When secured lenders chose Chrysler bonds, they accepted a lower rate of return in exchange for the assurance that in the event of trouble, they would be paid everything they were owed before any money went to the junior or unsecured lenders. (The unsecured lenders in this case would be the United Autoworkers Union, a.k.a., the UAW.)
In short, the bondholders were assured that they would be paid first because the United States is supposed to be governed by the rule of law. (As many Lakota and others are aware, this country doesn’t always measure up to that standard.)
More specifically, legal precedents in the areas of contract and bankruptcy law provided the bondholders a “guarantee” of being paid first.
That concept went out the window with the Obama plan. The secured lenders were paid 29 cents on the dollar while the unsecured lenders were paid 50 cents.
Yes, some of these secured lenders were hedge funds but according to economist Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson, they were also “retired blue-collar workers, investment firms managing the retirement accounts of state and municipal employees,” and “school endowments…”
Obama unfairly lumped these folks in with the hedge funds and referred to all of the ripped-off bondholders as “speculators.”
The uncomfortable conclusion I’ve come to is that Obama violated the rule of law so he could reward his UAW supporters. This behavior smacks of Soviet style cronyism, in my opinion. This is theft at the highest branches of the government and at this point, no one is safe with the rule of law thrown out the window.
There are also constitutional problems with the Chrysler bankruptcy and government semi-nationalization.
Dr. Hendrickson claimed that : “The Constitution allows Uncle Sam to ‘regulate commerce’ not to own and manage it.”
According to the attorney for the Chrysler bondholders, Tom Lauria, an argument could also be made that the Constitution was violated in the area of right to contract and right to property.
The executive office, which is charged with enforcing the law is breaking the law, he claims.
With this plan, the executive office is intruding into the judicial branch and upsetting the checks and balances that are supposed to prevent this sort of abuse.
So it’s with some disgust that I share the following clip of Obama proclaiming that the secured lenders to Chrysler wanted an “unjustified tax payer funded bailout.” “Unjustified?” What’s unjustified about expecting contract and bankruptcy laws to be respected? What about the U.S. Constitution?
In addition, Obama says that the bondholders “were hoping that everybody else would make sacrifices and they would have to make none,” when in fact, the bondholders’ attorney offered to take 50 cents on the dollar when they had no legal obligation to take less than 100%! No joke!
If what attorney Tom Lauria said is accurate, this is one of the most disgusting cases of spin that I’ve ever seen come out of the White House; prepare yourself.
What is differentiating us from a Banana Republic on this issue?
Where is the collective outrage?
Maybe it’s in hiding until people in this country really start to hurt.
Watch your pensions and your 401Ks. They may very well be stolen to bail-out the bankrupt social security system.
Quote of the Week: “God seems to have left the receiver off the hook.”
Attorney for Bondholders Accuses the White House of Threats
Please check out this clip of attorney Tom Lauria being interviewed by WJR talk radio host Frank Beckmann.
Mr. Lauria is representing the secured Chrysler bondholders. He makes some shocking allegations about the Obama administration.
And here’s a later Fox Business News clip where Mr. Lauria seems to back off somewhat from his earlier allegations.
Readers, if you have any theories about why Lauria moved into “no comment” mode regarding his earlier allegations, please let me know.
Lauria seems to be saying that his client wanted him to be quiet about it.
My best guess is that the White House was unappreciative of Lauria speaking publicly about the threats and so they issued further threats to his client and/or Lauria, if he didn’t shut his mouth.
I realize that Thomas and Matthews aren’t talking about our current economic crisis in this MSNBC clip.
But maybe my fears of runaway inflation due to the overspending of the Bush-Obama years are unfounded.
After all, if Obama can deliver “…the world, once again, from evil” (Chris Matthews of MSNBC) and “he’s sort of God” (Evan Thomas of Newsweek), then perhaps I’m over-reacting.
