The Terrorist Who Made Sense

"IN “BIZARRO WORLD,” WHO DO SO-CALLED “TERRORIST” LEADERS MAKE MORE SENSE THAN OUR OWN?

--source--"

McCain to Steal Election

"Cyber Security Expert: Hackers Planning To Steal Election For McCain

admin
Prison Planet
September 30, 2008

Spoonamore says electronic voting machines represent national security threat, Israel, China and Russia have capability to rig presidential outcome

Paul Joseph Watson
[1] Prison Planet
Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Stephen Spoonamore warns in a new interview that electronic voting machines represent a national security threat and that hackers are already planning to steal the 2008 presidential election for John McCain.

Spoonamore is a GOP member and a lifelong Republican, having worked on election campaigns with Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg. He also has 20 years worth of experience in encrypted and networked communications systems for banks, TV, telecommunications, EMS, Military and other uses.

In an ten part You Tube interview, Spoonamore warns that hackers are planning to steal the election on behalf of the McCain camp and even predicts the margin of victory, that McCain will make a “shocking recovery” and win 51.2 percent of the vote with three electoral votes over Obama.

“This is a national security threat,” said Spoonamore, “it is very possible for a foreign government to begin manipulating that transmission of code just as they attempt to do fairly often with our financial data….we deal with it every day on the commercial side,” he added, noting that China, and not the American people, has a greater chance of choosing the next U.S. president.

Spoonamore also fingered Israel as another foreign government that was planning to attempt to hack the 2008 election.

“We don’t know who’s changing the vote now - these weird results are coming in all over,” said Spoonamore, adding that the danger of the vote being hacked by Israel, China or Russia is an even greater threat than partisan vote fraud on behalf of the Democrats and Republicans.

“You’ve built a vulnerable system and many people would want to exploit that vulnerability and not all of them have the best interests of our nation at heart,” he added.

In the interview, Spoonamore stresses how easy it is to hack an electronic voting machine and rig an election.

“If people think that a voting machine that calls in to a tabulator is any different than all those cash registers calling in to the central processor - it’s the same thing,” said Spoonamore. “If you put a man in the middle attack, a computer sitting in the middle that can change or capture or manipulate the information, it will do so,” he added.

“It’s valuable to be president….if you can steal it for a couple of million bucks why not,” said Spoonamore, adding that the last two presidential elections were stolen.

Spoonamore said that he had personally witnessed people attempting to hack election systems and since going public with his testimony had received threats not to talk about vote fraud because it would undermine American’s confidence in the voting process, to which Spoonamore responded that people should doubt their vote because “it’s being stolen”.

Spoonamore said that top Republican operatives had told him that election hacking was “just a different methodology” but they didn’t grasp the fact that if you build a hackable system, “there’s hundreds of sharks that want to hack it and you will not know who the final hacker was.”

Spoonamore said that the only way to prevent elections being stolen is a complete return to paper ballots, a “move back to what worked so well for 190 years,” and the elimination of electronic voting machines.

Watch a key clip below or watch the entire interview [3] via this wmv link or via [4] You Tube.

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The Coming MOSSAD False-Flag Attack against US Personnel in Israel

"The Coming MOSSAD False-Flag Attack against US personnel in Israel

The MOSSAD and the war mongering elements in the Israeli government must be licking their chops over this gift handed to them of American personnel stationed in Israel this past week to maintain anti-missile radar and "defenses" against an Iranian attack, as this story shows.

The MOSSAD are experts at false-flag attacks, by dressing up as Arabs and committing mayhem, which Israel and her complaint American MSM blame on some group or country Israel wants to blow to bits.

Even the Pentagon knows that the MOSSAD are skilled in the use of false-flags, as this article shows about a study of the MOSSAD by the Army School of Advanced Military Studies or SAMS:

"Of the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service, the SAMS officers say: "Wildcard. Ruthless and cunning. Has capability to target U.S. forces and make it look like a Palestinian/Arab act."

Those American personnel currently in Israel have a bulls-eye painted on their backs in the shape of the Star of David.

So far, Israel has been unable to trick America into invading Iran. Their echo chamber of bought and paid for DC politicians and pseudo-journalists haven't been able to ramp up the fear factor that was so instrumental in getting America to invade Iraq.

So Israel will use their time-tested method of dressing up like Arabs and launching a raid on the Americans stationed in Israel, conveniently in the Negev Desert.

That is where the attackers will come from, the Negev, helping feed into the planned story line that those camel jockeys were behind this outrage.

The Israeli's will launch a savage and brutal false-flag attack against the Americans, to get American blood boiling and demanding revenge.

The MOSSAD assassins that perpetrate the attack will leave around clues that point the finger of blame at Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas. Israel will yank some Arab prisoners out of their cells, dragging them to the Israeli staged massacre and shoot them, when members of the IDF come to "rescue" their American friends.

And like that other false-flag, 9/11, convenient clues will be scattered about the crime scene, pointing back at Israel's enemies. These clues will be broadcast and on the air within hours of Israel's murderous activities, with CNN and FUX both on the ground in Tel Aviv, showing pics 24/7 of the deadly raid.

The MOSSAD might even film a throat cutting or a beheading on video, to show and inflame Americans into a frenzy.

That's when Bush or McBama will address the nation, in a somber tone, saying we know the Iranians financed and helped plan this attack, blah, blah, blah.

And off America will go, fighting another war for Israel.

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A Few Thoughts for the Jewish Holidays

"IN ISRAEL, CHARITY BEGINS AT HOME AND ENDS THERE

Another tale from the hospital….

‘Chesid’ is the Hebrew term for charity and kindness… an integral part of the religion…. BUT…. charity and kindness for whom? For everyone or just for Jews? That is the question….

There are various charitable organisations that regularly visit patients in Israeli hospitals. Some bring sandwiches to give to people visiting the patients, others come just to give greetings and make the sick feel that they are not alone with their suffering.

BUT…. what if the patient is a Palestinian? Is he treated the same way by these supposed dogooders? NO!!!!

Their visitors do not receive sandwiches…. they themselves do not receive the friendly greetings. Is this ‘Chesid’ or is this racism? You decide.

I’ve often heard that charity begins at home… but isn’t this taking that a bit too far? Are the sick not all equal in the hospital? Are Palestinians not people?

Because of the closures and the sieges imposed by the Israeli government on the people of Palestine it is virtually impossible for Palestinian organisations to carry out the same sort of charitable work. Taking that into account, should these Jewish charitable organisations not try to bend over backwards to ease the suffering of those in the hospital? Should they not adhere to the biblical words telling us to ‘treat the stranger as we treat ourselves’?

How else are we to achieve a true and lasting peace in this land if we do not extend and open our homes to all and treat all with the due honour and respect they deserve?

Just a few random thoughts to think about during these Holidays….

--MORE--"

Also read: ISRAEL PUTS A DAMPER ON THE HOLIDAYS

A Boston Globe Shocker: Gaza's Health Crisis

Bailout Bill is Back in Congress TODAY!

Update: Dow UP TRIPLE DIGITS!!! WTF? The SKY DIDN'T FALL?

Yup, DIDN'T GET OUR MONEY and now it is BACK to BUSINESS!!!! Meanwhile, CONSTRUCTION WORKERS were fixing up the CLOSED WENDYS in town this morning!!!!

Update, update: Apparently, the economy is not THAT DIRE because Congress is taking TWO DAYS OFF for the JEWISH HOLIDAYS!!! Yup, we are in a CRISIS all right!!!!!!

Update: I called Olver (what part of NO do you noy understand, click) and Reid (same thing), then dialed up Kaptur, Kucinich, Hensarling, Paul, and the three no votes from Mass. and expressed my appreciation, gratitude and respect, but I gotta blog now.

NOW it is YOUR TURN, readers... You should know by now, readers, that the battle never ends.

