The Slaughterhouse Informer

A Compendiium of Various Official Lies, Business Scandals, Small Murders, Frauds, and Other Gross Defects of Our Current Political, Business and Religious Moral Lepers.

Presenting a new magazine that contains material that is not found elsewhere and is very difficult to post on the Internet. The ‘Voice of the White House’ will appear in each issue containing material not found on TBR News for very obvious reasons.This publication will appear once a week, on Wednesday, every week, will be ten pages in length and is available by subscription only. The price is $5.00 a month and can be paid via PayPal or by check. If you don’t like it, and Bush supporters can read the Drudge Report for free, you can cancel at any time.

Civil insurrection in America and government countermeasures: The official papers

By Bradley Moscrip

An in-depth study of official American plans to construct FEMA detention centers in America and specific recent U.S. Army domestic counterinsurgency plans. Here is a sampling of the ebook contents:

Gun Control by Confiscation

As the American general population is known to be the most heavily armed in the world, immediately upon the declaration of Martial Law and the execution by the military of counterinsurgency programs, it has been determined that the BATF, will begin the process of rounding up all rifles, pistols and so-called assault weaponry from the civil population. Lists of gun collectors obtained from firearms dealers, gun magazine subscription lists and other sources will be the basis for these mass confiscations. Gun owners will be supplied documentation by the BATF showing which pieces have been confiscated so that in the future, they will be told, they can recover their weapons when the state of emergency has passed. In actuality, weapons that do not have a high value or are not suitable for arming loyalist police forces, will be destroyed by order

This study is available from tbrnews at $5.00 by PayPal  

The Voice of the White House

Washington, D.C., April 7, 2010: “On April 5, an entity called ‘WikiLeaks’ published what it claimed was ‘an authentic, secret U.S. Army video showing the murder of civilians in Iraq by Apache helicopter gunships.’ Julian Assange, who runs the website, claimed he got the fuzzy and indistinct videotape showing, as he says, "the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people"  from an unnamed “confidential but important source.”

            This tape is alleged to have been made in Iraq in July of 2007 but the U.S. military authorities can find no copy of it in their files. This is not surprising because the tapes did not come from any source in the United States military but from a source with strong ties to Wikileaks, the PRC.

          The tapes, made in 2009 under the orders of China's State Administration of Radio, Film and Television  广播电影电视总局 , were offered to a number of reputable news agencies by Chinese agents but none of them had any interest in what are obvious fakes.  

            The Chinese are currently, [and have been for some time,]  engaged in a silent and pervasive war with the United States, whom it sees as a rival to be either exterminated or supplanted by itself, and has been conducing sporadic and clandestine warfare against this country for years.

            China once bought up enormous amounts of American Treasury bills in the hope that this would give them some control over our economy. When Obama decided to hike up the interest rate on the future sale of these instruments, the Chinese screamed with rage because this action would essentially reduce the value of their holdings. Their fury went unaddressed by the President who needed more income to fund his new projects and the Chinese then retaliated by making up what amounted to billions of dollars of counterfeit American treasury gold bars.

  These were made in tungsten, very close to gold in weight, and then gold plated and quickly dumped onto the world market. When a Swiss bank discovered the bars were worthless, the Chinese then claimed the Americans were “cutting holes in good gold bars and stuffing tungsten into them,” something that is nonsensical and  inherently impossible.

             The Chinese fakes had all the proper official markings on them but they did not know the numbering sequences the Treasury issued, and made gross and easily proven errors in their attempts to replicate these.

             Along with dangerously contaminated food products, gleefully shipped to American markets, the Chinese also sold tons of construction wallboard to this country, wallboard filled with seriously contaminated industrial waste. They also have been flooding this country with tens of thousands of counterfeit American gold and silver coins that appear to be authentic but in fact weigh far less than originals. A U.S., overlooked by WikiLeaks, indicates that all the American fakes are manufactured in the PRC by a government-sponsored firm located at:

             2-27B,No.261-265 Jiahe RD,Xiamen,Fujian 361009 P.R.China ...

            The clever Chinese have also sold a whole container of very dangerous radioactive waste to Iran and only the fortunate hijacking of the Iranian cargo ship with its deadly load by Somali pirates prevented the Iranian religious fanatics from disseminating the radioactive material into the eastern end of the Mediterranean with a clear eye to causing horrific casualties in Israel.

             Now, to return to the fake atrocity tapes: The fuzzy and clumsy Chinese propaganda tape shows gleeful Americans shooting innocent civilians and laughing as they machinegun innocent people.

  WikiLeaks, a product of the Wiki people, a group with a deep and abiding relationship with a certain American intelligence agency, is stated to be a nonprofit public awareness group that was first posted in 2006. It was touted at the time as being a bold defender of truth in everything and developed close connections with several American groups that post similar material:

http://cryptome.org/wikileaks/wikileaks-leak.htm
            http://cryptome.org/wikileaks/wikileaks-leak2.htm

             WikiLeaks has no official headquarters and previously has had its information posted on a Swedish server that practices so-called bulletproof hosting “to protect its sources.” 