“If increased government spending with borrowed or newly created money is a ’stimulus,’ then the Weimar Republic should have been stimulated to unprecedented prosperity, instead of runaway inflation and widespread economic desperation that ultimately brought Adolf Hitler to power.”
~Thomas Sowell (as quoted in the May 27, 2009 issue of the Rapid City Journal, and available online here).
The false left-right paradigm that divides Americans over this financial crisis continues to crumble, in spite of the tea parties which seemed to divide. I believe this divisiveness was stoked by the media and then latched onto by far too many participants and critics.
People seem to want to blame the financial crisis on conservatives in bed with the banking industry (deregulation) and excessive spending on liberals. I understand how tempting it is to have a party to believe in but sadly, these views are both incorrect in my opinion. Both parties are guilty on both counts.
Our problems as a nation are going to badger us until we realize that both Republicans and Democrats are in the pocket of the banking industry and other special interests (please see the “Buried News of the Week” below).
Bi-partisan action led to this crisis, and we’ll probably need bi-partisan action to get out of it, assuming politicians have the power and motivation to help in spite of the special interests.
This is a time to unite instead of fighting each other and pointing fingers at one party or the other. (Oh, I’ll so some finger pointing in this post, but it won’t have anything to do with one political party being superior to the other.)
The Monday, March 30 issue of the Rapid City Journal had a ground-breaking column by Robert Scheer on page A13. I’ve read several of Scheer’s columns in the past and walked away thinking that while the guy has interesting things to say from time to time, he seemed like a partisan hack and cheerleader for Obama. I was wrong about that.
I suspect Scheer just had unrealistic expectations of Obama after eight years of Bush and the Bush banker bailout.When he saw how Obama was going to govern, he again found the critical voice that he wielded against Bush.
For one of the best explanations of whom to blame for bringing us this financial crisis, please read Scheer’s column, “Obama’s toxic advisers are keeping the country from the bigger issue.” (Available online here.)
Scheer mentions Greenspan as one engineer of the economic crisis, but doesn’t mention the fact that Greenspan also helped fuel the housing collapse by slamming the accelerator down on the housing market with artificially low interest rates, thereby helping to create the housing bubble.
What’s Scheer upset about in regard to the housing and financial crisis?
Obama has appointed Gary Gensler to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
From the article, Scheer writes, “Gensler helped create this financial crisis when he was in the Treasury Department back in the Clinton era, when bipartisan cooperation with Wall Street lobbyists was all the rage.”
Scheer then quotes Sen. Bernie Sanders, explaining his reason for blocking Obama’s nomination of Gary Gensler for head of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission: “Mr. Gensler worked with Sen. Phil Gramm and Alan Greenspan to exempt credit default swaps from regulation, which led to the collapse of AIG and has resulted in the largest taxpayer bailout in U.S. history.” The disastrous legislation that these men supported was known as the Commodity Futures Modernization Act. (It was signed by former President Bill Clinton.)
It gets better (I mean worse). Who else supported this legislation during the Clinton years? Obama’s chief economic adviser, Lawrence Summers.
When Clinton’s CFTC appointee Brooksley Born “attempted to sound a warning (about the legislation), she was treated by the rest of Clinton’s team as the enemy. In response to Born’s warning, they drove her from government…”
Can you think of a better interview for 60 Minutes than a hard-hitting piece with this very bright and courageous woman? I don’t think they would touch it with a ten-foot pole because it would be too embarrassing for some very powerful people.
How ironic is it that the woman who sounded a very prescient warning on the credit default swap deregulation was driven out of government, while the man who was blind to the coming crisis gets her job?
How could so many smart people get this so wrong?One factor is that money from the banking industry greases the wheels of action with our Senators and Congress people.
Greed over-rides common sense, along with an arrogance that comes from being “too big to fail.”
Quote of the Week: “And the banks — hard to believe in a time when we’re facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created — are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place.”