"Senate May Try to Revive Bank-Rescue Bill as Early as Tomorrow

Alison Fitzgerald and Matthew Benjamin
Bloomberg
Tuesday, Sept 30, 2008

The U.S. Senate will try to salvage a $700 billion financial-rescue package after the measure was defeated in the House of Representatives. The lawmakers won’t have a lot of room to negotiate.

While they need to tweak the legislation enough to win over reluctant Republicans, they’ll risk losing votes from Democrats if they veer too far from the delicate compromise that congressional leaders hammered out with the U.S. Treasury.

Senators say they have no choice but to revive the measure, which is designed to restore confidence in the nation’s banking system.

“We don’t intend to leave here without the job being done,” said Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat, who said the senators may deal with the bill as early as tomorrow.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said he expects his chamber to be ready to take up the plan again after a Senate vote. ``We're not out of business until this is addressed,'' Hoyer said.

Hoyer said he has spoken with Republican Whip Roy Blunt and both are committed to working together on a compromise.

--MORE--"

Also see: Ammunition To Use Against the “New, Improved” Bailout Proposal

Black Monday?

What to do Today

Vote tally; see if your congressman is a traitor.

"WHO VOTED YES, WHO VOTED NO, WHO STAYS, WHO GOES!

PLEASE TAKE TIME TO CONTACT THOSE WHO VOTED NO AND EXPRESS YOUR SUPPORT BECAUSE RIGHT NOW PELOSI AND THE GOON SQUAD ARE PUTTING HORSE'S HEADS IN THEIR BEDS BEFORE THEY COME BACK WITH BAILOUT II: THE FINAL SCREWING!

Contact info at congress.org" -- Webmaster of Wake the Flock Up

My 2008 Presidential Selection

I'm gonna do it!! Here is the name I'm writing in.

Finally A Peoples Victory

"Finally A Peoples Victory

Unless we are vigilant, this win against our criminal 'leaders' will be short lived.

"Hold'em...or not! Artist: Lee Burgess

The people spoke out this time.

They didn't yell very loud about stolen elections, false flag attacks, lies for war or impeachment of traitors, but when the people thought it's about their money they burned up the phone and email lines.

Having all the reps up for re-election helped. Facing the voters very soon most likely put the fear into some of them.

My weasel representative, Bart Gordon, Democrat - TN, voted yes for the bailout. He doesn't have a viable opponent so he thinks he has nothing to lose by going with his money bosses, Pelosi, Bush, the Fed. This man needs to go but unfortunately it won't be this election. Maybe next time.

So far this has been a great defeat for the lying Bush, Paulson and Bernanke, as well as the enablers on both sides of the aisle of Congress but it's not the end.

The main stream media is doing it's best to manipulate the people into thinking the end of the world is near. There will be another vote and the arm twisting, blackmail and bribery will come into play. We have to keep yelling no or the scared will cave.

We need to build on this. Pound the congress again and again, make our voices count while we still have a say.

Demand that Congress do what we tell them to do. We are the ones who put them there. That's how it is supposed to be.

It's too late to impeach Bush/Cheney. It's never too late to get indictments and trials for domestic crimes and war crimes. There needs to be hundreds if not thousands of trials of government officials, financial criminals, lobbyists, corporate crooks, traitors in the military industrial complex and the media who propagandize and lie.

A word to the wise.

Financial manipulations by the Federal Reserve will try to hurt us and scare us to keep us in line.

False flag attacks are part of the arsenal of the bankers, intelligence agencies and puppet leaders.
They will do anything to keep from losing power.

If and when these attacks against the people occur, we must not lose faith and give in to the lies.

We took a small baby step forward today in the war against the people.

If we keep shouting loud enough each succeeding step we take could move us farther away from the ultimate slavery the bastards have planned for us.

It's what we have to do.

Posted by kenny's sideshow at 5:05 PM

--MORE--"

Breaking News: House Defeats Bush Bailout Bill as Dow Drops 500 Points

Update: Vote tally; see if your congressman is a traitor. MINE (Olver, aye) IS!!!

I watched the vote totals as they came in on C-Span:

YEA -- 207 votes
NAY -- 226 votes.

God BLESS them all -- EACH and EVERY ONE!!!!!

And YOU, American voters who CALLED CONGRESS and PROTESTED!!!!!

Also see: Dow

It was DOWN 700 a FEW MINUTES ago.

Now CNN is reporting that VOTES are being STRONG-ARMED to CHANGE!!!

Well, if THIS BILL GOES THROUGH NOW, there will be HELL TO PAY, Washington!!!!!

Think of THAT before you CHANGE YOUR VOTES, assholes!!!

Now I hear they are working on ANOTHER VERSION!

Hey, What Part of "NO!" Does the U.S. Congress Not Understand?

Also see: FED to pump over 600 BILLION to banks anyway

Update (9:15 p.m. edt): What I have seen the entire afternoon on the tv after the WALL STREET BAILOUT has FAILED has been DISGUSTING!!! As soon as it went down to defeat, the TV news made it BREAKING NEWS!!! The "crisis" went from Wall Street to Main Street, and the Wall Street and MSM types all had serious frowns on their faces. The crisis was now going to affect YOUR SAVINGS and YOUR JOBS and YOUR RETIREMENTS!!!

What a CROCK of CRAP!!!! The WHOLESALE MISREPRESENTATION of the issue by this LYING, AGENDA-PUSHING, PRO-CORPORATE, PRO-RICH MSM is SICKENING BEYOND BELIEF!!! There is NO TALK of the PUBLIC being UNIVERSALLY AGAINST THIS TAXPAYER GIVEAWAY tot he wealthy of Wall Street!! It is just the same old shit song when it comes to the issues they are advancing -- and it is NOT in OUR INTERESTS, readers!!! They are portraying the REJECTION of this GIVEAWAY as a FAILURE when it is a TREMENDOUS SUCCESS in DEMOCRACY!!!!! That's the LYING AmeriKan MSM for you!!!

So after the vote, with the tv people all over it, the MARKET MANIPULATORS at the DOW start work! I WATCHED the DOW PLUNGE and thought to myself "This is ON PURPOSE to PUNISH the people who are against this money grab" and ADVANCE the AGENDA by exacerbating the "problem." It ended DOWN 777 by the time the lying looters down there were through!! It was an AMAZING thing to BEHOLD -- the MSM quickly move to PROPAGANDA MODE after an UNEXPECTED ALTERATION in the script! (I later saw the the Bush administration was "shell-shocked" over the defeat. Really? I guess getting their way unimpeded the last eight years really gave them an attitude, huh?)

The FINAL INSULT that compelled me to type this update was the CLINTON FOLKS COMING ON and saying THIS IS ABOUT MAIN STREET and the ENTIRE ECONOMY is AT RISK!! Doesn't it BOTHER YOU, America, that the TWO PARTIES AGREE AGAINST YOUR WISHES?!! That the "representatives" of the "people" DO NOT GIVE a DAMN WHAT WE SAY?!!! That the MSM SO LIES about the PARAMETERS of the "debate?" That the DEMOCRATS are IN LINE with BUSH in fulfilling their corporate masters' wishes?

And now they are coming home, huh? Well, GET AFTER THEM, America!!!!!! REJECT and VOTE OUT ALL INCUMBENTS and if that doesn't work, WARM UP the TAR PITS!!!!!!!! Hell, I'll even OFFER YOU UP MY REP for starters!!!!!

What part of N-O does the U.S. Congress NOT UNDERSTAND?

Talk about DATE RAPISTS!!!!!!!!!!!

For a great read, see: Finally A Peoples Victory

Black Monday?

"Black Monday?; House and Global Investors Vote "No" on Paulson Bailout

by MIKE WHITNEY
September 29, 2008

Today the US House rejected Treasury Secretary Paulson's $700 billion Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008. Paulson said he has the votes, but Paulson was wrong. The House bucked the Paulson's claim that buying up the illiquid mortgage-backed assets from the nation's banks would be enough to save the financial system from an impending meltdown. The jury remains out on that question, too. Professor Nouriel Roubini, chairman of Roubini Global Economics, summed it up like this, "You're not resolving the two fundamental issues: You still have to recapitalize the banking system, and household debt is going to stay high". A large number of economists believe Roubini is right. The bill would not solve the underlying problems.

