Beans Rice and Gold

2011 GDP: 1.7%

2012-01-27T13:52:00.003-05:00

That's the final, pathetic growth number for 2011.

From the just-released GDP report:

Real GDP increased 1.7 percent in 2011 (that is, from the 2010 annual level to the 2011 annual level), compared with an increase of 3.0 percent in 2010. The increase in real GDP in 2011 primarily reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures (PCE), exports, and nonresidential fixed investment that were partly offset by negative contributions from state and local government spending, private inventory investment, and federal government spending. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased. More...

Taxpayers still owed $132.9B from bailout

2012-01-26T17:20:00.001-05:00

A government watchdog says U.S. taxpayers are still owed $132.9 billion that companies haven't repaid from the financial bailout, and some of that will never be recovered.

The bailout launched at the height of the financial crisis in September 2008 will continue to exist for years, says a report issued Thursday by Christy Romero, the acting special inspector general for the $700 billion bailout. Some bailout programs, such as the effort to help homeowners avoid foreclosure by reducing mortgage payments, will last as late as 2017, costing the government an additional $51 billion or so.

The gyrating stock market has slowed the Treasury Department's efforts to sell off its stakes in 458 bailed-out companies, the report says. They include insurer American International Group Inc., General Motors Co. and Ally Financial Inc. More...

Citigroup sued for fraud over $1 billion of CDOs

2012-01-25T14:02:00.000-05:00

Karen Freifeld
NEW YORK (Reuters)

Citigroup Inc was sued for fraud by Loreley Financing over nearly $1 billion worth of collateralized debt obligations purchased in 2006 and 2007.

Citigroup is accused of defrauding Loreley into purchasing "fraudulent investments that are now worthless," Loreley said in a complaint filed Tuesday in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan.

Citi used the CDOs to offload the risks of toxic mortgage-backed securities on its books and to help preferred clients "short" the housing market, the lawsuit claims.

Danielle Romero-Apsilos, a spokeswoman for Citigroup, said in an email, "We believe the suit is without merit."
Loreley Financing is a group of special-purpose entities formed to invest in CD0s. The entities are organized under the laws of Jersey in the Channel Islands.

The entities, whose claims include fraud and unjust enrichment, are seeking at least $965 million paid for the notes and buybacks.

The case is Loreley Financing v. Citigroup Global Markets, 650212/2012, New York State Supreme Court.

Obama Pushes Hard to Protect Big Banks from Fraud Prosecutions

2012-01-20T20:14:00.000-05:00

As we’ve noted for years, the entire strategy of Washington towards the economy is to cover up the fraud which caused the financial crisis … even though prosecuting fraud and re-establishing the rule of law is the only way to get out of this depression.

One major front in Washington’s cover-up effort has been to settle fraud cases with the big banks for pennies on the dollar. This is a backdoor bailout for the banks, encourages them to commit more fraud, and fails to plug the basic holes in the economy which are preventing a recovery.
Why are we bringing this up now?

Because Obama is making a giant push to pressure the states attorneys general to settle all of their mortgage-related fraud claims against the banks for pennies on the dollar. More...

Air Force’s Top Brain Wants a ‘Social Radar’ to ‘See Into Hearts and Minds’

2012-01-20T18:40:00.000-05:00

Cover of Minority Report [Blu-ray]

Chief Scientists of the Air Force usually spend their time trying to figure out how to build better satellites or make jets go insanely fast. Which makes Dr. Mark Maybury, today’s chief scientist, a bit of an outlier. He’d like to build a set of sensors that peer into people’s souls — and forecast wars before they erupt.

Maybury calls his vision “Social Radar.” And the comparison to traditional sensors is no accident, he tells Danger Room. “The Air Force and the Navy in this and other countries have a history of developing Sonar to see through the water, Radar to see through the air, and IR [infrared] to see through the night. Well, we also want to see into the hearts and the minds of people,” says Maybury, who serves as the top science advisor to the Air Force’s top brass.

But Social Radar won’t be a single sensor to discover your secret yearnings. It’ll be more of a virtual sensor, combining a vast array of technologies and disciplines, all employed to take a society’s pulse and assess its future health. It’s part of a broader Pentagon effort to master the societal and cultural elements of war — and effort that even many in the Defense Department believe is deeply flawed. First step: mine Twitter feeds for indications of upset. More...

Lack of dental coverage sends patients to ER for pain

2012-01-20T13:52:00.000-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

When a man recently visited an emergency room here with a toothache, consulting physician Alan Sorkey quickly diagnosed the dental infection was serious and even potentially fatal.

The patient was on more than 25 medications and scheduled for a major surgery — not dental related — all covered by government health care programs, Sorkey said.

Those same programs wouldn't cover the estimated $70 to pull the rotting tooth. The patient didn't have the money for it, and a local low-cost oral surgery clinic had a wait of as long as a year for an appointment, he said.

"All of this care the patient had received would have been for naught because these programs generally do not cover dental-related problems," said Sorkey, who ultimately persuaded the clinic to see the patient sooner. "In his immune-compromised situation, this infected tooth threatened to take his life without immediate treatment." More...

Bankrupt Solyndra Caught Destroying Brand New Parts

2012-01-20T12:48:00.001-05:00

Image via CrunchBase

After filing for bankruptcy last year, Fremont solar company Solyndra still owes American taxpayers half a billion dollars. But CBS 5 caught them destroying millions of dollars worth of parts.

At Solyndra’s sprawling complex in Fremont, workers in white jumpsuits were unwrapping brand new glass tubes used in solar panels last week. They are the latest, most cutting-edge solar technology, and they are being thrown into dumpsters.

Forklifts brought one pallet after another piled high with the carefully packaged glass. Slowly but surely it all ended up shattered. And it’s not a few loads. Hundreds of thousands of tubes on shrink-wrapped pallets will meet a similar demise. More...

Nearly Half of U.S Lives in Household Receiving Government Benefits

2012-01-19T13:32:00.000-05:00

The pool of Americans relying on government benefits rose to record highs last year as an increasing share of families tapped aid in a weak economy.Some 48.6% of the population lived in a household receiving some type of government benefit in the second quarter of 2010, up a notch from 48.5% in the first quarter, according to Census data.Expanding government programs combined with the worst downturn since the Great Depression have led to an explosion in the share of Americans relying on outside help.

To combat prolonged economic weakness, Congress extended unemployment benefits to a record 99 weeks (up from the normal 26-weeks offered in most states). The food stamp program was tweaked so it was more generous. Americans flocked to Social Security disability, a last bastion of support for some of the long-term unemployed. (See a timeline on the history of government benefits programs here.)

Experts predict recipient rolls will decline as the economy grows healthier, but the rising federal deficit has brought government spending, and particularly benefits programs, under closer scrutiny. House Republicans, for example, have proposed block-granting Medicaid (the federal-state health care program for the poor) in order to cut costs. The shift would put more of the responsibility on the states for both designing and paying for their health care programs. More...

China’s Foreign Direct Investment Declines for Second Consecutive Month

2012-01-18T11:05:00.003-05:00

Foreign direct investment in China fell for the second straight month in December as global financial turmoil dimmed companies’ appetite for spending. Investment from overseas fell 12.73 percent to $12.24 billion last month from a year earlier, the Ministry of Commerce said in a statement in Beijing today.

For the full year, spending rose 9.72 percent to a record $116 billion, the data showed. Investment fell 9.8 percent in November, the first decline since 2009.China announced amendments to policies to attract foreign funds last month, changes that may weigh on spending in some industries this year.

Europe’s debt crisis and anticipated weaker growth in the U.S. this year may also limit investment, with central bank Governor Zhou Xiaochuan warning this month a global downturn could lead to “large” capital withdrawals from the country. More...

Recovery at risk as Americans raid savings accounts

2012-01-17T19:13:00.002-05:00

More than four years after the United States fell into recession, many Americans have resorted to raiding their savings to get them through the stop-start economic recovery.

Some policymakers worry that a recent spike in credit card usage could mean that people, many of whom are struggling on incomes that have lagged inflation, are taking out new debt just to meet the costs of day-to-day living.

In an ominous sign for America's economic growth prospects, workers are paring back contributions to college funds and growing numbers are borrowing from their retirement accounts.

Almost a third of plan participants currently have a loan outstanding, according to an upcoming survey of 150,000 holders of 401(k)s by consulting firm Aon Hewitt. Just as Americans used to borrow against the value of their homes before the property crash, now many are taking out loans from their 401(k) retirement savings plans. More...http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/17/us-recovery-risk-idUSTRE80G08320120117

Average age of US vehicles hits record 10.8 years

2012-01-17T14:40:00.000-05:00

That clunker in America's driveway has reached a record old age, but there are signs that people may be growing confident enough in the economy to get a whiff of that fresh new car scent very soon.

The average age of a car or truck in the U.S. hit a record 10.8 years last year as job security and other economic worries kept many people from making big-ticket purchases such as a new car.

That's up from the old record of 10.6 years in 2010, and it and continues a trend that dates to 1995, when the average age of a car was 8.4 years, according to a study of state vehicle registration data by the Southfield, Mich.-based Polk automotive research firm.

Last year, auto sales rebounded a bit to 12.8 million vehicles, especially in November and December, when sales were unusually strong. In 2010, U.S. sales totaled 11.6 million after hitting a 30-year low of 10.4 million in 2009. Polk expects sales around 13.7 million this year, rising by about 1 million per year through 2015, when they reach about 16 million. That's back to around what industry analysts consider normal, and approaching the U.S. sales peak of 17 million in 2005. More...

FDA fines Red Cross nearly $9.6 million for blood safety lapses

2012-01-17T12:23:00.001-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

Federal health officials have fined the American Red Cross nearly $9.6 million for sloppy and unsafe blood management practices, the second multi-million-dollar penalty levied against the agency in the last two years.

The new Food and Drug Administration fine follows inspections at 16 Red Cross blood centers between April and October 2010 that revealed ongoing problems that appeared to endanger donors and to allow potentially contaminated blood into the nation’s supply.

An FDA spokeswoman said the agency found no evidence of actual harm to blood recipients and that officials remain confident about sources of blood in the U.S. More...

India reports new strain of 'totally drug-resistant tuberculosis'

2012-01-16T11:42:00.000-05:00

Indian doctors have reported the country's first cases of "totally drug-resistant tuberculosis," a long-feared and virtually untreatable form of the killer lung disease.

It's not the first time highly resistant cases like this have been seen. Since 2003, patients have been documented in Italy and Iran. It has mostly been limited to impoverished areas, and has not spread widely. But experts believe there could be many undocumented cases.

No one expects the Indian TB strains to rapidly spread elsewhere. The airborne disease is mainly transmitted through close personal contact and isn't nearly as contagious as the flu. Indeed, most of the cases of this kind of TB were not from person-to-person infection but were mutations that occurred in poorly treated patients. More...

Panetta admits Iran not developing nukes

2012-01-12T07:31:00.000-05:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeU.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta let slip on Sunday the big open secret that Washington war hawks don’t want widely known: Iran is not developing nuclear weapons.

Appearing on CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday, Panetta admitted that despite all the rhetoric, Iran is not pursuing the ability to split atoms with weapons, saying it is instead pursuing “a nuclear capability.”

That “capability” falls in line with what Iran has said for years: that it is developing nuclear energy facilities, not nuclear weapons.

“I think the pressure of the sanctions, the diplomatic pressures from everywhere, Europe, the United States, elsewhere, it’s working to put pressure on them,” Panetta explained on Sunday. “To make them understand that they cannot continue to do what they’re doing. Are they trying to develop a nuclear weapon? No. But we know that they’re trying to develop a nuclear capability, and that’s what concerns us. And our red line to Iran is, do not develop a nuclear weapon. That’s a red line for us.” More...

Consumer borrowing surges in November

2012-01-10T10:17:00.000-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

Consumer borrowing surged in November by $20.4 billion, the Federal Reserve said Monday. That's the largest monthly gain in a decade.

Consumers took out more loans to buy cars and swiped their credit cards frequently to purchase holiday gifts.

The Fed's category that measures credit card debt rose by $5.6 billion, the most since March 2008. Its gauge that tracks auto loans increased $14.8 billion, nearly matching July's gain that was the biggest since February 2005.