            It claims to have a $600,000 annual budget (!), raised by ‘grateful contributions from individuals, human-rights groups, and assorted other nongovernmental watchdogs and press organizations,’  none of which are ever credited.

However, in recent months, the group has lost a great deal of public support and is now frantically begging for donations to ‘keep it alive in its quest for the truth.” In their case, this group has never produced any documentary revelations that could even remotely be called ‘secret’ and its founders were Chinese nationals resident in the United States, most notably in Seattle, Washington.”

Military can't find its copy of Iraq ‘killing video’

April 6, 2010

by Anne Flaherty

Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military said Tuesday it can't find its copy of a video that shows two employees of the Reuters news agency being killed by Army helicopters in 2007, after a leaked version circulated the Internet and renewed questions about the attack.

Capt. Jack Hanzlik, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command, said that the military has not been able to locate the video within its files after being asked to authenticate the version available online.

"We had no reason to hold the video at (Central Command), nor did the higher headquarters in Iraq," Hanzlik said in an e-mailed statement. "We're attempting to retrieve the video from the unit who did the investigation."

It's the latest twist in a three-year saga that raises questions about the rules of engagement in battle and the safety of journalists sent to cover wars.

Advocates for increased government transparency also have questioned why the military withheld the video from the public, even though Reuters requested a copy through the Freedom of Information Act after watching it in an off-the-record meeting with the military in 2007.

The video includes audio of troops calling to "light 'em up!" and referring to the men as "dead bastards." An internal investigation concluded that the troops had acted appropriately, despite having mistaken the camera equipment for weapons.

"Clearly, it is unflattering to the military, but that is not justification for withholding it," said Steven Aftergood, an expert on government secrecy with the Federation of American Scientists.

The July 12, 2007, attack has been reported before. But Web site Wikileaks.org on Monday posted the video shot from one of the Apache helicopters, putting it on "collateralmurder.com" site.

Military officials said they believed the video was authentic, but that they had to compare the images and audio with their own video before confirming it publicly.

When pressed Tuesday on why the military had not released the video when other documents related to the investigation were made public, officials said they were still looking for it and weren't entirely sure where it was.

The video was taken by the tactical unit that operated the helicopters. The unit has only been identified as a "1st Air Cavalry Brigade," which reported to the Multinational Division in Baghdad.

Feds: Texas explosives suspect was angry at gov't

April 8, 2010

by Schuyler Dixon

Associated Press

TYLER, Texas (AP) — A man accused of dropping more than 30 explosive devices into mailboxes and other locations across east Texas did so out of anger toward the government and was acting alone, federal authorities said Thursday.

Larry Eugene North was indicted Wednesday on charges of possessing an illegal firearm or destructive device. Authorities said they would evaluate whether to pursue more charges.

Authorities believe North is responsible for planting 36 devices between Feb. 5 and Wednesday, said Robert R. Champion, an agent with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Authorities previously said they had found at least 16 explosive devices, including five pipe bombs.

These devices, over 30 in number, have caused fear in this community nothing short of domestic terrorism," prosecutor Brit Featherston said. "Today that fear stops."

North had been under surveillance for about a week before he was arrested Wednesday while placing an explosive in a Tyler mailbox, authorities said. A pipe bomb was found in the van he was driving and bomb-making materials were discovered in his home, they said.

No injuries or explosions resulted from the devices. At least half were found in mailboxes, while others were in assorted locations such as the front yard of a business and a cemetery, officials said. The spate of discoveries kept people on edge for weeks in east Texas, a region recently hit by a series of church arsons.

North, 52, remained jailed after a brief hearing Thursday in federal court during which a judge granted court-appointed defense attorney Ken Hawk's request for a mental competency exam. North could face 10 years in prison if convicted.

He didn't address U.S. Magistrate Judge John Love during the hearing. Hawk declined to discuss specifics of the case with reporters, and North's relatives wouldn't comment.

Champion said North's apparent anger with the government stems from a court dispute, but he didn't have any details.

"We know he did not particularly care for the U.S. government," the ATF agent said.

The indictment accuses North of possessing a pipe bomb on or about March 23 — the same day one was found in a mailbox near a woman's home in the small community of Laird Hill, about 115 miles east of Dallas.

Of the 36 devices planted, the final 10 were pipe bombs, Champion said.

"The ones yesterday we felt were ready to go at any time," he said, noting they had a fuse but no timer.

No one answered the door Thursday at North's small, brick home on the outskirts of Henderson, and there was no sign of a police investigation. The yard was well kept, flower pots adorned the house's entrance, a portable basketball hoop sat on the driveway and a bike lay in the grass.

A neighbor declined to comment.

About 30 miles away, longtime family friend Mario Rodriguez described North as a fun man who liked to joke around.