There is a crisis. The banking system is undercapitalized, the credit markets are frozen, and foreign creditors are beginning to slow their purchases of US debt. It's all bad. At the same time the number of casualties among the financial giants--Bear Stearns, Indymac, AIG, Lehman, Washington Mutual--continues to grow. Three more struggling European banks were added to the list of financial institutions that needed emergency government assistance this past weekend. It's no wonder Congress feels like they have to do something to stop the bleeding.

Before the stock market opened on Monday, the futures markets had slumped heavily into negative territory, while the TED spread, an indicator of stress in interbank lending, had widened to 3.19, a level that suggests another rocky week of trading ahead. Could this be another Black Monday?

Paulson's bill was designed to avert a system-wide crash by clearing the banks' balance sheets so they could resume extending credit to consumers and businesses. The hope was that massive infusion of capital would "turn back the clock" to the happy days of low interest speculation and bubble economics. Paulson is a "one trick pony" who firmly adheres to the belief that wealth creation depends on maximum leverage and an ever-weakening currency. But that world view is no longer applicable after reaching Peak Credit, where consumers are no longer able to make the interest payments on their loans and businesses and financial institutions are forced to curb their spending and dump their toxic assets at firesale prices. The system is deleveraging and nothing can stop it. Paulson has yet to accept the new reality.

Besides, there was no guarantee that the banks would use the money in the way that Paulson imagines. As one Wall Street veteran explained to me, "I don't see one penny of that $700 billion ending up helping the broader economy. I see it being used to prop up share prices so the insiders can salvage as much as possible when dumping their shares".

Indeed, the $700 billion is just part of a massive "pump and dump" scheme engineered with the tacit approval of the US Treasury and the Federal Reserve. Once the banksters have offloaded their fraudulent securities and crappy paper on Uncle Sam, they will do whatever they need to do pad the bottom line and drive their stocks up. That means they will shovel capital into hard assets, foreign currencies, gold, interest rate swaps, carry trade swindles, and Swiss bank accounts. The notion that they will recapitalize so they can provide loans to US consumers and businesses in a slumping economy is a pipedream.

The US is headed into its worst recession in 60 years. The housing market is crashing, securitzation is kaput, and the broader economy is drifting towards the reef. The banks are not going to waste their time trying to revive a moribund US market where consumers and businesses are already tapped out. No way; it's on to greener pastures. They'll move their capital wherever they think they can maximize their profits. In fact, a sizable portion of the $700 billion will likely be invested in commodities, which means that we'll see another round of hyperbolic speculation in food and energy futures pushing food and fuel prices into the stratosphere. Ironically, the taxpayers’ largesse will be used against them, making a bad situation even worse.

Then again, if a rehabbed bill isn't passed, no one can predict with certainty what will happen. Here's how Tim Shipman summed it up in "Bailout Failure Will Cause US Crash", in the UK Telegraph:

"Officials close to Paulson are privately painting a far bleaker portrait of the fragility of the global economy than that advanced by President George W Bush in his televised address last week.

One Republican said that the message from government officials is that 'the economy is dropping into the john.' He added: 'We could see falls of 3,000 or 4,000 points on the Dow [the New York market that currently trades at around 11,000]. That could happen in just a couple of days.

'What’s being put around behind the scenes is that we’re looking at 1930s stuff. We’re looking at catastrophe, huge, amazing catastrophe. Everybody is extraordinarily scared. It’s going to be really, really nasty.'”

The fear on Capital Hill is palpable, especially among the Democrats who have led the effort to pass Paulson's boondoggle ASAP. Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, and fellow Democratic Party leaders, Chris Dodd, Harry Reid and the blabbering blowhard from Massachusetts, Barney Frank, did everything in their power to sandbag dissenters, quash resistance, and rush the bill to a vote without the usual deliberation and debate. Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) was one of many angry members of congress who lashed out at Pelosi's highhandedness. It's all caught on a one minute video:

Rep. Marcy Kaptur: "The normal legislative process that should accompany a monumental proposal to bail out Wall Street has been shelved. Yes, shelved! Only a few insiders are doing the dealing. These criminals have so much power they can shut down the normal legislative process of the highest lawmaking body in this land. All the committees that should be scanning every word that is being negotiated have been benched. And that means the American people have been benched. We are constitutionally sworn to protect this country against all enemies foreign and domestic, and yes, my friends, there are enemies....The people who are pushing this bill are the very same one's who are responsible for the implosion on Wall Street. They were fraudulent then; and they are fraudulent now.We should say No to this deal".

Republicans were equally furious at the way the Pelosi Politburo kept the rank and file out of loop as much as possible. Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas) summarized the feelings of a great many congressmen who felt they were being railroaded by Pelosi and Co: "We have seen no bill. We have been here debating talking points ...House Republicans have been cut out of the process and derided by the leaders of the House Democrats as "unpatriotic" for not participating in supporting the bill. Mr. Speaker, I have been thrown out of more meetings in the last 24 hours than I ever thought possible as an elected official of 800,000 citizens of N. Texas....Since we didn't have hearings, since we didn't have markup, let's at least put this legislation up on the Internet for 24 hours and let the American people see what we have done in the dark of night. After all, I have never gotten more mail on a single issue than on this bill that is before us tonight."

Rep Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) gave the best speech of the day railing against the financial industry and defending the interests of working class Americans.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich: "The $700 bailout bill is being driven by fear not fact. This is too much money, in too short of time, going to too few people, while too many questions remain unanswered. Why aren't we having hearings...Why aren't we considering any other alternatives other than giving $700 billion to Wall Street? Why aren't we passing new laws to stop the speculation which triggered this? Why aren't we putting up new regulatory structures to protect the investors? Why aren't we directly helping homeowners with their debt burdens? Why aren't we helping American families faced with bankruptcy? Isn't time for fundamental change to our debt-based monetary system so we can free ourselves from the manipulation of the Federal Reserve and the banks? Is this the US Congress or the Board of Directors of Goldman Sachs?”

There was greater opposition to the Paulson bill than any legislation in the last half century. The groundswell of public outrage has been unprecedented, and yet, Congress, completely insulated from the demands of their constituents, continues to blunder ahead following the same pro-industry script as their ideological twins in the White House. There's not a dime's worth of difference between the two parties. Not surprisingly, neither Pelosi nor any of the Democratic leadership has even met with any of the more than 200 leading economists who have stated unequivocally that the bailout will not address the central problems that are wreaking havoc on the financial system. Instead, they have caved in to Bush's demagoguery and the spurious claims of G-Sax bagman Henry Paulson, a man who has misled the public on every issue related to the subprime/financial fiasco so far.

There are parts of Paulson's Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 that every US taxpayer should understand, even though the media is keeping those facts obscured. In sections 128 and 132; the proposed bill would have suspend "mark to market" accounting. This means that the banks would no longer be required to assess the worth of their assets according to what similar assets fetched on the open market. For example, Merrill Lynch just sold $31 billion of mortgage-backed securities for $6 billion, which means that similar bonds should be similarly priced. Simple; right? The banks need to adjust the value of those assets on their balance sheet accordingly. This gives investors and depositors the ability to know whether their bank is in bad shape or not. But Paulson's bill lifted this requirement and allowed the banks to assign their own arbitrary value to these assets, which is the same old Enron-style accounting scam.

Paulson's bill also proposed the "Elimination of FASB 157 and 0% reserves". This is just as sketchy as it sounds. FASB or Financial Services Regulatory Relief Act reads:

"Federal Reserve Banks are authorized to pay banks interest on reserves under Section 201 of the Act. In addition, Section 202 permits the FRB to change the ratio of reserves a bank must maintain relative to its transaction accounts, allowing a zero reserve ratio if appropriate. Due to federal budgetary requirements, Section 203 provides that these legislative changes will not take effect until October 1, 2011."

