New Content: (09/09/2008)
Last Addition: (09/13/2008)
Departments
"If the American people ever allow
private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation,
then by deflation, (i.e., the "business cycle") the banks and corporations
that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until
their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered."
I've just accepted an invitation to
speak about Marijuana Policy at the
TrumblePlex in Detroit on Sunday October 19th, 2008. I
will be talking about the "Medical Marijuana" Proposal that is on
November's the ballot because we collected over 400,000 signatures to
get it there. I am proud to say that I collected over 1,000 of
those signatures. The expected win in November will make Michigan
the 13th State to make Marijuana available for medical patients, since
1996, when Proposition 215 passed in California. I will also
be talking about the "MERP" Model for Re-Legalizing Marijuana, which you
might call the final step in ending the War on Marijuana.
The MERP Model would allow all adults
to grow up to 100 plants without any government taxation, regulation or
other forms of interference. It would destroy the Mexican Drug
Cartels, local drug gangs and would make our streets much safer in the
process. It would also screw the police, attorneys and the prison
industrial complex of billions in ill-gotten gains from the harassment
of over 830,000 responsible Marijuana consumers each year in the United
States alone. Citibank and many other banking institutions would
also get screwed as they would no longer be profiting from basically
"laundering" drug money.
Here is a more formal preview of what
I will be talking about on the 19th:
At any rate it should be a great time. I will
be speaking around 8:00 PM in the middle of the 5 Bands. Doors
open at 5 PM and I believe there is a $6 donation per guest. Hope
to see you there!
Here's a map. The "star" is where the TrumbullPlex is located:
I
want to thank Richard Rawlings for nominating me on behalf of the United
States Marijuana Party. To be clear it would take
a historic viral internet campaign
to actually deliver me to the White House in 2009. But it is my
hope that we minimally build a large coalition, in the next several
months, so that we can minimally push the "New Agenda
for America" down the throats of whichever Corporate Candidate
(e.g., Obama or McCain) actually "wins" the election.
Here are the
initial "planks" of my Presidential Platform known as the "New
Agenda for America:"
(1) Universal Health Care for All
American Citizens
(2) A 20-year moratorium on all
immigration into the United States
(3) Legal Marijuana for all
Adults and Medical Patients
(4) An immediate reversal to the
Offshoring and Inshoring of American Jobs
(5) A strict enforcement on
issues of Separation of Church and State
(6) An immediate move from
so-called Free Trade Agreements to Bilateral Trade agreements
(7) A major R&D project to bring
energy independence to the United States and the World through recycling, reuse,
ending hyper-consumerism and investing in the development of sustainable energy
sources (e.g., solar, photovoltaic, wind, geothermal)
(8) No further ownership of US
Assets (businesses, homes, ports, stock exchanges) by foreign governments or
individuals!
(9) Replace the Federal Reserve
with a People's Reserve which allows public oversight
(10) Absolute support for Net Neutrality
Of course one of the 10 planks, of
the "New Agenda for America" is the MERP Model for Re-Legalizing
Marijuana.
The MERP Project
The Marijuana Re-Legalization Policy (MRP) Project
This is the most progressive of all Marijuana reform
models because it basically allows all adults over 18 to grow up to 100
plants without ANY federal taxation, regulation or other forms of
interference. I would also argue that this small expansion of
individual liberty is required, given the liberties that have been lost
since September 11th, 2001.
If, by some miracle, I did win the election, my first
official act would be to set up a special office that would grant
clemency to EVERY non-violent Marijuana offender throughout the United
States. This would be followed by executive pressure on both
Houses to remove Marijuana completely from the Controlled Substances Act
(1970). This would definitely end 70 years of needless Marijuana
Prohibition throughout the United States of America.
The very next thing I would do is reinstate Habeas
Corpus and Posse Commitatus. It should be remembered that the writ
of habeas corpus goes all the way back to the signing of the Magna Carta
in 1215 AD. That is a good measure as to how far George Bush
has pushed back the rights of Americans in the last 8 years. After
that is a long list which would include:
* Sending out the 12 million "No-Match" letters and
deporting all Illegal Aliens and Visa "overstays" that these letters
would surely identify.
* Reopen the "911" investigation with the help of such experts as
Griffin etc.
* Drafting a massive "debt relief" program for legal American Citizens
that will assure the ownership of their homes and the access to American
jobs and other opportunities.
* Complete disruption of funding to any nation (e.g., Saudi Arabia) that
does not recognize inalienable rights such as Freedom of Religion and
Separation of Church and State.
Well, I think you've got the idea. It would not
be "business as usual" unless of course we are finally talking about the
People's business. And it is sad to say that no one has talked
about the business of the American People in at least 50 years.
Now for more information on the United States
Marijuana Party:
The
United States Marijuana Party - is a motivated group of Americans who
are tired of living in fear of their government because of marijuana
prohibition. We are fed up with the intrusion into our personal lives,
with urine testing at work and at school, with armed home invasions, and
with the possibility of prison because of a plant. WE are Americans and
WE do not piss in a cup for anyone!
WE feel it is time for the 12 million Americans who smoke marijuana on a
regular basis to stop hiding their love for this plant and unite as one
large body of voters to demand an end to the unconstitutional
prohibition of marijuana and the drug war. The U.S. cannot lock up 12
million people. The War on Drugs causes more harm than the drugs
themselves ever will. United WE are a potential 12 million vote
political machine. WE want to live free and WE must be determined to
stand up, be counted, demonstrate, rally, and write. Waiting for the
government to silence us all in the American prison system is not an
option! Too many of our brethren are there, in prison right now.
More Americans are in jail today for non-violent drug offenses than at
any previous time in American history. More Americans are in jail today
for marijuana offenses than at any previous moment in American history.
The war against marijuana is a genocidal war waged against us by a
government determined to eradicate our plant, our culture, our freedom
and our political rights.
The text of the poll appears below. I think if we can get a large
response, that supports a Immigration Moratorium, we can send the
results to our traitorous representatives and make clear that we are
REALLY beginning to loose patience. As I speak the House Judiciary
is currently considering raising the number of annual Green Card Visas,
into the US, from 1.0 to 1.5 MILLION a year! You would have
thought that the McCain/Kennedy Amnesty Bill defeat would have made it
clear that we are getting fed up with these corporate whores that
masquerade as our representatives.
Please, Please, Please. Send this out as widely as possible and post the
link on you websites, FaceBook, MySpace and other networking websites.
The fact of the matter is that 80% of the American People want either a
complete Moratorium or a drastic reduction on immigration into the US.
This is not surprising given the fact we have lost over 600,000 jobs in
the first 8 months of 2008 and are also beginning to see water shortages
due to unsustainable population growth: mostly due to Legal and Illegal
Immigration. Yet both Obama and McCain have promised to grant Amnesty to
between 12-30 million Illegal Aliens and both also want to continue to
allow over 1 million Legal Immigrants into the US each year. This is
just one issue that shows the 2008 Election to be a fraud (e.g., they
don't' represent the people). Do you agree that we should impose an
immediate moratorium on ALL immigration into the United States?
Select the response that most closely reflects your position:
(1)I agree that we should impose an immediate moratorium on ALL
immigration into the United States?
(2)I agree on a moratorium on ILLEGAL Immigration but NOT LEGAL
Immigration
(3)I agree on a moratorium on LEGAL Immigration but NOT ILLEGAL
Immigration
(4)I believe we should allow more LEGAL and ILLEGAL Immigration
You don't really need those glasses
from "They Live" to see who the "Aliens" are. All you have to do
to realize that both Obama and McCain are "Aliens" is to consider the
following facts:
(1) 80% of Americans want
greatly reduced immigration
(2) Both Obama and McCain have not so subtlety told the Hispanic
ethno-centric PACs that they will both grant Amnesty to 12-30 million
Illegal Aliens as soon as they get into office.
(3) Only 9% of American citizens believe Congress is doing an adequate
job -- a historic low.
(4) There is absolutely no doubt that our government has been hi-jacked
by a Global Corporate Elite whose agenda is to destroy all national
sovereign states in favor of a One World Global Corpocracy. You see this
in NAFTA, the NAU, the EU and the FTAA.
(5) 63% (Zogby Poll) of Americans find both Obama and McCain as
"unacceptable" choices for President. What better evidence that
the 2008 Presidential Election is nothing but a fraud.
Both candidates are hold numerous
viewpoint and positions which are "alien" to both the wishes and
interests of the American People: especially the working class.
You will see, in the following
description of "They Live," that this 1988 film almost perfectly
portrays what is going on in this country today. Soon I will be
setting up a petition (both online and paper) to get at the Achilles
Heel of this fraudulent election: A demand for a 20 Year Moratorium on
ALL Immigration into the US.
They
Live is a 1988 film directed by John Carpenter, who also wrote the
screenplay under the pseudonym “Frank Armitage”. The movie is based on
Ray Nelson's 1963 short story Eight O'clock in the Morning.