The third straight monthly increase in overall borrowing marks a departure from the more thrifty habits practiced during and immediately after the recession, when credit tumbled and the savings rate climbed. More...http://www.usatoday.com/money/story/2012-01-09/November-consumer-credit-surges/52469942/1

Guaranteed mayhem, riots, violent protests in 2012

2012-01-09T08:33:00.000-05:00

Image by Friends of the Earth International via FlickrIn order to have an understanding of what could happen in the coming year, it is essential to keep the big picture in focus. As we enter the fifth year of this twenty year Crisis period, there is absolutely no chance that 2012 will see an improvement in our economy, political atmosphere or world situation. Fourth Turnings never de-intensify. They exhaust themselves after years of chaos, conflict and turmoil. I can guarantee you that 2012 will see increased mayhem, riots, violent protests, recessions, bear markets, and a presidential election that will confound the establishment. All the episodes which will occur in 2012 will have at their core one of the three elements described by Strauss & Howe in 1997: Debt, Civic Decay, or Global Disorder.

In order to have an understanding of what could happen in the coming year, it is essential to keep the big picture in focus. As we enter the fifth year of this twenty year Crisis period, there is absolutely no chance that 2012 will see an improvement in our economy, political atmosphere or world situation. Fourth Turnings never de-intensify. They exhaust themselves after years of chaos, conflict and turmoil. I can guarantee you that 2012 will see increased mayhem, riots, violent protests, recessions, bear markets, and a presidential election that will confound the establishment. All the episodes which will occur in 2012 will have at their core one of the three elements described by Strauss & Howe in 1997: Debt, Civic Decay, or Global Disorder.

Any critical thinking person can look at the chart above and realize that creating more debt out of thin air to solve a debt problem is foolish, dangerous, and self serving to only bankers and politicians. The debt crisis took decades of terrible choices and bogus promises to produce. The world is now in the midst of a debt driven catastrophe. At best, the excessive levels of sovereign debt will slow economic growth to zero or below in 2012. At worst, interest rates will soar as counties attempt to rollover their debt and rolling defaults across Europe will plunge the continent into a depression. The largest banks in Europe are leveraged 40 to 1, therefore a 3% reduction in their capital will cause bankruptcy. Once you pass 90% debt to GDP, your fate is sealed. More...

Planned job cuts up 14% in 2011

2012-01-05T13:47:00.000-05:00

Planned job cuts dropped in December but were up 14% overall for 2011, according to a report from outplacement consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

December's total of 41,785 announced lay-offs was a 1.6% drop versus November, and was the lowest monthly total since June. Total announced job cuts for 2011, however, hit 606,802, up from the 529,973 announced in 2010.

The increase in cuts was driven primarily by lay-offs in government and financial sector jobs, which together accounted for 41% of all announced job losses.

With pressure on governments at all levels to cut spending and the European debt crisis still unresolved, both these sectors are "likely to continue to struggle in 2012," Challenger CEO John Challenger said in a statement accompanying the report. More...

Americans’ Incomes Have Dropped 6.7 Percent During the ‘Recovery’

2012-01-04T16:28:00.000-05:00

According to Sentier’s report, the median American household income has actually fallen during the “recovery.” Not only that, but it has fallen even more than it did during the recession. Gordon Green, former chief of the Governments Division at the U.S. Census Bureau and co-author of the report (with fellow Census veteran John Coder), says, “Real income fell by 3.2 percent during [the recession]. And during the recovery it went down by 6.7 percent.” So “income [has] declined twice as much in the recovery as in the recession itself.”

While the real median income of American households dropped 6.7 percent during the first two years of the “recovery,” the incomes of many households dropped even more than that. The income drop was steeper for those under 25 years of age (their incomes were down 9.5 percent), for those between 25 and 34 years of age (down 9.8 percent), for black Americans (down 9.4 percent), for families with three or more children (down 9.5 percent), and for families headed by part-time workers (down 11.5 percent). And that’s despite the fact that the report’s income tallies include unemployment compensation and monetary public assistance (both state and federal). More...

How Congress is Signing its own Arrest Warrants in the NDAA Citizen Arrest bill

2012-01-02T17:26:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaNaomi Wolf
I never thought I would have to write this: but—incredibly—Congress has now passed the National Defense Appropriations Act, with Amendment 1031, which allows for the military detention of American citizens. The amendment is so loosely worded that any American citizen could be held without due process. The language of this bill can be read to assure Americans that they can challenge their detention — but most people do not realize what this means: at Guantanamo and in other military prisons, one’s lawyer’s calls are monitored, witnesses for one’s defense are not allowed to testify, and one can be forced into nudity and isolation. Incredibly, ninety-three Senators voted to support this bill and now most of Congress: a roster of names that will live in infamy in the history of our nation, and never be expunged from the dark column of the history books.

They may have supported this bill because—although it’s hard to believe—they think the military will only arrest active members of Al Qaida; or maybe, less naively, they believe that ‘at most’, low-level dissenting figures, activists, or troublesome protesters might be subjected to military arrest. But they are forgetting something critical: history shows that those who signed this bill will soon be subject to arrest themselves.

Our leaders appear to be supporting this bill thinking that they will always be what they are now, in the fading light of a once-great democracy — those civilian leaders who safely and securely sit in freedom and DIRECT the military. In inhabiting this bubble, which their own actions are about to destroy, they are cocooned by an arrogance of power, placing their own security in jeopardy by their own hands, and ignoring history and its inevitable laws. The moment this bill becomes law, though Congress is accustomed, in a weak democracy, to being the ones who direct and control the military, the power roles will reverse: Congress will no longer be directing and in charge of the military: rather, the military will be directing and in charge of individual Congressional leaders, as well as in charge of everyone else — as any Parliamentarian in any society who handed this power over to the military can attest.

Perhaps Congress assumes that it will always only be ‘they’ who are targeted for arrest and military detention: but sadly, Parliamentary leaders are the first to face pressure, threats, arrest and even violence when the military obtains to power to make civilian arrests and hold civilians in military facilities without due process. There is no exception to this rule. Just as I traveled the country four years ago warning against the introduction of torture and secret prisons – and confidently offering a hundred thousand dollar reward to anyone who could name a nation that allowed torture of the ‘other’ that did not eventually turn this abuse on its own citizens — (confident because I knew there was no such place) — so today I warn that one cannot name a nation that gave the military the power to make civilian arrests and hold citizens in military detention, that did not almost at once turn that power almost against members of that nation’s own political ruling class. This makes sense — the obverse sense of a democracy, in which power protects you; political power endangers you in a militarized police state: the more powerful a political leader is, the more can be gained in a militarized police state by pressuring, threatening or even arresting him or her. More...

Dismal year-to-date performance of some of the major global banking stocks

2011-12-29T14:48:00.000-05:00

Here's a little overview of the year-to-date performance of some of the major global banking stocks on December 29, 2011, before the opening bell:

BofA: -60.38%
Citi: -44.76%
Goldman Sachs: -46.41%
JPMorgan: -23.03%
Morgan Stanley: -45.24%
RBS: -50%
Barclays: -34.32%
Lloyds: -63.02%
UBS: -29.33%
Deutsche Bank: -28,55%
Crédit Agricole: -56.04%
BNP Paribas: -37.67%
Société Générale: -59.57%

These are just some of the Too Big To Fail institutions. And while your governments have enough faith in them - or so they want you to believe - to prop them up with trillions of dollars of your money, investors are fleeing them, even if they can expect them to be propped up further.

That doesn't just say something about confidence in the individual banks, it shouts loud and clear from the rooftops on confidence in the banking system as a whole, and indeed on governments' ability to continue bailing them out. In other words: bailouts don’t build confidence, they are taken as a sign that trouble's on the way. More...

U.S. aircraft carrier spotted in Iran wargames zone

2011-12-29T13:26:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaA US aircraft carrier entered a zone near the Strait of Hormuz being used by the Iranian navy for wargames, an Iranian official said Thursday amid rising tensions over the key oil-transit channel.

“A US aircraft carrier was spotted inside the manoeuvre zone… by a navy reconnaissance aircraft,” Commodore Mahmoud Mousavi, the spokesman for the Iranian exercises, told the official IRNA news agency.

The Iranian aircraft took video and photos of the US vessel, he added.

The US aircraft carrier was believed to the USS John C. Stennis, one of the US navy’s biggest warships.

US officials announced Wednesday that the ship and its accompanying battle group moved through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow stretch at the entrance to the Gulf that is the world’s most important choke point for oil shipments.

After warnings from the Iranian government and navy this week that Iran could close the strait if threatened by further Western sanctions, the US Defence Department warned Wednesday that such actions “will not be tolerated.” More...

Home prices down for 6th straight month

2011-12-27T13:45:00.000-05:00

By Les Christie

Home prices fell for the sixth straight month in October, down 1.2% compared with September and 3.4% a year ago, according to the latest S&P/Case-Shiller 20-city index.

The decline was disappointing in light of several other recent reports, which painted a more positive picture of the housing market. More...

Holiday returns to hit record $46 billion

2011-12-27T11:38:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaThe holidays aren't even over yet and shoppers are racking up returns already. Whether it's the wrong size, wrong style or just plain weird, shoppers will return $46.28 billion in holiday merchandise, a record high, according to the National Retail Federation.

This year, shoppers are bringing items back even before those presents are wrapped or bows are tied. That's partly a result of record-breaking sales on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, when buyers flocked to stores like Target, Wal-Mart and Best Buy.

"Higher sales will bring higher return amounts," said Kathy Grannis, a spokeswoman for the NRF. Some gift buyers are bringing purchases back now to take advantage of additional markdowns retailers are making in the days before Christmas, explained Candace Corlett of WSL Strategic Retail, a New York-based consulting firm. More...

DHS program to monitor social media users draws lawsuit

2011-12-23T12:35:00.000-05:00

Image by Thomas Hawk via FlickrPrivacy advocates are suing the Homeland Security Department to obtain information on a program that monitors the social media interactions of citizens following a federal vendor's private sector plans to sabotage certain groups' online activities with similar technology.

Homeland Security officials have expanded an ongoing initiative that tracks public online communications in the interests of public safety, according a February DHS notice.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center on Tuesday filed a lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act that seeks all government communications with contractors related to the program. The request was prompted by a leak of planning emails from government contractor HB Gary describing project proposals for a private firm to monitor and discredit the online activities of Americans, such as labor union leaders. Other emails in the cache showed that an HB Gary executive was planning a special training session with Homeland Security officials. Hacker activists from the loosely organized collective Anonymous released the communications. More...

Shell companies steal hundreds of millions from Medicare

2011-12-22T12:18:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaBy the time authorities busted a fake AIDS clinic in Miami, it had bilked Medicare of more than $4.5 million. Still, the man behind the scheme remained far ahead of the agents pursuing him.

Michel De Jesus Huarte, a 40-year-old Cuban-American, hadn't simply avoided arrest. He had hatched a plan to steal millions more from Medicare by forming at least 29 other shell companies — paper-only firms with no real operations. Each time, he would keep his name out of any corporate records. Other people — some paid by Huarte, some whose identities had been stolen — would be listed in incorporation papers.

The shells functioned as a vital tool to hide the Medicare deceit — and not only for Huarte. Hundreds of others have used the veil of corporate secrecy to help steal hundreds of millions of dollars from one of the nation's largest social service programs, a Reuters investigation has found. More...

Donations to Salvation Army drop 10 percent

2011-12-21T14:08:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaDonations to the Salvation Army’s iconic red kettles are down 10 percent in the Chicago area this year when compared with the same time last year, the organization said today.

The dip is likely due to a combination of factors, including the country’s continuing economic struggles and a decrease in both the number of bell ringers and the number of sites where the kettles can be placed, said Lt. Col. Ralph Bukiewicz, divisional commander for the Chicago region.

“Having fewer sites, fewer workers and a greater need throughout (the area) seems to be creating an ever-widening gap,” Bukiewicz said.

The kettles first appeared throughout the area this year on Nov. 18 in an effort to raise $13 million, Bukiewicz said. As of Tuesday evening, the organization had raised about $7.3 million, or just over 56 percent of its goal, Bukiewicz said. More...