I refer to the latest crisis as the “So-Called Swine Flu” because I’ve heard that the pathogen is a combination of human, swine, and avian flu. I believe this is referred to as a recombinant virus. I’ve also heard that these qualities could enable the germ to pass from humans to animals and back again, possibly mutating into a more deadly form.
I think we need a new and easier name for this illness. How about “Cocktail Flu?”
Are there any Stephen King fans out there? How about “Captain Trips?” Well sorry, that would be premature at this point…maybe later…let’s pray not.
I have listened to several different epidemiologists and docs on talk radio and in mainstream news stories over the last several days. The general consensus seems to be that we don’t know yet if this flu outbreak will be a pandemic or peter out. (Many of the docs I’ve heard on alternative media think there’s a possibility this virus was cooked up in a lab and either released accidentally or on purpose. Gary Ridenour, M.D., was all ready with a book on the pandemic potential of avian flu.)
Until we know what this virus is going to do, I think extreme caution with any long positions would be wise. Obviously, if this turns into a pandemic, your portfolio will suffer. (Gold, silver and other hedges should be OK.)
Quote of the Week:
“When there are two conflicting versions of a story, the wise course is to believe the one in which people appear at their worst.”
~H. Allen Smith, as quoted in the April 27, 2009 issue of Forbes magazine.
Buried News of the Week
I had a very strange experience last night. In listening to all the commentary about this flu outbreak, I realized, hey, I heard something like this a couple of weeks ago. Then I thought, “Hey wait a minute. A couple of weeks ago, there was no flu outbreak.”
Having said that, I am NOT vouching for the veracity of what the woman in the clip below says. Quite frankly, there are several things in her story that don’t make sense to me.
However, I do find it very strange that a few short weeks before this outbreak, someone called into a radio show claiming that the Department of Homeland Security was transporting large amounts of bird flu virus to various parts of the country.
The woman provides an incredible amount of detail, ostensibly to back up her story. That leads me to believe that if this is just a “lucky” hoax, it should fall apart fairly quickly due to the level of detail she provides.
If anyone has any theories about this caller, I’d be happy to share mine as well. Please comment!
I first ran across this Youtube.com clip yesterday. At first I felt somewhat vindicated to hear former Bill Clinton adviser and Fox News contributor Dick Morris proclaim thatpeople like me “have been crazy, but now they’re right. It’s happening.”
“People like me” are those who according to Morris “have been yelling, ‘Oh, the UN is going to take over, global government.’” Hannity added, “Conspiracy theorists.”
What were these “conspiracy theorists” right about? Morris proclaimed on the April 1, 2009 Hannity show that the G20 Summit in London includes planning “to put our Fed and our SEC under the control, in effect, of the IMF.”
Hannity expanded on Morris’s point by adding “…Geithner said he would be open to the idea of a global currency…those conspiracy people…had suggested that for years. You’re not wrong!”
Later, I felt less vindicated by Morris’s comments and more sad and frustrated; many still consider this information crazy when all that’s necessary is to pay attention to alternative media and read the globalists own documents and listen to their own statements. None of this is a secret. No one is forcing the American people to dismiss this information until the mainstream media talks about it!
Here’s a good Web site to start with that helps people break through denial about global government. Not only is this a professional and well-sourced site but the man who runs it, Alex Jones, also has a great radio show which can be accessed at that site.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I don’t agree with everything Jones says. I try not to check my critical thinking skills at the door no matter who I’m listening to. However, I believe Jones provides a valuable service to our society, because he’s willing to look at information and come up with uncomfortable conclusions.
Also as I’ve said before, I believe Naomi Wolf provides a similar service; it’s nice to have both sides of the political spectrum represented!
Jones sometimes gets callers who may be a little too enthusiastic about what a great guy Jones is. Jones often responds by asking what’s so great about someone who can “read the TV Guide?”
I’ll try to illustrate what I think he means by that with this example, taken from the “G20 Summit Meeting in London” link above.
