California's anti-tax crusaders talk revolt
Taking inspiration from a landmark 1970s tax revolt, a determined group of activists say the moment is right for another voter uprising in California, where recession-battered residents have been hit with the highest income and sales tax rates in the nation.
Greece Teeters on the Verge of Bankruptcy
Greece is on the brink of bankruptcy despite the fact that the global recession has yet to hit the country with full force. Strikes are paralyzing the country and the EU is putting on the pressure. But the government is still trying to put a positive spin on things.
FOLLOW THE MONEY / MADOFF, MOSSAD, AIG AND 9/11
The Madoff investigation is very similar to the 9-11 investigation in that evidence of a larger conspiracy is being avoided and ignored. It is possible that the billions that Madoff stole, and is still unaccounted for, was being used to finance Israel’s vast global spy and sabotage network Mossad with connections to both AIG and quite possibly 9/11 itself
It's More or Less Official: We're In a Global Depression
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is the organization that audits the books of countries world-wide to determine their real financial health. The IMF is also responsible for bailing out countries in trouble, and stabilizing the world's economic systems.
New and worse secrecy and immunity claims from the Obama DOJ
By Glenn Greenwald
When Congress immunized telecoms last August for their illegal participation in Bush's warrantless eavesdropping program, Senate Democratic apologists for telecom immunity repeatedly justified that action by pointing out that Bush officials who broke the law were not immunized -- only the telecoms. Some so called conservatives say Obama is a fascist, while others say he's a communist or socialist. Their the same people that promoted Bush and his warrrantless spy program. What I'm wondering is, do those same conservatives still think it's such a wonderful idea, now that Obama is president, to have a fascist, communist or socialist, spying on them? Truth is, warrantless spying was never good policy in the first place. Source: Bank 'stress test' results delayed
The U.S. Treasury Department is planning to delay the release of any completed bank "stress test" results until after the first-quarter earnings season to avoid complicating stock market reaction, a source familiar with Treasury's discussions said Tuesday.
Ted Stevens' conviction set aside
A federal judge Tuesday set aside the conviction of former Sen. Ted Stevens. The judge also initiated criminal contempt proceedings against the government lawyers who prosecuted the 85-year-old Alaska Republican.
Borderless World the Long-held Dream of Bilderberg Group
Bilderberg will continue to push for world government at the May 14-19 secret meeting in Vouliagmeni, Greece, according to a participant. Alice Rivlin, who has represented the Brookings Institution at Bilderberg, smiled and nodded when asked if the agenda this year includes “world government, a world without borders and an American Union.”
Iceland investigators turn to SFO
Investigators looking into alleged corruption in the Icelandic banking system want to enlist the help of the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and Europol.
Peru court rules Fujimori guilty
Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori has been found guilty of ordering death-squad killings and kidnappings in the 1990s.
Inmate's chopped up body found in western Mexican jail
An inmate who was serving time for drug trafficking was murdered and chopped up in pieces in a prison in the western Mexican town of Uruapan, authorities in the state of Michoacan said Monday.
The Storm Widens
By Dahr Jamail
One week after Iraqi government forces arrested an Awakening Group (commonly referred to as Sons of Iraq, al-Sahwa) leader, Adil al-Mashhadani, head of a patrol unit in central Baghdad's Fadhil neighborhood in Baghdad, sparking gun battles that raged for hours between US-backed Iraqi forces and US-allied Sunni militiamen that killed three people, militiamen have once again been detained, widening concerns that sectarian violence may once more engulf Baghdad. There are 50,000 Sahwa fighters in Baghdad alone.
The Financial War Against Iceland
By Prof Michael Hudson
Iceland is under attack not militarily but financially. It owes more than it can pay. This threatens debtors with forfeiture of what remains of their homes and other assets. The government is being told to sell off the nation’s public domain, its natural resources and public enterprises to pay the financial gambling debts run up irresponsibly by a new banking class.
Signs emerge of global crime wave
In all catastrophes, there are always winners among the host of losers and victims. Bad times, like good ones, generate profits for someone. In the case of the present global economic meltdown, with our world at the brink and up to 50 million people potentially losing their jobs by the end of this year, one winner is likely to be criminal activity and crime syndicates.