It's all legal mumbo jumbo to conceal the fact that the banks can continue to operate with insufficient capital, which is why the system is currently blowing up. It all get's down to this: The reason the system is exploding is because the various financial institutions have been allowed--via deregulation--to act as banks and create as much credit as they choose without a sufficient capital base. When one reads about massive deleveraging, this relates directly to the fact that under-capitalized businesses were operating with too much debt in relationship to their capital. That's it in a nutshell; forget about the CDOs, the MBSs, the CDS and the whole alphabet soup of derivatives garbage. They were all inserted into the system so Wall Street landsharks could expand credit without supervision and balance trillions of dollars of debt on the back of a one dollar bill. This is why Paulson wants to suspend the rules which would bring credibility and trust back to the system. After all, that might impinge on Wall Street's ability to enrich itself at the public's expense.

Nouriel Roubini sites a study by Barry Eichengreen, "And Now the Great Depression", which points out why Paulson's $700 billion plan is likely to fail:

"Whenever there is a systemic banking crisis there is a need to recapitalize the banking/financial system to avoid an excessive and destructive credit contraction. But purchasing toxic/illiquid assets of the financial system is NOT the most effective and efficient way to recapitalize the banking system....

“A recent IMF study of 42 systemic banking crises across the world provides evidence of how different crises were resolved.

“First of all only in 32 of the 42 cases there was government financial intervention of any sort; in 10 cases systemic banking crises were resolved without any government financial intervention. Of the 32 cases where the government recapitalized the banking system only seven included a program of purchase of bad assets/loans (like the one proposed by the US Treasury). In 25 other cases there was no government purchase of such toxic assets. In 6 cases the government purchased preferred shares; in 4 cases the government purchased common shares; in 11 cases the government purchased subordinated debt; in 12 cases the government injected cash in the banks; in 2 cases credit was extended to the banks; and in 3 cases the government assumed bank liabilities. Even in cases where bad assets were purchased – as in Chile – dividends were suspended and all profits and recoveries had to be used to repurchase the bad assets. Of course in most cases multiple forms of government recapitalization of banks were used." (Nouriel Roubini's Global EonoMonitor.)

In short, it wouldn't work. Nor was it designed to work. The bill was just Paulson's way of carving a silver canoe for he and his brandy-drooling investor buddies so they can paddle away to some offshore haven while the rest of us drown in a bottomless ocean of debt.

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Look What WE Are Doing To Other People’s Babies

Video already got taken down, huh?

"Look What WE Are Doing To Other People’s Babies 30 09 2008

What To Do Today

Already did my part. Told girl who answered Olver's office if it passed my money was coming out, that they shouldn't be doing this thing, and if it passes I'm voting against every incumbent. Kerry -- who is up for reelection -- had machine taking calls, so I left him a scathing message and told him if he voted for it, out comes the dough along with you, senator.

"Bailout negotiations break down into bipartisan bickering

"Just now the ranking members of the House issued a statement, which basically sounds like "we made progress", but reading between the lines, they do NOT have the votes to pass the bill.

KEEP UP THE PRESSURE!

This is a rip-off of the taxpayer to make rich people richer. Remember, this is the same government and media that assured you Saddam had "nookular" weapons. You KNOW they lie to you. Bush is the little boy who cried "nuke" and we have no reason to listen to his phony warnings now, especially as this whole bailout is just a repeat of the same scam his father pulled on us all back in the 1980s.

Go to congress.org and get the contact info for your congresscritter. Do NOT waste time with emails. Do NOT fall for the websites that promise to get your message to Congress for you with a single click; most of those are run by PR companies trying to shield congress from seeing just how angry we all are.

But we ARE getting through. In interview after interview we are seeing congresscritters admit their offices are being flooded with phone calls ans FAXes.

So, phone their offices, FAX their offices, even better VISIT their offices and let them know you support the "nookular" option if the bailout is passed. President Bush says it is permissible to wipe out an entire Pakistani village to get one suspected terrorist. Under that precedent it is permissible for We The People to vote out all of Congress to get one suspected greedy bastard.

Tell your congressman that the very first thing you will do if the bailout passes is go to the bank and withdraw all your money, and that you will urge your friends to do the exact same thing at the exact same time.

THAT will get their attention!" --Webmaster of Wake the Flock Up

Happy Belated Birthday, Ann Darrow

My favorite actress in the whole world.

"Sept 28, 2008 ... Today is Naomi Watts' birthday! Naomi Ellen Watts (born September 28, 1968) is a British actress known for her roles in Mulholland Drive,

News for Sep. 28, 2008

Happy Birthday Naomi Watts!

- Xoanon

Today is Naomi Watts' birthday! Naomi Ellen Watts (born September 28, 1968) is a British actress known for her roles in Mulholland Drive, the film remakes of The Ring and King Kong, as well as her Academy Award-nominated role in the film 21 Grams. Happy Birthday Naomi!

...

--MORE--"

And it just so happens that this week is Lord of the Rings week!

It's J.R.R. Tolkien Week! In conjunction, check out our largest Tolkien community, dedicated to the Lord of the Rings trilogy. You can discuss everything from the LOTR books and films to the many other Tolkien stories. Welcome to Middle Earth."

Some of you may wonder why I have no LOTR films listed as my favorites; I'll offer a brief explanation. The fact is, I wasn't much of an LOTR fan. I read the books as a kid, and I (heretic that I am) wasn't that impressed. There were a couple other series I liked better; however, I did see the LOTR films and was impressed with the adaptation and special effects, but not enough of an impact was made for me to list them as all-time favorites.

So along comes the remake of King Kong. The truth is that my expectations were low. I had just come off the summer of Return of the Sith, and felt no movie could match the pinnacle of the Star Wars series (especially Lucas' contemporary analogies contained within). Furthermore, word leaked that director Peter Jackson was taking the remake back to the 1930s. I was going to see the film; however, my expectations were low. I was even going to wait until after Christams to see it, but ducked into a theater on a Saturday afternoon when I was there.

That is what made the film so special. I was completely unprepared for the absolute love and dedication that Jackson absorbed himself with in making the picture. I am familiar with the length issue that turned so many off; however, the three-hour run time is perfect, set in three one-hour sets each. The three hours passed quickly once the lights went down, as Jackson always kept the story flowing at the right pace.

The first hour, often criticized, was vital to developing the characters. Without that, the audience does not care what happens to them on Skull Island. I will not get into all the nuances that Jackson added or adapted upon; however, the contraption that sacrifices the women to Kong was the first instance of awe I can remember feeling.

The second hour is spent on Skull Island as we are introduced to Kong's world, and Kong is introduced to Ann. The computer-generated effects are so brilliant that as an audience member you TRULY BELIEVE that KONG is REAL!!! The large screen was an obvious advantage in this regard, with the big galoot on screen reflecting in-your-face realism. Perhaps the dinosaur fight was a bit over-the-top; however, it was FANTASTIC!! By the time Kong is captured for his trip the New York City, the bonding between he and Ann is complete.

The third hour is the climax of the film, and Jackson doesn't disappoint! Having Ann find Kong (as opposed to the other way around) and temper his outburst after he escapes the theater was a master stroke; and yet, Jackson tops it with the ice pond scene in Central Park that completely breaks the audience down -- just before Kong begins his climb to the top of the Empire State Building.

The final fifteen minutes of the film were spectacular as much for the cinematography and special effects as for the emotion of the two protagonists of the film. The fight scenes with the airplanes atop the Empire State building -- with the backdrop of the city so far below -- was as exhilarating as it was horrifying. And as much as the audience believes in Kong, they can just as strongly believe in ANN'S LOVE for Kong. When he falls of of that building, so do you. The greatest testament to that was the stone-cold silence leaving the theater -- and the old man blowing his nose, a memory I will never forget.

