvertent harvesting of private data sent over wireless networks.
Key Republicans and Democrats in Congress have indicated that the privacy issues raised by Google's Street View data collection could be a factor when lawmakers consider new Internet privacy legislation next year.
Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, a senior Republican lawmaker, suggested last week on C-SPAN that Google's data collection wasn't accidental and that it was "something to look at."

A legitimate tea party
By Robert Hamberger - HamburgersStand.clom
Wikipedia defines the Boston Tea Party as a, "direct action by colonists in Boston, a town in the British colony of Massachusetts, against the British government and the monopolistic East India Company that controlled all the tea coming into the colonies. On December 16, 1773, after officials in Boston refused to return three shiploads of taxed tea to Britain, a group of colonists boarded the ships and destroyed the tea by throwing it into Boston Harbor."
The Boston Tea Party participants put themselves in harm's way to protest a tax by the government at the time. The colonists who boarded those ships on that cold moonlit night were willing to risk jail, and even death.
Compare that to the tea partiers today. Most risk nothing. They yell at our government. They yell at Obama. Racial hatred peppers their rhetoric. Some only consent to being interviewed on one cable news network.

Cargo plane bomb found in Britain was primed to blow up over US
Device thought to have been sent by Yemen-based al-Qaida made safe three hours from explosion
By Vikram Dodd, Richard Norton-Taylor, Paul Harris - guardian.co.uk
The shocking reality of the terrorist printer cartridge bomb plot emerged today when Scotland Yard revealed that the device taken from a plane in Britain was timed to explode in mid-air over the eastern United States.
The bomb was found by police on board a cargo plane at East Midlands airport last month after detailed information was passed through intelligence channels to the UK and US from Saudi Arabia.
The Guardian understands that an alarm clock on a mobile phone attached to the printer bomb was set to go off at 10.30am BST. Tests revealed that if the cargo plane's journey had gone to schedule, the device - in a package addressed to a synagogue in Chicago - would have gone off in midair over the eastern seaboard of the US.

Obama Warns North Korea in Speech
By MARTIN FACKLER - NYTimes.com
SEOUL, South Korea - In a Veterans Day speech at a United States Army base in central Seoul, President Obama said Thursday that America remains committed to defending South Korea, and warned North Korea that it faces continued isolation unless it fulfills its commitments to give up nuclear weapons.
While Mr. Obama is in South Korea for a Group of 20 meeting on fixing the stricken global economy, relations with North Korea are also expected to be on the agenda, particularly in talks with the host nation. The United States and its allies are seeking ways to get North Korea to return to six-party talks aimed at convincing the North to drop its weapons program.

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Wedesday 11.10.2010

America for Sale: The Greatest Liquidation Event Ever
By Robert Morley - The Trumpet.com
We are living through one of the greatest transfers of wealth ever experienced. As Americans continue to live unsustainable lifestyles, the nation is selling off its strategic assets to pay the bills. Now the Federal Reserve has telegraphed the biggest liquidation event in world history. America is up for sale, and at knock-down, distressed-asset levels.
Last week Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke announced that the Fed would print up $600 billion - by fiat - to inject into the economy. The official purpose is to increase exports and stimulate the economy. But instead, he has opened the doors for a massive dollar flood.
He confirmed to the world that America can no longer pay its bills and that the dollar is no longer a safe store of wealth. The Fed is now officially engaging in debt monetization - cheating its creditors by printing money and making the dollar worth less.

Dark Ages for a modern Middle Class - Modern day debt serfdom and rising prices not seen through the consumer price index. Coffee up 50 percent for the year.
MyBudget360.com
Most Americans enjoy a good cup of coffee. Yet very few realize that coffee futures are now up over 50 percent for 2010. Creative packaging that includes smaller quantities but offers the same price helps delude many Americans into thinking their dollar still has the purchasing power of better days. This all occurs in a relatively subtle and typically hidden process. Cotton for example is now up 90 percent for the year. Corn is up over 40 percent. It would be one thing if this was all based purely on demand but more of this increase in price is coming from the Federal Reserve pursuing actions that are punishing the U.S. Dollar. The below chart is rather startling and shows that even though the CPI has remained weak, principally because of the crashing housing market, many other areas are seeing incredible price increases.

Barack Obama:
We Must Embrace Globalism And The Emerging One World Economy
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Although it received very little coverage in the mainstream media, Barack Obama made some comments about globalism during his speech in Mumbai, India that were very eye-opening. As he was discussing the new realities of world trade in 2010, Obama warned against "those who see globalization as a threat" and he spoke of the "integrated world" in which we all now live. But is merging the entire globe into a one world economy, a one world financial system and a one world labor market really the best thing for the American people?

The Search for a New Currency System
Dollar's Reserve Role Causes Angst, but Alternatives Fall Flat; Some Seek a Multicurrency Option
By DAVID WESSEL - WSJ.com
More than 60 years after the victors in World War II devised new rules for currencies at Bretton Woods, N.H., and more than 30 years after Richard Nixon blew up that regime, the search is on for a new way to manage the tensions that come from countries using their own national currencies.
But there is more agreement on the shortcomings of the current regime, in which currencies trade relatively freely against each other, than on what should replace it.

Webster Tarpley: The Next Decade 1/4

Webster Tarpley: The Next Decade 2/4

Webster Tarpley: The Next Decade 3/4

Webster Tarpley: The Next Decade 4/4

Ireland's Fate Tied to Doomed Banks
By CHARLES FORELLE and DAVID ENRICH
DUBLIN - With doubts swirling about the solvency of the Irish state in early September, Finance Minister Brian Lenihan summoned a dozen senior government and bank officials to a conference room nicknamed the "torture chamber," a nod to its history as a venue for painful meetings.
For two years, Ireland had poured money on a raging banking crisis, to no avail. Each estimate of the rising price of rescuing Ireland's banks turned out too low. Mr. Lenihan needed to halt the drip-drip of bad news that was leading his country to ruin. "I want a final figure ASAP," he told the group.

Seoul Signals Openness on U.S. Trade Deal
SEOUL - South Korea's trade minister, after talks with his U.S. counterpart on Monday, signaled some openness to compromise on regulations that have been a barrier to U.S. auto makers and left U.S. lawmakers unwilling to ratify a free-trade agreement the two countries forged three years ago.
In a brief statement after more than six hours of negotiations with U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk, South Korean Trade Minister Kim Jong-hoon said he believed the country's auto standards - chiefly a blend of American and European rules - serve its safety and environmental needs.

China's Dagong Lowers U.S. Credit Rating on Fed Easing
By Joshua Fellman and Ye Xie
Nov. 10 (Bloomberg) -- China's Dagong Global Credit Rating Co. reduced its credit rating for the U.S. to A+ from AA, citing a deteriorating intent and ability to repay debt obligations after the Federal Reserve announced more monetary easing.
The credit outlook for the U.S. is "negative," as the Fed's plan to buy government debt will erode the value of the dollar and "entirely encroaches" on the interests of creditors, analysts at Dagong, one of China's three largest ratings companies, said in a statement. The U.S. is rated Aaa and AAA by Moody's Investors Service and Standard Poor's Corp., the highest credit ratings of the New York-based companies.

Is US heading for a severe discontent?
By Steve Betts - CommodityOnline.com
Lost in all the election and Fed hoopla are the problems in Ireland. The yield on Irish debt is surging and the share price for Bank of Ireland stock is plummeting. Ireland, like it or not, is going the way of Greece. As of Friday the yield for Irish debt stands at close to 8% and that's about 2.5% more than you would pay for a home loan in the United States. With respect to the Bank of Ireland shares lost almost 15% of their value on Friday and the share price has been cut in half over the last two months.
There was a complete breakdown on Friday in spite of the fact that the stock is extremely oversold. Without a doubt the European Central Bank will be digging into its pockets and doling out more liquidity in an effort to prop up the country.

Volcker Says No Quick Way To Cut US Unemployment
Obama Adviser Volcker Says No Quick Way To Reduce High US Unemployment - CBSNews.com
(AP) BEIJNG (AP) - Paul Volcker, a top economic adviser to President Barack Obama, said Tuesday he sees no short-term way to reduce high U.S. unemployment and expects slow growth for the next year or more.
Volcker's comments come after the U.S. Federal Reserve said last week it would purchase $600 billion in Treasurys in an effort to boost growth and create jobs, cutting unemployment that stands at 9.6 percent.
"I have no answer to it at the moment, and I think that is the basic problem," said Volcker when asked about unemployment at a financial forum.

Peter Schiff & Judge Napolitano FOX Business News Nov 08 2010

You No Longer Have to Be Crazy to Buy Gold
Written by Mad Hedge Fund Trader - OilPrice.com
The good news is that you no longer have to be crazy to buy gold. Until recently, certifiable believers chasing the barbaric relic were driven by a host of urban legends and wild conspiracy theories which frequently appear on the Internet, such as the imminent bankruptcy of the US Treasury, Fort Knox holding only titanium bars that had been painted gold, Weimar style hyperinflation that is just around the corner, or the gold ETF (GLD) owning only paper, and not physical gold.
No more. The long term structural demand for the yellow metal is now so well known, that I can read about it in the tabloids while waiting in line at Safeway. There is an emerging market central bank bidding war going on, with India and China trying to outmaneuver each other to raise their gold holdings to developed world levels. The EC or the IMF may sate that demand by selling off their remaining holdings to bail out Greece. A rising emerging market middle class also brings large, newly enriched consumers from countries that have long cultural preferences for owning gold and silver over paper fiat currencies.

Gold may hit $1500 soon
LONDON (Commodity Online): Debt woes in the Europe and signals from the US on inflationary pressures pushed gold prices to new record heights on Tuesday.
Spot gold rose to an all-time high of $1,412.75 an ounce, before easing to $1,410.45. Spot silver hit a new 30-year high just below $28, and palladium extended gains to a new nine-year peak of $712.75.
According to market experts, liquidity is being thrown into the market place, the dollar is being debased as a way the US government can get out of debt obligations, while Asian central banks keep buying dollars and keep their currencies cheap. Hard assets are just going to continue to benefit.

Investors push up prices of industrial metals, not just gold
By Matt Krantz, USA TODAY
It's easy to get blinded by soaring prices of precious metals such as gold and silver, but some less-glamorous metals are glittering in their own way.
Prices of industrial metals such as tin, nickel and copper are surging this year as investors look for commodities of value to shield themselves from inflation as well as bet on growth in emerging nations.
Exchange traded investments that track the prices of tin, nickel and copper are up 58%, 28% and 15% this year as investors buy up those metals, which are used to manufacture many products.

Gold Trades North Of $1,420 After China's PBOC Advisor Li Says "Absurd" Dollar Is Reserve Currency
Submitted by Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
Precious metals have now entered their parabolic phase. The latest catalyst for gold having traded north of $1,420 is not only the ongoing collapse of Europe via surging spreads and accelerating ECB bond monetization, which in tried and true bizarro fashion have lead to a more than 100 pip move higher in the EURUSD, but the latest speech by PBOC academic advisor Li Daokui, who said that it is "absurd" that the dollar is still the reserve currency of the world. We are confident that pretty much everyone in China agrees. The likelihood that China is about to do something big in FX land was also confirmed by the biggest move higher in the CNY which rose by 0.51%, the most since the revaluation period, and also by the high yield in the one week auction, which has led some to believe that China may be willing to hike rates once again, and further weaken the dollar peg.

Gold To 5K-Peter Schiff on Fox Business-11-9-09

Gold remains near record gains despite strong dollar
SINGAPORE (Commodity Online): Gold eased marginally but remained well above $1400 an ounce mark in Asian trade Tuesday as the greenback climbed against the euro.
Gold for immediate delivery was seen trading at $1410.31 an ounce at 2.30 p.m Singapore time while US gold futures were little changed at $1,413 an ounce on the Comex division of Nymex.
Analysts said the precious yellow metal likely to remain volatile during the day as concern that some European governments may struggle to raise funds, boosting demand for the metal as a haven is offset by a strong dollar.

European debt, currency concerns push Gold past $1,400/Oz
By Allen Sykora - CommodityOnline.com
(Kitco News) - Worries about European debt have picked up again, and combined with the recently soft U.S. dollar, have provided a boost to send gold above the $1,400-an-ounce level that many analysts had listed as their year-end target not that many weeks ago.
Still more support has come from signs that jewelry demand has held up despite higher prices, along with early-week comments from World Bank President Robert Zoellick calling for some type of role for gold in the global monetary system.

China Pension Chief Dai Proposes Dollar Trading Range
By Bloomberg News
Nov. 9 (Bloomberg) -- China's pension-fund chief proposed setting a trading range for the dollar as officials in the fastest-growing major economy fault the U.S. for adopting policies without regard for the American currency's global role.
The world needs a stable dollar, Dai Xianglong, chairman of China's National Council for Social Security Fund and a former head of the nation's central bank, said today at a forum in Beijing. He spoke two days before a Group of 20 summit aimed at addressing global imbalances in trade and investment flows.

China Again Dumps Yen - Or Does It?
From Japan Real Time: via WSJ.com
The mystery deepens on who exactly is buying the yen.
Over the summer, as the yen swelled in strength versus the greenback, some blame was placed on the shoulders of China, who had been snapping yen at a record pace through July, according to Ministry of Finance data.
Then, just as quickly as they had been buying, they started to sell. In August, China sold 2 trillion yen ($24 billion) after scooping up 2.3 trillion from January to July.
In September, according to the latest data released Tuesday, China sold another 700 billion yen, putting it down 400 billion for the year.
So is China out of the mix?

Ron Paul - Cavuto Nov 5 2010

ICE Clear Europe Announces Acceptance Of Gold Bullion Collateral - Adds Triparty Collateral Management Service To Enhance Security And Flexibility -- MondoVisione.com
IntercontinentalExchange (NYSE: ICE), a leading operator of global regulated futures exchanges, clearing houses and over-the-counter (OTC) markets, today announced that ICE Clear Europe will accept gold bullion as collateral for all energy and credit default swaps (CDS) transactions beginning 22 November.
Acceptable collateral for ICE Clear Europe currently includes cash and government securities. Gold bullion will be permitted for initial margin only and will be accepted by the clearing house by electronic transfer in increments of 1 troy ounce, and will be priced daily using the London Gold Fixing Price in US Dollars.

Fisher Says Fed Doesn't Want to See Value of U.S. Dollar Eroded
By Vivien Lou Chen
Nov. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve policy makers support a strong U.S. currency and want to ensure that it doesn't lose its purchasing power, said Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher.
"All of us are believers in a strong dollar," Fisher said in a Fox Business Network interview today. "We want to make sure that the dollar has its purchasing power," and "we want to make sure it is of great international standing," he said.
Fisher said yesterday that the central bank's decision to undertake a second round of large-scale Treasury purchases may be the "wrong medicine" for the economy.

Barack Obama And Ben Bernanke Continue To Defend Quantitative Easing, But For The Rest Of The World The Verdict Is In: They Hate It
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Even as Barack Obama and Ben Bernanke publicly defend the Federal Reserve's new $600 billion quantitative easing program, top finance officials around the globe are expressing alarm and outrage. But what did Obama and Bernanke expect? "Quantitative easing" is little more than legalized cheating. For a moment, imagine that the global economy is a giant game of Monopoly. Essentially what Bernanke has done is that he has just reached under the table and has slipped another $600 billion on to his pile of money, hoping that the rest of the players will not call him out on it. The rest of the world has heavily invested in the U.S. dollar and in U.S. Treasuries, and this new quantitative easing program is going to devalue all of those holdings. If the Federal Reserve continues to go down the road of monetizing U.S. government debt, other nations are rapidly going to get spooked and will soon refuse to invest in U.S. dollars and U.S. Treasuries. When that day arrives, it is going to cause mass panic in the world financial system.

Ben Bernanke was Wrong

Art Cashin On Fraudclosure Reminds Everyone
That "Things Could Turn Very Ugly"
Submitted by Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
A very troubling anecdote by Art Cashin today on the possible future developments in fraudclosure.
An Amazing Assertion - Last week one of the FoF regulars brought a friend to one of the plenary sessions. The gentleman, in addition to being quite personable, was a lawyer who had a lot of experience in asset backed securities. Naturally, I tried to pick his brain on the real status of the foreclosure fiasco.
In the middle of the discussion, I avowed that I had become very concerned when several large servicers suspended mortgage foreclosures. It smacked of wholesale legal protections to avoid exposure to court reversals and possible sanctions for undecipherable records of true ownership. I remarked to our guest that it was with a large sigh of relief I greeted the announcement that foreclosures would resume - not in a scrooge-like manner, but only because resumption suggested the records might be in order.

Smaller banks report tighter underwriting standards on mortgages
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
Smaller banks and mortgage lenders reported tighter lending standards on mortgage loans over the previous three months, according to the October 2010 Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices from the Federal Reserve.
It marks a reversal from the slight net easing reported in the previous survey conducted in July.
The tightening of underwriting standards on prime mortgage was largely tied to smaller banking institutions, while larger banks reported little change on such mortgages.
But both large and small banks reported a net tightening in underwriting on non-traditional mortgage loans, such as subprime and Alt-A loan offerings.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Continue to Amass Foreclosed Properties -Now valued at $24 Billion
PersonalFinanceBulletin.com
Who owns all of those homes that have been foreclosed on from 2008 to the fall of 2010? As a taxpayer - You do.
Taxpayers fund mortgage lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Last year at this time the two lenders possessed around 120,000 homes mortgaged through various lending banks. These banks sold the mortgages to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac who in turn bundled them as securities and sold them to investors. These federal lenders guarantee the payment of the mortgages they sell. When the homeowners stop making monthly payments, Freddie and Fannie are on the hook for the remainder of the unpaid mortgage.

Homeowners at risk of foreclosure taking out second mortgages
TheTruthAboutMortgage.com
Some Florida homeowners facing foreclosure are taking out second mortgages to cover attorney fees, according to a report in the NY Times.
The second mortgage only takes effect if the homeowner's foreclosure filing is dismissed and the mortgage balance is reduced.
Ever since the robosigner debacle, homeowners have been pounding down lawyers' doors to see if they too can spare their homes from foreclosure by exploiting the mistakes and potential fraud carried out by lenders and loan servicers.

Gerald Celente on Irish Radio

A GM Unit in China's Hands
By Dennis Berman - WSJ.com
You don't need to understand exchange rates and trade wars to grasp the economic change that has come to Saginaw, Mich. Remarkably, the largest private employer there will soon be the city government of Beijing.
In the weeks ahead, a 104-year-old unit of General Motors will be sold to new owners from China. The unit made steering equipment for decades under the name Saginaw Steering Gear. Now known as Nexteer, it employs 8,300 people around the world. Its new Beijing owners call themselves Pacific Century Motors.

A GM Unit in China's Hands
by Dennis K. Berman
You don't need to understand exchange rates and trade wars to grasp the economic change that has come to Saginaw, Mich. Remarkably, the largest private employer there will soon be the city government of Beijing.
In the weeks ahead, a 104-year-old unit of General Motors will be sold to new owners from China. The unit made steering equipment for decades under the name Saginaw Steering Gear. Now known as Nexteer, it employs 8,300 people around the world. Its new Beijing owners call themselves Pacific Century Motors.
You and the rest of the world probably missed this $450 million deal. General Motors, still controlled by the U.S. government, gave it little attention this summer as it readied its own high-profile return to the stock market.

GE to invest more than $2B in China ventures
USAToday.com
NEW YORK (AP) - General Electric plans to sink more than $2 billion into China through 2012 as the conglomerate looks to build partnerships there.
GE said Tuesday that it will likely spend $500 million on research and development and new customer innovation centers, adding more than 1,000 jobs. More than $1.5 billion is expected to be put toward new joint ventures with Chinese state-owned enterprises in high-technology sectors.
The news comes a day after GE named John Rice head of global operations. In that role, Rice will concentrate on growth in markets including China, India the Middle East and Brazil.

JMP: Lindsey Williams Update 11-05-2010

Baby Boomers Are No Longer Luxury Retailing's Future
By MERCEDES CARDONA - DailyFinance.com
Yes, wealthy consumers appear to be spending again, and luxury retail is showing improvement. But some analysts are predicting that one of the lasting effects of the Great Recession will be a generational shift in the luxury goods that will force retailers to change how they sell.
Baby boomers, who had been the backbone of the luxury market, have lost a lot of their net worth as their investments and property values tanked. That could lead retailers to start focus on the boomers' children, the echo-boomers of Generation Y, a sizable cohort of consumers who came of age at the turn of the millennium.

18 Iconic Products That America Doesn't Make Anymore
by Anika Anand and Gus Lubin - Tech Ticker
Another American icon has bit the dust: Pontiac.
GM is canceling the 84-year-old brand after winding down production over the past few years. Like other American automakers, it is restructuring and rebranding to compete with foreign companies.
Pontiac joins a long list of iconic products that aren't made anywhere in America.
Meanwhile, plenty of beer is still made here, but many of America's most-iconic beer brands, including Miller, Coors, and Budweiser, are owned by foreign companies. In 2008, Anheuser-Busch, the St. Louis-based company that has a nearly 50 percent market share in the U.S., was sold to InBev, a Belgium-based conglomerate run by Brazilian executives. In the accompanying video, Julie McIntosh, author of Dethroning the King: The Hostile Takeover of Anheuser-Busch, an American Icon, discusses the deal with Yahoo! Finance economics editor Daniel Gross.