Part science fiction thriller and part black comedy, the film echoed
contemporary fears of a declining economy, within a culture of greed and
conspicuous consumption common among Americans in the 1980s. In They
Live, the ruling class within the moneyed elite are in fact aliens
managing human social affairs through the use of subliminal media
advertising and the control of economic opportunity.
I really encourage people to start getting together in small groups to
begin talking about what we are going to do after one of these two
traitors gets into office in 2009. We cannot allow them to grant
Amnesty to 12-30 Million Illegal Immigrants. My suggestion is to
have them watch this movie and then discuss how it relates to our
current life in the United States.
Here is a synopsis of the plot to
help aid with your discussions. You can either get the file from
the video store or connect your router connected laptop to a television
for the purpose of group viewing.
Plot
Nada (Roddy Piper) is a homeless laborer who finds work on a Los Angeles
construction site. One of the workers, Frank Armitage (Keith David),
takes him to spend the night at a local shantytown. While being shown
around, he notices odd behavior at a small church across the street.
Investigating the next day, he discovers that the soup kitchen they are
operating is a sham. The choir practice is a recording, scientific
apparatus and stacks of cardboard boxes are scattered around the rear
areas of the building, and he accidentally stumbles on several more
boxes hidden in a secret compartment in a wall.
That night, the police surround the church, forcing the inhabitants to
flee. The police then turn on the shantytown, destroying it with
bulldozers and beating the blind minister of the church. Nada returns to
the site the next day and investigates the church again, which has been
emptied. He takes one of the boxes from the secret compartment and opens
it in an alleyway, finding it full of sunglasses. He keeps one pair and
leaves the rest in a garbage can.
When Nada later dons the glasses for the first time, the world appears
in shades of grey, with significant differences. He notices that a
billboard now simply displays the word "Obey"; without them it displays
the ad that Control Data is "creating a transparent computing
environment". Another billboard (normally displaying "Come to the
Caribbean" written above a lovely woman lying on a beach) now displays
the text "Marry and Reproduce". He also sees that paper money bears the
words "This is your God". All printed matter around him contains
subliminal advertising.
Additionally, he soon discovers that many people are actually aliens.
When the aliens realize he can see them for what they truly are, the
police suddenly arrive. Nada escapes and steals a police shotgun, going
on a shooting spree at a local bank filled with aliens. One sees him and
disappears after twisting a dial on his wristwatch. He forces a woman to
take him to her house in the Hollywood Hills at gunpoint. Taking off the
glasses to rest, he remarks "these glasses are like a drug... but when
you take them off, you come down hard". Holly (the woman) tricks Nada
and pushes him through her window, nearly killing him. He leaves behind
his pair of sunglasses, however.
After recovering, Nada returns to the construction site to talk over
with Frank what he discovered. Seeing Nada as a wanted man for the
shooting spree, Frank is initially uninterested in his story. The two
engage in a long fight as Nada attempts to convince and then force Frank
to put on the sunglasses. When Frank finally puts on the glasses, he
sees the aliens around him as well. Frank joins Nada as they get in
contact with the group from the church. They learn that a meeting is
being held at a local community center later that evening. The community
group listens to a seminar in the background introducing radical ideas.
For example, the aliens are blamed for carbon dioxide and methane
emissions — "they are turning our atmosphere into their atmosphere" —
and quickly using up the planet's resources. Holly returns, claiming to
now believe John, and delivers some information to the rebels.
At the meeting, they learn that the aliens' primary method of control is
a signal being sent out on television, which is why the general public
cannot see the aliens for what they are. An unknown but brilliant
inventor creates a lenses. It is called the Hoffman lens named after
Albert Hoffman, the inventor of LSD (this is not explained in the
movie). The glasses show the word as it really is.
[Commentary (Bruce W. Cain): My
guess at the explanation for the "Hoffman Lens" is due to the
deprogramming aspects of LSD. Anyone that has ever "tripped"
understands that it forever changes the way you look at the world.
Entheogenic drugs, such as LSD, have been used by the mystic traditions
for at least 10,000 years. It was used by Socrates, Pythagoras,
and most of the other philosophers of the humanities, whose ideas are
prominently embedded in the US Constitution. These philosophers
were all participants in the Eleusinian Mysteries: a annual ritual that
archeologists now believe included the use of a LSD-like substances that
served as the sacrament. The following 10-minute video elaborates
on the origins of the Eleusinian Mysteries:
Another mystic tradition, Zen
Buddhism, also shed some light on this as the term "Zen" transliterates
into "as it is."
I would also recommend that you
watch some of the related videos on the "mysteries" on YouTube.
This, by the way, is exactly why we need to assure "net neutrality"
which is the 10th plank in the "New Agenda for
America." For the internet has truly become the repository for
all knowledge: certainly eclipsing the Libraries of Alexandria. And it
is worth noting that the Libraries of Alexandria were burned to the
ground in order to destroy the access to this complete repository of
human knowledge. Knowledge is power. And the elites, from
which ever age, have always been afraid of the people having too much
knowledge, because it is a threat to their hegemony.]
The glasses, which are also
available as contact lenses, interfere with the signal. The meeting is
raided by the police, who shoot to kill. Nada and Frank escape with the
help of one of the wrist devices. They find themselves in an unknown
building where the aliens are throwing a party for their human
collaborators.
The building turns out to be the basement of a local TV station, Cable
54, and the source of the aliens' signal. Holly, who works at the
station, is found by Frank and Nada and they take her with them to the
roof. When Nada runs up to the roof, expecting Holly and Frank behind
him, Holly kills Frank. Holly then takes aim at Nada when she gets to
the roof. Nada manages to destroy the broadcasting antenna, being
killed, and killing Holly in the process. As a last dying act, Nada
gives the aliens the finger. With the signal now missing, people around
L.A. are surprised to discover aliens in their midst.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_Live]
I
wanted to add some new content but encourage my readers to make sure they
also read through the last edition which contains some important unreported
coverage of the 2008 Presidential Election Fraud. You can go there now
by clicking on the following link:
Earlier editions of the "New Age Citizen"
Homepage archive can be accessed by clicking on the links in the blue column
to the right. If you want to help out with the financing of this
website you can always send us a check or money order by following the
instructions at the link below:
Last week I read that the bailout of
Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae was going to cost the US taxpayer, (that would be
YOU) about 20 Billion dollars. Then on Monday (09/08/208) the media
reported that it might be more like 200 Billion. So you are probably
figuring about $666 dollars for each and every of the 300 million living in
the United States. Kind of takes your Bush "economic stimulus check"
away, but it is not the end of the world, you might be saying.
But then yesterday, on the
Glenn Beck
Show, an expert puts the ultimate figure somewhere around 2 TRILLION
dollars. Yep, I will definitely include the transcript so you don't
think I'm just making this up. So what do you get when you divide that
2 Trillion dollar debt among each and every living American citizen?
2,000,000,000,000/300,000,000 = $6,666
Now add to that the nearly 100 Trillion
in total US debt and divide that among each and every living American
citizen.
100,000,000,000,000/300,000,000 =
$333,333
And of course the auto companies are also
lining up for a 50 Billion dollar bail out, as well as many other companies
that are sure to be waiting in the wings.
So have you noticed that everyone seems
to be getting a "bailout" except the American people? And of course
what should be making you even angrier is that many of the people getting
bailed out are the very same people that created the problem. In point
of fact the "big boys" saw this coming a long time ago. That is why
they had your congressional representatives pass the "Credit Card" and
"Bankruptcy" legislation during the first Bush presidential term
(2001-2004).
You see while they knew they were too big
to fail, they also wanted to make sure that the little guy would not be able
to get off the hook. After all, someone is going to have to pay for
this mess. So they allowed the Credit Card companies to escalate your
credit card interest rates to levels that would make a loan shark cry with
envy. And it should be known that Joe Biden, Obama's vice presidential
pick, "carried the water" for the "Credit Card" legislation. He was
the primary sponsor, which makes sense because he is from the banking Mecca
of America, Delaware.
Then there is the "Bankruptcy"
legislation. Seeing that the "Housing Bubble" -- engineered by Federal
Reserve "chief" Greenspan -- was going to burst, once Greenspan started
pushing up those interest rates, they wanted to make sure the America
Working Class would have no relief through Chapter 7, 11 or 13 bankruptcies.
Again, someone is going to have to pay for this mess. So what did they
do? They rewrote the bankruptcy legislation so Americans -- who were
suffering unforeseen medical problems or who saw there jobs offshored to
India, China etc. --
This is especially disturbing when you
consider that 50% of bankruptcies, up until today, were due to working
Americans that could no longer pay their medical bills. And of course
if we had Single Payer Universal Health Care, like most other industrial
countries, there would be 50% fewer bankruptcies, up until today. But
then neither Obama or McCain are really talking about Single Payer Universal
Health Care because they get so much money from the Health Insurance lobby.
And of course the Health Insurance lobby is glad to pay the money because
they hoard about a third of our Health Care dollars.