So there it is, readers. My explanation why King Kong sits atop the list of my all-time favorite films -- just as he sat atop the Empire State building after scaling it with Ann Darrow. So HAPPY BIRTHDAY, Naomi Watts, and THANK YOU for such an OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE!!! Bravo!

BRAVOOOO!!!!!!!

The Middle East Troublemakers

"The Mischief-Makers; The real troublemakers in the Middle East

by Justin Raimondo
September 29, 2008

While the American people are consumed with the news on the home front – economic implosion, job loss, a record number of foreclosures, failed banks – and a presidential election in which the usual amount of smoke is being blown, if you look behind the headlines the outline of an emerging crisis in – where else? – the Middle East is beginning to take shape.

What the heck is going on in Syria? The news of a huge explosion in Damascus, caused by a car bomb, has shaken the region, and it isn't at all clear who or what is responsible. Whatever the source, however, the attack – which killed 17 bystanders, including possibly a top Syrian intelligence official – augurs ill for the future of peace in the Middle East (an increasingly elusive goal).

The attack occurred Saturday morning, near a major Syrian intelligence facility, although news reports in the West are focusing on the proximity of the Shi'ite shrine. Israeli media are emphasizing the possibility of an internal struggle within the Syrian regime itself, while the Iranians are saying the blast was the work of the Mossad and/or CIA. Suffice to say that this incident is shrouded in mystery, as the Syrians hint of attackers from beyond their borders, and the context – a series of equally mysterious attacks on targets in Syria over the past few years – indicates they may be correct.

In August, Syrian army Gen. Mohammad Suleiman was assassinated by a sniper in the city of Tartus. Suleiman was reputed to be the Syrian regime's chief liaison to Lebanon's Hezbollah organization – a job description that would point to Israel as the culprit. Last February, an explosion in Damascus knocked off Imad Mughniyeh, a Hezbollah military commander. Hezbollah and Syria have close ties.

Add to this recent Israeli allegations that the Syrians were trying to build a nuclear facility – accusations debunked in this space, and later proven to be entirely bogus – and the circumstantial evidence certainly points in the direction of Tel Aviv.

The key to understanding what is going on in the Middle East today – including the American invasion and occupation of Iraq and the stepped-up pressure on the Iranians – is to be found in a seminal paper published in 1996 by an Israeli think-tank, the Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies: "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for the Realm." In it, five U.S. academics and policymakers – many of whom hold (or held) high positions in the U.S. government, including Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, and David Wurmser – outline a strategic perspective that posits a policy of regime change throughout the region. The premise is that Israel is caught in a bind, hemmed in by hostile neighbors and unfavorable demographic facts on the ground. Israel, the authors aver, must break out of its box, or perish in the attempt. The first item on the agenda: regime change in Iraq. The rationale for this was that the road to Damascus must first pass through Baghdad. Syria is the primary "frontline state" engaged in destabilizing the occupied territories and fomenting the Palestinian uprising, so it must be eliminated. Damascus has always been the primary target of the Israelis, whether they are engaged in Lebanon or the occupied territories, and now that Iraq is out of the way, thanks to Uncle Sam, it makes sense that the Israelis are moving against Damascus.

It also computes in a broader sense: the Israelis have always targeted the more secular elements among their many enemies in the region. Saddam Hussein was their first target, and his regime was notably irreligious, although in its latter years the Ba'athists tried to assume the mantle of Islamic legitimacy. Earlier, you'll remember, the Israelis also went after Yasser Arafat hammer and tongs, while helping Hamas – at least, in its initial stages – to gain a foothold. Now they are going after the secular Ba'ath Party of Syria, which has ruled that country with an iron hand since the days of the late Hafez al-Assad. Assad's son, Bashir, a UK-educated ophthalmologist, is generally seen as an ineffective ruler, and is reportedly in the midst of a power struggle between the old guard and his own supporters. Israeli news outlets portray the mysterious explosions as being a function of this purported internal struggle, but it is more likely that the Israelis are using their new position of strength to exert enough pressure to cause the brittle Syrian regime to implode.

That this would introduce chaos into the region and unleash the forces of Islamic extremism – including al-Qaeda, which reportedly has a Syrian adjunct – concerns them not at all. Better to fight al-Qaeda, which has narrow support among in the Arab world, than to face a secular anti-Zionist force such as the PLO or the Syrian Ba'athists, who enjoy some degree of popular support.

In Israel itself, there are disturbing developments aplenty. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, upon leaving office in the wake of a financial scandal, denounced the rising tide of "extremism, " exemplified by the recent attack on a prominent academic critic of the settler movement. We warned about that, too, in this space, and the gathering ultra-rightist sentiments in the Israeli electorate at large do not bode well for the future. The present Israeli government reportedly asked for a green light from the Bush administration to go ahead and bomb Iran, ostensibly to take out its nuclear facilities. The answer, according to the British newspaper the Guardian, was no. A future Israeli government, run by extremists, might not be in the mood to ask permission before striking.

There is trouble afoot in the Middle East, and the source of it consists of two major mischief-makers: on the one hand, we have al-Qaeda (and affiliated Sunni extremists), and on the other we are witnessing the rising tide of extremism in Israel, both in government and in the general population. These two forces, ostensibly antithetical, are objectively allied in the sense that they both share a number of common goals: the elimination of Arab moderates, the defeat of Arab secularism, and opposition to all nationalism. Regarding this last, the Israelis oppose Arab nationalism because it inspires military resistance to their predations, and al-Qaeda disapproves of it because it often comes packaged with secularism or what they regard as heretical versions of Islam (such as the Alawite sect that the ruling caste in Syria belongs to). Nationalism also flies in the face of Osama bin Laden's vision of a Sunni caliphate stretching from the straits of Gibraltar to the steppes of Central Asia.

Another reason for Israeli concentration on secular Arab targets it the American factor: U.S. public opinion is much more likely to side with the Jewish state if the enemy is seen as a fanatical religious movement that cannot be reasoned with. That Israel itself is coming to resemble this caricature is not something the authors of the "Clean Break" scenario took into account. Nor has Israel's lobby in the U.S., which has yet to react to – or take seriously – the upsurge in extremist activity in Israel.

If Syria implodes, the consequences for the U.S. will be incalculably awful. With 150,000 troops in neighboring Iraq, we will soon be hearing that al-Qaeda has established a base in Syria, and the war will spread. We will also be hearing that Syria, too, needs "liberation," and all sorts of figures will be brought forth as likely candidates for U.S. support, including, no doubt, the Reform Party of Syria, which has been promoted and nurtured by the neocons in Washington for the past few years.

There is an alternative to this mess, and it consists of preventive diplomacy. Although the Syrians have cooperated with the U.S. in fighting al-Qaeda – including providing some vital intelligence early on in the fight against Sunni extremism – we have not reciprocated. Instead, for the past eight years, U.S. government officials have refused to talk with the Syrians, and that country's ambassador to the U.S. is reportedly the loneliest man in Washington, D.C. Not only that, but Donald Rumsfeld, when he was defense secretary, routinely threatened the Syrians with military action, claiming that they deliberately kept their border porous to facilitate the passage of Iraqi insurgents, supposedly based in Damascus. Yet there is no more fearsome and effective foe of al-Qaeda-type organizations than the Ba'athist dictatorship, which, under old Hafez, slaughtered some 30,000 inhabitants of the city of Hama, where members and fighters of the Muslim Brotherhood had risen up against him. Not very nice, but the Middle East is a rough neighborhood, and any upset in the balance of forces – including the stability of the Syrian regime – would likely produce a result far worse than the status quo.