Gun fight with the feds in Big Sky Country?
In the wake of the easy passage through the Montana legislature of Montana House Bill 246, Governor Brian Schweitzer's signature is all that is needed to set up a potentially explosive battle between state sovereignty on the one hand, and smothering, centralized federal power on the other.
The Financial New World Order: Towards a Global Currency and World Government - Part 2
By Andrew G. Marshall
Indeed, the current "solutions" being proposed to the global financial crisis benefit those that caused the crisis over those that are poised to suffer the most as a result of the crisis: the disappearing middle classes, the world's dispossessed, poor, indebted people. The proposed solutions to this crisis represent the manifestations and actualization of the ultimate generational goals of the global elite; and thus, represent the least favourable conditions for the vast majority of the world's people.
Bad news gets worse for euro zone
The euro-zone economy's record contraction in the final three months of 2008 was even deeper than previously thought, statistics agency Eurostat said Tuesday in its final estimate of fourth-quarter gross domestic product.
Toxic debts could reach $4 trillion, IMF to warn
Toxic debts racked up by banks and insurers could spiral to $4 trillion (£2.7 trillion), new forecasts from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are set to suggest.
Goodbye, Bill of Rights
By Philip Giraldi
hose who hoped that the change promised by candidate Barack Obama would include repeal of the various acts that have stripped Americans of their constitutional rights should be disappointed. Benjamin Franklin supposedly wrote, "Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." The citation is likely apocryphal, at least in terms of its attribution to Franklin, but it is useful shorthand for the unfortunate abandonment of many of the liberties guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution as a consequence of 9/11.
GM and Segway create new vehicle
US carmaker General Motors is joining with scooter maker Segway to make a new type of two-seat electric vehicle.
A city in ruins, a warning ignored
Blindsided residents dig desperately through rubble after early-morning earthquake kills at least 207 and leaves thousands homeless, while scandal brews over seismologist's dismissed predictions
No threat to kill Obama Turkish official says
Turkish police detained a man after receiving a hoax tip that he was plotting to kill President Barack Obama but quickly released him without charge, a government official said Tuesday.
Judge: U.S. used mentally ill witness in Guantanamo cases
The Justice Department improperly withheld important psychiatric records of a government witness who was used in a "significant" number of Guantanamo cases, a federal judge has concluded.
Report Calls CIA Detainee Treatment 'Inhuman'
Medical officers who oversaw interrogations of terrorism suspects in CIA secret prisons committed gross violations of medical ethics and in some cases essentially participated in torture, the International Committee of the Red Cross concluded in a confidential report that labeled the CIA program "inhuman."
The ‘war on drugs’ is a war on you
By Michael Boldin
The drug war is based on a repugnant assertion that you do not have ownership over your own body; that you don’t have the right to decide what you’ll do with your body, with your property and with your life. The position of the drug warriors is that you should be in jail if you decide to do something with your body that they don’t approve of.
Bernanke's Financial Rescue Plan: Will the US default on its debt?
By Mike Whitney
Fed chief Ben Bernanke has embarked on a radical and ruinous financial rescue plan. According to Bloomberg News, the Fed has already lent or committed $12.8 trillion trying to stabilize the financial system after the the bursting of Wall Street's speculative mega-bubble.
Big Brother ID cards 'could use chip-and-pin'
The UK's ID cards could be fitted with chip-and-pin technology to tackle identity fraud, the head of the agency responsible for them has said.
Pentagon Chief Calls for Cuts; Congress Opens Fire
It was the opening shot in what is certain to be a long war. In many ways, Gates, in taking on the defense contractors and their many friends in Congress, has invited a fight with an opponent more potent than any he has faced in Iraq and Afghanistan as President Obama's and before that President George W. Bush's defense secretary.
US Recovery Is Far Off, Banks Are 'Basically Insolvent': Soros
The U.S. economy is in for a "lasting slowdown" and could face a Japan-style period of relatively low growth coupled with high inflation, billionaire investor George Soros said on Monday.
U.S. fighter jets scrambled to intercept stolen plane
A pilot stole a small airplane in Canada on Monday and headed south, forcing U.S. military officials to scramble F-16 fighter jets to trail him, before landing on a highway in Missouri and fleeing on foot.
