ArkBuilders

Recent roundup from www.kingworldnews.com

2012-01-19T14:34:00.001+04:00

Got precous metals?

Big changes on the precious metals front. The noise from knowledeable insiders is unified, loud, clear and urgent. Dump whatever you can for whatever it is worth and get into the action for massive rewards long term.

Each number is a different article, hyperlink directly to the story provided at the beginning of the text.

Bill Haynes, President and owner of CMI Gold & Silver - “I’m shocked by the demand for eagles. As an example we just had a buyer who picked up $1.5 million of one ounce silver eagles and that’s all he wanted -- the eagles. The significant thing I’m seeing here, Eric, is there is next to no selling by retail customers. It would appear the gold and silver, held by the public, is in extremely strong hands... “What I would add to this is investors who can handle silver’s bulk and weight really need to be there. They need to be buying silver because that is where the greatest upside potential is. With the gold/silver ratio this high, people need to be buying silver... The people I deal with are buying aggressively on the dips and almost cheering when the price drops because they can add to their positions at a lower price. Somewhere in here we will get into the third phase, years from now, when prices will go parabolic.”
Michael Pento, of Pento Portfolio Strategies, writes for King World News to warn about a coming US default and subsequent gold explosion. Pento had this to say about the situation: “If you ask most investors what is the main driver for the price of gold they are likely you tell you that it’s the direction of the U.S. dollar. Therefore, the only due diligence most investors perform is a perfunctory glance at the Dollar Index (DXY). While it is true that the purchasing power of the dollar is a key metric to judge the direction of gold prices, the DXY will only tell you what the dollar is doing against a basket of 6 other flawed fiat currencies.” Since the intrinsic value of the dollar continues to deteriorate, investors would do well to ignore the dollar’s temporary and beneficial measurement against the Euro and focus on its true fundamentals, which are forcing investors towards gold.”
Keith Barron consults with major gold companies around the world as well as major brokerage houses and Keith is responsible for one of the largest gold discoveries in history. Here is what Barron said about a coming mania: “Oh yes, that’s coming. I met with a gentleman last week, I’m not going to mention his name because a lot of listeners would know who he is and he was saying to me, ‘Look, we haven’t even got to first base yet.’ He thinks gold is going to between $3,500 to $5,000. You get all of this talk in the media, especially on CNBC, saying that gold is in a bubble. Every time it goes up a couple hundred dollars it’s in a bubble again. The American government, as we know, is cooking the books as far as the inflation numbers go. Anyone who buys groceries or gasoline certainly knows it’s getting more expensive every day....That’s just going to continue on. We are going to see it in Europe as well. The only way these various governments can create jobs and spend largesse is too print money. That’s very inflationary and that will take gold and silver much, much higher... The US Mint is selling silver American eagles like there is no tomorrow.
Jim Rickards clients include private investment funds and banks, government directorates around the globe in national security and defense and he has worked directly with the Fed and US Treasury. Jim is also a KWN resident expert and author of the extraordinary book, “Currency Wars: The Making of the Next Global Crisis.” (whole article below)

By Jim Rickards, Sr. Managing Dir. Tangent Capital

January 17 (King World News) - The ongoing financial crisis in Europe is the biggest financial story in the world today and is covered daily. The stories are filled with doom and gloom and predictions of imminent collapse of the currency and the monetary union. Our view is the euro sovereign bonds are in distress and European banks are mostly insolvent but that does not mean the currency will fail. The bonds, banks and currency are three different things and the failure of the first two does not mean failure of the third. The reasons for this are based on the fact that the U.S., China and Germany are united in their desire for a strong euro. The U.S. and China both need a strong euro so Europeans can buy more of their exported goods to maintain growth. China's leverage comes from the fact that it can prop up the European bond market with fresh purchases. The U.S. leverage comes from the fact that it provides the dollar liquidity Europe needs via central bank swap lines. Germany has a demonstrated capacity, dating to the 1970's and earlier, to remain an export powerhouse even with a strong currency and a strong euro all but eliminates intra-European competition. In this sense, the euro is the biggest loser in the currency wars.

    The Chinese growth story is so taken for granted that markets and analysts have difficulty imagining anything else. In fact, Chinese growth is on the brink of collapse - something the world and the markets have not fully priced in. Chinese growth has been driven about 70% by investment mostly directed by the Communist Party. Initially this could be efficient as the low-hanging fruit of fairly productive projects such as ports and roads were harvested through the use of debt. The result was a "machine" of debt creation, infrastructure development, constructions, jobs, cronyism, kickbacks, bribes and new projects that fed on itself and cascaded into progressively less productive and even wealth destroying white elephant projects such as "ghost cities," bridges to nowhere and high-speed trains that fly off the tracks. This process will clearly end in a debt debacle and the leadership understands this. They will wind down investment and deleverage banks while increasing bank reserves and shutting down shadow lenders when they can. This will be problematic and time consuming at best and risks an investment collapse and bank run at worst. Meanwhile the much-vaunted Chinese consumer will find that his savings are suppressed to prop up bank balance sheets so there is nothing left over for consumption. The result will be 4% growth for the next ten years at best, or collapse at worst. In time, China may even devalue its currency, contrary to all expectations of upward revaluation, in order to help growth. The cumulative effect will be to pull growth from Europe and the U.S. thus exacerbating global problems of too much debt and not enough growth.

    The U.S. has benefitted in the short run from the strong euro and the appreciating Chinese yuan. But if growth stalls in China, as expected, the Chinese may actually turn to currency devaluation again at the expense of U.S. exports thus hurting growth here. Also, as much as the U.S. and China both want a strong euro, declining growth in China and continued bond market and bank stock distress in Europe may cause a renewed flight to quality to the U.S. dollar and a strengthening U.S. dollar against the wishes of the Fed and Treasury. This will hurt U.S. growth, as net exports have been the one bright spot lately. It is also likely to lead to a third round of Quantitative Easing ("QE") under the name of "targeting Nominal GDP". The key to forecasting QE3 is not the level of interest rates but rather the level of the USD/EUR and USD/CNY exchange rates since the purpose of QE in the first place is to cheapen the dollar. So, if the euro remains strong, QE3 is off the table, but if the euro crashes on a flight to quality in the U.S. dollar, then you will see QE3. Using QE3 is the secret weapon of the U.S. in the currency wars.

    The key to all of the above analysis is to move away from the traditional approach of thinking about "currency pairs" such as USD/EUR and USD/CNY and to see USD, EUR and CNY in a triangular relationship. If CNY and EUR are both strong then the U.S. is the winner in the currency wars and has some prospect of growth. But if CNY devalues on a Chinese growth collapse and EUR devalues on fears of financial distress, then the result will be strong U.S. dollars making the U.S. the temporary loser in the currency wars. At that point, the U.S. will bring out its secret weapon, Quantitative Easing, dressed up as nominal GDP targeting, to fight back and cheapen the U.S. dollar to preserve growth in the U.S. This is the ultimate futility of currency wars - it just propagates round after round of competitive devaluations. In the end, all of the major currencies will devalue at once against the only money than cannot fight back - gold. The result will be sharply higher gold prices and global commodity inflation, which will trigger consumer inflation - exactly what central banks want to devalue debt and stimulate the velocity of money. Will it work? Maybe, but maybe not. If it works we’re in for a bout of global inflation worse than the 1970's. If it fails there may be a collapse of faith in paper money across the board.

Posted via email from The Hook of Magog

No Chermicals Allowed! (Ulsaker Bees in New Zealand 2011)

2011-12-12T13:30:00.001+04:00

Urban_Bees_Movie_Project_Ulsaker_2011.wmv Watch on Posterous

No Chermicals Allowed! (Ulsaker Bees in New Zealand 2011)

Posted via email from The Hook of Magog

Untitled

2011-12-12T13:13:00.001+04:00

Posted via email from The Hook of Magog

Here's the Risk: "Occupy" ends up doing the bidding of the global elite

2011-11-25T22:14:00.001+04:00

"Many OWS participants might be completely unaware of who actually launched it. Upon investigation, what one finds is a daisy chain of non-profit foundations"

www.Globalresearch.ca nails another important story that mainstream news ignores, proving once again that history is not what we percieve through establishment channels. There is always something deeper going on behind the scenes that betray the simpleton scripts of our mainstream news channels.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=27708

Here's the Risk: "Occupy" ends up doing the bidding of the global elite by Patrick Henningsen

Global Research, November 17, 2011
The Guardian - 2011-11-16


History shows us it is easy for 'grassroots' campaigns to become co-opted by the very interests they are fighting against. A 21st-century grassroots movement faces many pitfalls. This was as true back in 1968 as it is today. It could be infiltrated by law enforcement and intelligence agencies, or co-opted by a major party. As the state continues to creep further into our lives, activists can expect that it will use all its resources – not just the violent reaction seen in New York overnight, but also its agents, informants and surveillance packages – in its effort to monitor both sides of any serious social debate. Even bleaker, however, is the possibility that the movement was actually planned and launched by the very establishment activists thought they were waging a battle against in the first place. The larger the movement, the more interested a major party becomes in absorbing it into either the left or the right side of the current two-party paradigm. The sudden emergence of America's Tea Party movement in 2007 is a good example. Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, its inventor, used it as a springboard to highlight libertarian and constitutional issues during his 2008 campaign. Soon after, it was co-opted by key political and media influencers from the US right wing, associating itself less with a libertarian manifesto, and more with emerging figures within the Republican establishment. Now it is has morphed into nothing more than a block of voters whom the Republican party can rely to strike a deal with during an election cycle. Arguably, the Occupy Wall Street movement has already drifted into the shadow of the Democratic party – with a number of Democratic establishment figures from the top down endorsing it. The Democrats' own media fundraising and media machine, Move On, has visibly adopted the cause. Like the Tea Party before it, the Occupy block would swing a close election during a national two-party race, functioning as a pressure-release valve for any issue too radical for the traditional platform. Alongside this is the threat of being infiltrated. Scores of declassified documents, along with accounts from veteran activists, will reveal many stories of members who were actually undercover police, FBI or M15. In the worst cases of infiltration, undercover agents have acted as provocateurs. Such incidents normally serve to radicalise a movement, thus demonising it in the eyes of society and effectively lessening its wider political appeal. Although the global Occupy movement has branched out in an open-source way, many of its participants and spectators might be completely unaware of who actually launched it. Upon investigation, what one finds is a daisy chain of non-profit foundations, all tied together by hundreds of millions per year in operational funding. The original call for Occupy Wall Street came from non-profit international media foundation Adbusters. Like many non-profits, Adbusters receives its funding and operating capital from other behind-the-scenes organisations. According to research conducted by watchdog Activistcash, Adbusters takes a significant portion of its money from the Tides Foundation, an organisation partnered with one of Wall Street billionaire oligarch George Soros's foundations, the Open Society Institute. Although mostly hidden from the public eye, all major foundations and professional thinktanks undertake research and host training seminars, which are used to influence certain public and foreign policies, and thus, must have a political agenda. Theirs is the venue of choice for activities that cannot officially be conducted on the government clock. Freedom House is another of Soros's Open Society partners. It supports the Centre for Applied Nonviolent Action and Strategies (Canvas), an organisation started by Serbians Ivan Marovic and Srdja Popovic. After playing a pivotal role in the CIA-backed deposing of Serbia's Slobodan Milosevic, the western media hailed Marovic as a democratic genius, but it came out later that his programme came out of an elite Boston thinktank's "regime change" manual, From Dictatorship to Democracy, written by Harvard professor Gene Sharp. Sharp's book is a bible of the colour revolutions – a "regime change for dummies". His Albert Einstein Institution has received funds from the National Endowment for Democracy and the Open Society Foundations, and his work serves as a template for western-backed opposition leaders in soft coups all around the world. There are also reports of Canvas activity during the early days of Occupy Wall Street, including a video of Marovic himself addressing the general assembly. Currently, Canvas are touting their recent role in working with Egyptian and Tunisian protesters from as early as 2009, teaching skills that helped bring down their presidents and spark regional revolt. When the dust settles and it's all said and done, millions of Occupy participants may very well be given a sober lesson under the heading of "controlled opposition". In the end, the Occupy movement could easily end up doing the bidding of the very elite globalist powers that they were demonstrating against to begin with. To avoid such an outcome, it's important for a movement to have a good knowledge of history and the levers of power in the 21st century. • Patrick Henningsen is speaking on Deep Politics and the Revolutions Business at Tent City University at St Paul's on Sunday, 20 November at 4pm
Patrick Henningsen is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Patrick Henningsen

Posted via email from The Hook of Magog

Fukushima is 33 times worse than Chernobyl

2011-11-24T22:02:00.001+04:00

Fukushima is being quantitatively measured as being 33 times worse than Chernobyl. Where is the mainstream press now, having already repeated the mantra that Fukushima is not as bad as Chernobyl?

In the more scientific press, Fukushima is being called the next level of nuclear disaster, something far beyond Chernobyl in scope, reach, impact. It is the "China Syndrome" typifying the worst fears connected to a runaway nuclear meltdown.

Cause for comparison - The results of Chernobyl left 1 million dead at an early age, and it continues to shorten lives.

The effects of radiation are fearsome by any objective measurement, and yet we can't avoid the rise in permanent higher levels of "background radiation" around the world.

Short Videos of Fukushima

Humorous Youtube vid here - FUKUSHIMA Radiation Levels Are like Gas Prices
Illustrative video of radiation flows on the world map, mostly Northern Hemisphere
Frightening in-depth explanation from Helen Caldicott, a very knowledgeable woman on this subject. Here, Helen Talks About the Horror of Fukushima and makes it all very understandable.

Posted via email from The Hook of Magog

Bilderberg is Busted - Let's Hope This Trend Continues!

2011-06-11T13:25:00.001+04:00

Bilderberg is Busted - Let's Hope This Trend Continues!

Today the largest and most influential news site in the world has 5 stories on the Bilderberg Group ( archived here --> http://www.drudgereportarchives.com/data/2011/06/10/20110610_195609.htm )

What is the Bilderberg Group?

"(I)n 1954, the international financiers decided that the world had become so small and their interests intersected so often, that they must have regular, annual meetings. That year they met at the Bilderberg Hotel in Holland, and took the name "Bilderberg" for themselves." - American Free Press

Why don't you know about this?

"We are grateful to the Washington Post, The New York Times, Time Magazine and other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and respected their promises of discretion for almost forty years. It would have been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subjected to the lights of publicity during those years. But, the world is now more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past centuries." - David Rockefeller, Baden-Baden, Germany 1991

Why are we hearing about this now?

Today is a new milestone for alternative news! Radio talk show host Alex Jones has broken 3 concurrent stories about the secretive Bilderberg Group on the biggest news site in the world, www.drudgereport.com.

The first story in red text tells the tale of Swiss People’s Party representative Dominique Baettig promising to march into the Bilderberg meeting and confront various attendees, including Henry Kissinger, and to make arrests.
The second story tells about Italian MEP Mario Borghezio given a bloody nose by Bilderberg security as he attempted to sneak into the the meeting.
The third story is a watered-down assessment of who these people are and the policies they plan to implement on the world from behind closed doors, out of sight from their electorate (a crime in many countries including the US).
The fourth story comes from Alex Jones' site. His organization is at liberty to report news as they see fit, unencumbered by "editorial review" by the corporate elite (who are not surprisingly represented heavily at Bilderberg meetings). As this story concludes - "... the plan is to take down national sovereignty, impose drastic austerity measures, hold fire sales on national assets, consolidate wealth and power, and use an endless economic crisis as an excuse to usher in world government, a one-world currency, and a sprawling high-tech police state."
The fifth story is a published list of this year's attendees, a who's who of global elite. The people who push for their unilateral and autocratic "New World Order" (their term) are represented by the giants of global finance, government, industry and military.

Why is this a big deal?

Bilderberg breaking on a site like Drudge is a big deal because alternative news researchers and whistle blowers have been reporting on this organization for many years without much affect. Jim Tucker has been following and reporting on the Bilderberg Group for 25-years and hasn't broken anything this big into the mainstream... until now.

It all started just recently, only a few years ago. Groups like "We Are Change" have been confronting Bilderberg attendees about their illegal record of attendance at these meetings and publishing video accounts on Youtube. Using less conventional means of getting alternative news out to the public, mass media is all but lost in the new Internet media like dinasaurs in a tar pit. Their only recourse is to restrict the Internet.

Where are other credible sources located so that I can research this for myself?

There have been many alternative efforts eroding the walls of mass media silence over the years:

Investigative Documentaries -

Investigative Books -

Review of Jim Tucker's book "Bilderberg Diary"
Review of Daniel Estulin's book "The True Story of the Bilderberg Group"

Archives on Websites -

Bilderberg.org website (ha, are the Bilderbergers too worried about closing down this site for fear of making them more popular?) - http://www.bilderberg.org/
List of news articles and videos on an Alex Jones site - http://www.prisonplanet.com/archive_bilderberg.html

And much, much more linked here -- http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_sociopol_bilderberg.htm

What do Bilderberg members think about all this unwanted openness?

According to reports from insider-moles who allegedly go to Bilderberg meetings, the elites are very concerned about being published, confronted, having their record of illegal behind-closed-doors policy making published and critiqued (even aggressively confronted here and here) by the newly informed public.

Is the era of Bilderberg secrecy finally coming to an end after over 5 decades of complicit news blackout by the elite mass media (whose owners are also long time attendees)? Let's hope so.

What else are they accused of conspiring throughout the last 5+ decades?

The Bilderberg Group was principally responsible for 1) establishing the EU, 2) the Euro currency, engineering through the media and lawmakers and politicians immigration and social policies that 3) erode national sovereignty of the US and Europe, placing friendly insiders into positions as 4) heads of state to further their global government agenda, 5) expanding profitable resource-wars in the Middle East without votes at home or provocation abroad, bringing about efforts to 6) tax carbon use on small entities while handing out exemptions to their insider buddies, putting out policy papers that seek to 7) restrict and tax the free Internet, expansion of Orwellian 8) police state structures on the false premise that society will be safer if all liberties are taken away and handed over to an unaccountable elite structure that tracks and traces everything we do, and of course the massive transfer of wealth away from state coffers into the hands of insider financiers via the 9) banker bailouts, trillions given to elites who are chiefly responsible for crashing risky derivatives bubbles that set the global recession into motion and now of course these same insiders are using free bailout trillions to buy up depressed assets in the environment of crash that they created. News media incorrectly calls these people "incompetent" because they are unable to fix the economy with QE1, QE2 and austerity measures. In fact, these people are not incompetent at all, they are criminals raiding the tresury under the color of law and false pretense.

Aren't these the very same people who tell us "If you have nothing to hide then you have nothing to fear" as they track and trace everything the common people do.

Is Bilderberg really breaking news on Drudge right now?

Getting this kind of news onto Drudge is more valuable than the rare opinion piece that makes it through the mass media gatekeepers. Now that the Bilderberg non-secret has made it prominently onto Drudgereport, we can expect to see more of it elsewhere. Drudge is credited with breaking the attempted spiked story of Monica Lewinsky in 1998, proving that corporate-owned media can't plug all the leaks. Now more than a decade later, the same lessons are being learned by the corporate media.

"Drudge has millions of readers and more influence than any other single newsmaker in America." - Guido Fawkes

According to MuStat, the Drudge Report reaches 1.5 million unique visitors per day while Alex Jones' main website brings in 350,000 unique visitors per day - about 1/4 as much. That means, for every day Alex Jones broadcasts his message on Drudge, he is effectively reaching 1.5 million people that wouldn't normally visit his site. In addition, the Drudge readers tend to be media savvy and consider Drudge to be a news maker. It only takes a push to set a snowball effect into motion.

For collapse-proof strategies that apply locally and for ideas on how to live a healthy post-collapse lifestyle, write to me at InfoHive@gmail.com

The above compiled by Tate Ulsaker

Founder of Direct INFO

Branch Manager of Advanced Personnel in Nelson, NZ

"Anyone may publish anything I write anywhere they wish without permission, just please link it back if convenient to do so." - Tate

See the full gallery on Posterous

Posted via email from The Hook of Magog

CNN forced to admit - 3 nuclear reactors melted down

2011-06-07T16:14:00.001+04:00

CNN forced to admit - 3 nuclear reactors melted down after quake, Japan confirms

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/06/06/japan.nuclear.meltdown/index.html?eref=rss_topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstories+%28RSS%3A+Top+Stories%29&utm_content=Google+International

Japan confirms that they are experiencing full-blown "China Syndrome" meltdowns in Fukushima. Not controlled meltdowns like Chernobyl, but out of control, spilling into the air and ocean and spreading around the world even though the US Environmental Protection Agency and US Food and Drug Administration are refusing to follow protocol and monitor radiation levels in the ocean and fish respectively.

Which countries were telling us that everthing would be fine, not to worry, just continue about your business, trust your government? That would be Japan, US and most of the western mainstream press.

In contrast, which countries were giving warnings, criticizing the response and secrecy of Japanese authorities and specifically Tokyo Electric Power Co? That would be China, South Korea, Iran and Russia to name a few.

