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Knight Capital Going Down Like the Titanic Posted by Ann Barnhardt
http://barnhardt.biz/index.cfm
The Knight Capital computer algorithm abortion yesterday is even worse than originally thought. The losses are being quoted now at $440 million. Egan Jones just downgraded Knight to junk CCC with this warning:
Tough math - KCG probably needs $600M of equity capital but its market cap is only $300M and therefore probably can only raise $80M to $90M using normal rules of thumb. A sale of the firm would take 90 days under good conditions and therefore only an equity or quasi-equity investment makes sense. However, with weakness in the markets, there is likely to be few likely buyers. In a good year KCG earns $115M and therefore the $440M loss is debilitating. (Watch for the secondary losses related the loss of client confidence.) Net revs for the June quarter declined by 13% YoY. The Market-Making segment revenues were down 21% with pre-tax income down 84% from $39.2M to $5.9M due to trading losses related to the Facebook IPO. June quarter oper inc was down from $29.5M to $5.4M. We are downgrading.
So Penson collapses and within a matter of weeks the firm that bought Penson collapses. MF Global. PFG Best. Who will be next?
And there are STILL people who are so stupid and so stuck in a normalcy bias / Stockholm Syndrome that they are emailing me asking how to open an account with me, or if I could recommend a good stock or futures broker. Heck, I had some sleazoid call me last week who - get this - said he started reading me back in November, was my number one fan, had listened to every interview I had done since, and wanted to know if I'd be interested in brokering and/or investing in a commodity pool that he was putting together to do call writing.
What does one even say to that level of cognitive dissonance?
Let me phrase this as bluntly as I can to hopefully nip any further inquiries in the bud:
DO NOT call me asking for a broker referral. The markets are dead and collapsing, and only a complete moron would expose money to the markets, either futures or stocks, at this point.
If you are one of those truly stupid people who is still trading stocks or futures and you get your money stolen, DO NOT CALL OR EMAIL ME whining about it. You're not going to get ANY sympathy. Since MF Global, the situation has been crystal, crystal clear. If you haven't totally exited the financial markets, then you are simply stupid, and there are consequences for being stupid.
Girls who go to frat parties dressed like prostitutes and then drink until they pass out get raped.
People who have money exposed to the collapsing, lawless, fascist financial markets get their money stolen.
Same thing.
DO NOT call me asking to open an account. This goes especially for people who claim to have been reading me since my Going Galt letter was published at ZeroHedge, was read on the air by both Limbaugh and Beck, and the subsequent Puplava and Schiff audio interviews, all of which totaled up to tens of millions of listeners. If you have been reading me since I went viral by SHUTTING MY FIRM DOWN, why, why, WHY would you email me asking to OPEN AN ACCOUNT? What exactly do you think "shutting down" and "ceasing operations" means? In all of those interviews when I have vociferously called for a total financial market strike, when I have repeatedly warned people to get their money COMPLETELY out of the markets, what do you think that meant? If you are so stupid that you don't understand what GET THE HELL OUT means, then you should not now and not ever be trading in any markets. There is a baseline intelligence requirement, and being able to understand one's native language spoken simply and clearly is that baseline.
If you are still, for whatever completely unfathomable and inexplicable reason, in the financial markets, get the hell out now, especially if you have an account that clears through Knight.
Oh, and for those of you who survive to the other side of this collapse and war and are charged with the rebuilding, all computerized trading, high-frequency trading and algorithm trading MUST be made illegal. In fact, I would recommend going completely old school back to open outcry markets. Orders can be entered and routed to the floor electronically, but must be executed BY HUMAN BEINGS.
Investing Legend Louis Bacon Has Had Enough Of Algos And Central Planners, Calls It Quits
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 08/01/2012 11:12 -0400
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/investing-legend-louis-bacon-has-had-enough-algos-and-central-planners-calls-it-quits
Markets are toast as Louis Bacon plans to give back 25% of his fund to investors as "liqudity and opportunities have become more constrained." As Bloomberg notes, Bacon is struggling to make money in his typically macroeconomic trend exploiting fund as "the risk on / risk off environment appears to be an abiding presence that has keep engagement low." Macro funds lost an average of 1.3 percent in the first six months of the year. Bacon, pointed out that "Markets are increasingly distorted by central banks’ attempts to squeeze drops of growth from an over-indebted private sector across much of the developed world." The U.S. markets are hindered by "a caustic political environment and an anti-business administration," he said.
U.S. banks have retreated from making markets in many securities because of the Dodd-Frank legislation, which limits them from trading for their own accounts. Bacon added that 'in some Kafkaesque absurdity,' the rule is "named after the two high protectors from regulatory oversight of perhaps the most egregious of U.S. financial miscreants, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac."
Bacon pulls no punches as he goes after inept regulators in Europe and the US, and describes the state of affairs as "Disaster Economics, where assets are valued based on their ability to withstand a lurking disaster as opposed to what they may yield or earn, is now the prism through which investors are pricing markets." And perhaps most 'distorted' is the credit market where trading in individual corporate credits has also been 'decimated' he said. "I shudder to think of the stress that is going to occur during the new credit liquidation cycle."
Salutes to the Homeys
By James Howard Kunstler
on July 30, 2012 9:25 AM
http://kunstler.com/blog/2012/07/salutes-to-the-homeys.html#more
Blogger Pater Tenebrarum of Acting Man put it nicely today: Since Mario Draghi "bought" European bankers and politicos a summer vacation by promising to pull out all the stops to save the Euro, this blog will take a break (not a vacation) for a week from the nauseating ongoing melodrama of international finance and instead offer reviews of the other bloggers and podcasters out there that I follow.
1. Outstanding for consistent excellence, acuity, clarity, and the milk of human kindness is the McAlvany Weekly Commentary. David McAlvany manages an investment company out of Durango, Colorado, with an emphasis on precious metals. His interview subjects are high-caliber figures often outside the posse of usual suspects making the rounds elsewhere on the web. He speaks beautifully in complete sentences, shows enough emotion to come off as sympathetically human, and has an equally intelligent sidekick in Kevin Orrick. Together they present the most coherent view of money and politics on the web. A Christian enthusiast, he admirably keeps religion mostly out of the script.
2. For years, The Automatic Earth has presented the most consistently intelligent, wide-ranging, and intellectually rigorous view of the overall ongoing financial fiasco in the written blog format. Until the past year, most of the commentary was written by the droll Raul Ilargi Meijer. Now he is joined by the brilliant energy and finance analyst Nicole Foss and young Ashvin Pandurangi. Their combined point of view is staunchly deflationist. They do immense amounts of homework, cut through all the bullshit to the dense core of our troubled reality, and publish several times a week. The title of the blog comes from a Paul Simon lyric out of Graceland.
3. Zero Hedge. The mysterious person(s) behind this massive continuous stream of reports and analysis from the loony bin of Wall Street and beyond has a manic edge but accurately reflects the madness of the current situation. Zero Hedge seems to post virtually around the clock, every day. They are relentless and hugely comical, with exactly the right sharply malicious overtones required in these evil times. The characters who infest their comment section are some of the worst vermin in trolldom.
4. Mish's Global Analysis. I don't know how Mike Shedlock ("Mish") does it. He puts out two or three commentaries a day as well as holding down a regular job. His great service to us is providing the best breaking analysis of breaking news, that is, making sense of events that are often mystifying -- since mystification is one of the prime tactics of financial playerdom in these dark, non-transparent times -- and getting it done in a very timely way. The upshot is that few of the dodges and ruses emanating from the money world get by this guard-dog, to the huge benefit of us civilians.
5. Charles Hugh Smith's blog, Of Two Minds, manages to publish keenly insightful analysis practically every day in the form of essays that tend to follow big picture themes: governance, energy, taxation, culture, electoral politics. Smith's penetrating, dogged analysis connects vast constellations of dots between the forces that are shattering late industrial economies. He apparently does it all by himself and has also produced several excellent books that form a rich matrix of understanding for anyone trying to make sense of the epochal changes coming down on us.
6. Naked Capitalism is Yves Smith's daily roundup of first rate essays on disasters of banking, including her own forceful callings-out of the ubiquitous misconduct that surrounds her on Wall Street where she works. Her writing is fluent and clear on subjects that would otherwise appear hopelessly abstruse, which is especially valuable where complexity is a cover for misbehavior.
7. In an earlier incarnation of this life, Chris Martenson was a PhD biochemist toiling for da man in the corporate swamps of Connecticut. He literally dropped out and reinvented himself as a blogger / podcaster when the peak oil and debt trap equation startled him into recognizing that the reigning system of political-economy's days were numbered. Since then, he has produced perhaps the best book on the failures of contemporary finance, The Crash Course, and has lately ginned up an excellent weekly interview podcast that should be indispensible.
8. The Archdruid Report. To the casual observer John Michael Greer would seem an odd figure, being a long-bearded, shambling, threadbare enthusiast of things druidical (whatever they are), but he's also about the most humane, articulate, and lucid observer of the crumbling economic and political scene from the realm of totally outside the box. He puts out a beautifully crafted essay every Thursday from the backwater of Cumberland, Maryland, and his view of where the human race is headed is sobering, reassuring, and full of authentic empathy for our multiple predicaments.
