Culture of Corruption

The book that President Obama's adoring media harem doesn't want you to read [Photo] Never has an administration taken office with more inflated promises of turning Washington around. Never have a media-anointed American Idol and his entourage fallen so fast and hard.In Culture of Corruption, New York Times bestselling author Michelle Malkin delivers a powerful, damning, and comprehensive indictment of the culture of corruption that surrounds Team Obama’s brazen tax evaders, Wall Street cronies, petty crooks, slum lords, and business-as-usual influence peddlers. After examining ONWS -- Obama Nominee Withdrawal Syndrome -- Malkin details the troubling influence of First Crony Michelle Obama, and explodes the myth of Vice President “Average Joe” Biden. She takes you on a tour of Obama’s outrageously flawed Cabinet and the backroom buddies he has appointed as “czars.” Malkin also details Obama’s disquieting connections with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN, which Malkin dubs A Community of Organized Racketeers Nationwide) and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). Finally, Malkin reveals how massive new federal spending plus tens of thousands of pages of new regulations -- along with unprecedented new powers over taxpayers and the economy -- have given Obama and his henchmen limitless new opportunities for sleaze, favor-trading, deal-cutting, and influence-peddling.Shaping up to be the most corrupt administration in American history:Obama’s team: Not the “best of the Washington insiders,” as the liberal media style them, but rather, a dysfunctional and dangerous conglomerate of business-as-usual cronies and hacksIn the first two weeks alone of his infant administration, Obama had made no fewer than 17 exceptions to his “no-lobbyist” rule Why the fact that the massive infusion of union dues into his campaign treasury didn’t trouble him in the least reveals Obama’s credibility as a reformer The lack of unprecedented pace of withdrawals and botched appointments -- and how getting through the confirmation process was no guarantee of ethical cleanliness or competence, even as Obama’s cheerleaders were glorifying the Greatest Transition in World HistoryInconsistency: How Obama, erstwhile critic of the campaign finance practice known as “bundling,” happily accepted more than $350,000 in bundled contributions from billionaire hedge-fund managersHow Obama broke his transparency pledge with the very first bill he signed into law -- helping make hostility to transparency is a running thread through Obama’s cabinetMichelle Obama: Beneath the cultured pearls, sleeveless designer dresses, and eyelashes applied by her full-time makeup artist, is a hardball Chicago politicoJoe Biden: It’s not just that he lies, it’s that he lies so well that you think he really believes the stuff he makes up Treasury Secretary Geithner: His ineptness and epic blundering -- including how he nearly caused the collapse of the dollar in international trade with a single remarkThe appalling story of Technology Czar Vivek Kundra, the convicted shoplifter in charge of the entire federal government’s information security infrastructureObama’s “Porker of the Month” Transportation Secretary, Roy LaHood: An earmark-addicted influence peddler born and raised on the politics of pay-to-playSEIU: Responsible for installing a cabal of hand-chosen officers who exploited their cash-infused fiefdoms for personal gain and presided over rigged elections -- in the process, becoming all that they had professed to stand against as representatives of the downtrodden workerHow Obama lied on his “Fight the Smears” campaign website when he claimed that he “never organized with ACORN” ACORN: How the profound threat the group poses is not merely ideological or economic -- it’s electoralACORN’s own internal review of shady money transfers among its web of affiliates: How it underscores concerns that conservatives have long raised about the organizationLiar, liar, pantsuit on fire: How Hillary Clinton has already trampled upon her promise not to let her husband’s financial dealings sway her decisions as Secretary of StateHow even a few principled progressives are finally beginning to question the cult of Obama -- even as Obama sycophants in the mainstream media continue to celebrate his “hipness” and “swagga”

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RAW POWER

Central Market's cooking school won't be doing much cooking on Thursday, July 30. Actually, the lesson focuses on a new trend in healthy eating: raw food. Gather up all your foodie friends and learn to prepare zucchini hummus, garden scrabble (are Qs and Zs still worth 10 points?), Greek salad, cherry malt and mango cobbler. There are still 18 seats available for the $45 course and class starts at 6:30 p.m. at Central Market's Coit Road location. Most evening classes offer wine and beer samples paired specially for the menu, but no worries if you're not quite 21 yet, participants only need to be 18-years-old to attend the class. Upcoming classes include modern clambake for $65, parent/children desserts for $60, international cooking focusing on Spain for $45 and seafood 101 for $55. For more information and registration, call 469-241-8389 or visit centralmarket.com.