Now lets get back to the bailout of
Fannie and Freddy for a moment. Isn't it odd that neither Obama or
McCain is talking about this in any structurally significant way. Why
would that be? Perhaps because Obama and McCain are getting hundreds
of thousands of dollars from Freddie Mac and Fanny Mae. Yep, just read
through the Lou Dobbs article for more detail on that. In fact Obama
is getting the third greatest "contribution" from these GSE's (Government
Sponsored Enterprises) to make sure he doesn't do anything to rock the boat.
And of course two groups of Americans
that are getting hit hardest are medical professionals (e.g., doctors and
nurses) and IT workers.
The destruction of medical jobs, for
American workers, started years ago with the residencies for doctors.
The US government pared down the number of residencies in the US which
limited the number of American workers able to gain the residencies required
to ultimately become doctors. But rich foreigners were able to pay for
residencies, outside the US, and were then welcomed into the US to take some
of the best paying jobs in the country. This is why you find such a
growing number of doctors that can barely understand what you are trying to
communicate with them regarding your illnesses. This is why some
hospitals now have staffs that are comprised of over 50% foreign doctors.
Now a very similar strategy is being used to usher in hordes of foreign
nurses.
IT workers saw their "Waterloo" occur in
early 2000, after the huge Y2K projects had ended. The Y2K
projects required pouring through code to insure that when 2000 rolled
around, the date functions would properly register the year 2000, instead of
the year 1900. Since the Y2K project took years to accomplish it gave
large US corporations a perfect opportunity to begin offshoring jobs to
countries like India. So when 2000 rolled around 2 things were
happening: (1) the thousands of Y2K jobs immediately vaporized and (2) US
corporations had laid the groundwork, and infrastructure, to begin
offshoring an increasing number of jobs to India. This led to the
explosion of the "IT Bubble" in the spring of 2000, leading to the greatest
loss of IT jobs in the history of the US.
Of course another trend was also in the
crucible prior to 2000 and that was the insourcing of foreign IT workers,
(Indian, Russian, Pakistani etc.) into the United States. Even most IT
workers don't understand the calculus behind this Congressionally supported
change in policy. The first "excuse" given for the importation of
these foreign workers was that American IT workers simply couldn't "cut it"
any more and it was imperative that we therefore bring in much smarter
foreign workers.
But around 2007 the cat was finally out
of the bag: the main reason was that corporations were paying them far less
than American workers. Of course it goes much further than that.
As "dual citizens" the employers did not have to contribute to their Social
Security which saved the US employers about 6.5% a year. Often the
H1Bs had their medical benefits covered by their home country. And
even where H1Bs did get US medical benefits the corporations benefited. Why?
Because the average H1B was in their mid-20's and was often replacing an
older IT worker in their mid-40's.
As I have said so many times, Ageism --
the corporately endorsed policy of getting rid of older American workers --
is becoming the new Racism in America. And yet I have yet to read a
single article that sheds any light on this de facto corporate policy that
often masquerades under rubrics such as "diversity training."
So the first benefit to businesses was
the related to the fact that the cost of providing health insurance to an
employee, doubles between the ages of 35 and 50. That alone saved the
employer around $5,000 each year for each employee. But it had another
benefit for the employer because it gave them an excuse to get rid of these
older workers before they were fully vested in the various entitlement
programs such as 401-Ks, pensions etc. The savings to big business is
in the billions. The cost to American IT (Information Technology)
workers meant the loss of their livelihoods. And your Congressional
Representatives knew very well what the cost to American workers was going
to be. They just didn't give a damn.
And to see where this has now leading us
I encourage you to read the article "IT Job Market:
Uncertainty Rules." In a nutshell this article predicts more
insourcing and outsourcing to the benefit of foreign workers, over American
workers. Many IT veterans are now discouraging young Americans to
steer clear of IT as a careet path. Again, you can thank Bush, Clinton
and your Congressional Representatives for basically screwing you up the
behind.
Then there is a program that very few
know about and which no one in office will even talk about. This is a
little known Visa program that goes by the name of an EB-5 Visa. It
allows up to 10,000 foreign millionaires -- think Chinese, Middle Eastern,
Russian etc. -- to have citizenship granted to them for buying new or
existent US businesses that are worth a million dollars or more. I
like to call this the "Foreigner Colonization" program.
I could go on and on. It's like the
"never ending nightmare." Then consider that both Obama and McCain are
going to grant Amnesty to 12-30 million Illegal Aliens as soon as either of
them gets into office in 2009.
I don't know about your but I am loosing
my patience. And becoming a "Lou Dobbs" Independent is not going to
solve this problem. Voting for me, Bruce Cain, is also not going to
solve this problem. But perhaps I might have a better chance in 2012,
should we even survive that long. The time for getting angry is long
overdue.
As I see things unfold I see two possible
futures. If we do nothing we will be absorbed by a Global New World
Order which will result in the total destruction of the American Working
Class. The other possibility is that we actually get off our asses and
begin what I like to call the "Second America Revolution."
Now I don't use the word revolution
without understanding the gravity of the word. But consider that the
reason for this "Second America Revolution" will be the same basic problem
that caused the "First American Revolution;" the loss of the people's
ability to coin their own money. For the colonists this began when
King George the Third, took away this right.
Consider the words of Benjamin Franklin,
as to the cause of the First American Revolution:
The colonies would gladly have
borne the little tax on tea and other matters had it not been that England
took away from the colonies their money, which created unemployment and
dissatisfaction. The inability of colonists to get power to issue their own
money permanently out of the hands of George the III and the international
bankers was the PRIME reason for the Revolutionary War.
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin
Our present day equivalent was caused by
the formation of the Federal Reserve Bank in 1913 which allowed Global
Bankers the right to print money and loan it to the US Government. You
see the Federal Reserve Bank is neither "federal" nor is it a "reserve."
What it is, is an abomination that needs to be eradicated immediately.
The "New Agenda for America" will go a
long way towards putting this country back on track. And hopefully it
will not require the spilling of blood which often accompanies such
significant changes in government. But I would caution everyone
reading this that we had best hope for peace but very assiduously prepare
for the possibility of internal warfare. I would highly recommend that
every American has at least one handgun and one rifle. Exercise your
2nd Amendment Rights. The corporate elite is not going to like
anything in the "New Agenda for America" and they are not likely to submit
without a fight.
Here is the "New Agenda for America" as
it stands today:
(1) Universal Health Care for All
American Citizens
(2) A 20-year moratorium on all
immigration into the United States
(3) Legal Marijuana for all
Adults and Medical Patients
(4) An immediate reversal to the
Offshoring and Inshoring of American Jobs
(5) A strict enforcement on
issues of Separation of Church and State
(6) An immediate move from
so-called Free Trade Agreements to Bilateral Trade agreements
(7) A major R&D project to bring
energy independence to the United States and the World through recycling, reuse,
ending hyper-consumerism and investing in the development of sustainable energy
sources (e.g., solar, photovoltaic, wind, geothermal)
(8) No further ownership of US
Assets (businesses, homes, ports, stock exchanges) by foreign governments or
individuals!
(9) Replace the Federal Reserve
with a People's Reserve which allows public oversight
(10) Absolute support for Net Neutrality
So while I have little hope for a win in
November, I am hopeful that we can spread the "New Agenda for America"
across the internet in the next 2 months and into the next Presidential
Administration. I am also hopeful that
we can begin building a coalition of "Freedom Loving Americans' that
will become the resistance, to which ever globalist shill ends up
winning the presidency this November.&
nbsp; To become part of this
movement I encourage you to get on the following mailing list
immediately. It is free to join:
And if you have a webpage of
any type (MySpace, FaceBook, personal etc.) please copy/paste this onto
your website to promote the "New Agenda for America."
GLENN BECK, HOST
(voice-over): Tonight, gee, who would have seen this coming? The U.S.
government seizes Fannie and Freddie, but how much is this bailout
actually going to cost? I`ll talk to one man who says any bailout will
be in the trillions -- with a "T" -- of dollars.
Then Sarah Palin
gets a lot of credit for pumping up the McCain campaign. Can this
working mom from Alaska counter the cult of Obama?
And we`ve been
telling you for a while that victims of drug violence in Mexico brought
across the border for treatment in U.S. hospitals. Guess who`s paying
for that, as well?
All this and
more, tonight.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BECK: Hello
America. Welcome to the program. I`m from Los Angeles tonight and I`m --
I`m thrilled to be here. NO, I really am.
We have Barack
Obama and Sarah Palin coming up in just a minute. And it was about a
year ago everybody was still pretending that our financial crisis was
nothing more than a blip on the way to a Dow, 50,000. It`s all up from
here.
I did a "Real
Story" on how the Democrats were proposing that Fannie Mae and Freddie
Mac should be able to take on more mortgages than usual. Bring them on
in. You know, just to get us through a rough patch in the economy. I
warned you, and here`s what I thought about the idea at the time.
(BEGIN VIDEO
CLIP)
BECK: What a
fantastic idea. So that way when those loans go bad, we get to shift the
burden from the people who actually wrote the loans and took the loans,
you know, the ones who are actually responsible, and shift that burden
right to you and me, people who didn`t have anything to do with them.