Please read these excerpts from an essay by Harvard Professor Richard N. Cooper: “‘I suggest a radical alternative scheme for the next century: the creation of a common currency for all of the industrial democracies, with a common monetary policy and a joint Bank of Issue to determine that monetary policy.‘ [Emphasis in original]
“‘How can independent states accomplish that? They need to turn over the determination of monetary policy to a supranational body.’ (Emphasis added)”
Does any of this sound familiar so far?
Cooper goes on to write, “‘This one-currency regime is much too radical to envisage in the near future,” he said. “But it is not too radical to envisage 25 years from now….’”
When and where was the above published? In the Fall 1984 issue of Foreign Affairs, the journal of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).
I think this is an example of what Jones means by “reading the TV Guide.”
However, I believe Jones is too modest. People aren’t in denial about what’s going to be on TV. (” Oh look, a re-run of Seinfeld!”) No one has a vested psychological interest in disbelieving TV schedules. This makes Jones’s job very, very challenging, although more and more people are waking up. (People are getting angry, which is working wonders, and we’re just getting warmed up!)
See you next time, hopefully before the next blizzard hits!
Blog update, 04-07-09: G20 Unsuccessful in Implementing IMF Regulations on Fed and SEC.
Here’s a quote from a Rapid City Journal article entitled, “Time to come down from G-20 Summit,” page E3 of the 04-05-09 edition: “France and Germany were instrumental in blocking the Obama initiative but then, they did not get their main objective either-a global supranational regulatory body to oversee the world’s largest financial institutions.”
Quote of the Week: “Human progress is furthered not by conformity, but by aberration.”
Regular readers have already figured out that I’m no fan of either political party, and when it comes to the financial crisis-with a few exceptions-I believe Republicans and Democrats are equal opportunity destroyers.
Sen. Judd Gregg, Obama’s former Commerce Secretary appointee, may be one of the exceptions. Gregg is the ranking Republican member of the Senate Budget Committee and has been highly critical of Obama’s handling of the budget since withdrawing his name from consideration due to “irresolvable conflicts” over such issues as the porkulus-I mean the stimulus package-and the Census.
What struck me about this interview was Gregg’s comment about how if we keep going with this budget over the next 10 years as planned, that “this country will go bankrupt.” He goes on to say that the budget numbers “aren’t sustainable” and that members of the Obama administration “know they’re not sustainable.”
Think about the implications of that statement. He’s basically saying that the Obama administration has developed a budget that will lead to the bankruptcy of this country and that they know it.
What if Gregg is correct and is telling the truth about Obama’s budget? Why would the administration plot such a disastrous course?
I have an idea, but maybe my readers have theories that could spark discussion.
Quote of the Week: “If the American people allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.”~Thomas Jefferson
Well, maybe not exactly homeless, just as long as you don’t mind calling a FEMA camp home.
Was Jefferson psychic about his predictions? No, he was a political genius and the deeper we get into this crisis, the more apparent this will become in my opinion.
Right now, we’re headed for a historic deflationary spiral, and then a historic inflationary spiral, all predominantly caused, in my opinion, by the private bank known as the Federal Reserve, with the collusion of powerful people in the Republican and Democratic parties. (Is there anyone left in this country who is surprised to know that theFederal Reserve is no more Federal than Federal Express? Check this Youtube video for Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s comments at 3:44 for the start of the discussion about the Fed, while the “Federal Express” comment comes at 3:57. He is also, in my opinion, one of the “exceptions.”
The wild divergence of predictions about our current economic crisis amazes me!
The March 16, 2009 issue of Newsweek has an article on page 37 entitled, “Brighter Days Ahead.” The subhead proclaims, “The recovery will be sluggish. But the doomsday scenario of depression, deflation and Dow 5000 seem farfetched.”
Farfetched? If Nouriel Roubini of Forbes magazine is correct, I believe this is a load of garbage. He wrote an article entitled, “The U.S. Financial System is Effectively Insolvent.” Roubini crunches the numbers and finds out that they don’t add up. I would like to see an effective rebuke to Roubini’s analysis instead of corporate sponsored cheerleading.