CDC: 59.1 million lacked insurance
by: Saundra Young - CNN Medical Senior Producer
The number of Americans without health insurance is rising, and it's not just those living in poverty who are affected. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's new Vital Signs report, 59.1 million people had no health insurance for at least some part of the 12-month period that ended in March of this year. That's up 400,000 people from 2009.
Of that 59.1 million people, about 50 million aged 18 to 64 years had no health insurance, according to the CDC- the most ever recorded in that age group.
The data is from the National Health Interview Survey covering 2006 through 2009 and the first quarter of 2010. Over that time, the number of people without insurance in the 18- to 64-year-old age group has increased an average of 1.1 million Americans per year. Half of the overall increase are among people with family incomes twice to three times higher than the federal poverty level of about $22,000 for a family of four.

Crude Oil May Rise to $90 by Thanksgiving
By Paul Burkhardt
Nov. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil may surpass $90 a barrel by the U.S. Thanksgiving Day holiday, building on the strength of a rally that started Nov. 1, according to a technical analysis by Jim Stellakis, an independent analyst.
"Oil has followed through on the breakout above $84 a barrel," said Stellakis, founder of New York-based research company Technical Alpha. An upside target of $90.50 is equal to the height of a late September rally, projected up from the start of the current advance, which began Nov. 1, he said.

Mysterious Missile Launches over Southern California

"Mystery missile" was probably an aircraft, government says
LATiimes.com
A Pentagon official said that an examination of radar data, satellite imagery and other sophisticated monitoring technology by multiple U.S. government agencies has turned up no conclusive evidence that a missile was fired in that vicinity and at that time.
Even U.S. agencies that monitor launches of rockets by private individuals or companies had no information of a launch, he said.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing, said that FAA records showed commercial airliners were flying in the area at the time, and that most government experts were coming to the conclusion that the condensation trail was caused by an aircraft. "The best we can tell, it was probably caused by an aircraft," the official said.

More federal workers' pay tops $150,000
By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY
The number of federal workers earning $150,000 or more a year has soared tenfold in the past five years and doubled since President Obama took office, a USA TODAY analysis finds.
The fast-growing pay of federal employees has captured the attention of fiscally conservative Republicans who won control of the U.S. House of Representatives in last week's elections. Already, some lawmakers are planning to use the lame-duck session that starts Monday to challenge the president's plan to give a 1.4% across-the-board pay raise to 2.1 million federal workers.

In Southern California, tour guides battle over Chinese visitors
Groups from the Asian nation increasingly are bringing along their escorts, angering Southland-based guides who say they are more qualified and cost less. The dispute has grown into confrontations.
By Hugo Mart’n and David Pierson, Los Angeles Times
Reporting from Los Angeles and Beijing - The 28 Chinese tourists arrived haggard and bleary-eyed at Los Angeles International Airport, looking to grab their bags and get on the bus to their hotel.
They weren't expecting to see Jason Wang, who headed them off at the luggage carousel. Wang, a 54-year-old tour guide from West Covina, passed out his rate sheets and asked why they hadn't hired an American like him to show them the sights.

Hires Rise, Still Five Unemployed Workers Per Job Opening
By Sara Murray - WSJ.com
There were five unemployed workers per every available job in September, the Labor Department said Tuesday, a sign that even with October's job growth the economy still has a lot of ground to make up.
But the report on job openings and labor turnover (JOLTS) also had some bright spots, including an increase in hiring. The number of quits also rose to more than 2 million, a slight increase from the prior month, and more than the 1.8 million layoffs and discharges. Quits tend to increase when workers feel confident the job market is strong enough for them to land another job.

Job openings fell 5.3% in September
Bloomberg News - USAToday.com
Job openings in the U.S. dropped in September for a second month, signaling that a sustained labor market rebound will take time to develop, a government report showed.
Openings decreased by 163,000 to 2.93 million, the Labor Department said Tuesday. The number of people hired rose from August, and separations declined.
The unemployment rate was 9.6% for a third month in October even as payrolls increased 151,000, Labor Department figures showed last week. Growth in the world's largest economy may need to quicken before enough jobs are created to make up for the recession-driven loss of more than 8 million positions.

Program seeks to aid hard-core homeless
Plan drafted by a civic task force hopes to slash costs by getting the chronically homeless into housing. But Supervisor Antonovich calls the controversial approach 'warehousing without healing.'
By Alexandra Zavis, Times Staff Writer
Prominent business leaders are putting their weight behind a plan that they say could make a major dent in homelessness in Los Angeles County, embracing a strategy that will face significant political opposition.
The blueprint they plan to unveil Tuesday seeks to put a permanent roof over the heads of the most entrenched street dwellers, then provide them as much counseling and treatment as they will use.

Eight congressional races still up in the air
Democrats lead Republicans in only two races. Two key statewide contests also remain undecided.
By Michael A. Memoli, Tribune Washington Bureau
Reporting from Washington - Eight congressional races remain undecided one week after election day, though Republicans appear set to add to their historic gains.
Seven races for the House are yet uncalled by the Associated Press, and Democrats were defending all seven. Of that group, only two Democrats lead their Republican opponents, with the average vote differential being fewer than 600 votes in each.

Barack Obama joined Muslim prayers at school, teacher says
By Anne Barrowclough - The Australian
AS a schoolboy in Jakarta, Barack Obama attended Muslim prayer sessions with his classmates against the wishes of his mother.
The US President's former grade three teacher said that Mr Obama - who was known as "Barry" when he attended the Menteng One school in Jakarta - studied the Koran and went to classes on Islam, despite the objections of Ann Dunham, a Catholic.
The teacher's recollections will add to speculation about Mr Obama's links to Islam during his much-anticipated visit to Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, as part of his ten-day tour of Asia.

Jihad by Stoning
By Aaron Goldstein - The American Spectator.org
Perhaps the most telling moment so far of President Obama's overseas trip to Southeastern Asia occurred while he was addressing students at St. Xavier's College in Mumbai, India. During a question and answer period which followed the President's remarks, a female student asked Obama's views about jihad. Here is a portion of the President Obama's reply to that question:

Well, the phrase jihad has a lot of meanings within Islam and is subject to a lot of different interpretations. But I will say that, first, Islam is one of the world's great religions. And more than a billion people who practice Islam, the overwhelming majority view their obligations to their religion as ones that reaffirm peace and justice and fairness and tolerance. I think all of us recognize that this great religion in the hands of a few extremists has been distorted to justify violence towards innocent people that is never justified.

Ireland's Next Blow Could Be Home Loans
Residential Mortgages Show Signs of Causing Problems
By DAVID ENRICH And CHARLES FORELLE - WSJ
Ireland's commercial-property bust has knocked the country's banks to their knees. Now the lenders are bracing for another blow: losses on home loans.
So far, residential mortgages haven't been nearly as big a problem for Irish banks as their portfolios of loans to finance real-estate development and construction projects. Those ill-fated property loans have saddled the banks with tens of billions of euros in losses, forcing the government to mount a series of costly bailouts that have pushed Ireland to the brink of insolvency.

Do We Need Another World War?
DharmaJoint.com
Ask the average guy on the street if we need another world war and he might respond with, "We need another world war like I need a hole in the head." Yet, there are medical conditions which can be solved by holes in the head, such as cranial swelling, i.e. when your brain gets too big for your skull.
War, according to Carl von Clausewitz, is merely the continuation of politics by other means. In other words, when talking fails to resolve an issue in need of resolution, military force will accomplish what persuasion couldn't.
However, winning a war, which, in Clausewitz' view, means achieving political goals via military means, is easier said than done. As Machiavelli warned, It ought to be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new.

Lindsey Williams Returns:
Get Ready for $150 Barrel of Oil and Mr. X Revealed! 1/3

Lindsey Williams Returns:
Get Ready for $150 Barrel of Oil and Mr. X Revealed! 2/3

Lindsey Williams Returns:
Get Ready for $150 Barrel of Oil and Mr. X Revealed! 3/3

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Tuesday 11.09.2010

The Man Who Called the Financial Crisis - 70 Years Early
By Jason Zweig - WSJ.com
Decades before anybody had ever heard of a mortgage derivative, an economist named Melchior Palyi predicted key causes of the 2008-2009 financial crisis with precision that makes a modern reader's hair stand on end.
His warnings help explain why investors insist on trusting market gatekeepers they know to be fallible - such as policy makers, regulators and credit-ratings firms.
The seeds of today's problem were planted long ago, and its forgotten history holds important lessons. In 1936, as part of reforms under the new Banking Act, the U.S. government mandated that federally regulated banks could no longer hold securities that weren't rated investment-grade by at least two ratings firms.

ATMs Crash Across The Country After "Bank Holiday" Warning
Paul Joseph Watson - Prison Planet.com
Following rumors of a "bank holiday" that could limit or prevent altogether cash withdrawals later this week, Twitter and other Internet forums were raging yesterday about numerous ATMs across the country that crashed in the early hours of Sunday morning, preventing customers from performing basic transactions.
It's unknown whether the crashes were partly a result of a surge of people trying to withdraw their money in preparation for any feared bank shutdown, or if mere technical glitches were to blame. The fact that the problem affected numerous different banks in different parts of the U.S. would seem to indicate the former.

Bank Holiday Rumors Swirl Amidst Currency Crisis
Paul Joseph Watson - Infowars.com
With the world on the verge of a currency war as the Federal Reserve follows through on its dollar-killing quantitative easing program, rumors are once again swirling of a "bank holiday," during which US citizens will be prevented from withdrawing money or at least limited in the amount of the withdrawal they can make.
The bank holiday is rumored to be set for next week, with Thursday November 11 pinpointed as the likeliest date.
According to radio host Steve Quayle, a pastor was told by one of the managers of a prominent east coast bank that banks would close for an undetermined amount of time, and that when they reopened, "all withdrawals by checks would be limited to $500 per week - no matter what the balance in the account is."

Is the USA having a Bank Holiday to Devalue the Dollar?
Posted by Phil Brennan on Nov 7, 2010
Ok, this is what I have so far. This is not going to be one of my usually well written posts - this is going to be pure information with no bells or whistles.
Twitter is going crazy with reports of ATMs and online accounts going down as of 01:00 hours EST of the 7th of November 2010. This is happening to many banks all across America. Some are trying to say that it is a computer glitch to do with the change in Daylight Savings Time, but I will call BS on this as we manage to put our clocks back over here in the UK without knocking out ATMs and online accounts nationally.

The Boiling Frog:
Effects of QE2 On The Bottom 80% of the U.S. Population
By Gonzalo Lira
An old metaphor: If you take a frog and drop it into a roiling pot of boiling water, it'll jump right out, unscathed. But if you put that same frog in a pot of cold water, and then slowly raise the heat, that frog won't move. It'll stay in that pot of water, calm as can be, right up until it is boiled to death.
I've been arguing that the unpayable Federal government debt, coupled with irresponsible Federal Reserve policies, will inevitably lead to a hyperinflationary event and currency collapse. In order to prepare for a web seminar on hyperinflation in America, I've been looking at the issue of how to safeguard assets before a currency collapse, and how to identify opportunities in the midst of a hyperinflationary crisis.

Bankruptcy filings jump 14% in 2010
By Ben Rooney - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- As the U.S. economy struggles to recover from a deep recession, the number of Americans filing for bankruptcy continues to rise dramatically.
In the federal government's fiscal year 2010, which ended September 30, more than 1.5 million non-business bankruptcy filings were processed, according to data released Monday by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. That's up more than 14% from fiscal 2009, when about 1.3 million personal bankruptcies were filed.

Fed Global Backlash Grows
China and Russia Join Germany in Scolding;
Obama Defends Move as Pro-Growth
By JONATHAN WEISMAN - WSJ.com
NEW DELHI - Global controversy mounted over the Federal Reserve's decision to pump billions of dollars into the U.S. economy, with President Barack Obama defending the move as China, Russia and the euro zone added to a chorus of criticism.
Mr. Obama returned fire in the growing confrontation over trade and currencies Monday in a joint news conference with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, taking the unusual step of publicly backing the Fed's decision to buy $600 billion in U.S. Treasury bonds - a move that has come under withering international criticism for weakening the U.S. dollar.

IMF Approves China as Third-Biggest Power, Weakening Europe
By Sandrine Rastello
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- The International Monetary Fund's executive board approved a plan that would make China the third- strongest voice in the organization while weakening Europe's influence to make room for emerging economies.
Acting on an Oct. 23 deal by finance chiefs of the Group of 20 nations, the IMF agreed to shift more than 6 percent of voting rights to what officials called "dynamic" developing countries. That would give more say to nations such as Brazil and South Korea, while decreasing the clout of European members including Belgium and Germany. "Advanced" European countries are also set to give up two seats on the board under the package.

World is in a serious currency crisis
By Steve Sjuggerud - CommodityOnline.com
A currency crisis is under way. It's not a matter of if we'll have one or not. My boss is always getting heat for his "crazy" claims and predictions.
Porter's latest claim might be his "craziest" yet...
In late 2006, Porter predicted GM would go bankrupt. He looked at GM's debts and determined there was no way the automaker could avoid bankruptcy. He received stacks of hate mail calling him crazy and anti-American.
In 2007, Porter came out with another "crazy" prediction. He told a packed investment conference that government agencies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would go bankrupt. Porter claimed a small decrease in home prices could crush the leveraged home lenders.
"Fannie Mae go bankrupt? It could never happen," thought the audience.
You know how the stories of Fannie, Freddie, and GM played out. All three were disasters. All three went bankrupt.

Bankruptcy of U.S. is 'Mathematical Certainty,'
Says Former CEO of Nation's 10th Largest Bank
By Terence P. Jeffrey
(CNSNews.com) - John Allison, who for two decades served as chairman and CEO of BB&T, the nation's 10th largest bank, told CNSNews.com it is a 'mathematical certainty' that the United States government will go bankrupt unless it dramatically changes its fiscal direction.
Allison likened what he sees as the predictable future bankruptcy of the United States to the problems at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, whose insolvency he also said was foreseeable to those who studied their business practices and financial situation.

Bernanke vs America
By Howard S. Katz - GoldSeek.com
Above is a chart of the price of silver over the past 10 years showing the move from $4/oz. to $26/oz. We call to the attention of Ben Bernanke that silver has been going up. Prices going up are not "deflation."
www.bloomberg.com reported:
"The U.S. central bank's decision to buy $600 billion of government debt has drawn scathing comments from a host of nations who contend it is generating global instability by ramping up their currencies against the dollar, inflating asset bubbles; and stoking inflation in their economies.
"'With all due respect, U.S. policy is clueless,' German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said in Berlin."

U.S. Says Europe Has No Alternative to Solving Debt Crisis
By Rebecca Christie
Nov. 8 (Bloomberg) -- The European Union has no alternative to the joint action needed to solve sovereign debt woes facing some of its member countries, a U.S. official said today.
As a whole, the EU has plenty of financial savings and capacity to act, the official told reporters, speaking on condition of anonymity on the sidelines of appearances in New Delhi today by President Barack Obama and Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner. The official expressed confidence that the EU would be able to manage the issue.

G-20 Spat Risk Eases as U.S. Eschews Pushing Targets
By Shamim Adam and Aki Ito
Nov. 8 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner refrained from pushing for current-account targets and China hailed the potential effect of Federal Reserve easing at a finance ministers' meeting days before the Group of 20 summit.
The Fed's move to buy $600 billion of Treasuries could contribute "tremendously" to global growth, Vice Finance Minister Wang Jun said after Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum finance chiefs met in Kyoto, Japan, Nov. 6. At the same gathering, Geithner said current-account deficits or surpluses aren't "something that is amenable to limits or targets."

Will the U.S. Enjoy a Swedish-Style Rebound? Don't Bet on It
By MICHAEL PANZNER - DailyFinance.com
In a New York Times article on Nov. 6 by Gretchen Morgenson, "He Saw Trouble Coming. Now He Sees It Going," a private-sector economist with a track record better than most suggests that the U.S. economy is on the verge of a sustainable recovery.
According to Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics, the total stock of commercial and industrial credit has stopped falling, signaling that lending to businesses, especially small firms that play a key role in driving economic growth, could soon be on the upswing.

Stocks step down as gold steps up
By Julianne Pepitone
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Stocks ended lower Monday, as investors took a step back from last week's run-up and shifted their focus to the global economic picture.
The Dow Jones industrial average lost 38 points, or 0.3%, to end at 11,406.84. The S&P 500 dropped 3 points, or 0.2%, to close at 1,223.25, and the Nasdaq added 1 point to end at 2,580.05.
Instead, investors turned to commodities. Gold surged to a new record high, settling at a record $1,403.20 an ounce, as jittery investors continue to see it as a hedge against inflation.

What Will Cause Gold To Rise From Here?
By: CAPTAINHOOK - GoldSeek.com
Gold is overbought from a conventional technical perspective; of this there is little doubt. So the question then arises, if this is to be so, as fundamentals for rising gold and silver prices become stronger by the day (see below), what will cause the prices of precious metals to rise further from here, or after a mild correction? Answer: A widespread (think currency wars) and accelerated currency debasement. And simply to catch up to previous inflation, never mind what is coming. This is of course the right answer, however it's not what will motivate people to actually buy gold and silver. No, that distinction will go to rising prices, which are on the way, coming soon to a theatre near you - literally. (I'm not sure how much higher movie ticket prices can go without affecting demand, but rest assured prices will keep rising until this is discovered.)

Gold futures top $1,410 on Globex
Analyst warns of correction before reaching $1,500 level
By Myra P. Saefong, MarketWatch
TOKYO (MarketWatch) - Gold futures edged higher on Globex during Asia's Tuesday morning trading, touching a high above $1,410 an ounce as global debt concerns continued to attract investors to the precious-metals sector.
Gold for December delivery climbed to a fresh intraday high of $1,410.10 in electronic trading. The contract later pulled back slightly to $1,404.60, still up $1.40.
Futures prices marked a record closing high of $1,403.20 in New York on Monday.
"The golden surge is rolling right along as investors flock to hard assets at a dizzying pace," said Kevin Kerr, editor of Kerr Commodities Watch. "Gold [at] $1,500 and beyond is not only likely, it is almost certain."

Gold price rise is more than just a devaluation of the dollar
Julian Phillips - SilverBearCafe.com
There are more things at play in the recent sharp gold price increase than just the corresponding fall in value of the U.S. dollar.
As we write, the gold price is about to assault the $1,400 level having been $1,332 on Wednesday of this week, a day ahead of the Fed announcement. Against the pound sterling, the yen the Swiss franc and most other currencies the dollar has weakened too. In the days ahead of that announcement the dollar had been wavering between $1.38 and $1.40 against the euro. After the announcement the U.S. dollar fell quickly down to $1.42 against the euro. But then the dollar recovered a little and is sitting at $1.41. Recently gold has again moved in the opposite direction to the dollar, until it ran up in the euro vigorously, so has this now changed again? Can there be more to the rise in gold than just the fall in the dollar? We believe so, because far more than QE 2 happened this past week.

Gold hits record on fears about inflation, European debt
By John Waggoner, USA TODAY
Metals - precious and otherwise - soared Monday, propelled by fears of European debt defaults and inflation.
Gold closed at an all-time high of $1,403.20 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange, up $5.50. Its gains powered other metals, too. Silver set a 30-year high as it rose 68 cents to $27.43 an ounce. Platinum gained $2.20, to $1,771.10.
Even lowly copper gleamed, rising less than a cent to $3.95 a pound on signs of increasing demand from emerging markets.

How China Will Drive Silver to $250
Peter Krauth - SilverBearCafe.com
Silver is up over 44% in the last nine months. But thanks to a new campaign by the Chinese government, silver is about to take off higher. Much higher. Here's how to play silver for a "triple" this year...
Once upon a time, the Chinese government forbade ownership of all precious metals.
But now, the ban has been lifted. In fact, China just introduced silver bars for investment. And now, state-run China Central Television (CCTV) is running a campaign encouraging the population to invest in silver.
That means there are over a billion potential new silver investors hitting the market. This is especially significant when you consider the average savings rate in China is 30 to 40%.

How High Would Gold & Silver Prices Go if GS, JPM and HSBC Were Barred from Participation in Gold/Silver Markets?
J.S. Kim - SilverBearCafe.com
Back on May 17, 2010, I granted an interview to Lars Schall of MMNews Germany, in which I stated,

"if U.S. regulators stepped in and said Goldman Sachs, HSBC and JPMorgan couldn't participate in the gold and silver futures-market for three weeks - I really think you would see the gold and silver price more than double in that time."

Though HSBC is the principle manipulator in the gold futures markets and JP Morgan the principle manipulator in the silver futures markets (always manipulating price downward), I included Goldman Sachs in the above stable of PM manipulators for GS's notable and likely deliberately-executed lies about gold that unfortunately influence global purchases of gold worldwide. For example at the end of 2007, Goldman Sachs listed shorting gold as one of their top 10 trades for 2008, after which gold promptly rose about 18% in less than three months. Though gold barely closed 2008 higher than where it started, the price of gold immediately dropped right after Goldman's announcement, at which point they almost undoubtedly bought more gold for their proprietary accounts.

It's Time to Move Beyond Bretton Woods, Zoellick Writes in FT
By John Simpson
Nov. 7 (Bloomberg) -- The development of a monetary system to follow on from 1971's Bretton Woods II will take time, but it's time to start, World Bank President Robert Zoellick writes in the Financial Times.
This week's summit of the Group of 20 leading economies in Seoul presents a test of international cooperation offering an opportunity for a key group of G20 countries to agree on parallel agendas of structural reform, Zoellick writes.
For instance, the U.S. and China could reach agreement on mutually reinforcing moves to stimulate further growth, such as a course for yuan appreciation, or a move to wide bands for exchange rates, the World Bank chief writes.