9. Jim Willie's Hat Trick Letter at The Golden Jackass Report is a deep, complex, often savage dissection of financial reality that always manages to illuminate new angles on the giant hairball of lies and swindles that the money world has become in our time. He writes in a singular telegraphic style that is delightful to read in a way similar to the pleasures of watching certain horror movies. He assumes that his readers already know a lot and can follow the often recondite pathways of financial discourse that he is such an excellent guide to
10. The Keiser Report with Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert. Stacy is the straight-person to Max's antic persona. But no one has flogged the evil-doers of banking as hard and unrelentingly as Max, who worked on the inside of the investment racket until driven by outrage to become one of its fiercest attackers. His perch in Paris gives him a front-row seat on the shenanigans now unraveling civilization in the Eurozone, but he shines his lamp under the rock of Wall Street regularly and loves to put the wicked Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan in the spotlight.
11. King World News. Eric King is the reigning gold bug of podcastdom. While he unabashedly "talks his book," one gathers he does it because he sincerely believes in the arguments for precious metals (as I do) and he brings out around five punchy interviews a week with a revolving cast of fellow gold bugs and other generally intelligent high level players in that world - though I could do without the snide Gerald Celente.
12. Financial Sense New Hour. Jim Puplava recently expanded his formerly weekends-only massive three hour podcast to include premium-priced weekday interviews with a lineup of insiders. Puplava covers the waterfront energetically, but he has some weaknesses: 1.) his malaprop rate is staggering; 2.) he doesn't challenge guests spouting obvious nonsense; 3.) other than being a staunch inflationist, his views on the markets shift with whatever wind is issuing from a guest's mouth; and 4.) he's a closet John Bircher who does an annual summer show (any week now) featuring an appalling roster of right-wing crazies. In a normal culture, that alone would tend to discredit all his other worthy endeavors. His sidekick John Loeffler sounds more consistently intelligent. Both of them are jesus freaks, of course.
I left a few characters off the main list, but shoutouts to CK Michaelson's Some Assembly Required blog, Bruce Krasting's blog, Bill Bonner's The Daily Reckoning, Whiskey and Gunpowder, the brave Martin Armstrong, Jesse's Café Americain, Barry Ritholtz's The Big Picture, Carl Denninger, Peter Schiff, the great, sobering Doug Noland of the Prudent Bear's Credit Bubble Bulletin, Pater Tenebrarum of Acting Man, Doug Henwood, the savvy and beautiful Lauren Lyster, Bill Moyers... and probably several others who I am (unfortunately) too rushed to mention.
Batman Massacre: WHY and HOW and WHO
Written by By Grace Powers July 28, 2012
http://www.helpfreetheearth.com/news617_batmanwhohow.html
THE MOTIVES
Robert Holmes, the shooting suspect's father, is a senior lead scientist with FICO, the American credit score company. He was scheduled to testify in the next few weeks before a US Senate panel that is investigating the largest bank fraud scandal in world history. This banking fraud threatens to destabilize and destroy the Western banking system.
Robert Holmes not only uncovered the true intent of the massive LIBOR banking fraud, but his "predictive algorithm model" also traced the trillions of "hidden"dollars to the exact bank accounts of the elite classes who stole it. In other words, Robert Holmes could NAME NAMES! Those names WOULD AWAKEN THE WORLD to the depth of government and corporate corruption which could include members of Congress, Wall Street, Federal Reserve and EU executives and could even include US Presidential candidates and the British Royal family...
(full article on link...)
http://www.helpfreetheearth.com/news617_batmanwhohow.html
faber interview 7-24-12:
IF it is not true (??) then yes it is pretty thin.
IF it IS TRUE (??) then it is a HUGE bit of "Twilight Zone" and should make everyone search for answers to what's REALLY going on (?) in our strange world.
I posted it for "food for thought" in this crazy world we now live in. If anyone can 100% disprove that information (??) please fell free.
My mind is open on this.
Just because the lamestream media fails to report this apparent fact (?) and an ignorant and lame poster here make folly of it doesn't mean diddly squat to me in the grand scheme of things.
YAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWNNNNN.
Wake me up when you have something interesting to say asserdan.
7/28/2012 -- Colorado Shooter = Father is SENIOR SCIENTIST w/ FICO -- to testify @ LIBOR
Why TrimTabs' CEO is 100% Bearish
Despite Mario Draghi's reassurance that the ECB will do everything in its power to save the euro zone, Europe is not going to do anything meaningful and central bank action will not save the equity markets - on the contrary, they'll "implode", Charles Biderman, Chief Executive and Founder of TrimTabs Investment Research, told CNBC.
"We see no chance that Europe is going to do anything meaningful. Mario Draghi and the other officials have been talking a good game for many years now but nothing has actually happened," he said.
Speaking to CNBC's "European Closing Bell", Biderman, known for his bearish stance on stocks and portfolio management, said that the only option he could see for Europe was money printing assuming that Germany agreed to such a stimulus measure, but that that alone was not enough to save Europe from its immediate crises.
"The fundamental problem in Europe is that the economies [there] are not generating enough taxable revenues to meet current bills, let alone growing future entitlements and let alone the huge stack of already molding debt that exists," he said. "In the face of that, I don't know what else they can do but talk."
Biderman was not only pessimistic about Europe, however, adding that another reason to be bearish was the faltering U.S. economy, low gains in wages (barely above inflation, he said) the jobs market and the Federal Reserve's strategy.
"The jobs market is bad, companies are now selling more shares than they're buying so even zero interest rates isn't enough to convince them their capital balance sheets to buy back shares."
As the Federal Reserve hesitates introducing another round of stimulus by reducing interest rates further, Biderman cautioned against believing that a more extreme strategy of quantitative easing could save the economy.
"I know most people wish for good things and are praying for a miracle but the only thing that printing money will do is give people a printed piece of paper. How is printing money going to solve anything if there is a gap between income and expenditures for the economies and the governments?."
"That's the issue that nobody wants to talk address," he said.
Biderman defended his 100 percent bearishness on equity markets, saying that central bank interference in the markets would not last, and could do permanent damage.
"I'm not saying that the world is going to zero, I'm saying that the companies that have been profiting from the central bank rigging of the equity and bond markets, will suffer as those markets implode."
"You can't fix markets forever without fixing the underlying problem of income and spending on a societal and governmental basis."
How the Hell Does the Dow Break 13,000?
Tuesday, February 21, 2012 – by Staff Report
https://www.thedailybell.com/3635/How-the-Hell-Does-the-Dow-Break-13000
Ron Hera The End of Cheap Everything
The Illusion of Choice
Joel Bowman Tell me sir, “yes” or “no,” have you stopped beating your wife?
Of the myriad rhetorical tools employed in public discourse today, there are dangerous few more insidious than the false dilemma. Little surprise then that, as the election season circus rolls into towns across the country, this Weapon of Dialectic Destruction (WDD) finds itself a favorite of slick politicians working to curry favor with an increasingly ovine voter mass.
Simply put, the false dilemma is a sly trick of exclusion whereby a speaker (always generously) offers his or her audience the apparently favorable choice between two unfortunately poor options.
“With which horn do you wish to be gored?”
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke furnished an infamous example when he told a hastily convened meeting in the conference room of then-House Speaker, the permanently-startled Nancy Pelosi:
“If we don’t do this [enact TARP legislation], we might not have an economy on Monday.”
News of the backroom political panic soon hit the streets. One could almost hear the trillions of excited neurons, misfiring in earnest around vacant braincases from sea to shining sea...
“Sure, creating a giant, taxpayer-sponsored slush fund from which Bernanke and his minions could (and would) dole out hundreds of billions of dollars to their bankster cronies is not exactly optimal...but not having an economy on Monday? Surely that’s worse, right?”
But were these the only two options? Your money or your...economy?
What about letting profligate institutions go broke? What about adhering to the market principle of Too Stupid to Succeed rather than capitulating to The State’s self-serving version: Too Big to Fail? Where might the economy be if the weak hands had been eliminated from the market, ceding what remaining value they had on the books to institutions that had exercised prudence and good judgment while future bailout recipients busily indulged in excessive risk-taking and reckless profligacy?
We’ll never know, of course...because Bernanke, Paulson, Pelosi & Co.’s false dilemma scared enough people into thinking there was “no other option.”
Known variously as the either-or fallacy, the fallacy of exhaustive hypotheses or, more colloquially, plain ol’ black and white thinking, the false dilemma is both deceptive and destructive. First, because it lures unsuspecting listeners into a misguided belief that their choices are limited to those offered by the speaker and, second, because it attacks the creative process by which new ideas come to “market” by slamming the door closed on alternative possibilities.
Take the above quote, from none other than President Barack Obama. Speaking to supporters in Roanoke, Virginia on Friday afternoon, Mr. Obama channeled the intellectually insufferable Massachusetts Senate candidate, Elizabeth Warren, in declaring that:
If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business — you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.
Implied here is the false notion that, without roads built by The State...there would be no roads. Without schools constructed by The State...there would be no education. Without the “unbelievable American system”...creative individuals wouldn’t be allowed to thrive.
In other words...
Choose The State, or choose illiteracy.
Choose The State, or choose dirt tracks on which to haul your goods.
Choose The State, or nobody will help you...nobody will cooperate with you...and you will be alone, unable even to survive, much less thrive.
Textbook false dilemmas.
Nowhere is a free market alternative presented. And it’s little wonder why. At the precise point the free market ends, the tyranny of The State begins. Nowhere do the two overlap. (Crony capitalism, mixed market economies and the rest are NOT free markets.) Clearly, therefore, it is in The State’s best interest to see that free market activity is marginalized as far as possible in order that The State itself might occupy ever more space in people’s minds and, by extension, in the economies they are “allowed” to build.