That sounds great. It`ll make the $519 billion S&L bailout from the
1980s seem like a picnic.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BECK: That was
over a year ago. Pass the potato salad, America, because here`s "The
Point" tonight.
Despite what
this government says, this bailout, which could be turn out to be the
largest in our country`s history, will cost every single household in
America over $14,000. Congratulations. I hope you enjoyed it. Was it
good for you? Let`s have a cigarette. How`s that for an election-year
tax hike?
Here`s how I got
there. When Secretary of the Treasury Hank Paulson announced the bailout
yesterday, he said that the cost to the taxpayer -- and if I may quote
-- is very difficult for anyone to know. Really? Good thing for you I
speak fluent bull crap, so I can translate. May I try?
What Secretary
Paulson should have said is that the cost is very difficult for anyone
to admit, given that this is a presidential election year and it`s just
eight weeks away. Don`t be fooled. Everything about this bailout is
connected to the election in some way or another. In fact, the current
plan is to actually just take over Freddie and Fannie, just temporarily,
so the next president and Congress can decide what to do with them:
either nationalize them -- hello Hugo Chavez -- or privatize. Hum. I
wonder which way President Obama will go?
The truth is,
the cost to the taxpayer isn`t difficult to find out. But when you want
to keep America`s focus on buying homes and spending more money, you
know, then throwing numbers around that end in the word trillion -- yes,
with a "T", trillion -- isn`t the smartest approach. So America, here`s
what you need to know tonight.
Fannie and
Freddie weren`t just too big to fail. They were also too poorly managed
to survive. And yet, instead of hearings, instead of investigations,
instead of trials and jail time -- does Enron come to mind? --we`re
bailing them out.
Hank Paulson was
careful not to blame any of Fannie and Freddie`s executives. No, no, no.
They have nothing to do with it. In fact, the CEOs are actually staying
on to help with the transition, which I think is a little like having
O.J. Simpson help the police find the real killer. I`ll have a lot more
on the unbelievable parallels between these two and Enron tomorrow.
But right now I
want to bring in somebody who doesn`t nearly have the resources of the
federal government but was still somehow or another able to figure out
exactly what this bailout is going to end up costing you. Don Rich is
the vice president of the Philadelphia chapter of Business Economics.
Don, I want to
start with this bubble chart. Can you please explain the bubble chart
here and what it is? Just put it up on the screen.
DON RICH, VICE
PRESIDENT, PHILADELPHIA CHAPTER OF BUSINESS ECONOMICS: What the chart
shows is the relationship of housing prices to the price of other goods,
and why you see it return to a level of 100 is that people in general
are only able to spend so much of their income on housing.
BECK: OK.
RICH: You`ll
note that over long periods of time, it always returns to a hundred,
which is why...
BECK: So wait a
minute. You`re saying that that big line at the end is coming down, back
down to a hundred?
RICH: It could
go below 100, actually, either because housing prices fall that far or
because the price of other goods rises, i.e. inflation, which is where
the cost number comes from. It`s a combination of either higher taxes
directly or indirectly through the inflation tax. That`s what people are
talking about.
BECK: All right.
So what does this mean on the cost, then, of this bailout, don?
RICH: Well, the
federal government has said THAT it will back, to an unlimited extent,
$5.4 trillion in mortgages and associated guarantees. Well, if you look
at the index, that means the underlying assets, in the end, their real
value is probably around $2.7 trillion.
The federal
government either has to extract that much in income taxes over, say, a
five to ten-year period or it has to raise the inflation rate to devalue
other liabilities of the federal government or some combination of the
two. But there`s no free lunch here. That $5.4 trillion is what is
promised to remain constant in stated value, where the real -- where the
real value of the asset is half that, at best. It might even be worse.
BECK: OK. So in
other words -- in other words, we`re going to have to make up at least
$2 trillion?
RICH: Well, I
think when you look at it, $1.3 trillion is the absolute best-case
scenario. And remember, that`s out of a $12 trillion economy over five
years, but that is still way past what politicians are talking about.
BECK: OK.
RICH: As you
said, they don`t want to talk about it.
BECK: All right.
This is, you know, Wall Street went crazy today, and everybody is like,
you know, "Hey, this is great." We are marching down the road of
socialism so fast your head should spin, America.
And what --
what`s crazy about this is all the people who did this -- I don`t see
any hearings. I don`t see anybody calling them out. I don`t see anything
other than keeping them on. This is truly about politics and special
favors to big business, big banks, and friends in the government, is it
not?
RICH: Well, you
can see the federal government did very little about this until Bear
Stearns collapsed. And then all of a sudden, there`s all this concern in
who they`re protecting, is like you say, powerful financiers on Wall
Street who have special access to the Federal Reserve, who is the other
villain of the piece. It`s not just Fannie and Freddie.
If you look at
when the bubble started, it was created by excessively easy monetary
policy, which is the hint of how they`re going to pay it off. If the
federal government says we`re going to back these loans to an unlimited
extent, that means a lot of higher taxes or more likely extended
inflation or asset price instability over time. It`s just simple math.
BECK: All right.
Don, thank you very much. We`ll talk to you again.
Now, let`s see
if I got this right. We bailed out one major Wall Street firm in Bear
Stearns. We have now two major mortgage firms. The next thing we need to
bail out should be three.
Good news in the
paper today. Three companies, the big three auto makers are more than
happy to step up to the plate to fill the void.
So you got
something again that is just too big to fail. Well, I hope we can all
get employee pricing, you know, on a permanent basis, because the
taxpayers will technically be owners of the companies, won`t they? And
by the way, gang, if you`re in love with the government being, you know,
in the mortgage and auto businesses, just wait, because they`re about to
take over health care. Mark my words: they`re going to make a move for
oil and energy, and the airlines are also too big to fail. It`s coming.
Steven Moore is
the economics writer of the editorial section for "The Wall Street
Journal." Steve, you and I have disagreed. I think about a year and a
half ago you and I were disagreeing. You`re in my camp now, aren`t you,
Steven?
STEVEN MOORE,
ECONOMICS WRITER, "WALL STREET JOURNAL": You love to tell me "I told you
so," don`t you?
BECK: I sure do,
because you`re smarter than me, Steve, and I saw this. I`m a recovering
alcoholic former deejay, and I saw this coming.
MOORE: Well, you
have that advantage over me. You know, I`ve got to -- before we talk
about these other bailouts, there is one question over the last 48
hours, as this bailout took shape, that no one in the media except for
you, as far as I can see, has asked. How much is this going to cost? The
Congressional Budget Office says, "Oh, we think maybe $25 billion."
BECK: No way.
MOORE: If your
previous guess was right, it`s not $25 billion, not $250 billion, but
potentially $2.5 trillion. So this is one of the biggest rescue plans
ever.
BECK: Steve, put
this into perspective. Nobody has any -- nobody has any idea what $2
trillion means. Put it into perspective.
MOORE: Well, a
trillion dollars is a million, million dollars. So that`s -- that`s a
pretty big number. And the thing is that most Americans cannot fathom a
number like this.
But when we talk
about these bailouts, Glenn, one thing to think about, you know, a lot
of people who listen to your show, own and operate small businesses.
When is the last time Washington bailed out a small business that got in
trouble? It`s only these huge industries that have mega-lobbyists in
Washington that get these gold-plated rescue plans.
BECK: OK. Now
we`re not talking about -- with the big three, we`re not talking about
an actual bailout. We`re talking about loans. But they are -- they`re
guaranteed.
MOORE: What`s
the difference?
BECK: No, no.
Listen to me, I am with you on this, Steven. I mean, I know that the
insurance for these loans, because it`ll equal $50 billion in federally
guaranteed loans. Fifty billion dollars. Just the insurance -- you know
we have to pay insurance when we get a house. Just the insurance is --
what is it, $7 billion, over the life of the loan?
MOORE: That`s
right. And don`t forget, when they say, "We`re only giving to give loan
guarantees to the big three auto companies, the housing crisis, all of
these -- we didn`t give direct subsidies to the housing industry. It was
loan guarantees. Doesn`t this sound familiar?
BECK: Yes.
MOORE: At some
point those loan guarantees have to be repaid. And, by the way, Glenn,
it is -- as I told you before, it`s not just the big three auto
companies. Now there`s talk about maybe the airline industry is in
trouble.
BECK: I know.
MOORE: United
Airlines. There`s almost certainly going to be additional bank failures.
Potentially one or two more Bear Stearns. Are we going to bail out them?
And then, of
course, I go back to the first question I asked, Glenn. Where is the
money going to come from? It`s almost like it`s Monopoly money.
BECK: Well, it`s
going to be, soon. Steve, you and I -- you and I talked about this. When
we first started talking about, you know, the economy, it was -- all of
the financial institutions said, "Oh, no. This`ll be tops 200 -- $200
billion. That`s tops."
We`re now
talking about one bailout being up in the neighborhood of $2 trillion.
That`s just the bailouts that happened today. What is the end game here?
How do you stop it ever?