There can be no sharper contrast.

On March 20, 2011, CNN reported:

President Barack Obama and numerous health officials have assured U.S. residents that while radioactive particles from Japan may be detected in the U.S., there will be no health consequences from it, as the particles will disperse over the more-than-5,000 miles separating the site from the U.S. West Coast. Point of comparison: Chernobyl, a far larger nuclear disaster that happened in 1986, is closer to New York than Fukushima Daiichi is to Los Angeles, and no health effects were felt in the United States from Chernobyl, either.

Three days earlier the Russian President said, "If you look at what has happened in Japan, it is of course a colossal national disaster, a catastrophe," Medvedev said.

Four days earlier, the Tehran Times quoted the Chief Engineer of the Chernobyl disaster - "Right now the situation around the (Fukushima) power station is already much more serious than what we have today around Chernobyl," says Savin, the chief engineer of Project Uktrytiye, or Enclosure, the group of scientists charged with the continuing effort to seal off and clear out the radiation from Chernobyl. "Walking around Chernobyl is much more safe than being anywhere near the damaged plant in Japan right now. So the risk to human health there is already serious."

Who was right? Obama and western mainstream press or is it the media from everyone else?

Honesty tends to flow more freely from sources that have less to gain by selling lies and more to gain by being honest. This is why I like to listen to insiders who step up to the challenge and report difficult truths about their own country or organization. These people can be found on alternative news sites that are run on a shoestring and reach millions of people because of the content supplied freely over the internet.

Alternative news on Fukushima - http://youtu.be/P3lSLpSHBuY

Think about it - Is the western mass media a trustworthy source for informaton about the Fukushima disaster? If not, then what else are they not trustworthy to report? I can think of quite a few issues where reporting by western press is collusive, biased and wrong-headed.

Lesson - Power Corrupts.

I suppose that when you have so much power consolidated by such a few big brands that own collectively most of the mainstream outlets, you will have collusion and bias and a sellout nature when it comes to reporting. They collectively want "business as usual" moving forward... even if it means going off a cliff.

- by Tate Ulsaker

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"'Nobody's Doing Nothin' - America Is Finished"

2010-09-24T00:12:00.001+04:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRC3ytAjGeo&feature=player_embedded

This guy is upset about the apathy in the US. Beware of curse. Anyway, the guy is speaking from the heart and he represents a large and rapidly growing segment of US society.

2010-08-11T12:17:00.000+04:00

Cameras in Cars is Just Another Indicator of Tyranny

America, if you let this one go through, you deserve what you are going to get.

Come on guys. This isn't about government "helping" you.

Powerful people are tempted beyond their ability to restrain themselves. This is the structure of tyranny shaping up all around you.

God destroyed the Tower of Babylon and gave us diverse languages because humans can't handle positions of obscene power consolidation.

This won't end well. No historical or spiritual or logical reference point can argue that this is a good thing. Naked body scanners, RFID chips, global currency, gene splicing and ownership of life as property, wars of terror, bailing out the bankers with trillions ... isn't this all just part of the same eerie trend towards consolidation of power away from the 99% and towards the 1%.

Are we going to rely on the 1% to "help" us when they own the whole world? This is really silly.

A man on the moon looking at us reading the mainstream media would have a decade long belly laugh at how stupid we are to accept this "help" from the bankers and globalist elites. With "help" like that, who needs slavery?

- Tate Ulsaker

========================================

Proposed Law Would Put Video Cameras In CarsPosted by Swtnlovabl on August 10, 2010 at 10:16pm

View Swtnlovabl's blog

.SACRAMENTO (CBS13) ―

Lawmakers are considering controversial new legislation this week that would allow vehicles to be equipped with dashboard cameras to record the moments leading up to accidents.

The proposed law, AB1942, would promote safer driving habits and reduce accidents by permitting video recorders to be installed on the windshield.
The bill currently allows devices to record video, audio, how fast and which direction the vehicle is traveling, a history of where your car has been, steering and brake performance and seat belt usage.

The devices would record in a continuous loop and would only save information if there is unusual vehicle motion or a crash. They could also be capable of transmitting the information to a central control center the moment of the accident.

Proponents say there are enough safety measures to avoid an invasion of privacy, but others call the proposal a huge overreach of government power.

"Having devices like that, I think infringes on our privacy," said Patricia Lewis. "We have less of that as it is."

The American Civil Liberties Union said they are not opposed to the bill, but have a number of issues they would like to see addressed, including making sure the video monitor is the property of the car owner and ensuring the technology has an on-and-off switch.

2010-08-08T07:13:00.000+04:00

Economy Heading into Hyperinflatinoary GREATER Depression

John Williams of Shadowstats pushes Helicopter Ben Bernanke aside and gives us some meaty truth to nourish our minds.

All of the below text comes from the original article. I only added the pictures.

Cheers, Tate

================================
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article7540.html

Economy Heading for a Systemic Collapse into Hyperinflationary Great Depression

Economics / Great Depression II

Aug 05, 2010 - 02:29 PM

By: The_Energy_Report

When Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke admits to seeing an "unusually uncertain" economy ahead, it's pretty terrifying to imagine what he's really thinking. What John Williams envisions—and he's by no means looking to the far horizon—is a systemic collapse, a hyperinflationary great depression and the cessation of normal commerce. Despite that bleak outlook, however, when the economist and editor of ShadowStats.com sat down for this exclusive Energy Report interview, he also had some good news.

The Energy Report: A few months back, John, you said, "if you strangle liquidity you always contract an economy and deliberately or not, liquidity is being strangled, resulting in sharp declines in consumer credit, commercial and industrial loans." Does this mean it would spur more economic growth if banks actually started lending?

John Williams: It sure wouldn't hurt. We're still seeing contractions in liquidity, and that's adjusted for inflation. In real terms, M3 money supply is down almost 8% year-over-year. It's the sharpest fall in the post -World War II era. It's not so much the depth of the decline in the liquidity or the duration, but the fact that the liquidity turns negative year-over-year that signals the economy turning down.

We had the signal in December of 2009 indicating intensification of the downturn, in this case, within six to nine months. We're in that timeframe now and see softening numbers. People are talking about a weaker economy. Even Mr. Bernanke has described the economy as "unusually uncertain" in terms of its outlook. Wording like that from the Fed is a pretty good indication that something's afoot.

TER: Why is M3 still contracting?

JW: Just as you noted, the banks are not lending. The money the Fed put into the system in terms of buying mortgage-backed securities from the banks and trying to help bank liquidity ended up back with the Fed as excess reserves. We have well over $1 trillion there; had the banks loaned that money in the normal stream of commerce, it would have added more than $10 trillion to the broad money supply, which otherwise is up around $14 trillion. That certainly would have had some inflationary impact if not in terms of actual business activity. You can't always get the economy to grow by pushing money into it. Sometimes it's like pushing on a string.

TER: And you say that a contracting money supply is a sure sign of trouble?

JW: When it contracts year-over-year adjusted for inflation, that's a signal for a downturn or an intensified downturn. It happens every time. Squeeze liquidity and business activity contracts.

On occasion, we've had recessions without a preceding downturn in the money supply. And sometimes, the money supply has turned positive but the economy has not followed—again, pushing on the string. Expanding money supply has led to upturns as well, so the Feds had to give it a try to stimulate the economy. But the one sure signal is the downturn. You don't get it often but it's very powerful when you do.

We're beginning to see the data break. Some unusual factors have been at work. I expect an accelerating pace of downturn in the next couple of months. The numbers will turn sharply worse. Consensus estimates are already moving in that direction and most everything will follow. Industrial production is still up but retail sales have been falling. Payroll numbers have been flat when you take out the effects of the census hiring. Those employment numbers will turn down in the next month or two, providing an important indicator of renewed economic contraction.

So we'll see how it develops, but we're at that turning point. It is happening as we speak. At the end of July, we got an estimate of the second quarter GDP, where the pace of annualized growth slowed to 2.4%. The early GDP estimates are very heavily guessed at, so most of the time you don't know if you're getting a positive or a negative number. You get a margin of error of plus or minus 3% around the early reporting. That happens also to be about average growth.

Nevertheless, on a quarter-to quarter-basis, I think we'll see GDP down again in the third quarter. With the bulk of the reported GDP in the first half due to inventory building, the stage for renewed contraction has been set. By then we'll find the consensus pretty much in the camp that we're in a double-dip recession. The popular press will describe it as a double dip, but we never had a recovery. Actually, this is just a very protracted, very deep downturn that has had a pattern of falling off a cliff, bottoming out, having a little bit of bump due to stimulus and then turning down again. Sort of shaped like the path of a novice skier going down a jump for the first time. Speeding sharply down the hill, he goes up in the air and starts spinning wildly as he tries to figure out which end is up with his skis. Then he takes a pretty bad tumble. We're beginning to spin in the air.

TER: But we've been in recession for three years now?

JW: The second leg that I'm talking about is the one now underway as we get to the middle of 2010. December 2007 is when this recession officially started, although I contend that it started earlier in 2007. At any rate, the economy plunged through 2008 and well into 2009. The numbers were pretty much bottom-bouncing during the second half of 2009. The auto deals and the homebuyer deals added a little spike to the growth pattern, but that growth was stolen from the future. It didn't create new demand.

Let me just clarify a bit. Recession, at least traditionally, was defined as two consecutive quarters of contracting real GDP growth adjusted for inflation. The National Bureau of Economic Research, the defining authority as to whether we're in a recession, will deny it, but at one time they used that general guideline as well. They've always used other numbers, too, such as employment and industrial production, trying to time the beginning or the end of a recession to a particular month. Significantly they did not call an end to this recession. They said it was too early to call, but I think they had a pretty good sense of what was going to happen. So what we're seeing now just looks like an ongoing deep recession. The next down leg is going to be particularly painful and I'm afraid particularly protracted.

TER: Can the governments pull any more stimulus levers yet this year?

JW: Oh, I think they'll try, but nothing much they can do will have anything other than short-term impact. If they write everyone a check, people go out and buy things. That would give the economy a quick boost but do nothing to change the underlying fundamentals or to correct the structural problems in this recession. Those are tied to the lack of robust growth in consumer income.

TER: So consumer income is a key factor.

JW: Absolutely. If you put in housing that's related to the consumer, that's three-quarters of the GDP. The average household is not staying ahead of inflation, and unless income grows faster than inflation, the economy won't grow faster than inflation—and that means that GDP is not growing. Income sustains consumption. When income grows, consumption grows. The only way to have sustainable long-term economic growth is to have healthy growth in income. You can buy some short-term economic growth, though, without growth in income, through debt expansion, which is what Greenspan tried.

Most of the growth we'd seen in the last decade prior to this downturn was due to debt expansion. The debt structures have pretty much been put through the wringer and consumers are not expanding credit, generally because it's not available to them. Absent debt expansion and/or significant growth in income, no way can the consumer expand personal consumption. You have to address employment, quality of jobs.

TER: You're suggesting that problems with the quality of jobs, if not the quantity, goes back to Greenspan—before the recession kicked in.

JW: Yes. A lot of high-paying jobs have been lost to offshore competition, to U.S. companies moving facilities offshore and to outsourcing offshore. That's been the primary driver of declining household income.

TER: We no longer really have the option of expanding the debt and it's doubtful that even short-term stimulus will have much impact. Looking at this next leg down against that backdrop, what projections would you make about unemployment, housing prices, GDP as we look through the end of 2010 and into '11?

JW: Unemployment will be a lot worse than most people expect. Housing will continue to suffer in terms of weak demand. But in this crazy, almost perverse circumstance, the renewed weakness to a large extent will help push us into higher inflation. Real estate tends to do better with higher inflation, but it's not going to be a happy circumstance for anyone.

The government is effectively bankrupt. Using GAAP accounting principles, the annual deficit is running in the range of $4 trillion to $5 trillion. That's beyond containment. The government can't cover it with taxes. They'd still be in deficit if they took 100% of personal income and corporate profits. They'd also still be in deficit if they cut every penny of government spending except for Social Security and Medicare. Washington lacks the will to slash its social programs severely, to change its approach to ever bigger government. The only option left going forward is for the government eventually to print the money for the obligations it cannot otherwise cover, which sets up a hyperinflation.

All of what I just described was already in place when the systemic solvency crisis broke. Before this crisis the government was effectively bankrupt. In response to the crisis, the government may have gone beyond what it had to do, but you err on the side of conservatism when you're trying to prevent a systemic collapse. That was a real risk. It still is. Irrespective of the politics of big government spending, quantitative easing, renewed bailing out of banks, whatever is involved, I'd argue that the government still will do whatever it takes to prevent a systemic collapse. That last series of actions had the effect of rapidly exploding the deficit. In just a year, we went from something under $500 billion in official reporting, on a cash basis as opposed to GAAP basis, to something close to $1.5 trillion.

TER: How big will that deficit grow in this second painful and protracted period?

JW: I can't give you a hard number, but I can tell you this. The markets came into this year on consensus projections that we'd have positive economic growth. Forecasts for the federal deficit, treasury funding, banking system solvency, etc. all were based on assumptions of recovery, of positive growth. Those assumptions presumably still underlie what I consider to be an irrational stock market.

But those projections and assumptions were wrong. We're going to have negative growth. The downturn will intensify. We're not in recovery. We have states on the brink of bankruptcy. The federal government isn't going to let California or New York or Illinois collapse. Those are threats to the systemic survival. They're also going to spend a lot more to support people on unemployment. Again, putting aside election year politics and such, the banking industry will need further bailout as solvency issues come to a head again. The federal deficit is going to balloon. It's going to blow up much worse than any formulas would give you, and Treasury funding needs will explode.

TER: Clearly you see us spiraling out of control.

JW: We've been talking about an economic recession, but we are headed for something far worse. I define a depression as a 10% peak-to-trough contraction in the economy. In terms of the broad economy, we're not down 10% in GDP yet. So while we're not formally in depression, we're certainly seeing it in a number of indicators and I think we'll be in a depression, with GDP down 10%, in the near future.

A contraction greater than 25% peak-to-trough puts you in a great depression. That is what I envision, but we'll be taken there by hyperinflation and a resultant cessation of normal commerce.

TER: Hyperinflation means different things to different people. How do you define it?

JW: My definition has been and will remain very simple. When the largest-denomination note in circulation—the $100 bill in the case of the U.S. dollar—has the same value as toilet paper, you have a hyperinflation. You saw that in the Weimar Republic. People papered their walls with money.

TER: I think you've said that the only reason that Zimbabwe's economy survived is because they started using dollars as black market currency.

JW: But you don't have anything like that in the United States as a backup. We're going to have a much rougher time in the U.S., of all places, than they had in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe was able to function because people could exchange the local currency into dollars, and then buy things with the dollars, so the economy continued to function. Without some kind of a backup system, as the currency becomes worthless you'll see disruptions to key supply chains. When people don't have food, you end up in very dangerous circumstances.

TER: Do you see any real potential for precious metals or another currency as a backup?

JW: Well, yes. I think they will become a backup fairly quickly, but we don't have any widely developed black market for another currency at this point because the dollar remains the world's reserve currency. All sorts of things may develop that we don't anticipate. What will be used to cover for the dollar? Gold and silver? The precious metals are limited in supply and not widely held by the population in general. Hard currency from Canada or Australia? That wouldn't be in wide circulation, at least not early on. I think a barter system is where it will go until the currency system is stabilized, but the currency system can't stabilize until the government's fiscal house is in order.

There's no sense in setting up a currency on a gold standard if you can't live within your means, because you'd just end up going through successive devaluations against gold. So whatever's done to set up a new currency system will have to be in general conjunction with the overhaul of the government's fiscal condition. But in the interim, something of a barter system would evolve. Even that, though, is something that may take six months to get stabilized.

TER: It's hard to imagine.

JW: In the Weimar Republic, you could go into a fine restaurant one evening and enjoy its most expensive bottle of wine with a nice dinner. You'd probably negotiate the price before you sat down, because the price would be higher by the time you finished dinner. By the next morning the empty wine bottle would be worth more as scrap glass than it had been worth as an expensive bottle of wine the night before. That's how rapidly things change in a hyperinflation.

But we have a circumstance that did not exist in the Weimar Republic. Our society is heavily dependent on electronic cash. Say you have a credit card with a $10,000 limit. In hyperinflation, that $10,000 might be enough to buy you a loaf of bread.

TER: There's not even enough physical cash running around anywhere in the United States that actually represents what goes back and forth electronically. If you can't use your debit card, how do you pay for your coffee at Starbucks? And how will companies and banks adjust?

JW: You're not going to have electronic payments that are in-barter equivalent that I can foresee. That would be a fairly sophisticated system and the needs are going to be immediate. When hyperinflation starts to break, it can unfold in a matter of weeks, months. You'll need to be able to handle things rapidly. Frankly I think the system will tend to break down. It's not a happy circumstance. How will a small company get its goods to people? There might be blackouts. Who's going to get the fuel to the power plants?

TER: And to the gas stations for the cars for people who still have jobs?

JW: Yup. It will get very difficult. Society won't run as we're used to it. People will find a way, but it's going to take a little while for that to stabilize.

In an electronic society it's going to take some creative thinking by businesses. I'm sure some people will figure out some ways to accommodate these changes, but it's going to be a painful, costly process that won't be conducive to normal revenue flows—at least not as measured in inflation-adjusted dollars.

TER: I'm almost afraid to ask, but how will the stock markets fare when the system breaks down?

JW: Stocks generally tend to reflect inflation, since revenues and profits are in inflated dollars. If you look at stock prices adjusted for inflation, you can have a bear market as well as a bull market. But these are not going to be good economic times. So I think we're going to have a real bad stock market adjusted for inflation. I'd stay out of stocks in the U.S. With the U.S. markets in serious trouble, the rest of the world probably will see lower stock prices as well, but they're not going to have the hyperinflation.

TER: What will plunge us into this abyss? And when?

JW: I think the odds are extremely high that we'll see it break within the next year. I would put it six months to a year, outside. We're getting extraordinary protestations from other central banks about the U.S. finances, its solvency, risk of the dollar. Before the current crisis you never would have heard any central banker making such comments. As this breaks, it's going to be obvious that the U.S. is moving to debase its dollar. It'll have no option to do otherwise. I would fully expect some foreign holders looking to dump the Treasuries. With the dollar plunging, the Treasury won't be able to get the funding that it needs from a practical standpoint in the open markets.

The Fed will come in to salvage that situation, becoming the lender of last resort to the Treasury—literally monetizing the Treasury debt. The Fed might have a couple different ways to address the dollar situation, from raising interest rates to direct intervention, slapping on currency controls. I can't tell you exactly how it's going to go. But you'll have an environment that's effectively creating a perfect storm for the U.S. dollar. I hate to use the term but it's a good one.

Heavy dollar selling will be exceptionally inflationary. Oil prices will spike in response to the weakness in the dollar. Oil is a primary commodity that drives consumer inflation; that's how you can have inflation in a recession. The traditional wisdom is that strong demand against limited supply causes inflation, but you can also have inflation due to commodity price distortions, which is what we had back in '73 and what we've seen over the last year or so.

Most of the recent volatility in the CPI has been due to swings in oil prices, which have been directly tied to swings in the value of the U.S. dollar. About $7 trillion in liquid dollar assets that overhang the market outside the U.S. could be dumped overnight. We're going to be seeing a lot of pressure to accept that back in our system, and it will be very inflationary. The Fed's options will be limited, but again I'd expect them to try and maintain systemic solvency.

So what we end up with is a circumstance where the dollar is under heavy selling pressure. People will feel the squeeze on their inflation-adjusted income with much higher prices for gasoline and fuel oil. The route to the monetary inflation will take hold from the Fed's direct monetization of Treasury debt. As we discussed earlier, the mortgage-backed securities taken off the bank balance sheets have generally gone to excess reserves and are sitting with the Fed. That hasn't been inflationary so far because it hasn't gone into the money supply.

TER: How do we get through this, John?

JW: If there's no solution for the system—and I don't see one; I think it just has to run its course—there still is good news. We as individuals have ways of protecting ourselves, our families, our friends, our businesses—whatever is important to us. To do that we have to preserve the value of our wealth and assets in order to ride out the storm. As terrible as it will be, it will end. A time will come when things become self-righting and the people who have been able to survive will be able to do some extraordinary things.

TER: And what do you advocate in terms of individuals preserving wealth and assets?

JW: Hold some gold, silver, precious metals. I'm talking physical possession. Preferably coins because coins, sovereign coins, are recognized as such. They don't have liquidity issues. Having some assets outside the U.S., and certainly some assets outside the U.S. dollar, is a good thing. I like the Australian dollar, the Canadian dollar, the Swiss franc in particular. They won't suffer the same hyperinflation in Australia, Canada and Switzerland as we do in the U.S., so those currencies will tend to act as ways of preserving wealth. Over time real estate is a traditional store of wealth, but it's not portable and sometimes it's not liquid.