Make gold an anchor for forex: World Bank chief
LONDON (Commodity Online): Now it has come from the World Bank president Robert Zoellick. This statement is set to cause jitters among the Americans as the WB chief called upon the G20 nations to bring gold back into the global monetary system as an anchor to guide currency movements.
Ahead of a G20 summit this week in Seoul, Zoellick wrote in Monday's Financial Times that an updated gold standard could contribute to retooling the world economy at a time of tensions over currencies and US monetary policy.

World Bank chief calls for new gold standard
By Chris Oliver, MarketWatch
HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- The president of the World Bank said in a newspaper editorial Monday that the Group of 20 leading economies should consider adopting a global reserve currency based on gold as part of structural reforms to the world's foreign-exchange regime.
World Bank chief Robert Zoellick said in an article the Financial Times that leading economies should consider "employing gold as an international reference point of market expectations about inflation, deflation and future currency values."

Citi: Central Banks Are Going To Start Dumping Dollars
In The Coming Weeks
By Joe Weisenthal - BusinessInsider.com
QE2 is likely to serve as a reminder to central bank reserve managers that they still have way too many dollars, and that they need to diversify away.
That's the argument from Citi's Steven Englander:
With FOMC out of the way and largely meeting expectations, investors are looking for what comes next. We think that reserve managers will contribute to the next stage of USD weakness as QE2 confirms their worst fears about the Fed's intentions and the quality of their reserves portfolios. To exacerbate their concerns, Global reserves have been growing very rapidly, on a headline basis about 11% over the last year and now are close to USD9trn (Figure 1). While Chinese reserves growth gets a large amount of attention, other countries reserves are growing similarly rapidly.

Radical Difference Between Monetization 1 and QE2
By Daniel R. Amerman, CFA
It's official: the Federal Reserve announced on November 3rd that it will create approximately $600 billion of new money to fund US Treasury bond purchases, and will also utilize another $250-$300 billion of money that had been previously created (also out of the nothingness). The usual term in the media for these planned purchases is "QE2", as in the second round of quantitative easing.
The "2" in "QE2" implies that this is something that has been done before. This implication is dead wrong.
"QE2" is radically different and radically more dangerous than the risky games that were played with earlier "quantitative easings". The Fed's current actions are all too likely to go down into financial infamy, and this brief article is intended to warn readers about some of the key differences this time around.

S&P: Buyback Exposure for Megabanks May Cost $31B More
NationalMortgageNews.com
Repurchase requests from secondary market investors - including Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac - could end up costing banks a total of $43 billion through 2012, according to a recent report from Standard & Poor's.
S&P notes that six top banks have already accounted for about $12.4 billion of losses from repurchases since 2009, leaving about $31 billion more of possible losses.
Bank of America Corp. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. are exposed to the biggest portion of those losses, S&P said, followed by Wells Fargo & Co., Citigroup Inc., U.S. Bancorp and PNC Financial Services Group Inc.

Don't Look Now, But Here Come the New, New Bank Fees
By JESSICA SILVER-GREENBERG - WSJ.com
Less than a year after the passage of new laws limiting banks' ability to impose certain fees on credit and debit cards, Bank of America Corp., Discover Financial Services, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and other lenders are using different tactics to boost their fee income.
Some are raising minimum payments on certain customers' accounts in order to increase late penalties. Others are ramping up credit-protection insurance programs and charging customers for coverage without permission. Still others are pushing aggressively into high-fee prepaid cards, which are exempt from most of the new rules.

Record Treasury Buying by Banks Frustrates Bernanke
By Daniel Kruger
Nov. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Brian Williams burned through $12,000 on rent for a vacant storefront in the historic district of St. Louis where he planned to open a pizzeria after banks refused him a $35,000 loan, forcing him to delay opening by a year.
"There were a lot of times when I thought I was going to pack it in," Williams, 53, said in an interview. He eventually turned to friends and smaller loans from government agencies and a microcredit lender for the money.

Caught In A Lie:
Bernanke Promised Congress The Federal Reserve Would Not Monetize The Debt But Now That Is Exactly What Is Happening
On June 3rd, 2009 Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke promised the U.S. Congress that the Federal Reserve would not monetize the debt of the U.S. government. On November 3rd, 2010 the Federal Reserve announced a massive quantitative easing plan which will involve the purchase of 600 billion dollars of U.S. Treasury securities by the middle of 2011. Creating 600 billion dollars out of thin air and using them to buy up U.S. government securities is monetizing the debt. So Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has been caught in a lie. Will we ever be able to trust a single word that he says ever again?
Monetizing the debt is a desperate act. It is a signal that we are rapidly reaching the end of the game. Slamming interest rates all the way to the floor did not revive the U.S. economy. Hundreds of billions of dollars in extra government spending did not do the trick either. The U.S. economy is still dying and the U.S. government is now beginning to find it very difficult to locate buyers for all the debt that it is constantly issuing.

Protecting Licensed Counterfeiters
Mises Daily: by Gary North
You shall do no injustice in judgment. You shall not be partial to the poor, nor honor the person of the mighty. But in righteousness you shall judge your neighbor (Leviticus 19:15).
Three counterfeiters are discovered. The first one is a middle-class man who owns a cheap offset printing press. He has printed 500 $20 bills and spent them into circulation.
The second one is a US government official. He works for the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. He has printed up a million $20 bills, and the government has spent them into circulation.
The third is the chairman of the board of a multibillion-dollar New York bank. His bank has loaned a billion dollars of fractional-reserve-bank money to Mexico's government-owned petroleum company, Pemex. The price of oil has collapsed, so Pemex can't pay its bills.
What happens to the three counterfeiters?

Ambac files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection
USAToday.com
NEW YORK (AP) - Bond insurer Ambac Financial Group said Monday that it has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after it failed to raise additional capital.
The embattled company also failed to arrange a structured bankruptcy agreement with senior debt holders.
It has tried for two years to regain its footing after getting pummeled by the collapse of the housing market.
The company continues to operate under the jurisdiction of the bankruptcy court.
As of June 30, it had $1.62 billion in debt.
As a result of the bankruptcy filing, Ambac's outstanding debt securities are accelerated. Upon the bankruptcy filing, any efforts to enforce such payment obligations are stayed pursuant to federal bankruptcy laws.

Obama returns fire after China slams Fed's move
By Patricia Zengerle and Krittivas Mukherjee
NEW DELHI, Nov 8 (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama defended the Federal Reserve's policy of printing dollars on Monday after China and Russia stepped up criticism ahead of this week's Group of 20 meeting.
The G20 summit has been pitched as a chance for leaders of the countries that account for 85 percent of world output to prevent a currency row escalating into a rush to protectionism that could imperil the global recovery.
But there is little sign of consensus.

The China powder keg:
a nation that's either on the edge of becoming THE superpower -
or exploding into anarchy
By JOHN HUMPHRYS - DailyMail Online
The chanting, when it began, sounded angry. I was in my hotel room in Beijing trying to put together a report on political repression for the Today programme and this sounded as if it might be just what I needed.
I had been in China for more than a week. Everywhere I went people had been telling me that things had changed so much since I first started reporting from here more than 30 years ago that I would scarcely recognise the place.
True, there are many protests, sometimes violent, but almost always out in the provinces and motivated by a single grievance.

The Iceberg Looms
By George Will - PatriotPost.us
WASHINGTON -- When Alexander Pope was on his deathbed, his doctor assured him that his breathing, pulse and other vital signs were improving. "Here I am," Pope said to a friend, "dying of a hundred good symptoms."
Some Democrats read the election returns as symptoms of health because things could have been worse: "Happily, we have leprosy, not cholera." But embracing the fallacy of false alternatives is not a step toward recuperation. Neither is continuing the attitude Democrats adopted when passing Obamacare and that foretold their unhappy election: "No compromise with the voters!"
For the second time in 24 months, Barack Obama has been at the epicenter of a historic election, this time with voters reconsidering the first one. For the third time in four years, they have emphatically complained. Democrats gained a total of 54 House seats in 2006 and 2008, but after Tuesday are in a net deficit over the last three cycles.

US trade deals recast India as job growth engine
By ERIKA KINETZ - The Bizmark Tribune
Indian and U.S. companies have discussed or signed over $14.9 billion in deals around President Barack Obama's trip that will support 53,670 U.S. jobs, the White House said.
The U.S. export content of the deals, estimated at $9.5 billion, won't go far to settle America's trade deficit, which was $46.3 billion in August alone, but the numbers are testament to India's growing importance as a global market and have provoked a swell of pride here.

Harley-Davidson to build bikes in India
By Sara Sidner, CNN
Harley-Davidson, the iconic American motorcycle brand with a cult-like following, has announced it has chosen to build its second assembly plant ever outside the United States in India.
The "complete knock down" plant or CKD is expected to be up and running in the northern Indian state of Haryana in first half of 2011. Parts made in America will be put together for the Indian market in Haryana.

One Piece Of Moderately Good Economic News And 14 Pieces Of Bad Economic News That Are So Horrifying You Might Not Want To Read Them Standing Up
The EconomicCollapseBlog.com
Today the financial world was buzzing with excitement because there was one moderately good piece of news for the U.S. economy. U.S. employers added 151,000 jobs during the month of October and the unemployment rate remained unchanged at 9.6%. This is certainly welcome news, but these days it seems as though there are at least ten pieces of bad economic news for every hopeful economic signal. So don't get fooled when the U.S. economy takes one step forward, because it is about to take another dozen or so steps backwards. We are living in the middle of a nightmarish long-term economic decline that has been building for generations. The deindustrialization of the United States, the horrific trade deficit caused by globalization and the skyrocketing national debt are problems that have taken decades to develop. The Federal Reserve has been ripping the guts out of our financial system since 1913. These are not things that are going to be fixed overnight. In fact, there are some statistics that just keep getting worse and worse and worse as time goes by. We are heading straight for a devastating economic collapse and hopefully we can all warn as many people as possible while there is still time.

Fed's Looser Lending Standards Fail to Spur Small Businesses to Borrow - By DANNY KING - DailyFinance.com
The more lenient lending policies enacted by the Federal Reserve last month have so far failed to increase demand from small businesses, indicating that the federal government's attempts to spur the U.S. economy through more aggressive monetary policy may need more time to take effect.
The Fed, which surveys banks every other month, said in a report Monday that financial institutions loosened lending policies in October, just as they did in August. For firms with annual sales of less than $50 million, about 11% of banks eased their loan standards, while 4% tightened them. For larger firms, 12% of banks loosened policies while 2% tightened them, according to the Fed's survey.

Banks Brace for Costly Fights Over Mortgage Mess
By Nelson D. Schwartz - NYTimes.com
Even as investors put aside their worries on Friday about the effect of the foreclosure mess on bank stocks, new signs emerged of what is likely to be a long and expensive legal battle for the financial services industry over mortgages gone bad.
Citigroup disclosed in a regulatory filing that it was being sued by several investors, including Charles Schwab and the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago, in an effort to force Citigroup to buy back soured mortgages that the investors contended did not conform to proper underwriting standards.

Oil near $90. Thanks a lot, Fed.
By Paul R. La Monica - CNNMoney.com
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Don't look now. But oil prices are getting close to $90 again.
Crude is currently trading around $87 a barrel. Prices have not topped $90 in more than two years. But now that the Federal Reserve has made its latest round of quantitative easing official, some fear that crude at $90 is likely in the not-so-distant future.
The dollar has weakened a lot leading up to the Fed announcing its $600 billion plan to buy more Treasury bonds. And many experts think the greenback may continue to fall. That would put more pressure on oil prices, which are priced in dollars.

Regulators flawed in foreclosure oversight
By Zachary A. Goldfarb - Washington Post
As foreclosures began to mount across the country three years ago, a group of state bank regulators suspected that some borrowers might be losing their homes unnecessarily. So the state officials asked the biggest national banks for details about their foreclosure operations.
When two banks - J.P. Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo - declined to cooperate, the state officials asked the banks' federal regulator for help, according to a letter they sent. But the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which oversees national banks, denied the states' request, saying the firms should answer only to inquiries from federal officials. In a response to state officials, John Dugan, comptroller at the time, wrote that his agency was already planning to collect foreclosure information and that any additional monitoring risked "confusing matters."

GMAC Foreclosure Case May Set Anti-Bank Precedent
By Michael Riley
Nov. 8 (Bloomberg) -- When James Renfro had to stop making payments on his two-story fixer-upper in Parma, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland, he triggered events that were supposed to result in the forced sale of his home.
That Nov. 15 auction has been canceled because of defects in documents submitted by his loan servicer, Ally Financial Inc.'s GMAC Mortgage unit. Two affidavits about Renfro's home were signed by Jeffrey Stephan, a GMAC employee who said in sworn depositions in Florida and Maine that he hadn't read thousands of affidavits he'd signed.

Credit scores to be revised amid soaring mortgage defaults
Changes in consumer behavior mean that borrowers who were once considered outstanding credit risks may no longer be so today. - By Kenneth R. Harney - LATimes.com
With foreclosures soaring - and homeowners with unblemished payment histories abruptly walking away from their houses with no warning to lenders - the two major producers of credit scores have begun changing how they evaluate consumers' risks of default. The revisions could affect you the next time you apply for a loan.
In late October, both Fair Isaac Corp., developer of the FICO score, which dominates the mortgage field, and VantageScore Solutions, a joint venture by the three national credit bureaus and marketer of the competing VantageScore, outlined modifications they were making to handle the vast credit disruptions caused by the housing bust, the recession, high unemployment and behavioral changes by consumers.

The Fed has Used the Fractional Banking System to Steal the Wealth of the Middle Class
Bob Chapman - SilverBearCafe.com
The UK, Europe, the US and Canada are different degrees of welfare states. By way of regulation, government controls via taxation. The states and their inhabitants send taxes to Washington, which takes its cut and sends funds back to the states with strings attached. You either do what we want you to do, or we cut off your funds. The states and the people are subject to extortion with government using their funds to do so. By using regulations, welfare and extortion, the federal government creates dependency.

1.2 million people want a job but aren't looking
By Paul Davidson, USA TODAY
A heartening jobs report last week masked an ominous statistic: Discouraged workers hit a record 1.2 million.
Discouraged workers are those who want a job but aren't counted in the labor force because they've stopped looking for work.
When the job market improves, many Americans on the sidelines will return to the labor force, holding up the unemployment rate even if job growth surges.
"That is going to be a major factor in keeping the unemployment rate from dropping," says Sean Snaith, economics professor at the University of Central Florida.
He predicts unemployment will still be at October's 9.6% by the end of 2011, despite 200,000 more jobs a month in the second half of next year.

Unemployment payouts push California deeper into debt
By Marc Lifsher, Los Angeles Times
Calif borrows $40M a day to pay unemployment
The state is borrowing $40 million a day from the federal government to provide assistance to jobless workers, but has resisted changing the formulas it uses to determine and fund those benefits.
Reporting from Sacramento - California's fund for paying unemployment insurance is broke.
With one in every eight workers out of a job, the state is borrowing billions of dollars from the federal government to pay benefits at the rate of $40 million a day.
The debt, now at $8.6 billion, is expected to reach $10.3 billion for the year, two-thirds greater than last year. Worse, the deficit is projected to hit $13.4 billion by the end of next year and $16 billion in 2012, according to the California Employment Development Department, which runs the program.

Will You Be Able To Heat Your Home This Winter?
Millions Of American Families Will Not
Will you have a warm house to come home to this winter? If so, you should consider yourself to be very fortunate. With the United States experiencing the highest levels of long-term unemployment that it has seen since the Great Depression, millions of Americans families are simply out of money. All across America this winter, families are going to be forced to make some heart breaking decisions. For many, the choice will come down to either heating their home or putting food on the table. According to the National Energy Assistance Directors' Association, more than 10 million U.S. households will not be able to afford to heat their homes this winter without assistance, which would be a new all-time record. So, if you are in a position to easily heat your home this winter, be very, very thankful. The number of American families that cannot even afford the basics of life is growing by the day.

FDA Says it Will Take Vending Machine Owners an Extra 14 Million Hours a Year to Comply with Obamacare Calorie Mandate
By Dan Joseph
(CNSNews.com) - The U.S. Food and Drug Administration estimates that it will take the food service industry 14 million additional hours each year to comply with a new regulation that mandates chain restaurants and vending machine operators label the products they sell with a calorie count in a place visible to the consumer.
Most of the burden of the regulation, which is buried in President Obama's 2,000 page health-care reform bill, will fall on the vending industry.
In the Nov. 5 edition of the Federal Register, the FDA estimates "a total of 14,068,808 recurring hours, with nearly all of these for vending machine operators, including 31,408 recurring hours for recordkeeping and 14,037,400 recurring hours for third party disclosure" in conjunction with the regulation.

The Growing Threat of Food Insecurity in America
By BRUCE WATSON - DailyFinance.com
When discussing the Great Recession, there are two standards for measuring its impact on the average household. The first is unemployment, which is currently hovering at 9.6%, down from a high of 10.1% in October 2009. The second is foreclosures, which hit a 50-year high in 2007 and have risen every year since then.
For much of the past three years, the recession narrative has been told in terms of these two dire numbers, showing how a failing economy has made it harder and harder to cling to the middle-class ideal of homeownership and a steady job. Recently, however, a third, even more disturbing figure has gained relevance: the number of Americans on food stamps.

To All Followers of The "Don't Worry, Be Happy" Crowd
Peter Grandich - SilverBearCafe.com
Does anyone really want to hear that America is in decline? For decades, most of us have been raised to believe that the United States is "number one" and that anyone who doubts that fact is a "gloom and doomer" that should just pack up and move to "Russia" or "Iraq" or some other country where things are not nearly as good. But does it do us or future generations any good to ignore the very serious signs of trouble that are erupting all around us? The truth is that it is about time to wake up and admit how much trouble we are actually in. The U.S. government is absolutely drowning in debt. The entire society is absolutely drowning in debt. We are being slaughtered in the arena of world trade, and every single month tens of billions of dollars (along with large numbers of factories and jobs) leave our shores for good. Our infrastructure is failing, our kids are less educated and our incomes are going down. We have serious, serious problems. At one time, the U.S. economy was so dominant that it was not even worth talking about who was in second place. That is no longer the case in 2010. Our forefathers handed us the greatest economic machine in history and we have allowed it to fall apart right in front of our eyes. A national economic crisis of historic proportions is getting worse with each passing month, and yet most of our leaders seem to be asleep at the switch.

New transparent, light-harvesting material could lead to power generating windows
Darren Quick - SilverBearCafe.com
While rooftops are the obvious place to put solar cells to generate clean electricity for the home, we've seen a number of technologies aimed at expanding the potential solar collecting area to include windows using transparent solar cells. These include Octillion Corp's NanoPower Window technology, RSi's semi-transparent photovoltaic glass windows, and EnSol's transparent thin film. In this latest development, U.S. scientists have fabricated a new type of self-assembling transparent thin film material that could boost the cost effectiveness and scalability of solar window production.

Coral damage near BP well could be from oil
Gulf spill may have made 'gunk'
AP - WashingtonTimes.com
NEW ORLEANS | For the first time, federal scientists have found damage to deep-sea coral and other marine life on the ocean floor several miles from the blown-out BP oil well - a strong indication that damage from the spill could be significantly greater than officials had previously acknowledged.
Tests are needed to verify that the coral died from oil that spewed into the Gulf of Mexico after the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion, but the chief scientist who led the government-funded expedition said Friday he was convinced it was related.

Obama Returns to Indonesia Chasing Trade Rather Than Chickens
By Julianna Goldman
Nov. 9 (Bloomberg) -- In President Barack Obama's 2006 book, "The Audacity of Hope," the then-freshman senator described growing up in Indonesia as a "joyous time, full of adventure and mystery -- days of chasing down chickens and running from water buffalo."
He is scheduled to return there today as leader of the world's biggest economy, aiming to solidify a relationship between the U.S. and the world's largest Muslim-majority country that his advisers say is one of the keys to future U.S. growth and security.
Administration officials say the Indonesia stop, postponed twice earlier this year, underscores Obama's goal of boosting U.S. exports to create jobs. Enlarging overseas markets for U.S. companies is a central theme of Obama's four-country tour of Asia that began in India Nov. 6.

Here's what President Obama, Michelle Obama said in Mumbai, India
A transcript of remarks by President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama in a town hall with St. Xavier College students in Mumbai, India, as provided by the White House:
MRS. OBAMA: Hello, everyone. Namaste. It is a pleasure and an honor to be here in India. Everyone, please sit, who can sit. Rest. It's warm. We are thrilled to be here and to have a chance to spend time with so many outstanding young people from St. Xavier's College and so many other schools across Mumbai.

Obama, Singh Pledge Deeper Economic Ties, Differ on Pakistan
By Julianna Goldman and Hans Nichols
Nov. 8 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. President Barack Obama and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh pledged to deepen economic and strategic ties even as they signaled differences on how best to improve relations between India and Pakistan.
Obama also indicated he may support India's bid to become a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council when he addresses parliament in New Delhi later today. That step would fulfill Indian hopes of having the U.S. join France and the U.K. in endorsing its candidacy.

Obama Backs Indian Bid for Permanent U.N. Security Council Seat
By Julianna Goldman and James Rupert
Nov. 8 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. President Barack Obama endorsed India's bid to become a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, a move his administration said would cement its status as a rising economic power and key strategic partner.
"The just and sustainable international order that America seeks includes a United Nations that is efficient, effective, credible and legitimate," Obama told hundreds of Indian lawmakers in a joint session of parliament. "That is why I can say today in the years ahead, I look forward to a reformed U.N. Security Council that includes India as a permanent member," Obama said.