My philosophy is to hope for the best and prepare for the worst.
To hope for the best, my advice would be to read the Newsweek article but don’t buy stocks right now for a long term hold. I believe the markets are in a sucker’s rally right now and I’m holding fast to my prediction of Dow 5,500 or lower.
Prepare for the worst by listening to people like author Dmitry Orlov and Peter Schiff.
Orlov wrote the book, “Reinventing Collapse: The Soviet Example and American Prospects.”
Orlov was recently interviewed by Russia Today and sees the collapse of the United States as “unavoidable.” He gives some advice on how to prepare, including starting a “tiny business,” eliminating debt and getting to know your neighbors. That’s good advice no matter what happens!
Quote of the week: “I’ve always believed that America’s government was a unique political system-one designed by geniuses so that it could be run by idiots. I was wrong. No system can be smart enough to survive this level of incompetence and recklessness by the people charged to run it.”
I ran across a couple of interesting articles at WorldNetDaily.com, so I decided to combine them and comment.
In this article by Jerome Corsi, he asserts that the Federal governments “$65.5 trillion in total obligations exceeds the gross domestic product of the world.”
He goes on to say that “the total U.S. obligations, including Social Security and Medicare benefits to be paid in the future, effectively have placed the U.S. government in bankruptcy, even before new continuing social welfare obligation embedded in the massive spending plan are taken into account.”
He explains that the true budget deficit for 2008 was “$5.1 Trillion,” and not the “$455 Billion” reported by the Congressional Budget Office.
Why the difference? Corsi reports that “the difference between the $455 billion ‘official’ budget deficit numbers and the $5.1 trillion budget deficit cited by ‘2008 Financial Report of the United States Government’ is that the official budget deficit is calculated on a cash basis, where all tax receipts, including Social Security tax receipts, are used to pay government liabilities as they occur.”
“But the numbers in the 2008 report are calculated on a GAAP basis (’Generally Accepted Accounting Practices’) that include year-for-year changes in the net present value of unfunded liabilities in social insurance programs such as Social Security and Medicare.”
“Under cash accounting, the government makes no provision for future Social Security and Medicare benefits in the year in which those benefits accrue.”
So in other words, the governments real obligations are hidden by a cash basis while they are revealed by Generally Accepted Accounting Practices.
Corsi illustrates the concept of a trillion dollars.
“If you had gone into business on the day Jesus was born, and your business lost a million dollars a day, 365 days a year, it would take you until October 2737 to lose $1 trillion.”
“If you spent $1 million a day, every day since Jesus was born, you would still be only slightly more that three-quarters of the way to spending $1 trillion.”
“Craig Smith, founder and CEO of Swiss America, estimates it would take approximately four generations of Americans to pay off the interest of the U.S. Treasury bonds sold as debt to create the $1 trillion stimulus package, factoring in a 3 percent growth rate in the economy throughout that time.”
Now taking all this into account, do you think the stimulus bill is responsible?
One of my readers says our leaders are incompetent in this department. I think the movers and shakers know what they’re doing and have no plans for a stable dollar. We the people are going to pay for this with massive inflation…eventually.
Excess debt helped create our problems. How is more debt going to solve our problems?
After reading this article, ask yourself how long states are going to be able to keep up this level of vigilance.
The Feds could simply say, “Do you want your money or do you want to go broke? Well then, forget the Ninth and Tenth Amendment!” I predict this will happen.
Haven’t heard about the states going broke? Check out this article.
Kansas is already withholding income tax refunds and may miss payroll. Check out this AP article.
In several prior blogs, I’ve noted the alarming executive orders and policy changes that seem to suggest that the U.S. may be moving from an open society to a closed one-from a constitutional republic to some form of tyranny.