"He was a good guy, honest," said Rodriguez, 44, of Longview, who said he has been North's brother's roommate for about 28 years. "I never thought he (Larry North) would do anything like that."

Rodriguez said he last saw North when the family got together for Thanksgiving or Christmas.

"He treated me like I was part of his family," he said.

Rodriguez said there was never any talk of explosives and he didn't know Larry North to be angry about anything.

The first incendiary device was discovered Feb. 5 while authorities were investigating a monthlong spree of church arsons that ended with a pair of arrests about two weeks later, officials said.

Champion said authorities soon ruled out a connection between the church fires and the incendiary devices. Two men are jailed in Tyler on $10 million bond apiece, facing an arson charge and suspected of intentionally setting nine other church fires.

The first reports of incendiary devices in mailboxes involved bottles containing flammable liquids and wicks, authorities said. Devices resembling pipe bombs then started turning up, which raised the sense of danger felt by 27-year-old Longview resident Robert Ziemba. One pipe bomb was found in a mailbox on a busy street in Longview.

"With pipe bombs, you never know," Ziemba said. "It could be in your backyard. It could be in your neighbor's backyard. You don't know where it's going to be."

___

Associated Press Writer Linda Stewart Ball in Dallas contributed to this report.

Here is a new informational letter concerning the MERS mortgage scandal. It is a must for anyone, private parties or attorneys, to learn the in-depth background of this scam and how to find out if you are a victim and, if you have that misfortune, what you can do about it. We recommend this for anyone interested in the subject. Ed.

The Tip of the Spear

Vol. 1 Issue 1 

7 April 10

With this email,  I am announcing the beginning of a weekly newsletter in which I will chronicle the news of the week along with commentary there on.  I will also share with the reader gossip and tidbits which I pick up in the process of following this story.  

The news of the week will probably show up a little later on in my blog site but it shall be without commentary.  You can wait to read it there and make what you will of it yourself or you can pick it up in the newsletter,  listen to my two cents along with gossip and hints of news which I discover,  but don’t have enough information to print.  In other words,  the blog is dedicated to well sourced news,  the newsletter is information garnered from conversations with attorneys and fellow researchers as we swap stories about what is happening in each of our particular areas.

The cost of the newsletter is $5/month,  cancellable at anytime.  My paypal account is info@chinkinthearmor.net 

I thank you in advance to all of you who subscribe,  to those of you who chose not to subscribe,  thank you for your patronage on the website and I hope the information I have provided has been helpful.  Please continue to follow the story in the blog.  You can access the blog from the website,  www.chinkinthearmor.net. 

And please,  please,  share this information far and wide and encourage those whom you share it with to share it with their circle of friends and family as well.  MERS on the Mortgage truly is the chink in the armor which can lead us to freedom.  We shall use their weapons against them but it takes more than just me,  or me and you together,  but me and you and your buddies …

News From the Front

I had a couple of interesting calls this week.  It seems there is a Complex Multi District Litigation (MDL) Action underway in Phoenix,  AZ under the auspices of the 9^th Circuit.  If I understand correctly,  an MDL is where there are similar issues cropping up in multi districts across the federal circuit and the courts gather them all together,  boil the issues down to their most simple,  and then have hearings and rulings on those issues.  All of the plaintiffs gather to say their piece,  all of the defendants gather together to say their piece.  The decision,  whenever it comes about,  is then appealable to the Supremes.

That’s the nuts and bolts of it.  What the nuances are is still a little unclear.  Speaking to one of my few attorney “friends” (as in real friends who happen to be attorneys),  I am told that the MDL is where litigation goes to be hopefully forgotten.  Her perspective was from an asbestosis case she worked many years ago in an MDL.  Her experience was by the time any individual got to a hearing with the MDL,  they were dead.  Bad in that case,  not necessarily bad in this case.  Would you be bothered if it took two years for your case to work its way through the system the whole time your entire contract is sort of held in abeyance?  I don’t know about you,  but I am cool with that.

I had two calls this week dealing with how MERS assignments are not the issue but merely a piece of the puzzle of an ever larger fraud than the $12T MERS scandal.  It still hasn’t quite settled in and I want to do a bit more research before going to press with this,  but it boils down to an extremely complicated insurance fraud where the people on the hook are the ones who gambled with Wall St. on their Credit Default Swaps and perhaps,  ultimately,  probably,  the taxpayer.  That means you.  This is particularly galling as our mortgages are the tool,  the vehicle for the scam

I'll probably harp on this periodically throughout these newsletter issues,  but you know,  all of this would go away if we could ever get true monetary reform from the gummit.  One of the duties of the sovereign is to provide the coin of the realm.  Our gummit,  in their infinite scandalous history of inside dealing gave that privilege to a select group of families descended from the robber barons of the Civil War era.  That delegation of powers has continued the rule of the robber barons and given rise to all the problems we have today.

Enough of this for now.  I don’t want your eyes glazing over too soon.