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Monday 11.08.2010

Regulators close banks in Md., Calif., Wash.;
143 US failures this year exceed all of 2009
MARCY GORDON - AP Business Writer - BaltimoreSun.com
WASHINGTON (AP) - Regulators shut down four banks Friday, bringing the total of 2010 failures to 143. That tops the 140 shuttered last year and is the most in a year since the savings-and-loan crisis two decades ago.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. took over K Bank, based in Randallstown, Md., with $538.3 million in assets, and Pierce Commercial Bank, based in Tacoma, Wash., with $221.1 million in assets. The FDIC also seized two California banks: Western Commercial Bank in Woodland Hills, with $98.6 million in assets, and First Vietnamese American Bank in Westminster, with assets of $48 million.

Banks set for small company failures
By Anousha Sakoui - FT.com
Banks are bracing themselves for a rise in small company insolvencies and restructurings over the next year, reversing this yearÕs downward trend.
Some of the largest UK corporate lenders, including Barclays, Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Bank of Scotland, see restructurings and insolvencies among smaller companies increasing or staying at current high levels, and are boosting their resources to meet the need.

Number of the Week: $10.2 Trillion in Global Borrowing
By Mark Whitehouse - WSJ.com
The amount of money advanced-nation governments will need to borrow in 2011
As the debts of advanced countries rise to levels not seen since the aftermath of World War II, it's hard to know how much is too much. But it's easy to see that the risk of serious financial trouble is growing.
Next year, fifteen major developed-country governments, including the U.S., Japan, the U.K., Spain and Greece, will have to raise some $10.2 trillion to repay maturing bonds and finance their budget deficits, according to estimates from the International Monetary Fund. That's up 7% from this year, and equals 27% of their combined annual economic output.

G20 tensions rise over the future of the global economy
G20 leaders gather in Seoul this week ready for a showdown amid tensions over the future of the global economy.
Philip Aldrick and Emma Rowley - Telegraph.co.uk
The daisy chains, kaftans and sweet haze of pot may have been missing, but last year's G20 summit in Pittsburgh was the closest to a love-in that the world's leaders have come. In the eye of the financial crisis, with recession gripping most major economies, heads of state joined hands and agreed to promote "strong, sustainable and balanced growth".
Those dangerous, destabilising global imbalances would be addressed, they pledged. "Deficit" countries, such as the UK and US, would save and export more. "Surplus" countries, such as China and Germany, would export less and get their consumers spending. Every country would do their bit, pull together, and all the bountiful progress would be chronicled the following year at the G20 summit in Seoul.

South Korea's Lee Myung-bak on the G-20, IMF and North Korea
By Bob Davis and Evan Ramstad - WSJ.com
President Lee Myung-bak is hosting next weeks summit of G-20 leaders, which makes him a kind of temporary chairman of the global economy's board of directors. It's a tough job, coming at a time of currency battles and questions about the continuing strength of the global economy. President Lee sat down with The Wall Street Journal in South Korea's presidential palace, the Blue House. Below is an edited transcript.
What progress do you expect on the currency issue at the Summit?
It's our responsibility to continue to move forward on that basis (of a finance ministers' meeting last month) and build upon it. We had an agreement on the current account imbalances and we will agree to indicative guidelines when the leaders meet here in Seoul next week so we can keep the current imbalances at sustainable levels. We're going to talk about a whole host of mechanisms or measures we can adopt so we can achieve that common goal.

G20 showdown likely over US Federal Reserve's quantitative easing
Angela Merkel expected to lead opposition in Seoul to Bernanke's QE2 programme
Phillip Inman - The Guardian
President Barack Obama can expect a rough ride at the G20 summit in South Korea this week after China and Germany denounced proposals by the Federal Reserve to flood the US economy with cheap money.
Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, was this weekend forced to mount a fresh defence of the US policy to pump an extra $600bn (£372bn) into the ailing US economy over the next eight months in an attempt to accelerate growth.
"We're not in the business of trying to create inflation," said Bernanke, to counter criticism that the flood of money will fuel price rises.

FORECLOSUREGATE COULD FORCE BANK NATIONALIZATION
By Ellen Brown - OpEdNews.com
For two years, politicians have danced around the nationalization issue, but ForeclosureGate may be the last straw. The megabanks are too big to fail, but they aren't too big to reorganize as federal institutions serving the public interest.
In January 2009, only a week into Obama's presidency, David Sanger reported in The New York Times that nationalizing the banks was being discussed. Privately, the Obama economic team was conceding that more taxpayer money was going to be needed to shore up the banks. When asked whether nationalization was a good idea, House speaker Nancy Pelosi replied:
"Well, whatever you want to call it .... If we are strengthening them, then the American people should get some of the upside of that strengthening. Some people call that nationalization.

ForeClosureGate and The Economic Crisis,
Spiralling Gold and Silver Prices
By: Bob Chapman - MarketOracle.co.uk
Foreclosuregate will soon again dominate the financial news along with the three class action lawsuits - one is a RICO suit, entered against JPMorgan Chase and HSBC for rigging the silver markets.
Irrespective of what Wall Street tells you, but in Foreclosuregate we are taking about 2 trillion in securitizations, plus $500 billion in second mortgages. These bonds were all rated AAA by S&P, MoodyÕs and Fitch, but were in fact BBB. We have written over and over again questioning why the buyers were stupid enough to be buyers, or why no civil suits or criminal actions were filed for three years. our synopsis tells us the buyers, particularly the Europeans, who purchased 60% of this toxic paper, were either collectively grossly incompetent, or they had the bonds secretly guaranteed by the Fed. Hundreds of lawyers cannot be that stupid, so we believe the latter. The losses for lenders will be somewhere north of $500 billion.

Homeowners say loan mods led them to foreclosure
CNBC.com
LOS ANGELES - Grocery store owners William and Esperanza Casco were making enough money to stay current on their mortgage, but when JPMorgan Chase & Co. offered a plan that reduced their payments, they figured they could use the extra cash and signed up.
The Cascos say they never missed a subsequent payment, so they were horrified when the bank decided the smaller payments weren't enough and foreclosed on their modest Long Beach home.
Their story is echoed across the country by people who claim - some in lawsuits - that banks didn't live up to their end of the deal when they agreed to trial mortgage modifications.

Ponzi promises & priceless gold
By John Browne - Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
In August, Boston University Professor Laurence Kotlikoff wrote an article in the Finance and Development Journal of the International Monetary Fund titled "U.S. Is Bankrupt and We Don't Even Know It."
In it he warned: "Let's get real. The U.S. is bankrupt. He estimated that "Based on the Congressional Budget Office's data ... a fiscal gap of $202 trillion (exists already), which is 15 times the official Treasury debt."
Last week, the Federal Reserve announced its intention to print another $600 billion plus to subsidize further the greatest Ponzi scheme in history called the U.S. Treasury market. What does it mean for ordinary Americans?

Greenspan and the Economic Crisis,
"Moral Hazard" and Financial Fraud are the Main Problems
By: Washington's Blog - MarketOracle.co.uk
Even Alan Greenspan is confirming what William Black, James Galbraith, Joseph Stiglitz, George Akerlof and many other economists and financial experts have been saying for a long time: the economy cannot recover if fraud is not prosecuted and if the big banks know that government will bail them out every time they get in trouble.
Specifically, Greenspan said today in a panel discussion at a Fed conference in Jekyll Island, Georgia (where the plans to form the Fed were originally hatched):

Banks operated with less capital because of an assumption they would be rescued by the government, he said. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. wouldn't have failed with adequate capital, he said. "Rampant fraud" was also an issue, he said.
Lack of Trust
"Fraud creates very considerable instability in competitive markets," Greenspan said. "If you cannot trust your counterparties, it would not work."

Gold Nudging $1400, $1600 Not Far Away,
$2,600 is Not Impossible
MarketOracle.co.uk
We're just nudging up against the $1400 mark, can $1600 be far away? ... That still seems to be the most talked about target although $2600 is not all that impossible. ... Let's see where we are at the present time, technically speaking.
With gold once more on the move and on everyone's mind let's take a look at the very long term point and figure (P&F) chart and see how we get some of our projections as to where we think gold might go, technically speaking.
For those who may not be familiar with my very simple P&F technique, the red down trend lines are bear market moves while the blue up trend lines are bull market moves. ...The thicker the line the more important is the line. ... For a bull market signal I need the Xs to break above the primary down trend line AND above two previous X highs.

How Gold's inflation hedge appeal trebled?
By Adrian Ash
Let's imagine ... the central bankers are right. Let's say that - rather than actually ending a two-decade deflation - the price of clothing to Western consumers is only now set to turn lower.
Let's agree that the doubling of central-bank foreign reserves since 2005...plus the worst sub-zero real rates of interest since the mid-70s...will count for nothing in global energy or food prices.
Let's also say, despite all experience since the credit crunch bit in 2007, that the "output gap" theory - those "low rates of resource utilization" as the Fed put it on Wednesday - finally comes good, and so excess capacity conspires with slack demand to pull costs lower.
Let's imagine, in short, that money actually starts to gain value. What then?

Tim Geithner denies US is planning to weaken the dollar
Tim Geithner, US Treasury Secretary, has hit back at suggestions the US is using its latest $600bn (£370bn) round of quantitative easing to purposely weaken the doll
By James Quinn - Telegraph.co.uk
Following claims from Wolfgang Schaeuble, the German finance minister, that "what the US accuses China of doing, the US is doing by different means," Mr Geithner rejected the notion that decisions by the Federal Reserve earlier this week somehow contained an ulterior motive.
He said that the US "won't ever use our dollar as a tool for economic advantage" - noting that capital is flowing towards the emerging markets to fuel growth in those areas.

Very Long Term US Dollar Chart
JESSE'S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
The revaluation of the SDR should be occurring around the end of 2010. As you know it is composed of a valuation basket of currencies that is adjusted every five years. There has been a recent change in voting power in the IMF that may give more weight to the BRICs and those who favor a broader basket that includes gold and silver. India, China and Brazil Become Major Players in the IMF.... This is also of importance because we forecast that the SDR is going to be a likely candidate to supplant the Dollar as the world's reserve currency, a move that will be resisted and delayed by the Anglo-American financiers.

China is right to fear US dollar debauchery
The US dollar has weakened sharply against the euro over the last week.
By Ian Campbell - Telegraph.co.uk
Optimism is one reason: investors feel cheerful enough to leave the supposedly safe haven of the greenback. But fear is another reason. In the middle of the week, China's central bank warned of a "policy mistake" by some of its western peers.
The Chinese are worried that the decisions by the US and the UK to try to print their way out of economic trouble will end badly. The money creation could end up debauching the dollar and pound and inviting a global inflationary crisis.

China as 1850?s America
By Joshua M Brown - TheReformedBroker.com
China's just so hard.
Intellectually, you want to agree with a Vitaliy Katsenelson or a Jim Chanos that the whole thing is completely nuts, but the demographics are just so overwhelming and undeniable.
Is it a bubble on the verge of bursting, or multi-decade mega-theme heading for a series of corrections buying opportunities on its unstoppable march higher?
Two American historians, Stephen Mihm and Jeffrey Wasserstrom, may have the answer.... Writing in TIME Magazine, they ask the question of whether or not China doesn't look an awful lot like America circa mid-19th Century.... There are some interesting parallels worth considering.

Bold-Faced Lies of the Day from Geithner, Bernanke
By Mike Shedlock
How can anyone take blatant liars seriously? How can anyone not know Bernanke and Geithner are blatant liars?
I have not figured out the answer to those questions but I can point out another round of lies from both Geithner and Bernanke.
Bernanke's Lie of the Day
MarketWatch reports Fed chairman: Increasing inflation not a goal
Some Fed critics have accused the bank of pursuing an inflationary strategy by adding trillions of dollars of credit into the nation's financial system. The Fed itself seemed to suggest inflation was too low in a policy statement two months ago.
Yet Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said Saturday that the central bank's decision this week to purchase $600 billion in Treasury bonds is solely aimed at keeping U.S. interest rates low so the economy can grow.

Wilbur Ross: Federal Reserve Is Directly Funding the Federal Deficit;
Consumer More Levered Than at the Peak of 2007
By: Lori Ann LaRocco - CNBC.com
Optimisim has spiked the water on Wall Street with a cocktail of the GOP taking back the House, QE2 and the employment numbers. So what's the smart money banking on as we rapidly approach the end of 2010?
Billionaire, vulture investor extrodinaire Wilbur Ross, Chairman and CEO of W.L. Ross & Co, is always a step or two ahead of the pack. I decided to sit down and talk to Wilbur on his views of QE2, the future of the Bush Tax cuts and his outlook on the economy.

Bernanke Delivers QE2 Last Rites for Dollar
as Worlds Reserve Currency
By: Mike Whitney - MarketOracle.co.uk
Millions of Americans have no idea what Quantitative Easing is or how it will effect them personally. That's why Wednesday's announcement that the Fed will purchase another $600 billion in US Treasuries merely reinforced feelings of helplessness and a sense that government spending is out-of-control. Unfortunately, Ben Bernanke's rambling explanation of QE2 in a Washington Post op-ed on Thursday only added to the confusion. The article is loaded with half-truths and omissions that are meant to mislead the public about how the program works and what the Fed's real objectives are. It's another missed opportunity by Bernanke to come clean with the people and let them know what policies are being enacted in their name. Here's an excerpt from the article:

100-Years of the Ever-Disintegrating Dollar
By Rocky Vega - The DailyReckoning.com
11/07/10 Stockholm, Sweden - Ben Bernanke, Alan Greenspan, a Goldman Sachs Managing Director - a fitting invitee - and others descended upon Jekyll Island, Georgia, for the weekend to celebrate the Fed's founding.
The immensely powerful and secretive institution, which has the exclusive reins on the US money supply, is coincidentally recognizing the occasion with another round of quantitative easing to the tune of $600 billion. Is the election going to help change things? Well... you can form your own opinion on that as you take a look at the clip below, which came to our attention via a Daily Bail post on the Fed celebrating a century of domination.

Ron Paul Is About to Totally Revolutionize
the House Monetary Policy Panel
By: John Carney - CNBC.com
Odds are you haven't heard of the monetary policy subcommittee. Officially known as the House Subcommittee for Domestic Monetary Policy and Technology, it's a subdivision of the House Financial Services Committee that has mostly occupied itself with pressing questions of issuing commemorative coins and whether or not to eliminate the penny.
That's about to change. Ron Paul, the Republican Congressman from Texas, is the ranking member of the monetary policy subcommittee, and when the next Congress takes over he'll likely be the chairman of the subcommittee.

China leads backlash against US stimulus as risk of currency war, protectionism grows
China led an Asian backlash against US measure to boost an economic recovery which has stoked concerns that a flood of 'hot money' could destabilise regional economies.
AP via Telegraph.co.uk
The Federal Reserve this week said it will pump $600bn (£370bn) into the economy through debt purchases - effectively printing more dollars - to boost employment and growth.
Asian nations fear the effects of extra cash pumping through the financial system, as traders turn from ailing Western economies to the growing Asia-Pacific region to get a better return on their dollars.

The rest of the world goes West when America prints more money
Last Wednesday was a hinge point in history. The United States decided to drop all pretence of being interested in leading - or even being part of - a coordinated global policy response to the most serious economic crisis in more than 70 years.
By Liam Halligan - Telegraph.co.uk
America is now isolated and the rest of the world is furious. The widespread use of capital controls and even a lurch into 1930s-style protectionism are both far more likely than just a few days ago.
The Federal Reserve's words may have been anodyne. "We will adjust the programme as needed to best foster maximum employment and price stability," said the US central bank's Open Market Committee. But by announcing another round of "quantitative easing", America is rightfully incurring the wrath not only of the emerging giants of the East, but the eurozone too.

Economic Recovery: The View From Bernanke's Helicopter
By Joel Bowman - The DailyRecknoing.com
11/06/10 Buenos Aires, Argentina - This week, the world caught a glimpse of what Henry Hazlitt might have called the "seen" - the primary, most conspicuous consequence of a preposterous economic policy. Of course, it is the "unseen," what comes next, that we ought to be worried about.
We are referring here to the dawning of the QE2 era. In the shadow of the midterm elections, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben "full steam ahead" Bernanke announced the second round of quantitative easing, or, for us non econo-scholars, "money printing."
In a nutshell, Bernanke committed the Fed to purchase $600 billion in Treasuries over the next 8 months. In addition, those nasty mortgage securities the Fed gobbled up during operation QE1 will continue to be rolled over into Treasuries. All in, the total price tag comes to $875 billion brand spankin' new dollarsÉwith the option to open the spigots further should inflation (the CPI version) come in under what the Fed deems as "healthy."

Fed's reflation express must keep on rolling
The governments of China, Brazil and Germany may think it's worth squaring up to Ben Bernanke, but investors in the UK stock market and plenty of others around the world are wisely acting on that old investment adage: Don't Fight the Fed.
By Tom Stevenson - Telegraph.co.uk
The FTSE 100 is now trading at a level not seen since before the stomach-churning volatility of the autumn of 2008. Elsewhere, the Indian market hit an all-time high after rising 5pc last week alone. Gold is on a tear and the oil price is heading back towards $90 a barrel. It has hardly mattered what you have owned in this resurgence of animal spirits.
What was most intriguing about the market reaction to last week's announcement of a $600bn (£370bn) injection of cash into the US economy, however, was the timing of the firework display. The initial response on Wednesday afternoon was relatively muted - as if investors were shrugging their shoulders at a measure that was bang in line with well-leaked expectations. The reaction on Thursday was of a different order altogether - a back-to-the-races explosion of risk appetite.

The Price of Oil is Going Up
by Mad Hedge Fund Trader - OilPrice.com
I received another scratchy, crackling cell phone call from my drilling buddy in the Texas natural gas fields today. You could almost choke from the dust on the line.
He told me that the BP Gulf disaster was turning the fundamental assumptions of the oil industry upside down, and that sharply higher oil prices were in the cards, probably $100/barrel by year end.
Major oil companies with deep pockets at risk were rushing to offload their existing offshore leases and partnerships in producing wells to avoid BP's potential $30 billion hickey.

Pentagon Fuel Supply Agreement Could Strain Relationship With Kyrgyzstan
by Deirdre Tynan - OilPrice.com
In a move that could strain Washington's relationship with Kyrgyzstan, a key Central Asian ally, the Pentagon opted November 3 to award a new fuel-supply contract to a company that is already at the center of a US congressional probe.
The Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) gave Mina Corp "a maximum $315,180,960 fixed price with economic price adjustment, requirements-type contract for jet fuel" at the Manas Transit Center. Mina Corp beat out eight other bidders, according to the DLA award. "The date of performance completion is Nov. 2, 2011," the Pentagon announcement stated.

Bernanke defends new Fed plan to boost economy
JEKYLL ISLAND, Ga. - Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke defended the Fed's new $600 billion program to aid the economy on Saturday, rejecting concerns that it will spur runaway inflation.
Critics, including some Fed officials, fear that all the money being injected into the economy could ignite inflation or speculative bubbles in the prices of bonds or commodities.
Speaking to a conference on the Georgia coast, Bernanke said the new program, announced Wednesday, won't push inflation to "super ordinary" levels.

Hoenig Says Fed Must Raise Rates to Create a 'Stable Economy'
By Caroline Salas and Joshua Zumbrun
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City President Thomas Hoenig said the central bank needs to increase interest rates to foster a more solid U.S. economy.
"I believe that moving rates modestly off of zero, where they have been since December 2008, still represents highly accommodative monetary policy," Hoenig said today in the text of remarks at a real estate conference in New Orleans. "More importantly, such action is necessary if we are to ensure a more stable economy that can thereby foster a more sustainable housing market."

Rep Bachus warns Geithner on "Volcker rule"
By Kevin Drawbaugh - Reuters via Yahoo
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican front-runner to head a key U.S. congressional bank oversight panel has urged regulators to consider whether a new rule limiting risky trading by U.S. banks may handicap them globally, according to a letter obtained by Reuters on Thursday.
In a sign of the policy position of the heir-apparent to the chair of the U.S. House of Representatives' Financial Services Committee, Representative Spencer Bachus raised basic questions in the letter about the impact of the "Volcker Rule" enacted into law in July.
"If the Volcker Rule's prohibitions are expansively interpreted and rigidly implemented against U.S. institutions while other nations refuse to adopt them, the damage to U.S. competitiveness and job creation could be substantial," Bachus wrote in the November 3 letter to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and other top regulators.

America will survive the errors of Ben Bernanke's trigger-happy Federal Reserve
America is a resilient nation, with far healthier demographics than China, Japan, Korea, Germany, Italy or Russia. The storm will blow over.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
At each stage of the great 20-year debt bubble we were told by the US Federal Reserve that it was not the job of central banks to worry about the dotcom boom or the surging cost of California property or the price of any other asset in the grip of credit fever.
A Princeton professor named Ben Bernanke was chief theorist for this doctrine. At the Fed's Jackson Hole conclave in 1999 he gave a speech laden with data arguing that central banks should ignore asset booms and focus exclusively on inflation.

Morgan Stanley financial adviser escapes felony charges for hit-and-run 'because it could jeopardise his job'
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
A financial manager for wealthy clients will not face charges for a hit-and-run because it could jeopardise his job, it has been revealed.
Martin Joel Erzinger, 52, was set to face felony charges for running over a doctor who he hit from behind in his 2010 Mercedes Benz, and then speeding off.
But now he will simply face two misdemeanour traffic charges from the July 3 incident in Eagle, Colorado.
His victim, Dr Steven Milo, 34, is meanwhile facing 'a lifetime of pain' from his injuries.
But prosecutors claim the decision is theirs to make.