MOORE: You used
the word "socialism." I don`t know if I would go that far, but you`re
pretty close. This is clearly the Europe model.
The reason the
European models crashed and burned in the `80s and `90s is they did just
this. Any time an industry was in trouble they would rush in and bail
them out. So what they did was take money from their healthy companies
and give it to the companies that were on their sick beds.
If we had this
kind of mentality 50 years ago we`d be bailing out the telegraph
companies, the stage coach companies, the Betamax producers, all of the
companies that have -- I mean, creative destruction. It`s not such a
terrible thing when a company goes out of business.
BECK: Yes. Look,
here`s the -- here`s the thing, Steve. You know and I know that this is
all favors to friends and Congress, and I`m doing a piece on it tomorrow
on the radio. Congress is delaying almost everything they can until this
next election, so they can have the votes that they need to barrel all
these things through. This stuff is coming.
MOORE: Just to
make your day, Glenn, I am predicting...
BECK: Yes.
MOORE: ... you
heard it first on the Glenn Beck show, we could be facing a $1 trillion
budget deficit in 2009. Nobody`s talking about that because we`re
passing out this money as if it`s free. A trillion-dollar deficit!
BECK: All right.
Thanks, Steven.
And coming up
next, a lot to be concerned when it comes to Senator Barack Obama, but
let`s not get into the Internet rumors. I`ll separate the fact from the
fiction. And it`s important we do so. Next.
Welcome back to CNN's first ever special Independent Convention designed
just for you. The House and the Senate returned to Washington, D.C. today,
you knew it had to happen sooner or later. They'll be back in session for
three weeks before their next vacation.
That means thousands of lobbyists are also back to work in Washington,
spending a lot of money, buying influence in our nation's capital,
representing powerful special interest groups, instead of the American
people who elected those representatives. As Lisa Sylvester now reports, a
growing number of Independent candidates are fighting back against a special
interest that now control the people's government.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My name is David Krikorian and I mean running to be our
representative in the United States Congress.
LISA SYLVESTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): David Krikorian is a small
business owner running for Ohio's Second District congressional seat as an
Independent. DAVID KRIKORIAN, INDEPENDENT CANDIDATE: I'm not a professional
politician. I'm pretty much you know an average guy who has had enough with
what passes for leadership in this country. And I wanted to do my part as a
patriotic American to bring positive change and some sanity back to our
government.
SYLVESTER: Krikorian wants to wrestle power in Washington away from the
elite and special interests.
KRIKORIAN: Our government right now is entirely run by political parties.
And the political parties are in bed with major corporations and special
interest groups in our country. They are not working for the benefit of the
American people. That is not right. And that is not America.
SYLVESTER: The lobbying power of corporate America has been growing and
crowding out the voice of the little guy.
MASSIE RITSCH, CTR. FOR RESPONSIVE POLITICS: You look at the companies that
account for the most money in politics, it's a "who's who" of major American
industry, Wall Street banks, law firms, accounting firms, media companies.
This is where the bulk of the money is.
SYLVESTER: And big business gets its way. Tax breaks for big oil, bailouts
for banks, and lax regulation of the mortgage industry.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SYLVESTER: And we are seeing how that lax regulation is now playing out, of
course, with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and we should tell you, Lou, that
these two organizations, these two entities have been really big players
when it comes to lobbying in Washington. They have hired an army of
lobbyists.
We have got some figures that we want to show you, and keep in mind this is
just last year alone. Fannie Mae spent $5.6 million on lobbying, Freddie
Mac, $8.5 million on lobbying. And they have also participated in these
political conventions, hosting some of those parties, and they have showered
these lawmakers with campaign contributions.
We've got a list I think you might be interested in; $1.5 million is how
much they have spent so far just this election cycle for Fannie Mae and
Freddie Mac. Number one at the list, topping that list is Chris Dodd; he is
the chair -- the powerful chair of the Senate Banking Committee that
overseas Fannie and Freddie. And number three, very interesting here, we
have none other than Senator Barack Obama; he has received the third highest
amount in contributions from Fannie and Freddie.
DOBBS: Well what's going on here? I can't believe that. I'm stunned.
(LAUGHTER)
SYLVESTER: This is Washington. This is how it works, Lou, as you well know.
DOBBS: I love the fact that second, third and fourth, Kerry, Obama and
Clinton.
SYLVESTER: Yeah.
DOBBS: Running for president seems to be a pretty good deal, doesn't it? I
mean that's incredible.
SYLVESTER: And you know Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, they are not the only
ones. I mean lobbying in Washington is a high art form. We want to show you
some other numbers. The amount spent on lobbying in Washington has doubled
in the last 10 years, it has doubled.
It was $1.44 billion in 1998. Today, it's $2.81 billion. And I know this
will not come as a surprise to you, but the biggest spender when it comes to
lobbying, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. They spent $380 million in the last
10 years on lobbying.
DOBBS: That's really not surprising. Lisa, thank you, but much of what
you've reported there is surprising, it's extraordinary. With over 17,000
lobbyists working to lobby, what, 535 elected officials in Congress, 100 in
the Senate, 435 in the House, I mean, it seems there's a lot at stake here.
I wonder business doesn't usually in any form make an investment upon which
there isn't a return if it has its way. The returns are pretty dramatic,
aren't they?
SYLVESTER: Oh and we have seen this. I mean Dean Baker was referring to --
he referred to the pharmaceuticals, but more recently you saw that with the
housing bill. I mean there were some really good little incentives there for
banks that we saw in that housing bill. I mean we see it again and again;
corporate America gets its way.
DOBBS: Gets its way and I think we should point out that it's sort of
interesting that as a condition of the bailout by the federal government of
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac today, one of the things they lose, in addition
to a lot of other things, including their CEOs, their boards of directors
and about 90 percent of the value of their common stock, they lose the
ability to lobby the United States Congress. Maybe that's an acknowledgement
by this Treasury secretary, this administration that there's just too much
lobbying influence on Capitol Hill.
SYLVESTER: Something is wrong. The system is definitely broken, Lou.
DOBBS: Lisa, thank you very much, Lisa Sylvester.
Here's another entry in the contest to find out whether many politicians are
just stupid or are cynically evil:
THE CRISIS: The feds announced last week that our official unemployment rate
has soared to 6.1%, the highest since September 2003.
THE CARING RESPONSE IN WORDS: Anticipating and reacting to the economic
uncertainty in so many households, both Presidential Nominating Conventions
were full of promises to help the beleaguered American worker.
THE ACTUAL STAB IN THE BACK: But this week, we get to see what ACTIONS the
politicians plan for us. First out of the blocks, the Democratic Leadership
of the U.S. House of Representatives is responding this week by trying to
shove through a bill -- H.R. 5882 -- which would provide about 550,000
permanent green cards to foreign workers next year. And those would be ABOVE
the 1 million permanent green cards already planned!
Folks, this is not just rhetoric. This is the House leadership trying to
pass this bill to permanently give away hundreds of thousands more American
jobs to foreign workers.
Unless you make a phone call before Wednesday, this legislation is almost
guaranteed to pass because it is backed by the richest, most powerful
corporate lobbying interests in town, by the House Democratic leadership and
by a large number of corporate-lobby-inspired Republicans.
AMERICANS NEED JOBS -- NOT FOREIGN WORKERS
Let's take a quick look at the employment statistics that don't seem to
matter to Members of Congress who are pushing H.R. 5882:
The official unemployment rate soared 0.4 percentage point to 6.1%, the
highest since September 2003. The unemployment rate was under 5% as recently
as February. Remember that the unemployment rate only measures those who are
looking for work and can't find it. Millions more have just stopped looking.
342,000 jobs were simply eliminated throughout the economy last month. And
the number of people officially looking for work and unable to find it rose
by 592,000.
Manufacturing firms cut 61,000 jobs, the biggest drop since July 2003.
Construction employment was down by 8,000.
Service-sector employment fell 27,000.
Business and professional services companies shed 53,000 jobs--the seventh
drop in eight months.
Retail trade cut 19,900 payrolls, the ninth-straight decline.
Even temporary employment fell by 36,900.
With that kind of news, what kind of person would schedule a vote this week
to offer an EXTRA 550,000 permanent green cards next year? Read on.
REP. ZOE LOFGREN IS THE ENEMY OF UNEMPLOYED WORKERS
There are so many Members of Congress who work primarily for the interests
of the cheap-labor lobbyists, it is difficult to single out just one to be
the face of all that is idiotic, cynical and callous about our immigration
policies.
But Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) gets to be that face this week. She is chair
of the House immigration subcommittee. She long has served on that
committee, doing the bidding of the corporations in her Silicon Valley
District.
But her decision to move H.R. 5882 through the Judiciary Committee is not
just about getting more higher skilled foreign workers instead of hiring
American tech workers.
No, this time she's bringing in foreign workers to take nearly every kind of
job in America. The only criteria really is that you have a couple of years
experience in the type of job you would be taking from an American worker.
These 550,000 extra greencards would be for engineers, health workers,
construction workers, service workers, manufacturing workers -- well, they
would go to foreign workers who do all the kinds of jobs that have been
disappearing!