Free Money,  Free Men,  Free Minds

American Monetary Institute (AMI): History of money, monetary reform, public action. 2 of 6

The American Monetary Institute is the world’s leading organization for understanding monetary history and how to reform monetary policy. These six articles reprint AMI’s principle information, available at AMI’s website, with their express permission to share widely:

1.       Explaining the need for monetary reform: the heart of our economic crisis

2.      Monetary history: synopsis of Stephen Zarlenga’s The Lost Science of Money

3.      How to reform our monetary system: understanding the mechanics of creating money

4.      The American Monetary Act: monetary reform legislation for Congress

5.      FAQ of monetary reform

6.      What can Americans do for monetary reform?

http://www.examiner.com/x-18425-LA-County-Nonpartisan-Examiner~y2010m4d3-American-Monetary-Institute-AMI-History-of-money-monetary-reform-public-action-2-of-6

Comment:  The AMI makes an excellent case for monetary reform.  I highly encourage everyone to become familiar with these issues.  It is the crux of all of the problems we face as a country.  Solve this one,  and the rest will begin to fall into line.  Granted,  as  a country,  there are some things we shall forever squabble about but that’s OK.    Fix this one,  and it takes a lot of pressure off of the rest.

Banksters are gambling states down the drain

By Laura Flanders

Online Journal Guest Writer

Apr 2, 2010, 00:15

Does it seem right to you that a state’s ability to stay afloat should be the stuff of secretive betting pools? That’s just what’s happening. While states like California struggle to pay their teachers, librarians and cops, traders are gambling -- by buying credit default swaps -- on the fate of our biggest state. And that’s just half the story.  The very same banks that sell and profit from the swaps, at the same time underwrite and price the state’s assets -- their municipal bonds. That means that even as JPMorgan Chase, Barclays, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup deal out the bonds that the state issues to raise cash, they’re making money, separately, on the risks involved. They get their fees coming and going.

It’s the same double-dip banking-and-betting scenario that’s accused of bringing Lehman Brothers down. What’s being done? In Europe, after Greece came dangerously close to sucking itself down the debt-swap sinkhole, EU leaders called for stiff regulations; reining in or even banning certain types of derivatives trading and demanding far greater transparency.

New laws proposed here, however, hardly put a dent in the way derivatives are handled. No one’s worrying too much because the federal government keeps selling bonds; debts keep on rising, debt buyers keep on profiting and state schools and libraries and police and fire departments shrink and shrink.

California’s state treasurer, Bill Lockyer, finally wroteto the big banks this week, asking for clarification. Being in hock to a croupier is bad enough, but when you’re paying the croupier you want to know he’s not working for people betting against you. Californians pay fees to the banks for all that bond underwriting. The state has a right to know: Just whom are the banks working for? And we the taxpayers have that same right.

In case you didn’t notice, taxpayers are the all-around losers here. Public coffers are taking on everyone’s risk (the states’ as well as the banks’) even as public services shrivel. Lovely.

The F Word is a regular commentary by Laura Flanders, the host of GRITtv which broadcasts weekdays on satellite TV (Dish Network Ch. 9415 Free Speech TV) on cable, and online at GRITtv.org and TheNation.com. Support us by signing up for our podcast, and follow GRITtv or GRITlaura on Twitter.com.

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_5756.shtml

Comment: Ms. Flanders,  they do, indeed,  make money coming and going.  I put this article in to start to lay the ground work for the story of the even larger fraud mentioned above.

Hedge Funds Make Hay

ublished: April 3, 2010

Riding high on the bank bailout, hedge fund managers posted record paydays in 2009, according to an annual survey.

Leading the pack, David Tepper of Appaloosa Management made $4 billion, in part by betting successfully that the government would bail out the big banks. John Paulson, of Paulson & Company, made $2.3 billion by buying back bank stocks he shorted in 2008. And a year after his fund received $200 million in the bailout of the American International Group, Kenneth Griffin of the Citadel Investment Group made $900 million.

In all, the top 25 managers earned $25.3 billion in 2009, including fees and capital gains.

Debate is endless about the role of hedge funds, largely unregulated investment pools for institutional and wealthy investors. What is not disputable is that the funds’ profits are bound up with a defective financial system that has fostered booms, busts and bailouts.

The day after the hedge fund results were released, the government reported that unemployment was stuck at 9.7 percent, with 15 million Americans out of work. For most people with a job, average earnings fell by 2 cents an hour in March, to $18.90. To add insult to injury, some hedge fund managers and, more commonly, private equity fund managers are able to pay a much lower rate of tax than the typical working professional.

The tax disparity results from an outdated rule that lets a money manager in a private partnership treat a chunk of his fees as if they were long-term capital gains, taxed at a special low rate of 15 percent. Fees for managing someone else’s money should be taxed as ordinary income, like wages and salary, at rates as high as 35 percent.