If I'm right about what's going to unfold, a significant shift in government is possible; suppose the government moved so far to the left where maybe private ownership of property was not allowed. Having a lot of assets in real estate under those circumstances might not be so good. I think generally real estate is a good bet but you also have to consider the risks. Use common sense. Think through different things that could happen.

Most importantly, build up a store of supplies, more than you would normally consume over a couple of months, particularly food and water, canned goods. Having those goods can save your life in a number of ways. You'd have food to eat, and if you have extra you can use it to barter. I met a guy who'd been through hyperinflation and found for purposes of the barter system those airline-size bottles of high-quality scotch proved quite valuable. Buy things that you would otherwise consume and rotate your inventory. Don't go out buying all sorts of things you'll never use. Keep what makes sense to you and your circumstances. Make sure you have things that are stable. Not too perishable.

I had a professor at Dartmouth who'd lived for a while in a hyperinflationary environment that devolved into a barter system. He told a story about how his father had traded his shirt for a can of sardines. He decided to eat the sardines, which was a mistake because they had gone bad. But nonetheless that can of sardines had taken on monetary value. So when you look to trade things you want to be careful what you're doing.

TER: How long does a hyperinflation environment typically last?

JW: I guess it depends on how comfortable people can be in the environment. It went on for a couple of years in Zimbabwe, but they were able to function. Here, in a system that can't function well with it, it's not going to last too long. You won't have a usable currency. It's likely a barter system would evolve, and if it became stable and functioned well, it could last for a while. People don't want to starve. If that's a real risk, they will take action to protect themselves. We may have rioting in the streets. The government might declare martial law. If people can live comfortably with hyperinflation it would tend to linger. The more difficult things are, the faster people will move to remedy it.

TER: Well on that note is there anything that we can do as voting citizens to turn this around? Or minimize the impact?

JW: If things break slowly enough that people can see what's coming and respond, tremendous change may result from what comes out of elections. Incumbents are going to have a rough time. The circumstance is open for the development of a major third party that could knock out either the Republicans or the Democrats as a second party. Over time, pocketbook issues tend to dominate elections. If things are going well, if people are prosperous, they ignore the corruption in political circles as being just part of the system. But when they're hurting, they turn out the bastards and look to put in some change. We sure need change. I can tell you that. It's not just one party. Both major parties have an equal share of guilt in what's unfolding. . .whichever one is in power keeps making it worse.

TER: Not very happy thoughts, John, but we appreciate your insights and look forward to talking with you again as we move through these trying times.

Walter J. "John" Williams, is a Baby Boomer who has been a private consulting economist and a specialist in government economic reporting for more than 25 years, working with individuals and Fortune 500 companies alike. He received his AB in economics, ***** laude, from Dartmouth College in 1971, and earned his MBA from Dartmouth's Amos Tuck School of Business Administration in 1972, where he was named an Edward Tuck Scholar. John, whose early work prompted him to study economic reporting and interview key government officials involved in the process, also surveyed business economists for their thinking about the quality of government statistics. What he learned led to front page stories in the New York Times and Investor's Business Daily, considerable coverage in the broadcast media and a joint meeting with representatives of all the government's statistical agencies. Despite a number of changes to the system since those days, he says that government reporting has deteriorated sharply in the last decade or so. On the bright side, it keeps John and his economic consultancy, Shadow Government Statistics, in the limelight. His analyses and commentaries have been featured widely in the popular domestic and international media.

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DISCLOSURE:

1) Brian Sylvester and Karen Roche of The Energy Report conducted this interview. They personally and/or their families own shares of the companies mentioned in this interview: None.

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3) Greg Gordon: See Morgan Stanley disclosure that follows.*

*The information and opinions in Morgan Stanley Research were prepared by Morgan Stanley & Co. Incorporated, and/or Morgan Stanley C.T.V.M. S.A. As used in this disclosure section, "Morgan Stanley" includes Morgan Stanley & Co. Incorporated, Morgan Stanley C.T.V.M. S.A. and their affiliates as necessary.

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2010-08-08T05:31:00.000+04:00

Marc Faber shows Robert Prechter a thing or two about global economic analysis

In criticism of Precter's Simpleton Analyses.

Prechter is a technical analyst. In other words, he uses past statistical trends to project a future prediction. This is fine when fundamentals remain constant. But fundamentals are anything but constant.
Prechter's genius is to see the future using the rear view mirror. If we are driving in a mostly straight line, this works fine and is often better than nothing when you can't simply see the future through the front window.

But in our times of total flux, re-vamping, tumultuous and upside-down spinning fundamentals, the likes of Prechter are rendering themselves into fools of the highest order.
Here is Prechter's biggest mistake made simple - He thinks that the dollar is a constant. All his models hold blind faith in the value of the dollar. Likewise, he thinks that energy and mineral availability will continue along as if the earth has unlimited capacity to feed forever growth projections moving forward. Although he didn't say this explicitly, his charting formulas imply this knuckleheaded way of thinking.
Who is he kidding?

To date, we have seen no less than 10,000 baseless fiat currencies die the value death in world history. And among those 10,000, guess how many held value over time? That's right - ZERO! Prechter is a fool to think the dollar is going to magically hover forever holding value as the Fed prints trillions from thin air to bail out the bankers.

Guys like Faber are are on the hard-core fundamentals that drive economies in flux. Prechter's simpleton analysis is useless in these times.

Cheers, Tate Ulsaker

======================

Faber: Prechter's Right on Dow 1,000 but Dollar Will Be Worthless

Friday, 06 Aug 2010 08:12 AM

Article Font Size

By: Julie Crawshaw

"The Gloom, Boom and Doom Report" publisher Marc Faber says analyst Robert Prechter is right about a lot of things, but a rising dollar isn't one of them.

Prechter, who forecasts markets using Elliot Waves, Fibonacci numbers and socioeconomic trends, says the Dow could hit 1,000.

"Prechter is right when says that when manias come to an end, prices tend to retreat to where the mania started,” Faber told CNBC. “So from this point of view, a Dow Jones at 1,000 should not be excluded."

However, Faber takes issue with Prechter's view that surviving "dollars and dollar credits, representing the denominator of the DJIA, will rise in value, and the Dow — along with everything else used as money — will fall in dollar price."

"The question here is really, with the Dow below 1,000, what kind of dollars — and especially what kind of dollar credits — will survive," Faber said.

"It is safe to assume that almost all banks in the world, and almost all governments, will be bust."

Faber concurs with Prechter that a complete credit collapse is in the offing, but differs from him on when this will happen.

"It is likely that if the Dow where to fall by more than 20 percent from the present level there would be further massive fiscal and monetary stimulus packages — not just in the U.S. but worldwide," says Faber.

"These economic policy measures would likely fail to boost economic activity in the U.S. but could support asset markets.”

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said the slowing economic recovery in the U.S. feels like a “quasi-recession” and the economy might contract again if home prices decline, Bloomberg reports.
“We’re in a pause in a recovery, a modest recovery, but a pause in the modest recovery feels like a quasi-recession,” Greenspan said in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

***

Proof of Coming Economic Storm

2010-07-09T09:29:00.001+04:00

Proof of Coming Economic Storm

A keyword search on Google News just this minute retrieved 5,917 results, indicating an active contemporary economic discussion on the issue as it relates to our current trends away from the boom, towards the bust.

Click on the text to see source articles where the text was found.

I see storm clouds on the horizon. Economic storms are typically followed by social and political ones.

Cheers,

Tate

"China has delivered a qualified vote of confidence in the dollar and US financial markets, ruling out the "nuclear option" of dumping its huge holdings of US government debt accumulated over the last decade." --> OUCH! The threats of China dumping US currency instruments is indeed a "nuclear option" and one that would put the US into the same class as Argentina and Weimar and Poland and Russia and Zimbabwe and all of the other hundreds of crashed currencies in history. Just the fact that they are talking about it is a threat. And the mainstream media is publishing these threats. It is economic sabre rattling of the highest order. Watch this space for developments. Better yet, plan to benefit from this certainty by holding more physical precious metals as soon as possible.
"Market forecaster Robert Prechter says we're on the verge of the biggest market crash since the 1720 collapse of Britain's South Sea Bubble, with the Dow nosediving to below 1,000 in the next five to six years, from around 10,000 now. Prechter, regarded as a powerful market "guru" in the late 1980s, relies on an esoteric technical-analysis tool that uses past market movements to predict future ones. "If I'm right, it will be such a shock that people will be telling their grandkids many years from now, 'Don't touch stocks,'" he says." --> Yes indeed, all economic analysts of any credibility whatsoever are saying precisely the same thing these days. Yes, it is really that obvious.
"Have you ever seen the guys playing the shell game in New York? Shuffling the three walnuts and there's supposed to be a pea under one of them? This is a shell game. Nobody is addressing the issue; there's more debt in the world than money. It's simple. It cannot be paid. It makes no difference who's on the hook for it. There's not enough money in the world to pay down the debt. Greece is bankrupt. Spain is bankrupt. Italy is bankrupt. Ireland is bankrupt. The UK is bankrupt. The U.S. is bankrupt. Japan is really bankrupt. Those are the issues we need to address-the issues for which governments are giving lip service. They're just as effective at solving this financial disaster as they are the Gulf of Mexico oil spill." --> See that, everyone is talking the same language here. Nobody of any credibility whatsoever is talking different.
"The recession is just starting, the stock market is set up for the biggest bear market crash ever, the government is going to be shocked when foreign lenders abandon it, and the dollar could devalue suddenly and catastrophically." --> From credible analysts all over the world, the pattern of speech is always the same. The only people talking different are the dummies and the con men.
"If the FED keeps funding the Treasury, this will produce monetary inflation. This will go to mass inflation: over 20% per annum. If it continues, this will go to hyperinflation."
"Throughout first 15 years of the 21st century investors and economists where debating heavily upon the economic environment. Is it deflation, inflation, stagflation or hyperinflation? Eventually, a new term emerged- Yo-Yo depression which describes an economic environment in which the economy moves violently every year or so from inflation to deflation. Well, below you can the complete list of arguments for a hyperinflationary and a deflationary depression:50 driving deflationary forces"

2010-07-08T11:02:00.002+04:00

Asymmetrical Capital Markets is another form of profitable terrorism for the United States of America today.

Interesting to read in the below article about how national security and capital markets are being considered in terms of asymmetrical warfare. And who are the capital markets terrorists then if it isn't our own SEC and COT and COMEX and CBOT, etc... who are enabling the likes of Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan to make and break markets that they both invent and then corrupt and then short sale? The pot is calling the kettle black when the US is worried about capital markets based asymmetrical warfare. I would guess that their interest is purely to keep out competitors. It is like the drug trade... The DEA and FBI and CIA arrange the arrest of all competing drug lords who don't pay their cut while US military planes fly thousands of tons of the stuff around every year, even getting caught by the media and no investigation. Just google that for loads of credible proof in the mainstream media and from our own congressmen, and insider whistle blowers etc... .

Back to the subject of "capital markets terrorism", apparently loads of consultants are rising to the increased demand by various tentacles within US national security interests for dominating / playing upon / raking in obscene profits through market manipulations under the guise of "national security". At least that is my take on all this. As the article suggests below, these guys are involved in war gaming scenarios where for example in the below, Russia starts hypothetically trading oil in gold denominated rubbles as a strategy for taking down the dollar. I say more power to the Russians if they pull off a gold alternative to the dollar and force all energy sales into that currency. People who trade with Russia would then increasingly keep more and more of their available currency in that gold rouble which isn't hyperinflating and then Iran would be emboldened to follow suit, then China. That would vacuum the demand for the dollar pretty quickly. More power to the Russkies if they manage to destroy the dollar with a commodities based currency, because we all benefit world-wide when the private money printer class gets it in the neck.

Cheers,

Tate Ulsaker

===========

Chris Whalen Paper Gold vs the Dollar?

Chris Whalen interviewed Jim Rickards for his IRA Newsletter. The discussion dealt with the fragility of the US dollar, and the possibility of the creation of a gold backed currency that could topple the US dollar as the world's reserve currency. Here are some snippets from that interview:

The IRA: Thank you for taking the time to talk with us. We previewed this interview yesterday on CNBC in a discussion with Ian Bremmer of Eurasia Group and Nouriel Roubini. We wanted to talk to you today about the global economy and the dollar. You may have seen our reference last week ("Country Risk: The World According to Robert Rubin (Updated)", June 29, 2010) to the new borrowing rights that the International Monetary Fund has created at the behest of the inflationist tendency in the White House.

Rickards: My day job is working with funds and banks, but by night I focus on the geopolitical implications of the global macroeconomic outlook....The people who can speak to a three-star general about asymmetrical warfare and then turn around and speak to a swap counterparty about collateral issues are few and far between. At Omnis we are finding more and more call for just this type of expertise. When credit default swaps are taking down Greece and you realize that Greece is a NATO ally, the reason for interest in financials by the security community is obvious.

The IRA: As we have said before, we note an increased interest in financial markets by members of the security community. If you go through the contract awards for SEC and the bank regulatory agencies you will see some names that are most often seen in the defense community.

Rickards: ....At the same time the national security community needs to understand capital markets because the security of nations is being undermined by fiscal policies and credit default swaps as we've seen in Greece. My firm is comfortable processing information in both directions; helping the national security community understand markets and helping capital markets participants understand geopolitics.

The IRA: ....But many of the "issues" facing regulators in better attacking problems in the financial markets involve process issues, not decision about the desired result. When our political class becomes so dissolute that their behavior threatens national security, it raises some issues that Americans are not used to dealing with.

Rickards: Agreed. To give you a sense of how much interest there is in financial matters in the national security community, I recently headed a panel at a program sponsored by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory.....The topic of my paper was a hypothetical press release issued by the Russian central bank announcing the creation of a new, gold-back currency. In the hypothetical, the Russians also announce that exports of energy and other natural resources will have to be made in this new "gold ruble." The Russians would become a market maker in gold and effectively control the marginal price of gold transactions. This is basically a plan for taking down the dollar.

The IRA: It is an entirely plausible scenario. The Russians could establish a "gold" price for oil and then the paper currencies would trade at a discount. Thanks to the lack of leadership in Washington by either party, the U.S. is quite vulnerable to the creation of a gold-backed or commodity-backed currency.....As a senior Fed official told us, look at the period since the 1990s. Count how many quarters we have not had either fiscal stimulus or accommodative interest rates by the Fed to maintain the illusion of growth.

Rickards: Precisely. But what is interesting is that a couple of days ago, we saw the arrest of this seemingly hapless Russian spy gang....one subject that got a lot of reaction from Moscow was gold. Whatever these people were collecting for the Russians, the information about gold was of great interest.....The paper I did is getting written up all over the web. But the fact that the information on gold touched a nerve in Moscow confirms my view about their intentions toward the dollar.

The IRA: Well it is so obvious. We interviewed David Kotok of Cumberland Advisers last month, some of which will appear in Chris Whalen's upcoming book. Kotok just published a bullish book on Europe, Invest in Europe Now, and Kotok is even more bullish today. As he puts it, the Greeks gave the Germans a 20% currency devaluation. Kotok thinks that the crisis in Europe will eventually force the EU to fully integrate. But we speak to insiders with precisely the opposite view, who say the Europeans do not have a grip on the financial problems. Does the EU emerge stronger from the crisis?

Rickards: I agree with the view that says the EU gets stronger. I keep reminding people that the European Central Bank and the 16 members of the monetary system have over 10,000 tons of gold. They have more gold that the U.S. Treasury. We have just over 8,100 tons ourselves. If the EU were to go to even a partial reserve coverage with gold, say 20% backing, it would put Europe at an enormous advantage. They have enough gold today to set a target and make a two-way market in gold. I think that the first major currency bloc that goes to gold will dominate the financial world because it will become the only currency anybody will want.....

The IRA: This is the idiocy of the U.S. position. We have set ourselves up as an easy target for our enemies. It is astounding that the Chinese have not been more aggressive in selling dollars. Maybe they are going to manage our downfall gently.

Rickards: ....The Japanese and Chinese are both influenced by Zen which, in Western jargon, is really about optionality.....Instead of committing yourself to a binary decision, you create a fan of probabilities and look for your openings. So in that sense, if you think of it in options space, the Chinese are probably content to play the American paper game with the dollar, but all the while preparing for the day when the dollar collapses completely.

The IRA: Americans are convinced that it cannot happen here, the greatest nation on earth. Reminds us of France after WWI. Same degree of self-delusion. And no reaction by U.S. officials to the Chinese and Russia gold purchases?

Rickards: The Russians do not hide their purchases of gold.....The Chinese have been more surreptitious in their purchases but even they have announced the reserves doubled in recent years....they are buying from internal, captive producers. And they pay below market prices because even paying $800 per ounce still gives their miners a tremendous profit. Between 2004 and 2008, China almost doubled the gold stocks of Peoples Bank of China, but they bought it through other state agencies to keep it off their books.

To read the entire interview with Jim Rickards which is contained in the piece Paper Gold vs the Dollar? CLICK HERE.

To hear the recent King World News interview with Jim Rickards CLICK HERE.

To hear the recent King World News interview with Chris Whalen CLICK HERE.

Eric King
KingWorldNews.com
To return to BLOG click here.

We Are Entering Another Great Depression - UK Telegraph

2010-07-06T03:39:00.000+04:00

Here it is, another mainstream news article, the UK Telegraph says we are entering another Great Depression.

The big one that we have been watching unfold for 10-years looks to be very close to us again.

Will they print more trillions to prolong a few more months (this is called “stimulus”)?

Or will the correction actually come in full force this time?

The debt is the gauge to follow. Unprecedented historic never-before seen public /private / corporate debts need to be corrected / cleansed / brought back in line with reality.

For the short term, being in precious metals and out of paper is an excellent position to be in when this happens.

For the long term, being as self reliant as possible when it comes to food, energy, security is also an excellent position of strength as systems of all kind become unreliable.

Cheers,

Tate

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Telegraph.co.uk

With the US trapped in depression, this really is starting to feel like 1932

The US workforce shrank by 652,000 in June, one of the sharpest contractions ever. The rate of hourly earnings fell 0.1pc. Wages are flirting with deflation.

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
Published: 9:33PM BST 04 Jul 2010

135 Comments

People queue for a job fair in New York. The share of the US working-age population with jobs in June fell from 58.7pc to 58.5pc. The ratio was 63pc three years ago. Photo: EPA

"The economy is still in the gravitational pull of the Great Recession," said Robert Reich, former US labour secretary. "All the booster rockets for getting us beyond it are failing."

· Monetary union has left half of Europe trapped in depression

· Asia needs to fully wake up to the scale of the West's economic crisis

· Buy-to-let: rents rise for first time in three months

· Eurozone falls into deflation as M3 money supply shrinks

· Wages fall at fastest rate since records began

· Deflation: workers face more pay freezes as prices fall at sharpest rate since 1933

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard: Comment

"Home sales are down. Retail sales are down. Factory orders in May suffered their biggest tumble since March of last year. So what are we doing about it? Less than nothing," he said.

California is tightening faster than Greece. State workers have seen a 14pc fall in earnings this year due to forced furloughs. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is cutting pay for 200,000 state workers to the minimum wage of $7.25 an hour to cover his $19bn (£15bn) deficit.

Can Illinois be far behind? The state has a deficit of $12bn and is $5bn in arrears to schools, nursing homes, child care centres, and prisons. "It is getting worse every single day," said state comptroller Daniel Hynes. "We are not paying bills for absolutely essential services. That is obscene."

Roughly a million Americans have dropped out of the jobs market altogether over the past two months. That is the only reason why the headline unemployment rate is not exploding to a post-war high.

Let us be honest. The US is still trapped in depression a full 18 months into zero interest rates, quantitative easing (QE), and fiscal stimulus that has pushed the budget deficit above 10pc of GDP.

The share of the US working-age population with jobs in June actually fell from 58.7pc to 58.5pc. This is the real stress indicator. The ratio was 63pc three years ago. Eight million jobs have been lost.

The average time needed to find a job has risen to a record 35.2 weeks. Nothing like this has been seen before in the post-war era. Jeff Weninger, of Harris Private Bank, said this compares with a peak of 21.2 weeks in the Volcker recession of the early 1980s.

"Legions of individuals have been left with stale skills, and little prospect of finding meaningful work, and benefits that are being exhausted. By our math the crop of people who are unemployed but not receiving a check amounts to 9.2m."

Republicans on Capitol Hill are filibustering a bill to extend the dole for up to 1.2m jobless facing an imminent cut-off. Dean Heller from Vermont called them "hobos". This really is starting to feel like 1932.

Washington's fiscal stimulus is draining away. It peaked in the first quarter, yet even then the economy eked out a growth rate of just 2.7pc. This compares with 5.1pc, 9.3pc, 8.1pc and 8.5pc in the four quarters coming off recession in the early 1980s.

The housing market is already crumbling as government props are pulled away. The expiry of homebuyers' tax credit led to a 30pc fall in the number of buyers signing contracts in May. "It is cataclysmic," said David Bloom from HSBC.