Borrowing from a Depression-era idea, they are aiming to help consumers make ends meet and support struggling local businesses.
Budget Expands Government as Economy Contracts
By Ron Paul
Last week the House passed another budget that increases federal power, raises taxes, and increases the national debt. I voted against it, and was pleased to see that not a single Republican representative voted for it.
National Security Claptrap
By Karen Kwiatkowski
I have never received a National Security Letter. NSLs require the recipient to "turn over information." I understand this as typical federal jackbootedness, but I do understand it. The part about how "this letter does not exist – tell no one" seems over the top, Mafioso, ten-year-old little boys playing spygam
US Deficit Reaches $1 Trillion For First Half Of 2009
The Congressional Budget Office has released preliminary deficit numbers, which indicate that for the first half of 2009 the deficit has already hit $1 trillion, $640 billion more than the comparable 2008 period, when the deficit was $313 billion.
Procuring Academics for Empire: The Pentagon Minerva Research Initiative
By James Petras
The biggest, but not the only, Pentagon-funded empire building research program in the social sciences is dubbed the Minerva Research Initiative (MRI). The MRI has contracted scores of academics from the usual prestigious academic brothels, including the veteran academic hookers and ambitious neophytes among post-doctorates and graduate assistants.
Bank of Japan Widens Range of Collateral for Loans
The Bank of Japan will provide more funds to commercial banks by broadening the range of collateral it accepts in an effort to encourage lending to companies.
Officer Is Charged in Shooting of Texas Man
A Harris County grand jury on Monday indicted a white Bellaire police sergeant who shot a black man in the driveway of his own home while responding to what turned out to be an erroneous stolen vehicle report.
House Preparing To Legalize Payday Loans With 391% APRs
A House subcommittee wants to legalize payday loans with interest rates of up to 391%. Lobbyists from the payday industry bought Congress' support by showering influential members, including Chairman Luiz Gutierrez, with campaign cash. The Congressman is now playing good cop, bad cop with the payday industry, which is pretending to oppose his generous gift of a bill.
GM Said to Speed Bankruptcy Plans as Board Crafts Savings Goals
General Motors Corp. is speeding up preparations for a possible bankruptcy filing even as directors seek deeper savings this week to avoid that outcome, people familiar with the plans said.
Useless Currencies of the World Unite!
By The Mogambo Guru
My brain went into some kind of weird spasm when Zhou Xiaochaun, head of the People’s Bank of China, went on record as saying that he doesn’t trust the dollar to be the world’s reserve currency anymore, and wants, instead of gold, the International Monetary Fund to expand the supply of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), which is just another stupid fiat currency, to use as the world’s reserve currency! Gaaahhhh!
IRS Gives Financial Companies an Audit Pass
espite the overwhelming place of the financial services sector in the broader corporate world, however, documents and data obtained by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) show that in FY 2008 the IRS allocated only 15% of its overall corporate revenue agents to the agency group that has the lead authority for auditing this complex and now troubled segment of the nation's economy.
Free Speech and Porn Flicks
By Jacob G. Hornberger
Students at the University of Maryland are receiving a valuable lesson about the welfare state and, specifically, the education dole that state officials provide institutions of higher learning. The students had scheduled a showing of a porn flick on campus as part of their studies on constitutional law. A Maryland state legislator threatened a cutoff of state funds to the university, which caused university officials to cancel the showing. Citing the First Amendment, the students are protesting by scheduling an unauthorized viewing of the film on campus.
TIME TO BREAK THE AXIS OF SLEAZE
By Eric S. Margolis
The global financial crisis that began on Wall Street has put the world in a surly, frightened mood. At least 25 million peoples have been thrown out of work by the made-in-USA crisis.
The Battle in the States: Freedom Vs Protection
By Tom DeWeese and Mark Lerner
Across the nation, state legislatures are struggling to take back their Constitutional rights as they also seek ways to protect us from outside threats. This has led to some near schizophrenic legislative sessions with laws swinging widely from left to right.
"State Secrets": Obama and the NSA
By Cannonfire
Well, you probably already know by now that President Hopeful has blocked legal challenges to government wiretapping by invoking the mantra "state secrets." Sounds awfully Bushian, does it not?