Americans' Perception of Their Standard of Living
is Unchanged From a Year Ago
By DANNY KING - DailyFinance.com
Americans' perception of their standard of living is unchanged from both last month and a year ago, indicating that any optimism from gains in the stock market and U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) has been offset by issues such as unemployment and a stagnant housing market.
About 50% of Americans earning at least $90,000 a year say their standard of living is improving, while 45% of those with lower incomes say the same, Gallup said Friday, citing its poll of about 30,000 adults last month. Both percentages are about the same as in September and in October 2009.

Fannie, Freddie, FHA REO Inventory Increases 24% in Q3 from Q2 2010 - by CalculatedRisk
The combined REO (Real Estate Owned) inventory for Fannie, Freddie and the FHA increased by 24% at the end of Q3 2010 compared to Q2 2010. The REO inventory increased 92% compared to Q3 2009 (year-over-year comparison).
This graph shows the REO inventory for Fannie, Freddie and FHA through Q3 2010.
The REO inventory for the "Fs" has increased sharply over the last year, from 153,007 at the end of Q3 2009 to a record 293,171 at the end of Q3 2010.
There are new records for Fannie, Freddie, and FHA REO inventory individually too.
Remember this is just a portion of the total REO inventory. Private label securities and banks and thrifts also hold a substantial number of REOs.

REO Investing and the Chain of Title Time Bomb
The Investor Insights
.... Here's the deal.
If foreclosures are halted in the near term it will mean that REO inventory will be greatly reduced but there's a bigger problem looming for real estate investors who invest in *previously securitized* REO's.
The root of the problem is a recently discovered flaw in the mortgage recording system (MERS) that clouds title on previously foreclosed properties.
Until the 1980's, most mortgages were loans between the homeowner and a bank, who lent the money directly. Today we only see this system with portfolio lenders - lenders that originate a loan, keep it in house and service it themselves.

Baghdad Barack & Nancy: Democrats in denial
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
It was fright and ignorance that led the electorate to deliver the most stinging rebuke of House Democrats in 72 years, President Obama seemed to say the morning after Tuesday's historic election. Mr. Obama's only real contrition or concession or excuse was that he didn't do a good enough job of selling the sizzle of a meatless steak.
Deposed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was frighteningly worse. It's not that voters rejected the progressives' socialism; it was that voters rejected the slow pace of socialism's implementation. And, don't you know, it was that voters, stupid lot that they are, were overtly influenced by all that money that those obscene outside conservative groups spent to influence the election. Never mind that liberals spent more.
This is like Baghdad Bob, Iraq's propaganda minister, arguing in 2003 that invading coalition forces were just a figment of someone's imagination.

How the Republicans Will Sucker the Tea Party
By: Gary North - MarketOracle.co.uk
First, you must understand that Boehner is a GobGop: a Good Old Boy of the Grand Old Party. The GobGops' goal is to keep the present system funded by the Bigs: Big Business, Big Pharma, Big Oil, and Big Banking. If you do not understand this, then you are as naive as a Democrat who thinks Obama speaks for The Common Man.
Boehner shilled for Hank Paulson and Goldman Sachs by begging the Republicans to vote for the $750+ billion Big Bank Bailout in 2008. Watch his emotional performance here. "We just have to do it!" No, they didn't. Ron Paul told it straight. He is no GobGop.
Boehner is going to do it again. He has already told us what he intends to do.

Pelosi to Run for House Minority Leader
AP via CNBC.com
Nancy Pelosi, the nation's first female House speaker, said Friday she will try to keep her spot as leader of the House Democrats despite huge election losses that cost her party the majority.
Pelosi, a California liberal, rejected pressure from moderate House Democrats - and even some liberal allies - who said the widespread defeats cried out for new party leadership.
Pelosi, 70, will seek her colleagues' support to become House minority leader when the new Congress convenes in January. That would keep her atop the Democratic House caucus, which will number about 190 people next year. But it would mark a big drop from being speaker, which carries tremendous power to influence legislation and is second only to the vice president in the line of presidential succession.

Nuclear bomb material found for sale on Georgia black market
Exclusive: Georgia trial reveals how sting netted highly enriched uranium that had been smuggled via train inside lead-lined cigarette box
Julian Borger in Tbilisi - guardian.co.uk
Highly enriched uranium that could be used to make a nuclear bomb is on sale on the black market along the fringes of the former Soviet Union, according to evidence emerging from a secret trial in Georgia.
Two Armenians, a businessman and a physicist, have pleaded guilty to smuggling highly enriched uranium (HEU) into Georgia in March, stashing it in a lead-lined package on a train from Yerevan to Tbilisi.

North Korea: A Burden for the Future?
By EVAN RAMSTAD - WSJ.com
The biggest wild card in South Korea's future is North Korea.
The North's authoritarian government, which has remained in power for 60 years by isolating and instilling fear in the country's citizens, has long posed the biggest threat to the economic and political stability of South Korea.
Officially, the North is intent on fulfilling the dream of its founding dictator, Kim Il Sung, by taking control of South Korea, a threat that is regularly repeated. But, despite its pursuit of nuclear weapons, North Korea has long been deterred from any aggression by its own social and economic weaknesses and the military and economic strength of the South, which enjoys the backing of the U.S. and other allies.

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Friday 11.05.2010

Nightmare on Main
By: Joseph Russo - SafeHaven.com
Get with the program At the Crest of Hyper-Inflation
This is where participants should most likely focus their attention - not on an outlier primary wave three down. It is abundantly clear who is running the show here; it is the Central banks of the world. If you subscribed to the rather convincing arguments of mainstream Elliott wave authorities for the past 15-years, we were supposedly at the crest of a bearish tidal wave in 1995. Well, the exact opposite happened. Equities TRIPLED in nominal value from 1995 through 2007.
Governments remain impotent / Central Banks Rule the World
The US central bank in particular, which has unfettered monopoly over the world's reserve currency, is in full control of the people's money. The United States Treasury and all branches of the US government are utterly impotent. Regardless of traditional political change and the will of the American people, this omnipotent central bank will do whatever necessary to maintain its world governing monopoly - keeping itself and Wall Street first in line to benefit while Main Street and its (in many instances complicit) elected government officials remain comatose and defenseless. In short, they have everyone of us by the shorthairs and the biggest of players tucked neatly in their back pockets.

Bernanke Fearing Fate of Japan, Not Greece
By SEWELL CHAN - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON - By placing a $600 billion bet on the Federal Reserve's ability to encourage the recovery, Ben S. Bernanke is gingerly trying to avoid the mistakes of Japan, where deflation has stymied growth. But the antideficit Republicans who seized control of the House on Tuesday draw cautionary lessons from a different country: debt-stricken Greece.
Regardless of which comparison is more apt, the Fed's decision on Wednesday to renew a no-holds-barred effort to nudge the recovery by lowering long-term interest rates was a notable display of Mr. Bernanke's determination to act at a time when the effectiveness of both monetary policy, which he controls, and fiscal policy, which he does not, is under debate.

From Stagnation to Stagflation
By John Butler - TheDailyReckoning.com
11/04/10 London, England - With economic growth as measured by real final demand so weak, any increase in inflation which is not associated with a higher rate of real growth will represent a transition from the economic stagnation of the past few years to an even more unsatisfactory state of affairs, a dreaded "stagflation", which came to plague the US and, to a lesser extent, global economy in the late 1970s. But wait, some might object, US CPI reached double-digits in the late 1970s/early 1980s, surely this is not a fair comparison? To which we reply: Good point. Let's make certain that we are comparing like with like and adjust for changes that have been made to the CPI calculation methodology in the interim, as these have been substantial.

PBoC advisor warns Fed move may cause another crisis
AFP -Google news
BEIJING - Unrestricted issuance of US dollars could plunge the world into a new financial crisis, an adviser to China's central bank warned, after the US Federal Reserve poured more money into the economy.
The comments in Chinese state media Friday came after the Fed said it would spend 600 billion dollars buying government bonds to kickstart the US recovery -- a move that could spark tensions at next week's G20 summit in South Korea.
"If there is no restraint in issuing major global currencies such as the US dollar, the occurrence of another crisis is inevitable," said Xia Bin, a member of the bank's monetary policy committee, according to the Beijing News.

Inflationary Thursday - Benny Drops the Big One!
By: PhilStockWorld - MarketOracle.co.uk
Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD).
That was the actual military policy of the United States of America and the rest of the World for about 30 years. We had Presidents and Kings and thousands of bureaucrats - the top minds of 2 generations - all getting together on a regular basis and coming up with or buying into insanity like the system on the right. We look back at it now and say "Gee, what were we thinking" but the whole World went down this path for a while.
There is a scene from Doctor Strangelove where Major Kong, the bomb commander, is so focused on completing his mission that he loses sight of the bigger picture but he doesn't regret his actions - he goes down in a blaze of glory that ultimately dooms the World but his sense of personal triumph at achieving his wrong-headed goal is the punctuation for the film. Watch this scene and think of Bernanke, tinkering with this or that but so focused on "fixing" the economy with the one tool at his disposal that he ends up destroying it instead.

What the Next Speaker Must Do
Secrecy, arrogance, and the abuse of power have shattered the bonds of trust between the people and their elected leaders. Repairing that trust requires sweeping change, beginning with an end to earmarks.
By JOHN BOEHNER - WSJ.com
I grew up in a small house on a hill in Cincinnati, Ohio, with 11 brothers and sisters. My dad ran a bar, Andy's CafŽ, that my grandfather Andrew Boehner opened in 1938. We didn't have much but were thankful for what we had. And we didn't think much about Washington.
That changed when I got involved with a small business, which I eventually built into a successful enterprise. I saw firsthand how government throws obstacles in the way of job-creation and stifles our prosperity. It prompted me to get involved in my government, and eventually took me to Congress.
Millions of Americans have had a similar experience. They look at Washington and see an arrogance of power. They see a Congress that doesn't listen, that is ruled by leaders who seem out of touch and dismissive, even disdainful, of the anger that Americans feel toward their government and the challenges they face in an economy struggling to create jobs.

Red Tape Rising: Obama's Torrent of New Regulation
Putting numbers to the "hidden tax."
By JAMES GATTUSO , DIANE KATZ AND STEPHEN KEEN
From the Heritage Foundation - WSJ.com
Abstract: The burden of regulation on Americans increased at an alarming rate in fiscal year 2010. Based on data from the Government Accountability Office, an unprecedented 43 major new regulations were imposed by Washington. And based on reports from government regulators themselves, the total cost of these rules topped $26.5 billion, far more than any other year for which records are available. These costs will affect Americans in many ways, raising the price of the cars they buy and the food they eat, while destroying an untold number of jobs. With the enactment of new health care laws, financial regulations, and plans for rulemaking in other areas, the regulatory burden on Americans is set to increase even further in the coming year.
The Hidden Tax
The cost of regulation has often been called a hidden tax. Although the total does not appear anywhere in the federal budget, the multitude of rules, restrictions, and mandates imposes a heavy burden on Americans and the U.S. economy. According to a report recently released by the Small Business Administration, total regulatory costs amount to about $1.75 trillion annually, [1] nearly twice as much as all individual income taxes collected last year.[2]

Two More Nails In The Dollar's Coffin
the Republican "Victory", and the Fed's QE2
So on Wednesday, not only did the Republicans win control of the House of Representatives, but the Federal Reserve finally took the plunge with Quantitative Easing 2-
-in other words, on the very same day, the U.S. dollar got the ol' one-two punch-right to the groin:
First the spend-and-cut-taxes Republicans won the Congress - and then, the Fed opened the money spigot with QE2.
Talk about a bad hair day! The issue is no longer if the dollar will be killed - it's now a matter of when.
Full disclosure: Though I am a fiscal and social conservative, I have always sneered at the Republican Party's fiscal policies.

Why Printing Money Won't Correct the Correction
By Bill Bonner - TheDailyReckoning.com
11/04/10 Delray Beach, Florida - Well, dear reader, you know the story as well as we do.
"US Stocks Rise as Fed Announces Additional Treasury Purchases," says Bloomberg.
US stocks advanced, with banks helping benchmark indexes erase losses, after the Federal Reserve announced an additional $600 billion of Treasury purchases through June in a bid to boost growth in the world's largest economy.
The S&P 500 climbed 0.4 percent to 1,198.03 as of 3:16 p.m. in New York. The measure had fallen as much as 0.8 percent. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 26.64 points, or 0.2 percent, to 11,215.36.

Doubts grow over wisdom of Ben Bernanke 'super-put'
The early verdict is in on the US Federal Reserve's $600bn of fresh money through quantitative easing. Yields on 30-year Treasury bonds jumped 20 basis points to 4.07pc.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
It is the clearest warning shot to date that global investors will not tolerate Ben Bernanke's openly-declared policy of generating inflation for much longer.
Soaring bourses may have stolen the headlines, but equities are rising for an unhealthy reason: because they are a safer asset class than bonds at the start of an inflationary credit cycle.
Meanwhile, the price of US crude oil jumped $2.5 a barrel to $87. It is up 20pc since markets first concluded in early September that 'QE2' was a done deal.

Bernanke Admits Targeting Stock Prices
by Mike Shedlock
Everyone knew the Fed was attempting to lift stock prices. Today Bernanke admitted it. Please consider Bernanke Says New Purchases Should Aid Growth With Lower Rates
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said resuming large-scale asset purchases should boost economic growth through lower borrowing costs and higher stock prices and that concerns about the strategy are "overstated."
"This approach eased financial conditions in the past and, so far, looks to be effective again," Bernanke said today in an opinion article for the Washington Post released hours after the Fed announced the $600 billion of Treasury buying through June in a second round of unconventional monetary stimulus.

A Huge Rally for Equities Coming in 2011
by Andy Zaky - SeekingAlpha.com
This is indeed the most important week of the year, and maybe even the most important week of the entire business cycle. Whatever happens, there will be a huge opportunity to make some significant gains in 2011. Either the market will breakout today and continue to run until year end, or we'll get our much needed correction after rallying nearly 20% in a little over 2 months on the NASDAQ.
Market participants are looking at two numbers today which will give us the direction for the intermediate term. If the S&P 500 breaks above 1,200 today (Thursday, November 4th) and closes above that mark, then we're headed much much higher from here. Maybe even to 1,300 before year end. If the S&P closes substantially below 1179, then we're probably at the eve of correction. It doesn't matter what happens today because there will be opportunity to capitalize on the directional move in the market.

Fed action may help stock investors but not savers
By John Waggoner, USA TODAY
The Federal Reserve is launching its second round of quantitative easing, and stock investors should get a rise out of it. But savers and bondholders might not be too happy.
QE2 will pump more money into the system to avert deflation - a period of falling prices.
The Fed's action was widely anticipated, so much of its impact may have already been priced into the markets, says Bill Stone, chief economist at PNC Financial. "It was the least-kept secret on the planet," he says.
Still, QE2 might be good for stocks, because it may force money from bonds and savings accounts into the stock market. Higher household 401(k) balances and brokerage accounts will make people feel wealthier and spend more, stimulating the economy, Stone says.

Bernanke's Plan Is Only a Short Term Bet
on the Stock Market (Think 6 Months)
by Bruce Krasting - SeekingAlpha.com
I got a laugh out of the $600b number. The dealers were polled on their expectations last week. The response was an even half trillion. So with that as a bogie the Fed does 600 large. They wanted to do just a bit more than was actually expected. So they added on an extra 100b. They gave the market what it wanted and a little bit of extra cream on the top.
It's like we are in Disney Land. Everything is orchestrated. For six weeks the Fed has been dishing out its intentions. Public speeches have all been planned and edited to make it appear there was a robust debate at the Fed on the merits and risks of QE. At least a half-dozen news articles were planted in major newspapers.

QE2 Shows The Fed Has Failed; Has No Credibility
by Aaron Krowne - ML-Implode.com founder
How soon we forget.
There has been a lot of good commentary on the Fed's latest round in its programme of "quantitative easing" (or "QE"), announced Tuesday, for $600 billion in additional bond buying (or is it $900 billion?) But it all seems to have missed the most important point: the Fed has shattered its credibility because it has broken its own promise, maintained doggedly over the last 1-2 years: that it would quickly exit from its emergency intervention programmes (most notably QE).

The Fed's $850 Billion Bet: Negative Long-Term Implications
by John M. Mason - SeekingAlpha.com
he headline reads that the Federal Reserve is going to engage in a new round of quantitative easing. The Fed is going to purchase an additional $600 billion in US Treasury securities over the next eight months, or $75 billion per month, in order to get the economy growing again. The information that did not make the headlines is that over the same time period, roughly $250 billion will run off of the Fed's mortgage-backed securities portfolio. This $250 billion in mortgage-backed securities will be replaced by the Fed with $250 billion in US Treasury securities.
The world investment community sees a Washington, DC in disarray. The Fed is going crazy. (But, this is not the first time that Bernanke has shown panic (see "The Bailout Plan: Did Bernanke Panic"). And, the additional federal deficit is projected to be at least $15 trillion over the next ten years.

$600 billion Fed funny money! Big LIE!
By: Larry Edelson - MarketOracle.co.uk
This is it - the hot news that Wall Street was waiting for with bated breath.
Fed Chief Bernanke's going to buy another $600 billion in Treasury securities to pump liquidity into the economy.
But it's all one big, fat lie.
Here's why:
First, because the whole concept of "buying Treasuries" is a smokescreen. What Bernanke is really doing is running the money printing presses, and it's no secret. Even the emperor himself knows he has no clothes.
Second, because Bernanke also knows - all too well - that he's not truly pumping money INTO the U.S. economy. In reality, the U.S. economy is leaking like a sieve. So for all practical purposes, he's pumping the money OUT OF the U.S. economy - to countries overseas.
Third and most important, the "big number" - $600 billion - is meaningless. The Fed says quite bluntly that they will ...

Gridlock Achieved
By: Dock Treece - SafeHaven.com
[Author's note: While this article talks about politics, the real focus is on economics, since it is now evident that, more than anywhere else in the world, economics drive politics. If the US economy does not continue to improve, politicians in this country will be punished by voters. The American people have shown that they will not tolerate policymaking that hurts American business and destroys American jobs.]
The night of November 2nd, as the results of elections rolled in from around the country, many political analysts (and politicians themselves) found themselves surprised - some pleasantly, others not so pleasantly. Though the final counts are still being tallied in several races, the broad ramifications of these elections are already evident.

Keep Your Head Above the Dollar
by Peter Schiff - SeekingAlpha.com
There has been so much discussion recently about "QE 2" that you would think the entire financial sector were about to embark on a transatlantic cruise. Unfortunately, they, and we, are not so lucky. In the year 2010, "QE 2" doesn't refer to a sumptuous ocean liner, but a second, more extravagant round of "quantitative easing" - stimulus. In the past, this technique was simply called "printing money." As if the nation has not already suffered enough from the first round, Captain Ben Bernanke and the Fed are determined to compound the damage by hitting us with another monetary juggernaut. Their stated goal is to boost the economy and create jobs. However, since economic growth cannot be achieved by printing money, their QE 2 will sink just as surely as the Titanic.

Gold Jumps $50 in 21 Hours as Fed Devalues the Dollar
with $600bn QE2
By: Adrian Ash - MarketOracle.co.uk
THE PRICE OF GOLD in wholesale dealing leapt at the start of US trading on Thursday, extending an overnight rise to within 0.5% of last month's record highs - and gaining $50 per ounce inside 21 hours - as the US Dollar sank in response to the Federal Reserve's hotly-anticipated "QEII" asset purchase program.
"Currency devaluation remains firmly en vogue," said one London bullion dealer this morning.
The weakening Dollar "is what's helping gold," notes commodity strategist Jesper Dannesboe at SocGen.
Crude oil today hit a 6-month high as the Euro and Sterling both jumped to fresh 10-month highs vs. the Dollar, capping the gold price for European investors at a 1-day high.
Asian and European stock markets added almost 2% on average. New York stocks opened the day over 1% higher.
"We remain bullish on gold," says UBS chief metals strategist Edel Tully, because of "inflation expectations on the rise, low real interest rates, the fear of currency debasement, resilient physical demand, and limited scrap sales."

Gold heading for $2,000 and on up on U.S. political, economic uncertainty
Republican control of Congress, plus more QE adds further uncertainty for the road ahead - and gold thrives on uncertainty.
Author: Jeffrey Nichols - MineWeb.com
NY - Gold thrives on political and economic uncertainty . . . and we've got plenty of that following the Republican victories this week and the Fed's Wednesday afternoon announcement that it is embarking on another large dose of monetary stimulus.
We reiterate our long-term forecast that gold prices will rise to $2,000 an ounce, then $3,000, and possibly higher over the next few years. Certainly, this week's U.S. Congressional election and the policy decisions just announced by the Fed only reinforce our confidence in gold's bullish prospects.
ECONOMIC POLICY STUMBLES ON CAPITOL HILL
Now that the Republicans have overwhelmingly seized control over the U.S. House of Representatives, there will be plenty of rhetoric from Congressional leadership and the Obama Administration about "working together" to solve America's economic problems.

Gold's Toxic Noose Is Untied: Next Crude Oil $150
By: Andrew Butter - MarketOracle.co.uk
Even a Gold Sceptic can go along with the idea that Ron Paul could buy a smart outfit with one ounce of gold in 1920 (including shoes), and that's how much he would need in 2010.
Although by that marker he would have needed four ounces in 2007, given that the sort of tailors that Ron frequents have slashed their prices in half; and the price of gold has doubled. But that's just splitting hairsÉBig Picture, it's not a bad storyline, and the message is that gold holds value, regardless of how insane governments get.
And by all accounts the recent bunch were as insane as Edward II (and ought to have got what he got too (look it up - they do it to Tigers when they want to stuff them)).
What's hard to understand is why gold prices have gone up so much in a time of very low inflation in the biggest economies in the world which, depending of course on your point of reference, might have included a touch of the dreaded deflation. Although no one wants to talk about that; anymore than they want to talk about the insanity of owner's equivalent of rent.