Federal tax rises are automatically baked into the pie. The Congressional Budget Office said fiscal policy will swing from
a net +2pc of GDP to -2pc by late 2011. The states and counties may have to cut as much as $180bn.

Investors are starting to chew over the awful possibility that America's recovery will stall just as Asia hits the buffers. China's manufacturing index has been falling since January, with a downward lurch in June to 50.4, just above the break-even line of 50. Momentum seems to be flagging everywhere, whether in Australian building permits, Turkish exports, or Japanese industrial output.

On Friday, Jacques Cailloux from RBS put out a "double-dip alert" for Europe. "The risk is rising fast. Absent an effective policy intervention to tackle the debt crisis on the periphery over coming months, the European economy will double dip in 2011," he said.

It is obvious what that policy should be for Europe, America, and Japan. If budgets are to shrink in an orderly fashion over several years – as they must, to avoid sovereign debt spirals – then central banks will have to cushion the blow keeping monetary policy ultra-loose for as long it takes.

The Fed is already eyeing the printing press again. "It's appropriate to think about what we would do under a deflationary scenario," said Dennis Lockhart for the Atlanta Fed. His colleague Kevin Warsh said the pros and cons of purchasing more bonds should be subject to "strict scrutiny", a comment I took as confirmation that the Fed Board is arguing internally about QE2.

Perhaps naively, I still think central banks have the tools to head off disaster. The question is whether they will do so fast enough, or even whether they wish to resist the chorus of 1930s liquidation taking charge of the debate. Last week the Bank for International Settlements called for combined fiscal and monetary tightening, lending its great authority to the forces of debt-deflation and mass unemployment. If even the BIS has lost the plot, God help us.

Tracking the Crash this Week with Eric King

2010-07-01T23:36:00.001+04:00

Financial events are happening at a rapid clip right now. The US Dollar looks to be at some stage of dying. There was never any serious debate over IF the dollar would die. All fiat currencies devalue over time until they arrive at zero value. The only question is WHEN the dollar will become worthless. I would suggest that the death will be rather sudden, taking most people by surprise. That is how it always happens. - Tate Ulsaker

Here is a quick roundup of select financial collapse related issues mostly sourced from Eric King's excellent blog over the past week -

The Fed, Debt and Systemic Collapse of the US - Eric King wrote after interviewing both Ron and Rand Paul, "Having a discussion about the Fed, massive debt and the systemic collapse of the United States with two of the most qualified individuals in US politics today cemented in my mind that we are in a depressionary cycle, and their is virtually no way out for a variety of reasons. This is why it is so important for readers to protect themselves and their families from the next wave down." To hear the interview with Dr. Rand Paul and Congressman Ron Paul on King World News CLICK HERE.
Unemployment at 16.6% + Home Prices To Fall 50% - Eric King points out "Some may call it a recession or the "Great Recession" but a depression by any other name is still a depression and in the end the real numbers don't lie."
Brett Arends, WSJ.com and MarketWatch says - "There is no double-dip, just a continuation of the Great Recession. I have been calling this "The Great Credit Crunch". On April 26th predicted the beginning of the second leg of the multi-year bear market which is again led by housing and financials. read more...."
Widening US Deficit To Collapse the Dollar - The graph on this article says it all... the current snapshot is horrendous and yet the government prediction for future spending just gets worse. Hey, we are already beyond anything close to historic levels of debt-to-GDP ration, exceeding Great Depression levels by twice currently and widening. What are they thinking? Projections for revenues are a pipe dream. As Eric King correctly says in the article - "As the chasm increases in size between spending and revenue, faith in the US dollar will evaporate. This will lead to a significant devaluation of the dollar, or an outright collapse."
Strength In Gold A Surprise To Many Traders - Eric King reminds us of investing basics that we need to remember as this gold boom turns into an outright explosion in precious metals prices to historic significance - "Remember that bull markets always surprise on the upside, so never give up your position. If you are afraid of your positions because you think gold will fall you have missed the point and probably will never make any money in the markets. Buy and hold during secular bull markets and stop worrying about gyrations in price."

And then the following article just appeared today, quoting in full -

Jim Rickards - Financial Equivalent of the Atomic Bomb

There are legitimate concerns over the safety of citizens in the event of a financial collapse in the United States where confidence is lost and the dollar plunges. We are mired in a depression, and the central planners continue to look for solutions to keep the monetary system from completely buckling. In his latest interview, Jim Rickards warned of a coming financial catastrophe and civil unrest. This was a portion from that sobering interview:

Jim Rickards: "But that could be a very chaotic process...Some people did die, there were riots in the streets. I mean people think that this is far fetched, and there is always the attitude that it can't happen here. But I know in my own lifetime you know in 1970 and '71, I mean I saw armored personnel carriers with armed troops in the streets of Georgetown, tear gas on the mall, civilians rounded up, and there weren't enough jails to put them in, so they herded them into RFK Stadium. I mean this sounds like scenes from Allende's Chile, but they were actually scenes from the Nixon administration from Washington in the early 70's."

Eric King: "Those people that were rounded up, that was in the tens of thousands wasn't it?"

Jim Rickards: "Correct, right, this is not fantasy, this is not fringe thinking. These are concrete facts. I mean I saw them with my own eyes, I don't need a historian to tell me what happened. I was there, and when you tamper with very fundamental things such as the value of your currency which everyone uses to make all of their investment decisions, all of their economic decisions, all of their job decisions, people are basing all of that on a unit of value and when you undermine the unit of value you undermine the entire economy, and from that you can very easily slip into civil disorder. It's fair to give people warning about that."

As mentioned in Jim Rickards interview with King World News, this week, here is the promised link to his 40 page piece "Economics and Financial Attacks" - (Attacks in this line of operation include targeting or acquiring sensitive financial, trade, or economic policy information, proprietary economic data, or critical technologies, and the potential impact to national security.)

Jim was asked not only to attend, but also to put together the above piece, be a speaker, and to sit on discussion panels at the high level Unrestricted Warfare Symposium. This was a gathering of the leading figures from the military intelligence community.

Jim gives a hypothetical description of the Russian Central Bank introducing a gold backed currency which would cause an overnight massive devaluation of the US dollar. Jim described this as the financial equivalent of the atomic bomb.

To hear the recent in-depth interview with Jim Rickards on King World News CLICK HERE.

Eric King

KingWorldNews.com

To return to BLOG click here.

The Upcoming US Dollar Crash = Biggest Transfer of Wealth in History

2010-06-29T08:25:00.000+04:00

The Upcoming US Dollar Crash = Biggest Transfer of Wealth in History

Yup, we all see it coming. The Upcoming US Dollar Crash = Biggest Transfer of Wealth in History, guaranteed the Federal Reserve’s own “Helicopter Ben” as he continues his policy of printing money for his banker friends by the trillions of dollars per quarter, as if from a volcano, into a confetti parade of debt monetization. Ouch, what a headache this party is going to give us when hyperinflation sets in.

As in the last 100-years, even more in the near future as the great transfer of wealth continues. In the big picture, this is all part of a 100-year trend isn’t it? Since the creation of the Federal Reserve System, the dollar has already lost over 96% of its value. Who continues to benefit from that?

If you put your ear to the sky and listen very carefully, you will hear a giant sucking sound. That is the sound of wealth transferring away from 90% of us who earn and save in dollar denominated paper assets. The big winners of this wealth vacuum are the 1% who facilitate newly printed money into depressed, crashed hard assets like forests, factories, real estate, etc…

Rough estimate on how this crash will play out - The 1% win big / 90% lose big / 9% remaining stay about the same. A glance at bonuses of bankers illustrates this fact quite clearly, and by the way, isn’t it their fault that we are in this mess? But nevermind…

“The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.” – Taken from Matt Taibbi’s seismic Rolling Stone piece on Goldman Sachs.

…Even the mainstream news on Drudgereport.com right now admits that the worst is yet to come…

· KRUGMAN: 'We are now, I fear, in the early stages of a third depression'...

· SCARY OBAMA: 'VERY DIFFICULT CHOICES AHEAD' ON DEFICITS...

· Says he's serious...

· Prepare for 'monster' money-printing by Fed...

Charts of the dollar clearly show what looks to be a peaking top, poised for another drop…

For example, dollar index last 2 years…

Dollar index last 40 years indicates growing weakness as a world currency compared to other currencies in the index basket. (The dollar index is of course a comparison of the dollar to other failing fiat currencies, all devaluing over time towards that magic number - “0”).

Dow expressed in terms of gold indicates that we are about half way through the downward correction, which is really just a natural process of cleansing of the historic never before seen levels of debt in public, private and corporate hands.

We have much-much more to go before the historical bottom when the value of the Dow = Gold.

Before we are done with this crash, the DOW will equal Gold!

What?

I said, historically speaking, before we are done with this crash, the DOW will equal Gold!

Will the DOW and Gold meet at 1000?

Will they meet at 20,000?

Depends upon how much printing the central bank does. I would guess closer to the 20,000 number. Imagine a 20,000 dollar gold coin and the DOW sitting at 20,000. What would the price of milk be at that time, about 20 dollars? It always happens like that and never does it not happen like that. We have a 100% guarantee that fiat currency always goes to zero over time. The only question is the time it takes to get from here to there.

Gold is good, but what about the poor man’s gold? What about the big picture for silver? Good questions. Price of silver adjusted for inflation for many hundreds of years going back shows that a return towards the historical norm can expected. Downward pressures on precious metals are backing off.

You can’t go wrong if you own real money, 6000 year storage of wealth in precious metals.

If you still feel uncertain about shifting paper denominated wealth into precious metals, consider this – In all of world history there have been 10,000 fiat currencies (not backed by any asset). And of all of those, none have held value over time. This is a zero to 10,000 gamble with losers holding paper and winners holding precious metals.

All of the arrows are pointing in the same direction à Physical Precious Metals are already showing themselves a winning choice, not yet half finished booming against most paper out there, according to core driving medium term and long term indicators.

The case couldn’t be clearer for what is destined to boom and what is doomed to bust. Place your bets wisely.

Cheers,

Tate Ulsaker

‘Kill Switch’ To Shut Down The Internet

2010-06-18T05:20:00.001+04:00

'Kill Switch' To Shut Down The Internet - Like we didn't see this coming! The free internet is doing so much damage to the globalist agenda. Their hand is being forced to regulate, tax, control, monitor and even "kill switch" our ablity to pass information around the world unregulated at light speed. Those in monopoly power of money creation don't want us to be aware of how things really work in the halls of power. The ruling elite require dumbed down masses and willing debt slaves. But even in Soviet Russia there were the arts. A lot can be said with sarcasm that government censorship can't comprehend. -Tate Ulsaker

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

New Bill Gives Obama 'Kill Switch' To Shut Down The Internet

Government would have "absolute power" to seize control of the world wide web under Lieberman legislation

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Wednesday, June 16, 2010

The federal government would have "absolute power" to shut down the Internet under the terms of a new US Senate bill being pushed by Joe Lieberman, legislation which would hand President Obama a figurative "kill switch" to seize control of the world wide web in response to a Homeland Security directive.

Lieberman has been pushing for government regulation of the Internet for years under the guise of cybersecurity, but this new bill goes even further in handing emergency powers over to the feds which could be used to silence free speech under the pretext of a national emergency.

"The legislation says that companies such as broadband providers, search engines or software firms that the US Government selects "shall immediately comply with any emergency measure or action developed" by the Department of Homeland Security. Anyone failing to comply would be fined," reports ZDNet's Declan McCullagh.

The 197-page bill (PDF) is entitled Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act, or PCNAA.

Technology lobbying group TechAmerica warned that the legislation created "the potential for absolute power," while the Center for Democracy and Technology worried that the bill's emergency powers "include authority to shut down or limit internet traffic on private systems."

The bill has the vehement support of Senator Jay Rockefeller, who last year asked during a congressional hearing, "Would it had been better if we'd have never invented the Internet?" while fearmongering about cyber-terrorists preparing attacks.

The largest Internet-based corporations are seemingly happy with the bill, primarily because it contains language that will give them immunity from civil lawsuits and also reimburse them for any costs incurred if the Internet is shut down for a period of time.

"If there's an "incident related to a cyber vulnerability" after the President has declared an emergency and the affected company has followed federal standards, plaintiffs' lawyers cannot collect damages for economic harm. And if the harm is caused by an emergency order from the Feds, not only does the possibility of damages virtually disappear, but the US Treasury will even pick up the private company's tab," writes McCullagh.

Tom Gann, McAfee's vice president for government relations, described the bill as a "very important piece of legislation".

As we have repeatedly warned for years, the federal government is desperate to seize control of the Internet because the establishment is petrified at the fact that alternative and independent media outlets are now eclipsing corporate media outlets in terms of audience share, trust, and influence.

We witnessed another example of this on Monday when establishment Congressman Bob Etheridge was publicly shamed after he was shown on video assaulting two college students who asked him a question. Two kids with a flip cam and a You Tube account could very well have changed the course of a state election, another startling reminder of the power of the Internet and independent media, and why the establishment is desperate to take that power away.

The government has been searching for any avenue possible through which to regulate free speech on the Internet and strangle alternative media outlets, with the FTC recently proposing a "Drudge Tax" that would force independent media organizations to pay fees that would be used to fund mainstream newspapers.

Similar legislation aimed at imposing Chinese-style censorship of the Internet and giving the state the power to shut down networks has already been passed globally, including in the UK, New Zealand and Australia.

We have extensively covered efforts to scrap the internet as we know it and move toward a greatly restricted "internet 2″ system. Handing government the power to control the Internet would only be the first step towards this system, whereby individual ID's and government permission would be required simply to operate a website.

The Lieberman bill needs to be met with fierce opposition at every level and from across the political spectrum. Regulation of the Internet would not only represent a massive assault on free speech, it would also create new roadblocks for e-commerce and as a consequence further devastate the economy.

WikiLeaks Founder Has ANOTHER Massacre Video

2010-06-17T04:06:00.001+04:00

Question - Where is it is a crime to report a crime?

Answer - In a criminal and collapsing empire.

Check this out -

"American officials have acknowledged in the past that they are concerned about the release of the Garani video (massacre video) , fearing that it could undermine public support for the American military campaign in Afghanistan both in that country and in the United States. Pentagon officials were outraged by WikiLeaks' release of the Baghdad video this spring."

- HA!

Oh poor guys. The war profits will surffer if peole see a video showing a bomb landing on 140 dirt poor innocent civilians. Meanwhile, there are another 5-6 miillion innocents dead since Yugoslavia and "support the troops" policies continue to confound explanation because nobody has a clue what all these "pre-emptive wars" are all about other than conquest and no-bid contracts.

We need more whistleblowers and more Wikileaks. Look at who is doing that, just young kids. Isn't there an adult somewhere higher up in the system who will turn his or her back on the war profits crowd?

-Tate Ulsaker

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

WikiLeaks Founder Has Massacre Video

by Philip Shenon Info

Julian Assange, who the Feds fear may release State Dept. secrets, denies having them—but he's readying video of a deadly U.S. airstrike in Afghanistan.

After several days underground, the founder of the secretive website WikiLeaks has gone public to disclose that he is preparing to release a classified Pentagon video of a U.S. airstrike in Afghanistan last year that left as many as 140 civilians dead, most of them children and teenagers.

In an email obtained by The Daily Beast that was sent to WikiLeaks supporters in the United States Tuesday, Julian Assange, the website's Australian-born founder, also defends a 22-year-old Army intelligence specialist who is now under arrest in Kuwait on charges that he leaked classified Pentagon combat videos, as well as 260,000 State Department cables, to WikiLeaks.

"Mr. Manning allegedly also sent us 260,000 classified US Department cables, reporting on the actions of US Embassy's [sic] engaging in abusive actions all over the world," Assange said in an email. "We have denied the allegation, but the US government is acting as if the allegation is true."

American officials have said they are eager to determine the whereabouts of Assange, who canceled an appearance last Friday in Las Vegas, to discourage him from releasing any more classified information on his website, which is nominally based in Sweden and promotes itself as a global resource for whistleblowers. As recently as two weeks ago, Assange, who first gained global notoriety as a computer hacker, was in his native Australia.

In April, his website posted a copy of a classified Pentagon video of a 2007 American helicopter attack in Baghdad in which a dozen people were killed; that video is also believed to have been leaked by the Army intelligence analyst, Specialist Bradley Manning of Potomac, Maryland.

While denying again that WikiLeaks has the State Department cables, Assange acknowledges in the email today that he is in custody of the May 2009 video that shows the airstrike on the Afghan village of Garani, believed to be the most lethal combat strike in Afghanistan—in terms of civilian deaths—since the United States invaded the country in 2001. Assange writes that "we are still working on" preparations for release of the video of "the Garani massacre."

The State Department and Pentagon did not immediately comment on Assange's email message.

American officials have acknowledged in the past that they are concerned about the release of the Garani video, fearing that it could undermine public support for the American military campaign in Afghanistan both in that country and in the United States. Pentagon officials were outraged by WikiLeaks' release of the Baghdad video this spring.

State Department officials are especially alarmed by the potential that Assange might post the huge library of classified department memos that Manning is reported to have bragged of providing to WikiLeaks earlier this year. The department has confirmed that it is conducting a forensic examination of Manning's computer equipment for evidence of what he may have downloaded.

In the email, Assange does not confirm any relationship between the website and Manning, describing him as "one of our alleged sources."

But he suggests that Manning is being treated unfairly—"detained and shipped to a US military prison in Kuwait, where he is being held" without trial.

"Manning is alleged to have acted according to his conscience and leaked to us the Collateral Murder video and the video of a massacre that took place in Afghanistan last year at Garani," Assange continues.

"Mr. Manning allegedly also sent us 260,000 classified US Department cables, reporting on the actions of US Embassy's [sic] engaging in abusive actions all over the world. We have denied the allegation, but the US government is acting as if the allegation is true and we do have a lot of other material that exposes human rights abuses by the United States government." Assange does not reveal exactly what that other material might be.

American officials are treating Assange's claim that he does not have the State Department emails with skepticism, suggesting that he is playing word games—that while he may not have exactly 260,000 cables, he has a large number of them.

Assange seems to enjoying taunting the United States government and news organizations with information that is not always accurate. Last Friday, WikiLeaks—which tends to communicate with the outside world through Twitter messages–created a flurry when it disclosed via tweet that Assange was scheduled to appear that afternoon at a journalists' conference in Las Vegas. The Twitter notice failed to mention that Assange had canceled his appearance several days earlier because of unspecified security concerns.

The arrest of Manning became public last week after Wired magazine disclosed that Manning had been turned in to authorities by another former computer hacker, Adrian Lamo, who had been contacted by Manning for counsel. Much of the evidence against Manning is contained in an Internet chat log that Lamo has already turned over to authorities.

In an interview with The Daily Beast on Monday, Lamo said that he had been interviewed for nearly 12 hours this weekend by investigators from the Defense Department, the State Department, and the FBI, as formal criminal charges are being prepared for Manning. Lamo said he was motivated to turn in Manning out of fear that the classified information he had provided to WikiLeaks could put lives in danger—within the United States government and elsewhere.

Lamo said he is convinced that Manning did have access to highly classified State Department cables, and that Manning's boast of having stolen 260,000 cables sounds truthful.

In his email, Assange asks supporters for money, citing "an enforced lack of resources" for the website. "Please donate and tell the world you have done so," he writes. "Encourage all your friends to follow the example you set, after all, courage is contagious."

Philip Shenon, a former investigative reporter at The New York Times, is the author of The Commission: The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation.

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For inquiries, please contact The Daily Beast at editorial@thedailybeast.com.

• Philip Shenon: Leaker May Face Espionage Charges

• Philip Shenon: Pentagon Manhunt

• Philip Shenon: The State Department's Worst Nightmare

• Sam Bungey: The Man Behind WikiLeaks

Jim Rickards Discovers IMF Gold-Based Currency Document

2010-06-16T09:04:00.001+04:00

The IMF is considering what to do after the US currency collapse. Guess what they want? Gold!

This should get very interesting for the gold bulls because all of their wildest dreams could happen overnight.

Will the globalist want a world currency based on gold and at the same time will they make gold illegal to hold?

And how about silver, the investment + industrial metal?

I would rather hold illegal gold and silver for the long term than hold whatever paper currency these guys invent.

The IMF document is accessible on a link at the bottom of this blog. It is highly readable and interesting. No doubt, they are intersted in putting gold into the formula for the new currency post dollar collapse and I can just see them pushing this "new and improved post-collapse currency" non-solution over the airwaves. It is going to be just another ponzi scheme for these guys to keep control into the next era where we again build up the post collapse world while the printers once again rake in profits on the backs of earners. Nothing in this world will change so long as we don't have a sound money system. And if these guys currently in control of things are presenting a new system then without a doubt, it will be rigged.

Cheers, Tate

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Jim Rickards - Discovers IMF Document

The IMF distributed a document late on a Friday when its representatives thought no one would catch it. Leave it to Jim Rickards of Omnis Inc. to track it down. The IMF document discusses the gold standard and gold's role as a monetary unit. Jim discussed the importance of this in our interview released yesterday and below is a link of the IMF document he located.