I wondered how the die-hard Obama fan squad would rationalize this behavior. As I've often said, strained rationalization is my favorite form of humor.
Consumers fall behind on loans at record rate
A record number of consumers are falling delinquent or into default on their loans, a problem that some economists say will only get worse this year.
Mo. official who oversaw "Militia' report reassigned
The Missouri Highway Patrol has reassigned the director of a center that produced a report linking third-party candidates and some abortion opponents to militias.
Poplawski was 'Braced for Fate' in days leading to attack
Accused cop-killer Richard Poplawski spent hours posting racist messages on an extremist right-wing Web site, decrying blacks and Latinos and warning of forthcoming economic collapse fueled by the "Zionist occupation" of America, an expert in political extremism has determined. Earlier, he had praised the "AK" rifle as his ideal weapon.
India to cut off 30 million mobile phones
India is to disconnect more than 30 million Chinese-made mobile phones amid concerns that the devices could be used by terrorists.
Resist or Become Serfs
By Chris Hedges
America is devolving into a third-world nation. And if we do not immediately halt our elite’s rapacious looting of the public treasury we will be left with trillions in debts, which can never be repaid, and widespread human misery which we will be helpless to ameliorate.
President Obama promised in his campaign to take cybersecurity seriously and he appears to be following up on that promise. Legislation just introduced in the Senate, written with White House input according to the Washington Post, would federalize the business of computer security. It would give White House officials the power to shut off private networks, decide what products could be used for security and set rules for who could practice computer security.
Spirko, 36, considers himself an average guy with a normal life.
But for the past few years, Spirko has been stockpiling food, water, gas, guns and ammunition. He also has a load of red wine, Starbucks coffee and deodorant stashed away.
Somali pirates seize five ships in two days
omali pirates seized ships from France, Britain, Germany, Taiwan and Yemen in the worst spate of hijackings in months, defying the world's naval powers by prowling further out in the Indian Ocean. Ransom-hunting pirates equipped with skiffs, guns and grapnels took five ships in 48 hours, the two latest sea-jackings coming on Monday and targeting a British cargo and a Taiwanese fishing vessel.
AP cuts newspaper rates, moves to protect Web news
The Associated Press unveiled rate cuts on Monday to help member newspapers reeling from declining advertising revenue and said that it would sue websites that used its members' articles without permission.
Peter Power: Some Companies Used G-20 Protests As “Training For Flu Pandemic”
Peter Power, the “crisis management expert” who ran drills of the very events of the London bombings on the morning of 7/7 as they were happening, told the BBC that some companies used the shut down of the city on Wednesday as a dress rehearsal for an influenza pandemic.
Net firms start storing user data
Details of user e-mails and net phone calls will be stored by internet service providers (ISPs) from Monday under an EU directive.
Duch - 'US helped Pol Pot's rise to power'
The Khmer Rouge's most notorious prison chief told a Cambodia war crimes court today US policies in the 1970s contributed to the rise of Pol Pot's genocidal regime.
More proof that torture won’t work
The legal and moral arguments against torture are compelling enough, but what should have ended the debate long ago is a practical one: It doesn’t work.
High court lets Abu-Jamal's conviction stand
Death-row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal lost his bid for a new trial in the killing of a city police officer after the U.S. Supreme Court said Monday that it will not take up the case.
The Law That Never Was
On January 10, 2008, the Federal District Court in Chicago issued a permanent injunction against me on the grounds that I was falsely telling people the 16th Amendment was not ratified. The Court refused to look at the evidence of the non-ratification of the 16th Amendment, deciding that the facts necessary to prove my statement was true were "irrelevant," What has America come to when the government can accuse you of lying and prohibit you from presenting a defense in a so called court of law? My attorney, Jeffrey A. Dickstein, will be filing an appeal to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. I urge you to review the pleadings filed in this case so you can see for yourself the tyranny being practiced in our courts.
US Envoy Writes of Israeli Threats
In the wake of the accusation by Chas Freeman that his nomination to lead the National Intelligence Council was derailed by an "Israeli lobby," a forthcoming memoir by another distinguished ambassador adds stunning new charges to the debate. The ambassador, John Gunther Dean, writes that over the years he not only came under pressure from pro-Israeli groups and officials in Washington but also was the target of an Israeli-inspired assassination attempt in 1980 in Lebanon, where he had opened links to the Palestine Liberation Organization.