I’m now suggesting that these moves may be leading up to the implementation of a North American Union tying Canada, the U.S. and Mexico together with open borders and one currency. I wonder if the next step could be global governance and if our current economic crisis may be used somehow as a catalyst-a pretext-to eventually bring all of this about.
The Wall Street Journal’s Market Watch ran an article on Tuesday, Jan. 28 2009 stating that “Uniting U.S., Canada, Mexico money could result from crisis.†The article also said that, “The New World Order is upon us, full of hope, promise and a fair amount of fear.â€
As previously posted, the respected Financial Times of London also ran a recent commentary considering the increased likelihood of world government due to the financial crisis and other factors.
The above articles are well-done, but failed to cover the news items below, which lend credence to the idea that we could be headed for historic and unconstitutional changes in how our government functions.
Unfortunately, most Americans are still unaware that 4,700 troops were deployed stateside on Oct. 1, 2008; that Congress was threatened a few days later with martial law if the No Banker Left Behind Bail-out wasn’t passed; that the Pentagon has admitted that 20 thousand more troops are on the way for deployment stateside-duties to include “civil unrest and crowd control;†that Congress-even members of the Homeland Security Committee-have been denied access to executive branch continuity of government plans (PDD 51) (aka, NSPD 51) which authorize martial law; that American citizens can be declared “enemy combatants†and lose their constitutional rights-even if they’ve never left our country (Military Commissions Act of 2006); that evidence of detention camps being constructed or refurbished-potentially to confine American citizens-goes back to 1999, before the attacks of 9/11; that HR 45 calls for gun licensing and registration; that if/when reintroduced and passed, HR 1022 would allow Attorney General Eric Holder-who is an anti-second amendment activist-to confiscate virtually any firearm he chooses from the American people…the list goes on and on.
Don’t feel bad if you haven’t heard about all this. If you want to hold your breath waiting to see the mainstream media put all these puzzle pieces together for you, you’re going to turn blue and keel over.
The agenda setting mainstream media is complicit in keeping the American people from seeing the big picture. (Note for those who haven’t read Chomsky: The Rapid City Journal isn’t part of the “agenda setting†mainstream media. If they were, this blog probably would’ve been shut down by now, or more likely, never offered in the first place.)
Based on the comments I’ve received, a minority of my readers still think the prospect of global governance is something to laugh about and ridicule. Even if these people are paid posters, hopefully this blog will help quell the laughter and bring about what we need instead: motivation to hold our leaders accountable, especially in regard to respecting our Constitution.
Now onto my headline: Legislation has been introduced in the form of House Resolution 645 that lends credence to the story about detention camps for American citizens, as discussed in this San Francisco Chronicle article and other publications.
As noted by infowars.com, “the National Emergency Centers Act or HR 645 mandates the establishment of ‘national emergency centers’ to be located on military installations for the purpose of providing ‘temporary housing, medical, and humanitarian assistance to individuals and families dislocated due to an emergency or major disaster,’ according to the bill.
The legislation also states that the camps will be used to ‘provide centralized locations to improve the coordination of preparedness, response, and recovery efforts of government, private, and not-for-profit entities and faith-based organizations’.
Ominously, the bill also states that the camps can be used to ‘meet other appropriate needs,’ as determined by the Secretary of Homeland Security,’ an open ended mandate which many fear could mean the forced detention of American citizens in the event of widespread rioting after a national emergency or total economic collapse.â€
Will the camps be used to detain American citizens who are declared “enemy combatants†and stripped of their constitutional rights?
Since the Army Times originally reported that the battle-hardened troops to be deployed stateside would be responsible for “civil unrest and crowd control,†this also raises the suspicions of many people regarding the use of these camps.
If troops were deployed stateside on Oct. 1 because of terrorism fears, why weren’t they sent until over seven years after the 911 attacks?
Is it possible that late last year, certain elements within our government knew more about what was coming than they told us?