If you -- or anybody you know -- works in any of these sectors, you had
better act fast because Rep. Lofgren and her followers have every intention
of giving away more of the declining number of jobs in your occupations.
If there were any sanity or compassion for struggling American workers,
Congress would not be considering increasing greencards but instead would be
considering reducing the already high 1 million greencards a year to
something more like the traditional average of just a quarter-million.
Feel free to call Rep. Lofgren and express your opinion through the
congressional switchboard at:
202-224-3121
You can also use that number to reach your own Representative and ask if
he/she is aware of the insanity planned for the House Judiciary Committee
this week.
And be sure to check your Action Buffet corkboard for other actions you can
take.
FALSE PRETENSES FOR PUSHING H.R. 5882
Rep. Lofgren and other pushers of H.R. 5882 think they have come up with a
really clever way to get around the general public opposition to immigration
increases.
Their gimmick is "Recapturing Unused Employer-Sponsored Visas."
You see, the law was changed in 1990 to triple the number of
employer-sponsored permanent immigrants each year. The upper limit was set
at 140,000. In fact, the feds have violated that limit several times since
1990 and given away more than 140,000 of these greencards. But in some
years, they also have issued fewer than 140,000.
The cheap-labor lobbyists came up with the idea to "recapture" the
greencards that weren't issued just in the years when the numbers fell below
140,000. First of all, the law is written so that "unused" visas in one
category are figured into how greencards are given in another category the
following year. By current law, there are NO "unused visas."
But there is an even more important matter here. The cap was set at the
extremely high level of 140,000. But, still, there is a cap. There is not a
floor. That is, the feds can decide in any given year that it would not be
good for American workers to give out all 140,000 permanent work visas. And
the cap is there to keep businesses from getting so many foreign workers in
a single year that they traumatize a whole section of American workers. The
cheap-labor lobbyists claim there are 550,000 greencards that weren't given
out during certain of the last 18 years and that they should be given that
many extra foreign workers next year.
Every Member of the House Judiciary Committee should be phoned and told that
592,000 additional Americans were thrown onto the official unemployment
rolls last month (and that doesn't count the millions already unemployed),
and that the 550,000 jobs that H.R. 5882 would give to foreign workers ought
to go to the unemployed Americans.
And please don't let the congressional staff tell you that these foreign
workers are needed because unemployed Americans are looking for different
kinds of jobs.
These 550,000 greencards would go to virtually every kind of foreign worker.
And virtually every kind American worker is losing jobs right now.
The video also talks about how Texas in
actually bringing in Mexican teachers to teach bi-lingual classes.
Please, where did I put my gun!!!
Globalist Ultimatum: Pay up or
Collapse
By Patrick Wood, Editor September 10, 2008
http://www.augustreview.com/news_commentary/global_banking/globalist_ultimatum%3a_pay_up_or_collapse_2008090998/
There’s going to be no end of controversy over the bailout of Fannie Mae and
Freddie Mac.
On September 9, 2008, CNBC’s popular financial show “Squawk Box Europe”
interviewed Jim Rogers (CEO of Rogers Holding) on his view of the government
takeover of Fannie and Freddie:
“You can see that this is welfare for the rich. This is socialism for the
rich. It’s bailing out the financiers, the banks, the Wall Streeters... This
is outrageous. Who are these people who are taking our money and doing this
and ruining America?"
Who, indeed!
On March 21, 2008, The August Review wrote,
“As the global financial crisis unfolds, one thing is certain: The major
investment and commercial banks who have wrecked our economy and financial
system are now successfully sucking unlimited amounts of money from the
people's Treasury to bail themselves out.”
The August Review has demonstrated repeatedly that the net effect of the New
International Economic Order (term coined by the Trilateral Commission in
1973) was to devise new and more effective ways to divert money from the
public sector into certain private hands.
With their right hand, elite bankers, investors and brokers can well afford
to take on all the risk they desire, knowing that their left hand can get
into the U.S. treasury to bail themselves out when they hit the financial
brick wall.
And with the government takeover of Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac, they have
simply outdone themselves: The magnitude of this bailout is on an order
higher than anything ever recorded in our planetary history.
Of course, everyone in the financial elite are feigning shock and dismay at
the tragic turn of events. Saving these companies, they say, will supposedly
save our financial system from utter destruction. It’s an ultimatum: Pay up
or collapse.
Is it all a smokescreen for yet another planned plundering of our Treasury?
In November 2005, Dr. Laurence J. Kotlikoff wrote a 23 page report titled,
“Is the U.S. Bankrupt?” It was issued by the Federal Reserve Bank of St.
Louis and quietly posted on their website – and it was totally ignored by
the U.S. press.
With irrefutable logic and statistical data, he concluded that
“Countries can and do go bankrupt. The United States, with its $65 trillion
fiscal gap, seems clearly headed down that path.”
Being that the U.S. government is the only and exclusive banking client of
the Federal Reserve, it is inconceivable that the Fed did not fully
understand what Kotlikoff was saying.
It is also inconceivable that the Fed would not take action to protect
itself, its money, its private stockholders, and hence, to appoint a
conservator.
A Man for all seasons?
In May of 2006, former Treasury Secretary John Snow was sacked by the Bush
administration and was simultaneously replaced by the chairman of Goldman
Sachs, Henry “Hammerin’ Hank” Paulson.
Goldman Sachs is one of a dozen or so global institutions that are allowed
to purchase Bills, Bonds and Notes directly from the Treasury, and is among
the top five investment banks in the world.
Conflict of interest, you say? Apparently, it is not to the Bush
administration or to the Senate who unanimously confirmed his appointment.
Furthermore, President Bush apparently didn’t want anyone to know about this
shuffle until it was a done deal.
On May 25, 2006, when Bush and U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair appeared
together on the White House lawn for a press conference, Bush was directly
asked by a reporter about rumors that John Snow was on his way out. Said
Bush, “No, he has not talked to me about resignation. I think he’s doing a
fine job.”
Yet, on May 30th, Administration Press Secretary Tony Snow (no relation to
John Snow) said in a White House press conference that “the two of them
(John Snow and Bush) met on the 20th of May and there was a conversation.
And Hank Paulson accepted the job a day later. That was subject to
clearance. It does take time, especially for a Senate confirmable position,
to complete those. So it did take time to get some of those clearances
wrapped up.”
So, Bush pointedly lied in front of national television, on May 25th about
Snow’s resignation and the appointment of Paulson that had occurred five
days earlier.
Why? After Tony Snow was jumped repeatedly by a reporter, he finally stated
“with all due respect, I think there was some concern again about how
something like that affects the markets.”
Thus, their concerns became quite clear, and any public debate that might
have disturbed the markets, was avoided.
Hammerin’ Hank’s Conservatorship?
If you follow financial news, you will have noticed that Paulson and Fed
Chairman Ben Bernanke are appearing together in public on a continual basis
these days– joint testimony before the Congress, joint press conferences,
meetings at the White House, etc.
Headlines like these have been hot and heavy: “Paulson, Bernanke call on
Congress to act”, “Bernanke, Paulson Push for New Regulatory Powers”,
“Paulson, Bernanke Say Housing Woes May Last”, and “Paulson Meets with
Bernanke, Fannie, Freddie Chiefs”.
Interesting. It never used to be this way.
On March 31, 2008, Paulson quietly released a 200 page document titled,
“Blueprint for Stronger Regulatory Structure,” that he and Bernanke are now
actively pushing Congress to adopt. It basically calls for the complete
restructuring of U.S. markets and their regulatory structures to meet new
“global standards”. After all, our regulatory bodies have been created over
the last 75 years and are not compatible with today’s financial challenges.
In addition, the Blueprint calls for much more self-regulation by the
banking/securities industry itself. The very people who brought us this
financial chaos in the first place, want us to let them do whatever is in
their self-perceived best interest to protect and increase their profits.
Meanwhile, Paulson recently demanded and received from Congress a blank
check for the bailout of Fannie and Freddie. The alternative, he boldly
claimed, was the further meltdown of the U.S. housing market and likely
destruction of the economy.
Does this appear like a bankruptcy proceeding?
The banker and the CFO (Paulson) make autocratic decisions
The bankrupt company gets reorganized
New capital or financing is secured to pay off creditors
If this is even remotely close to the mark, then we can expect to see more
bold ultimatums and actions by both Bernanke and Paulson. We can also expect
that those who are getting protection for their investments are the global
banks and investment houses, not the American people.
The Implications
U.S. citizens are getting hosed while banks, brokerages, hedge funds,
sovereign wealth funds, wealthy investors, etc., are saved from trillions of
dollars in well-deserved losses.
By assuming the debts of Fannie and Freddie, the national debt virtually
doubles overnight. Even worse, the government risks a downgrade to our
existing debt, potentially pushing borrowing costs up by hundreds of
billions of dollars per year.
Americans can and should demand that Congress let Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
fail like any other grossly mismanaged company. And in the process, they
ought to investigate their senior management for malfeasance and cooking the
books to cover it up.