From the opening of the IMF Document:

"Under the Gold Standard, the major national currencies were freely convertible to gold at a fixed exchange rate, with adjustment largely undertaken through flexible prices, wages and income. This system survived up to the outbreak of the First World War, and while it was subsequently re-established in a modified form following a painful period of post-war disinflation, the economic and political strains of the Great Depression led to the system's ultimate collapse in the 1930s."

They left out the fact that the Federal Reserve was created one year prior to the outbreak of World War I and it helped to fuel the credit boom which caused so many dislocations and human suffering.

Putting that aside for a moment because that is a discussion for another day, the very fact that an IMF document was discussing a history of gold in such detail as this one does surprised me. There is much more in the IMF piece, but let's move on to Jim Rickards thoughts from his interview:

"But the alternative is to find another engine, another liquidity pump if you will, and that's clearly what the G-20 leadership would like to do, and their sort of chosen candidate are the SDR's, and their chosen vehicle is the IMF. So basically the IMF putting out SDR's, will over time displace the Fed printing dollars as the engine of world trade, world liquidity and world growth."

"So, that can't happen overnight, that is a momentous shift. It's going to require a lot of consensus building among the G-20 members. So what they do is they put these papers out, get the dialogue going and get it on the agenda, talk about it, get people kind of used to it. The average citizen has kind of no idea, it's not that their dumb it's just that they're not necessarily informed or trained in this fairly technical area, and so it's the kind of thing the elites can pull off without a lot of accountability and they are definitely headed in that direction."

Jim's interview covers tremendous ground. It is linked below.

Eric King

KingWorldNews.com

To hear the recent in-depth interview with Jim Rickards on King World News CLICK HERE.

To read the IMF document CLICK HERE.

The Silver Story

2010-06-16T08:27:00.001+04:00

Dear Everyone,

People are asking about the difference between Gold and Silver as an investment in this crash.

As most of you know, I have greatly favored silver over gold. Gold is good but silver is a multiple of good additional than gold and the reason is related to what analysts call "The Silver Story".

When the Silver Story is known, it will go up.

When silver goes up, the silver story will become known.

It is just a matter of time.

The below items are what I consider to be direct and credible access to the silver story, which should be self explanatory as to why there are so many hard core silver fanatics out there.

My primary source is Ted Butler so if you find fault with his analysis I would be keen to know:

http://news.silverseek.com/TedButler/1161705933.php - Table in the middle of the story shows industrial drawdown of silver
http://www.silverinstitute.org/silver_uses.php - Shows 3 categories of silver market demand

3. The above, taken together, leads us to the conclusion - http://news.silverseek.com/TedButler/1160149628.php

"INDUSTRIAL USER PANIC
"The amount of silver used in each industrial application, while vital to the finished item, is a tiny percentage of the product's total cost. This means industrial users will not readily substitute other materials for silver in a price rise. If the price of silver jumps significantly, they will be more inclined to build inventories.

"When the inevitable silver shortage hits, it will be only a matter of time before industrial users try to protect themselves from delays and price increases. They will attempt to build inventories of silver. You don't risk the shutdown of an assembly line for want of a single, low-cost component.

"As industrial users try to immunize themselves from assembly line shutdowns, extraordinary demand will make the supply tighter.

"This is how panics occur. The price of palladium rose to over $1,100 an ounce because industrial users panicked and built inventories. Silver is used in many more applications than palladium. That increases the chance that silver users will panic and try to build inventories. If a panic does develop, there is only one known cure - it must burn itself out at extremely high prices."

4. In addition to the above trend, we also have a wholly separate bullish factor of the historic short position to consider, as follows:

In his most recent commentary, "The Smoking Gun, Part II", Butler lays out the obvious (and heinous) facts. The Comex criminals (composed of a gang of four banks), now control at least 72.5% of the Comex "short" position. To provide some context, this is more than five times as large a concentration, as when the Hunt Brothers were accused of "cornering the market" in silver – on the long side... the greatest "short-squeeze" in the history of markets (at least on a percentage basis

So the silver story basically is a "perfect storm" scenario of the following factors coming together:

Massive industrial drawdown of supply
Increasing and diverse demand increasing
Easy to get silver already gotten with cheap energy
People ready to shift because currency losing value
Unprecedented concentrated short position speaks to a bullish rise when manipulation gives way to physical shortages
Safety in a 6,000 year history of money
Large market from buyers globally - Poor man's metal

Gold is also good, I don't think anyone denies that.

Cheers,

Tate

A Suggested Survival List

2010-06-16T04:58:00.001+04:00

Dear Friends,

Someone gave this to me years ago and now the author recently updated it.

A popular subject increasingly around the world today.

I passed this around the office. Tell you what, this trend is a big one around the world. People are seriously waking up and it is about time.

Cheers,

Tate

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

http://chuckbaldwinlive.com/home/?p=1724

Posted on Jun 15, 2010

A Suggested Survival List

Categories: Archived Columns, Columns by Chuck Baldwin

This column was initially released last December. Without a doubt, this has been one of my most requested columns. So, in response to the large number of readers who have asked me to re-release this column, I do so today. And in doing so, I have added some new material to the original column.

One does not have to be a prophet to know that we are on the precipice of some potentially catastrophic–or at the very least, challenging–days. In fact, most of us are already in challenging days, and some are already enduring catastrophic events. That is, if one would call being out of work, losing one's home, facing life-threatening medical conditions without any prospect of medical insurance, several families being forced to live in one house due to homes being foreclosed, etc., catastrophic.

The potential for an escalation of cataclysmic events, however, is very real. Only a "blooming idiot" would call someone who attempts to prepare for "the day of adversity" a Chicken Little now. Anyone who does not see the storm clouds on the horizon isn't paying attention.

For example, can one imagine what would happen if terrorists nuked a major American city or cities? (Once again, I encourage readers to go get the videos of the CBS TV series "Jericho" to get an idea of how quickly life, and even civilization, could change.) Imagine if there was another 9/11-type event. What would happen if some form of Zimbabwe-style inflation hit the US? What would happen if anything disrupted the distribution of Welfare checks, or food to local grocers? Imagine a Hurricane Katrina-style natural disaster in your town. I think people everywhere are beginning to awaken to just how vulnerable we all really are.

As a result, people from virtually every walk of life have recently been asking my thoughts on how they should prepare. Therefore, I will attempt to share with my readers some of the counsel I have given these folks.

First, a disclaimer. I am not an economist; I am not a survival expert; I am not a firearms expert; I am not an attorney; I am not a physician. In fact, I am not an expert in anything! For several years, however, I have tried to learn from others. I am an avid reader. My work has allowed me to travel extensively. I have had the privilege of sitting at the feet of–and learning from–many of America's most learned, most trained, and most qualified "experts" in a variety of fields. What I write today, I have learned from others. I've formed my own opinions and priorities, of course, but everything I'm sharing has been said, or written about, before. But if I can share something in today's column that will help someone be better prepared for the days to come, then my goal will have been achieved.

Location:

First, analyze your living conditions. Where do you live? Do you live in an urban or rural environment? Is it a big city or small town? Do you live in an apartment or condominium? How close are your neighbors? Do you even know your neighbors? Would you trust them if the electricity was off and they were hungry? Could you grow your own food, if you had to? How easily could you secure your home? If you live in a cold weather environment, how long could you stay warm without electricity? These are the kinds of questions you need to ask yourself now.

Over the past several decades, masses of people have migrated into large metropolitan areas. More people live in urban areas than at any time in American history. While this may be well and good for times of prosperity, it is an absolute nightmare in any kind of disaster. Does anyone remember what New Orleans looked like after Hurricane Katrina came through? Can anyone recall what happened in downtown Los Angeles during the 1992 riots? Needless to say, any inner-city environment could become a powder keg almost instantaneously, given the right (or wrong) circumstances. And the bigger the city, the bigger the potential problems.

If you live in the inner city, I suggest you consider moving to a more rural location. Obviously, now is a very good time to buy property (especially rural property), but the downside is, selling property is not as favorable. If you can afford it, now is a great time to buy a "safe house" outside the city. If you are fortunate enough to have family or some true friends nearby, you might want to put your heads–and some resources–together in preparation for serious upheaval. Obviously, a team of prepared people is much better than being alone.

If you must stay in your urban location, have some commonsense plans in hand in the event of a major disaster. Get to know your neighbors: find out whom you can trust and whom you can't. Keep some extra gasoline on hand, in case you need to get in your car quickly and leave. Have several exit routes planned ahead of time, in case roads are blocked. Have a "bug-out" bag containing essential ingredients to live on for 3 or 4 days. If leaving is not an option, have a plan to secure your home as best you can. You'll need to think about things such as food, water, medicine, warmth, self-defense, etc. But at this point, to do nothing is absolute lunacy!

Provisions:

During a major disaster, food will quickly disappear. Living for over 3 decades on the Gulf Coast, I can tell you with absolute certainty that whenever disaster strikes (usually an approaching hurricane, for us), food and provisions at the store sell completely out in a matter of a few hours. People panic, and within hours, you cannot find food, bottled water, ice, generators, batteries, candles, etc. In a matter of hours, every gas station in the area will be completely out of gas. Not days. Hours!

Furthermore, almost all disasters include a complete loss of electricity. The water supply is compromised. Bottled water becomes more valuable than bank accounts. Dehydration becomes a very real and present danger. I remember witnessing a man offer an ice vendor $100 for an extra bag of ice during Hurricane Ivan. My wife and I went 2 weeks (14 days) without electricity in the aftermath of that hurricane. Believe me, I got a taste of just how precious bottled water, ice, batteries, generators, fuel, etc., can become.

I suggest you have a supply of food and water to last at least 2 weeks. A month would be even better. Personally, I can live a long time on tuna fish or peanut butter. You can purchase MREs from a variety of sources, as well as "camp-style" packaged food from stores such as Academy Sports & Outdoors. Of course, bottled water is available everywhere during normal times. Stock up! Plus, I suggest you have some water purification tablets or a Katadyn water filter on hand. And, if you are able, prepare to grow your own food. Canning food is another very helpful hedge against deprivation. If your parents were like mine, this was standard operating procedure.

Get a generator. Keep a supply of fuel on hand. Stay stocked up on batteries, candles, portable lights, first aid supplies, and personal hygiene items–especially toilet paper. Trust me, during times of intense and prolonged disaster, toilet paper could become more valuable than money. I also suggest you never run out of lighters or matches. You never know when you'll need to build a fire, and during a prolonged survival situation, fire could save your life. If you live in a cold weather climate, you probably already have some sort of wood stove or fireplace.

Obviously, you need to take stock of your clothing. Do you have clothes suitable for extended outdoor activity? What about boots? During a disaster, you would trade your best suit from Neiman Marcus for a good pair of boots. Do you have gloves? Insulated underwear? What about camouflage clothing? These could become essential outerwear in the right conditions. Plus, any "bug-out" bag will need to include spare clothing.

Communication and medical provisions are also a high priority in any kind of emergency. How will you communicate with your loved ones when the phones (including cell phones) go down? A preordained rally point (or safe house) might be something to think about. And what about medical supplies? Do you have enough to take care of routine (and not-so-routine) emergencies? What about your prescription drugs? How long could you function if you were cut off from your druggist for any length of time? Think about it now.

And one more suggestion, while we're on this subject: the best resources in the world are of little use if one is physically incapable of making good use of them. In other words, GET IN SHAPE. During any kind of emergency situation, physical exertion and stamina become immensely important.

Commodities:

I suggest you have at least some cash on hand. Just about any and all disasters will result in banks being closed for extended periods of time. That also means credit card purchases being suspended. You need to have enough cash to be able to purchase essential goods (if they are even available) for an undetermined amount of time.

Of course, some survival gurus insist that during any cataclysmic climate, precious metals will become the only reliable currency. But when most of us are trying to feed our families and pay our bills, it is difficult to get excited about buying gold and silver. Obviously, I would never recommend that anyone jeopardize the present on the altar of the future. My parents made it through the Great Depression with canned goods and garden vegetables; gold and silver were certainly not a priority with them. On the other hand, a little gold and silver could go a long way in a prolonged emergency–if you can afford it without jeopardizing present needs.

In fact, in a disaster, what is considered a valuable commodity can change rather quickly, as the barter system takes a life of its own. What is valuable is determined by what you need and how badly you need it. In a prolonged disaster, simple things such as toilet paper, canned goods, ammunition, and clothing could become extremely valuable; while cars, video games, televisions, etc., could be reduced to junk status. In antiquity, wars were fought over things such as salt.

Speaking of cars, remember that during a prolonged "national emergency" that might involve some sort of nuclear attack or widespread civil unrest, an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) might be employed; in which case, most every late model vehicle would be completely inoperable. Accordingly, if one can keep an older, pre-computer-age vehicle in good working order, he or she might be driving the only non-government vehicle capable of going anywhere.

Self-Defense:

Needless to say, during any kind of disaster, your safety and protection will be completely up to you. If you really think that the police are going to be able to protect you during an upheaval, you are living in a dreamworld.

In both the New Orleans and Los Angeles disasters, police protection was non-existent. Lawless gangs quickly took control of the streets, and people were left to either defend themselves or swiftly become the helpless prey of violent marauders. In fact, in New Orleans, some of the policemen actually abandoned their oaths to uphold the law and joined with the criminals, turning their weapons upon the public.

Face it, folks: in any kind of disaster, you must be able to defend yourself, or you and your family will be meat for these animals of society that will quickly descend without mercy upon the unprepared, unsuspecting souls around them. This requires that you be armed! It also requires that you be skilled enough to be able to efficiently use your arms.

Therefore, I strongly suggest that you purchase firearms sufficient to keep you and your family safe, and also that you practice sufficiently to know how to use them.

Now, when it comes to a discussion of which firearms are preferable for self-defense, the suggestions are as varied as the people who proffer them. These are my suggestions:

I believe every man (along with his wife and children of adequate age) should be proficient with the following weapons: a handgun in .38 caliber or above, a .22 rifle, a center-fire hunting rifle, a semi-automatic battle rifle, and a shotgun.

My personal preference for a self-defense handgun is either a .45 ACP 1911 (either Colt or Kimber) or a .40 S&W. In the .40 caliber, my favorite is a Glock 23. In the 1911, I like the Commander size configuration. I also like the Glock 21, 30, and 36 in .45 caliber. My wife prefers to carry a Smith & Wesson .38 caliber revolver in the snub-nose, J-frame configuration. But this is primarily due to the reduced weight of these weapons for carry purposes. If needed, she could make a good accounting of herself with a Glock 19 in 9mm. If you are someone who has never owned and seldom fired a handgun, I recommend you buy a Glock. They are as simple as revolvers to operate, reliable, and almost indestructible. Plus, they provide increased magazine capacity, and are safe. They are also very easy to disassemble and clean. Of course, in dangerous game territory, you will need the power of a .45 Long Colt, .44 Magnum, or even a .454 Casull. These calibers are not for the limp-wristed, but when one is facing a brown bear or mountain lion, it is what one will need to survive. Plus, when your life is on the line, you'll never feel the recoil.

For a .22 rifle, I really like the Ruger 10/22. For a hunting rifle, my suggestion is either a .270 or .30-06 caliber bolt-action rifle. I prefer the Remington Model 700 BDL or Browning X-Bolt, but there are several fine weapons in this configuration and caliber by numerous manufacturers. In dangerous game territory, a Marlin .45-70 could be a lifesaver. For a battle rifle, I suggest an AR-15-style weapon (I prefer Bushmaster) in .223 caliber or a .308 Springfield M1A. For a shotgun, I suggest a 12-gauge pump. Here I prefer a Winchester Model 1300, which is not made anymore. So, you'll probably have to choose between Mossberg and Remington. For ladies, however, a 20-gauge shotgun is probably a better choice, and at "bad breath" range (where a shotgun shines, anyway), it is just as lethal.

Whatever you choose, practice with it to the point that you are able to use it proficiently. And be sure you stock up on ammunition. A gun without ammo is reduced to being either an expensive club or a cumbersome paperweight.

Go to your local independent sporting goods store (I don't recommend the large national chain stores to do your firearms shopping) and get to know your hometown firearms dealer. Most of these people are kind and helpful folks who will be more than happy to assist you in finding exactly what type of firearm is suitable for you and your family. If you live in the Pensacola, Florida, area, a visit with Rick Bankston at Buck and Bass on Pine Forest Road is highly recommended. He is a fine Christian gentleman and very knowledgeable in all things gun. His phone number is 850-944-5692. Give him a call.

Spiritual Power:

I firmly believe that man is created to have fellowship with his Creator-God. I really don't know how people can face the uncertain future that we currently face without the spiritual knowledge, wisdom, comfort, and power that is made available through Jesus Christ. I believe the maxim is true: "Wise men still seek Him." I strongly suggest that you seek to possess a personal relationship with God's only begotten Son. In truth, spiritual preparation is far and away the most important preparation of all. Accordingly, be sure to pack a copy of God's Word in your survival gear.

That we are facing challenging days is a certainty. Exactly what that means is yet to be determined. I trust that some of my suggestions will help you be better prepared for what lies before us. Plus, here is an excellent online Survival Blog chock-full of great suggestions and resources for all things survival. Check it out:

http://www.survivalblog.com/

I am sure that I have left out several items that others more qualified than me would include. I welcome their suggestions, as I am always desirous to learn from those who are wiser and more experienced. In the meantime, remember your Boy Scout motto: "Be Prepared."

P.S. It's almost time to print THE FREEDOM DOCUMENTS. To reserve (or pre-pay) your copies, go here:

http://chuckbaldwinlive.com/home/?p=279

United States is beyond point of no return financially - John Embry

2010-06-13T10:55:00.001+04:00

Several multiples higher for gold.

Silver would be potentially several plus.

Cheers,

Tate

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

John Embry - Reasons To Own Gold

Tip of the hat to Jim Sinclair. John Embry's latest piece titled Reasons To Own Gold is nothing short of outstanding. From his piece, "The U.S. dollar is the world's reserve currency and thus anchors the world's monetary system. Unfortunately, by virtually any measurement we look at, the United States is beyond the point of no return with respect to its financial position."

John goes on to say, "Imbedded federal government debt of nearly $13 trillion, unfunded future liabilities in medicare, social security, etc. well in excess of $50 trillion and a current budget deficit of over 10% of GDP virtually ensures ongoing massive monetary debasement. When the near bankruptcy of the majority of the fifty states in the union is factored in, the situation looks ever more dire."

John goes on to warn about the possibility of hyperinflation, "To combat the massive deficits that inevitably resulted, widespread quantitative easing was undertaken. That policy is here to stay and the fiscal deficits in many countries have now reached percentages of GDP that have almost always resulted in eventual currency collapse."

He also warns about paper gold investments, "Investors should also have strong reservations about gold ETF's, gold pooled accounts and gold certificates where the gold is unallocated and thus not specifically accounted for."

Regarding central bank price suppression, "The western central banks, who have supplied massive quantities of gold to the market over the past fifteen years, both to meet burgeoning demand and to suppress the price, are running dangerously short."

Credit given to GATA, "The work of the Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee (GATA), which has been remarkably accurate over the past ten years, is finally receiving belated acknowledgment following years of being studiously ignored. The extent of the suppression has been so great that it virtually guarantees a far greater upward explosion in the gold price than would otherwise have occurred."

John puts things in perspective, "All the gold mined since the beginning of time is worth less than $6 trillion currently and the total capitalization of all the world's gold stocks barely exceeds that of Walmart. This pales in comparison to the amount of paper money that could seek refuge in the world's eternal money...I expect gold to trade at several multiples of the current price before this bull market breathes its last breath."

To read the entire piece by John Embry CLICK HERE.

Eric King

KingWorldNews.com

Toxic Corexit dispersant chemicals remained secret as feds colluded with Big Business

2010-06-11T10:00:00.001+04:00

BP, the ones responsible for the oil volcano are also self-appointed to clean up their mess. In their role, they find it expedient to keep us in the dark about the volume of oil gushing out, and about the cloud of oil under the sea and about the contents of the toxic chemicals used to disperse (they say) the oil.

... but do we need to disperse the oil with chemicals that are many times more toxic than the oil itself? Who does that serve by making oil disperse with toxins and sink below the surface of the ocean undetectable by satellite?

Too many things wrong with this picture and where is the leadership? Should we hope for change and leave it at that?

Something tells me this won't end well.

Cheers, Tate

====================

Toxic Corexit dispersant chemicals remained secret as feds colluded with Big Business

Friday, June 11, 2010
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Editor of NaturalNews.com (See all articles...)

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(NaturalNews) After weeks of silence on the issue, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finally decided to go public with the list of ingredients used to manufacture Corexit, the chemical dispersant used by BP in the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. There are two things about this announcement that deserve our attention: First, the ingredients that have been disclosed are extremely toxic, and second, why did the EPA protect the oil industry's "trade secrets" for so long by refusing to disclose these ingredients until now?