The Shocking Truth of The Pending EU Collapse

2011-12-21T11:43:00.000-05:00

"When the hell do we the so called common people wake the hell up?
Unlimited money supply is not enough for these people. They want all of our souls!"

Bank loans to small business fall to 12-year low

2011-12-19T13:46:00.000-05:00

New federal data show that the number of small bank loans to business has fallen to the lowest point in more than a decade, cutting the flow of money to a sector that's usually a job-creation powerhouse.

"It's usually the smaller business that is more able to bounce back and take advantage of different opportunities faster than a middle-market company," said Linda O'Connell, manager of small business research at Barlow Research Associates, a Minneapolis market research firm that focuses on the financial industries. "We haven't seen that."

An analysis of recently released Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. data by the Investigative Reporting Workshop shows that overall commercial and industrial lending by banks has increased for five straight quarters, but small loans to business of $1 million or less have been shrinking consistently since June 2008. As of Sept. 30, total outstanding loan volume was down 14.7 percent from its peak. More...

Occupy Tampa to march on Obama office to protest National Defense Authorization Act

2011-12-16T20:44:00.000-05:00

By Cooper Levey-Baker

Occupy Tampa protesters plan to march to Obama’s Ybor City campaign office today to protest the president’s decision to support the National Defense Authorization Act, a bill that authorizes the “indefinite detention of terrorist suspects” — including American citizens — “without trial.”

In a statement given to Obama’s office yesterday, Occupy Tampa protesters wrote:

In your newly stated support for the provisions that allow for the indefinite detainment of American citizens, the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act, you have betrayed the trust of those who have put you into office and the trust of the citizens that your office was created to serve.

If you fail to veto this bill in its entirety due to these provisions, you can expect members of occupations all over the country to dedicate ourselves to act against your political interests in the 2012 election and beyond.

This bill threatens the first amendment.

This bill explicitly violates Art. III, Sec. 3 of the constitution which states, “No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court”. The removal of the rights of citizenship without due process of law allows for the destruction of the rights and liberties that we, the citizens, have, for generations, fought and bled for.

This bill violates the Fourth amendment, and the founding principles of due process that stands as the basis for justice in our country.

This bill further eliminates the protections guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment right to make use of due process of law.

This bill violates the Sixth amendment of the Constitution, as it denies citizens to the basic protection of a guaranteed trial by jury.

For the first time in legislative history the government of the United States has, through legislative fiat, designated the entire planet upon which we live a war zone and every citizen a potential enemy of the state.

This bill goes against everything that you have said previously, everything you have purported to stand for, and what has distinguished this nation as the founder of the free world.

We expect you to veto this assault on the American way of life.

The NDAA has drawn fierce criticism from civil liberties advocates. The executive director of Human Rights Watch said that by deciding to support the bill, Obama “will go down in history as the president who enshrined indefinite detention without trial in US law.” An ACLU representative said that “if President Obama signs this bill, it will damage both his legacy and American’s reputation for upholding the rule of law.”

Government Shutdown Looms as US Tax Fight Gets Nastier

2011-12-15T14:11:00.000-05:00

The U.S. faced the prospect of an imminent government shutdown for the third time this year, as a year-end fight between Republican and Democratic lawmakers in Congress over taxes and spending turned nastier.

Democrats, led by President Barack Obama, are refusing to sign off on a bipartisan $1 trillion government funding bill that would keep federal agencies operating beyond Friday. They first want Republicans to agree to a compromise deal to extend a payroll tax cut for 160 million Americans. The Republican-led House of Representatives passed its version of the payroll tax cut bill along a mostly party-line vote Tuesday, but Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has vowed to kill it as soon as he can bring it to a vote.

The Republican bill proposes to pay for the $120 billion cost of the payroll tax cut largely by freezing federal pay and shrinking the size of the government work force. Democrats reject it and are instead proposing a surtax on millionaires. More...

Realtors: We Overcounted Home Sales for Five Years

2011-12-14T13:11:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaData on sales of previously owned U.S. homes from 2007 through October this year will be revised down next week because of double counting, indicating a much weaker housing market than previously thought.

The National Association of Realtors said a benchmarking exercise had revealed that some properties were listed more than once, and in some instances, new home sales were also captured.

"All the sales and inventory data that have been reported since January 2007 are being downwardly revised. Sales were weaker than people thought," NAR spokesman Walter Malony told Reuters.

"We're capturing some new home data that should have been filtered out and we also discovered that some properties were being listed in more than one list." More...

The Governments Hidden $500 Billion Inflation Tax on Savings

2011-12-09T13:35:00.000-05:00

Image by 401K via FlickrThere is a hidden and deeply unfair "tax" that is costing US savers in excess of $500 billion per year. Through forcing interest rates far below the rate of inflation, the government has effectively created a tax on savings that not only takes all real interest income, but quite deliberately confiscates wealth from tens of millions of savers every year - for the direct benefit of the government.

As will be demonstrated with step by step, simple illustrations, the government is imposing the economic equivalent of a 90% income tax on savers. The amount taken annually from savers is equal to more than half of all individual income taxes, and is nearly three times as large as total corporate income taxes.

The tax is not uniformly imposed, but instead targets older middle class savers in particular. The effects include invalidating decades of financial planning, and potentially impoverishing millions of current and future retirees. More...

Too-Big-To-Fail Banks Back on Senate Agenda

2011-12-07T12:39:00.000-05:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeSenator Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat who co-wrote a proposal last year to limit the size of banks, plans to hold a hearing today on “new oversight authority to shield Main Street from Wall Street megabank risk,” according to a statement from his office. Former Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chairman Sheila Bair, who has said that governments around the world are propping up a bloated financial system, will be a witness.

Last year’s Dodd-Frank Act gave the FDIC authority to close large failing financial firms, and Federal Reserve officials say new rules will force the biggest banks to boost capital, making failure less likely.

“For too long, Wall Street has been permitted to operate in the dark, putting our economy at risk and leaving taxpayers on the hook,” Brown said yesterday in an e-mailed statement. More...

Many have little to no savings as retirement looms

2011-12-05T14:39:00.000-05:00

After a vicious decade of no growth for the stock market, including two 401(k)-eating bear markets and persistently sky-high unemployment, more Americans are finding themselves in their 50s and 60s with practically no money saved for retirement.

"We were in our 30s, blinked, and now we're our parents' age," says Alan Tipps, a corporate jet pilot who typically earns more than $100,000 a year when he's working. But Tipps, 52, has been laid off three times during the past four years, and says that has forced him to burn through what was in his 401(k) just to "keep the lights on" in his home in Portales, N.M.

Investors of all ages have suffered. But for those close to retirement, it's been especially tough, because they're faced with taking distributions from investment portfolios that in some cases are a fraction of their peak value. Forced early retirements and the near extinction of pensions are making things worse, creating a generation of aging investors in which some have little or no plans for how they're going to pay for retirement. More...

Lincoln, Kennedy, Murdered By Banking Cartel

2011-12-04T09:05:00.001-05:00

US Presidents Murdered By The Rothschild Banking Cartel

Abraham Lincoln worked valiantly to prevent the Rothschild's attempts to involve themselves in financing the Civil War.

Interestingly, it was the Czar of Russia who provided the needed assistance against the British and French, who were among the driving forces behind the secession of the South and her subsequent financing. Russia intervened by providing naval forces for the Union blockade of the South in European waters, and by letting both countries know that if they attempted to join the Confederacy with military forces, they would also have to go to war with Russia.

The Rothschild interests did succeed, through their agent Treasury Secretary Salmon P. Chase, to force a bill (the National Banking Act) through Congress creating a federally chartered central bank that had the power to issue U.S. Bank Notes. Afterward, Lincoln warned the American people:

"The money power preys upon the nation in time of peace and conspires against it in times of adversity. It is more despotic than monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, more selfish than bureaucracy. I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me, and causes me to tremble for the safety of our country. Corporations have been enthroned, an era of corruption will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people, until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands, and the republic is destroyed.

Lincoln continued to fight against the central bank, and some now believe that it was his anticipated success in influencing Congress to limit the life of the Bank of the United States to just the war years that was the motivating factor behind his assassination.

The Lone Assassin Myth is Born

Modern researchers have uncovered evidence of a massive conspiracy that links the following parties to the Bank of Rothschild: Lincoln's Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, John Wilkes Booth, his eight co-conspirators, and over seventy government officials and businessmen involved in the conspiracy.

When Booth's diary was recovered by Stanton's troops, it was delivered to Stanton. When it was later produced during the investigation, eighteen pages had been ripped out. These pages, containing the aforementioned names,were later found in the attic of one of Stanton's descendants.

From Booth's trunk, a coded message was found that linked him directly to Judah P. Benjamin, the Civil War campaign manager in the South for the House of Rothschild. When the war ended, the key to the code was found in Benjamin's possession.

The assassin, portrayed as a crazed lone gunman with a few radical friends, escaped by way of the only bridge in Washington not guarded by Stanton's troops.

"Booth" was located hiding in a barn near Port Royal, Virginia, three days after escaping from Washington. He was shot by a soldier named Boston Corbett, who fired without orders. Whether or not the man killed was Booth is still a matter of contention, but the fact remains that whoever it was, he had no chance to identify himself. It was Secretary of War Edwin Stanton who made the final identification. Some now believe that a dupe was used and that the real John Wilkes Booth escaped with Stanton's assistance.

Mary Todd Lincoln, upon hearing of her husband's death, began screaming, "Oh, that dreadful house!" Earlier historians felt that this spontaneous utterance referred to the White House. Some now believe it may have been directed to Thomas W. House, a gun runner, financier, and agent of the Rothschild's during the Civil War, who was linked to the anti-Lincoln, pro-banker interests. More...

US Needs To Generate 263,700 Jobs Monthly To Return To Pre-Depression Employment By End Of Obama Second Term

2011-12-02T10:11:00.000-05:00

Zero Hedge
We will simply copy and paste, with the appropriate adjustments, the form text we put up after each and every NFP report calculating the number of people that have to be added by the end of a hypothetical second Obama term. Using the November boilerplate: "Every few months we rerun an analysis of how many jobs the US economy has to generate to return to the unemployment rate as of December 2007 when the Great Financial Crisis started, by the end of Obama's potential second term in November 2016.

This calculation takes into account the historical change in Payroll and includes the 90,000/month natural growth to the labor force, and extrapolates into the future. And every time we rerun this calculation, the number of jobs that has to be created to get back to baseline increases: First it was 245,500 in April, then 250,000 in June, then 254,000 in July then 261,200 in October [and finally 262,500 in November].

this number has has just risen to an all time high of 263,700. This means that unless that number of jobs is created each month for the next 5 years, America will have a higher unemployment rate in October 2016 than it did in December 2007. More...

Initial Jobless Claims Back Over 400K, Prior Revised Higher

2011-12-01T09:36:00.000-05:00

After a few brief weeks with a 3 handle in initial claims, initial layoffs once again jumped over 400k, to 402,000 in the Thanksgiving shortened week. As is now par for the course of the data fudgers at the BLS, the previous number was revised higher as is 100% the case always now on a weekly basis, from 393K to 396K.

As a reminder, last week's forecast had been for a 388K print, so the 5k miss certainly looked better than an 8k, or 60% higher miss. Unadjusted claims was the silver lining, declining by 69.7k following the massive surge the week prior. Continuing claims also missed expectations, rising from an upward revised 3,705K to 3,740K, on consensus print of 3,650K. Probably most notable is the surge in EUCs as over 76k people dropped off continuing claims and had to file for extended benefits. More...

Waiting for midnight, hungry families on food stamps give Walmart 'enormous spike'

2011-11-29T18:49:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaAt the stroke of midnight, a growing number of Americans are lining up at Walmart not to cash in on a holiday sale, but because they’re hungry. The increasing number of Americans relying on food stamps to survive the sluggish economic recovery has changed the way the largest retailer in the United States does business.

Carol Johnston, Walmart’s senior vice president of store development, said that store managers have seen an “enormous spike” in the number of consumers shopping at midnight on the first of the month. That’s typically when those receiving federal food assistance have their accounts refilled each month.