President Obama has included a provision to end that special treatment in his most recent budget. For three years running, the House has passed a bill to close the loophole. In the Senate both Democrats and Republicans have resisted, all for fear of losing lucrative campaign donations.

If lawmakers cannot even close this blatant loophole, is there any hope for real reform? The answer, now, appears to be no. In its proposal for overhauling the financial system, the administration has called for necessary, though modest, changes in how private investment groups do business — mainly giving more power to regulators to examine their books and to compel disclosures to investors. House and Senate reform bills are weaker.

What is needed is fair tax treatment and stricter oversight. Lawmakers need to protect the interests of all of their constituents — not just a handful of billionaires.http://dailybail.com/home/bernanke-feels-the-heat-maiden-lane-asset-disclosure-reveals.html

Comment:  Illustrating what many of you already know or suspect.  There are one set of rules for the oligarchs,  there is another for the rest of us.

Failed Banks and Failed Billions

More Financial Bubbles Ahead in the US Housing Market

By Bob Chapman

April 01, 2010 "International Forecaster" -- Bubbles have a hard time coming to an end, especially in residential real estate. Underlying forces such as government intervention to prolong the agony and the abject stupidity of builders extends the bubbles.

We are in a vast home inventory expansion and builders are going to build 535,000 new homes. The projected foreclosure rate could give us as much as a 3-year home inventory, up from present levels of about a year, if one includes the lenders shadow inventory. This past week the home building index rose 7.1% and it is up 25.1% year-to-date. The retail index rose 17% y-t-d, yet unemployment stubbornly clings to 22-1/8%. In fact, the retail index is up 87.4% y-o-y. We would say that index is grossly overpriced. As you can see bubbles have a way of not wanting to die quickly. This is caused by man’s disparately wanting to cling to the past attempting to take the easy way out rather than adapting to change. Government tries to keep sections of the economy alive rather than letting the cleansing process take its course.

The subsidization of the housing market is doomed to failure, because there simply isn’t enough money and credit available to keep it going indefinitely. All government is doing is re-flating a dying bubble. These Socialistic/Marxist policies just won’t work. Whether government likes it or not interest rates are headed higher, probably by 1% or more by the end of the year as government in its quest for more money to cover its debts crowds most others out of the market. This can be accommodated by the Fed, but not without higher inflation or perhaps hyperinflation, which in turn will drive interest rates even higher. We are seeing the reigniting of speculative mania in other markets as well – in the stock market and particularly in the low quality sector of the bond market worldwide. The mis-pricing of investments and finance is resulting in terrible distortions, mostly the result of Fed and government policy.

This mania has been aided and abetted by US dollar strength, especially over the past two months. We saw JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup and others loading up on the long side of the dollar starting last October between USDX 74 and 78. They obviously knew the Greece episode was on the way. Irrespective, and in spite of no positive fundamentals, dollar strength was used to draw funds into dollar denominated assets. Supposedly the dollar has some sort of competitive advantage, which it doesn’t, and that a strong dollar will be re-flationary, which it has been. Gold and silver should have been flying to the upside, but our government detests free markets and it again temporarily suppressed prices. This is the result of the machinations of Larry Summers and Tim Geither. Dollar strength has the perceived benefit of the Fed’s ability to endlessly create money and credit.

It is this perception added to Greece, European and euro problems that have fueled speculation in world markets. Perceptions are one thing, and fundamentals are another more powerful force, which in time will reassert themselves. Problems will first be evident in the bond markets, which have already begun. As soon as the 10-year T-note solidly crosses 4% the market, the dollar and bonds will falter. The current strength is perceived to be the weakness of other currencies and their economies, prospective re-flationary policies and the concept of too big to fail. This is why there is the concept that the current “recovery” will persist. They also recognize that individual euro zone countries cannot inflate their way out of problems. One currency prohibits that from happening. This means Greece and others cannot monetize their debt and that means any kind of recovery is years away. All 19 near bankrupt countries are in the same boat except the US. Markets believe in the Bernanke put or backstop. They also believe the Fed will reinflate again. They would rather have inflation or hyperinflation, which they can in part control, rather than deflation, which once it begins cannot be contained.

Then enters the question will the Fed deliberately choose deflation in a year or two to bring about world government? Is this what Greece was all about? We do not know for sure. All we can do is guess. Do not forget Europe’s problems are not as bad as those of the US even though they are led to believe they are.

The 10-year Treasury note may well be telling us something and that is that higher rates are on the way. It certainly doesn’t auger well for any recovery. If credit spreads widen watch out. Such a development would mean the dollar would begin to retrace its recent gains. Dollar gains are over at 82 on the USDX. We await its correction.

We have spent more than 70 years as Americans and we gasp at the criminal enterprise that America has become. Lawbreaking has become as casual as running a business, whether it is on Wall Street or within the beltway in Washington. Worse yet, almost all malefactors never see the inside of a jail, they just have their corporations pay fines and go back to doing what they were doing, which was breaking the law.