Americans Feel 15.6% Unemployment as Underemployment Surges
oseph Ramelo gave up searching for work in January to return to school, two months after he was laid off as a San Francisco election clerk. Antonio Poe is struggling to get by doing part-time landscaping in Greensboro, North Carolina, after losing his job as an electrician.
While such workers are feeling real pain from the recession that began in December 2007, they’re not represented in the 8.5 percent unemployment rate the Labor Department reported last week. They are part of a broader group that includes those who want a job but have stopped looking for work and those who want full-time positions but have to settle for part-time employment.
Italy muzzled scientist who foresaw quake
An Italian scientist predicted a major earthquake around L'Aquila weeks before disaster struck the city on Monday, killing dozens of people, but was reported to authorities for spreading panic among the population.
Not far from the gilded towers that house the London bases of discredited institutions such as the Royal Bank of Scotland and UBS, and tucked above a sandwich shop, is what is thought to be the first pawnbroker to open in the City of London for the best part of a century.
Government goes gargantuan
By Deroy Murdock
Anyone who doubts that the Bush and Obama administrations collectively transformed America into a socialist state should consider this - for every dollar American citizens generated last year, the federal bailout consumed more than 90 cents in outlays, loans and commitments.
Bloomberg News has tallied Washington's spending and promises as it props up banks, insurers, automakers and seemingly everyone except hardworking taxpayers who promptly pay their bills. Bloomberg deserves great credit for focusing on this constantly moving target.
Obama declares US not at war with Islam
Barack Obama, making his first visit to a Muslim nation as president, declared Monday the United States "is not and will never be at war with Islam."
UN: No Immediate Action Against N Korea
There will be no immediate action against North Korea by the UN Security Council although the country breached council resolutions when it launched a rocket over Japan
America's Financial Oligarchy Is Still in Control
By Lorimer Wilson
“The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States . One of the most alarming is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government”, says Simon Johnson, a chief economist with the International Monetary Fund in 2007 and 2008. In an article entitled “The Quiet Coup” in the May, 2009 issue of the Atlantic magazine he (with James Kwak) goes on to say that “if the IMF's staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform and if we are to prevent a true depression, we're running out of time”.
Optimism Opium
By Laura Martin
In an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times (October 16, 1998), Gerald Celente predicted that government intervention to rescue "private corporations deemed ‘too big to fail’," would result in the demise of free-market capitalism.
Media covers U.S. war dead's return after 18-year ban
The media was permitted on Sunday to cover the arrival of a U.S. soldier's coffin at the Pentagon's main mortuary in Delaware late for the first time in 18 years.
Geithner denies White House sidestepping CEO pay limits
U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner denied on Sunday the Obama administration was crafting bailout initiatives to allow companies to evade limits on executive pay and other restrictions imposed by Congress.
In fact, two previous scientific papers have also found evidence contradicting the official story about 9/11 Firms Move to Fight Overseas-Profit Tax
In one of the biggest battles between the business community and the White House, corporate lobbyists are intensifying efforts to block an Obama administration proposal to raise taxes on overseas profits. Executives say the measure, which could cost U.S.-based multinationals $100 billion over the next decade, would hamper economic recovery efforts.
Obama Aid Calls for the Firing of Top Bank Executives
Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard law professor and chair of the congressional oversight committee monitoring the goverment's Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), is now calling for the firing of the nation's top bank executives if the economy is to have any chance of recovery. Warren says that letting banking leaders off the hook for the mess their companies are in will plunge the country into an even deeper hole.
The Profile Police
As high school students flock to social networking sites, campus police are scanning their Facebook and MySpace pages for tips to help break up fights, monitor gangs and thwart crime in what amounts to a new cyberbeat.
Brain Researchers Open Door to Editing Memory
Suppose scientists could erase certain memories by tinkering with a single substance in the brain. Could make you forget a chronic fear, a traumatic loss, even a bad habit.