“We’ll bring in more staff to stock. We’ll also make sure all of our registers…are open…Some people may think at 12:01, Walmart’s very quiet, but in a lot of our areas of the country, 12:01 is a big day or a big night for us, actually,” Johnston said. More...

Dealers See Fed Buying $545B Mortgage Bonds

2011-11-28T08:14:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaAfter cutting its target interest rate for overnight loans between banks to a range of zero to 0.25 percent, the Fed bought about $1.7 trillion of government and mortgage debt during QE1 between December 2008 and March 2010, and purchased $600 billion of Treasuries between November 2010 and June through QE2.

Now the biggest bond dealers in the U.S. say the Federal Reserve is poised to start a new round of stimulus, injecting more money into the economy by purchasing mortgage securities instead of Treasuries.

Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and his fellow policy makers, who bought $2.3 trillion of Treasury and mortgage-related bonds between 2008 and June, will start another program next quarter, 16 of the 21 primary dealers of U.S. government securities that trade with the central bank said in a Bloomberg News survey last week. The Fed may buy about $545 billion in home-loan debt, based on the median of the 10 firms that provided estimates. More...

Extended families are making a comeback

2011-11-25T03:40:00.000-05:00

Image by JoshLawton via FlickrAn increasing number of extended families across the USA are under the same roof, living together either permanently or temporarily. Sometimes these arrangements are multigenerational, with adult children, grandchildren or an elderly parent sharing quarters. In other cases, an extended family bunks together, with siblings, cousins, nieces or nephews sharing space.

The reasons are economic, social and demographic. The recession and its aftermath have pushed extended families to share space at a time when the average age at first marriage has climbed to 28.7 for men and 26.5 for women. And life expectancy — now 75.7 for men and 80.6 for women in the USA — continues to rise. The flow of immigrants into this country also has been a factor; immigrants are more likely than other groups to live with members of their extended family.

Taken together, the trends suggest that the rise of the extended family is going to be with us for a while, analysts say. More...

Moody's warns U.S. not to back off automatic deficit cuts

2011-11-25T03:16:00.000-05:00

Moody's Investors Services warned on Wednesday that it could downgrade the U.S. government's top credit rating, if Congress backs off $1.2 trillion in automatic deficit cuts scheduled over the next decade.

The credit rating agency said in a statement it will not immediately lower the nation's rating on long-term debt after a special congressional panel failed this week to reach agreement on alternative cuts to the deficit.

The impasse triggered the automatic cuts, which are scheduled to begin in 2013. Moody's said any effort to reduce those cuts could force the agency to downgrade its rating. Some Republicans are vowing to block the cuts slated to occur in defense programs, which amount to about half of the total. More...

U.S. Billionaires Avoid Reporting Cash to IRS

2011-11-21T19:29:00.000-05:00

When billionaire Billy Joe “Red” McCombs, co-founder of Clear Channel Communications Inc., reported a $9.8 million loss on his tax return, he failed to include about $259 million from a lucrative stock transaction.

After an audit, the Internal Revenue Service ordered him to pay $44.7 million in back taxes. McCombs, who is worth an estimated $1.4 billion and is a former owner of the Minnesota Vikings, Denver Nuggets and San Antonio Spurs sports franchises, sued the IRS, settling the case in March for about half the disputed amount.

McCombs’s fight with the IRS illustrates an overlooked facet in the debate over tax rates paid by the nation’s wealthiest. Billionaires -- from McCombs to Philip Anschutz to Ronald S. Lauder -- who derive the bulk of their wealth from stock appreciation are using strategies that reap hundreds of millions of dollars from those valuable shares in ways the IRS often doesn’t classify as taxable income, securities filings and tax court records show. More...

Here's What The Wall Street Protesters Are So Angry About

2011-11-17T12:40:00.001-05:00

Image by david_shankbone via Flickrbusinessinsider.com
The "Occupy Wall Street" protests are gaining momentum, having spread from a small park in New York to marches to other cities across the country.

So far, the protests seem fueled by a collective sense that things in our economy are not fair or right. But the protesters have not done a good job of focusing their complaints—and thus have been skewered as malcontents who don't know what they stand for or want.

(An early list of "grievances" included some legitimate beefs, but was otherwise just a vague attack on "corporations." Given that these are the same corporations that employ more than 100 million Americans and make the products we all use every day, this broadside did not resonate with most Americans).

So, what are the protesters so upset about, really?

Do they have legitimate gripes?

To answer the latter question first, yes, they have very legitimate gripes.

And if America cannot figure out a way to address these gripes, the country will likely become increasingly "de-stabilized," as sociologists might say. And in that scenario, the current protests will likely be only the beginning.

The problem in a nutshell is this: Inequality in this country has hit a level that has been seen only once in the nation's history, and unemployment has reached a level that has been seen only once since the Great Depression. And, at the same time, corporate profits are at a record high.

In other words, in the never-ending tug-of-war between "labor" and "capital," there has rarely—if ever—been a time when "capital" was so clearly winning.
Click here to see what the protesters are so upset about...

US Middle-class areas shrinking

2011-11-17T09:47:00.000-05:00

Image by VLKR via FlickrThe number of middle-income neighborhoods in the United States has dwindled significantly over the past 40 years, as the rich-poor divide deepens across the country, a study released Wednesday showed.

In 2007, nearly a third of American families -- 31 percent -- lived in either an affluent neighborhood or a mainly low-income one, up from just 15 percent in 1970, according to the study conducted by Stanford University, and released in partnership with the Russell Sage Foundation and Brown University.

Meanwhile, 44 percent of American families lived in middle-class neighborhoods in 2007, down from 65 percent in 1970.

"Mixed income neighborhoods have grown rarer, while affluent and poor neighborhoods have grown much more common," the study said. More...

Fannie, Freddie execs score $100 million payday

2011-11-15T11:44:00.000-05:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeMortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac received the biggest federal bailout of the financial crisis. And nearly $100 million of those tax dollars went to lucrative pay packages for top executives, filings show.

The top five executives at Fannie Mae received $33.3 million in 2009 and 2010, while the top five at Freddie Mac received $28.1 million. And each company has set pay targets of as much as $17 million for its top managers for 2011.

That's a total of $95.4 million, which will essentially be coming from taxpayers, who have been keeping the mortgage finance giants alive with regular quarterly cash infusions since the Federal Home Finance Agency (FHFA) took control of the companies in September 2008.

Fannie CEO Michael Williams and Freddie CEO Charles Halderman, each received about $5.5 million in pay for last year, and they could receive more when their final deferred compensation for 2010 is set. All the executives receive a significant portion of their pay in the year or years after they earn it. More...

A Den of Vipers and Thieves

2011-11-14T12:10:00.001-05:00

Image by Webbaliah via FlickrScott Johnson
For some, the upcoming dollar extinction event will be completely unexpected. For others, the coming days may be seen as the unraveling of the greatest silent oppression story humanity has ever had the displeasure of calling reality. Mislead by the deceitful words from generations of countless “professional politicians”, the lives of all Americans will be forever changed over the next two years, no person to be excluded.

We now live in a society where lies are presented as truth, military imperialism is justified in the name of humanitarianism, and more debt continues to be issued to “promote” economic health and stability. The long-run is not in focus, and short-term perspective is constantly subject to manipulation.

The staples of life, such as the food we eat, the water we drink, the education we receive, and the medical practices developed have all fallen victim to the hands of profiteer-ism, lacking respect for the well-being of the population, better known as crony capitalism.

America’s children have been taught to memorize, repeat, and to be entertained. We have been told that we are nothing without a college degree, in which many are forced to take out student loans in which opens the precedent to a life of debt. What sort of precedent is this setting our future up for? (Approaching one trillion dollars… larger than all credit card debt).

Our media has been hijacked, as responsible journalism has all but vanished from the mainstream arena. Many complain about specific networks or mediums, when in truth it matters not which different “race”of news one mentions, for they are all fed by the two dominant mainstream news sources, Reuters and Associated Press.

Our economy has been morphed from a goods producing private sector, into a government subsidized welfare state. The basis for what is left of the American economy depends on consuming cheap goods, many in which come from China and other openly oppressed nations. Regardless of this known fact, the American Public and the U.S. government adopt the “out of sight, out of mind” philosophy with respect to ethics and morality of the exploited labor. If this was truly the land of the free, why do we play benefactor to the exploitation of labor trade?

So it is no wonder why in these times, so many are confused, angry, and even frightened about what the future holds. For those who are opening up to the world, they are greeted by the many harsh unspoken realities in which this world is founded upon. And for those who remain unaware, the life they have known seems to be changing at an increasing rate. Both types of people are left asking why?

The answer is quite straightforward, yet elegantly complicated in its delicacies. To understand why all these illusions are converging upon the next several years, one must look at the common denominator among these large and complex lies, or the heart of the beast one may say, currency (money). More...

Mossad, CIA, MI6 Set up Spying Centers Near Iranian Borders

2011-11-10T10:06:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaTEHRAN (FNA)- A senior Iranian legislative official revealed on Wednesday that the US, Israeli and British spy agencies have set up a number of bases in the neighboring states of Iran to conduct espionage and sabotage operations against the Islamic Republic.

"Based on investigations, Mossad, CIA and MI6 spy agencies have set up spy bases on the borderlines of five neighboring countries (with Iran)," member of the parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Zohreh Elahian told FNA.

"The bases are tasked with directing terrorist groups and even conducting sabotage and espionage operations against the Islamic Republic and its citizens," she added.

Elahian named Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan as the five countries in which the US, Israeli and British spy agencies have established bases.

In December, an independent French weekly, Le Canard enchaine, revealed that the US, Israeli and British spy agencies have been directly involved in the recent terrorist attacks against Iranian scientists.

Mossad conducted the assassinations "with the help of the CIA and MI6," Le Canard enchaine said.

Intelligence sources told the influential French weekly that the assassinations were part of Israeli plots aimed at sabotaging Iran's nuclear program.

Iran announced in December that security forces have arrested a number of perpetrators of the recent terrorist attacks on the country's scientists and university professors.

Iranian Interior Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar said at the time that the confessions made by the arrested terrorists indicated Israel's direct role in the attacks. More...

40,000 join credit unions in bank dumping protest

2011-11-09T10:03:00.000-05:00

Image via WikipediaMore than 40,000 people joined credit unions during the "Move Your Money" and "Bank Transfer Day" movements this past Saturday, continuing the exodus of customers fed up with big banks.

The new customers were the latest in a surge of members credit unions have signed up in recent weeks, as public anger over proposed fees at Bank of America and elsewhere has boiled over, the Credit Union National Association said Tuesday.

"Since Sept. 29 -- the day Bank of America announced its now-rescinded monthly $5 debit card fee -- average estimated membership increases nationally were around 20,000 new members each day, " CUNA President and CEO Bill Cheney said in a statement. "On Saturday, consumers doubled the pace. It's clear that consumers kept up their interest in credit unions."

In a previous survey, released late last week, the industry group said an estimated 650,000 consumers had joined credit unions between September 29 and the first week of November, bringing with them an estimated $4.5 billion in new savings accounts. More...

Seniors Join Occupy Chicago, Protest Cuts To Medicare, Social Security

2011-11-07T16:28:00.000-05:00

Hundreds of senior citizens gathered in Chicago's Federal Plaza Monday morning to let Congress know how they feel about cutting Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. The group ultimately blocked traffic at a downtown intersection -- leading to 47 arrests.

Members of the Jane Addams Senior Caucus were joined by other grassroots organizations, including Occupy Chicago, in a rally outside of Sen. Mark Kirk and Sen. Dick Durbin's office, followed by a march.

“We are fighting for our elders, for our children, and for our future," Occupy Chicago's Rachael Perrotta said in a statement. "Their welfare is our priority. We demand our elected leaders, like Durbin, Kirk and 'Mayor 1%' Emanuel, choose to serve the people, and protect the programs that ensure our futures.” More...

Consolidation of power by the Secret Government has been achieved

2011-11-05T03:43:00.000-04:00

Comment of the day by Joyful

The real subtext of this [CME] story is exclusively about government debt.