One of the ultimate insults comes from the FDIC requesting donations. 200 to 500 banks will fail this year because of incompetence and terrible investments. We believe, as the year progresses, bank failures will explode. One of the factors leading us to this conclusion is that more than 1,000 banks have professionals overseeing bank operations from the Comptroller of the Currency’s Office. Worse yet, we are seeing many banks and credit unions telling depositors they may have to wait seven days or more for their money. Can bank holidays be far behind? We believe it will happen over the next couple of years.

As we go forward we continue to see massive Treasury purchases by the Fed. The monetization is spellbinding at somewhere between 50 and 80 percent. The more we look at this cartoon the more we know quantitative easing cannot stop. If it does the system will collapse. The Fed and the FDIC even want pension funds to buy their toxic garbage, as does Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. What a sordid turn of events, but not unexpected considering what we are dealing with.

Unemployment sticks at 22-1/8% as tax revenues continue to plunge as the budget deficit heads toward Mars. The next administration push will be to legalize illegal aliens. You ask where will this all end? Can you believe builders have been buying CDOs? Lennar has plunged in and Orleans fell into insolvency with 20% of their assets in toxic garbage.

There is no question zero interest rates, unbridled government deficits, stimulus plans and the Fed’s quantitative easing have been a failure. The result normally would be to pump more aggregates into the system. We will have to see what the Fed, Congress and the administration do, especially between now and the election. Is it any wonder we have called for a two-third’s official dollar devaluation and a debt default. Be patient we should see them happen within two years. Maybe we will get lucky and get tariffs on goods and services. That way we can bring most of our jobs back and get a healthy economy back with 5% unemployment. Many credit derivatives will be banned as well. We have been involved in markets for 50 years and we know sooner or later those who are leveraged – or on margin – lose sooner or later. As a broker we never had margin accounts. The halt in the downward fall of economics, finance and stock market prices are but an interlude. There are still no solutions, so the downside will begin anew. One thing that has come out of the foregoing and the recent troubles in Greece and with the euro is that gold has been recognized as money, as a currency. That view is going to grow as gold trades higher and higher. As an example, just look at the value of gold in euros and all other currencies. Gold has consolidated time after time at $1,050 to $1,100 no matter what the US government threw at the gold market. There have been a few exceptions to gold’s strength, but over time all currencies will fall against the only real money. On the short-term do not forget the government is very short gold and silver on the Comex, probably the LBMA and most certainly in the producer shares. This week’s numbers will give us an indication whether they have begun to cover. We are going to also see a resumption of inflation officially in the next CPI figures. Real inflation is again approaching 8% and this inflation will be reflected in gold and silver prices. Not all professionals are dumb enough to believe official figures. On the downside we do not believe $1,050 to $1,100 will ever be broken again. Your gains when they come will be quick and large.

Now that most of the evidence is in, it is apparent that Lehman Brothers management created a colossal fraud even bigger than that of Enron with its Repo 105 maneuvers and was assisted by its accounting firm of Ernst & Young, and by the NY fed under the direction of our current Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. Geithner and all the top management and directors of Lehman should be charged criminally, but all being Illuminati members no one has been charged. Do not expect much from the Department of Justice. Eric Holder was the official who wrote the pardon letter for March Rich, tax cheat and Mossad operative for the State of Israel. As you can see Holder is where he is today because of his enablement of criminal activity. It shows you again that Wall Street, banking and Washington are nothing more than a criminal cartel. The question now is who else on Wall Street is doing the same thing? We already know they keep two sets of books, which is sanctioned by the BIS, the FASB and your government. What is really going on at these Illuminist firms, besides that they tell us they are doing God’s work.

As this criminal activity unfolds the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke wants more regulatory authority for the Fed so the Fed can better cover up criminal activities. He says the Fed is unequally suited to supervise large, complex financial organizations and to address both safety and soundness risks and risks in the stability of the financial system as a whole. This is the ringleader talking. This is the nexus, the core, the leader of criminal activity in America grasping for even more power. This is the same group under Greenspan and then Bernanke that created the stock market bubble of the late 1990s, the housing, mortgage, commercial real estate bubble, the bubble that took the Dow to 14,100 and then from 6,500 to 10,900, the toxic garbage bubble and the bubble on Wall Street and in banking.