Now, I’m sure there are explanations for all of this, but would they be true? If the Constitution was still in place to protect Habeus Corpus from arbitrary revocation by the executive branch (Military Commissions Act of 2006), and Congress was allowed access to all of PDD 51, and if the Posse Comitatus statutes hadn’t been subverted, etc., etc., etc., I would feel much more comfortable.
As things stand, I wonder if certain elements of our government are gaslighting us and then providing us with the “solutions†they want to ease the anxiety they created. Could this be a deliberate strategy to implement policies and consolidate power in a way that Americans wouldn’t otherwise accept?!
Our country seems to be establishing the framework for socialism and tyranny!
Is the banker bailout a fraud that was never intended to help?!
If this is true, then I believe we will see more bail-outs approved even when we have proof that they don’t work.
For an eye-opening and fascinating lecture, please scroll down and listen to New York Times best-selling author Naomi Wolf discuss the 10 signs that an open society is transforming into a closed one. Wolf has studied history and sees all ten signs occurring today in the United States. I tend to agree with her.
Hearing a politically liberal person passionately defend the 2nd Amendment at 23:06 is worth the price of admission alone! Which would be…let’s see…ZERO! What a bargain!
Please keep in mind that when Wolf made this defense of the 2nd Amendment she was worried primarily about Blackwater Security.
Now there are 4,700 Army troops stationed stateside with another 20,000 admitted to be on the way, as I wrote earlier. I predict that we’ll see more than another 20,000 and sooner than 2011.
Wolf also gave this lecture before the banker bail-outs were even dreamed about. I think these facts make her presentation even more prescient.
Please check it out!
CALL TO ACTION: Please contact your U.S. Representative (Stephanie Herseth Sandlin for South Dakota) and politely ask him/her how the abuse of these new governmental powers is going to be limited.
I recommend that PDD 51 (aka, NSPD 51) would be a good starting point. As I wrote earlier, this is the directive that includes executive branch continuity of government plans authorizing physical martial law in America, in the event of a catastrophic emergency.
The Homeland Security Committee and the entire Congress have been denied access to the classified portions of this document! THIS IS NOT THE AMERICAN WAY! Here’s a link to the clip I referred to earlier regarding PDD 51. Please ask Rep. Herseth Sandlin if congressional hearings on this power grab are forthcoming. WE NEED SOME ACCOUNTABILITY!
Contact Information:
U.S. Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, 331 Cannon House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515, Ph: 202-225-2801.
In Rapid City, 343 Quincy St., Suite 102, Rapid City, SD 57701, Ph: 605-394-5280
Contact Kim and Don with VOH at : kim_don2001@yahoo.com
Put in the subject line, “Film Suggestion,” and ask them if they would please consider The End of America, and if you’d like, please add why you think this film is important for VOH to show to the Rapid City community.
Thanks to everyone who writes!
Please check out the Youtube video below featuring the trailer for Naomi Wolf’s new documentary film.
We can get the film below shown at the Elks Theatre in Rapid City! Please contact Kim and Don and encourage VOH to show it! The agenda-setting mainstream media in the U.S. is not doing their job, so I believe we MUST step up to the plate to get the word out!
Quote of the Week: “A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves.”
~Edward R. Murrow
Does anyone else see the irony of a (Naomi) “Wolf” warning us about the “wolves” in the government? Is this the Universe’s/God’s sense of humor? Anyway…
PS: Check out this music video featuring A Perfect Circle at 2:13 for the sequence with the hooded sheep running around scaring the other sheep. (Be forewarned, it is graphic.) I see this as a metaphor for the reaction to the sort of warnings I talk about in this blog. Like the sheep that run away from the black ones, a certain percentage of the population will run away from what people like me say but won’t bother to check the facts and seriously consider them because of fear and/or denial. That, I believe, is the true source of the laughter in some cases.