So profoundly have certain false dilemmas bored their way into people’s “thinking” that supposedly able-minded individuals have stricken the very possibility of free market cooperation from their mental map.
Indeed, some confused people even contend that, were we to ignore the iron-fisted directives of The State, we would promptly descend into a Mad Max-style dystopia, in which a collection of unchecked territorial monopolies would roam the planet, stealing and damaging property at whim and torturing, imprisoning and killing whomever they so wished.
Strange then that these same people would “remedy” this apocalyptic nightmare by supporting The State...a collection of unchecked territorial monopolies that roam the planet, stealing and damaging property at whim and torturing, imprisoning and killing whomever they so wish.
These individuals are sorely misled...victims of the false dilemma. They are so misled, in fact, that they find themselves circling back to a position that sees them fervently supporting an entity that tirelessly labors to turn their worst fears into harsh reality. Worse still, they continue to mislead others by repeating such vapid nonsense.
Unlike The State’s obedient apologists, advocates of the free market don’t need to pretend to know the best solution to each and every problem — something F.A. Hayek called the pretence of knowledge. We simply need to cede the discovery process to free individuals acting in their own self-interest.
When confronted with a problem deserved of our best solution, voluntarists first ask, “Is there a peaceful, market-based solution here? Might, for example, freely-associating individuals work together to build schools, roads and bridges? Might free competition stand guard against coercive monopolies? Might the market process of creative destruction weed out inept and/or corrupt businesses, rather than reward them with stolen property?”
Like the election process itself, in which well-intentioned voters saddle themselves with the misguided obligation to choose the “lesser of two evils,” the false dilemma lulls individuals into thinking there is no alternative, no preferable option, no choice that does not, at least to some degree, rely on compromising their values and morals. No choice that does not involve the hired gun of The State. No choice, in other words, that does not render them party to evil.
Surely we can think a little harder than that, Fellow Reckoner, beyond the iniquities perpetrated by the political left and the right. Instead of a system based on force and coercion and violence, instead of extracting money from people for “services” by threatening to put them in cages, peaceful, cooperative individuals learn in time to welcome and celebrate a system such as here described by Hayek:
“Spontaneous order is a system which has developed not through the central direction or patronage of one or a few individuals but through the unintended consequences of the decisions of myriad individuals each pursuing their own interests through voluntary exchange, cooperation and trial and error.”
When it comes to false dilemmas, we need not slavishly impale ourselves on one of The State’s two horns, but only to open our eyes. The free market alternative invites decent people everywhere to stand up and confidently declare, “It’s time to cut the bull.”
Regards,
Joel Bowman
for The Daily Reckoning
<<"Hi Scotty. Ihub precipitously shut the room down. So here we are, many old faces. I'll give you the details I'm aware of in a PM later. I'm pretty annoyed at the shabby way it was done.">>
I AGREE.
Zab you are lucky you survived the cancer....Congrats.
As the explosive growth of cancer continues (ever wonder why??)...
...I think the article did a pretty brutally truthful expose of the "cancer racket" that has evolved and is feeding off the ongoing cancer epidemic that rages out of control...
http://www.activistpost.com/2012/07/19-ways-cancer-becomes-ultimate-soft.html
19 Ways Cancer Becomes the Ultimate Soft-Kill Operation
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
In earlier times it was easier to control a million people than physically to kill a million people. Today it is infinitely easier to kill a million people then to control a million people. -
Zbigniew Brzezinski
http://www.activistpost.com/2012/07/19-ways-cancer-becomes-ultimate-soft.html
BINGO! Great post.
-I project a crash of world health from 2013-15 on, followed by a collapse of life expectancy.
http://www.amanita.at/Interessantes/Gastartikel/detail.php?id=18289
Good article!
I agree. This is going to be a very sick and unhealthy world in the near future. GMO foods, electromagnetic pollution, the disastrous effects of the Fukushima nuclear disaster etc.
How Close Are We to New Great Depression?
Published: Monday, 16 Jul 2012 | 8:17 AM ET
http://www.cnbc.com/id/48193471
By: Catherine Boyle
Staff Writer, CNBC.com
The risk of a new depression — a sustained, severe recession — has struck fear into the heart of markets and driven monetary policy in developed economies since the current financial crisis began.
“We’re in a very unfortunate position to be here,” Richard Duncan, author of The New Depression, warned on CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” Monday.
“When we broke the link between money and gold, this removed all constraints on credit creation. This explosion of credit created the world we live in, but it now seems that credit cannot expand any further because the private sector is incapable of repaying the debt it has already, and if credit begins to contract, there’s a very real danger that we will collapse into a new Great Depression,” he argued.
“If this credit bubble pops, the depression could be so severe that I don’t think our civilization could survive it.”
The explosion in cheap credit has been widely blamed for the global financial crisis, but the debate about how to fix the problem continues.
In the past few years, central banks including the U.S. Federal Reserve , the European Central Bank and the Bank of England have pumped liquidity into their financial systems through a number of ways, including quantitative easing and the ECB’s long-term refinancing operation (LTRO).
“We could keep deferring the depression, but that could just encourage the bad guys. If you do this, you possibly do more harm than good,” Roger Nightingale, economist and strategist at RND Associates, told CNBC Monday.
“You can defer, but not prevent.”
Nightingale argued that previous credit booms, for example in Japan in the 1980s, have led to sustained recessions.
RELATED LINKS
Is a Europe-Only Recession in the Cards? Marc Faber: 100% Chance of Global Recession A Global Recession? The Warning Signs Are Everywhere
“When you throw money into the system at a rate much in excess of the requirements of the real economy, you’re trying to get people to borrow and spend, but the good guys out there won’t because they’re too cautious. It’s the bad guys who come in, the malefactors,” he said.
“When the central banks realize what is going on and raise interest rates, it flings the world economy into depression.”
The ideas of Milton Friedman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist who argued that monetary policy should constantly expand, informed some of the Fed’s response to the crisis.
“Policymakers really believe that if we allow credit to contract, we will reach a new Depression,” Duncan said.
“The increase in government debt is making total debt grow, otherwise we would already have collapsed in to a debt-deflation death spiral. This creates great perils, but also tremendous opportunities.”
Duncan argues that governments in the developed world should borrow “massive” amounts of money at the current low interest rates to invest in new technologies like renewable energy and genetic engineering.
“Even if this is wasted, at least we could enjoy this civilization for another ten years before it collapses,” he said.
His views counter those of economists who believe that governments should focus on cutting their debt, particularly where repayments on that debt are threatening to reach unsustainable levels, like in Greece.
© 2012 CNBC.com
City of the Century that became a ghost town: Tragic portraits from the decaying world of America's industrial heartlands
By JAMES NYE
PUBLISHED: 20:26 EST, 14 July 2012 | UPDATED: 08:50 EST, 15 July 2012
Ever since the 1990's succesive mayor's of Gary, Indiana have pledged to revitalise the city, but to date nothing has been realised.
Former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney said in an interview about the city, that 'This kind of situation is happening all across our country.'
The United States is becoming a shell of itself and at the same time, it's the decision makers in Washington D.C. have chosen to finance war, after war and after war while we decay here at home.'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2173761/Tragic-portrait-city-decline-The-desolate-ruins-Gary-Indiana-reveal-decaying-heart-Americas-proud-industrial-centre.html#ixzz20lIv4on5
re: Facebook = CIAbook...
Sometimes humor and parody are the best vehicles to deliver the truth. Both Facebook
and Google received In-Q-Tel (CIA venture capital) funds early on. Most people don't
even know In-Q-Tel is real...
http://www.siliconinvestor.com/readmsg.aspx?msgid=28261522
Facebook = CIAbook
Mark Zuckerberg Awarded CIA Surveillance Medal
Posted on July 11, 2012 by Soren Dreier
Well, now it is official. Mark Zuckerberg was not so smart after all, but just fronting for the CIA in one of the biggest Intelligence coups of all times.
But there remains one small problem, the CIA is not supposed to monitor Americans. I guess we will hear more on that soon from the lawyers once the litigation gets cranked up.
Personally I will be more interested in how this is going to effect the stock offering and shares as all Americans should own the entity that has been spying on them.
And then there are the SEC full disclosure regulations and penalties. It’s bonanza time for the lawyers.
Could the loophole the CIA used be that, ‘you aren’t being spied on if you are willingly posting everything a repressive regime would love to have on your Facebook account, with no threats, no family hostages, no dirty movies or photos that could be released?
But enough with the lead in. Let’s take you directly to our source where you can get it straight from the sources mouth, including seeing Zuckerberg getting his award...
Scranton Mayor: Minimum Wage For All Or Become Stockton
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/09/2012 15:10 -0400
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/scranton-mayor-minimum-wage-all-or-become-stockton
The infamous city of Scanton, PA has had financial troubles for a couple of decades - losing population since the end of WWII - but as NPR reported this weekend, the $16.8 million budget gap that Mayor Chris Doherty is trying to fill (and the disagreements between his taxation proposal and the city council's borrow-more-money view) has driven the mayor to an incredible action. Doherty has reduced everyone's pay - including his own - to the state's minimum wage of $7.25 per hour. In an ironic choice of words, the desperate mayor noted: "I'm trying to do the best I can with the limited amount of funds that I have," Doherty says, "I want the employees to get paid. Our people work hard — our police and fire — I just don't have enough money and I can't print it in the basement." NPR continues, After paying workers Friday, the city had only about $5,000 left in the bank. More money flowed into city accounts that day, but it was still not enough to pay the $1 million the city still owes to its nearly 400 employees.