The CME, the primary dealers, TBTF banks are running interference for the FED, so as to disguise the latest manipulations dreamed up by the subgenius MBAs who finally had to acknowledge that the QE experiment had run out of runway.

In other words, this is a governmental liquidity crisis. It will be 'solved' (temporarily, as always) by a mass confiscation of investor savings disquised as more 'free market' events. (hint:MFG as precursor event)

If Wall Street and the big banks get blamed for the fallout, that will be entirely satisfactory to the TPTB: it's part of the deal for the rake off they get for hiding the true nature of the crime and indentity of the criminals. Besides- beta testing for the imposition of martial law (hint:OWS) has advanced to the stage where everyone is sure that public anger can and will be contained.

That this is unfolding in sync on both sides of the euro-merikan pond is mere confirmation that consolidation of power by the Secret Government has been achieved to the necessary degree to successfully collapse our post-feudal experiment in individual liberties and return us all to the required level of peonage.

Nothing new under the Sun...this is 1720, all over again. Rinse, repeat, sheer the sheep. If the small investor class does not go completely apeshit over what's already happened to them as of this week, they will assuredly be completely destroyed before that Mayan calendar thingy even has a chance to kick in.

1720 saw the CONCURRENT failure of schemes wherein governmental debt was farmed into corporate hands in order to complete an integration of public-private insider trading which ruined the investing classes of the times in Britain, France and the Netherlands. It also involved an incipient USA insofar and the Mississippi Company was the vehicle by which public risk was institutionalized via the crown takeover of a public company's risk.

I don't have the time right now to go into all the details of Jon Corzines channeling of John Laws template of corporate fascism aka statist ponzi schemes. But I can assure you that everything is completely under control. It's the people who are at greatest risk of 'folding' not the banks.

For now.

Greek style riots hit Occupy Oakland

2011-11-03T00:12:00.001-04:00

Occupy Oakland protesters vandalized businesses and smashed bank windows, as they tried to shut down the city with a series of marches today.

Thousands of Wall Street protesters marched through the streets of Oakland, where demonstrators had called for a 'general strike' in an attempt to bring the city to its knees.

Emotions have run high in the city since last week when an attempt by police to break up a camp lead to the serious injury of an Iraq war veteran.

Ultimately only around five percent of city workers took the day off work, officials said.

The demonstrators' attempt to close down Oakland port, America's fifth biggest, also failed.

Perhaps frustrated at their inability to disrupt city business, protesters on the second march of the day turned violent, smashing windows at a Chase bank branch a few blocks from the city's downtown.

Graffiti was also painted on the bank. Employees tried in vain to close up the broken windows with boards and other materials, while one private security guard looked on helpless. More...

New all time record number of 45.8 billion on food stamps

2011-11-01T17:18:00.000-04:00

As the European news flow overflow continues, it is useful to occasionally look at how America's own economy is doing. After all remember that the latest paradigm is that the US will decouple from everyone (as is always foolishly and erroneously assumed whenever the ROW turns lower) and carry the weight of the global economy on its own shoulders. So here is this month's refresh from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which informs us that in August, a new all time record number of Americans, or 45.8 billion, relied on food stamps for sustenance. More...

Home prices heading for triple-dip

2011-10-31T10:21:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaThe besieged housing market has even further to fall before home prices really hit rock bottom. According to Fiserv, a financial analytics company, home values are expected to fall another 3.6% by next June, pushing them to a new low of 35% below the peak reached in early 2006 and marking a triple dip in prices.

Several factors will be working against the housing market in the upcoming months, including an increase in foreclosure activity and sustained high unemployment, explained David Stiff, Fiserv's chief economist.

Should home values meet Fiserv's expectations, it would make it the third (and lowest) trough for home prices since the housing bubble burst.

The first post-bubble bottom was hit in 2009, when prices fell to 31% below peak. The First-Time Homebuyer Credit helped perk prices up by mid-2010, but by the time the credit expired, prices fell again. More...

Home Depot moving white-collar jobs overseas

2011-10-28T13:43:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaU.S. figures show American companies have slashed labor costs by moving millions of manufacturing jobs to China. A new trend involves many companies moving higher-paying, white-collar positions overseas too. Many American corporate call centers now are in places like the Philippines and technical jobs are in India. One example is Channel 2 parent company Cox Media Group, which uses overseas call center for some customer service questions.

Now, U.S. firms are quietly moving high-paying accounting, finance and human resource jobs offshore. National labor statistics reveal that in the past 10 years, American companies have slashed 2.9 million jobs in the United States. At the same time, they have created 2.4 million jobs for people overseas.

Local companies, like Home Depot, are among them. The company built an international chain from one store in Atlanta. Now it's moving white collar jobs offshore.

Channel 2 Action News has reported in recent years that Home Depot has laid off thousands of workers, including hundreds at its worldwide corporate headquarters in Vinings in Cobb County. At the same time, it's hiring hundreds of workers thousands of miles away.

Georgia Labor Department records show Home Depot has moved jobs from Vinings to India. Companies usually keep outsourcing details a secret, but two Home Depot executives taped a testimonial posted online for the outsourcing company in India now is handling some of their accounting functions. More...

Shanghai Homeowners Smash Showroom in Protest Over Falling Prices

2011-10-28T13:23:00.001-04:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeA weekend scuffle in Shanghai over a drop in apartment prices adds to increasing evidence that China’s efforts to tame a surging property market are having an impact – even as it offers a hint of what could happen if the measures go too far.

A group of around 400 homeowners in Shanghai demonstrated publicly and damaged a showroom operated by their property developer after the company said it cut prices. Home buyers had wanted to speak with the developer to refund or cancel their contracts but were unsuccessful, according to local media. One report said the price cuts exceeded 25% per square meter.

The local media reports said an unspecified number of people were injured. The property developer, a unit of China Overseas Holdings Ltd., didn’t respond to requests for comment. Photos of the event showed broken glass in the sales office, homeowners marching with banners and a phalanx of police watching over. More...

US consumer confidence is collapsing

2011-10-26T08:39:00.000-04:00

Image by Sifter via FlickrUS consumer confidence is collapsing and there is no other word for it. The Conference Board's index of consumer confidence posted yet another decline in October, falling to 39.8 (previous: 46.4) - the weakest reading since the end of the recession! Looking at the detail there is a rather worrying issue here as the decrease reflects declines in both the present situation and expectations components, whereas the previous, more recent major moves down in the index were driven primarily by the expectations component.

This means the concerns are NOW. Spending will now surely take a hit and some shocks in retail sales are on the way in the US and in the UK as deleveraging is forced upon the masses. I cannot highlight or stress how important this issue is to growth everywhere. As prices increase and wages stagnate, things are going to get tougher into the winter and I note with interest the component in the US data highlighting concerns over future earnings. In the past low confidence has not always hit sales but in my mind things are different as the debt burden is almost unbearable and many have little credit left, adjustments will have to be made.

When these adjustments come through, in my mind very soon, the Fed and other central banks may see a steep move towards deflation as growth stumbles and economies go back into recession, probably led by the EU then the UK and finally the US. The world cannot fill that massive customer void.

The timing of this could be dreadful as just at a time when the world needs China and the other Asian exporters to pull us through, the hard landings will hit. Global growth expectations are far too optimistic and policy shifts will be swift where possible. What the world does not need right now is a falling Dollar as that complicates matters worse but it is of little concern to Bernanke and Geithner as they are concerned about America and rightly so.

Again I reiterate that a world where we have deleveraging from Sovereigns (which demands draconian austerity measures), banks (lack of credit supply to small businesses, the essential for growth) and the consumer, is not a world that is going to grow. In fact the speed of the fall could surprise. More...

Consumer Confidence Falls to Two-Year Low

2011-10-25T10:46:00.000-04:00

Consumer confidence unexpectedly slumped in October to the lowest level since March 2009, when the U.S. economy was in a recession, as Americans’ outlooks for employment and incomes soured.

Limited job availability, deteriorating home values and the threat of a European debt default are weighing on sentiment. A drop in optimism helps explain concern among some companies like Levi Strauss & Co. that spending will falter during the holiday shopping season.

“Dysfunctional labor and housing markets and the turmoil in Europe all are drags on confidence,” Robert Dye, chief economist at Comerica Inc. in Dallas, said before the report. “Consumers are fundamentally constrained, and consumer spending won’t be leading the economy forward.” More...

Survey: Economists more bleak about US economy

2011-10-24T15:05:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaFewer U.S. companies expect to hire new workers in coming months, as business economists grow increasingly pessimistic about the overall economy's growth in the coming year.

Nearly 85 percent of economic experts surveyed expect the economy to grow at a meager 2 percent or less over the next 12 months, according to the National Association for Business Economists. In July only 23 percent of the survey's respondents predicted such slow growth.

Additionally, the number of companies that plan to hire more workers fell from 42 percent to 30 percent, while the number of companies laying workers off rose. The group reports that 13 percent of respondents have reduced their staff, up from 8 percent in July.

One-fifth of the economists say the European debt crisis has hurt sales, with the average estimate around 10 percent, and 30 percent expect the squeeze to continue into the first quarter of 2012.

The quarterly survey includes the views of 70 economists for private companies and trade groups who are NABE members. The data are reported by broad industry group. More...

For Chicago's poor, a long wait in line for food

2011-10-21T10:21:00.000-04:00

In the rain and chill of an October morning, they waited for food -- many for hours. "I got here at 5 o'clock this morning," said Marlon Jenkins, one of the people waiting on line.

The St. Columbanus Church food pantry on Chicago's south side is where then-President-elect Barack Obama handed out Thanksgiving dinners in 2008. Back then, the pantry fed about 370 hungry households every week. Now the number is up to 500 and counting.

Every Wednesday, the line stretches around the corner. "It keeps getting worse every week," said Father Mike Knotek, who greets almost everyone who waits. More...

Cost of Living Keeps Rising

2011-10-19T14:35:00.000-04:00

Image by xcode via FlickrThe cost of living in the U.S. kept rising in September, led by continued increases in food and energy prices, posing another challenge for Americans struggling with a weak job market.

Rising prices for food, shelter and other necessities led to the first cost-of-living increase in Social Security benefits since 2009. The more than 60 million Americans who receive Social Security will see their checks increase by 3.6%, the government said, but the increase will largely be offset by higher medical-care costs.

Consumer prices last month rose a seasonally adjusted 0.3% from August, the third straight monthly increase, the Labor Department said Wednesday.

Separately, U.S. home building grew in September to the highest level in 17 months. The results, however, were driven by a more than 50% monthly increase in construction of multifamily homes with at least two units, a volatile part of the market. Construction of single-family homes rose by 1.7% from a month earlier.

The weak housing market is a key concern to economic policy makers, and Federal Reserve officials monitor the consumer price data for any signs of inflation. That's because higher prices eat into the purchasing power of many Americans already struggling to find a job or to get a pay increase. Fed officials need to calibrate their interest-rate policy so that it boosts the economy and jobs without spurring too much inflation. More...

Bank Fees Push Consumers to Put Money Elsewhere

2011-10-18T08:47:00.000-04:00

Occupy Santa Cruz - Bank of America refusing to close account

Alternative finance firms, from credit unions to online and pawn lenders, are gaining traction as banks turn off the tap for easy cash and start charging fees for services that customers have had for free.

Some 60 million Americans — close to a fifth of the adult population — were underbanked or unbanked in 2009, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. That number is likely to rise as banks choke off free checking, and adjust to new rules that cut into their revenue.

Bank of America, Citigroup, J.P. Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, PNC Financial, Suntrust and others are beginning to charge for once-free services, making a bank account more of a luxury to those living on a tight budget.

"Credit unions are an alternative source for the kind of services a bank provides," said professor Lawrence White of New York's Stern School of Business. "I'm hoping they would see the unbanked as part of their mission. That would be the most socially worthwhile thing they could do." More...

Raw Video: Calif. Cops Remove Occupy Protesters

2011-10-15T07:39:00.000-04:00

San Diego police on Friday began removing about a half-dozen tents after warning demonstrators their personal belongings couldn't stay in the Occupy San Diego camp at a downtown plaza where they've camped for a week.