The Iraq war's consequences are still rippling outward, and the destabilization of Syria is perhaps the most perilous, as far as U.S. interests are concerned. If and when whomever is trying to upset the Syrian apple cart succeeds, it is Americans – after, of course, the poor Syrians – who will be paying the price. The only solution: diplomatic engagement and the dropping of economic sanctions, followed by a policy that encourages the opening up of Syria to Western influence. This has been the dearest wish of the Syrian government, which has been earnestly, if ineffectively, trying to repair relations with the West. Yet the Israel lobby has such a powerful stranglehold on policymaking, including Congress and the White House, that this has proved impossible. Whether or not the election of Barack Obama – who supposedly will talk to anyone – will mean a fundamental break with the failed policies of the past remains to be seen. For the moment, however, we can only hope that Washington will rein in the Israelis before they do irreparable damage and Syria comes unraveled.

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Breaking News: Pelosi Invokes Martial Law Over Bailout Bill

If it hadn't been for the blogs, I wouldn't have heard a thing. And we are to believe in Democrats as agents of change?

"Rep. Michael Burgess - “we are under Martial Law”

September 28th, 2008

By: D. H. Williams

Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX) reports from the floor of the House that the Republicans have been cut out of the process and called unpatriotic for not blindly supporting the fraudulent bailout. He says the only debate has been about what talking points to use on the American people. The most ominous revelation is when he claims the Speaker has declared martial law.

“I have been thrown out of more meetings in this capital in the last 24 hours than I ever thought possible, as a duly elected representative of 825,000 citizens of north Texas.” Said Congressman Burgess.

Burgess asks the Speaker of the House to post the bailout bill on the internet for at least 24 hours instead of passing the largest piece of legislation in US financial history in the “dark of night.”

The most frightening part of Rep. Burgess’ one-minute floor speech is when he says, “Mr. Speaker I understand we are under Martial Law as declared by the speaker last night.”

Discussion Draft of yet unnumbered House Resolution Bill to turn your life and liberty over to the elitist who really control this country. Think of it as the Emancipation Proclamation in reverse.

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Breaking News: Wall Street Loot Deal Done

"Deal reached on financial bailout

Congressional leaders and the Bush administration reached a tentative deal early Sunday. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the $700 billion accord just after midnight but said it still has to be put on paper (AP)."

So, What Part of "NO!" Does the U.S. Congress Not Understand?

Wall Street Took the Money and Ran

These companies are now BROKE, huh?

I say GIVE BACK the MONEY, richer, or WE EAT YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

"Wall Street Executives Made $3 Billion Before Crisis" by Tom Randall and Jamie McGee

Sept. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Wall Street's five biggest firms paid more than $3 billion in the last five years to their top executives, while they presided over the packaging and sale of loans that helped bring down the investment-banking system.

Merrill Lynch & Co. paid its chief executives the most, with Stanley O'Neal taking in $172 million from 2003 to 2007 and John Thain getting $86 million, including a signing bonus, after beginning work in December. The company agreed to be acquired by Bank of America Corp. for about $50 billion on Sept. 15. Bear Stearns Cos.'s James ``Jimmy'' Cayne made $161 million before the company collapsed and was sold to JPMorgan Chase & Co. in June.

Wall Street firms have shared profits liberally with employees. The five biggest -- Goldman, Morgan Stanley, Merrill, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Bear Stearns -- paid their 185,687 employees $66 billion in 2007, including about $39 billion in bonuses. That amounts to average pay of $353,089 per employee, including an average bonus of $211,849. The five firms had combined net income of $93 billion during the five years through 2007.

CEO Pay Doubled

The $3.1 billion paid to the top five executives at the firms between 2003 and 2007 was about three times what JPMorgan spent to buy Bear Stearns. Goldman Sachs had the highest total, with $859 million, followed by Bear Stearns at $609 million. CEO pay at the five firms increased each year, doubling to $253 million in 2007, according to data compiled from company filings.

So why are ANY TAXPAYER DOLLARS NEEDED to "bail out" Wall Street?

Answer: They are NOT!!!

Goldman Sachs spokesman Michael Duvally declined to comment. Merrill Lynch spokeswoman Jessica Oppenheim, JPMorgan spokesman Brian Marchiony and Lehman spokeswoman Monique Wise didn't return calls for comment.

Goldman Sachs... PAULSON'S OLD FIRM!!

Hmmmm, I smell the STENCH of a CONFLICT of INTEREST!!!!

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How Much Has Been Spent on the Bank Bailout So Far?

At a MINIMUM....

"5 x 188 billion = 940 billion, already more than the bailout." -- Webmaster of Wake the Flock Up

Also see: What Part of "NO!" Does the U.S. Congress Not Understand?

"Bank borrowing from Fed reaches record $188 billion a day; Fed Keeps Banks Afloat as Money Market Crisis Deepens" by John Parry and Jamie McGeeever, Reuters | September 25, 2008

U.S. banks and money managers borrowed a record amount from the Federal Reserve in the latest week, nearly $188 billion a day on average, showing the central bank went to extremes to keep the banking system afloat amid the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression.

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Anybody else got any ideas on the #s of $$$ being tossed at the looters?

"Bank Borrowing From Fed Already Exceeded Bailout Total in Last Week; $700 billion figure means nothing

by Steve Watson
Infowars.net
Friday, Sept 26, 2008

U.S. banks borrowed $188 billion per day on average in the latest week from the Federal Reserve, meaning that the Fed loaned out more money than the Treasury's proposed bailout in just one week, still barely managing to keep the economy afloat.

Federal Reserve data showed on Thursday the total amount banks borrowed nearly quadrupled the previous record of $47.97 billion per day notched just the week before, Reuters reports.

$188 billion per day on average over the course of five days means that the total amount borrowed from the Fed in the week ending the 24th September stood at $940 billion - a figure that easily eclipses the proposed $700 billion bailout.

As we have already reported, the $700 billion number was simply pulled out of thin air by the Treasury.

The Treasury’s fact sheet about the bailout states, “The Secretary will have the discretion, in consultation with the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, to purchase other assets, as deemed necessary to effectively stabilize financial markets.”

This gives the government and the Federal Reserve carte blanche to do whatever they want to long as it is done in the name of stabilizing financial markets, they can nationalize any company or industry and use taxpayer money, above and beyond the initial $700 billion, for whatever purpose is deemed necessary, without any oversight. Paulson’s bailout plan is also unreviewable by any court, it will remain in perpetuity.

Paulson’s draft bailout plans says: “The Secretary’s authority to purchase mortgage-related assets under this Act shall be limited to $700,000,000,000 outstanding at any one time.”

As Chris Martenson writes, “This means that $700 billion is NOT the cost of this dangerous legislation, it is only the amount that can be outstanding at any one time. After, say, $100 billion of bad mortgages are disposed of, another $100 billion can be bought. In short, these four little words assure that there is NO LIMIT to the potential size of this bailout. This means that $700 billion is a rolling amount, not a ceiling.”

If the bailout bill passes it is just the beginning of something much larger. $700 billion is a meaningless figure that will do nothing to shore up the economy. It is not a bailout, it is a giveaway that will allow insiders to purge themselves of bad bets and leave them free to continue where they left off. The real reason for the bill is the unprecedented transfer of power to the Executive Branch and into the hands of the global corporate elite.

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What is worse than rape? ENDLESS RAPE!

The Credit Crunch is a Conspiracy

Well, when you CONTROL the SPIGOT, you can shut it off and cry thirst, can't you?

Also see: Bernanke Grabs Plunger for U.S. Economy

"Are the Big Banks Faking a "Liquidity Crisis"?

I previously pointed out that when the Japanese government threw cash at their big banks in the 90's, the banks just horded the money instead of using it to restore "liquidity".

Well, a professor of economics and an expert in liquidity now hints that the entire liquidity "crisis" might be a hoax.

Bloomberg quotes the good professor:

"I suspect that part of what we're seeing in the freezing up of lending markets is strategic behavior on the part of big financial players who stand to benefit from the bailout,'' said David K. Levine, an economist at Washington University in St. Louis, who studies liquidity constraints and game theory.