This is, of course, stressful on the union workers affected as one notes: "[The] kids aren't going to be able to do certain activities this summer — maybe we're not going to be able to go on vacation" (to Italy we wonder?) adding that (via HuffPo), "With Scranton and Pennsylvania being such a hot bed for the next election, we want to make sure that they know there's a Democratic mayor that's not taking care of his public safety unions,". The unions plan to be back in court first thing Monday morning to ask the judge to hold Doherty in contempt. It seems municipalties across the country are increasingly turning to austerity measures to tackle their budget gaps and protect bond-holders (until they finally become Stockton, CA).
PFG Best. "The BEST thing about our technology is our people"
ANn Barnhardt's blog: http://barnhardt.biz/
Uh, so do you believe me now?
When I said, "Get the hell out," do you understand that I meant to GET. THE. HELL. OUT.? When I wrote in my Going Galt Letter that the problem was SYSTEMIC, do you now understand that I wasn't just typing big, fancy words so that I could hear the soft pitter-pat of my keyboard?
When I said over and over again in interview after interview that the so-called regulatory system overseeing the futures industry was no such thing, but rather an evil, despicable mafia, administered by politicking psychopaths on the take, and staffed by affirmative action hires to provide plausible deniability and scapegoats, WERE YOU NOT LISTENING?
How did I see this coming? How could I NOT see this coming?
PFGBest, which used to be the old Alaron Trading, has stolen at least $220 million of customer funds, which is fully HALF the entire customer asset base. The firm's owner attempted suicide this morning in the parking lot outside of the corporate HQ in Iowa.
While claiming to have over $200 million in bank accounts, it turned out that PFGBest only had $10 million at most. And they had been short NINETY-FIVE PERCENT of their seg funds for at least five months, and it may be closer to two years. The reportage on the timelines is very fuzzy.
Alright. Here's where we call bullshit. Action item number one for any auditor is the independent confirmation of bank account balances. When little tiny me was audited both by the regulators AND for my annual Sarbanes-Oxley audit done by a local accounting firm, the first thing I had to do was sign the balance confirmation requests that the auditors then sent to Wells Fargo. This is the fundamental purpose of an audit. Make absolutely sure the flipping money is where they say it is.
What this PFGBest situation tells us is that the auditors were NOT independently verifying the bank account balances and were instead using internal, falsified, forged documentation provided not by the bank, but by the firm itself.
Oversight by the auditors? Mistake by the regulators? Oopsie? No flipping way, Jack.
Try: Premeditated fraud. Try: Conspiracy. Try: Full knowledge, complicity and cooperation by the regulators in covering the stolen customer funds, and all within mere WEEKS of MFGlobal. Try: Capital Economic Treason.
Try: Life in prison or execution.
Some of the MF Global rape victims were actually bulk transferred to this firm back in November. The owner (who attempted suicide this morning) pitched a fit back in November and got about 700 of the MFG accounts bulk transferred over to PFGBest.
So, yes, there are now people, many of whom are agricultural hedgers, who have now been raped by having their equity stolen TWICE in nine months.
And yet, how much do you want to bet that a significant percentage of these people go back for more? How many of them are so whipped, and so stupid, and so convinced that they just have to be trading futures and options because that's what all of the cool kids do, that they will go right back to the Penn State gang showers with Mr. Sandusky?
How many other traders and hedgers are out there telling themselves that this STILL isn't any big deal, because it didn't happen to them?
"First they came for the MF Global customers, but I didn't say anything because I didn't clear MF Global. Then they came for the PFGBest customers, and I still didn't say anything because I didn't clear through PFGBest . . . . "
It seems so familiar.
Finally, for all of you brokers who cleared PFGBest, not only do I not have any sympathy for you, I actually hold you in contempt, and hope that your clients all sue you personally. You knew that the entire system was suicidally risk-laden and yet instead of being honest with your customers and yourselves and walking away from a known death-trap, you decided to live a damnable lie and pretend like your customers' funds were safe, because you were too chickenshit to do the right thing.
And that goes for every other broker out there right now. You know that it is just a matter of time. You know that your FCM could blow sky-high next week. You know that every assurance of integrity and solvency and "compliance" is bullshit, and has been bullshit for quite some time. You know that every bank wire and check that comes in from your clients is being deposited into the gaping maw of a living lie. You know the NFA, CFTC, SEC and the CME are lying, thieving psychopathic criminals, and that your clients are viewed as nothing but zeroes and ones on servers that can be "harvested" whenever JPMorgan or Goldman Sachs sees fit to do it, and then Tyqueesha in the back office and LaNeequa the junior auditor and Jamahl the assistant compliance manager/robosigner will be blamed. If you continue to expose your clients to that, then you are no better than the criminals, and will deserve to be sued into the ground for lying to your customers about the safety of the markets.
The ultimate catch-22: by the very act of being in the futures business, you are by definition breaching your fiduciary duty to your clients, and are thus in violation of the law.
Welcome to Communism. Welcome to hell.
The Ultimate Krugman Take-Down
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/09/2012 21:18 -0400
Forget Ali - Frazier; ignore Santelli - Liesman; dismiss Yankees - Red Sox; never mind Silva - Sonnen; the new undisputed standard by which all showdowns will be judged happened in Spain over the weekend. During a debate on Europe's crisis, Pedro Schwartz (a mild-mannered Spanish 'Austrian' economics professor) took on the heavyweight Paul 'I coulda been a Fed Chair contender' Krugman, and - in our humble opinion - wiped the floor with his Keynesian philosophy...
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/ultimate-krugman-take-down
Roubini: My 'Perfect Storm' Is Unfolding Now By Ansuya Harjani | CNBC – 7 hours ago
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/roubini-perfect-storm-unfolding-now-104907590.html
"Dr. Doom" Nouriel Roubini, says the "perfect storm" scenario he forecast for the global economy earlier this year is unfolding right now as growth slows in the U.S., Europe as well as China.
In May, Roubini predicted four elements - stalling growth in the U.S., debt troubles in Europe, a slowdown in emerging markets, particularly China, and military conflict in Iran - would come together in to create a storm for the global economy in 2013.
"(The) 2013 perfect storm scenario I wrote on months ago is unfolding," Roubini said on Twitter on Monday.
Chinese inflation data released on Monday, suggested that the economy is cooling faster than expected, while employment data out of the U.S. on Friday indicated that jobs growth was tepid for a fourth straight month in June.
Roubini said that unlike in 2008 when central banks had "policy bullets" to stimulate the global economy, this time around policymakers are "running out of rabbits to pull out of the hat."
Policy easing moves by the European Central Bank (ECB), Bank of England (BoE) and the People's Bank of China (PBoC) last week did little to inspire confidence in global stock markets.
"Levitational force of policy easing can only temporarily lift asset prices as gravitational forces of weaker fundamentals dominate over time," he said.
Bill Smead, CEO of Smead Capital Management, agrees that there is little central banks can do arrest the global slowdown.
Last week, he told CNBC that there is " virtually zero chance" that pump-priming by central banks will succeed, suggesting that policymakers should instead let the economic bust work itself through the system.
Poor Land in Jail as Companies Add Huge Fees for Probation
By ETHAN BRONNER
Published: July 2, 2012
CHILDERSBURG, Ala. — Three years ago, Gina Ray, who is now 31 and unemployed, was fined $179 for speeding. She failed to show up at court (she says the ticket bore the wrong date), so her license was revoked.
Enlarge This Image
The New York Times Childersburg turned to the private sector for probation. Gina Ray still owes over $3,000, and potentially faces more jail time.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/03/us/probation-fees-multiply-as-companies-profit.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all
When she was next pulled over, she was, of course, driving without a license. By then her fees added up to more than $1,500. Unable to pay, she was handed over to a private probation company and jailed — charged an additional fee for each day behind bars.
For that driving offense, Ms. Ray has been locked up three times for a total of 40 days and owes $3,170, much of it to the probation company. Her story, in hardscrabble, rural Alabama, where Krispy Kreme promises that “two can dine for $5.99,” is not about innocence.
It is, rather, about the mushrooming of fines and fees levied by money-starved towns across the country and the for-profit businesses that administer the system. The result is that growing numbers of poor people, like Ms. Ray, are ending up jailed and in debt for minor infractions.
“With so many towns economically strapped, there is growing pressure on the courts to bring in money rather than mete out justice,” said Lisa W. Borden, a partner in Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz, a large law firm in Birmingham, Ala., who has spent a great deal of time on the issue. “The companies they hire are aggressive. Those arrested are not told about the right to counsel or asked whether they are indigent or offered an alternative to fines and jail. There are real constitutional issues at stake.”
Half a century ago in a landmark case, the Supreme Court ruled that those accused of crimes had to be provided a lawyer if they could not afford one. But in misdemeanors, the right to counsel is rarely brought up, even though defendants can run the risk of jail. The probation companies promise revenue to the towns, while saying they also help offenders, and the defendants often end up lost in a legal Twilight Zone.
Here in Childersburg, where there is no public transportation, Ms. Ray has plenty of company in her plight. Richard Garrett has spent a total of 24 months in jail and owes $10,000, all for traffic and license violations that began a decade ago. A onetime employee of United States Steel, Mr. Garrett is suffering from health difficulties and is without work. William M. Dawson, a Birmingham lawyer and Democratic Party activist, has filed a lawsuit for Mr. Garrett and others against the local authorities and the probation company, Judicial Correction Services, which is based in Georgia.