Utah to make gold legal currency

2011-10-14T19:39:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaThe US state of Utah has passed a Bill that legalizes gold and silver for everyday financial transactions. Press TV talks with David Morgan, Silver Investor.com from Washington who was a party to the signing of this declaration to allow people to use gold and silver as transactional money for their everyday living expenses. He explains how this would be done. Following is an approximate transcript of the interview.

Press TV: There's a huge global insurrection against banker occupation and underneath that we see some interesting cross currents going on as well. You've just returned from the Utah monetary conference where you signed the Utah monetary declaration. How exciting - tell us all about it?

David Morgan: Utah is the first state in the union that has at law passed the fact that citizens can voluntarily transaction in the state in commerce. So in other words simply stated you can buy and sell with gold and silver as a transaction basis throughout the state.

Now, that is a little tough to do coin-wise so they've implemented a strategy that I think is very simple and one that we're familiar with - Put your gold and your silver with a depository; the bank gives you a credit on their balance sheet; they issue you with a debit card; and then you just use the debit card.

So to the merchants, Wal-Mart as an example, you simply swipe your debit card, the transaction goes down to the spot price that day whatever the spot price for gold or silver is and then at the end of the month they reconcile the account based on what you purchased during the month.

Once this is implemented I think it's going to catch on and then of course it sets a standard I think for other states to come along and do the same thing. There are 11 states that have proposed gold and silver in transactions, but Utah is the only one that has passed it in the law so far.

Press TV: If you have your account based in gold and silver and you're using it as your go-to savings account and checking account, you have protection against the government printing up lots of fiat-dollars and inflating the purchasing value away from your currency - so why wouldn't anyone not want to do this?

David Morgan: I do believe it's going to catch on - it's hard to say; there's a argument about Gresham's law that good money chases out bad - that you're only going to save the good money. But I don't think this is necessarily true and I don't have time to go into all the arguments, but I interviewed Larry Hilton who wrote the bill - he's a lawyer in Utah - and basically there's lots of reasons why you would want to use physical gold and silver in a transaction. More...

US to Experience Stagflation Worse Than 1970s: Jim Rogers

2011-10-14T12:20:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaThe U.S. economy is likely to experience a period of stagflation worse than the 1970s, which would cause bond yields to spike, commodity bull Jim Rogers told CNBC on Friday in Singapore. Rogers said governments were lying about the inflation problem and the recent rally in Treasurys was a bubble.

"As the inflation numbers get worse and as governments print more money and as governments have to issue many, many more bonds - somewhere along the line we get to the point when (bond prices) go down."

Between 1974 and 1978 average inflation in the U.S. was at 8 percent, while unemployment hit a peak of 9 percent in May 1975. Currently, unemployment is at 9.1 percent while CPI is at 3.8 percent.

Rogers believes inflation will get much worse this time because, he said, in the 1970s only the Fed was printing money, whereas now many global central banks have been easing monetary policy. More...

U.S. bank failures through 2015 will drain $19 billion from FDIC

2011-10-12T03:37:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaU.S. bank failures through 2015 will drain $19 billion from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. fund for covering losses from shutdowns, the agency said in an update of its reserve ratio projections.

The $19 billion figure reported by the FDIC today is a decrease from the estimated $23 billion needed to cover bank failures in 2010, reflecting both the slowing rate of bank shutdowns and the impact of assessment increases imposed by the FDIC to bolster the Deposit Insurance Fund.

The fund, pushed into deficit by the wave of failures stemming from the 2008 credit crisis, turned positive as of June 30 after seven consecutive quarters of negative balances.

“The assessment that the insurance fund remains on the path to recovery and on track to meet the goals established by Congress is welcome news,” FDIC Acting Chairman Martin J. Gruenberg said in a statement. “As we seek to stay on track, it’s important to always be mindful of the challenges we face and ongoing risks to the insurance fund.”

Under current projections, FDIC assessment rates will boost the insurance fund to 1.15 percent of insured deposits in 2018, according to the agency’s statement. The regulator is required by the Dodd-Frank Act to increase the ratio to 1.35 percent by Sept. 30, 2020.

Today’s report shows that the FDIC may have gone farther than it needed to in increasing assessments, according to James Chessen, chief economist for the American Bankers Association. More...

Marines speak out in support of OWS rally

2011-10-10T20:12:00.002-04:00

Recently Sean Hannity called the occupy wall street protesters un-american in response Henry James Ferry interviewed a few Marines at Zuccotti Park.
The Marines stated why they had come to protest and in direct response to Hannity's statement said "Fuck off" and "Thats the biggest load of shit I've ever heard"

Make banks public utilities and prosecute all corrupt bankers

2011-10-08T16:24:00.000-04:00

Image by r0b0r0b via FlickrComment by "chindit13" from Chart Of The Week: European "Fear And Loathing" Hits Record $1.3 Trillion

If I sift through everything and try to filter out the noise, what I am left with as the agent of change is this: Greece. I’ll explain.

Greece is the only economic superpower in the world right now, if that terms means the land that has its finger on the financial nuclear trigger. Like democracy and the olympics, everything springs from Greece.

Greece will default. That is obvious. How they default is where it gets interesting. If Greece remains in the euro system, there is a possibility---very slight---that the default can be managed. It will hurt, and hurt badly, but it won't mean annihilation. If Greece leaves the euro, all hell breaks loose.

Think about how a departure from the euro might occur, and what repercussions it would have. If Greece hinted at departure, what Greek would not immediately head to the bank and remove his cash euros? Who wants 'new drachma', at an exchange rate determined first by the Greek government, before the Black Market gets a chance to have its say? Banks will have no choice but to close as their deposit base shrinks to zero. The Greek government also will have to impose capital restrictions, as those euros will want to find a resting place outside of the Greek government's reach.

Then what about the debt held by non-Greek banks? In what currency is it denominated? Will a private Greek borrower be told by his Eurobank that he still owes euro, and if so, will the Greek government even allow the borrower to pay back in euro? I'll bet "NO". There is precedent for this.

Now suppose the Italians or Spanish are paying attention. They, too, will immediately head to the bank and withdraw cash euros, just in case, or move them to Luxembourg or the Caymans or somewhere safe. Spanish and Italian banks will have to close, too. No other bank---not even a medium sized Bavarian bank (aka The Eternal Chumps) is going to do business with a Greek, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese or Irish Bank. Outstanding debts to Italian and Spanish firms will be recalled, in euros.

When nobody gets paid back, or gets paid back in new drachmas or new lire, no Eurobank gets out alive. French and Germans will remove what money they have in the bank. Gold will do well, but for a time so will physical euro cash. Inertia and a desire for simplicity will do that.

Then there's the US banks........what's the exposure? On and on it goes.

And it all started with tiny little Greece. Had Greece been the only profligate son of the EU, its loss could have been survivable, no matter the manner of default. It isn't alone, however, it is just first, and worst.

Is it any wonder the Troika is getting panicky? They are slowly awakening to the realization that they must take the lesser of two evils and try to orchestrate a controlled default of Greece. Even Mervyn King, BOE Chief, says this is the worst crisis since the 1930s...worse than 2008. It might well all collapse anyway. They might not be able to sell "bailout" to their populations, because populations have Armageddon Fatigue. They have heard it all before. That card has been played. The masses were fooled once; they won't be fooled again, as the Who say.

The absolute only way that this in the euro bailout can be pulled off---and even then success is hardly guaranteed---is to offer the concessions that should never have had to be offered, because what needs to be broken down should never have existed in the first place.

What are those concessions? Break up all TBTFs worldwide. Install an international Glass Steagall. Limit bonuses and do clawbacks on unearned bonuses from the last ten years. Make banks similar to public utilities. And the most important thing for public morale: PROSECUTE.

"Sooner than most people think" has arrived. Stopgaps such as announcing a massive stabilization fund or "plans" to recapitalize banks now can buy only a brief respite. Euroleaders can do it the "easy" way, or they can let this hit them full bore. Either way there is pain, but they can minimize the pain by sharing it, which means those who have escaped it thus far are overdue to get their butts smacked.

'Occupy Wall Street' Growing More Organized

2011-10-08T14:52:00.001-04:00

Volunteers working on food, sanitation, health care and other needs keep the Occupy Wall Street protest functioning.

The professed underlying fundamentals of the OWS movement

2011-10-08T13:49:00.000-04:00

Image by david_shankbone via FlickrEeyores Enigma
First the most powerful meme of this movement, the one that scares TPTB to there core, is the fact that it is all about;

1% vs the other 99%

The accounting has been done by multiple organizations. The banking industry in the US and probably globally, have the assets to cover peoples deposits, merchant deposits and transactions, basically all of the "REAL ECONOMY's" money.

Unfortunately this only represents a small portion of the banking and finance industries activities. The other 90% of what they have been doing, essentially gambling and fraud, is what is being bailed out, that is what is at risk if (when) banking collapses, NOT the real economy.

This is a bit over simplified as banking collapse would certainly effect all trade and therefore the real economy but not in the way that they are saying and recovery of the real economy would be possible and maybe even reasonable whereas what is happening right now is that the real economy where 99% of us live, is being sucked dry, thrown under the bus, raped, or what have you, in order to cover the bad gambling debts of the 1%.

It's not just banking and finance it is all big corporations most of which have been augmenting low and declining revenues from making and selling stuff by participating in the financial dealings (gambling and fraud) also.

The politicians currently in charge (and those aspiring to be) got there positions and owe complete allegiance to BIG money. They will do what is best for the 1% NOT what is best for the 99%. In all fairness they are convinced that serving the 1% is whats best for the other 99%. I know this for a fact.

Money = a claim on the future.
1% controls all of the money.
99% have no future.

Bottom line This is a crisis of capitalism but this is where it gets tricky.

Debt driven Capitalism is and has been the optimal system to promote exponential growth. Resource depletion, over population, environmental degradation, are just a few of the detrimental results. A version of capitalism is what every Country around the world uses to juice growth, even communist China. Silly people think they can control capital, LOL!

Capitalism functions like a pyramid scheme in that there are always opportunities for more and more people to acquire wealth but only as long as multiples of additional participants are constantly coming in at the bottom. Oh, yeah, capitalism also requires that there is enough cheap, almost free energy coming on line at a similar or greater multiple in order for those participants to generate excess profit$ to pass on up the pyramid.

Right now there are plenty of willing participants but due to the lack of cheap, almost free energy these participants are unable to generate "excess profit$" to pass up the pyramid. Low life bums. So instead of money flowing, being pushed up that is, the relentless, unquenchable demand that "capital" is simply sucks it up anyway it can even if it has to create virtual participants with virtual excess profits. There is no stoping capital…FEED ME SEYMOUR!

Capital has muscle too and is always looking for cheap, almost free energy. Is it any coincidence that last of the light sweet crude is in Iraq and Libya?

Even that is not enough so it just keeps on expanding debt/credit and skimming off the top.

Debt/credit expansion has continued on well beyond anything that this planet can ever support.

Problem is whenever you talk this way people scream "your a damn communist/ socialist".

Clearly humanity needs to operate from a base of support that includes healthcare for all. education for all, security in old age for all, in order to maintain dignity and humanity and this is socialism. Above and beyond that maybe we can have some form of capitalism that allows people to reach there aspirations BUT CAN NEVER INTRUDE ON THE BASIC SOCIALISTIC BASE SYSTEM.

Truth is we kind of had this sort of setup here in the US for a while but then capital noticed this while heading out for some grub one day and…well the rest is history and here we are.

Maybe instead of Debt based Capitalism we should try Gift based Capitalism.

FBI to launch nationwide facial recognition service

2011-10-07T17:30:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaThe FBI by mid-January will activate a nationwide facial recognition service in select states that will allow local police to identify unknown subjects in photos, bureau officials told Nextgov.

The federal government is embarking on a multiyear, $1 billion dollar overhaul of the FBI's existing fingerprint database to more quickly and accurately identify suspects, partly through applying other biometric markers, such as iris scans and voice recordings.

Often law enforcement authorities will "have a photo of a person and for whatever reason they just don't know who it is [but they know] this is clearly the missing link to our case," said Nick Megna, a unit chief at the FBI's criminal justice information services division. The new facial recognition service can help provide that missing link by retrieving a list of mug shots ranked in order of similarity to the features of the subject in the photo.