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6 Reasons Obama-Care Is Bad Medicine

by  Chuck Norris

07/28/2009

No one denies that in an affluent country such as our own, it borders on tragic that millions do not have some form of health care. I feel for those Americans; I really do. I agree that health care reform is needed badly in America, but I don't believe the bill of goods called "universal health care" that is being pitched presently by our president contains the solution. In fact, I believe it is bad medicine for America.

-- First, universal health care unwisely is being rushed.

Should sweeping health care reform be enacted in a world-record time? Just like the stimulus packages and bogus bailout baloney, Obama-care is being shoved downed America's throat (without explanation) and propelled like a ramrod through Congress (without examination). I call it the Obama blitzkrieg: create crisis; crunch numbers; and cram legislation. The fact is the president continues to sell the program, but there is still no single plan he or Congress is ready to sell.

-- Second, universal health care clearly would drive our country deeper into debt, which is being progressively purchased by foreign powers without any concern by Washington to stop it.

Obama said in his nationally televised news conference, "Health care reform is not going to add to that deficit; it's designed to lower it." How can he say that when they haven't even settled on a single health care plan? When he doesn't know the far-reaching implications of offering it in every community across the nation?

The president is struggling to base his rhetoric in fiscal reality. Even according to the Congressional Budget Office, the Senate version of the health care legislation "would result in a net increase in federal deficits of about $1.0 trillion for fiscal years 2010 through 2019." Is that what you call good fiscal responsibility within an economy and government that already is bordering on bankruptcy?

-- Third, universal health care would impersonalize health care and ration medical services.

Government takeover of health care also would allow Washington to use "comparative effectiveness research" to dictate to doctors which treatments they should prescribe and how much they should cost. That in turn would lead to rationing of health care services.

Canada and Europe already have proved that national health care translates into national nightmares, with a plethora of new government regulations and new systems of rationing medical attention. Under government-run services, personal health care would transform into more impersonal harassment. More government means more menacing minutiae running our lives.

-- Fourth, universal health care ultimately would limit the competitive market of health care.

And what about for the taxpayers who would pay for the program? Would having universal health care encourage their future productivity? Further taxing members of the upper class (which would mean further penalizing their productivity) certainly would not provide incentive for Americans chasing the American dream. And their added taxes obviously would trickle down to consumers, as well. Or do we just assume they would pay 47 million Americans' universal health care out of their surpluses?

You don't create competitive markets by creating monopolies, yet that is exactly what government-run universal health care would prevent: competition. If government should do anything, it should crack down on medical insurance monopolies. If government wants to regulate one more thing, it would be better to regulate the medical insurance companies, not the American people.

-- Fifth, universal health care ultimately would transform legislators into quasi health care practitioners.

With government-sanctioned universal health care, legislators would become quasi medical practitioners because they would lead and guide the government-controlled medical boards, personnel and policies that would oversee the program. That would include abortive and end-of-life counsel and services. Federal politicians would rely upon relatively few chief physicians (appointed mostly by them), who in turn would oversee and implement the medical policies and procedures that they felt were best for the country.

-- Sixth, universal health care would increase big government, and America would continue on the slippery slope toward socialism.

The nanny state is not our solution to better health. Our government already provides two medical coverage programs: Medicare (for senior citizens) and Medicaid (for low-income citizens). The president mentioned in his speech last week that those two programs are the greatest contributors to our skyrocketing deficit. So why not reform, improve and enhance those programs rather than create a third (or fourth or fifth) government medical bureaucracy called "universal health care"?