Gold Higher as Risk of Competitive Currency Devaluation
and Debasement Underestimated
By: GoldCore - MarketOracle.co.uk
Gold fell initially after the QE2 announcement yesterday prior to recovering and it then rose steadily in after hours Asian and again in early European trading. Gold has risen to $1,362/oz due to the dollar falling and oil and commodities rising significantly in the aftermath of the announcement of the new $600 billion of quantitative easing.
Gold is currently trading at $1,362.30/oz, €957.21/oz, £843.20/oz.
Gold is now only 2% below its recent nominal record high on October 14th ($1,387.35/oz) and after a period of consolidation the trend would suggest that $1,400/oz remains a near term target. Silver traded erratically yesterday with unusual price swings prior to reasserting its upward momentum and rising to new 30 year highs at $25.40/oz this morning.

Gold Prices Pass a Record $1,380-an-Ounce on Inflation Fears
By DANNY KING - DailyFinance.com
Gold futures surpassed a record price of $1,380 an ounce Thursday on investor fears that the Federal Government's new $600 billion stimulus package may spur inflation and devalue the U.S. dollar.
Gold futures for December rose 3.4% to $1,383.20 an ounce at about 2:40 p.m. Eastern time Thursday after touching an intraday high of $1,384.30. Silver futures for December were up more than 6% Thursday to $25.97 an ounce.
Precious metal prices have been rising all year as investors look for a safe haven amid fears of currency volatility.

BlackRock says gold not pricey given fundamentals
IBTTimes.com
The manager of BlackRock's (BLK.N) $4.5 billion gold fund said bullion is not overpriced given its limited supply and investors' desire for assets that preserve wealth as currencies become more volatile.
Evy Hambro, who manages the 2.8 billion pound ($4.5 billion) Gold & General Fund for the world's largest asset manager, said gold production has largely been flat over the past decade, while the costs of bringing a new mine on stream have risen.
"That supports the price on its own, and then you have to say the inflation-adjusted price for gold to have kept pace with purchasing power is over $2,000 an ounce. So those are your reference points around the gold market right now, and gold is within that range and I don't think it's gone too far at all," he said, although he could not comment on a price target.

IMF gold selling like hot cake
The international monet just announced that it sold 32 tonnes of Gold Bullion in September, writes Julian Phillips of GoldForecaster.
This included the 10 tonnes of Gold Bullion sold to Bangladesh, leaving around 71 tonnes left to go from the IMF's total 403 tonnes first slated for sale in early 2009.
We have passed October now, so if the IMF sold a similar amount of gold last month, then we are down to just below 40 tonnes remaining. If they continue this pace of selling in November, the IMF will only be left with less than 10 tonnes to sell in December and will complete their sales before the end of this year.

Gold and Commodity Investors Profiting As the Fed Creates More Money
By: Richard Daughty - MarketOracle.co.uk
The latest news to depress me is that incomes were reported down 0.1%, and the latest news about spending is that spending is up 0.2%.
The reason that it was extraordinarily depressing for me is that I was trying, in vain, to explain to the drooling half-witted pinhead idiot seated next to me at the bar that I think that "spending" is actually waaAAAaaay down, because, while total spending is up, it is mostly because prices have risen so much that people buy fewer things overall, but pay more per item that they do still buy, which they do because of the rapid decline of their standards of living caused by the loss of buying power of the dollar as a result of the Federal Reserve creating so many more of them.

Gold and Twelve 11 Zeroes, Part Two
By: Adrian Ash - SafeHaven.com
How the one-trick "inflation hedge" more than trebled amid the modern world's template deflation...
LET'S IMAGINE the central bankers are right.
Let's say that - rather than actually ending a two-decade deflation - the price of clothing to Western consumers is only now set to turn lower.
Let's agree that the doubling of central-bank foreign reserves since 2005...plus the worst sub-zero real rates of interest since the mid-70s...will count for nothing in global energy or food prices.
Let's also say, despite all experience since the credit crunch bit in 2007, that the "output gap" theory - those "low rates of resource utilization" as the Fed put it on Wednesday - finally comes good, and so excess capacity conspires with slack demand to pull costs lower.
Let's imagine, in short, that money actually starts to gain value. What then?

Politicians Cannot Stop the Gold Bull Market
By: Jordan Roy Byrne -MarketOracle.co.uk
I can guess the bear argument before they begin to make it. The republicans win congress and there will be a new mandate. Spending will be cut. Money printing may cease. We may have austerity in the US. The US Dollar will rally. This will crush the bull market in precious metals.
First of all, some must have amnesia. They must be forgetting that the largest expansion in government spending and debt came about during republican administrations. (Would Bush have done any different than Obama?). Suddenly they are going to get religion on cutting spending? Will republicans go against their brethren and end the wars? Will they cut social services when at least one person in 50% of households are dependent on Uncle Sam? Will they go for austerity when economic growth and employment growth are stagnant? These are not policies that will keep them in power.

Republican victory and its impact on gold
By Jeffrey Nichols - CommodityOnline.com
Gold thrives on political and economic uncertainty ... and we've got plenty of that following the Republican victories this week and the Fed's Wednesday afternoon announcement that it is embarking on another large dose of monetary stimulus.
We reiterate our long-term forecast that gold prices will rise to $2000 an ounce, then $3000, and possibly higher over the next few years. Certainly, this week's U.S. Congressional election and the policy decisions just announced by the Fed only reinforce our confidence in gold's bullish prospects.

If manipulation ends silver prices could rise sharply
The CFTC investigations and the recent lawsuit accusing HSBC and JP Morgan of illegally manipulating the silver price could lead to substantially higher silver prices going forward.
Author: David Levenstein - MineWeb.com
JOHANNESBURG - For many years numerous analysts have accused some of the large bullion banks of manipulating the price of silver by using futures contracts offered by Comex. In simple terms they have created an artificial supply of silver by maintaining an oversized short position which they have rolled over month after month, or increased whenever the prices have moved upwards. The position held by four or less of these bullion banks has at times been equivalent to more than fifty percent of the annual production of silver. The effect of this short position has been to suppress the price of silver despite the extremely bullish fundamentals for this metal. However, while this short position has managed to cap the prices of silver for a long time, when these shorts are bought back or covered, the price effect of going short is reversed and it becomes bullish.

Battered Obama took part in a 'cover up', says ex-regulator
by Will Henley - GFSNews.com
Following the Democrat Party's drubbing in mid-term elections, outspoken former regulator Bill Black takes aim at Barack Obama's "disastrous" response to the financial crisis
In a last campaign pitch to voters, US President Barack Obama justified his response to the Great Recession by contrasting it to "S&L", a 1980s and early 1990s crisis which saw nearly 800 savings and loans institutions go bust amid a disastrous commercial real estate bubble.
Yet for Bill Black - a former Federal Home Loan Bank Board litigation director who as deputy director of the National Commission on Financial Institution Reform, Recovery and Enforcement contributed to a major 1993 report on S&L - it's an analogy which sticks in the throat.
"It's a terrible comparison," says Black.

Global stock markets rally,
dollar slides on US Federal Reseve stimulus plan
World stock markets rallied and the dollar slid as the US Federal Reserve's $600bn (£370bn) plan to stimulate the economy reignited investor appetite for risk.
Telegraph.co.uk
London's FTSE 100 index, which had risen strongly in the morning, closed up 113 points - almost 2pc - to a 28-month high of 5863 points, and US stocks opened sharply higher.
The Dow Jones in jumped to a fresh two-year high, gaining more than 170 points - or 1.5pc - to 11,386 - yesterday it rose 0.2pc after the Fed outlined its bond buying plan. The broader S&P 500 gained 1.3pc and the technology-rich Nasdaq rose 1.2pc.
US Retailers reported solid sales in October, helped lift shares with Gap up 7pc in early trading and Macy's 4pc. Evidence that US shoppers were spending more on clothing helped traders shrug off a higher-than-expected rise in the number of new jobless claims.

Will QE2 Trigger Massive Selloff? Marc Faber Weighs In
by Michael Bogan - LewRockwell.com
Speaking to Bloomberg last week, Marc Faber gave viewers a rundown of his thoughts on the markets as an announcement from the Fed regarding QE2 nears.
On equities, Faber is not optimistic in the short term. He expects a selloff after the Fed announcement on Wednesday, noting that many investors could be disappointed with the language released out of the Sept. 2-3 FOMC meeting.
In addition to his expectations regarding investor reactions to the FOMC meeting, the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII) released results of a survey which show overly optimistic sentiment of further gains in the S&P. Faber doesn't like any asset that is too heavily weighted with investors optimism.

All Treasuries All the Time: The Impact of QE2
By Addison Wiggin - Ther DailyReckoning.com
11/04/10 Baltimore, Maryland - So ... This is what life after "QE2" looks like:

Record gold prices
Stocks back at pre-Lehman levels
And a dollar cruising toward its 2008 lows.
Everything is rallying...in terms of depreciating dollars. Mission accomplished. Ben Bernanke needs George W. Bush's ol' "shock and awe" flak jacket.
In case mainstream media coverage made you glaze over, here's the quick and dirty of the Federal Reserve's fateful decision...
The Fed will buy $600 billion in Treasuries over the next 8 months
The mortgage securities the Fed bought during QE1 now reaching maturity will continue to be rolled over into Treasuries, as they have been since August. That's another $275 billion, give or take
There was also the caveat that more of this could be in the works if unemployment stays high and inflation (as defined by core CPI) stays low.

Taxing the Rich to Cure the Governments Debt Crisis?
By: Robert Murphy - MarketOracle.co.uk
"Progressive" Income-Tax Codes Lead to Volatile Revenues
In the opening moments of the segment, correspondent Lesley Stahl explains that "eight states have increased so-called millionaire income taxes so far as a way of avoiding drastic budget cuts."
Of course, many readers of Mises.org really mean it when they say theft is wrong, and that a majority cannot justly take an individual's property, even if they plan on doing something nice with it. On this score, raising taxes is wrong for purely ethical reasons. Unfortunately, most Americans don't endorse this way of thinking, and so, in the present article, I'll focus on pragmatic arguments.

Soak-the-Rich Taxes: Fail!
Mises Daily: by Robert P. Murphy
This week's episode of 60 Minutes featured a 13-minute segment on "taxing the rich" in order to cure the government's debt problem. In addition to being an outrageously biased story, the coverage was filled with more economic fallacies than I can address in a single article.
"Progressive" Income-Tax Codes Lead to Volatile Revenues
In the opening moments of the segment, correspondent Lesley Stahl explains that "eight states have increased so-called millionaire income taxes so far as a way of avoiding drastic budget cuts."

Swiss Bankers Want To Liquidate Tamarack Resort
Swiss Bankers To Idaho Judge: Liquidation Of Tamarack Ski Resort 'the Only Reasonable Course'
(AP) BOISE, Idaho (AP) - The Swiss bank that leads a lender group owed $300 million by Tamarack Resort says liquidating the central Idaho vacation getaway is the best way to recoup a fraction of their investment.
Credit Suisse Group asked U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Terry Myers this week to set the stage for the final sale of Tamarack assets, either under a U.S. trustee or a state court judge's supervision.
Tamarack owner Jean-Pierre Boespflug, trying desperately to arrange a sale, said Wednesday he plans to oppose the motion.
The Zurich-based bank's move is an about-face from its failed bid last month to lend $2 million to help Tamarack find a buyer.

Largest Lenders Control Mortgage Industry.
Time to Engage Community Bankers
by Joe Murin - MortgageNewsDaily.com
I've been very busy over the past few weeks answering questions regarding the foreclosure mess and the accompanying "robo-signing" dilemma.
What surprises me are not the concerns over systematic risks surrounding the issue or whether or not fraud has occurred, but the fact that everyone I've spoken to is shocked that something like this could have happened.
To this I say, have you not been paying attention?
The government initiated HAMP program has failed to address loan modifications effectively and short-sales have failed to efficiently mitigate housing's losses.
These two outcomes have played out for the same reason: Four major banks control over 75% of the nations mortgage servicing. The GSE's failure too can be linked to Fannie and Freddie controlling over 70% of the nations mortgage-backed securities market during their hay day. Too much control in the hands of the few has ultimately ended in chaos.

Quantitative easing is just devaluation
By JEFF RUBIN - The globe and mail
As the Federal Reserve Board gets ready for yet another round of quantitative easing (i.e. printing more money), one may well ask: Why? If previous quantitative easing hasn't spurred domestic spending, why does the Fed believe that more of the same will suddenly produce results?
It's not domestic spending that the Fed really hopes to stimulate by printing more money, but, rather, exports. While the Fed's zero-interest rate policy has yet to lever much in the way of a domestic spending rebound, no one can doubt its ability to drop the value of its currency.

Bernanke Unleashes $15.9 Billion in Bond Sales: Credit Markets
By Sapna Maheshwari
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Corporate bond sales surged to $15.9 billion, the busiest day in almost two months, as the Federal Reserve's move to stimulate the economy ignited a rush of issuers tapping credit markets at record-low interest rates.
Coca-Cola Co., the world's largest soft-drink maker, raised $4.5 billion in its biggest offering, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The securities include $1.25 billion of three-year notes at a coupon of 0.75 percent, tying the Atlanta-based company with Wal-Mart Stores Inc. for the lowest rate for that maturity.

Is bull market in bond funds close to running its course?
By John Waggoneer - USAToday.com
Every so often, you get a sense of impending doom. Did I forget to unplug the toaster? Why is my boss so pale? Does the postman usually wear a hockey mask?
If you have bond funds in your portfolio, you probably feel the same way: Sooner or later, interest rates will rise, and the value of your bond funds will fall. Perhaps you should start replacing those bond funds with something virtually guaranteed to go up: money funds.

Bernanke soft-pedals QE2 risks
Posted by Colin Barr - CNNMoney Fortune
Is Ben Bernanke trying to export our problems to the rest of the world?
Bernanke says in a piece in Thursday's Washington Post that the Fed decided to buy $600 billion worth of Treasury bonds over the next eight months in order to bring domestic interest rates down even further and boost asset prices. He hopes to start a "virtuous circle" of more spending, higher incomes and expanding profits, he says, that will support U.S. economic growth.
But while the United States has long been seen as the locomotive pulling the global economy behind it, a leading pundit says the Fed's latest move isn't likely to fire up the boilers in the U.S. What's more, the latest round of asset purchases risks putting the world's biggest economy on a collision course with other countries whose problems will only be exacerbated by QE2 outcomes such as a falling dollar.

Geithner's 4% Plan May Be 'Unworkable' as APEC Meets
By Simon Kennedy and Shamim Adam
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner's shot to end the "currency war" by pushing for targets to shrink current-account gaps may fail even with backing from China, Citigroup Inc. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. say.
Geithner aims to use a Nov. 5-6 meeting of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum counterparts in Kyoto, Japan, to press his case for current-account deficit or surplus targets of less than 4 percent of gross domestic product. The proposal is also on the agenda for a Group of 20 summit in Seoul next week.

China backs France's G-20 goals
By Nathalie Boschat and William Horobin
PARIS (MarketWatch) - China supports France's aim to work on ways to reform the international monetary system when it takes up the presidency of the Group of 20 developed and emerging nations, the presidents of the two nations said in a joint statement Thursday.
China "actively supports France's upcoming presidency of the G-20" France's President Nicolas Sarkozy and China's President Hu Jintao said in a statement on the first day of the Chinese leader's three-day official visit to France.
The two leaders stressed the need for the G-20 to increase the coordination of macroeconomic policies and to revamp the global monetary system in order to curb currency volatility, which hurts growth. China added it backs France's aim to fight excessive volatility on commodities markets.

China's Korea Bond Holdings Triple as Reserves Exit Dollars
By Frances Yoon - BusinessWeek
Nov. 3 (Bloomberg) -- China's holdings of South Korean government bonds almost tripled in the first 10 months of this year as policy makers shifted part of the world's largest foreign-exchange reserves out of U.S. Treasuries and into emerging-market assets.
The amount of Korean Treasury bonds owned by China totaled 5.59 trillion won ($5 billion) at the end of October, 198 percent more than at the start of the year, according to data released today by South Korea's Financial Supervisory Service. China boosted its holdings of the securities by 438 billion won in October, the biggest increase since May. Its holdings of U.S. Treasuries fell 2.3 percent in the first eight months of 2010 to $868.4 billion, U.S. data show.

China's Banks Buy Dollars in Korea
By Kim Jae-won - Staff Reporter - 04-19-2010
Major Chinese banks operating here are busy buying up dollars from Korean lenders as they are suffering a dollar shortage due to China's tightening monetary policy and the rising possibility of revaluating the yuan.
Seoul branches of three Chinese banks - China Construction Bank (CCB), Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), and Bank of Communications - said that they are seeking to buy dollars from Korean banks in order to offset the drainage of dollars at their headquarters.
They said that there are two key reasons behind their dollar buying here - tightening money supply policy and looming appreciation of the yuan.

BofA's Moynihan 'Surprised' by New York Fed Loan Putback Demand
By David Mildenberg and Jody Shenn
Nov. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Bank of America Corp. Chief Executive Officer Brian T. Moynihan said he was surprised when the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and investors sent a letter pushing the firm to repurchase soured mortgages pooled into securities.
The bank expects to resolve the dispute, which could pressure Bank of America to foreclose on borrowers more quickly, Moynihan, 51, said today in Boston during a presentation to banking analysts. "I don't think we should be put in a position where we aren't trying to help homeowners through this strife because people want us to foreclose faster," he said.

New questions being raised about court filings in foreclosure cases
Individuals hired by law firms to notify homeowners of pending foreclosure cases may have filed faulty or false documents
Diane C. Lade, Sun Sentinel
The expanding investigation into Florida's foreclosure crisis has turned up a new problem that may involve a number of cases: Individuals hired by law firms to notify struggling homeowners when their foreclosure cases are to be heard in court may have filed faulty or false documents.
Foreclosure defense attorneys and consumer advocates say they have documented a number of foreclosure cases where "process servers" filed questionable paperwork. State investigators who are examining foreclosure documentation problems -- involving law firms that employed "robosigners" to rapidly process claims -- are also taking a close look at process servers, court documents show.

More Board Members Getting Hired as CEOs:
An Unwise Corporate Trend
By SHERYL NANCE-NASH - DailyFinance.com
Over the past year, the Fortune 1,000 has seen a significant jump in the number of directors being appointed as the CEOs of companies on whose boards they serve: Ten directors stepped in as permanent CEOs from October 2009 to October 2010, compared to only three tapped as chief during the 12 months prior. One additional director was named interim CEO this year, bringing the total for the past year to 11, according to research from Heidrick & Struggles. In August alone, three directors sat down in the CEO's seat: Dan Akerson at GM, Fred Chang at online retailer Newegg, and James Shelton of nursing home pharmacy giant Omnicare.
So why has the number of directors being tapped for CEO posts more than tripled in the past year?

Only 1 out of 21 distressed properties show up on the MLS for Pasadena
DoctorHousingBubble.com
Southern California housing is entering a special kind of rehab and not the kind seen on HGTV. There is still this lingering nostalgia from many that I have spoken to that somehow we are only a few months away from entering another glorious housing bull (bubble) market. Some are pointing to the almighty Federal Reserve and their manufactured attempt at Quantitative Easing. People forget that the Fed has already embarked on this and look how well that Midas touch turned out. What many fail to understand is that without real income growth there is little point in juicing up the banking market yet again. All this will do is prolong the misery and put the U.S. dollar at risk for further weakness which long-term is probably more distressing. Yet everything is different in the sunshine state and math doesn't apply in Hollywood right? Well let us look at a few examples in Pasadena and see what is going on in the trenches.

30-year fixed mortgage rates rise, others fall
Rates on the popular 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rose for a third straight week as all other loan programs saw improvement, mortgage financier Freddie Mac reported today.
The 30-year fixed inched up to 4.24 percent during the week ending November 4, up from 4.23 percent last week, but well below the 4.98 percent average seen a year ago.
The 15-year fixed fell to 3.63 percent from 3.66 percent, and is nearly a point below the 4.40 percent average seen this time last year.
Five-Year and One-Year ARMs Hit Record Lows
Meanwhile, the five-year adjustable-rate mortgage hit a new record low 3.39 percent, down from 3.41 percent last week and 4.35 percent a year ago.
The one-year ARM also fell into record territory, slipping to 3.26 percent from 3.30 percent, and is more than a point below the 4.47 percent average seen back in November 2009.

Countrywide purchase keeps costing Bank of America
$8.5 billion lost since '08; lawsuits, investigations, buyback requests add to tab
By Rick Rothacker - CharlotteObserver.com
For Bank of America, Countrywide Financial is turning into a fixer-upper home that keeps needing one more budget-busting repair.
In January 2008, then-chief executive Ken Lewis called the Charlotte bank's $4billion deal to buy the troubled lender a "compelling value." But nearly three years later, the mortgage unit created by the acquisition is a major headache for Lewis' successor, Brian Moynihan, and the bank's shareholders.
Since the purchase closed in July 2008, the bank's home loan division has lost $8.5 billion. Bank of America has reached more than $730 million in Countrywide-related legal and regulatory settlements. And the bank has set aside $4.4 billion to cover requests from investors to buy back soured home loans.