“The Supreme Court has made clear that it is unconstitutional to jail people just because they can’t pay a fine,” Mr. Dawson said in an interview.
In Georgia, three dozen for-profit probation companies operate in hundreds of courts, and there have been similar lawsuits. In one, Randy Miller, 39, an Iraq war veteran who had lost his job, was jailed after failing to make child support payments of $860 a month. In another, Hills McGee, with a monthly income of $243 in veterans benefits, was charged with public drunkenness, assessed $270 by a court and put on probation through a private company. The company added a $15 enrollment fee and $39 in monthly fees. That put his total for a year above $700, which Mr. McGee, 53, struggled to meet before being jailed for failing to pay it all.
“These companies are bill collectors, but they are given the authority to say to someone that if he doesn’t pay, he is going to jail,” said John B. Long, a lawyer in Augusta, Ga., who is taking the issue to a federal appeals court this fall. “There are things like garbage collection where private companies are O.K. No one’s liberty is affected. The closer you get to locking someone up, the closer you get to a constitutional issue.”
The issue of using the courts to produce income has caught the attention of the country’s legal establishment. A recent study by the nonpartisan Conference of State Court Administrators, “Courts Are Not Revenue Centers,” said that in traffic violations, “court leaders face the greatest challenge in ensuring that fines, fees and surcharges are not simply an alternate form of taxation.”
J. Scott Vowell, the presiding judge of Alabama’s 10th Judicial Circuit, said in an interview that his state’s Legislature, like many across the country, was pressuring courts to produce revenue, and that some legislators even believed courts should be financially self-sufficient.
In a 2010 study, the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law examined the fee structure in the 15 states — including California, Florida and Texas — with the largest prison populations. It asserted: “Many states are imposing new and often onerous ‘user fees’ on individuals with criminal convictions. Yet far from being easy money, these fees impose severe — and often hidden — costs on communities, taxpayers and indigent people convicted of crimes. They create new paths to prison for those unable to pay their debts and make it harder to find employment and housing as well as to meet child support obligations.”
Most of those fees are for felonies and do not involve private probation companies, which have so far been limited to chasing those guilty of misdemeanors. A decade or two ago, many states abandoned pursuing misdemeanor fees because it was time-consuming and costly. Companies like Judicial Correction Services saw an opportunity. They charge public authorities nothing and make their money by adding fees onto the bills of the defendants.
Stephen B. Bright, president of the Southern Center for Human Rights, who teaches at Yale Law School, said courts were increasingly using fees “for such things as the retirement funds for various court officials, law enforcement functions such as police training and crime laboratories, victim assistance programs and even the court’s computer system.” He added, “In one county in Pennsylvania, 26 different fees totaling $2,500 are assessed in addition to the fine.”
Mr. Dawson’s Alabama lawsuit alleges that Judicial Correction Services does not discuss alternatives to fines or jail and that its training manual “is devoid of any discussion of indigency or waiver of fees.”
In a joint telephone interview, two senior officials of Judicial Correction Services, Robert H. McMichael, its chief executive, and Kevin Egan, its chief marketing officer, rejected the lawsuit’s accusations. They said that the company does try to help those in need, but that the authority to determine who is indigent rests with the court, not the company.
“We hear a lot of ‘I can’t pay the fee,’ ” Mr. Egan said. “It is not our job to figure that out. Only the judge can make that determination.” Mr. Egan said his company had doubled the number of completed sentences where it is employed to more than two-thirds, from about one-third, and that this serves the company, the towns and the defendant. “Our job is to keep people out of jail,” he said. “We have a financial interest in getting them to comply. If they don’t pay, we don’t get paid.”
Mr. Bright, of the Southern Center for Human Rights, said that with the private companies seeking a profit, with courts in need of income and with the most vulnerable caught up in the system, “we end up balancing the budget on the backs of the poorest people in society.”
Roubini On 2013's "Global Perfect Storm" And Greedy Bankers "Hanging In The Streets"
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/roubini-2013s-global-perfect-storm-and-greedy-bankers-hanging-streets
The Collapsing US Economy and the End of the World
Paul Craig Roberts | Washington in its pursuit of world hegemony brings us into military confrontation with Russia and China.
http://www.infowars.com/the-collapsing-us-economy-and-the-end-of-the-world/
<Steve Keen On Why Debt Matters "All The Time" And The Need For "Quantitative Easing For The Public"
http://www.siliconinvestor.com/readmsg.aspx?msgid=28253326
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/07/2012 18:26 -0400
Following his somewhat epic blog debate with Paul Krugman, Steve Keen appears on Capital Account with Lauren Lyster to debunk more Keynesian propaganda and the kleptocratic status quo 'debt doesn't matter' arguments. Poking holes in the stable/exogenous shock equilibrium 'model' versus the real-world's dynamic systems, the Aussie economist warms up with the zero-interest rate conundrum and liquidity trap (at around 7:00); moves on to the empirical falseness of the debt-to-unemployment relationship (at around 11:00) - implying 'debt matters all the time' as Keen explains common-sensibly (but not Neoclassically) that the 'change in debt adds to demand' and that involves banks which breaks modern economic theory (since lending is credit creation not savings transfer).
Echoing the deleveraging from the Great Depression, it could take 15 years of unwinding this epic debt bubble before its all over - but not if the status quo of deficit spending is maintained - as Keen somewhat controversially concludes (at around 13:00) "you can't just cure this with deficit spending [since debt is already beyond the black-hole's 'event horizon'], you have to abolish the private debt as well" by "quantitative easing for the public".
Student loan debt and delinquency is also discussed and its self-referential ponzi-like nature (at around 16:00)...
Keen discusses his controversial idea of a debt-jubilee and the Debt Black Hole 'event horizon' that we are already in at around 19:00... (and notably at 24:30 he discusses how to avoid the 'moral-hazard' of a modern debt-jubilee with no 'advantage' to being in debt)
At around 20:30, Keen relates the drop in bankruptcies to the low interest rate environment warning that this will just lead to an endless zombie state like Japan...
Lie-borgate is discussed at around 21:00 with his view being that the outright fraud confirms his feeling that these bankers are behaving like a parasite on the host of the economy...
What's Behind Illinois Stealing Local Hero's Bee Hives?
July 05 2012 |
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/07/05/monsanto-roundup-effects-on-honeybees.aspx?e_cid=20120705_DNL_artNew_1
By Dr. Mercola
An Illinois beekeeper whose bee hives were stolen and allegedly destroyed by the Illinois Department of Agriculture has stirred up a hornet's nest with his questions on why the state did this, and most importantly, what they did with his bees.
The state claims the bees were destroyed because they were infected with a disease called foulbrood.
But when the 58-year apiary keeper had his hearing—three weeks after the removal of his bees without his knowledge—the state's "evidence" had disappeared, leaving more questions than answers about the raid on the beekeeper's hives.
Some people, including the beekeeper, Terrence Ingram, suspect the raid has more to do with Ingram's 15 years of research on Monsanto's Roundup and his documented evidence that Roundup kills bees, than it does about any concerns about his hives.
Interestingly, the state's theft targeted the queen bee and hive he'd been using to conduct the research.
The Ingram CaseA recent article by Tom Kocal in the Prairie Advocate retells the full story of how Terrence Ingram's bees and hives wound up being taken by the Illinois State Department of Agriculture (IDofAG) i.
While the state claims the removal of the property was due to Ingram's failure to comply with the Department's notice instructing him to burn the affected hives, they have been less than open about why the inspectors came in and took the bees and hives without due process.
At a time when the Ingram's were absent from the property. Ingram claims the Department also conducted three out of four inspections on his private property while no one was home.
While Department inspectors claim his hives had foulbrood—an allegedly highly contagious disease—Mr. Ingram believes he could prove that this was not the case. As reported by the featured Prairie Advocate article:
"Ingram knew that the inspectors could not tell what they were seeing and had warned the Department that if any of them came back it would be considered a criminal trespass. Yet they came back when he was not home, stole his hives and ruined his 15 years of research."
Ingram initially reported the missing bees and hives as having been stolen on March 14, unaware that they'd been removed by the IDofAG. News of the theft was published in the Prairie Advocate on March 21.
As a result of that article, an area County Farm Bureau manager called the reporter, stating he knew the equipment hadn't been stolen, but that it had been "destroyed" by the Department of Agriculture because they were infected with foulbrood and Ingram hadn't disposed of them as instructed.
The most nonsensical part of this story is that Ingram didn't get a hearing to determine whether his hives were affected by the disease until three weeks after they were removed and destroyed.
Kocal quotes Mr. Ingram as saying:
"I own four businesses. I am here all the time. Yet they took our bees and hives when we were not home. What did they do, sit up on the hill and watch until we left? We had not yet had our day in court to prove that our hives did not have foulbrood!"
Making matters worse, during that April 4 hearing, the Department couldn't produce any evidence of what they'd done with the bees and the hives. Meanwhile, Ingram ended up being ordered to pay the $500 fine for violating Sections 2-1 of the Illinois Bees and Apiaries Act. According to Kocal:
"There are 2 questions that Ingram wants answered:
1) Did the IDofA, a state agency, have the right to enter Ingram's property and confiscate a suspected "nuisance," before Ingram had his day in court?
2) Where are his bees? The "evidence" has disappeared, and the IDofA refuses to tell Ingram where they are, before, during, and after the hearing.