What is needed in Washington is a truly bipartisan group that is allowed an ample amount of time to work on a compromise health care program that wouldn't raise taxes (for anyone), regulate personal medical choices or ration health care.

Why wait for Washington? Go to http://PatientsUnitedNow.com to learn more about how you and your local community can reform health care and keep your options for doctors and medical care. And mostly, go to the Web site of Dr. Betsy McCaughey at http://www.DefendYourHealthCare.us. She is a health policy expert and former lieutenant governor of New York and actually has read the entire Senate bill on universal health care. She is disclosing many hidden details within it that are not being discussed with the American public.

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Winning The Uphills ...Seth Godin

Interesting business lesson learned on a bicycle: it's very difficult to improve your performance on the downhills

I used to dread the uphill parts of my ride. On a recumbent bike, they're particularly difficult. So I'd slog through, barely surviving, looking forward to the superspeedy downhill parts.

Unfortunately, I had a serious accident a few years ago (saving the life of a clueless pedestrian by throwing myself onto the pavement). Downhill might be fast, but it's crazy.

Lesson learned. Now, I look forward to the uphill parts, because that's where the work is, the fun is, the improvement is. On the uphills, I have a reasonable shot at a gain over last time. The downhills are already maxed out by the laws of physics and safety.

The best time to do great customer service is when a customer is upset. The moment you earn your keep as a public speaker is when the room isn't just right or the plane is late or the projector doesn't work or the audience is tired or distracted. The best time to engage with an employee is when everything falls apart, not when you're hitting every milestone. And everyone now knows that the best time to start a project is when the economy is lousy.

Most of your competition spend their days looking forward to those rare moments when everything goes right. Imagine how much leverage you have if you spend your time maximizing those common moments when it doesn't.

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Two Trillion Tons, Obama Parody, Dr. Evil, Federal Reserve, Treasury, IRS, Taxes, Tea Party, 16 Tons

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Behind the music: Where are the female A&Rs

There are plenty of talented women in music, but the people responsible for signing, developing and promoting them are almost always men

Mica Levi, centre, of Micachu and the Shapes. Photograph: PR

This year looks like an exciting one for female artists in the UK (they were pretty successful last year too, with Duffy outselling the majority of male pop stars). The airwaves and charts are dominated by artists like Micachu and the Shapes, Little Boots and Pixie Lott, while La Roux, Florence and the Machine, Bat for Lashes and Lisa Hannigan have been shortlisted for the Mercury prize.

But if you saw the industry panels at music conferences in the past year, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the people working behind the scenes are all white men. At a recent all-day event, there wasn't a single woman on stage (apart from the one filling the panellists' glasses with water).

Though the reality isn't as bleak as the conference would suggest, a recent study from Creative & Cultural Skills shows that 66% of people working in the music industry are male. When it comes to promotion and management work the figure rises to 77%. When Andria Vidler was appointed EMI UK and Ireland president a couple of months ago, she was the first woman to hold such a position in a major UK record company. You'd think that the music business would be more progressive than the financial sector, but it appears not.

But the part of the music industry that seems to have a complete dearth of women is record A&R (artists and repertoire). I've never come across a female A&R myself, though I've been told by someone at Universal that there are a few in their building. A male A&R at a major label says he doesn't believe the old argument that women don't want to slog around the country, spending each night at a different club. "I've known a few female talent scouts through the years, but A&Rs today tend to be former heads of indie labels, lawyers and, on rare occasions, managers, and for some reason those jobs are almost never done by women."

I asked a male manager, who has also worked on record labels, for his thoughts. He said: "How many female music anoraks do you know? Girls tend to be more interested in what the band looks like on the record sleeve than how it was recorded and how it was put together."