If you’d like to hear ideas similar to what Naomi Wolf has to say but would rather hear it from a more politically conservative source, I recommend the following documentary from Alex Jones, which is available for free viewing on Google video. Please keep in mind that I don’t agree with everything Jones says and he’s not known for subtlety! However, he is good at citing sources for many of the allegations he makes and he’s obviously very intelligent and articulate, similar to Wolf-just with a different flavor.
If you like Police State 3: Total Enslavement, you can find more videos at Google video and Youtube, or you can go to his Websites to find more information at www.infowars.com or www.prisonplanet.com
Another good conservative voice is former Presidential candidate Ron Paul.
I hope I’m wrong about that, but so far it appears that spewing fiat money isn’t solving our problems.
My position is that this economic crisis was created predominantly by easy money, excess spending and debt. This situation led to a bubble in housing. Trying to re-inflate the bubble with more easy money and excess spending is only going to make our problems worse, leading to a collapse of this house of cards economy and another depression (assuming we’re not already in one).
So what is Obama’s plan? Do more of the same. This seems like a regular pattern with governments: When something doesn’t work, do more of it.
That being said, we may see an Obama bump in the economy, but I don’t think it will last. He does have some tax cuts on the agenda which may actually help a little. But basically, his main plan is to follow Bush’s lead and keep those fake money machines rolling.
My new downside target for the Dow is 5,500 or lower. Does anyone care to make a bet? (Be forewarned; if you’re an optimist, my portfolio has probably done better than yours, going back to about August of ‘07.)
I saw a funny cartoon the other day. It showed our major financial institutions on fire while Ben Bernanke and Henry Paulson tried to put out the fire with fire hoses. The only trouble was, a massive stream of cash was coming out instead of water, feeding the fire. I believe this is an excellent illustration of what is happening.
To avoid making things worse, Obama should be listening to people who saw this crisis coming years ago.
Peter Schiff, former economic adviser to Dr. Ron Paul, was one of those people.
I’ve written in this blog before about Peter Schiff. He wasn’t the only person to see the credit crisis coming, but he was perhaps the most outspoken and well-known. Some supposedly very intelligent people ridiculed Schiff for his views, but he pushed back hard. (Here’s an example, from my previous blog.)
My main purpose in writing this blog is to highlight the fact that, according to Schiff, no one in our government has contacted Schiff for his input on how to get out of this mess! I think that’s nuts, since he was one of the few experts to see this recession coming the way it did!
In the video below, Schiff gives a great summary of why no one listened to him, why we’re in trouble, how to get out of it, and what will happen if we don’t. He also gives some advice on what to do with your money.
The only thing I disagree with him on is the inflation issue. I think we’re in for massive deflation for the foreseeable future.
I don’t think we’ll see really nasty inflation and a collapse of the dollar for many months or even years, but I do agree that it will come. (If I’m wrong about that, I’ll pay for it in my portfolio.)
See you all next time and I hope everyone’s new year is off to a good start!
Money Talks Trader’s Group Update: Tuke and I will be meeting at the Firehouse Brewing Company in Rapid at 3 pm on Saturday, January 17, 2009. Check my last blog to see what I look like. Everyone interested in investing, trading, or the crazy developments in this world is welcome! See you there!
Tuke is an excellent technical trader and has taught me a lot already about trading and reading the charts.
Portfolio Update: My ProShares UltraShort Real Estate ETF (SRS) did very well Wednesday. Then it started up huge early Thursday before dropping like a rock.
I got stopped out Thursday at $65 for a profit of $5.01 per share plus a dividend of .86 and capital gains of $164.40. This comes out to about 15.6% in 26 days. (Profit in my second batch of SRS-which I sold first- was much lower.)
I put in a limit order tonight for another dose of SRS at $56.50. I doubt I’ll get it Friday, but things are really volatile right now so who knows?
Quotes of the Week:
“Reality is a mass hallucination. We gauge what’s real according to what others say. And others, like us, rein in their words, caving in to timidity. Thanks to conformity enforcement and to cowardice, a little power goes a long, long way.”