These are the people who lost Americans trillions of dollars so they could implement world government. All this just didn’t happen; it was planned that way. Yes, they are unequally suited to the creation and transmission of criminal activity. This is the same Fed that spent two years in Lehman’s offices and found nothing, because they aided and abetted their criminal activity. They knew everything that was going on. They were trying to bail Lehman out and it did not work. The SEC was there with them, shoulder to shoulder, covering up the crime scene. They are all liars and thieves, not incompetents. We then wonder how deep and serious the fraud is at other firms. From what we have seen so far we haven’t even scratched the surface. We want to see all these facilitators in jail. We do not want to see the Fed with more power. We want to see the Fed out of business as well as the end of the SEC and CFTC. As you can see our government and Wall Street are totally corrupt and unless we do something about it they will destroy our country.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25124.htm

Comment:  Nothing to see here folks,  let’s go look at the pony.  Seriously,  while Mr. Chapman brings up points which are absolutely on the mark,  what he misses is the MERS scandal.  It is so big,  so monstrous,  that the PTB’s (Powers that be) will do everything they can to keep a lid on it.  Much of what you see is the market churning in its last throes as they seek for ways to hold on.  If they can “reflate the bubble” all of the problems can be papered over and maybe no one will look too closely.  The other thing that frustrates me when I read things like this is the pundit always sets the terms of the debate in a way so that the monetary system is never challenged.  Frame the debate in terms of how hopeless it is under the current monetary system and what things would look like if the sovereign reclaimed the duty of providing the coin of the realm.  Oh,  well.  I can dream. –End-

Voluntary Foreclosure Prevention Fails to Deliver

April 2, 2010

by Greg Kaufmann

The Nation

            The foreclosure crisis has gone from bad to worse.

Over 2.4 million foreclosures are expected this year, up from 2.1 million in 2009. One out of every four homeowners is now underwater--owing more on their mortgages than their homes are worth. More than one in seven are behind on their payments.

The Obama administration's main focus in its fight against foreclosures is the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP).

It's failing.

Once touted as a program that would help 3 to 4 million borrowers by December 31, 2012, it has helped fewer than 200,000 people receive permanent modifications. (And "permanent" modifications only guarantee the lower payments for five years.)

With a record like that, it's no surprise that last week the administration announced some tweaks to its approach to much (too much) fanfare.

New requirements for banks would help unemployed people by reducing mortgage payments to 31 percent of their unemployment benefits for three to six months. (Homeowners would then need to repay their payment savings with interest, according to Julia Gordon, senior policy counsel for the Center for Responsible Lending.) And there are new incentives for banks to do principal reductions for homeowners who are underwater, and to modify or extinguish second liens.

But the key word here is "incentives." Incentives for banks to voluntarily do the right thing is the reason that both the Bush and Obama administrations have failed to stem the tide of foreclosures. American homeowners need mandatory principal reductions.

"I'm not optimistic that the incentives will be enough to entice servicers and investors to reduce loan principals," said John Taylor, president and CEO of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition. "The real acceleration in the number of foreclosures prevented will come with mandatory principal writedowns."

Congressman Raúl Grijalva, co-chair of the Progressive Caucus, agreed. In a recent phone interview he told me, "The fundamental problem--and we learned this with previous efforts to slow down the foreclosure rate--is the fact that it's voluntary on the part of the lender. It's not just a question of looking at the mortgage and making some modifications. The endgame should be keeping people in their homes."

Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur--who was focused on the foreclosure crisis long before others even recognized there was one--also told me, "The full weight of the federal government is not being used effectively. We still have a hands-off attitude that somehow downstream these ossified bureaucracies of service companies and large banks will act in good faith. But when left to their own devices, guess what? They don't."

With HAMP's steadfast faith in corporate volunteerism doomed to fail, progressive legislators are pushing the administration to look at new approaches.

To that end, Grijalva and Kaptur penned a letter along with twenty-five House Democratic colleagues to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner suggesting the establishment of "a new federal entity" modeled after FDR's Home Owners' Loan Corporation (HOLC). The letter notes, "During the Great Depression, the government successfully acquired, refinanced, serviced and sold more than a million mortgages, accounting for one in every five non-farm dwellings in the United States. Such actions prevented untold foreclosures, and even managed to return a small profit to the Treasury."

The new HOLC would be capitalized through remaining funds in the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP). It would have the power to purchase distressed mortgages at auction, and also at fair market value through eminent domain. The authors of the letter point out that the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 authorizes the Treasury Secretary to purchase "troubled assets from any financial institution...on such terms and conditions as are determined by the Secretary."

"We're replicating what happened in the past," said Grijalva. "But it worked, it didn't cost the taxpayer money, and it returned a little profit to the Treasury.... We need to tell Wall Street and the lenders--this is the way the business is going to be run. This is the intervention the government is bringing to you. And not be shy about that. We'd get a lot of support from the American people because of who we're regulating and because this is a crisis and every community knows it's a crisis."

Those who oppose this kind of intervention because they believe it rewards bad behavior--the moral hazard issue--are missing the big picture. Everyone is impacted by this crisis, not just families who lose their homes. And the major drivers of this crisis are now unemployment and homeowners who are underwater, not those who took on mortgages they couldn't afford. (And even many of those homeowners were steered towards bad products through predatory and deceptive practices.)