Caroline Elleray, head of A&R for Universal Music Publishing in the UK, takes issue with this. "I absolutely love what I do and I am a proper music anorak," she says. Elleray signed Coldplay and Keane to BMG Publishing, and helped with funding before they even had record deals. "Some days I think I need pages and pages on this subject … and then other days I think a sad face and a question mark just about covers it. There's no doubt that the music business is under-populated by women. More than any other business."

As a songwriter, I've often been told to write songs with girls in mind: "When you write for a guy, write what girls would like a guy to say to them, and when you write for a girl, say what a girl would like to say." If record companies are set on making records for girls, how come the people in charge of signing acts, guiding their development and choosing what singles they release are almost all men?

The music executives I spoke to said that there isn't a concerted effort not to employ women, but neither would they make a concerted effort to employ them. Does that mean that woman are no good at A&R or that my manager friend is right – they're just not interested? Being a confirmed "music anorak" myself, I'd say that's certainly not the case. I think that, traditionally, there's been a lack of encouragement for women trying to enter that side of the music business – and a certain amount of sexism still exists.

Last week, I was part of a music and technology panel trying to answer the question: who pays the piper? And, yes, I was the only woman (let alone the only person representing the artist community). When we took questions from the audience a man stood up, announcing that he was the head of Grokster, and now in charge of getting music licences for the soon-to–be-relaunched Pirate Bay. He addressed me as "Korean" (as it sort of rhymes with my name). Even though he was informed of my real name, he continued calling me Korean – and when I asked him what his name was, he said: "It's Wayne Rosso, but you can call me Big Daddy." The more things change, the more they stay the same.

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Tips For Better Shows

You’ve updated your website; you’ve setup some great viral marketing with MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, NOW WHAT?

Play live anywhere and as often as possible is the best way to build a following. The larger your following, the more in demand you will be. If you learn what makes venue owners happy and you do it, then most likely you will have a standing invitation to come back as often as you want to.

A few suggestions:

• Email blasts to your fans
• Create traffic to your website with regular, purposeful communication on social sites. And when you send fans to your website, make sure there is plenty of new video, audio, photos, and so on to give them something exciting and fresh to look at.
• Cold calls. Call every venue, promoter you can find and then follow up each lead. I understand these concepts are not new but they work.
• Work for free

We need to be creative and smart with our time and resources. Keep in mind that at the same time as you are cold calling, emailing, and communicating with fans, you could go to a church, a coffee shop, or some other venue and play for free. After all, most places will take a chance on someone who is doing the gig for free.

Then if you get in there you have a few options to make some money anyway. You can sell some product to make a few $$. If you have aligned yourself with a charity you can make some $$ (and help others at the same time).

But the bigger point is this: all of this is good (experience, exposure, and generating a little income) – BUT, if you are amazing LIVE, they will book you again. And the next time, they’ll pay you!

Bottom Line for Success remains: Live shows and building your fan base. You can have the best of everything else, but unless you focus on these two, it's unlikely you will play a venue more than once.

All roads do lead to the stage, where you and your band have the best opportunity to connect with fans by creating special moments and memories that will gain you the most important thing in your music career: TRUE BLUE FANS.

Sneaking Health Care Past Congress - - artditzel's Blog - Blogster

Sneaking Health Care Past Congress - - artditzel's Blog - Blogster

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Bilderberg Club, A SECRET Society

The Bilderberg Club: a secret society of the richest and most influential people conspiring to achieve a world government

D. Estulin

The November-December, 2005 issue of the Kingston Eye Opener (Box 3514, Kingston, ON, Canada, K7L 5J9) published an interview of editor Geoff Matthews with Daniel Estulin, Communications Training Specialist, who wrote a book on the Bilderbergers:

Daniel, could you please define Bilderberg for our readers.