33% Tax Hike Will Hit Illinois; Another Stiffed Illinois Vendor Stops Servicing State; Common Sense in Tucson and Delta Airlines
By Mike Shedlock
Illinois has a $13 billion and growing deficit. The current backlog of bills approaches $6 billion. The state has not paid some suppliers for seven months. In response some vendors have stopped doing business with the state.
Please consider Another vendor quits doing business with Illinois
Records show the Illinois Department of Corrections was forced to scramble this week when a vendor refused to deliver foam food trays to Menard Correctional Center because it hadn't been paid. Industrial Soap Co., which holds the master contract for the foam trays, "will not deliver due to delinquent invoices," prison officials noted.

Census Bureau Reports More Renters, Fewer Homeowners
HousingDoom.com
With millions of homes going into foreclosure, you'd assume that homeownership rates were falling and more folks were renting. Data from the U.S. Census Bureau seems to support this:
National vacancy rates in the third quarter 2010 were 10.3 percent for rental housing, a decline of 0.8 percentage points lower than the rate recorded in the third quarter 2009 and 0.3 percentage points lower than last quarter. That's a 7 percent decline in one year.

Prices for milk, beef, sugar on the rise
By Julie Jargon and Ilan Brat, Dow Jones News Service
An inflationary tide is beginning to ripple through America's supermarkets and restaurants, threatening to end the tamest year of food pricing in nearly two decades.
Prices of staples including milk, beef, coffee, cocoa and sugar have risen sharply in recent months. And food makers and retailers including McDonald's Corp., Kellogg Co. and Kroger Co. have begun to signal that they will try to make consumers shoulder more of the higher costs for ingredients.

The Ugly Truth About Unemployment
By VISHESH KUMAR - DailyFinance.com
Investors are starting to get more confident about the outlook for the U.S. economy. Risky assets like stocks, for example, are seeing renewed interest.
But the painful unemployment situation in the country continues to hold center stage. The Republican Party registered big midterm election gains from an electorate frustrated by a lack of progress on jobs, among other things. And the Fed announced more measures to drive down interest rates in an effort to further boost the economy and increase hiring on Wednesday.

Who Needs 'Shovel-Ready' Projects?
Reason Foundation's annual study of state highway systems.
By DAVID T. HARTGE, RAVI K. KARANAM, M. GREGORY FIELDS, TRAVIS A. KERSCHER, AND ADRIAN T. MOORE
From the Reason Foundation
We often hear the nation's infrastructure is crumbling, but state highway conditions are the best they've been in 19 years, according to Reason Foundation's 19th Annual Highway Report. Unfortunately, the recession is partly responsible for the improvement in road conditions: people are driving less which has helped slow pavement deterioration and reduced traffic congestion and fatalities.
The annual Reason Foundation study measures the condition and cost-effectiveness of state-owned roads in 11 categories, including deficient bridges, urban traffic congestion, fatality rates, pavement condition on urban and rural Interstates and on major rural roads, and the number of unsafe narrow rural lanes. National performance in all of those key areas improved in 2008, the most recent year with complete data available.

New Republican House Promises Investigation Of Global Warming Fraud
Paul Joseph Watson - Prison Planet.com
One of the first tasks of the new Republican-controlled House of Congress will be to launch a full investigation into the man-made global warming fraud, as the climate change con that threatens to tax and regulate the American middle class out of existence is exposed to what could prove terminal scrutiny.
"The GOP plans to hold high profile hearings examining the alleged "scientific fraud" behind global warming, a sleeper issue in this election that motivated the base quite a bit," writes the Atlantic's Marc Ambinder.
As Politico's Darren Samuelsohn and Robin Bravender reported yesterday, Barack Obama can count of substantially less allies in his effort to push through his cap and tax agenda, because over two dozen of them were defeated in the mid-term elections, being replaced by Republicans who on the whole are increasingly skeptical towards man-made climate change.

UK / Vatican ?

Did somebody just try to buy the British government?
Hansard is the official printed transcript of the proceedings of the houses of parliament - in other words, the working log of the British government.
It is an authoritative primary source, and records every speech made in the House of Commons and the House of Lords. Interestingly, it also records words spoken under parliamentary privilege.
So when an eminent member of the House of Lords stands up six hours into a debate and blows the gaff on a shadowy foreign Foundation making a bid to buy the British state, and this is recorded in Hansard, one tends to sit up and take notice. And one takes even more notice when His Lordship tip-toes around actually naming the Foundation in question, especially after the throw-away about money-laundering for the IRA on behalf of the Bank of England. Parliamentary privilege only stretches so far, it seems, and Foundation X is beyond its reach. I'm going to quote at length below the cut - if you want to read the original, search for "1 Nov 2010 : Column 1538" which is where things begin to tip-toe into Robert Ludlum territory.

India Tries to Reassure U.S. Over Outsourcing Fears
AP via FOXNews.com
MUMBAI, India -- India's outsourcing companies, often blamed for stealing Main Street jobs, want Americans to know: We're hiring in the U.S.
They along with President Obama, who arrives in India's financial capital Mumbai on Saturday, are at pains to reassure the American public that India is here to help the U.S.
On paper, the relationship looks great: Two big markets, two democracies, growing trade. In practice, there's a creeping sense that it may not live up to the hype. India, emboldened by its growing economic importance, is not playing by U.S. rules. And the U.S., which has lashed out at India's key outsourcing industry even as it funnels billions to its ally in the war on terror -- India's archrival Pakistan -- looks like less of a friend than New Delhi might like.

November 2nd, 1922.
Arctic Ocean Getting Warm;
Seals Vanish and Icebergs Melt.
The original source of the story resurfacing recently was from an Inside the Beltway column of August 14th, 2007. The newspaper article was located in the Library of Congress archives by James Lockwood.
Here is the text of the Washington Post (Associated Press) article:

The Arctic ocean is warming up, icebergs are growing scarcer and in some places the seals are finding the water too hot, according to a report to the Commerce Department yesterday from Consul Ifft, at Bergen, Norway.
Reports from fishermen, seal hunters and explorers, he declared, all point to a radical change in climate conditions and hitherto unheard-of temperatures in the Arctic zone. Exploration expeditions report that scarcely any ice has been met with as far north as 81 degrees 29 minutes. Soundings to a depth of 3,100 meters showed the gulf stream still very warm.
Great masses of ice have been replaced by moraines of earth and stones, the report continued, while at many points well known glaciers have entirely disappeared. Very few seals and no white fish are found in the eastern Arctic, while vast shoals of herring and smelts, which have never before ventured so far north, are being encountered in the old seal fishing grounds.

UPDATE:
The source report of the Washington Post article on changes in the arctic has been found in the Monthly Weather Review for November 1922.

EGYPT: Authorities on high alert to protect churches
after Al Qaeda threat
LATimes.com
Egyptian authorities are stepping up efforts to protect the country's Christian churches following a series of threats by Al Qaeda.
Newspapers reported Tuesday that the Ministry of Interior had tightened its security presence and police patrols around all churches in Cairo and other provinces across the country. Worshipers will also be thoroughly searched before entering any church.
An eyewitness in the Qena, where six Copts and a Muslim were killed in a drive-by shooting outside a church on Jan. 7, said that no fewer than six security vehicles were positioned outside his neighborhood church. He added that no cars were allowed to park within about 300 yards of the area.

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Thursday 11.04.2010

The U.S. Mid-Term Elections are Over ... Yet it Ain't Over
By: Joseph Toronto - MarketOracle.co.uk
Our financial system and our economy nearly collapsed over two years ago. With proper management we should have recovered, but we haven't. Unemployment, the one thing that voters see and feel, front and center, remains the highest it's been for decades and voters are justifiably angry.
The diagnosis and remedy has been obscured by dogma and propaganda, but it is not rocket science. Our politicians have had ample time to execute the single most important agenda item of the voters, economic recovery, yet they didn't. They therefore must be recalled. They fought over health care (medium priority), politics (who gets to be in charge), and dithered over everything else. The most egregious sin of all was giving away Trillions of voter money to overleveraged failing banks and corporations of the elite who made no worse decisions in going into debt than the voters themselves who overextended into debt to buy homes. While saving our incompetent institutions, the people were afforded no likewise relief from their politicians that control their own tax money.

The Road Ahead Turns Right
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN - NYTimes.com
Energized by their big victories in the midterm elections, Congressional Republican leaders wasted no time on Wednesday in putting President Obama and Democrats on notice: the days of single-party control are numbered and legislating in Washington is about to get a whole lot more complicated.
Oh, and by the way, lest anyone forget: Republicans still have major problems with the two major pieces of legislation that Democrats pushed through this year - the overhauls of health care and financial regulation - and they intend to do something about it as soon as they can.

Republicans Take the House and QE Too!
By: PhilStockWorld - MarketOracle.co.uk
By Now, like many Americans, the Democrats know what it's like to lose their House.
Back in the mid-1800's, the nation had another kind of Tea Party as the Whigs became a successful 3rd party, even going so far as to put two men in the White House - William Henry Harrison and Zachary Taylor plus Millard Fillmore, who succeeded "Old Rough and Ready" who died just after a year in office but that was a long term compared to Harrison, who caught pneumonia making a long inauguration speech in the freezing rain and died of it a month later despite attempts to cure him with opium, castor oil and leeches - treatments we are likely to see again as the Republicans vow to repeal Health Care legislation.

Dr. Ron Paul says Rand and I will introduce legislation
to End the Fed! First day!

Why Quantitative Easing Is Similar to Monopoly
By: Jared Levy - MarketOracle.co.uk
The second iteration of quantitative easing (QE2) is supposed to make "money easier" -- make it flow from the banks to consumers to businesses, etc. The first round of quantitative easing pumped billions of U.S. dollars into the system, but not much of it made it into my hands, and I'm guessing yours either ...
If you have ever played Monopoly and have been "the bank," you get to control all the money that is divided out to each player.
Remember that the "extra" money is not part of the money circulating in the game yet.
Did you ever cheat and add a little of that "bank" money to your own reserves? I know some of you may have at least thought about it. I mean, how cool was it to just print or add money as you saw fit, so you could buy more stuff?

The Federal Reserve's Gamble: Here's What Could Go Wrong
Wednesday, November 03, 2010
By Matthew Craft CNSNews.com
(AP) - The Federal Reserve is about to take a huge risk in hopes of getting the economy steaming along again. Nobody is sure it will work, and it may actually do damage.
The Fed is expected to announce Wednesday that it will buy $500 billion to $1 trillion in government debt, and drive already low long-term interest rates even lower. The central bank would buy the debt in chunks of $100 billion a month, probably starting immediately.
Economists call it "quantitative easing." It gets the name "QE2" -- like the ship -- because this would be the second round. The Fed spent about $1.7 trillion from 2008 to earlier this year to take bonds off the hands of banks and stabilize them.

No Cutting Back: The Bernanke Money Printing Story
By Bill Bonner - The DailyReckoning.com
11/03/10 Delray Beach, Florida - We had a brush with democracy yesterday. Very unpleasant. Elizabeth went to vote. Her husband accompanied her.
"Do you really think your vote will make a difference?" we asked as we headed for the polling station.
"No, but if everyone took your point of view we couldn't have a democracy at all."
"Wouldn't that be a good thing?"
"I'm not going to get into a big discussion with you. I'm doing what I think I should as a good citizen. That's all there is to it."
The polling station was manned by women. Old women. About 8 of them. There was one old man at the door. There were more attendants than voters when we went in at about 1PM. It was quiet. Still. Of course, this was Florida. But the geriatrics made us think that the whole thing was about to go into terminal care. American democracy, that is.

With the Republicans in Power, What About The U.S. Economy?
By: Danny Schechter - MarketOracle.co.uk
The Election is over. The Dems were thumped. They lost the House, even if they still have the Senate by a hair. Barney Frank will be back but not Alan Grayson or Russ Feingold. WSWS offered the key reason: "intractable and deepening economic crisis and the evident inability of the Obama administration to develop any policies to overcome it."
Is that crisis likely to go away after an emboldened army of the righteous (and well-financed claque of self-styled "economically responsible" free market boosters) won more nominal power?

Did the New Deal End the Depression?
Don't make Thomas Sowell laugh.
By Thomas Sowell - LewRockwell.com
Guess Who?
Guess who said the following: "We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work." Was it Sarah Palin? Rush Limbaugh? Karl Rove?
Not even close. It was Henry Morgenthau, Secretary of the Treasury under Franklin D. Roosevelt and one of FDR's closest advisers. He added, "after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started ... And an enormous debt to boot!"

U.S. Revolution Coming Against State Handouts
By: Gary North - MarketOracle.co.uk
Almost nobody these days likes to call a spade a spade in public. In fact, calling a spade a spade in public is a form of political incorrectness. The Establishment puts negative pressure on all those who identify a spade as a spade, if that identification might cost the government a loss of power.
Here are a few examples. We are not supposed to say "government handouts." Instead, these are called "entitlements." It is not proper to say "central bank inflation." This is called "quantitative easing." Illegal aliens are "undocumented workers." In true Orwellian fashion, the systematic practice of deception is called "transparency."

The gap big enough to swallow a party
By Wesley Pruden - NYTimes.com
Tip O'Neill, the speaker of the House when the collective wisdom was that Congress belonged by right to the Democrats, insisted that "all politics is local." That was the key to the success that rained and rained on Democrats.
Every senator, every congressman, even every governor learns to put his considerable ego aside to recognize that it's the race for sheriff that draws the voters to the Election Day polls.
But there's an occasional exception, and this is that year. This year, politics is about waking up after a long sleep with Barack Obama, and wishing the president had been in someone else's bed. This is the year the national became local.

Global Monetary System in Crisis,
Currency War Is Leading to Trade War
By: Bob Chapman - MarketOracle.co.uk
The UK, Europe, the US and Canada are different degrees of welfare states. By way of regulation, government controls via taxation. The states and their inhabitants send taxes to Washington, which takes its cut and sends funds back to the states with strings attached. You either do what we want you to do, or we cut off your funds. The states and the people are subject to extortion with government using their funds to do so. By using regulations, welfare and extortion, the federal government creates dependency.

U.S. "Quantitative Easing" is Fracturing the Global Economy
Prof Michael Hudson - SilverBearCafe.co.uk
Great structural changes in world trade and finance occur quickly - by quantum leaps, not by slow marginal accretions. The 1945-2010 era of relatively open trade, capital movements and foreign exchange markets is being destroyed by a predatory financial opportunism that is breaking the world economy into two spheres: a dollar sphere in which central banks in Europe, Japan and many OPEC and Third World countries hold their reserves the form of U.S. Treasury debt of declining foreign-exchange value; and a BRIC-centered sphere, led by China, India, Brazil and Russia, reaching out to include Turkey and Iran, most of Asia, and major raw materials exporters that are running trade surpluses.

The Imminent Currency Collapse, a Possible Solution
Szandor Blestman - SilverBearCafe.com
I apologize to my readers in advance for this article as I am going to take a slight left turn to my usual opinion. While I remain a staunch advocate of free markets and a voluntary society, I accept that there is a need to acknowledge the reality that exists. While I believe that the current power structure needs a major overhaul, I understand that change needs to come about gradually and peacefully, otherwise the violence inherent in the system perpetuates itself. When it comes time to examine these issues and consider solutions to existing problems, one should try to consider how to make changes that will impact the common folk in the least painful way.

Keep Your Head Above the Dollar
By Peter Schiff - SeekingAlpha.com
There has been so much discussion recently about "QE 2" that you would think the entire financial sector were about to embark on a transatlantic cruise. Unfortunately, they, and we, are not so lucky. In the year 2010, "QE 2" doesn't refer to a sumptuous ocean liner, but a second, more extravagant round of "quantitative easing" - stimulus. In the past, this technique was simply called "printing money." As if the nation has not already suffered enough from the first round, Captain Ben Bernanke and the Fed are determined to compound the damage by hitting us with another monetary juggernaut. Their stated goal is to boost the economy and create jobs. However, since economic growth cannot be achieved by printing money, their QE 2 will sink just as surely as the Titanic.

Making Sense of the Money Supply
By: Chris Riley - MarketOracle.co.uk
With the Fed's rapid expansion of the monetary base in recent years, many commentators have pointed out that this has not led to growth in the money supply and hence the Fed is powerless to deal with "deflationary" forces in the economy.
The first point to note is that rapid expansion in the monetary base has not yet led to runaway monetary growth. The expansion in the monetary base has been used to prevent the money supply from collapsing. This does not preclude the possibility that money supply growth will runaway in the future, particularly if the Fed is left holding assets that it does not, or cannot, liquidate quickly. However, is there any direct link between money supply growth and price inflation?

Why Investing in Gold Will Save Your Butt
By: Richard Daughty - MarketOracle.co.uk
When I got back to the office, the place was abuzz, all stemming from how my boss wanted to "see me" as soon as I got back from wherever the hell I was. I knew what it was about. It was about old man Sanderson and the stupid Sanderson account.
The problem was that I had just seen the Britebart.tv video of the megalomaniacal and totally incompetent Harry Reid, Congressional Representative from Nevada and doofus extraordinaire, saying, "But for me, we'd be in a worldwide depression."
So, inspired, I told Sanderson to stick his problems, and that, "But for me, you would be sued into bankruptcy after using our defective parts, ya moron!"

Gold rallies as price drop lures investors
Prices climb as much as $18 an ounce after U.S. Fed's QE decision
By Myra P. Saefong, MarketWatch
TOKYO (MarketWatch) - Gold futures rebounded in electronic trading late Thursday morning in Tokyo, as a more than $19 loss in New York spurred bargain hunters in the wake of the U.S. Federal Reserve's plan for more quantitative easing.
December gold was up $17.90 at $1,355.50 an ounce after tapping a high of $1,356.50. The contract had closed Wednesday in New York down $19.30, for a loss of 1.4%.
The Fed plans to buy up to $600 billion in long-term Treasurys until the end of June 2011, including about $75 billion this month, in a bid to boost the economy.
The expected government spending will add fuel to the "inflation fire," said Kevin Kerr, editor of Kerr Commodities Watch, so "gold is the safe harbor longer term."

Gold Hits Volatility, Silver Hits $25, Ahead of Fed's
"Dangerous Gamble with Global Economy"
By: Adrian Ash - MarketOracle.co.uk
THE PRICE OF GOLD was volatile in a widening price-range on Wednesday morning in London, whipping between $1353 and $1364 per ounce ahead of the Federal Reserve's widely-expected relaunch of quantitative easing, aka QEII.
World stock markets traded higher as the US Dollar fell, and major-economy government bonds also rose in price, nudging 10-year US Treasury yields down to 2.55%.
Crude oil jumped back towards $85 per barrel, while the Australian Dollar rose through parity to the US currency for the first time since July 1982.
Silver recorded its first London Fix above $25.00 per ounce since 3 March 1980.
"The Federal Reserve's proposed policy of quantitative easing is a dangerous gamble with only a small potential upside benefit and substantial risks of creating asset bubbles that could destabilise the global economy," says Harvard economist Marty Feldstein in the Financial Times today.

Silver is the Precious Metal of Choice
Kenneth Schortgen Jr - SilverBearCafe.com
In older times, financial planners would say to buy safe assets like annuities or bonds for wealth protection. Realtors would tell us that land is the way to go since they aren't making any more of it, and the business world would try to sell you on the value of the stock markets to grow your investment dollars.
Those financial vehicles are fine, only when used in the proper cycle of the markets. However, with the current recession we are in, NONE of these products are anywhere near safe, nor viable as the government works to create inflation through the Fed's quantitative easing.

Silver...Silver...Silver....'More on the Case of Silver'
By: David Galland - MarketOracle.co.uk
Last month gold broke into new record territory - reaching an all-time high of $1,387 on October 14.
A new record in nominal terms, that is. To top the previous high in inflation-adjusted dollars, gold will have to approximately double from there.
Silver, however, has barely made it halfway back to its prior nominal high of $49.45 an ounce, achieved on January 21, 1980. In order to break into new territory in inflation-adjusted dollars (using the same CPI calculation methodology used in 1980), silver would have to rise to over $250 an ounce - more than ten times where it is today.

When the Price of Silver Doubles in a Month
By The Mogambo Guru The DailyReckoning.com
11/03/10 Tampa, Florida - Bill Bonner here at The Daily Reckoning writes, "In England, the government of David Cameron has announced the biggest cutbacks since WWII. He's going to lighten the UK government expense load by 81 billion pounds over the next 5 years. Nearly half a million government employees are to be given the heave-ho."
In an odd sort of symmetry, it is sort of like that around here, too. Rumors fly like sparks that the company is losing money, and to save money, a lot of people are going to be fired, particularly me, along with a few other lazy incompetents who actually deserve to get fired, if you ask me, because they are so stupid that when I ask them a simple question like, "Are you buying gold, silver and oil in fearful response to the Federal Reserve creating so much money that the wholesale debasement of the purchasing power of the dollar, popularly perceived as inflation in prices, is going to cause the gigantic inflation in consumer prices that was actually predicted earlier in the same sentence, spooky and Nostradamus-like, thus proving everything I said?"

If You Haven't Bought Silver Yet, Read This
By: DailyWealth - MarketOracle.co.uk
Chris Weber writes: The last time I was able to identify a period when a precious metals correction was about over happened two years ago ...
At that time, gold hit a low of $693 and silver $9.63. Since then, gold has risen over 40%, but silver has soared 158%. This is an extraordinary occurrence in just two years.
Two weeks ago, I thought both metals, and especially silver, were due for a rest, and perhaps a correction.
Silver reached $24.75 on October 14. I expected a back-off to begin. But so far, we've had very little. Silver briefly touched as low as $23. That is a 7% fall. In the universe of silver, this is nothing. And then the rise resumed. As I wrote this, silver reached a new high of $24.91, surpassing October 14's $24.75.