Let the free market provide new lenders who perhaps won’t be so greedy and
ill-principled.
If a few more commercial or investment banks succumb in the process because
of such action, let it serve as a warning to those survivors that they had
better shape up or risk losing everything.
If there are any more ultimatums delivered, it should be us telling them to
“Get out!” “Hit the road!” “Don’t come back!”
Allowing Bernanke and Paulson to administrate our financial crisis is like
giving an ax and frying pan to the foxes who were left in charge of the hen
house.
WASHINGTON — Just weeks before the government's fiscal year ends Sept. 30 ,
the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office on Tuesday projected a
near-record federal budget deficit of $407 billion , sharply higher than
White House projections six weeks ago and more than double last year's
figure.
Mammoth federal-budget deficits feed inflation, make America dependent on
foreign lenders, cost taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars in interest
payments on the growing national debt and drain capital savings from more
productive investments.
The widening gap between what the government spends and the revenue it
brings in is sure to weigh on the next president and impede his efforts to
spend on new or larger programs or to cut taxes.
Yet John McCain and Barack Obama show few signs that they're ready to take
tough steps to curb deficits, according to budget analysts.
"I don't think either candidate is treating the deficit, or the debt,
seriously. And I don't see any proposals from either one that would make the
situation any better," said Robert Bixby , the executive director of the
Concord Coalition , a bipartisan budget-watchdog organization.
Maya MacGuineas , the president of the bipartisan Center for a Responsible
Federal Budget , said in a statement that both candidates "are promising
hundreds of billions more in spending and tax cuts than they are paying
for."
Republican nominee McCain has promised to balance the budget by 2013, but
most analysts consider that goal elusive unless lawmakers make radical
changes in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid funding. McCain has made
no such dramatic proposals.
Obama issued a statement Tuesday on the new data, promising that he'd "bring
real change by cutting taxes for middle-class families and small businesses,
paying for all his proposals to reduce the deficit" and working toward
fiscal responsibility. He'd let tax cuts for the wealthiest earners expire
and would impose higher taxes on certain corporations.
However, the Brookings Institution-Urban Institute Tax Policy Center has
found that Obama's tax-reduction plan would increase the national debt by
$3.5 trillion by 2018. McCain wants to leave existing tax cuts in place
rather than let them expire, which the center said would add $5 trillion to
the debt.
The CBO also offered a dismal forecast Tuesday, projecting a record deficit
of $438 billion in the coming year due to the slowing economy, which would
reduce tax receipts to the Treasury.
That fiscal 2009 deficit could rise another $83 billion if Congress , as
expected, adjusts the alternative minimum tax. The deficit projection also
doesn't include the potential costs to taxpayers from last weekend's seizure
of mortgage-finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac . The CBO had
estimated a takeover cost of $25 billion , although financial experts
suggest that it could exceed $100 billion .
The CBO's latest estimate for fiscal 2008 is $18 billion higher than the
Bush administration's projection six weeks ago. The record is $413 billion
in fiscal 2004. Fiscal 2007's deficit was $161 billion .
"The significant expansion in the deficit is the result of a substantial
increase in spending and a halt in the growth of tax revenues," the CBO
said.
White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said that one big reason the deficit
went up was the stimulus that President Bush signed into law in February.
The CBO said that another large part of the deficit's unexpected growth came
from rising unemployment-benefit payments and higher spending to cover
insured deposits in insolvent financial institutions.
Another boost to the deficit came from Congress and Bush's appetite for
discretionary spending, which is expected to rise by $85 billion , or 8.1
percent, in the current fiscal year, mostly because of higher defense costs.
The CBO projected that economic growth would slow to a 1.5 percent annual
rate this calendar year and 1.1 percent next year. Even if the tax cuts of
2001 and 2003 expire as scheduled on Jan. 1, 2011 , the deficit would be
$325 billion the following year.
To bridge the gap between spending and tax revenues, the federal government
borrows, increasing the national debt. It's grown from $5.7 trillion in 2000
to almost $9.7 trillion on Tuesday.
Analyst Bixby doubted that either presidential candidate's proposals would
make a serious dent in the deficit and debt.
"Even if both of them can pay for their new initiatives and not make the
situation any worse, the situation is unsustainable," he said. "Simply
treading water is not good enough if you are headed over the falls."
IT Job Market: Uncertainty Rules
By Brian P. Watson 2008-09-08
http://www.cioinsight.com/c/a/Foreward/IT-Job-Market-Uncertain/?kc=CIOMINUTE09102008CIO1
The future for many IT workers is highly uncertain, no matter how positive
the government data may look.
Recent reports show IT employment is healthier than ever: The U.S. IT
workforce topped 4 million for the first time this spring, according to
government data.
But hordes of American IT workers find the news hard to reconcile with their
own day-to-day experiences. When we broke the employment report story, a
swarm of employed and unemployed IT pros sounded off in response, forcefully
claiming that the numbers mask the realities of the job market. Highly
qualified American IT workers contend that they can’t find gainful
employment in the United States, while foreign workers—holding the
oft-controversial H-1B visas—seem to be doing just fine.
CIOs are under pressure to run their shops like businesses within
businesses. By paring down overhead and finding cheaper labor elsewhere,
some business-technology leaders are doing just that. That’s good news for
the CIOs, because it shows that they can toe the bottom line like other
executives. But it doesn’t provide heartening news to unemployed IT workers.
And the truth is that the woes of American IT workers may well be just
beginning. The global business landscape is morphing by the day.
Globalization is no longer about American businesses colonizing the third
world.
Just ask Hal Sirkin, co-author of Globality: Competing With Everyone From
Everywhere for Everything. In it, he details how all those countries your
company used to outsource IT work to are giving birth to a new breed of
global competitors.
Or read our interview with Harvard professor F. Warren McFarlan, who sees
huge ramifications for IT in the rise of China.
The long-term impact on U.S. IT workers is tough to predict, but the trends
seem to foreshadow increased investment by American companies in those
emerging markets. In an age of cost-cutting and productivity maximizing,
more and more work traditionally done on U.S. soil will shift overseas.
Indeed, 72 percent of CIOs and other IT executives responding to our 2008
Future of IT survey see offshore outsourcing growing faster than domestic
outsourcing over the next five years.
As business expands overseas, even U.S. IT services firms, like outsourcers
and consultancies, will look for workers abroad, too. Employment in that
sector has steadily risen, up 4.1 percent in the past year, according to
Bureau of Labor Statistics data released in July. To compete in emerging
markets, those firms will continue to look for top managers, and also for
experts in those markets. That will exclude a very high percentage of
U.S.-based IT pros.
Another major—though less-mentioned—factor in the IT employment climate is
the uncertain economy. Those of the optimistic persuasion may be hoping that
an economic uptick will lead to more hiring, and that’s reasonable. But in
an uncertain and rather volatile climate, it’s tough to put your chips on
anything at this point.
So what’s an out-of-work IT worker to do? Many of the more fortunate (read:
employed) IT pros urge the unemployed to sharpen their skills and evolve in
their professions. Of course, that’s easier said than done—and much easier
to do when you’re employed by a firm that devotes resources to educating its
staffers. Others, even those gainfully employed, recommend that IT workers
get out of the industry altogether. That’s not advice that was
well-received. But, while stinging, it may show a good grasp on the reality
of the labor market ahead.
The future for many IT workers is highly uncertain, no matter how positive
the government statistics may make things look.
Another great film questioning the
credentials of Obama and McCain. You can watch most of the
chapters by double clicking on the video which will bring it up in the
YouTube pane. Then look to the right of the video frame where you will
find additional chapters of this film to view.
The following videos seem
appropriate as we observe the 7th anniversary of "911." While I am not
one to prejudge I think it is quite clear than there are many "puzzle
pieces" that need to be put together. One thing is quite clear
however: the Corporate Media is "dead set" against any legitimate debate as
to what really happened in the run-up to "911." And it is this very
obvious censorship of inquiry into "911" that should be a concern to us all.
Comment: Jesse Ventura takes what I
consider to be a "perfect" position on "911" because he focuses on the
inconsistencies without drawing any conclusions. And like myself
Ventura is merely asking for a more thorough investigation in order to
resolve these inconsistencies. Of course what should concern all
of us is the fact that corporate media has decided to thwart any further
investigation by refusing to objectively parse the concerns of the "911
Truth" movement. Instead they continue to merely label the "911 Truth"
movement as a bunch of "conspiracy nuts" while doggedly sticking to the "911
commission report." This behavior is not "fair and balanced" and is
instead an attempt to "manufacture consent" through obfuscation by a media
that, most definitely, serves the goals and objectives of the Corporate
Elite. This also explains the fact that the same Corporate Elite
will not discuss the fact that Obama and McCain support Amnesty for Illegal
Aliens when 80% of the American People are opposed. If I had to draw a
comparison I would cite the similar treatment that Galileo received, by the
Roman Catholic Church, when he put forth his theory of a heliocentric
universe. Of course it turns out the Galileo was, in fact, correct.