Bilderberg is not a person, but an idea. It is an idea centred on the perception of man as intrinsically evil. Humanity cannot gain its freedom from synarchism unless it defeats the idealism that it represents. It is the idea that creates the policies of state which rip up the tallest constitutions and drag humanity into war from the highest position of power. That is why it must be acknowledged that World War II has not been won in real terms. A single man and his clique had been brought down in this war at a cost of a hundred million lives lost, but the idea behind them had not been defeated. The idea has now come to roost in America, and has infested its platform of business, its economy, its institutions for learning, and finally, its highest position of government.

The 2006 meeting of the Bilderbegers took place June 8-10 at the Brookstreet Hotel, in Ottawa, Canada. Ottawa police officers were standing guard outside a dozen metal gates that served as security checkpoints a half kilometre from the hotel. But to approach the hotel property, even uniformed officers had to show their credentials to the half -dozen black-suited men working for a private security firm hired by the Bilderbergers.

Some of this year's attendees were pictured on the front page of the Ottawa Citizen: from left to right, first row: David Rockefeller, founder of the Trilateral Commission and former chairman of the Chase Manhattan Bank; Frank McKenna, former Premier of New Brunswick and ex-ambassador to the U.S.; Gordon Nixon, President and CEO of the Royal Bank of Canada; second row: James Wolfensohn, former president of the World Bank; Richard Perle, assistant secretary of defence to U.S. President Reagan and advisor of present President Bush; Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands

Who was the most prominent individual involved with the founding of the Bilderbergers?

Without a doubt, Joseph Retinger, a 33rd degree mason. He was the political aide to General Sikorski, and served for the London-based Polish government-in-exile. In addition, at the age of 58, he parachuted into German-occupied territory outside Warsaw for some sabotage missions.

Due to his high-profile career, in the 1950s he was able to create contacts with numerous high-ranking military officials and political leaders. His main aim was to unite the world in peace. His peace dividend was to be under the control of supranational, powerful organisations. He believed that such organisations would be immune from short-term ideological conflicts erupting between governments. To Retinger, it was insignificant what dominated the economic ideology of a country. He believed these differences could be brought into line by powerful multinational organisations dictating and applying powerful economic and military policies, thereby creating a union and a bond between the nations.

Oh really!? I thought that it was Prince Bernhard of Holland who actually founded the secret Club.

Bernhard was a poster boy. A pretty face and a facade. In 1952, Retinger approached Bernhard with a proposal for a secret conference to involve the NATO leaders in an open and frank discussion on international affairs behind closed doors. Prince Bernhard, at the time, was an important figure in the oil industry and held a major position in Royal Dutch Petroleum (Shell Oil), as well as Société Générale de Belgique — a powerful global corporation.

In which ways (people, institutions, etc.) are the decisions of the Club “networked” and forwarded in the level of international organizations, the media, banks, states and governments in a way that they can be implemented?

You know, everywhere you look — government, big business, and any other institution seeking to exercise power — the key is secrecy. Meetings such as those of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the G-8, World Trade Organisation, World Economic Forum, Central Banks, the European Union Council of Ministers and the EU Commission, EU summits, government cabinet meetings, numerous think tanks, etc., are always conducted behind closed doors. The only possible reason for this is that they don't want you and me to know what they are really up to. That well worn excuse for keeping things under wraps — “it is not in the public interest” really means that it is not in the interest of the powers that be that the public should know.

However there is, in addition, a network of private forums and meetings that take place where the secrecy principle extends to the forums and meetings themselves — by and large, we don't even know that they are taking place, let alone what is being planned and discussed.

There's the World Economic Forum at Davos in January/February, the Bilderberg and G8 meetings in June/July, and the IMF/World Bank annual conference in September. A kind of international consensus emerges and is carried over from one meeting to the next. But no one's really leading it. This consensus becomes the background for G8 economic communiqués; it becomes what informs the IMF when it imposes an adjustment programme on Argentina; and it becomes what the US President proposes to Congress.

With what other international centres of power/authority does the Club cooperate and in what aspect?

Bilderberg controls the IMF, the World Bank, the UN, all the European Central Banks. Every prominent European commissioner has at one time or another attended a Bilderberger meeting. Every NATO general secretary is a Bilderberger. You see what we are up against.