As reported in the New York Times, Brian Turnbaugh, a policy analyst at OMB Watch said, "EPA had the authority to act all along; its decision to now disclose the ingredients demonstrates this. Yet it took a public outcry and weeks of complaints for the agency to act and place the public's interest ahead of corporate interests."

On the toxicity question, you could hardly find a more dangerous combination of poisons to dump into the Gulf of Mexico than what has been revealed in Corexit. The Corexit 9527 product has been designated a "chronic and acute health hazard" by the EPA. It is made with 2-butoxyethanol, a highly toxic chemical that has long been linked to the health problems of cleanup crews who worked on the Exxon Valdez spill.

A newer Corexit recipe dubbed the "9500 formula" contains dioctyl sodium sulfosuccinate, a detergent chemical that's also found in laxatives. What do you suppose happens to the marine ecosystem when fish and sea turtles ingest this chemical through their gills and skin? And just as importantly, what do you think happens to the human beings who are working around this chemical, breathing in its fumes and touching it with their skin?

The answers are currently unknown, which is exactly why it is so inexcusable that Nalco and the oil industry giants would for so long refuse to disclose the chemical ingredients they're dumping into the Gulf of Mexico in huge quantities (over a million gallons dumped into the ocean to date).

But it gets even more interesting when you look at just how widespread this "chemical secrecy" is across Big Business in the USA... and how the U.S. government more often than not conspires with industry to keep these chemicals a secret.

It's time to end chemical trade secrets

Armed with the accomplices in the FDA, EPA, FTC and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, powerful corporations have been keeping secrets from us all. It's not just the toxic chemicals in Corexit, either: Large manufacturers of consumers products -- such as Unilever, Proctor & Gamble and Johnson & Johnson -- routinely use toxic chemical ingredients in their products -- ingredients which are usually kept secret from the public.

Similarly, virtually every perfume, cologne and fragrance product on the market is made with cancer-causing chemicals that their manufacturers refuse to disclose, claiming their formulas are "trade secrets."

Throughout Big Business in America, the toxic chemicals used in everyday products such as household cleaners, cosmetics and yard care remain a dangerous secret, and the U.S. government actually colludes with industry to keep these chemical ingredients a secret by, for example, refusing to require full disclosure of ingredients for personal care products. The FDA offers us virtually no enforcement in this area, depending almost entirely on companies to declare their own chemicals are safe rather than requiring actual safety testing to be conducted.

This is why the following statement is frightening yet true: What BP is doing to the Gulf of Mexico, companies like Proctor & Gamble are doing to the entire population. We are all being mass poisoned by the toxic chemicals in personal care products, foods, medicines, fragrance products and other concoctions created by powerful corporations that use toxic chemicals throughout their product lines... but who refuse to disclose those ingredients in the public.

Thanks to the widespread use of secret chemicals in foods, medicines and personal care products, we are awash in synthetic toxic chemicals that have already reached the shores of public health. The rates of cancer, Alzheimer's, diabetes and infertility that we're seeing right now are a reflection of the devastating health cost associated with ongoing the ongoing chemical contamination of our population. Even public water fluoridation policies are a kind of "water contamination disaster" where chemicals from an undisclosed source are dumped into the water supply (on purpose, no less!).

What's doubly disturbing about all this is that many of the chemicals used in foods, medicines, household cleaners and personal care products end up in the Gulf of Mexico as well because they get flushed down stream. So now the Gulf isn't just polluted with crude oil and dispersant chemicals; it's also heavily contaminated with all the chemical runoff from the products made by large corporations that refuse to disclose the actual chemical ingredients, claiming they're trade secrets.

It's time to end the chemical secrecy

As this Gulf of Mexico oil disaster clearly demonstrates, it's time to end the chemical secrecy maintained by Big Business. We must demand that all ingredients be fully disclosed for all products so that the curtain of chemical secrecy is lifted once a for all.

Neither oil companies nor consumer product companies should be able to hide behind the excuse of "trade secrets" to avoid disclosing the actual chemicals contained in the products they sell. As consumers, we must demand chemical transparency from these companies or refuse to buy their products.

Legislatively, we must demand new laws that require full disclosure on all consumer products so that ordinary people can see what's contained in the products they buy.

In a world where one person's chemical runoff impacts every other person, there is no justification for chemical secrecy. We all have the right to know what we're putting on (or in) our bodies, and if companies refuse to be honest with us, we should boycott their products and publicly shame them for engaging in deceptive, secretive behavior.

Because the truth is that consumer product companies don't dare want you to know what's actually found in their products. And that's because most of their products are made with poison. If the average perfume product listed its chemical ingredients on the label, for example, product sales would plummet as consumers realized just how many of those ingredients are linked to cancer and liver disorders.

Big Business wants us all to remain ignorant... blinded to the truth of what poisons they're slathering on our skin or dripping down our throats. But it's time to halt this dark era of chemical secrets in our modern world. It's time to demand transparency, clean up our waterways and stop poisoning ourselves and our planet.

Sources for this story include:
http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2010/0...

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About the author: Mike Adams is a natural health researcher and author with a strong interest in personal health, the environment and the power of nature to help us all heal He has authored more than 1,800 articles and dozens of reports, guides and interviews on natural health topics, impacting the lives of millions of readers around the world who are experiencing phenomenal health benefits from reading his articles. Adams is an independent journalist with strong ethics who does not get paid to write articles about any product or company. He is the writer and singer of 'I Want My Bailout Money,' 'Don't Inject Me' and other popular hip-hop songs on socially-conscious topics. He also founded an environmentally-friendly online retailer called BetterLifeGoods.com that uses retail profits to help support consumer advocacy programs. He's also a veteran of the software technology industry, having founded a personalized mass email software product used to deliver email newsletters to subscribers. Adams is currently the executive director of the Consumer Wellness Center, a 501(c)3 non-profit, and pursues hobbies such as Pilates, Capoeira, nature macrophotography and organic gardening. Known as the 'Health Ranger,' Adams' personal health statistics and mission statements are located at www.HealthRanger.org

Government scientists confirm massive oil plumes BP issues denial

2010-06-11T02:55:00.001+04:00

Question - What if BP were commissioned with the task of destroying the Gulf for tourism and killing off all life in the area for the next 10 years? What would they need to do in this case to be MORE effective than what they are ALREADY doing with the denials, the spraying of dispersants, the failed strategies.

Isn't it common sense to NOT let the cause of a problem ALSO be a fix of the problem?

Are these the guys with the moral fortitude and competence that we need to fix the very problem that they caused?

QUOTE from below - BP continued to deny the existence of the plumes, without providing any evidence of its own. "We haven't found any large concentrations of oil under the sea. To my knowledge, no one has," BP Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles declared"

This world is obviously run by greedy smart maniacs and frontmen clownish idiots. I can't tell which of the two groups are the more prevalent. A stiff competition it seems.

- Tate Ulsaker

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Government scientists confirm massive oil plumes BP issues denial

By Tom Eley

WSWS, June 10, 2010

On Tuesday scientists working for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) confirmed the existence of massive underwater plumes of oil in the Gulf of Mexico, first identified by independent scientists three weeks ago. BP, which continues to control the cleanup and spill site, responded by once again denying the existence of the plumes.

Photo: IBRRC (International Bird Rescue Research Center)

The plumes, which could create enormous oxygen-depleted "dead zones" in the Gulf, likely have been caused by the depth of the spill coupled with the application of hundreds of thousands of gallons of chemical dispersant. The dispersed oil has not vanished, but has been broken up into clouds of particles called hydro-carbons grouped together in the plumes.

Unlike the spill on the surface, which is moved by winds, tides, currents and eddies, the underwater plumes appear to move in somewhat unpredictable ways. NOAA confirmed that one of the plumes has moved northeast about 42 miles from the spill site toward Alabama, reaching depths of 3,300 feet. University of South Florida scientists found a plume at a similar location at the end of May, which they estimated was 22 miles long and 100 feet thick. Other plumes have been identified, one about 142 miles southeast of the Deepwater Horizon site.

Scientists fear that the plumes may effectively suffocate large areas in the Gulf, including critical deep-sea coral reefs. As expected, the oil is under attack by microbes, which serve to decompose it. But in doing so the microbes also remove large amounts of oxygen from entire strata in the water column, potentially choking off organisms low on the food chain that cannot freely move away, from plankton to mussels, crabs, clams, oysters and small fish. With all higher forms of ocean life ultimately based on these lesser forms, the plumes could break the food chain at its most important links, devastating fish populations as well as marine mammals such as dolphins and sperm whales.

There are also concerns over the effects of the chemical dispersant, Corexit, on marine life. Though less toxic than oil, in combination the two substances could form a highly toxic cocktail. Whereas a surface spill may drive many species away to safer waters, the massive plumes are not so dense and are mostly invisible. Marine life likely continues to move through them, consuming both poisoned organisms and water. Fish eggs and larva can be damaged by oil even at concentrations of one part per million.

Efforts to understand the plumes are hindered by BP's refusal to release to scientists the chemical composition of the dispersants they are using, which are protected as "trade secrets."

"I and many others are trying to get samples of the various dispersants that are being used," said Samantha Joye, an oceanographer at the University of Georgia and one of the scientists who first identified the plumes, at a Tuesday news conference in Athens, Georgia. "I have been unable to secure any so far. And I know there are many other researchers that want to get samples of the various types of Corexit to do lab experiments with; so we are hopeful we will be able to get those dispersants, but right now we haven't been able to secure any."

NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco admitted the existence of the plumes after dismissing or downplaying them for weeks. Like BP, NOAA and the Obama administration have from the beginning sought to minimize the extent of the spill. It was a NOAA organized study that initially established the spill size at 5,000 barrels per day, an assertion endlessly repeated by BP and the US Coast Guard. The figure was sharply criticized by scientists because its method relied on a very limited observation of only the spill on the surface, thus excluding the enormous amounts of oil under the surface.

Even in admitting the existence of the plumes, Lubchenco sought to downplay their significance, describing them as "very low concentrations of subsurface oil."

Scientific evidence suggests that just the opposite is true. On Tuesday Joye revealed data suggesting that methane levels in the plume range from 100 times to 10,000 times the normal reading for Gulf waters.

"I've never seen concentrations of methane this high anywhere," said Joye. "The whole water column has less oxygen than it normally does."

BP continued to deny the existence of the plumes, without providing any evidence of its own. "We haven't found any large concentrations of oil under the sea. To my knowledge, no one has," BP Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles declared in a patent lie. He then attempted to reduce the question to one of semantics. "It may be down to how you define what a plume is here," Suttles offered. "But basically, what some people have asked is, are there large concentrations of oil under the sea? And those have not been found so far by us or anyone else that's measuring this. The oil that has been found is in very minute quantities."

This is only a slight retreat from the categorical denial of the plumes made by BP CEO Tony Hayward last week—again without offering any evidence. "The oil is on the surface," Hayward said. "There aren't any plumes."

Coast Guard commander Thad Allen, who is heading up the federal response to the disaster, also rejected use of the term "plume." "The term 'plume' has been used for quite awhile," he complained. "I think what we are talking about are concentrations. 'Cloud' is a better term." Allen has no scientific training.

Carl Safina, an ocean biologist with the Blue Water Institute, raised concerns over the toxicity of the oil and dispersant in the plumes. "BP doesn't reveal the content of the dispersant, but we know it kills fish eggs and larvae depending on the dose," Safina told the World Socialist Web Site. "In the worst case scenario, the Gulf communities are suffering a situation of the total end of fishing. I don't see how the fish populations will be able to withstand what has happened. The basis of their livelihoods is being destroyed."

"This is not a temporary issue," Safina continued. "Those things don't come back the day the oil stops. After the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989, the herring never recovered. The killer whale population is still reduced by half."

The WSWS asked Safina what species, in particular, would suffer, beyond the fish populations.

"In the Gulf, the endangered kemp's ridley turtle is in trouble," he said. "It's taken Herculean efforts to bring their population up to more than 8,000. All these turtles have to breed in the Gulf. Blue-fin tuna in the Gulf of Mexico represent a separate population from those in the Mediterranean. It takes 12 years for them to mature. Losing one breeding season or more will be a total catastrophe for them."

"The marine mammals like sperm whales and dolphins are in big trouble because they must emerge through layers of the water column and the surface in order to breathe," Safina said. "You cannot breathe through that mass of oil."

"The sea birds cannot make a living but by diving into the water for their food, so there really is no quick way to protect them," Safina said. "It would almost be better if in the short term if we would remove their nests in the hope that they might move to nest elsewhere. May was a big month for migratory birds, with various terns and gannet who travel as far as New England and Newfoundland nesting in the area. Some of these birds will not come back because of the spill."

Safina said that the damage cannot be easily remedied. "It can't be cleaned up the way you might think," he said. Referring to the use of dispersants, Safina offered an analogy. "You might as well try to extract an egg from an already baked cake."

"One thing I can't understand is why they are not doing more to corral it as it comes to the surface rather than attempting to disperse it in the water column," he said. "The boom they are using is good for hemming in 100 gallons of oil that just spilled in a harbor, but it is useless in the Gulf." Safina said that boom with fins going up and down with it would hold it in the water and more effectively prevent oil from passing over and under.

:: Article nr. 66879 sent on 10-jun-2010 18:20 ECT

www.uruknet.info?p=66879

50 Ships To Join Second Freedom Flotilla

2010-06-11T02:34:00.001+04:00

Yikes! We have "about a week" to get our affairs in order.

Not to sound too dramatic, but this could spiral out of control really fast.

I doubt that even the globalists are going to confident about controlling this event to their own profit, as they usually like to do with those one-sided wars over resource-rich areas of the world. This could easily escalate into something altogether different.

Cheers, Tate

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50 Ships To Join Second Freedom Flotilla

Palestine News Network Report

June 10, 2010

Yasser Qashlaq, the head of the Free Palestine Movement, announced Thursday that Freedom Flotilla 2 could include up to 50 ships.

Qashlaq

On Wednesday, organizers of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla announced that a Swiss ship will join the next convoy to Gaza.

On Monday, May 31, Israeli Navy commandos attacked the original Freedom Flotilla while it was sailing to Gaza but still in international waters. The raid killed nine civilian activists and injured 54. Eight Israeli soldiers were wounded in the operation.

The Freedom Flotilla was an effort by a coalition of human rights and humanitarian organizations to nonviolently break through Israel's blockade and deliver much needed humanitarian and developmental aid to the Palestinians of Gaza.

Almost 700 passengers from 40 different countries joined the flotilla. There were human rights workers, humanitarian aid workers, members of parliament, doctors, nurses, teachers, community leaders, and international journalists on board the ships.

The lead coalition partners included Insani Yardim Vakfi (IHH). IHH was the largest coalition partner. It contributing 2 Turkish-flagged cargo ships including the passenger ship the Mavi Marmara and 380 Turkish nationals to the effort. This was IHH's first attempt to break the Gaza blockade.

Mish - Magic Keynesian Mirror

2010-06-10T09:55:00.001+04:00

It is too late to learn lessons for this crash.

But it is useful to point out the extreeme nature of today's economic folly. People like to pretend it is all a big misunderstanding. Like the bankers accidentally did everything exactly wrong. That is an incorrect analysis of the situation. That is like explaining a bank robbery as follows - "The foolish man wore a ski mask on a hot day, fell into the bank on accident, pointed a gun at people by mistake, said a few threats without thinking, and then fell out of the bank not realizing that his hands were full of cash."

The bankers know exactly what they are doing even if their frontmen stooges don't always seem to know.

Cheers,

Tate

PS. Below ripped from Eric King and Mish

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Mish - Magic Keynesian Mirror

The following piece was sent to me by Mike "Mish" Shedlock, here is a portion: "We had a chance to write off the debt and to let the insolvent banks go under. Instead we wasted over a trillion dollars bailing out banks that still are not lending (and wisely will not lend) because we never purged the debts that needed to be purged nor did we reduce rampant overcapacity." Here is the entire piece:

Paul Krugman's Magic Keynesian Mirror

Paul Krugman is quite upset with the deficit hawks at the G-20, so much so that he says Lost Decade, Here We Come

The deficit hawks have taken over the G20.

It's basically incredible that this is happening with unemployment in the euro area still rising, and only slight labor market progress in the US.

The right thing, overwhelmingly, is to do things that will reduce spending and/or raise revenue after the economy has recovered — specifically, wait until after the economy is strong enough that monetary policy can offset the contractionary effects of fiscal austerity. But no: the deficit hawks want their cuts while unemployment rates are still at near-record highs and monetary policy is still hard up against the zero bound.

Utter folly posing as wisdom. Incredible.

G-20 an Amazing Success

In sharp contrast, I called the G-20 an Amazing Success

With all the heated debate and every country doing what they want, inquiring minds just may be asking "How the heck can you call this a success?"

That's a good question so let's highlight the positives.

Defining G-20 Success

1. 1Merkel and Trichet politely told Geithner to go to hell. Given that Geithner needs to be fired, this is a positive event.

2. 2Europe is more concerned about sovereign debt issues than stimulating growth. Only fools like Geither and the IMF would argue against that.

3. 3No one paid any attention to Geithner or the Keynesian clowns at the IMF, most notably, IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

4. 4There was no agreement on a universal bank levy. A universal tax is the wrong approach to risk management and it punishes banks with good lending practices.

5. 5Geithner made a complete fool out of himself.

6. 6A dozen cheers for German Chancellor Angela Merkel who said "We can only spend what we receive in income." Finally someone gets it.

What more could you possibly ask for?

Predictable Reaction

Without mentioning Krugman specifically, I am not surprised by his reaction. Indeed, I predicted it on Saturday in G20 Heated Debates; Europe Politely Tells Geithner Where To Go.

Kiss the Illusion Goodbye

With global stimulus efforts playing second fiddle to default concerns, a double-dip recession is just around the corner. Please see Hungary Tries To Calm Markets; Europe Headed Back in Recession, US Will Not Decouple for further discussion.

The Keynesian clowns will be howling that reduced stimulus killed the recovery. However, the reality is there was no recovery in the first place, only an illusion caused by unsustainable stimulus.

Krugman's Magic Mirror

Clearly one of us is wrong. But whom? Perhaps this image can help.

Throwing money at problems never works in the long run.

Japan tried that and now has debt to GDP of 200%. Because of its aging demographics, Japan is in serious trouble as soon as interest rates rise. Japan will not be able to finance its monstrous debt nor will it be able to grow its way out of the problem. Such is the nature of compound interest and unsustainable levels of debt.

Likewise, the US tried to spend its way out of the 2000-2001 recession.

Greenspan's policies seemed to work, but it was nothing but an illusion. The real economy was taking a nosedive even as financial assets soared. It was a nice party, as all Keynesian parties are, but in the final analysis all Greenspan and Bernanke accomplished was to dig the deepest debt hole mankind has ever seen. The housing and debt implosion of 2007-2008 was the direct result.

Now Paul Krugman thinks it's too early to shut off stimulus.

Hello Paul!

It will always be too early for you. There is no recovery nor will there ever be a recovery until there is genuine demand for goods and services at prices set by the free market not the government.

When the problem is debt, going deeper in debt cannot possibly be the solution.

Yes, Paul, we lost a decade. Yes, Paul, we are going to lose another, not because we failed to follow your recommendations, but precisely because we did!

We had a chance to write off the debt and to let the insolvent banks go under. Instead we wasted over a trillion dollars bailing out banks that still are not lending (and wisely will not lend) because we never purged the debts that needed to be purged nor did we reduce rampant overcapacity.

We could have and should have forced the bondholders of Citigroup and Fannie Mae to take a hit. Instead, taxpayers who cannot possibly afford it, bailed out wealthy bondholders.

In addition, we tried all sorts of Keynesian nonsense like cash-for-clunkers and an $8,000 tax credits for houses. As soon as the tax credit expired housing went in the gutter. It is about to do so for the second time.

Bernanke will not know what hit him even though it is point blank foolish to stimulate housing when there is an ocean of housing oversupply already.

By the way, how many roads can you pave? We paved roads in our area that did not even need to be paved. Now fooking what?

This is exactly the mistake Japan made. Yet you want to repeat it with more absurd makeshift work.

The stimulus money is nearly out and you want more. You will always want more for the simple reason there is no real demand for goods and services, only an illusion of a recovery that comes from passing out "free money".

When you look in a mirror you see the illusion, what you should see is a Keynesian warthog. Substitute the words "Keynesian Economics" for "Real Economy" on that hag, and the picture is perfect.

As Europe found out, the will and the means to pass out "free money" is 100% guaranteed to end before a lasting recovery can take hold.

That dear Paul, whether you like it or not, is the mechanics of peak debt, compound interest, global wage arbitrage, and something you desperately need to learn: Austrian economics.

Recommended Reading List

Paul, you need help. I suggest a few books on my recommended reading list.

1. Economics in One Lesson: The Shortest and Surest Way to Understand Basic Economics by Henry Hazlit

2. Economics for Real People by Gene Callahan

3. What Has Government Done to Our Money? and The Case for a 100 Percent Gold Dollar by Murray N. Rothbard

Mike "Mish" Shedlock

http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

KingWorldNews.com

Bernanke to Congress: Reduce the Deficit!