Are the big banks faking a liquidity crisis because they know that if they act like the financial system is drying up, they'll get a big bailout?

Like a kid who pretends he's sick so he can play hookie from school, are the big players pretending they are financially "sick" so that they can play hookie from the free market?

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So WHO is behind this "conspiracy," readers?

"Who is Putting "Intense Pressure" on Bush and Congress to Pass the Bailout

An article in CNBC states, "The U.S. Congress and the Bush administration were under intense pressure on Saturday to negotiate a $700 billion rescue".

Who is putting intense pressure on both the White House and Congress to pass the bailout?

Not the American people, who overwhelmingly oppose the bailout.

Not American economists, former treasury secretaries, chairmen of the FDIC, or the Congressional Budget Office, who all say that the bailout won't work, and will actually harm the economy.

So who is putting the intense pressure on our government?

Maybe its just America's financial elite.

But consider that many financial analysts say that the real reason that the government bailed out Freddie and Fannie is because China demanded it. And there were rumors last week that China instructed its banks to stop lending to U.S. banks. The U.S. owes trillions of dollars to China which, along with Japan, Saudi Arabia, and other creditor nations, is keeping America afloat. If they pulled the plug, the U.S. would instantly default on its obligations.

They say that economics and finance are now global. Perhaps corruption, blackmail and tyranny are also.

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That help?

The 9/11 Attack America Missed

It is still in progress because this one is a slow-motion exercise.

You didn't even know it was happening, did you, 'murka?

"Is Our "Financial Crisis" A New 9/11? Chumps Think So, And I Do Too

Saturday, September 27, 2008

I've seen a remarkable number of mentions of 9/11 in connection with the current so-called "financial crisis". Most of them have come from people who seem to have no knowledge of or interest in what actually happened on 9/11. And yet they all seem to "get" the parallel. How odd. Or maybe not.

The most prominent common features, in my view, between the so-called "terrorist attacks" of 2001 and the so-called "financial crisis" of 2008 are:

It's an inside job -- a terrorist attack of unprecedented scope and scale -- enabled by statements from politicians and the media which are chock-full of lies and spin.

There was nothing sudden about it; it was forseen by many and could have been prevented if the government had wanted to prevent it.

Instead it has been encouraged, and facilitated, by the very people who claim to be keeping you safe. But you can see that they don't want you to feel safe. They want you to be afraid, very afraid.

Arthur Silber highlights this nugget:

At Wednesday's House hearing, Rep. Steve LaTourette cut to the chase, summing up the frustration of members who think their constituents aren't getting the gravity of the situation from the dispassionate Bernanke and Paulson show.

LaTourette began talking about "my guy on the couch" back home in his district who was hassled by his boss and angered about doubts he'll be able to get a new car, keep his job, retain his credit card and save for his daughter's education.

"He's scared because he's the first generation who can't pass on the American dream to his daughter," said the Ohio Republican -- adding, "In order to accept this plan...he needs to be more scared."

Paulson obliged.

“He should be angry and he should be scared – and I think right now he’s angrier than he is scared,” said Paulson “And it puts us in a difficult position—no one likes to be painting an overly dire picture and scaring people, but the fact is that if the financial markets are not stabilized the situation can be very severe as it relates not just to his current situation – but keeping his job… this is a serious situation and one he should be concerned about.”

Your fear will be managed and amplified and used as a weapon with which to rob you of your future income and personal security. In the larger picture, millions of lives will be destroyed and a very few will be enriched.

The administration that was elected on a promise of "small government" is using this situation to attempt another enormous power grab, trying to increase the powers of appointed officials while bypassing the courts.