"I have been keeping bees for 58 years," Ingram said during an interview at his home and apiary. "I am not a newcomer to beekeeping, and I definitely know what I am doing. I have been teaching beginning beekeeping classes for 40 years..." At the April 4 hearing, Ingram said he felt he was able to show the court that the inspector could not tell the difference between "chilled brood" and foulbrood. He also proved to the court that the inspectors did not know the symptoms of foulbrood."
15 Years of Research DestroyedIngram believes the destruction of his bees and hives is more likely to be related to his research into the effect of Roundup on honey bees. He claims some 250 of his colonies have been killed off over the years by Monsanto's broad-spectrum herbicide, used in large quantities on both conventional- and genetically engineered crops. Ingram's research shows that Roundup can lead to what's called chilled brood, which is an entirely different scenario.
According to Ingram, quoted from Kocal's article:
"When Round-Up kills the adult bees there are not enough bees left in the hive to keep the young bees (brood) warm, and the young bees die from the cold (chilled brood). I tried to prove that just because foulbrood can be detected once the hive has been disturbed, doesn't mean the hive has foulbrood.
Inside a honeybee hive is one of the cleanest places you can find. Anything that is a problem, if the bees can't remove it, they cover it with propolis, which is an antiseptic... When you go into the comb and cut it up, disturb it like the investigators did, then send it to a lab, it exposes foulbrood to the world. In the beehive, it's covered up. The bees aren't affected by it. But you can find it by sending it in to a lab."
Ingram has studied the effects of Roundup on honeybees for the past 15 years, and he believes he had built up sufficient amount of data to show that the herbicide causes not just bee die-offs, but also Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD)—a mysterious phenomenon that has decimated an estimated one-third of all honey bees since 2006. While some bees inexplicably die, many simply vanish and never return to their hives. Ingram told Kocal that:
"CCD is a calamity that is affecting honeybee colonies across the nation. In fact, I had one queen, which had survived three summers of spraying and three winters. I was planning to raise daughters from that queen to see if she may have had some genetic resistance to Roundup. But she and her hive were taken during the theft. I don't even know where the bees and my equipment are. They ruined 15 years of my research."
... "I asked Rep. Sacia to take the teeth out of the current law, preventing untrained inspectors from doing sneak inspections without the beekeeper present, killing their bees and burning their equipment, or forcing organic beekeepers out of business, telling them that they have to use chemicals to keep bees in Illinois. Are the chemical companies really running our food supply?"
... "Is Illinois becoming a police state, where citizens do not have rights?" Ingram asked in desperation. "Knowing that Monsanto and the Dept. of Ag are in bed together, one has to wonder if Monsanto was behind the theft to ruin my research that may prove Roundup was, and is, killing honeybees. Beekeepers across the state are being threatened that the same thing may be done to their hives and livelihood. I was not treated properly, I don't want to see this happen to anyone else in this state, and I want this type of illegal action to end."
Monsanto is the New Owner of Leading Bee Research FirmIngram is quite correct about chemical companies like Monsanto—they are seeking to take nearly full control of the food supply by controlling virtually every aspect of crop production. So he has cause to be suspicious when it comes to the question of who ordered the theft and destruction of his bees. It wouldn't be the first time the biotech giant has used questionable tactics to get rid of its adversaries. And research implicating Monsanto as the cause of CCD could definitely cause some harm to the company's bottom line.
One of the forerunning theories of colony collapse disorder (CCD) is that it's being caused by genetically engineered crops—either as a result of the crops themselves or the pesticides and herbicides applied on them, such as Roundup. Ingram's research could potentially have strengthened this theory. Monsanto's Roundup herbicide is one of the most widely used herbicides there is. As a result, Monsanto has received increasing amounts of bad publicity over their potential role in the devastating demise of bees around the globe.
There's no doubt that CCD is a serious problem. To get an idea of the magnitude of the importance of bees, the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) estimates that without bees to act as pollinators, the United States alone could lose $15 billion worth of crops. ii Research into the phenomenon is therefore absolutely crucial, to identify the sources of the problem.
Monsanto however, keeping true to form, appears to have taken measures to control the direction of the research into their products' effect on bees. As I recently reported, Monsanto has purchased one of the leading bee research firms – one that, conveniently, lists its primary goal as studying colony collapse disorder! Monsanto bought the company, called Beeologics, in September 2011, just months before Poland announced it would ban growing of Monsanto's genetically modified MON810 maize, noting, poignantly, that "pollen of this strain could have a harmful effect on bees." iii
The ongoing blight of genetically engineered crops has been implicated in CCD for years. In one German study, iv when bees were released in a genetically engineered rapeseed crop, then fed the pollen to younger bees, scientists discovered the bacteria in the guts of the young ones mirrored the same genetic traits as ones found in the GE crop, indicating that horizontal gene transfer had occurred.
But Roundup is not the only herbicide that has come under scrutiny. Newer systemic insecticides, known as neonicotinoids, two prominent examples of which include Imidacloprid and Clothianidin, are also frequently used on both conventional- and genetically engineered crops and have been implicated in CCD. In fact, bee colonies started disappearing in the U.S. shortly after the EPA allowed these new insecticides on the market. Even the EPA itself admits that "pesticide poisoning" is a likely cause of bee colony collapse as these pesticides weaken the bees' immune system.
What Can You do to Help the Honeybees?If you want to learn more about bees and CCD, I highly recommend watching the documentary film Vanishing of the Bees. The film recommends four actions you can take to help preserve honeybees everywhere:
Support organic farmers and shop at local farmer's markets as often as possible. You can "vote with your fork" three times a day. [When you buy organic, you are making a statement by saying "no" to genetically engineered foods]Cut the use of toxic chemicals in your house and on your lawn, and use organic pest control.Better yet, get rid of your lawn altogether and plant a garden. Lawns offer very little benefit for the environment. Both flower and vegetable gardens provide good honey bee habitats.Become an amateur beekeeper. Having a hive in your garden requires only about an hour of your time per week, benefits your local ecosystem, and you can enjoy your own honey!If you are interested in more information about bee preservation, the following organizations are a good place to start.
Pesticide Action Network Bee Campaign vThe Foundation for the Preservation of Honey Bees viAmerican Beekeeping Federation viiHelp the Honey Bees viii
What's Behind Illinois Stealing Local Hero's Bee Hives?
July 05 2012 |
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/07/05/monsanto-roundup-effects-on-honeybees.aspx?e_cid=20120705_DNL_artNew_1
By Dr. Mercola
An Illinois beekeeper whose bee hives were stolen and allegedly destroyed by the Illinois Department of Agriculture has stirred up a hornet's nest with his questions on why the state did this, and most importantly, what they did with his bees.
The state claims the bees were destroyed because they were infected with a disease called foulbrood.
But when the 58-year apiary keeper had his hearing—three weeks after the removal of his bees without his knowledge—the state's "evidence" had disappeared, leaving more questions than answers about the raid on the beekeeper's hives.
Some people, including the beekeeper, Terrence Ingram, suspect the raid has more to do with Ingram's 15 years of research on Monsanto's Roundup and his documented evidence that Roundup kills bees, than it does about any concerns about his hives.
Interestingly, the state's theft targeted the queen bee and hive he'd been using to conduct the research.
The Ingram CaseA recent article by Tom Kocal in the Prairie Advocate retells the full story of how Terrence Ingram's bees and hives wound up being taken by the Illinois State Department of Agriculture (IDofAG) i.
While the state claims the removal of the property was due to Ingram's failure to comply with the Department's notice instructing him to burn the affected hives, they have been less than open about why the inspectors came in and took the bees and hives without due process.
At a time when the Ingram's were absent from the property. Ingram claims the Department also conducted three out of four inspections on his private property while no one was home.
While Department inspectors claim his hives had foulbrood—an allegedly highly contagious disease—Mr. Ingram believes he could prove that this was not the case. As reported by the featured Prairie Advocate article:
"Ingram knew that the inspectors could not tell what they were seeing and had warned the Department that if any of them came back it would be considered a criminal trespass. Yet they came back when he was not home, stole his hives and ruined his 15 years of research."
Ingram initially reported the missing bees and hives as having been stolen on March 14, unaware that they'd been removed by the IDofAG. News of the theft was published in the Prairie Advocate on March 21.
As a result of that article, an area County Farm Bureau manager called the reporter, stating he knew the equipment hadn't been stolen, but that it had been "destroyed" by the Department of Agriculture because they were infected with foulbrood and Ingram hadn't disposed of them as instructed.
The most nonsensical part of this story is that Ingram didn't get a hearing to determine whether his hives were affected by the disease until three weeks after they were removed and destroyed.
Kocal quotes Mr. Ingram as saying:
"I own four businesses. I am here all the time. Yet they took our bees and hives when we were not home. What did they do, sit up on the hill and watch until we left? We had not yet had our day in court to prove that our hives did not have foulbrood!"
Making matters worse, during that April 4 hearing, the Department couldn't produce any evidence of what they'd done with the bees and the hives. Meanwhile, Ingram ended up being ordered to pay the $500 fine for violating Sections 2-1 of the Illinois Bees and Apiaries Act. According to Kocal:
"There are 2 questions that Ingram wants answered:
1) Did the IDofA, a state agency, have the right to enter Ingram's property and confiscate a suspected "nuisance," before Ingram had his day in court?
2) Where are his bees? The "evidence" has disappeared, and the IDofA refuses to tell Ingram where they are, before, during, and after the hearing.
"I have been keeping bees for 58 years," Ingram said during an interview at his home and apiary. "I am not a newcomer to beekeeping, and I definitely know what I am doing. I have been teaching beginning beekeeping classes for 40 years..." At the April 4 hearing, Ingram said he felt he was able to show the court that the inspector could not tell the difference between "chilled brood" and foulbrood. He also proved to the court that the inspectors did not know the symptoms of foulbrood."