2010-06-10T09:36:00.001+04:00

Arsonist Bernanke Gives Advice He Didn't Follow.

In the below article, Fed Chairman Bernanke is compared to an arsonist who started a series of fires and then he tells firemen to go and put them out.

In actual fact it is worse than that. He is not only an arsonist but also he is collecting insurance fraud on the burning buildings and skimming the paychecks of the firemen.

This whole financial debacle can only end with a mighty crash and that is getting obvious to almost everyone. It is the debt stupid. Clearing debts due with more debt money is like opening a daisy chain of credit cards, each paying off the previous in successive transactions of borrowed money until the banks say "no more". And we are at that point now where the banks are saying no more but the government just bribes and threatens the banks to go ahead and give more credit but it won't end well. You can't keep doubling down on interest accrued forever in a hockey stick graph beyond the reaches of the universe. There are limits and if anyone can find them, the current crop of wide-eyed bankster frontmen will.

More below...

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Bernanke to Congress: Reduce the Deficit!

Wyatt Research Staff | The Daily Profit | June 9, 2010 3:49pm EDT

As stocks traded mostly sideways today, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke paid a visit to Congress to address the House Budget Committee. In a surprising turn from what's been the hallmark of his reign as the head of the Fed, Bernanke seemed legitimately concerned about sovereign debt issues here in the United States.

He said, "To avoid sharp, disruptive shifts in spending programs and tax policies in the future, and to retain the confidence of the public and the markets, we should be planning now how we will meet these looming budgetary challenges."

Strong words for a Fed Chief who has been responsible for the largest money supply increase in the history of the U.S.

Between 2007 and 2010, Bernanke created at least an additional $2 trillion in dollars in order to bail out his banker buddies, and since his is an appointed position to a quasi-private group of banks, no American citizens can ever vote him out…ever.

So to hear him tell the Congress to cut the deficit is a bit like an arsonist telling firemen to extinguish fires.

At this point, with the country's politicians either too ignorant or too complicit to lift a finger in defense of America's currency, or American citizens, there are very few avenues of recourse for investors.

The only logical alternative to swallowing Bernanke's tripe is to trade in your dollars for investments that will benefit from the demise of the dollar.

This action accomplishes two things:

1) It removes those dollars out of harm's way.

2) It lets you profit as Bernanke and friends raid its worth for every penny.

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Precisely!

Every hard earned dollar you dump into the market before the bankers dump their newly printed confetti into the market is more leverage for you and less for them.

Sink that soon-to-be-devalued paper into real gold and silver. Enjoy the mania phase III that Eric King keeps talking about (previous post).

The once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to grow wealth by multiples is here for the masses. The vehicle is gold and silver. Tax free in many regions of the world. Off the books for most types of transactions. Consider it today.

Cheers,

Tate

Gold Boom Rationale Tracking in Mainstream News (finally)

2010-06-10T07:31:00.001+04:00

Eric King, the guy who interviewed almost everyone who is anyone in today's economic guru world, says that we are in a long phase II and about to enter into a phase III mania.

What does that mean?

Good question. I also want to know.

Perhaps these charts can help us understand... (scroll down in the link to the last chart and hold on to your pants... that is what we have to look forward to when this phase of the precious metals bull market shifts into the next phase, due unexpectedly at anytime)...

http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_04/king080204.html

Enjoy more from Eric King below...

Cheers, Tate

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Forbes - Gold: The World's True Reserve Currency

This is a portion of an excellent article from Forbes regarding gold: Inflation is just another form of a cruel tax placed on the middle class without its consent...While Europe is embracing austerity, the U.S. is headed in the opposite direction.

Here are a few more snippets from the Forbes piece:

How can anyone believe a government can create viable growth or sustainable wealth? The truth is that governments are incapable of any such thing. Redistributing savings from one part of the economy to another does not lead to growth. Borrowing money from foreign sources only amounts to a deferred tax on future production--with interest.

...The real problem with the U.S. thinking all it needs to do is spend more and keep interest rates in the cellar is that much of the rest of the world has already started to repent. Leaders in many other countries now understand that they must reduce leverage instead of borrowing more, and are raising interest rates to protect their currencies.

The 20th century taught Europeans two valuable lessons: that killing each other isn't really a good way to bring about peace, and that massively inflating a currency doesn't engender prosperity. Now the 21st century is--we hope-- teaching them that countries cannot bail themselves out of debt by issuing more debt.

...The two most important factors in protecting the value of any nation's currency are to have the central bank provide interest rates above the rate of inflation, and for the government to ensure the debt of the nation can always be easily serviced. Canada, Europe, South America and Asia are moving slowly toward those goals. Leaders in those economies are also learning that any fiat currency--even the almighty dollar--can never truly be an adequate substitute for owning gold. That's especially true when the U.S. government and Federal Reserve are determined to undermine the dollar's purchasing power.

The pressing question has become how long other countries will continue to squander savings by parking it in U.S. dollars, if we continue to debase both the value of our debt and the currency in which it is based.

Some may worry that these types of articles going mainstream are a warning sign. The fact is that this is a natural occurrence in a secular bull market, especially as you move through a long phase II, prior to the phase III mania. Gold has plenty more work to do on the upside, so be patient and do not worry about gyrations in the gold price.

To read the entire Forbes article CLICK HERE.

Eric King

KingWorldNews.com

Massive Global Trend Change!

2010-06-09T03:47:00.000+04:00

Massive Global Trend Change!

This just in… big news hitting the world economy starting approximately this year… Peak production of cheap goods. Here forward, stuff gets more expensive. This will impact the world in a big way.

Could there be a silver lining? Maybe now countries will have a chance to (be forced to) expand their internal manufacturing again?

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Global Trend Change!

You are about to read one of the single most important pieces of this year. China to be the engine of inflation going forward? From the NY Times, China helped many global companies lower costs and prices. “But this may be the beginning of the end of an era.”

Also from the Times, “The shift was dramatized Sunday, when Foxconn Technology, one of the world’s largest contract electronics manufacturers and the maker of everything from the Apple iPhone to Dell computer parts, said that within three months it would double the salaries of many of its assembly line workers.”

The Times article continues:

The announcement follows a spate of suicides at two Foxconn campuses in southern China and criticism of the company’s labor practices.Taiwan-based Foxconn, which has more than 800,000 workers in China, said the salary increases are meant to improve the lives of its workers.

The changes are coming about because of the growing clout of workers in China’s sizzling economy, analysts say, and because soaring food and housing prices are eroding the spending power of migrant workers.

But there are other reasons. Analysts say Beijing is backing wage increases as a way to spur domestic consumption and make the country less dependent on low-priced exports. The government hopes the move will force some export-oriented companies to invest in more innovative or higher-value goods.

But Chinese policymakers also favor higher wages because they could help ease a widening income gap between the rich and the poor.

Last Thursday, the Beijing municipal government said it would raise its minimum wage 20 percent to about $140 a month; several other cities are preparing to implement similar increases.

United States and European Union officials have been pressing China to help improve the health of the global economy by consuming more and reducing the country’s massive trade surpluses.

Rising labor costs here aren’t the end of cheap production in China, analysts say, but they are likely to help change the country’s manufacturing mix.

This is one of the most important articles of the year and you should pass this blog link around to friends or business associates who have the capacity to understand the significance of this article.

To summarize, there is a tremendous change which will occur globally as China exports to the world and the deflation they have exported is coming to an end. On a go forward basis China will export inflation. Although the impact of this event will take a little time to be felt, it will have a long lasting impact and translate into higher prices and inflation.

Make sure you are protected by owning hard assets such as gold and silver. That means taking possession of gold and silver not owning paper gold or silver.

For the link to the NY Times Article CLICK HERE.

Eric King

KingWorldNews.com

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More…

The article below comes with photo illustration of what is being presented from China…

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/08/why-the-end-of-cheap-chin_n_600330.html

This will be very convenient for the bankers in 2 or 3 months when their bailout currency hits the general money supply.

“Oh, look at inflation, isn’t it horrible. It isn’t because we printed trillions out of thin air and gave it to ourselves. Not at all. It is those Chinese doing it to us.” – Bernanke paraphrase (prediction).

There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root. - Henry David Thoreau

Round and round we go, media always steering us away from the disease (root) but always the symptoms (leaves). Why? Because it is more profitable for us to leave those in power in control of the rigged system as it continues to transfer wealth away from the masses and towards the elite 1% banker class.

- Tate Ulsaker

2010-06-09T03:42:00.000+04:00

Lookout! The US Fed Vacuum is Switched "ON".

Can you hear the giant vacuum "Whoooosh" sound? That is the Federal Reserve sucking digits of value out of every paper promise in all of their various forms, from bills, to stocks to bonds to funds to currencies... all of it devaluing at an accelerated rate starting fairly soon. This year and next will see a massive shakeout, a meltdown of paper values, a transfer of wealth to the printers from everyone else. This is just a continuation of where paper has been and a historical perspective on where all paper goes... to Zero value all the time and without exception.

The beneficiaries to THIS paper devaluation (as with the LAST paper devaluation) will be few.

All of those who hold physical gold and silver at home or in a non-bank vault will be among those few.

The dollar bust is coming soon. Eric King puts it into concise perspective below...

- Tate Ulsaker

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Gold and the US Stock Market

We are in a depression, the first one in over 70 years, and the main stream media is still trying to sell the public on a recovery in order to keep them in stocks. In the midst of all of this, gold has rallied over five fold in less than a decade and the Dow/Gold ratio has fallen from a peak of roughly 43 to 1 to around 8 to 1. The next leg of the depression will see a change in lifestyle and an acceleration of the lowering of the standard of living for Americans.

When the last depression happened it was like a thief in the night and it dragged on until people began to believe there was a certain permanence about it. This depression is a bit more of a slow motion event in the early stages. Unfortunately it will accelerate. If you are upset lately that people who have been irresponsible have not been paying for their sins be careful what you wish for. People were literally starving to death in the last depression and that is not something you will want to see with your own eyes. People wanted to work who did not have jobs, but there was no work to be had.

When I was speaking to Eric Sprott last Friday he commented on the phony nature of the US stock market and how the advances are on low volume. Included above is a chart which shows the Dow is bumping into resistance at the 50 month moving average, and volume on the advances has been minimal. The declines, however, have been accompanied by large volume. Big money is exiting the stock market, and it has been accumulating gold and other hard assets.

I think the end of Eric Sprott's most recent piece, "A Busted Formula" sums up the situation nicely. In it he writes "Gold's recent strength in lieu of seemingly 'deflationary' economic data confirms the market's doubts over government intervention in the financial system. Needless to say, we remain bearish."

What is the lesson here? The lesson is that it is much easier to invest in bull markets. So if you have not already made a decision to own gold, what are you waiting for? Simply pick out your entry point, be patient and accumulate like the big money is doing. There is nothing wrong with buying the major pullbacks. It's just that most human beings do not have the stomach for it, so it is probably better for most to simply dollar cost average and make purchases once or twice a month. And yes, the Dow/Gold ratio is on its way to 1 to 1 again, so the stock market should be avoided at all costs until that time.

I do not believe that this depression will end in deflation. I believe it will end with the destruction of currencies as Felix Zulauf said in his interview on this network last week. A wealth transfer is in process. Make sure you are correctly positioned.

Eric King

KingWorldNews.com

2010-06-09T03:41:00.000+04:00

New Zealand is an Increasingly Recognized Anti-Crash Location among the wealthy and well-connected.

By no means is the survival movement a new phenomena, and this wouldn't be the first time I saw New Zealand as a desired destination in times of global economic collapse and war. However, I found on the latest subscription newsletter called "Without Borders" from Casey's Research, a sort of insider's guide to crash specifically targeting the wealthy international investor type of person. I believe that New Zealand will increasingly be on the short list of the wealthy and well-connected. If just 1/10th of 1% of the world came here, we would have more than double the current population. It might be time to tighten immigration laws for New Zealand if this destination is going to remain attractive.

Thanks to SW from Belgium and China for the newsletter. I cut the below interesting little snippet from that issue. Enjoy!

- Tate Ulsaker

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

New Zealand

We last wrote about New Zealand a little over a

year ago and we plan on making a trip back there

this year. Many of our friends spend part of the

year there and the more we hear the more we want

to explore the options. If Uruguay is no longer an

option then New Zealand may move up to the top

of the list as a place to establish residency. New

Zealand has a lot to offer from a lifestyle and

security perspective especially for families. As we

mentioned in the Welcome Letter our friend Mark

just put together a comprehensive ebook which we

think is probably the best source of information for

anyone thinking about becoming a part time or full

time Kiwi. We are not in the business of selling

ebooks. Most of the ones out there about living

abroad are thinly disguised propaganda or

marketing material but Mark has really done an

excellent job of compiling all the information

Haliburton Catalyst for All that is Good

2010-06-01T02:27:00.001+04:00

Haliburton has a hand in the oil spill? You're kidding, right?

Naw, there is nothing here, keep moving along. Just ignore the elephant in the living room. All is as it should be.

Cheers, Tate

(When bitterness fails, try humor :-))

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

What was Halliburton's role in US oil spill?

By David Usborne

May 30, 2010

Shares in Halliburton, the world's second-largest energy services company once headed by former US vice-president Dick Cheney, slid in trading on Friday, in part because of the new six-month moratorium on offshore drilling projects imposed last week by President Barack Obama.

But investors have had other reasons to feel concern for the fortunes of Halliburton. As the investigation into the BP oil rig explosion accelerates, new information has been surfacing in congressional hearings in Washington pointing to possible problems with the casings that were put around the bore hole in the sea bed and the cementing that is critical to sealing it up.

Halliburton did the cementing at the well, under contract to BP. It was to inject the cement to seal the casing in the bore hole to make any seepage of gas and oil impossible, and insert the cement plug that would have allowed BP to return at a later date to begin production. Last August, Halliburton was involved in the cementing of a well in the Timor Sea off the coast of Australia that similarly blew out, sending thousands of gallons into the ocean.

Even within days of the US tragedy, which left 11 men dead and unleashed the worst oil spill America has ever seen, investigators were focusing on the type of cement used – it had been infused with nitrogen – and tests that were done to ensure it had set properly. BP investigators told members of Congress that in the hours before the blast, a "fundamental mistake" may have been made in moving forward with placing the plug even when pressure tests had shown a "very large abnormality".

The notion that blame for the blast could eventually be put on Halliburton might be tempting for BP. Indeed, at early hearings, BP seemed to point fingers both at Halliburton and at Transocean, the owner of the rig, prompting a rebuke from President Obama.

From the start, Halliburton's lawyers have insisted that its men on the rig were simply following specifications and instructions from BP. In other words, if the cement does turn out to have been at least partly responsible for the tragedy, BP is "bound to hold Halliburton harmless", as one of the lawyers told Congress last week. Transocean has made a similar case that as the owner of the lease on the well, BP must be ultimately responsible.

:: Article nr. 66494 sent on 31-may-2010 01:20 ECT

www.uruknet.info?p=66494

Link: www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/what-was-halliburtons-role-in-us-oil-s

pill-1987038.html

Dollar at Death's Door

2010-05-29T23:28:00.001+04:00

Dollar at Death's Door

Lindsey Williams says that has elite insider contacts to people who
run the world. Lindsey says that the elites plan to devalue the
dollar 30-50% in 2010...

... and then replace it with another currency in 2011. See link below...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqiBhWsykzo

The death of the dollar shouldn't surprise anyone. All baseless
currencies eventually die because they have no value other than the
paper they are printed on. And that a dollar collapse would be
controlled isn't surprising either, because a controlled collapse
allows for controlled profits to those printing ever more paper /
buying bankrupted assets for free.

The game is rigged. It always has been rigged. The dollar is being
set up for a massive collapse this year.

I have been on to this fact since early 2000s and now, 10 years later,
the collapse seems to be at the door.

What is bad news to holders of dollar-based financial instruments is
good news for holders of gold and silver. The time to trade devaluing
paper for booming precious metals is coming fast to a close soon.

The background on Lindsey Williams and how he got into the elite
circle of people who run the world is also a fascinating study, below
link is the first of 10 parts that walk through that if interested...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHMtHvODtoQ&feature=related

You don't have to have insider connections to the ruling elite of this
world to know that fiat currencies all devalue over time and
eventually die. We have ten thousand examples of currency crash in
world history, we don't have a single case where a fiat currency held
value over time. Not a single exception so why would anyone be
surprised?

I believe we are near to that mathematically sound prediction that the
US dollar currency will not last. The crossroads couldn't be clearer
regarding what steps are prudent to take at times like these.

Best wishes,
Tate Ulsaker

"I think silver is really at the nexus" - Stephen Leeb

2010-05-28T10:21:00.001+04:00

The silver story will be told in the financial history books as something awesome to behold. Like the tulip bubble, but more purposeful. - Tate Ulsaker

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Stephen Leeb - Bullish On Gold And Silver

I interviewed Stephen Leeb today, and when asked if the situation today was similar to the 70's, Stephen replied, "No, no I think this is much worse, honestly...You pick up the books that are readily available to the public and they'll tell you there are three asset classes, there is stocks, there are bonds and there is cash and you should be divided among those I don't think they mention commodities or gold as an asset class."

Leeb went on to say, "And yeah, I mean it's sort of ingrained in you that gold is something for, you know, right wing civil libertarians, and I spent most of my life with that kind of feeling. I mean I really did not like gold, and if I can just give you one statistic which is interesting... if you look at the last four decades...Gold started trading as a commodity, freely trading in I think 1971. If you look at its compounded annualized average annual return between when it started trading and today, it's about nine and a half percent per year. Well, that comes almost right in line with what the S&P 500 did, and it certainly beats cash, and it certainly beats bonds."

When asked about silver Leeb stated, "I think silver is really at the nexus of it being a precious metal and therefore something of a hedge against inflation and also being a vital metal."

The interview will be released on Saturday. Stephen discusses gold and silver at length and the fact that he expects another mania in the precious metals market and for gold to eclipse it's performance in the 70's.

Eric King

KingWorldNews.com

RE: My complaint against the CFTC was published

2010-05-26T18:38:00.001+04:00

(yours, page 82.) you do good work.

Date: Wed, 26 May 2010 15:37:28 +1200
Subject: My complaint against the CFTC was published
From: infohive@gmail.com
To: directinfo.infohive@blogger.com

For the record - The CFTC actually published my complaint! about the silver manipulation.

In the below text, I am listed as a complaintant to the CFTC, which is supposed to be the controlling authority on commodities trade in the US government but of course they are basically told what to do by their real owners, the ones who manipulate the market.

To their credit, my complaint was published along with hundreds of others on the CFTC government website here --> http://www.cftc.gov/ucm/groups/public/@lrfederalregister/documents/frcomment/10-005c022.pdf.

The big question of course: Will the evil market manipulators ever listen to a government organization that is basically owns? Probably not. But they will listen to a physical shortage and resulting market crash in paper silver. Looking forward to that day.

Cheers, Tate

Tate Ulsaker <arkbuilders_org@yahoo. com>
Tuesday, April 13, 2010 4:35 AM
Metals Hearing <metalshearing@CFTC.gov>
Position Limits on Precious Metals at COMEX

Dear Sir;

Thank you for asking for comments on the issue of position limits for
precious metals.

I am especially concerned about position limits in COMEX on silver held
by in concentrated hands of between 1 and 4 entities.
I believe that a fair level of contracts for any one entity to hold should
be no more than 1500 contracts because this amount is similiar to limits
placed on other commodities in terms of available market supply.
Please restrict any hedging exemptions from those limits to legitimate
hedgers.

Please stop the levels of concentration in COMEX silver futures by such
entities as JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs that have no reason to be
global giants of naked paper shorts other than to manipulate the market.
Please investigate and prosecute any illegal acts done by entities such as
JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs who have whistleblowers giving
us convincing proof of manipulation as if these companies have
been consistently acting above the law for many years already.
Please do you job for both the American people and all of the average
traders world-wide who wish to preserve the legitimacy and fairness of
the CFTC and COMEX.

The New Busy think 9 to 5 is a cute idea. Combine multiple calendars with Hotmail. Get busy.

Read Futurist Predictions

2010-05-26T13:13:00.001+04:00

Most of these guys are respectful analysts of the fundamentals and futurists.

Please read them and consider how you might benefit from trends that some fear. Don't fear the facts, but steer your future based upon them. The only fear is if you ignore change. Fear of change in our age is like death. Embrace change. Be change. Act upon change.

Cheers, Tate

----------------------------

Predictions For The Rest Of 2010

5-25-10

Bob Chapman

First 6 months of 2010, Americans will continue to live in the 'unreality'the period between July and October is when the financial fireworks will begin. The Fed will act unilaterally for its own survival irrespective of any political implications (source is from insider at FED meetings). In the last quarter of the year we could even see Martial law, which is more likely for the first 6 months of 2011. The FDIC will collapse in September 2010. Commercial real estate is set to implode in 2010. Wall Streetbelieves there is a 100% chance of crash in bond market, especially municipals sometime during 2010. The dollar will be devalued by the end of 2010.