Gun-Free Zones Are a Magnet for Attacks Like the Tragedy In Binghamton
By John R. Lott, Jr.
Time after time multiple- victim public shootings occur in “gun free zones” — public places where citizens are not legally able to carry guns. The horrible attack today in Binghamton, New York is no different. Every multiple-victim public shooting that I have studied, where more than three people have been killed, has taken place where guns are banned.
"If a killer were stalking your family, would you feel safer putting a sign out front announcing, “This home is a gun-free zone”? But that is what all these places did."
You would think that it would be an important part of the news stories for a simple reason: Gun-free zones are a magnet for these attacks. Extensive discussions of these attacks can be found here and here. We want to keep people safe, but the problem is that it is the law-abiding good citizens, not the criminals, who obey these laws. We end up disarming the potential victims and not the criminals. Rather than making places safe for victims, we unintentionally make them safe for the criminal.
New Jewish settlement town may be death blow to hopes for Israel peace
The sign in big, red Hebrew letters reads “Welcome to Mevasseret Adumim, the Harbinger of the Hills”. A three-lane road with roundabouts leads up the hill to a police station and street lamps line the flyover that links the new town to neighbouring Ma'aleh Adumim, one of the largest Jewish settlements in Israel.
There are no houses, cars or people in Mevasseret Adumim: it is a town laid out, waiting to be built. That is because international pressure has so far prevented construction from going ahead. The area is the last piece of open land linking Arab East Jerusalem to the West Bank and critics said that to develop it would bury the very notion of a two-state solution to the Middle East crisis.
US to pursue missile shield plan
US President Barack Obama said Sunday he would move forward with a plan to base a missile defence shield in central Europe despite Russian objections, saying the threat posed by Iran remained real.
Karzai bows to international calls to scrap Afghan 'rape' law
Afghanistan is to review legislation which the UN says would legalise rape within marriage after a dramatic reversal from the president, Hamid Karzai, who signed the rules into law last month.
‘Rigged’ face scan airport security risk
AIRPORT face scanners designed to stop terrorists getting into the UK have been “rigged” to cut passenger queues and are creating an “unacceptable” security risk, a confidential Whitehall e-mail has claimed.
UK border officials at Manchester airport allege the machines have been recalibrated so that passengers shown as having just a 30% likeness to their passport photographs are being let into the country.
Widow with frozen US fortune dies in poverty
A widow living in Cuba whose fortune was trapped in a Boston bank by the US trade embargo has died at the age of 108 without having ever received her money. Mary McCarthy died in her rundown Havana mansion after failing to get treatment for respiratory problems due to a shortage of cash, according to her godson and heir, Elio Garcia. "She had been suffering the embargo for 50 years," he said.
Knights Templar hid the Shroud of Turin, says Vatican
Medieval knights hid and secretly venerated The Holy Shroud of Turin for more than 100 years after the Crusades, the Vatican said today in an announcement that appeared to solve the mystery of the relic’s missing years.
U.S. Currency Exchange Controls
By Patrick Wood
Could President Obama and Treasury Secretary Geithner suddenly impose currency exchange controls on the United States and the U.S. dollar? This report will explore this notion and its possible consequences.
Police 'assaulted' bystander who died during G20 protests
The man who died during last week's G20 protests was "assaulted" by riot police shortly before he suffered a heart attack, according to witness statements received by the Independent Police Complaints Commission.
NKorean rocket appears to fizzle, prompts outcry
The rocket launched by nuclear-armed North Korea on Sunday appears to have fizzled in the Pacific Ocean, but positioned a defiant Kim Jong Il to make demands from an international community worried that it indicates the capacity to fire a long-range missile.
Obama resumes Iran threat rhetoric
President Barack Obama vows not to shelve the controversial US missile plans until an "Iranian missile threat" is eliminated.
Let's Play Pretend!
By Peter Schiff
When elementary school kids want to escape the confines of their circumstances they pretend to be pirates, princesses, and Jedi knights. Now, with the relaxation of "mark to market" valuation rules announced yesterday by the accounting trade's self-regulatory body, our bankrupt financial institutions can escape their own reality by pretending to be solvent.
Justice Dept under microscope after Stevens trial
The bungled trial of former GOP Sen. Ted Stevens tainted more than just the Justice Department. It probably tipped the balance of a close election, and the fallout from that is far from over.