Today, an agent would have to already know the name of an individual to pull up the suspect's mug shot from among the 10 million shots stored in the bureau's existing Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System. Using the new Next-Generation Identification system that is under development, law enforcement analysts will be able to upload a photo of an unknown person; choose a desired number of results from two to 50 mug shots; and, within 15 minutes, receive identified mugs to inspect for potential matches. Users typically will request 20 candidates, Megna said. The service does not provide a direct match. More...

DHS: Pre-crime detection being tested on public

2011-10-07T15:58:00.001-04:00

Cover of Minority Report [Blu-ray]CNET
Homeland Security moves forward with 'pre-crime' detection

An internal U.S. Department of Homeland Security document indicates that a controversial program designed to predict whether a person will commit a crime is already being tested on some members of the public, CNET has learned.

If this sounds a bit like the Tom Cruise movie called "Minority Report," or the CBS drama "Person of Interest," it is. But where "Minority Report" author Philip K. Dick enlisted psychics to predict crimes, DHS is betting on algorithms: it's building a "prototype screening facility" that it hopes will use factors such as ethnicity, gender, breathing, and heart rate to "detect cues indicative of mal-intent."

The latest developments, which reveal efforts to "collect, process, or retain information on" members of "the public," came to light through an internal DHS document obtained under open-government laws by the Electronic Privacy Information Center. DHS calls its "pre-crime" system Future Attribute Screening Technology, or FAST.

"If it were deployed against the public, it would be very problematic," says Ginger McCall, open government counsel at EPIC, a nonprofit group in Washington, D.C.

It's unclear why the June 2010 DHS document (PDF) specified that information is currently collected or retained on members of "the public" as part of FAST, and a department representative declined to answer questions that CNET posed two days ago.

Elsewhere in the document, FAST program manager Robert Middleton Jr. refers to a "limited" initial trial using DHS employees as test subjects. Middleton says that FAST "sensors will non-intrusively collect video images, audio recordings, and psychophysiological measurements from the employees," with a subgroup of employees singled out, with their permission, for more rigorous evaluation. More...

US Needs To Generate 261,200 Jobs Per Month To Return To Pre-Depression Employment

2011-10-07T09:52:00.000-04:00

Every few months we rerun an analysis of how many jobs the US economy has to generate to return to the unemployment rate as of December 2007 when the Great Financial Crisis started, by the end of Obama's potential second term in November 2016.

This calculation takes into account the historical change in Payroll and includes the 90,000/month natural growth to the labor force, and extrapolates into the future. And every time we rerun this calculation, the number of jobs that has to be created to get back to baseline increases: First it was 245,500 in April, then 250,000 in June, then 254,000 in July. As of today, following the just announced "beat" of meager NFP expectations, this number has has just risen to an all time high 261,200. More...

New Bank Fees Push Thousands Into Credit Unions

2011-10-06T19:02:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaLast Friday, after Bank of America's (BAC) announcement of new fees on debit cards, retired postal worker Victoria Lee took her adult daughters to her local USPS Credit Union. "[My daughters opened] free checking accounts with no charges for the use of debit cards," Lee said. Like many Americans who are carefully watching every dollar, the Florida resident said she was grateful to have an alternative to retail Wall Street banks.

Meanwhile, a record-breaking 3,200 new checking accounts were opened over the weekend at the Navy Federal Credit Union, the world's largest credit union with 3.7 million members and nearly $48 billion in assets. The weekend surge -- which crushed the previous high of 2,500 -- fits into a larger trend for the credit union, which serves the Department of Defense and active duty military. It has had annual growth between 6.3% and 6.7% since 2007, and is on track to record a 14% uptick in membership this year, said Tisa Head, the senior vice president of savings products. In addition to its fee-free debit cards and accounts, another driver for the year's projected double-digit membership increase has been the credit union's willingness to post pay early for active duty members who use the Active Duty Checking account. More...

Right-to-work drive gains steam in Michigan

2011-10-05T12:06:00.000-04:00

In this historic stronghold of the American labor movement, the phrase “right to work” is seen by many as fighting words.

But with a new GOP-controlled state Legislature and a Republican governor in place in Lansing, a move is afoot to make Michigan the 23rd state in the nation to adopt legislation that would prohibit unions and employers from regulating collection of union dues or requiring employees to join a union if their workplace is organized.

“We’ve got growing and substantial support in the Legislature for pursuing Michigan becoming a right-to-work state, but this is a marathon, not a sprint, and it’s all about making sure we are removing all obstacles to jobs,” said state Rep. Mike Shirkey, Clarklake Republican.

“Everyone acknowledges that overcoming the 75-plus-year history of legacy unions here is not something you do overnight. But some of the polls statewide indicate the public is moving toward a direction of supporting workers having the choice,” he said. “I’m not anti-union. I call it labor freedom, where unions are as free to make their case as workers are to make their choice.” More...

Greece Falls Into 'Death Spiral': Rising Debt, No Growth

2011-10-04T10:40:00.000-04:00

Image by rad(ish)labs via FlickrDrowning in red ink, Greece has nowhere to turn to revive the economic growth that might put its debt on a sustainable trajectory, reassure angry foreign creditors and offer hope to its recession-weary citizens.

Instead, the country finds itself in a vicious circle—a death spiral, some would say—in which it is borrowing ever more to keep up on its existing debts, crushing growth in the process and thereby worsening its all-important ratio of debt-to-gross domestic product.

Springing the debt trap would not be a miracle cure either: a manageable level of borrowing is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for Greece to start restoring competitiveness and resume growth after three years of economic contraction. More...

Occupy Wall Street protesters march against police brutality

2011-10-01T08:38:00.000-04:00

Several thousand anti-Wall Street protesters marched through downtown Manhattan on Friday night to protest against incidents of police brutality at a previous demonstration.

The group was part of the Occupy Wall Street movement which has camped for almost two weeks in a New York square to protest against the finance industry, among other grievances.

The group had attempted a march last weekend which ended in scores of arrests. Numerous incidents of police roughing up protesters were caught on film including one senior officer spraying mace at several female demonstrators being kept behind a police barrier.

Video of that attack went viral on the internet prompted mainstream media – which had mostly ignored the protests – to give them sympathetic attention. Computer hackers also released the name and address of the officer caught on film. Since then the occupation has garnered many new supporters and global press attention. More...

Occupy Wall Street Movement Report from the Frontlines: Origins of the 99% Movement

2011-09-30T14:02:00.000-04:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeDavid DeGraw
As the occupation of Wall Street moves into its third week, there are many questions about the organizers behind the ongoing protests and the origins of the 99% Movement. As one of the many people who actively supported the effort, and helped launch the 99% Movement, I will give my perspective on the events leading up to the occupation of Liberty Park.

As I understand it, the #OccuppyWallStreet 99% Movement is a decentralized non-violent rebellion against economic tyranny. It is a leaderless movement that has been dependent upon tens of thousands of individuals taking it upon themselves to take action and fight back against their own personal financial hardships, and in defense of their family and friends who are desperately struggling to make ends meets.

The road that led to the successful occupation has been a long, hard and winding one. When you go to Liberty Park, into the heart of the occupation, you will see a very diverse group of people with opinions across the entire political spectrum. It is the very essence of a ground-up grassroots decentralized movement. Everyone there has their own individual story on what brought them to take such a strong and inspiring stand in support this action. I urge members of the press and people interested in the movement to begin a dialogue with any one of the people taking part. There are many fascinating stories to be heard and a deeper understanding of what’s happening is impossible without hearing from a plurality of voices.

To give some background information, the following is a timeline of my 19-month long personal experience within the movement: More...

Another reason not to hire - rising unemployment taxes

2011-09-29T12:08:00.000-04:00

Companies have yet another reason not to boost hiring: rising unemployment taxes.

Employers around the nation are getting socked with higher state unemployment tax bills as states are forced to shell out more than $1 billion in interest payments this month. More than 30 states have had to borrow billions from a federal fund to cover unemployment benefits for their jobless residents in recent years.

And this is only the first of two tax spikes employers are contending with, on both the state and federal level. Come January, companies in 24 states could have to shell out between $21 and $63 more per employee in federal unemployment taxes.

These hikes are the latest in a series of unemployment tax increases as states look to replenish their unemployment trust funds devastated by the Great Recession.

Last year, employers paid 27.8% more in state jobless taxes, said Doug Holmes, president, UWC Strategic Services on Unemployment & Workers' Compensation, a business trade association.

"Unemployment taxes, which were a relatively low bottom-line cost in 2008, are now becoming a significant cost," Holmes said. "It discourages companies from electing to hire new employees." More...

The World is in a global synchronous recession

2011-09-29T12:00:00.001-04:00

Image via WikipediaAs the third quarter comes to an end, strategists and investors are beginning to prep their clients and portfolios for the chance that the whole globe slides into a recession at the same time.

The worse news is that with uncertainty in Europe, the U.S. and China as high as when the quarter began, they can’t find much to do about it.

“A more sinister scenario could also unfold, namely a global synchronous recession where deflation becomes more visible,” said Morgan Stanley’s Adam Parker, the head of U.S. equity strategy, in a note to clients this week. “In recent days, a number of clients have told us they are having great difficulty in getting defensive, even when they want to.”

The S&P 500 continued its churn Wednesday near its 2011 lows as copper plunged. European benchmarks zigzagged as member countries reportedly remain conflicted about increasing the size of the Greece bailout fund. China’s equity benchmark fell to a new low for the year. More...

Financially-strapped cities cut jobs, services

2011-09-28T12:09:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaBelt-tightening continued in cities across the United States in 2011, as fiscal crunches forced local governments to cut back.

City revenues are projected to decline 2.3% by the end of 2011, according to a new report from the National League of Cities released Tuesday, marking the fifth straight year of declines.

One of the main factors contributing to the decline in revenue is a drop in property tax collections, which are projected to fall by 3.7% in 2011, the second straight year of declines. Last year's drop of 2.0% was the first year-over-year decline in city property tax revenues in 15 years.

To make up for the shortfalls, cities reported numerous job cuts, canceled infrastructure projects, cuts in services like libraries and parks and recreation programs, and modified health care benefits for employees. More...

Hundreds sell their own burial plots to make some quick cash

2011-09-27T11:43:00.000-04:00

Holly Purkey, 28, is one of many Floridians trying to sell her pre-purchased burial plots for some quick cash. She is selling two burial plots in Forest Hills Memorial Park in Palm City. "This is new to me. Kind of a weird investment," said Purkey, of Port St. Lucie.

The side-by-side plots belonged to her grandparents, who had moved out of state. She bought them seven years ago. Now Purkey, a stay at home mother, wants this cemetery real estate off her hands. She would like $3,000 for the pair of plots in return. "The money would help. That's the reason why I should get these on Craigslist and do something about it," she said.

Sellers are posting online, using burial plot brokers, and also funeral homes to market the real estate. Some of those advertisements show single plots starting at about $1,000, while family plots can go for up to $50,000. More...

Poverty pervades the suburbs

2011-09-23T15:01:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaGuess where most people in poverty live? Hint: It's not in the inner cities or rural America. It's in the idyllic suburbs.

A record 15.4 million suburban residents lived below the poverty line last year, up 11.5% from the year before, according to a Brookings Institution analysis of Census data released Thursday. That's one-third of the nation's poor.

And their ranks are swelling fast, as jobs disappear and incomes decline amid the continued weak economy.

Since 2000, the number of suburban poor has skyrocketed by 53%, battered by the two recessions that wiped out many manufacturing jobs early on, and low-wage construction and retail positions more recently.

America's cities, meanwhile, had 12.7 million people in poverty last year, up about 5% from the year before and 23% since 2000. The remaining 18 million poor folks in the U.S. are roughly split between smaller metro areas and rural communities.

"We think of poverty as a really urban or ultra-rural phenomenon, but it's not," said Elizabeth Kneebone, senior research associate at Brookings. "It's increasingly a suburban issue." More...

Obama's stimulus plan a flop for small businesses

2011-09-20T15:26:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaThe $447 billion stimulus plan that President Obama unveiled earlier this month won't change hiring plans for many small businesses, according to a survey released Tuesday.