Gerald Celente

Terrorist attacks and the "Crash of 2010". 40% devaluation at first = the greatest depression, worse than the Great Depression.

George Ure

Markets up until mid-to-late-summer. Then "all hell breaks lose" from then on through the rest of the year.

Igor Panarin

In the summer of 1998, based on classified data about the state of the U.S. economy and society supplied to him by fellow FAPSI analysts, Panarin forecast the probable disintegration of the USA into six parts in 2010 (at the end of June start of July 2010, as he specified on 10 December 2000

Neithercorps

Have projected that the third and final stage of the economic collapse will begin sometime in 2010. Barring some kind of financial miracle, or the complete dissolution of the Federal Reserve, a snowballing implosion should become visible by the end of this year. The behavior of the Fed, along with that of the IMF seems to suggest that they are preparing for a focused collapse, peaking within weeks or months instead of years, and the most certain fall of the dollar.

Webbots

July and onward things get very strange. Revolution. Dollar dead by November 2010.

George Ure

Markets up until mid-to-late-summer. Then "all hell breaks lose" from then on through the rest of the year.

LEAP 20/20

2010 Outlook from a group of 25 European Economists with a 90% accuracy rating- We anticipate a sudden intensification of the crisis in the second half of 2010, caused by a double effect of a catching up of events which were temporarily &laqno; frozen » in the second half of 2009 and the impossibility of maintaining the palliative remedies of past years. There is a perfect (economic) storm coming within the global financial markets and inevitable pressure on interest rates in the U.S. The injection of zero-cost money into the Western banking system has failed to restart the economy. Despite zero-cost money, the system has stalled. It is slowly rolling over into the next big down wave, which in Elliott Wave terminology will be Super Cycle Wave Three, or in common language, "THE BIG ONE, WHERE WE ALL GO OVER THE FALLS TOGETHER."

Joseph Meyer

Forecasts on the economy. He sees the real estate market continuing to decline, and advised people to invest in precious metals and commodities, as well as keeping cash at home in a safe place in case of bank closures. The stock market, after peaking in March or April (around 10,850), will fall all the way down to somewhere between 2450 and 4125 during the next leg down.

Harry Dent (investor)

A very likely second crash by late 2010. The coming depression (starts around the summer of 2010). Dent sees the stock marketcurrently benefiting from upward momentum and peppier economic activityheaded for a very brief and pleasant run that could lift the Dow to the 10,700-11,500 range from its current level of about 10.090. But then, he sees the market running into a stone wall, which will be followed by a nasty stock market decline (starting in early March to late April) that could drive down the Dow later this year to 3,000-5,000, with his best guess about 3,800.

Richard Russell (Market Expert)

(from 2/3/10) says the bear market rally is in the process of breaking up and panic is on the way. He sees a full correction of the entire rise from the 2002 low of 7,286 to the bull market high of 14,164.53 set on October 9, 2007. The halfway level of retracement was 10,725. The total retracement was to 6,547.05 on March 9, 2009. He now sees the Dow falling to 7,286 and if that level does not hold, "I see it sinking to its 1980-82 area low of Dow 1,000." The current action is the worst he has ever seen. (Bob Chapman says for Russell to make such a startling statement is unusual because he never cries wolf and is almost never wrong)

Niño Becerra (Professor of Economics)

Predicted in July 2007 that what was going to happen was that by mid 2010 there is going to be a crisis only comparable to the one in 1929. From October 2009 to May 2010 people will begin to see things are not working out the way the government thought. In May of 2010, the crisis starts with all its force and continues and strengthens throughout 2011. He accurately predicted the current recession and market crash to the month.

Lyndon Larouche

The crisis is accelerating and will become worse week by week until the whole system grinds into a collapse, likely sometime this year. And when it does, it will be the greatest collapse since the fall of the Roman Empire.

WALL STREET JOURNAL- (2/2010)

"You are witnessing a fundamental breakdown of the American dream, a systemic breakdown of our democracy and our capitalism, a breakdown driven by the blind insatiable greed of Wall Street: Dysfunctional government, insane markets, economy on the brink. Multiply that many times over and see a world in total disarray. Ignore it now, tomorrow will be too late."

Eric deCarbonnel

There is no precedence for the panic and chaos that will occur in 2010. The global food supply/demand picture has NEVER been so out of balance. The 2010 food crisis will rearrange economic, financial, and political order of the world, and those who aren't prepared will suffer terrible lossesAs the dollar loses most of its value, America 's savings will be wiped out. The US service economy will disintegrate as consumer spending in real terms (ie: gold or other stable currencies) drops like a rock, bringing unemployment to levels exceeding the great depression. Public health services/programs will be cut back, as individuals will have no savings/credit/income to pay for medical care. Value of most investments will be wiped out. The US debt markets will freeze again, this time permanently. There will be no buyers except at the most drastic of firesale prices, and inflation will wipe away value before credit markets have any chance at recovery. The panic in 2010 will see the majority of derivatives end up worthless. Since global derivatives markets operate on the assumption of the continued stable value of the dollar and short term US debt, using derivatives to bet against the dollar is NOT a good idea. The panic in 2010 will see the majority of derivatives end up worthless. The dollar's collapse will rob US consumers of all purchasing power, and any investment depend on US consumption will lose most of its value.

Alpha-Omega Report (Trends Forecast)

Going into 2010, the trends seemed to lead nowhere or towards oblivion. Geo-politically, the Middle East was and is trending towards some sort of military clash, most likely by mid-year, but perhaps soonerAt the moment, it seems 2010 is shaping up to be a year of absolute chaos. We see trends for war between Israel and her neighbors that will shake every facet of human activityIn the event of war, we see all other societal trends being thoroughly disruptedIran will most likely shut off the flow of oil from the Persian Gulf. This will have immense consequences for the world's economy. Oil prices will skyrocket into the stratosphere and become so expensive that world's economies will collapse..There are also trend indicators along economic lines that point to the potential for a total meltdown of the world's financial system with major crisis points developing with the change of each quarter of the year. 2010 could be a meltdown year for the world's economy, regardless of what goes on in the Middle East .

Robin Landry (Market Expert)

I believe we are headed to new market highs between 10780-11241 over the next few months. The most likely time frame for the top is the April-May area. Remember the evidence IMHO still says we are in a bear market rally with a major decline to follow once this rally ends.

John P. Hussman, Ph.D.

In my estimation, there is still close to an 80% probability (Bayes' Rule) that a second market plunge and economic downturn will unfold during 2010.

Robert Prechter

Founder of Elliott Wave International, implores retail investors stay away from the markets for now. Prechter, who was bullish near the lows in March 2009, now says the stock market "is in a topping area, "predicting another crash in 2010 that will bring stocks below the 2009 low. His word to the wise, "be patient, don't rush it" keep your money in cash and cash equivalents.

Richard Mogey

Current Research Director at the Foundation for the Study of Cycles- Because of a convergence of numerous cycles all at once, the stock market may go up for a little while, but will crash in 2010 and reach all-time lows late 2012. Mogey says that the 2008 crash was nothing compared to the coming crash. Gold may correct in 2009, but will go up in 2010 and peak in 2011. Silver will follow gold.

James Howard Kunstler (January 2010)

The economy as we've known it simply can't go on, which James Howard Kunstler has been saying all along. The shenanigans with stimulus and bailouts will just compound the central problem with debt. There's not much longer to go before the whole thing collapses and dies. Six Months to Live- The economy that is. Especially the part that consists of swapping paper certificates. That's the buzz I've gotten the first two weeks of 2010.

Peter Schiff (3/13/2010)

"In my opinion, the market is now perfectly positioned for a massive dollar sell-off. The fundamentals for the dollar in 2010 are so much worse than they were in 2008 that it is hard to imagine a reason for people to keep buying once a modicum of political and monetary stability can be restored in Europe . In fact, the euro has recently stabilized. My gut is that the dollar sell-off will be sharp and swift. Once the dollar decisively breaks below last year's lows, many of the traders who jumped ship in the recent rally will look to re-establish their positions. This will accelerate the dollar's descent and refocus everyone's attention back on the financial train-wreck unfolding in the United States . Any doubts about the future of the U.S. dollar should be laid to rest by today's announcement that San Francisco Federal Reserve President Janet Yellen has been nominated to be Vice Chair of the Fed's Board of Governors, and thereby a voter on the interest rate-setting, seven-member Open Markets Committee. Ms. Yellen has earned a reputation for being one of the biggest inflation doves among the Fed's top players." Schiff is famous for his accurate predictions of the economic events of 2008.

Lindsey Williams

Dollar devalued 30-50% by end of year. It will become very difficult for the average American to afford to buy even food. This was revealed to him through an Illuminati insider.

Unnamed Economist working for US Gov't (GLP)

What we have experienced the last two years is nothing to what we are going to experience this year. If you have a job nowyou may not have it in three to six months. (by August 2010). Stock market will fall = great depression. Foreign investors stop financing debt = collapse. 6.2 million are about to lose their unemployment.

Jimmy "Doomsday"

DOW will fall below 7,000 before mid summer 2010- Dollar will rise above 95 on the dollar index before mid summer 2010- Gold will bottom out below $800 before mid summer 2010- Silver will bottom out below $10 before mid summer 2010- CA debt implosion will start its major downturn by mid summer and hit crisis mode before Q4 2010- Dollar index will plunge below 65 between Q3 and Q4 2010- Commercial real estate will hit crisis mode in Q4 2010- Over 35 states will be bailed out by end of Q4 2010 by the US tax payer End of Q4 2010 gold will hit $1,600 and silver jump to $35 an oz.

Posted by giveusliberty1776

My complaint against the CFTC was published

2010-05-26T07:37:00.001+04:00

For the record - The CFTC actually published my complaint! about the silver manipulation.

Cheers, Tate

Tate Ulsaker <arkbuilders_org@yahoo. com>

Tuesday, April 13, 2010 4:35 AM

Metals Hearing <metalshearing@CFTC.gov>

Position Limits on Precious Metals at COMEX

Dear Sir;

Thank you for asking for comments on the issue of position limits for

precious metals.

I am especially concerned about position limits in COMEX on silver held

by in concentrated hands of between 1 and 4 entities.

I believe that a fair level of contracts for any one entity to hold should

be no more than 1500 contracts because this amount is similiar to limits

placed on other commodities in terms of available market supply.

Please restrict any hedging exemptions from those limits to legitimate

hedgers.

Please stop the levels of concentration in COMEX silver futures by such

entities as JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs that have no reason to be

global giants of naked paper shorts other than to manipulate the market.

Please investigate and prosecute any illegal acts done by entities such as

JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs who have whistleblowers giving

us convincing proof of manipulation as if these companies have

been consistently acting above the law for many years already.

Please do you job for both the American people and all of the average

traders world-wide who wish to preserve the legitimacy and fairness of

the CFTC and COMEX.

Trend Watch - Wealthy Getting Out of Currency

2010-05-26T04:07:00.001+04:00

Wealthy getting out of fiat currency - very predictable!

Fiat currency is at the tipping point. Now that lending has been peaked because debt saturation is maximized beyond anything ever seen in human history spanning all the way back as far as one can go, it is time for the next great play. What can the bankers do now except transfer wealth over to themselves by inflating the money supply to pay off nominal digits on their balance sheets? It is a simple game really. Imagine if you could print unlimited amounts of paper that others considered to be "money". Why would you worry about debt? Just keep printing additional money and keep buying up real assets. Those who can't repay you will have to forfeit their collateralized assets to you. No risk, high reward, devaluation of currency, transfer of wealth. This is the new game for moving past the post-peak of debt saturation. After that game is played, then there is another game that comes into play historically, and that is war. Yup, after the wealth is consolidated into the hands of the few then there is only one easy way to distract and work the masses for nearly nothing. You need a big enemy abroad and a widespread all consuming war, as patriotic as possible, with weapons sales to both sides. That will last about 4-years or so historically. And then after all the death and destruction has played out, the new game starts all over again with newly printed currency, perhaps even a new constitution and a renewed appeal for rebuilding. The same people behind the currency printing press remain in control. New presidents come in like frontmen selling the story they are told to sell. We get to vote for either side of the false paradigm "left" or "right", both boots of the same banking con game.

Can we break free from the above predictable cycle? Yes we can. If we refuse to participate in their money system, we rob them of their ability to rob us. And we keep power at the local level more while also preventing power from being consolidated. Simple really. Wish I thought of it but actually, this has always been common knowledge. The founding fathers of the US were all into this stuff.

- Tate Ulsaker

(below ripped from Eric King's site...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Richard Russell - Wealthy Getting Out of Fiat Money II

Eric King: Here is a sneak peak from the most recent issue of Richard Russell's Dow Theory Letters, dated May 26th: "Yet in the background big money, wealthy investors, are seriously worried. In their hearts, they don't trust fiat currency." Richard Russell is the Godfather of the newsletter business, and recently he has been chronicling the fact that the wealthy are shaken. Their confidence in fiat moeny and other paper assets is disappearing.

Russell goes on to say about the wealthy:

"They are familiar with the history of fiat currency, and they know that no fiat currency has ever survived for long. Therefore, these people are buying items of intrinsic value — gold, silver, platinum, gems, top quality art, rubies, jade, beach property, collectables."

Russell is also noting massive demand for gold:

"Germany's greatest fear is inflation, as per the 1920s. Headline in the May 16 Financial Times — "GERMANS LEAD GOLD RUSH FRENZY. We have some extraordinary sales to German customers," says Deborah Thomson, the Rand treasurer. "The refinery which usually sells 2,000 coins to each customer at a time, said that last week it received an order from a German bank for 30,000 coins. Another banks requested 15,000 coins."

Regarding auctions, Russell writes:

"Yet diamond prices have been surging. Wanted art objects and paintings have been setting record prices."

This is exactly the type of action one would expect to see during phase II of a secular bull market in gold. Always ignore the noise, the day to day and week to week action and keep your eye on the big picture, the big trend. Follow the big money. The big money wants hard assets such as gold.

Very few human beings can stay invested for the entire duration of a secular bull market; they simply don't have the stomach for it. Don't lose your position and fail to stay invested because of the frailty of your emotions.

Eric King

King World News

For more Richard Rusell go to Dow Theory Letters or CLICK HERE.

2010-05-18T09:19:00.002+04:00

Gold today is one of the biggest dummy-proof investments in human history.

How in the world can gold stay anywhere near current levels?

And how in the world can the dollar or the Euro remain anywhere near current purchasing power?

Folks, today we have the biggest dummy-proof investment vehicle in world history right before our eyes because the biggest fraud in human history is taking place with these banker bailouts. Whole countries are being bailed out of their short term debt problems with the addition of much more longer term debt that will only add heaps of additional problems onto existing problems down the road.

The factors pointing towards a gold boom are staggering. Likewise, the factors pointing towards currency devaluation are staggering. There are no contrary indicators that have a prayer of mitigating these diverging trends.

Hello gold boom. Goodbye dollar.

- Tate Ulsaker

===========================

Rob McEwen: Gold $2,000 By Years End
Eric King: Rob McEwen was being interviewed on CNBC this morning and was discussing the timetable for his $5,000 price target on gold. What has been interesting is the amount of coverage gold has been getting on CNBC lately. This coverage, by and large, has encouraged investors to sell, and this is gold friendly.
Getting back to Rob's interview he commented, "We have declining production, and we have massive amounts of monetary stimulation that will debase the currencies around the world."
He was asked why he was so convinced that gold would continue to run when guests on CBNC were saying to take profits, and Rob replied, "We really haven't seen the effects of the massive stimulative policies that are in place right now, and it's going to get worse."
When asked about his $5,000 target price Rob stated, "That's probably 2012 to 2014."
Rob is a veteran of markets and knows this bull market is secular in nature and will ultimately reach its full maturity at much higher price levels.
To hear a more in depth interview with Rob McEwen recently on King World News CLICK HERE.
To see the CNBC interview CLICK HERE.

2010-05-18T06:34:00.002+04:00

Our Debt-based fiat currency system was doomed from the start, a mathematical guarantee. How can you depend upon a monetary system that requires by the very nature of its structure a increase in debts perpetually, along with continually expanding money supply and inflation? You can’t. Our debt-based money system is a ponzi-scheme by design. It is a wealth transferring mechanism. The principle is printed and the interest is not. How can such a system exist without continually transferring hard assets away from the savers and earners and towards the printers until everyone is in debt to their eyeballs and the system crashes? That is exactly what the system was designed to do – profitable crash machine. A transfer of wealth machine. There is no other argument so sound as this: no fiat currency ever survived among tens of thousands of examples worldwide throughout history. Every single one of them collapsed to zero value over time without any exception. What began in 1913 is ending now and very profitably so for those who do nothing but print and manage debt paper. Look at them, sitting on multi-billions and they didn’t produce a single economic good. Those who took debt lost assets. Those who printed took assets. End of story.

When will we stop participating in our own slavery?

– Tate Ulsaker

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Ron Paul: Bullish on Gold

Eric King: This comment from Ron Paul, from his CNBC interview, sums up the situation we are in perfectly: “The system that replaced Bretton Woods was a non-viable system...So this is the unwinding of a system.” This statement is short, simple and completely accurate.

Congressman Paul also stated, “We gained the power to issue the reserve currency of the world...We literally created the system. It spread and it’s still trusted. The Dollar is trusted, and people still buy treasury bills, but all of that will come to an end.”

Ron Paul also commented, “We have not allowed for the liquidation of debt. We have not allowed the elimination of the malinvestment. It’s still in the system.”

Stop looking at the daily fluctuations in the price of gold; they are completely meaningless. Keep your eye on the big picture, and that is the secular structure of this bull market in gold. Do not give up your “core” position in gold. Learn to look at significant corrections in the gold market as opportunities to accumulate.

Change your mental mindset, and learn to think like a professional. That is how you make the big money. This way, when big corrections happen in the gold market, you will view them as fire sales and learn to buy when everyone else is afraid.

Michael Nystrom constantly updates information regarding Ron Paul and a variety of other topics at his site DailyPaul.com and his was the first site to have this out on a blog today.

For more great DailyPaul info CLICK HERE.

ArkBuilders

Recent roundup from www.kingworldnews.com

No Chermicals Allowed! (Ulsaker Bees in New Zealand 2011)

Untitled

Here's the Risk: "Occupy" ends up doing the bidding of the global elite

Fukushima is 33 times worse than Chernobyl

Bilderberg is Busted - Let's Hope This Trend Continues!

CNN forced to admit - 3 nuclear reactors melted down

"'Nobody's Doing Nothin' - America Is Finished"

Proof of Coming Economic Storm

We Are Entering Another Great Depression - UK Telegraph

With the US trapped in depression, this really is starting to feel like 1932

The US workforce shrank by 652,000 in June, one of the sharpest contractions ever. The rate of hourly earnings fell 0.1pc. Wages are flirting with deflation.

Related Articles

· Monetary union has left half of Europe trapped in depression

· Asia needs to fully wake up to the scale of the West's economic crisis

· Buy-to-let: rents rise for first time in three months

· Eurozone falls into deflation as M3 money supply shrinks

· Wages fall at fastest rate since records began

· Deflation: workers face more pay freezes as prices fall at sharpest rate since 1933

Tracking the Crash this Week with Eric King

The Upcoming US Dollar Crash = Biggest Transfer of Wealth in History

‘Kill Switch’ To Shut Down The Internet

New Bill Gives Obama 'Kill Switch' To Shut Down The Internet

WikiLeaks Founder Has ANOTHER Massacre Video

WikiLeaks Founder Has Massacre Video

Jim Rickards Discovers IMF Gold-Based Currency Document

The Silver Story

A Suggested Survival List

United States is beyond point of no return financially - John Embry

Toxic Corexit dispersant chemicals remained secret as feds colluded with Big Business

Toxic Corexit dispersant chemicals remained secret as feds colluded with Big Business

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It's time to end chemical trade secrets

It's time to end the chemical secrecy

Government scientists confirm massive oil plumes BP issues denial

Government scientists confirm massive oil plumes BP issues denial

By Tom Eley

50 Ships To Join Second Freedom Flotilla

50 Ships To Join Second Freedom Flotilla

Palestine News Network Report

Mish - Magic Keynesian Mirror

Bernanke to Congress: Reduce the Deficit!

Bernanke to Congress: Reduce the Deficit!

Wyatt Research Staff | The Daily Profit | June 9, 2010 3:49pm EDT

Gold Boom Rationale Tracking in Mainstream News (finally)

Massive Global Trend Change!

Haliburton Catalyst for All that is Good

What was Halliburton's role in US oil spill?

By David Usborne

Dollar at Death's Door

"I think silver is really at the nexus" - Stephen Leeb

RE: My complaint against the CFTC was published

Read Futurist Predictions

My complaint against the CFTC was published

Trend Watch - Wealthy Getting Out of Currency