RICO Suit Filed Against HSBC And JPMorgan
For Silver Market Manipulation
Submitted by Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
If JPM and HSBC hoped that the lawsuits filed a week ago by Brian Beatty and Peter Laskari, which we discussed previously, were going to be the end of their public exposure with regard to possible silver market manipulation, they are about to be disappointed. Today, in a separate lawsuit filed by Carl Loeb in the Southern District of New York, a new light on precious manipulation by the duo was shone, this time involving allegations of breach of the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. And with the CFTC itself admitting of ongoing manipulation in the silver market, it appears this issue is not going to go away quietly any time soon. Per Steve Berman, co-counsel of plaintiff law firm Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro: "The practice of naked short selling has long been a serious issue on Wall Street. What we know about the scope and intent of JP Morgan and HSBC's actions in this short-selling scheme dwarfs any other similar attempt to manipulate a commodities market." As this case is also seeking class action status for the class, readers who wish to join this particular case may apply to do so at the following link. Plaintiffs are seeking that the court enjoin JP Morgan and HSBC from continuing their alleged conspiracy and manipulation of the silver futures and options contracts market.

Rebublican win, QE2, SchiffRadio.com

The Fed No Longer Cares About Hiding The Fact
It Is Killing The Dollar
Analysts, Economists, Even Fed Employees Warn
Against Disastrous QE2
Steve Watson - Prisonplanet.com
A number of prominent figures within the financial world are warning that a second round of quantitative easing, expected to be announced today by the Federal Reserve, will have disastrous consequences for the US dollar and the global economy.
The Fed will release a statement this afternoon, most likely confirming that it is to buy at least $500 billion of long-term securities, in the form of printing money out of thin air.
The justification is to offset deflationary fears and stimulate spending, however, critics have refuted this outlook.

Will QE2 Trigger Massive Selloff? Marc Faber Weighs In
by Michael Bogan - LewRockwell.com
Is the Fed Engineering a Crack-Up Boom?
Speaking to Bloomberg last week, Marc Faber gave viewers a rundown of his thoughts on the markets as an announcement from the Fed regarding QE2 nears.
On equities, Faber is not optimistic in the short term. He expects a selloff after the Fed announcement on Wednesday, noting that many investors could be disappointed with the language released out of the Sept. 2-3 FOMC meeting.
In addition to his expectations regarding investor reactions to the FOMC meeting, the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII) released results of a survey which show overly optimistic sentiment of further gains in the S&P. Faber doesn't like any asset that is too heavily weighted with investors optimism.

Bill Gross: Fed Actions Could Lead to a 20% Weaker Dollar
By Rocky Vega - The DailyReckoning.com
11/03/10 Stockholm, Sweden - The jitters continue as we near the Federal Reserve's announcement of its new stimulation policyÉ which is likely to pump another half billion or so into the nation's zombie economy through Treasury bond purchases. Perpetually influential Bill Gross, co-CIO & founder of PIMCO, which manages over $1 trillion in assets, is anticipating that Bernanke's upcoming moves could lead to a precipitous 20 percent drop in the dollar's value.
According to Moneycontrol.com:
"'I think a 20% decline in the dollar is possible,' Gross said, adding the pace of the currency's decline was also an important consideration for investors. 'When a central bank prints trillions of dollars of checks, which is not necessarily what (a second round of quantitative easing) will do in terms of the amount, but if it gets into that territory - that is a debasement of the dollar in terms of the supply of dollars on a global basis,' Gross told Reuters in an interview at his PIMCO headquarters.

The Fuzzy Logic Of Useful Idiots
By Giordano Bruno - Neithercorp Press - 11/03/2010
It hurts to be wrong. Not just emotionally, but physically, especially when it's public, like swimming headfirst into a school of very ill-tempered jellyfish ... or maybe piranha. The horror of it is almost cinematic. The more artificially pumped your ego, or the more brainwashed with academic pretension, the more terrifying that moment of realization is, that moment when all your assumptions are dashed aside like a three-year-old's alphabet blocks. To a certain point, it is understandable why so many people live in such violent denial, however, this does not detract from the perils of that denial ...

Voters Actually Concerned About US Federal Deficit
By Addison Wiggin - The DailyReckoning.com
11/03/10 Baltimore, Maryland - We awaken to a bright new day, a spring in our step. For we stand at the dawn of a new era, in which fiscal responsibility is the primary objective of Congress again.
Oh, hell - we haven't had enough coffee yet to keep up the pretense this morning. Last night on CNN, Wolf Blitzer tossed a softball question to Rep. Eric Cantor, the likely new House majority leader: Name one federal program Republicans will reduce.
Cantor whiffed.
Still, we won't dismiss the message that voters were trying to send yesterday, however much it will fall on deaf ears.
It's worth revisiting a poll commissioned by the Peterson Foundation in March 2009 - when employers were shedding nearly 700,000 jobs a month and the S&P 500 stood at the ominous number of 666.
The poll asked a simple question: What do you believe poses a major threat to the nation's future?

Ireland is running out of time
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard - Telegraph.co.uk
Ireland has been desperately unlucky.
The bond crisis is snowballing out of control before the country has had enough time to let its medical, pharma, IT, and financial services industries (don't laugh, some of it is doing well) come to the rescue.
Yields on 10-year Irish bonds surged this morning to a post-EMU high of 7.41pc.
Yes, Ireland is fully-funded until April - and has another Û12bn in pension reserves that could be tapped in extremis - but that is less reassuring than it looks. The spreads over German Bunds are mimicking the action seen in Greece in the final hours before the dam broke.
Once a confidence crisis takes root in this fashion it starts to contaminate everything, as we are seeing in punitive borrowing costs for Irish banks.

Fed prints another $600bn to keep US recovery on track
The US Federal Reserve is to pump another $600bn (£370bn) into the economy over the next eight months in a bid to resuscitate America's flagging recover
By Philip Aldrick and Emma Rowley - Telegraph.co.uk
The latest round of quantitative easing (QE) comes on top of the $1.7 trillion already completed and is intended "to promote a stronger pace of recovery", the Fed said. It is changing tack, however, buying US government bonds instead of corporate debt and mortgage-backed securities. Existing QE will be rolled over, but also recycled into treasuries.
By the end of June, the Fed expects to have bought $850bn to $900bn of treasuries - roughly $110bn a month, $75bn of which will be additional QE. The Fed also kept interest rates at 0pc to 0.25pc, where they have been since December 2008.

New York Fed Statement on Securities Purchases: Full Text
Nov. 3 (Bloomberg) -- The following is a reformatted version of a New York Fed statement regarding purchases of Treasury Securities by the Federal Open Market Committee.
On November 3, 2010, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) decided to expand the Federal Reserve's holdings of securities in the System Open Market Account (SOMA) to promote a stronger pace of economic recovery and to help ensure that inflation, over time, is at levels consistent with its mandate. In particular, the FOMC directed the Open Market Trading Desk (the Desk) at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to purchase an additional $600 billion of longer term Treasury securities by the end of the second quarter of 2011.

9 Reasons Why Quantitative Easing Is Bad For The U.S. Economy
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Buckle up and hold on - a new round of quantitative easing is here and things could start getting very ugly in the financial world over the coming months. The truth is that many economists fear that an out of control Federal Reserve is "crossing the Rubicon" by announcing another wave of quantitative easing. Have we now reached a point where the Federal Reserve is simply going to fire up the printing presses and shower massive wads of cash into the financial system whenever the U.S. economy is not growing fast enough? If so, what does the mean for inflation, the stability of the world financial system and the future of the U.S. dollar? The Fed says that the plan is to purchase $600 billion of U.S. Treasury securities by the middle of 2011. In addition, the Federal Reserve has announced that it will be "reinvesting" an additional $250 billion to $300 billion from the proceeds of its mortgage portfolio in U.S. Treasury securities over the same time period. So that is a total injection of about $900 billion. Perhaps the Fed thought that number would sound a little less ominous than $1 trillion. In any event, the Federal Reserve seems convinced that quantitative easing is going to work this time. So should we believe the Federal Reserve?

Fed Anounces $600 Billion QE2 to Buy U.S. Treasury Bonds
and Reinvest $250 Billion More
By: Mike Shedlock - MarketOracle.co.uk
As expected, the Fed announced a "modest" $600 billion second round of Quantitative Easing. Estimates rated as high as $2 trillion.
On November 3, 2010, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) decided to expand the Federal Reserve's holdings of securities in the System Open Market Account (SOMA) to promote a stronger pace of economic recovery and to help ensure that inflation, over time, is at levels consistent with its mandate. In particular, the FOMC directed the Open Market Trading Desk (the Desk) at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to purchase an additional $600 billion of longer-term Treasury securities by the end of the second quarter of 2011.

Fed's More Aggressive Move May Not Go Far Enough
By DAVID LEONHARDT - NYTimes.com
For much of the last year, there were three basic camps on what the Federal Reserve should be doing.
One focused on the risks of the Fed's taking more action to help the economy. This camp - known as the hawks, because of their vigilance against inflation - worried that the Fed could be sowing the seeds of future inflation and that any further action might cause global investors to panic.
Another camp - the doves - argued instead that the Fed had not done enough: inflation remained near zero, and unemployment near a 30-year high.

Fed's $600bn gamble risks throwing away America's biggest asset
Apparently, there's been an election in the US. The BBC tells us that America's wholly unsurprising verdict on the past two years is frightfully important and signals the end of the Obama dream, whatever that may have been; it was never entirely clear.
By Jeremy Warner - Telegraph.co.uk
Barely able to disguise his horror at the result, Mark Mardell, the Beeb's North America editor, solemnly pronounced that the hope Obama raised when elected president had turned out to be "too audacious for the times".
It didn't seem to occur to him that Obama's drubbing was not so much a case of haplessly falling victim to economic circumstance but was in fact largely down to incoherent legislative experiment, blind disregard for the deficit and chronic mishandling of the economy. Americans had reasonably expected better.

Bernanke Breathes New Life Into Junk Bond Rally: Credit Markets
By Mary Childs and Shannon D. Harrington
Nov. 4 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve sent the cost of protecting high-yield, high-risk debt from default to the lowest in almost six months by bolstering demand for the investments with its program to buy $600 billion more of Treasuries.
The benchmark credit-default swaps index for junk bonds that rises as investor confidence improves jumped to the highest since April 15, according to data provider CMA. The extra yield investors demand to own the bonds rather than Treasuries fell 2 basis points to 592 basis points, or 5.92 percentage points, Bank of America Merrill Lynch index data show.

Good Money And The Fall Of Bankers
Jeff Nielson - SilverBearCafe.com
Last week I wrote a piece titled "The Return to Good Money", based upon the practical and innovative proposal from Hugo Salinas Price for the United States to return to a quasi-silver based monetary system, where silver "money" would be circulated parallel to the bankers' paper-dollars.
This is totally different from the current, gold and silver coins minted by the U.S. (and Canadian) government. These coins are given an arbitrary (and ridiculously undervalued) denomination by our governments, to punish those Canadians and Americans who try to protect their wealth from the ravages of banker-induced "inflation" - which is nothing more than the rate at which our paper money is being destroyed through dilutive money-printing.

Goldman's Pay Pool Shrinks Fastest as Traders' Fortunes Dwindle
By Christine Harper
Nov. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Wall Street traders, who typically receive the fattest year-end bonuses among bank employees, are poised to suffer the biggest pay cuts as revenue at their divisions dropped an average of 12 percent so far this year.
Goldman Sachs Group Inc., the New York-based bank that makes most of its money from trading and set a Wall Street pay record in 2007, slashed average compensation 26 percent in the first nine months. By contrast, Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America Corp., which employs branch managers and brokers as well as bankers and traders, raised average pay 10 percent.

How to Bully a Country into Bankruptcy
By: MISES - MarketOracle.co.uk
.... Trade unions set wages, working time, retirement age, and social benefits; then they oversee and enforce them by going on strike each time the government is unwilling to succumb to their demands. God forbid someone anger the hyperactive trade unions. They will use force, seize the economy, and fervently hunt down anyone who dares to think that each worker is responsible to consumers and not to union leaders.
More than most, French workers have always been at odds with capitalist morality. Recently, we have seen how a country can be run - or run into the ground - by trade unions. In reaction to President Sarkozy's proposed pension reforms, French workers have gone on strike and paralyzed the nation.

Is Health Care A Right?

Stalemate seen in Congress on banking and housing
By Kevin Drawbaugh
(Reuters) - Republicans grabbed the steering wheel of the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday, but weren't expected to get out of the driveway when it comes to restraining Wall Street reforms and fixing housing finance.
A political standoff lies ahead for two years on key banking and housing issues as election returns showed Democrats losing control of the House, but retaining a narrow majority in the U.S. Senate, as widely expected.
President Barack Obama's veto and Democratic Senate power will likely block any attempts by Republicans to roll back the landmark Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act that Obama signed into law in July.

Freddie Mac Reports $2.5 Billion Loss, Warns of Weak Housing Market
By NICK TIMIRAOS - WSJ.com
Freddie Mac reported a narrower $2.5 billion third-quarter loss, the smallest shortfall in more than a year amid signs that mortgage delinquencies are slowing. But the company warned that delays in the foreclosure process could raise costs "significantly" and that losses also could rise amid a faltering housing recovery.
The third-quarter loss compared with a year-earlier net loss of $5.4 billion. While gains in the value of certain securities and derivatives left Freddie with a small cash surplus at the end of the quarter, it was forced to ask the Treasury for $100 million, in part to cover the cost of $1.6 billion in interest payments made to the government.

Loopholes in loan recording mess
Loan recording mess in Va. allows homeowners who don't qualify
to get tax break
By David S. Hilzenrath - Washington Post
Countless homeowners in Virginia are getting a tax break for which they don't really qualify because a mortgage documentation mess makes it hard to determine who qualifies, officials say.
The loss of tax revenue for local governments and the state is another result of the lending industry growing so fast and becoming so complex during its go-go years that it outstripped its paper trail.
Because the problem involves blind spots in official records, no one can say how much revenue is being lost. But the amount could be significant.

LPS Mortgage Monitor Shows 7 Million Noncurrent Loans,
2 Million Homes in Foreclosures, Deteriorating Conditions
By Mike Shedlock
The LPS Mortgage Monitor has a nice series of 33 slides that shows delinquent loans had stabilized in the first half of 2010 but new problem loans are once again picking up.
Over 4 million homes are 90 days late or in foreclosure.
Delinquent loans still at troubling levels. Expect foreclosures to rise.
There are 7 million noncurrent loans but that is down from 8.1 million at the beginning of the year.
Unfortunately, things have gotten worse since July-August, just about when home prices stopped rising.

U.S. Homeownership at Decade Low as Foreclosures Rise
By Kathleen M. Howley
Nov. 2 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. homeownership rate was unchanged at a 10-year low in the third quarter as banks stepped up property seizures from borrowers who defaulted on mortgages.
The homeownership rate was 66.9 percent, matching the second-quarter level that was the lowest since 1999, the U.S. Census Bureau said in a report today. The homeowner vacancy rate, or the share of properties vacant and for sale, was unchanged at 2.5 percent, according to the report.
Lenders are repossessing properties as borrowers fall behind in mortgage payments after the worst housing crash since the Great Depression. Banks seized a record 288,345 homes in the third quarter, up 22 percent from a year earlier, according to an Oct. 14 report from RealtyTrac Inc. in Irvine, California.

Sept. consumer spending weak while incomes dip
By Martin Crutsinger - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON (AP) - Americans slowed their spending in September to the weakest pace in three months, and their incomes fell for the first time in 14 months.
Personal spending rose at an annual rate of 0.2 percent in September, the Commerce Department said Monday. That's below the 0.5 percent gains recorded in July and August.
Incomes fell 0.1 percent in September, following a 0.4 percent rise in August that was pushed higher by the return of extended unemployment benefits.

Food Sellers Grit Teeth, Raise Prices
Packagers and Supermarkets Pressured to Pass Along Rising Costs, Even as Consumers Pinch Pennies
By JULIE JARGON And ILAN BRAT - WSJ.com
An inflationary tide is beginning to ripple through America's supermarkets and restaurants, threatening to end the tamest year of food pricing in nearly two decades.
Prices of staples including milk, beef, coffee, cocoa and sugar have risen sharply in recent months. And food makers and retailers including McDonald's Corp., Kellogg Co. and Kroger Co. have begun to signal that they'll try to make consumers shoulder more of the higher costs for ingredients.

Oil Rises Above $85 After Dollar Falls Against Euro on Fed Move
By James Paton and Mark Shenk
Nov. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Oil rose for a fourth day to more than $85 a barrel as the dollar traded near a nine-month low against the euro after the Federal Reserve's move to buy an additional $600 billion of Treasuries to spur the economy.
A U.S. government report showing fuel supplies had dropped drove crude up 0.9 percent yesterday to the highest settlement price since May 3. Gasoline inventories fell 2.69 million barrels to 212.3 million last week, the lowest level since Nov. 20, 2009, the Energy Department said.

G.M. Confirms U.S. Will Cut Its Stake to 35%
By MICHAEL J. de la MERCED - NYTimes.com
General Motors confirmed on Wednesday that the government would sell enough shares in the automaker's initial public offering to become a minority investor, a crucial step toward refashioning itself as a smaller, more profitable company.
The company also said that it earned about $2 billion in the third quarter, after accounting for $203 million in dividend payments on its preferred stock. The company plans to hold an earnings call on Nov. 10.
G.M.'s initial offering, which could fetch nearly $11 billion, would be among the largest initial public offerings in recent years. Though the company's bankers cut the size of the offering from what might have been $15 billion or more, it would still be the biggest initial offering in the United States since Verisk Analytics issued $1.8 billion in stock in October, according to data from Capital IQ.

Opt Out of a Body Scan? Then Brace Yourself
By JOE SHARKEY - NYTimes.com
HAVING been taught by nuns in grade school and later going through military boot camp, I have always disliked uniformed authorities shouting at me. So I was unhappy last week when some security screeners at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago started yelling.
"Opt out! We got an opt out!" one bellowed about me in a tone that people in my desert neighborhood in Tucson usually reserve for declaring, "Rattlesnake!"
Other screeners took up the "Opt out!" shout. I was marched from the metal detector lane to one of those nearby whole-body imagers, ordered to take everything out of my pockets, remove my belt and hold my possessions up high. Then I was required to stand still while I received a rough pat-down by a man whose résumé, I suspected, included experience at a state prison.
"Hold your pants up!" he ordered me.

Catherine Austin Fitts: The Looting Of America 1/4

Catherine Austin Fitts: The Looting Of America 2/4

Catherine Austin Fitts: The Looting Of America 3/4

Catherine Austin Fitts: The Looting Of America 4/4

GOP likely to urge Obama officials not to shred documents
By Jordy Yager and Bob Cusack - TheHill.com
Republicans are likely to urge the Obama administration not to shred documents as they transition to the House majority.
Before the election, GOP officials on Capitol Hill privately discussed the issue but refrained from publicly tackling it, not wanting to assume what would happen on Election Day.
Now that Republicans will control the House, the shredding matter will move front and center.
No one is accusing the Obama administration of destroying documents, but Republicans are expected to try to ensure that all records - on a range of issues - are kept intact.

Barack Obama seeks compromise after Democrats' midterm losses
President says severe losses his party suffered across the country reflect frustration at the slow pace of economic recovery
Ewen MacAskill in Washington - guardian.co.uk
Barack Obama has expressed humility and promised to work with the Republicans after one of the worst Democratic election defeats in 70 years.
Speaking at a White House press conference, Obama acknowledged that the devastating losses suffered in races across the country reflected voters' frustration with the slow economic recovery.
He offered to sit down with Republican and Democratic leaders to see whether there were areas where they could agree. "I have been willing to compromise in the past and I am willing to compromise going forward," Obama said.

Reid: McConnell comment about one-term Obama 'a road to nowhere'
By Sean J. Miller - TheHill.com
LAS VEGAS - Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Nev.) said the "main lesson" from the Democrat's drubbing at the polls Tuesday was that voters want the parties to cooperate in Congress.
"People want us to work together," Reid said at a press conference at the Vdara Hotel one day after his stunning victory in a closely fought Senate race. "They're demanding to have good government."
Reid said he's "friends" with Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and he has a "long-standing" relationship with House Republican Leader John Boehner (Ohio), who's expected to be the next Speaker.

Pelosi: No decision yet on future plans after massive party losses
By Mike Lillis and Russell Berman - TheHill.com
Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Wednesday she's not ready to decide if she'll remain in Congress after the Democrats' drubbing at the polls.
In her first public interview since Tuesday's elections returned the House majority to Republicans, the California Democrat told ABC News she's still mulling her future in Washington.
"I'll have a conversation with my caucus, I'll have a conversation with my family, and pray over it, and decide how to go forward," Pelosi told ABC's Diane Sawyer for "World News Tonight." "But today isn't that day."

YouTube yanks Islamic cleric's jihad sermon videos: NY Times
AFP - Breitbart.com
YouTube has yanked videos featuring calls by Yemen-based radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaqi for a holy war, The New York Times reported Wednesday.
The American-born Awlaqi has been cited as a catalyst for terrorist attacks and was charged Tuesday in absentia in Yemen with incitement to kill foreigners under the banner of Al-Qaeda.
The move by Yemeni prosecutors came several days after parcel bombs destined for Chicago were traced to suspected jihadists in Yemen.

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Wednesday 11.03.2010

The Calm Before The Storm
TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
An eerie calm has descended upon world financial markets as they await perhaps the two