Almost 70% of small businesses polled said that the plan, should it pass, would not spur them to add jobs, said Manta, a small business website.

Of the 1,648 businesses polled, only 11% of those businesses said they would hire if the jobs package becomes law. Another 13% said it depends on what version of the proposal is passed. Another 7% said they just weren't sure.

The American Jobs Act promises to cut the payroll tax businesses pay in half -- to 3.1% -- on the first $5 million in wages. Also, if a business hires a new worker or gives an existing worker a raise, all payroll taxes will be waived. The act would also extend a tax benefit allowing businesses to write off their expenses more quickly. More...

Poverty in America: Faces behind the figures

2011-09-19T11:19:00.000-04:00

At a food pantry in a Chicago suburb, a 38-year-old mother of two breaks into tears. She and her husband have been out of work for nearly two years. Their house and car are gone. So is their foothold in the middle class and, at times, their self-esteem.

"It's like there is no way out," says Kris Fallon.

She is trapped like so many others, destitute in the midst of America's abundance. Last week, the Census Bureau released new figures showing that nearly one in six Americans lives in poverty — a record 46.2 million people. The poverty rate, pegged at 15.1 percent, is the highest of any major industrialized nation, and many experts believe it could get worse before it abates.

The numbers are daunting — but they also can seem abstract and numbing without names and faces. More...

Food inflation is far worse in grocery stores than restaurants

2011-09-16T13:25:00.000-04:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeAccording to the latest government figures, the consumer price index for food at home increased by 60 basis points year-over-year to 6% versus the 10 basis point gain in food away from home CPI inflation to 2.7%.

Food inflation is now the most important household expense, according to Wal-Mart's (WMT) commentary during its earnings call last month. Food prices, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, continue to accelerate higher. The charts below illustrate food cost trends and food cost trends versus core inflation. It's worth noting that the spread between food at home inflation and core inflation widened month-over-month while the spread between food away from home and core inflation narrowed. More...

More Americans 'double up' in tough economy

2011-09-14T14:01:00.000-04:00

There's been talk of people sharing homes during the recession, and now the Census Bureau has released the data to prove it.

This spring, there were 21.8 million "doubled-up" households across the nation, a 10.7 percent increase from the 19.7 million households in the spring of 2007, the Census Bureau said. That means 18.3 percent of all households were combined households.

Much of the increase was the result of adult children who either moved back home during the recession or never left. Among adults between the ages of 25 and 34, some 5.9 million were living with their parents this spring, up from 4.7 million before the recession hit in 2007. That 25 percent increase translated to 14.2 percent of all young adults living with their parents in March, the bureau said. More...

Census: US poverty rate swells to nearly 1 in 6

2011-09-13T10:54:00.000-04:00

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Census Bureau reports the number of Americans in poverty jumped to 15.1 percent in 2010, a 27-year high.

About 46.2 million people, or nearly 1 in 6, were in poverty. That's up from 43.6 million, or 14.3 percent, in 2009. It was the highest level since 1983.

The number of people lacking health insurance increased to 49.9 million, a new high after revisions were made to 2009 figures. Losses were due mostly to working-age Americans who lost employer-provided insurance in the weak economy. Main provisions of the health overhaul don't take effect until 2014.

The statistics released Tuesday cover 2010, when U.S. unemployment averaged 9.6 percent, up from 9.3 percent the previous year.

The median -- or midpoint -- household income was $49,445, a 2.3 decline from 2009.

US poverty rate rose to 15.1% in 2010

2011-09-13T10:49:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaAmid a still struggling economy, more Americans fell below the poverty line last year, according to new census data released Tuesday. The nation's poverty rate rose to 15.1% in 2010, its highest level since 1993. About 46.2 million people are considered in need.

The government defines the poverty line as income of $22,314 a year for a family of four and $11,139 for an individual. The Office of Management and Budget updates the poverty line each year to account for inflation.

As for middle-class American families, income fell in 2010. The median household income was $49,445, down slightly from $49,777 the year before.

Overall, median income has changed very little compared to rising consumer prices over the last 30 years. Adjusted for inflation, the middle-income family only earns 11% more than they did in 1980, while consumer prices have risen roughly 155%. More...

Employers Say Obama's Jobs Plan Won’t Lead to Hiring Spur

2011-09-10T08:47:00.000-04:00

Image by jamesomalley via FlickrThe dismal state of the economy is the main reason many companies are reluctant to hire workers, and few executives are saying that President Obama’s jobs plan — while welcome — will change their minds any time soon.

That sentiment was echoed across numerous industries by executives in companies big and small on Friday, underscoring the challenge for the Obama administration as it tries to encourage hiring and perk up the moribund economy.

The plan failed to generate any optimism on Wall Street as the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index and the Dow Jones industrial average each fell about 2.7 percent.

As President Obama faced an uphill battle in Congress to win support even for portions of the plan, many employers dismissed the notion that any particular tax break or incentive would be persuasive. Instead, they said they tended to hire more workers or expand when the economy improved.

Companies are focused on jittery consumer confidence, an unstable stock market, perceived obstacles to business expansion like government regulation and, above all, swings in demand for their products.

“You still need to have the business need to hire,” said Jeffery Braverman, owner of Nutsonline, an e-commerce company in Cranford, N.J., that sells nuts and dried fruit. While a $4,000 credit could offset the cost of the company’s lowest-cost health insurance plan, he said, it would not spur him to hire someone. “Business demand is what drives hiring,” he said. More...

Marc Faber: Obama's Job Package 'a Complete Joke'

2011-09-09T14:23:00.000-04:00

Image by twid via FlickrThe package is “another complete failure of Keynesian economics and corrupt interventions,” Faber told CNBC.com on Friday morning.

Other economists have welcomed the plan as it attempts to boost employment.

Faber's major problem is that governments around the world should be attempting to cut spending, not spend more.

“This all amid talk of deficit reductions,” said Faber. The package is a “complete joke.” More...

Ex-Citigroup VP Admits Embezzling Over $22 Million

2011-09-07T17:08:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaA former vice president for Citigroup Inc pleaded guilty Tuesday to embezzling more than $22 million from the company and funneling the money to his personal bank account.

Gary Foster, 35, pleaded guilty to bank fraud, admitting that he took the money between 2003 and 2010. He appeared in U.S. district court in Brooklyn before Judge Eric Vitaliano.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Yaeger said the government will request a prison sentence of eight to 10 years. Foster will remain free on $800,000 bail until he is sentenced.

Foster was arrested in June and at the time was charged with embezzling $19 million from the bank's accounts. He admitted in court Tuesday to taking more than $22 million, although his total seized assets were estimated at $16 million, Yaeger said.

The defendant, who worked for Citigroup for 10 years, said that between 2003 and 2010 he drafted emails and faxes directing the funds to his personal account. More...

Gold May Top $6,000, Silver $600: Asset Manager

2011-09-05T09:40:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaGold prices may reach $6,200 per ounce in a bull run which will “end all major bull markets,” Urs Gmuer, asset manager at Dolefin, a Swiss investment advice firm, told CNBC.

Gmuer’s prediction is based on analysis of the last major gold boom of the 1970s, during which gold prices rose from $35 per ounce to $850 per ounce. Gmuer said that in the current bull run, prices would be pushed upwards by a protracted period of global economic difficulty—potentially lasting years—during which investors would continue to search for so-called safe havens.

“Gold prices have risen over the last few years, as the macroeconomic picture has become worse. The deterioration of the fundamental situation has now gone even further.

“Purchases by investors of gold will be based on fears of systemic risk or banking crashes,” Gmuer said. More...

Surveys Show Manufacturing Slowing Worldwide

2011-09-01T13:08:00.000-04:00

Factory activity worldwide stalled last month as new orders tumbled, heightening fears that the global economy might be heading for another recession and driving stock markets lower.

In the euro area, the purchasing managers’ indexes showed that manufacturing contracted for the first time in almost two years in August, echoing earlier data from South Korea and Taiwan, where new export orders fell sharply.

Britain’s manufacturing sector shrank at its fastest pace in more than two years, hurt by a sharp decline in demand for exports.

The pace of growth in the U.S. manufacturing sector slowed to a crawl but fared better than economists had forecast.

The Institute for Supply Management said its index of national factory activity edged down to 50.6 from 50.9 the month before. The reading topped expectations of 48.5, which would have signaled a contraction, according to a Reuters poll of economists. More...

CEO's Earn More Than Firms Pay in US Taxes

2011-08-31T09:18:00.000-04:00

At least 25 top United States companies paid more to their chief executives in 2010 than they did to the federal government in taxes, according to a study released on Wednesday.

The companies — which include household names like eBay, Boeing, General Electric (Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft Corp. and NBC Universal, which is jointly owned by Comcast Corp. and General Electric) and Verizon — averaged $1.9 billion each in profits, according to the study by the Institute for Policy Studies, a liberal-leaning research group. But a variety of shelters, loopholes and tax reduction strategies allowed the companies to average more than $400 million each in tax benefits — which can be taken as a refund or used as write-off against earnings in future years. More...

It May Be 2008 All Over Again, But There Is One Key Difference

2011-08-27T19:25:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaThere were two financial assets which boomed in late 2008. One was Treasury debt, the other was the US Dollar. While Gold and everything else was falling out of bed, the trade-weighted US Dollar index - the USDX - soared 21 percent from 73 to 88.2 between early August and late November 2008.

Compare that to what is happening now. Treasuries are soaring but the US Dollar is, at best, flat. And Gold in terms of EVERY major paper currency has gone ballistic. This time, things do look different. More...

A story missing from our media: Iceland's on-going revolution

2011-08-27T18:52:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaAn Italian radio program's story about Iceland’s on-going revolution is a stunning example of how little our media tells us about the rest of the world. We may remember that at the start of the 2008 financial crisis, Iceland literally went bankrupt. The reasons were mentioned only in passing, and since then, this little-known member of the European Union fell back into oblivion.

As one European country after another fails or risks failing, imperiling the Euro, with repercussions for the entire world, the last thing the powers that be want is for Iceland to become an example. Here's why:

Five years of a pure neo-liberal regime had made Iceland, (population 320 thousand, no army), one of the richest countries in the world. In 2003 all the country’s banks were privatised, and in an effort to attract foreign investors, they offered on-line banking whose minimal costs allowed them to offer relatively high rates of return. The accounts, called IceSave, attracted many UK and Dutch small investors. But as investments grew, so did the banks’ foreign debt. In 2003 Iceland’s debt was equal to 200 times its GNP, but in 2007, it was 900 percent. The 2008 world financial crisis was the coup de grace. The three main Icelandic banks, Landbanki, Kapthing and Glitnir, went belly up and were nationalised, while the Kroner lost 85% of its value with respect to the Euro. At the end of the year Iceland declared bankruptcy.

Contrary to what could be expected, the crisis resulted in Icelanders recovering their sovereign rights, through a process of direct participatory democracy that eventually led to a new Constitution. But only after much pain. More...

Why Iceland Should Be in the News, But Is Not

2011-08-25T09:29:00.000-04:00

Image via WikipediaAn Italian radio program's story about Iceland’s on-going revolution is a stunning example of how little our media tells us about the rest of the world. Americans may remember that at the start of the 2008 financial crisis, Iceland literally went bankrupt. The reasons were mentioned only in passing, and since then, this little-known member of the European Union fell back into oblivion.

As one European country after another fails or risks failing, imperiling the Euro, with repercussions for the entire world, the last thing the powers that be want is for Iceland to become an example. Here's why:

Five years of a pure neo-liberal regime had made Iceland, (population 320 thousand, no army), one of the richest countries in the world. In 2003 all the country’s banks were privatized, and in an effort to attract foreign investors, they offered on-line banking whose minimal costs allowed them to offer relatively high rates of return. The accounts, called IceSave, attracted many English and Dutch small investors. But as investments grew, so did the banks’ foreign debt. In 2003 Iceland’s debt was equal to 200 times its GNP, but in 2007, it was 900 percent. The 2008 world financial crisis was the coup de grace. The three main Icelandic banks, Landbanki, Kapthing and Glitnir, went belly up and were nationalized, while the Kroner lost 85% of its value with respect to the Euro. At the end of the year Iceland declared bankruptcy. More...