15 Years of Research DestroyedIngram believes the destruction of his bees and hives is more likely to be related to his research into the effect of Roundup on honey bees. He claims some 250 of his colonies have been killed off over the years by Monsanto's broad-spectrum herbicide, used in large quantities on both conventional- and genetically engineered crops. Ingram's research shows that Roundup can lead to what's called chilled brood, which is an entirely different scenario.
According to Ingram, quoted from Kocal's article:
"When Round-Up kills the adult bees there are not enough bees left in the hive to keep the young bees (brood) warm, and the young bees die from the cold (chilled brood). I tried to prove that just because foulbrood can be detected once the hive has been disturbed, doesn't mean the hive has foulbrood.
Inside a honeybee hive is one of the cleanest places you can find. Anything that is a problem, if the bees can't remove it, they cover it with propolis, which is an antiseptic... When you go into the comb and cut it up, disturb it like the investigators did, then send it to a lab, it exposes foulbrood to the world. In the beehive, it's covered up. The bees aren't affected by it. But you can find it by sending it in to a lab."
Ingram has studied the effects of Roundup on honeybees for the past 15 years, and he believes he had built up sufficient amount of data to show that the herbicide causes not just bee die-offs, but also Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD)—a mysterious phenomenon that has decimated an estimated one-third of all honey bees since 2006. While some bees inexplicably die, many simply vanish and never return to their hives. Ingram told Kocal that:
"CCD is a calamity that is affecting honeybee colonies across the nation. In fact, I had one queen, which had survived three summers of spraying and three winters. I was planning to raise daughters from that queen to see if she may have had some genetic resistance to Roundup. But she and her hive were taken during the theft. I don't even know where the bees and my equipment are. They ruined 15 years of my research."
... "I asked Rep. Sacia to take the teeth out of the current law, preventing untrained inspectors from doing sneak inspections without the beekeeper present, killing their bees and burning their equipment, or forcing organic beekeepers out of business, telling them that they have to use chemicals to keep bees in Illinois. Are the chemical companies really running our food supply?"
... "Is Illinois becoming a police state, where citizens do not have rights?" Ingram asked in desperation. "Knowing that Monsanto and the Dept. of Ag are in bed together, one has to wonder if Monsanto was behind the theft to ruin my research that may prove Roundup was, and is, killing honeybees. Beekeepers across the state are being threatened that the same thing may be done to their hives and livelihood. I was not treated properly, I don't want to see this happen to anyone else in this state, and I want this type of illegal action to end."
Monsanto is the New Owner of Leading Bee Research FirmIngram is quite correct about chemical companies like Monsanto—they are seeking to take nearly full control of the food supply by controlling virtually every aspect of crop production. So he has cause to be suspicious when it comes to the question of who ordered the theft and destruction of his bees. It wouldn't be the first time the biotech giant has used questionable tactics to get rid of its adversaries. And research implicating Monsanto as the cause of CCD could definitely cause some harm to the company's bottom line.
One of the forerunning theories of colony collapse disorder (CCD) is that it's being caused by genetically engineered crops—either as a result of the crops themselves or the pesticides and herbicides applied on them, such as Roundup. Ingram's research could potentially have strengthened this theory. Monsanto's Roundup herbicide is one of the most widely used herbicides there is. As a result, Monsanto has received increasing amounts of bad publicity over their potential role in the devastating demise of bees around the globe.
There's no doubt that CCD is a serious problem. To get an idea of the magnitude of the importance of bees, the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) estimates that without bees to act as pollinators, the United States alone could lose $15 billion worth of crops. ii Research into the phenomenon is therefore absolutely crucial, to identify the sources of the problem.
Monsanto however, keeping true to form, appears to have taken measures to control the direction of the research into their products' effect on bees. As I recently reported, Monsanto has purchased one of the leading bee research firms – one that, conveniently, lists its primary goal as studying colony collapse disorder! Monsanto bought the company, called Beeologics, in September 2011, just months before Poland announced it would ban growing of Monsanto's genetically modified MON810 maize, noting, poignantly, that "pollen of this strain could have a harmful effect on bees." iii
The ongoing blight of genetically engineered crops has been implicated in CCD for years. In one German study, iv when bees were released in a genetically engineered rapeseed crop, then fed the pollen to younger bees, scientists discovered the bacteria in the guts of the young ones mirrored the same genetic traits as ones found in the GE crop, indicating that horizontal gene transfer had occurred.
But Roundup is not the only herbicide that has come under scrutiny. Newer systemic insecticides, known as neonicotinoids, two prominent examples of which include Imidacloprid and Clothianidin, are also frequently used on both conventional- and genetically engineered crops and have been implicated in CCD. In fact, bee colonies started disappearing in the U.S. shortly after the EPA allowed these new insecticides on the market. Even the EPA itself admits that "pesticide poisoning" is a likely cause of bee colony collapse as these pesticides weaken the bees' immune system.
What Can You do to Help the Honeybees?If you want to learn more about bees and CCD, I highly recommend watching the documentary film Vanishing of the Bees. The film recommends four actions you can take to help preserve honeybees everywhere:
Support organic farmers and shop at local farmer's markets as often as possible. You can "vote with your fork" three times a day. [When you buy organic, you are making a statement by saying "no" to genetically engineered foods]Cut the use of toxic chemicals in your house and on your lawn, and use organic pest control.Better yet, get rid of your lawn altogether and plant a garden. Lawns offer very little benefit for the environment. Both flower and vegetable gardens provide good honey bee habitats.Become an amateur beekeeper. Having a hive in your garden requires only about an hour of your time per week, benefits your local ecosystem, and you can enjoy your own honey!If you are interested in more information about bee preservation, the following organizations are a good place to start.
Pesticide Action Network Bee Campaign vThe Foundation for the Preservation of Honey Bees viAmerican Beekeeping Federation viiHelp the Honey Bees viii
Thought provoking posting to say the least...
http://www.siliconinvestor.com/readmsg.aspx?msgid=28246974
"If the 80% are not willing to sacrifice the 20%, and STOP the .01%, ALL 99.99% will perish, or wish they had, before the .01% are done playing their new game..."
To: SliderOnTheBlack who wrote (26115) 7/5/2012 1:43:52 AM
From: SOROS 1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) of 26132
Without saying "Life is not fair, and it is certainly not equal," they will never fix the problems, and the nation and world will eventually economically collapse.
Everything is not a RIGHT, just because a person is born. There are people born in Africa every day who will have a life of hunger, sickness, and early death, as will many others around the world.
To say that in America, everyone born in the country, as well as everyone who makes their way into the borders legally or illegally, is entitled to education, healthcare, housing, and food is not only unrealistic, it is suicide.
LIFE IS NOT FAIR. If governments attempt to make it so, they will eventually destroy what has made America be able to at least provide a higher standard of living for a much greater percentage of the population than any country in the world.
Will there still be those with not enough to eat and no medical care? Absolutely. But would most Americans rather see 10-20% not have the necessities, or would they like to see .01% have wealth beyond their dreams, while 99.99% have their standard of living brought down, or up (for the 10-20% on poverty now) to a level that is just above the poor in other countries?
The gov't can only raise about 2.5-3 trillion a year. The budget, with keeping approximately 20% of the people in poverty, and without having healthcare as a basic "right" of life, is about the same amount. However, I believe about 2.5-3 trillion is spent EVERY YEAR on healthcare in the US. The math does not support giving healthcare to every person living in the country. If you do, then you go in the hole 2 trillion every year and face economic calamity soon, while at the same time, lowering the standard of living and the quality of health care for the approximately 80% of the people who do have it.
No one wants pain, and that is why the country and world face calamity. The needs of the many (80%) MUST outweigh the needs of the few (20%). If the gov't steps in to try and change what cannot be done mathematically, by printing money from paper and diluting the world's currency, disaster will not just happen to 20%, but it will come to 99.99%!
The real kicker in this is that that 20% in poverty would be less, because there would always be charity, and Americans, if not overly-burdened by a gov't wanting to steal all they earn, WOULD take care of those in need, like they have for 200 years. Perfect? No. But WAY closer to it than ANY other country in the world.
Do the .01% care? Heck no. They are bored with life and everything that having too much money can buy, so they love playing this game with the sheeple's lives.
It is simple entertainment for them! That is the point the sheeple do not understand! Wealth, like to the Hollywood stars, brings boredom eventually. Then it's drugs, divorce, and all kinds of damaging activities. For the .01%, this push to total socialism under THEIR control, is their illegal drug! To be able to play a real-time game with billions of people's lives must be a hoot for them. "Let's kill off this group." "Let's drop healthcare for this sect." "Let's wage war on this people." "Let's see what happens IF we DO this?" GREAT FUN FOR THE PSYCHO-PATHETIC RICH OF THE WORLD!
If the 80% are not willing to sacrifice the 20%, and STOP the .01%, ALL 99.99% will perish, or wish they had, before the .01% are done playing their new game.
10 sobering realizations the Eastern U.S. power grid failure is teaching us about a real collapse
Sunday, July 01, 2012
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Editor of NaturalNews.com (See all articles...)
Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/036355_natural_disaster_power_grid_preparedness.html#ixzz1zbXXu5RS
<In the wake of violent storms, the power remains out today for millions of Americans across several U.S. states. Governors of Virginia, West Virginia and Ohio have declared a state of emergency. Over a dozen people are now confirmed dead, and millions are sweltering in blistering temperatures while having no air conditioning or refrigeration. As their frozen foods melt into processed goo, they're waking up to a few lessons that we would all be wise to remember.