"Everybody has a dog in this hunt when it comes to these foreclosures," Taylor recently testified at a House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform hearing assessing the HAMP program. "Every foreclosure reduces the value of their neighbor's property. Millions of foreclosures caused job loss, reduction in tax revenue and has dragged down the American economy. Foreclosures reduced all homeowners' equity and for many a significant portion of their retirement savings. Over $7 trillion of wealth has been lost by American households."

"We're misreading the impact that foreclosure has in a lot of areas," says Grijalva, "in the health of a community, the economy, and the social fabric of a community. The cost of continuing to let the lenders dance around the edges in terms of this housing crisis and foreclosure crisis is that with every foreclosure--and more are expected this year and then more the year after--that is just a bigger hit on the economy."

I asked Congressman Grijalva why--besides pressure from financial services industry lobbyists--there is so much resistance from the Obama administration to forcing principal reductions.

"Many of the people making and crafting these decisions have been intimates and come from the same farm," said Grijalva. "So, I think there is almost a cultural reluctance to mess with the system that they came from. You need a real outside perspective--outside of Wall Street and the financial services industry to really bring some creative ideas."

That's exactly where Kaptur is now turning her attention. She secured a commitment from Secretary Geithner to meet in April with her and some policy experts who are on the ground in Ohio and experiencing the crisis firsthand.

"We're trying to bring Main Street to them," she said. "Sharing the experiences of the key people in our state who are involved in housing and bank regulation. We feel the administration can use Ohio as a checkpoint against which they can measure their programs' effectiveness. For example, HAMP is not having a huge impact in Ohio. We need to share where Ohio is and where we need to be."

Kaptur says HOLC is "one possible tool, but not the only tool." Another possibility is allowing people to remain in their homes through a turnkey program, a rent-to-own program with forty-year mortgages--or possibly a right-to-rent program keeping families in homes at an affordable rate.

"We have got to put a tourniquet on this to stop the bleeding," Kaptur said.

The death of public education: Lack of money is killing our schools

April 6, 2010

by Derrick Z. Jackson

Boston Globe

The news says we are watching the death of public education before our eyes. Detroit is closing more than 40 schools, Kansas City wants to close more than 40 percent of its school buildings. Other cities have been closing schools over the last decade. Boston avoided closings in its most recent budget deliberations, but still must slash custodial staff and postpone building repairs.

It is no secret that American education is at a great divide, unrivaled in most of the developed world. The United States spends $9,800 per public primary and secondary education student, which is technically high by global standards.

But meanwhile, children of the wealthy are being trained at private schools at more than triple the expenditures. In the Boston area, day school tuition rates are closing in on $35,000.

Our investment in public school teachers is paltry for the wealthiest country in the world. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the United States ranks in some measures behind England, Italy, Japan, Scotland and way behind Germany in starting teacher pay. The average expenditure on college students in the United States amounts to $24,400 per college student, two and a half times more than the $9,800 per-pupil spending in the public schools.

Beneath the numbers is the resegregation of children on the basis of class, race and immigration status. Prison spending soared so much, that by 2007, five states spent as much or more on corrections than on higher education, according to the Pew Center on the States.

In monetary terms, we have given up on millions of children. “I don’t think necessarily that public education is dead, but certain parts of it are dying,’’ said Linda Darling-Hammond, a Stanford University professor who headed President Barack Obama’s education transition team. “The programs of the 1960s and 1970s that helped make education more equitable were mostly eliminated in the 1980s and never put back.

“We’re disinvesting in a significant way. With the huge decline in America of manual labor jobs that are being off-shored or digitalized, the vast majority of jobs are knowledge based. If we do not invest that way, we really can’t survive as a nation. To deeply underfund public education as we are doing does not make any sense.’’

Author of the 2009 book, “The Flat World and Education,’’ Darling-Hammond says neither poverty, nor the diverse nature of the American population are excuses not to educate everyone. Several countries were behind the United States decades ago in education and now have passed us.

She cites the example of Korea, which “in the space of one generation . . . moved from a nation that educated less than a quarter of its citizens through high school to one that now ranks third in college-educated adults.’’

She noted how Singapore, where 80 percent of families live in public housing, was tops in the world in fourth-grade and eighth-grade math assessments in 2003. “When children leave the tiny, spare apartments they occupy in high-rises throughout the city,’’ she wrote of Singapore, “they arrive at colorful, airy school buildings where student artwork, papers, projects, and awards are displayed throughout, libraries and classrooms are well-stocked, instructional technology is plentiful, and teachers are well trained.’’

It is enough to make one consider whether America needs to start from scratch. Whatever we are doing, it is not working. For instance, Darling-Hammond said Obama has an education platform that could rival the last serious education president, whom she considers to be Lyndon Johnson, but “to date has not squarely embraced the idea of equity. He did a great job coming out of the box on higher education, but inequity in elementary and secondary education is continuing to widen.’’

Johnson once said you cannot “take a person who for years has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, ‘You are free to compete with all the others.’ ’’ Today millions of American children once again need our help to get to the starting line.

Derrick Z. Jackson can be reached at jackson@globe.com.