Bruce W. Cain
Jesse Ventura, the former governor of
Minnesota, ex Navy Seal Vietnam Veteran, Demolition Expert and an avid
spokesperson for 911 Truth. The governor takes on a swarm of media in
the footage below for about 30 minutes. This is a pretty intense interview!
(The first 2 minutes isn’t worth watching, it’s just someone walking around
with a camera. Fast forward about 2 minutes to get to the interview.)
I can understand how some, who identify themselves as Christians, might be
offended by the film Zeitgeist. Here is a good example of a Christian that
was offended by the film:
===============
The promotion of atheism appears to be designed to alienate Christians from
studying the Conspiracy. It also has nothing to do with some worthwhile
information in the later portion of the movie, which is not properly
credited to the late Aaron Russo, Alex Jones and others. The movie is so
anti-Christian that it fails to acknowledge that the Conspiracy has attacked
Christianity since the time of Adam Weishaupt and the French Revolution. The
creator of the movie also totally ignores that most of the 60,000,000 murder
victims of the Bolsheviks in Russia were Christians.
===============
But the fact of the matter is that Jesus would have been one of the greatest
critics of what has masqueraded as Christianity since Constantine “embraced”
Christianity in Constantinople in the 4th century AD. I think the better
response for Christians might be to embrace the Gnostic Christianity that
Jesus, and many others, have been trying to spread for millennia. In recent
times Aldous Huxley has described this as the Perennial Philosophy in his
book by the same name.
Here is one reader’s description of the book:
==============
Culled from Christian, Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, and Taoist sources, Huxley
makes the case for the universality of certain religious doctrines grounded
in a common mystical experience. This work by Huxley established him as one
of the greatest lay theologians. It is a work of syncretism of the highest
order. Huxley was raised as a Christian, yet was a mystical seeker across
religious traditions. His quest included experiments with psychedelics,
studying Vedanta and other religious traditions.
This book is a must read for the mystical seeker, who wants confirmation
that the mystical experience is real. This text was also highly influential
within the academic study of religion. Huston Smith, who has written the
most widely used textbook on the world's religions, has cited it numerous
times in his writings as shaping his own views on the commonality of all
religious traditions.
This does not mean that you even have to leave your current church, whether
it is Christian, Muslim, Jewish or some other literalist philosophy.
Instead, I would encourage you to become an activist, within your church, to
transform it from a literalist to a mystical tradition. Even atheists can
get in on this one because quite frankly the mystical traditions don’t even
require a belief in a god.
The main point that the film Zeitgeist is making – or should be making -- is
that elites have hijacked the mystical traditions (Goddess Cultures etc.)
through the incorporation of mystic astrology that was embraced by what the
prevailing elites, of these earlier periods, described as “pagan” belief
systems. Their main goal was to interpose themselves between the people and
their god. And the reason they wanted to do this was quite simple. Once they
achieved legitimacy for interpreting the literal communications of “god”
they knew they would enjoy unprecedented power. After all, when they say god
wants you to go to war, who you are to question their decision?
And of course it is all dependant on the people believing that the elite can
literally interpret the “will of God.”
This also explains why the Roman Catholic Church was so adamant about
destroying the various mystical traditions, such as Gnostic Christianity. It
also explains why Muslims don’t like the Sufis. You see the mystical
traditions have always insisted that the truth must be found within. And
there is probably no greater threat to an established elite than those that
would question their authority. I believe Jesus alluded to this in the
following:
================
And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should
come, he answered them and said, The kingdom of God cometh not with
observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the
kingdom of God is within you. (Luke 17:21)
================
So why is this so important? It is because the various elites can’t control
you if you insist on seeking knowledge (e.g., Gnosis) within yourself. They
might say, “God says we’re going to war next Tuesday.” The last thing they
want to hear is all their people saying back to them that they will mediate
on it and get back to them. Nope, the elite always demands immediate and
unquestioning compliance. This in a nutshell is what it has always been
about since agriculture paved the way for hierarchical societies. And the
bottom line is that the “literalists” have every intention of keeping their
place at the top of that hierarchical pyramid. What they have long
understood is that in order for them to enjoy their riches, they have always
seen it necessary to enslave the majority as a malleable slave class. And
most of us are part of that slave class. Or as George Carlin once put it.
‘There is this big club. And let’s be clear that we are not part of that big
club.”
Now you would be forgiven for asking how this meditative introspection could
be so dangerous to the future of the Global Elite. And unless you
experienced it for yourself any explanation would fall short. Of course the
most obvious danger is that “finding the “god” within” cultivates the
questioning of authority. That in itself explains the crucifixions, the
inquisitions and the incessant preoccupation of the elite to wipe out any
form of dissent. But it really goes much further.
Because whether you experience this epiphany through yoga, meditation, LSD,
tantric methods, sacred marriage etc the result is universal: you experience
a connection with the totality of existence. You see that everything is part
of a great singularity [Google “String Theory”]. Now if you suddenly
actually believe this, it most naturally results in a heightened compassion
for what revolves around you. After all if you are connected to your fellow
man how can you then debase and exploit him?
Now some might then say that this would argue for granting Amnesty for all
Illegal’s and might even argue for a One World Government. After all “we are
all one.”
To that I would reply: Bullshit. Illegal Immigration is merely part of the
Global Elite's agenda to bring the American Working Class into a state of
indentured servitude. And the Illegal Aliens are also being exploited by
their attempts to lay our borders wide open. They are seeking a state of
global slavery.
But what this revelation might do is have us looking at how we might steer
our future towards a world where people can better live where they were
born. It might propel us to using our knowledge (e.g., Gnosis) to make the
best choices for our individual and collective futures: like using
contraception and family planning to reverse population growth. It might
propel us towards policies that insure a dignified life that lives in
harmony with the world in which we find ourselves. It might have us finding
the best use of technology to insulate us from the more dangerous
occupations. And though this might eventually lead to a “One World
Government” it would not be the “New World Order” that we are currently
being forced into.
Well, I’m quite sure I’ve lost many of you by now. And I’ve got a CD and a
book to complete. You can actually purchase the “raw” version of this CD
right now:
Of course the book will be expanding on the "New Agenda for America" which I
have talked about so much over the past year:
NEW AGENDA FOR AMERICA: Preliminary Planks
==========================================
Help Influence the 2008 Presidency
[More info: http://www.newagecitizen.com and click on topic]
[Video:
http://www.newagecitizen.com/NAA.htm]
(1) Universal Health Care for All American Citizens
(2) A 20-year moratorium on all immigration into the United States
(3) Legal Marijuana for all Adults and Medical Patients
(4) An immediate reversal to the Offshoring and Inshoring of American Jobs
(5) A strict enforcement on issues of Separation of Church and State
(6) An immediate move from so-called Free Trade Agreements to Bilateral
Trade agreements
(7) A major R&D project to bring energy independence to the United States
and the World through recycling, reuse, ending hyper-consumerism and
investing in the development of sustainable energy sources (e.g., solar,
photovoltaic, wind, geothermal)
(8) No further ownership of US Assets (businesses, homes, ports, stock
exchanges) by foreign governments or individuals!
(9) Replace the Federal Reserve with a People's Reserve which allows public
oversight
(10) Absolute support for Net Neutrality
=========== ===============================
So I’ve got no more time to take this discussion any further right now.
But I want to leave you with one of the best descriptions of this “Perennial
Philosophy” that has ever been conveyed. It is a series of lectures by the
late Krishnamurti in 1966. This is one of the purest elucidations of the
“Perennial Philosophy” that has ever been given. His ideas were absolutely
crucial to the “hippie” generation of the 1960’s. His ideas permeate the
hidden themes within the lyrics of the Beatles. His ideas parallel the
underlying Deist philosophies of your Founding Fathers (Washington,
Franklin, Jefferson) who were adamantly opposed to what masqueraded as
Christianity during their times. And I have a feeling that you will find
that his message is far more crucial to our current times than when he
originally gave this talk some 42 years ago.
The “Real Revolution” lays down this “Perennial Philosophy” which is so very
threatening to the Global Elite. It will take you far beyond the initial
revelations espoused in the first part of Zeitgeist.
For what he is really saying in this lecture can be summarized as follows.
'First we change our minds. Then we can change the world.'
And while I might be a bit to optimistic in this claim I sure hope I am
right. Because, if this approach does not do the trick, you can look forward
to a future full of war, pestilence and totalitarian government: throughout
the planet. There will be no place to escape should the New World Order
prevail. It is a battle that we must win.
Anything purchased,
through the links in this column, generate revenue for New Age Citizen
and will help us achieve the policy goals discussed at this website.
In addition to the book links is the "New Age Emporium" link below.
This will take you to our comprehensive digital storefront where you can
purchase anything from books, to DVD's, to computers. This allows
you to purchase things you actually need, while helping New Age Citizen
achieve needed social change. We appreciate your support.
They
Live is a 1988 film directed by John Carpenter, who also wrote the
screenplay under the pseudonym “Frank Armitage”. The movie is based on
Ray Nelson's 1963 short story Eight O'clock in the Morning.