See some shocking photos of recent weather events, including a trampoline strung over power lines at:
http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/shocking-images-follow-sup...
Here are 10 hard lessons we're all learning (or re-learning, as the case may be) as we watch this situation unfold:
#1) The power grid is ridiculously vulnerable to disruptions and failureAll it takes is Mother Nature unleashing a little wind storm, and entire human cities are cut off from their power grid. Wind and trees, in other words, can destroy in seconds what takes humans years to construct.
#2) Without electricity, acquiring food and water in a major U.S. city can become a difficult taskRight now, masses of people across the Eastern U.S. are scrambling to try to find food and water. Fortunately for them, malls and gas stations are open, providing (processed) food, water and air conditioning. That's because the power outages are fragmented, affecting some neighborhoods but not others.
In a total grid down scenario, food and water supplies in a given U.S. city will disappear almost overnight. It's much the same for gasoline, batteries and even ammunition. All these supplies (and many more) will simply be stripped from the shelves.
#3) Most people are simply not prepared and therefore worsen any crisisThe average American citizen practices zero preparedness. They are 100% dependent on the power grid, the city water supply, and long-distance food deliveries to their grocery store. They have no backup plans, no stored food, no emergency mindset and no hope of surviving a real crisis. All they know to do is call 911 when something goes wrong... and 911 simply won't be there.
As a result, their lack of preparedness worsens any crisis. Instead of being part of the solution, these people become a burden on all the emergency services and supplies desperately needed across the region.
Hilariously, today's city goers actually consider malls and movie theaters to be places of refuge. As Fox News reported today, "On Saturday, many people flocked to places like malls and movie theaters in the hope the lights would be on again when they returned home." ( http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/07/01/millions-without-power-brace-for...)
#4) Cell phones are a fragile technology that can't be counted on in an emergencyOne of the more interesting observations about the current crisis is that many cell phone towers are out of service. That's because they have no electricity and / or they have been damaged by wind or debris.
As a result, people who depend on cell phones for their lifeline to friends, relatives and 911 emergency services were suddenly left with non-functioning devices. Even in areas where cell phone towers were still operating, many people had no place to charge their phones because their own homes were cut off from electricity.
When the grid is up, and there are no storms, solar flares or disruptions, cell phones are truly amazing devices, but they are vulnerable to even small-scale natural events, and they therefore cannot be relied on when you need them most.
#5) The internet is wildly vulnerable to natural disastersAccording to news reports, these storms took down a portion of the Amazon Cloud, and this in turn shut down Netflix, Pinterest and Instagram. Those services have now been restored, but they were offline for several hours during which many of their users no doubt thought the world was coming to an end.
#6) The government uses every crisis to try to tell everybody what to doConsider this quote about the CDC telling people what to do:
"The U.S. Centers of Disease Control and Prevention was among many government agencies trying to keep people informed -- from knowing when the food in your suddenly inoperable freezer can't be eaten to taking a cool bath if you don't have AC." ( http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/30/us/extreme-heat/index.html)
Seriously? Does the government have to tell people to take a cool bath in order to avoid overheating? Do people not know when food has spoiled? And even more strangely, is it now the role of the U.S. government to tell everybody what to do in every emergency?
Whatever happened to common sense? I can tell you what: It moved out to the country.
Out in the country of Texas, Georgia, Kentucky and just about everywhere else, ranchers and farmers still have common sense. They know about backup water supplies, and they can figure things out for themselves. It seems to be city people who need the most instructions from Washington D.C. because many of them have forgotten the fundamental skills of human survival. Their lives depend entirely on the grid.
#7) 911 and other emergency services are quickly overwhelmedAccording to MSNBC:
In Washington's northern Virginia suburbs, emergency 911 call centers were out of service; residents were told to call local police and fire departments. Huge trees toppled across streets in the nation's capital, crumpling cars. Cellphone and Internet service was spotty, gas stations shut down and residents were urged to conserve water.
( http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48032427/ns/weather/)
Fortunately, there have so far been no reports of outbreaks of violence or social unrest. But that's a timing issue: If the power stays off for another few days, and food and water remain hard to come by, the "politeness" of society quickly erodes and you end up with desperate people doing desperate things. Calling 911 is, of course, completely useless. This is a scenario where home defense and self defense skills can truly be lifesaving.
#8) A national grid-down situation would be far more complex to repairThe recent storms that caused this "grid down" situation for millions of Americans was a local event, and its repair and restoration has been aided by workers arriving from outside the affected regions. In a national grid down scenario, however, there will be no excess human capital to lend to the situation. Every worker will be busy trying to restore the power grid in their own home regions.
This means repairs will take significantly longer, and according to some experts like David Chalk and James Wesley Rawles, a national grid down scenario has the potential of being unable to be repaired at all, resulting in years of no power grid which would obviously unleash mass death across the U.S. population.
Across all fifty U.S. states, only Texas has its own independent power grid, and even that grid has been strained by recent high temperatures.
#9) Many emergencies arrive unannouncedThe Eastern seaboard of the USA was shocked by this recent "derecho" wind storm. Unlike a hurricane which approaches over a period of several days, this derecho event arrived without notice and struck without warning.
This is yet another reminder to be prepared at ALL times because many events arrive with no notice whatsoever. The power grid can be taken down by an EMP weapon ( http://www.naturalnews.com/034344_EMP_weapons_electronics_modern_civi...), and a sufficiently strong solar flare could unleash hundreds of nuclear meltdowns across the planet ( http://www.naturalnews.com/033564_solar_flares_nuclear_power_plants.h...). These and other events would strike with virtually no warning. If you don't already have gas in the tank, a "go bag" ready to rock, and your self defense skills fine tuned, you may be caught unprepared.
#10) Mother Nature will humble humanityAny time human beings get too arrogant and too big-headed about all their amazing cell phone technology, hi-rise cities and nuclear power plants, Mother Nature just shrugs and sends forth a tsunami of water or wind as a subtle reminder to stay humble. All of humanity's greatest constructs are but fragile toys to the truly awesome power of Mother Nature and the resilience of planet Earth.
If the power grid goes down across planet Earth for just one year, 90% of human civilization will perish, and along with it all the DVDs, Nike shoes and designer bling as well. Even the entire fictional construct of society's laws and banking system will cease to exist. That's because they were all fictional to begin with.
Mother Nature is real. Consciousness is real. Seeds are real. But much of what humanity has so far created is paper-thin and temporary. It can all cease to exist in the blink of a cosmic eye. There is nothing humanity has yet done that contributes anything notable to the universe. We are but specks of irrelevant dust against a backdrop of a beautifully woven tapestry of life, energy and consciousness. If the universe is keeping score of lasting achievement, human civilization has still not risen above zero.
We are fragile beings exploring a sea of such greatness and scale that our own lives seem silly by comparison. What humans think of as a natural "disaster" is but a tiny expression of natural patterns to Mother Nature. If we truly hope to survive as a species, we would be wise to remember how insignificant we really are in the greater scope of things... and why we must learn to respect nature and the universe rather than arrogantly thinking we have conquered it with GMOs, nuclear power and a supercollider.
Humanity has much to learn and much to demonstrate before we count for anything. Only through humility do we even stand a chance of seeking to gain that understanding rather than destroying ourselves from runaway "scientific" arrogance.>
The two websites:
http://readynutrition.com/
http://www.naturalnews.com/index.html
Hedge fund manager Kyle Bass on the chaotic world financial situation...
Interview with Catherine Austin Fitts... Euro zone: the centralization battle rages on... no pulled punches.
Interview with Catherine Austin Fitts... Euro zone: the centralization battle rages on... no pulled punches.
<<<"Fascism is the combining of government power and corporations. How does a government that requires you to buy an insurance policy from a pre-approved list of big corporations sound in that context?">>
It sound's to me like Fascism is now Constitutional???
Ughhhh the horraaaa to come....
<<"With guaranteed issue requirement under ACA driving up insurance premium by 30-50% annually in the coming years, how many people will continue to carry insurance before they are sick? especially the penalty is lower than the cost of any insurance that would meet the legal mandate (as it is currently designed)
It's like if there were a legal requirement that a house already on fire or burned down has to be accepted for insurance underwriting as an undamaged house . . . many people would wait for the fire before buying insurance; then the insurance company would have to raise premium, making more and more people drop buying insurance until there is fire.
Soon enough, the mandate becomes a tax on the bulk of the population indeed, as most would choose to pay the tax most years and buy insurance only after they are sick. That's how the ACA is designed. It's a backdoor tax plan that will hit the typical middle class American family.">>
It is easy to see how this system will completely fail and the quality of health care will deteriorate as well as the US "standard of living" for all.
We need real critical thought and change in the heath care mess of the USA.
<<"Since you are so worked up about medical industry seeking profit, when was the last time you volunteered at a hospital or a pharmaceutical company? What makes you think Europeans and Canadians are the Socialist Newman donating their lives to "the Greater Good"? Why do you think the typical biotech and pharma company in the US is full of young interns from Europe? Since you don't volunteer yourself, but demand others to provide voluntary service (using government coercion if necessary), you are essentially advocating slavery.
There were indeed many problems in the American medical system, most of which were the result of earlier government meddling, especially that of LBJ. Obamacare is a step in the wrong direction, and will make it even worse.">>
Well said.