And congress is working overtime -- even as I type -- to write new legislation enabling this outrageous abuse of government to continue.

~~~

I've studied enough economics to know that the entire "science" is manure. It's not a science at all; it's a bogus belief system built on invisible premises that just happen to be false.

The primary false belief behind the "science" of economics is that things that can be bought and sold have value (as reflected in their prices) and things that can not be bought or sold have none (as reflected in their lack of prices).

For economists, their entire world-view depends on this obvious lie. And yet they build intricate simulations and prediction systems on it, and they get frustrated when "the people" don't act according to "the model".

Because of this all-encompassing reliance on the lie and the model rather than reality, nobody trained in "economics" can possibly tell the truth. They can't even see the truth. And that's why I ran away from this so-called discipline as fast as I could, as soon as I realized what it was.

The people who are looking for a handout in this so-called crisis are the scum of the earth, in my opinion. Their request for government money is the epitome of greed gone wild. But it's exactly what we can always expect from the parasites who suck the blood of the system.

Market speculators -- in currency and real estate especially -- add no value to anything; they only add to the prices of things. Rather than designing and building products, or serving the needs of society in some other way, they spend their lives building extensive portfolios of imaginary money which they consider "wealth".

This "wealth" exists only insofar as other people are willing to pay for the elements of their portfolios, and as long as nobody else knows that a portfolio is essentially worthless, the owner of worthless garbage can consider himself "successful", and even "wealthy".

So, in real estate, for instance, speculators buy and sell and flip and flip again, and all this action drives up the price of housing -- which for most people is an essential commodity. Because of the speculation in the housing market, values are artificially inflated to the point where people can't afford the houses, but in the meantime the houses are deteriorating and their actual values are falling.

And eventually it becomes clear to all who will look that the incessant flipping is driving an increase in homelessness, but do the speculators care? NO! They're just busy keepin' up with the other portfolio-builders in their high and mighty society. Or at least they were.

But now they want hundreds of billions of your dollars because it turns out that they can no longer hide the fact that they've been spending way too much for way too little.

What should the government tell them? That they should go out and get jobs like everybody else. That they should create products, or provide services, and earn an honest living for a change -- if they can!

But instead the government wants you to buy the portfolios the speculators can't sell to anyone else.

We hear all the time about how the economy will never survive unless the speculators with the worthless portfolios are bailed out. But -- just like the case in 9/11 -- the fact of the matter is quite the opposite from the official story.

The market will survive -- if it survives at all -- just like a sick body heals itself: by purging itself of toxins, and of the parasites that produce them.

This is how a free market is supposed to work; as the Republicans try to tell us all the time, it's the ownership society and you are responsible for your decisions. If you've bought a portfolio of garbage, you're stuck with it, chump. Caveat emptor, baby, and you have no right to foist your mistakes off on anybody else.

But that's exactly what this bailout is: the government buying worthless securities at highly inflated prices from people who never should have bought them in the first place.

New York Times columnist Paul Krugman describes the portfolios in question as "toxic waste" and claims the "grown-up" thing for the government to do is to force the taxpayers to buy all of it. As if we need any more toxic waste.

My five-year-old son uses the word "grown-up". My eight-year-old says "adult". In this context Krugman's vocabulary reminds me of a six-year-old. And so does his reasoning.

Perhaps we cannot expect Paul Krugman -- who was trained as an economist, after all -- to see the truth of the matter. And we certainly cannot expect the NYT to print the truth even if they had somebody on staff willing and able to write it. But the adult thing to do would be to let market rid itself of the parasites and the toxins, just the way it's supposed to work.

The programs endorsed by Krugman and every other bailout proponent amount to robbing from the poor and innocent to give to the rich and guilty, under cover of extreme fear deliberately induced by our own government and media.

And guess what? It's just like 9/11 all over again, and from an administration whose only claim to legitimacy was that it supposedly protected us from such things.

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Double False Flags

"Double False Flags, Shifting Sands: Warrior Nominated For Peace Prize

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

If you dig into modern terrorism for a while, you will eventually begin to notice two different trends that are almost always happening simultaneously.

Often they are happening so subtly that if you keep digging for a while longer you can almost stop noticing them, as they become part of the background noise.

But you never quite get used to that noise, and sometimes it makes itself evident in jarring ways, as it has done recently for me.

Double False Flag Terror

One of these two subtle trends might be called "double false flagging". In a "single" false flag attack, the real perpetrators are disguised as somebody else. The object is to frame an enemy. This trick is as old as the hills.

The modern twist on the old trick calls for disguising both the perpetrators and victims. And we've seen quite a bit of it in our lifetimes -- almost enough to take it for granted.

The attacks of September 11, 2001, involved very specific and heavily symbolic targets: the World Trade Center and the Pentagon stood for American economic and military dominance over the world, and many Americans were proud to say so.

When they were attacked, it would have been easy to conclude that the attacks had targeted American global dominance and two very visible symbols thereof. But instead we were told incessantly that it was the civilized world itself that had been attacked. Did you believe that?

Whoever "gets to be the victim" of a terrorist attack can use the emotional power of the event for good (theoretically) or ill (as it always seems to happen). I've used quotes around the phrase "gets to be the victim" because, as we all know (or would know if we were thinking), the actual victims of actual terrorist attacks are already dead.

9/11 is a classic case of a double-lie about victims and perpetrators, as people who falsely call themselves the victims wage a seemingly endless war against other people whom they falsely call the perpetrators. How can this happen? When the "news" media are onside with the double-lie, the truth barely has a chance.

Last October 18th, a bomb blast (or two) ripped through a political procession in Karachi, Pakistan, killing more than 130 people. The leader of the procession, Benazir Bhutto, was not injured in the attack -- due to either a remarkable string of coincidences or (dare we say it?) foreknowledge.

I blogged extensively about this attack, and noted many very strange details. But one of the things that struck me most powerfully was the fact that within days, the uninjured Bhutto was referring to herself as the victim of the attack.

In fact, most of the victims had been members of her human shield, and they'd been paid (four pounds a day) to be there.

We saw another example of this cynical ploy last weekend after the Marriott Hotel bombing in Islamabad.

Barack Obama showed unsurpassed skill at "getting to be the victim" when he said:

"Today’s attack demonstrates the grave and urgent threat that al Qaeda and its affiliates pose to the United States, to Pakistan, and to the security of all nations."

A bomb goes off in front of a hotel and that demonstrates "a grave and urgent threat" to "the security of all nations"?

He's good, isn't he? Scary good.

In the "good old days" of 9/11, only the civilized world was under attack. Now it's all nations, civilized or not. In Obama's world, we all get to be the victims. He's a uniter, not a divider. Barack Obama wants to embroil everyone in the morass...

Well, it turned out that al Qaeda didn't claim responsibility for the Marriott bombing, and another -- totally unknown -- group did. That group didn't have any terrorist history or any obvious affiliation with al Qaeda, but Obama's statement still stands, doesn't it? We're all under grave and imminent threat from ... whoever did it ... aren't we?

The Shifting Sands Of Time

The other parallel and complementary trend, which I call "the shifting sands of time", concerns the way that changes are made to the official stories of major terror attacks. The original story is almost always found wanting and replaced with another one, which turns out to be ludicrous and is replaced, and so on ... but nobody ever seems to draw the logical conclusion from all these changes.

That's not quite true, of course, because some people do notice the shifting stories. But the people who notice the shifts and talk about them are all but barred from public discourse. I've been watching this trend all my life.

In 1963, when JFK was assassinated, we were told the assassin was behind the president and that Kennedy has been shot in the front of the neck. But then people started asking the logical question: How could the president have been shot in the front, from behind?

The New York Times came along with a ready-made explanation: He was turning to wave to someone behind him when he was shot. Fair enough -- or not really?

Not really. JFK had been injured in World War II and he wore a heavy back brace. He could never have turned around and waved to the rear while sitting in a car seat. Or could he?

No, he couldn't! And the Zapruder film showed him being shot while facing forward. Oops! Now the sands had to shift again. The entrance wound in the President's neck became an exit wound, and the NYT's explanation was revealed as a flat-out lie. So that lie was buried under the shifting sands, and the nation moved on... Or did it?

Most did, but not all. One of the people who didn't was a New York attorney named Mark Lane. He made a collection of news clippings, such as the NYT piece I've mentioned, which showed just how much the sands in this case had been shifting ever since the President was shot. And Lane started doing public presentations based on his research.

Eventually he published a book, "Rush To Judgment", which devastated the official story. And for his efforts, his research, his presentations, and his book, Mark Lane was called a kook, a crank, an egomaniac, and a madman. The national "news" media poured scorn on him for years, and even many so-called "JFK researchers" joined in the character abuse -- none of which changed the fact that Mark Lane was right. JFK wasn't shot in the front from behind. He was shot in the front from the front.

The case of Rashid Rauf, the alleged ringleader of the so-called Liquid Bombers, provides another fine example of shifting sands. In August of 2006, when the Liquid Bombers were arrested, we were told that Rauf's arrest in Pakistan had triggered all the arrests in England which followed. But we didn't know much about Rashid Rauf himself.

At the time, furious Googling turned up his home page, and not much else about him. I can recall being frustrated about the scarcity of information, and I started paying close attention, watching for his name to appear on the net. In the past two years I have mirrored more than 300 newspaper articles about Rashid Rauf at my "other" blog, Winter Parking, and I've read more blog posts mentioning his name than I can count.

I've also written more than 30 extensively detailed articles about the plot and the aftermath of the arrests.

"So what?" you may say. And maybe it doesn't matter. But I'm very rarely surprised by anything I read about this man, or about this case -- unless it's false.

And one day I found a post at Long War Journal which called Rashid Rauf an "al Qaeda commander". I had never seen him described as such, so I did some more Googling and found two articles in which it was hinted that perhaps Rashid Rauf had met an al Qaeda commander. But nothing more substantial -- and it's a far cry from allegedly perhaps meeting an al Qaeda commander to becoming one yourself, so I revisited that post and left a comment.

My comment said: "How do you know that Rashid Rauf is an al Qaeda commander?" And I was pleasantly surprised that it was published without any delay for moderation. I was even hoping to learn something from the response. So I stopped by again the next day, and found that my comment had been deleted.

In my opinion, this is how we know whether or not Rashid Rauf is really an al Qaeda commander. It's also a reminder: inquiring minds are very dangerous to the shifters of sand, especially if they're connected to functional memory banks.

All Together, Now

When you see the shifting sands and the double false flags together, you know something special's going on. And that brings us back to Islamabad, where one of the questions that's been in the air lately runs: "Why was the Marriott Hotel attacked?"

Immediately after the attack, Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik produced a fine combination of being the victim and shifting the sands, when he told the media the reason the terrorists had chosen the Marriott was because they were trying to kill the leaders of the government, who had planned to eat together at the hotel that evening.

But instead they'd decided to dine at the Prime Minister's residence, said Malik, in a manner which one scribe reported as sounding "as if they'd saved the entire country".

Given this background, it might have been embarrassing for Rehman Malik when the owner of the Marriott Hotel told the press he knew of no plans for the government leaders to visit his hotel on the fatal evening.

Can you imagine hundreds of the country's most important politicians planning to arrive together at a hotel for dinner, without giving the management advance notice? How could that happen? It wouldn't.

Instead, the sands needed to be shifted again. And on Wednesday the International Human Rights Commission nominated Rehman Malik for an International Peace Award for his role in the "War against Terrorism".

Rehman Malik is now in a magical realm, where he gets to be both "the victim" and "the hero".

According to Dawn,

The award is recognition of the services rendered by Rehman Malik in the area of fighting war against terrorism and extremism and for achieving the lasting peace in the country, strengthening the democratic institution after the establishment of newly elected government under the leadership of President Asif Ali Zardari.

Lasting peace? That's a bad joke. The war against militants in the mountains has already produced scores of thousands of refugees, and now "analysts" are saying they "fear" Pakistan may descend into civil war.

We shall soon see how much lasting peace Rehman Malik and his colleagues have brought to Pakistan. I will be surprised if there is any.

But what else can we expect, when warriors are getting nominated for peace prizes?

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