Obama said N. Korea 'broke the rules.' Now what?
North Korea's successful rocket launch Sunday - despite the failure to orbit a satellite – boosts the rogue state's chances of one day building a nuclear-tipped Intercontinental Ballistic Missile. But it leaves the US and her Asian allies in a quandary over their long-term strategy toward Pyongyang
Estimated U.S. taxpayer cost for bailout jumps
U.S. congressional budget analysts have raised their estimate of the net cost to taxpayers for the government's financial rescue program to $356 billion, an increase of $167 billion from earlier estimates.
Obama outlines sweeping goal of nuclear-free world
Declaring the future of mankind at stake, President Barack Obama on Sunday said all nations must strive to rid the world of nuclear arms and that the U.S. had a "moral responsibility" to lead because no other country has used one.
Thousands flee bomb attacks by US drones
AMERICAN drone attacks on the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan are causing a massive humanitarian emergency, Pakistani officials claimed after a new attack yesterday killed 13 people.
Some carried scary names like "Three Strikes and You're Out," as in cast out of society. The harshest penalties for drug offenders, the Rockefeller laws, were named after a New York governor battling a 1970s heroin epidemic.
Legal U.S. Arms Exports May Be Source of Narco Syndicates Rising Firepower
A Narco News investigation into the flow of arms across the U.S. border appears to lead right back to the systemic corruption that afflicts a vast swath of the Mexican government under President Felipe Calderon and this nation’s own embrace of market-driven free-trade policies.
As Home Values Fall, Property Tax Revolt Brews
Homeowners watching the value of their houses slowly ebb are storming tax offices from Ann Arbor, Mich., to Atlanta, demanding that county officials reassess their homes and lower their property taxes.
£15bn for Government snoop network? Just use Facebook
Cambridge University researchers have revealed how the profile information Facebook releases to search engines could be exploited by spammers or even governments.
Conyers Again Seeks Bush Prosecutor
House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers has renewed his call for a special prosecutor to conduct a criminal inquiry into “war on terror” policies of the Bush administration, including whether “enhanced interrogation techniques” used on alleged terrorist detainees violated international and federal laws against torture.
Obama Endorses Soros Plan to Loot America
By Cliff Kincaid
At the G 20 summit in London, President Barack Obama won rave reviews from reporters, many of whom clamored like school kids for the chance to ask him a question at his news conference, but the official conference document proves that plans are being made for what can only be described as the further looting of American taxpayers in order to feed unaccountable and corrupt global entities.
No Debt Left Behind
By The Mogambo Guru
Over at Whiskey & Gunpowder, an essay by Don Stott of coloradogold.com reveals that we are more alike than we thought, in that he, too, is “astonished at the credulity and unabashed total economic illiteracy of the American and even the world’s public. We’re headed for hyperinflation, with prices of everything going through the roof, and America is buying stocks rather than gold and silver?”
NKorea launches rocket, defying world pressure
North Korea defiantly carried out a provocative rocket launch Sunday that the U.S., Japan and other nations suspect was a cover for a test of its long-range missile technology.
Blair steps up fight to be crowned first 'President of EU'
Tony Blair has emerged as the leading candidate to become the first permanent president of the European Union after Gordon Brown gave his grudging blessing to the plan. The former prime minister has stepped up his campaign for the job, which he wants to use to build a bridge between Europe and the new Obama administration.
Economist: US collapse driven by 'fraud' (Video & Transcript)
The financial industry brought the economy to its knees, but how did they get away with it? With the nation wondering how to hold the bankers accountable, Bill Moyers sits down with William K. Black, the former senior regulator who cracked down on banks during the savings and loan crisis of the 1980s. Black offers his analysis of what went wrong and his critique of the bailout
Geithner is charging, is covering up. Just like Paulson did before him. Geithner is publicly saying that it's going to take $2 trillion — a trillion is a thousand billion — $2 trillion taxpayer dollars to deal with this problem. But they're allowing all the banks to report that they're not only solvent, but fully capitalized. Both statements can't be true. It can't be that they need $2 trillion, because they have masses losses, and that they're fine.