Are there any other centres of power/authority that are considered opposite/rival to the Club? If yes, which are they and what do they stand for?

Bilderberg, in fact, is a foreign policy arm of an all-powerful and completely unknown group called “The Committee of 300” whose ancestors were the British East Indian Tea Company, whose main line of work didn't have anything to do with selling tea but rather with moving drugs.

In fact, the entire world drug trade is controlled by the most powerful man and a few women in the world. All of them belong to the Committee of 300. I have spoken on several occasions with deep cover intelligence officers, both in Europe and the US, and all of them have given me a rough estimate of annual drug profit margins between US $500-$700 billion. Most of this dirty money is recycled through all the major stock markets, and then pocketed as a legitimate profit.

Who invites the people that attend the gatherings of the Bilderberg, and what criteria do the guests have to fulfil in order to be invited?

Bilderberg, from its inception, has been administered by a small nucleus of persons, appointed since 1954 by a committee of the wise men, which is made up of a permanent chair, an American chair, European and an American secretary and treasurer. The annual invitations are only sent out to important and respected people who, through their special knowledge, personal contacts and influence in national and international circles, can amplify the objectives and resources of the Bilderberg Group.

Nobody can buy their way into a Bilderberg meeting, although many corporations have tried. The steering committee decides who to invite — what the Guardian newspaper of London aptly calls a “Bilderberg person”, that hasn't changed in 50 years of secret meetings — a Fabian Socialist (Translation: Fabianism believes in what it describes as “the democratic control of society in all its activities.” The key word is control of the individual. This as being best achieved through global government, a goal it shares with Communism) and a One World Order enthusiast.

What means do they use in order to keep their activity silent and away from the media?

Big time media is part of the world elite and with the slyness of a slave, they don't need to be told by the Bilderbergers to keep the meeting secret. They do it voluntarily. The Washington Post, The New York Times, Grupo Prisa in Spain, Le Monde, The Economist, the Wall Street Journal, Toronto Star, the National Post to name just a few, fully realize the advantages of cooperating with the Bilderbergers.

They also know what will happen if they are to “betray” the most secret of secret societies. Newspapers live and die by the advertising they take in. Do you know how simple it is for Rockefeller, the Prime Minister of Canada, Etienne Davingnon, and other influential Bilderbergers to pick up the phone and tell GE, Siemens, Mercedes, Novartis, etc., to stop advertising in such and such media?

Actually, as all the biggest and the most powerful corporations in the world belong to the Bilderbergers, they police themselves. For those not entirely convinced what may happen to them, we have a case of Richard Nixon being destroyed in the false Watergate crisis for the entire world to see, as I explain in my new best seller on the Bilderbergers.

Or the case of Argentina being destroyed, again, for the whole world to see by the New World Order in the Falkland's War because Argentina was willing to sell nuclear power, the cleanest, cheapest, and best source of energy to Mexico against the wishes of the Global Masters. So, Kissinger gave the order to attack.

If the President of the US can be put out of business, or an independent nation be subjugated, what chance, I ask you, does a newspaper have against the all-powerful Bilderbergers? So, the big-time media follows every direction and command without as much as a whimper.

What would you consider to be the more “curious coincidences” for some of Bilderberger recruits?

The most dramatic example of a “useful recruit” was the obscure governor of Arkansas, Bill Clinton, who attended his first Bilderberg meeting at Baden Baden, Germany, in 1991. There, Clinton was told what NAFFA (North American Free Trade Agreement) is by David Rockefeller, and that he was to support it. The next year, he was elected President. Tony Blair attended a Bilderberg meeting in 1993, became party leader in July 1994, and became Prime Minister in May 1997. John Edwards was invited to a Bilderberg meeting in 2004, several weeks later to be “chosen” John Kerry's Vice Presidential candidate. The fact that Edwards wasn't invited back this year suggests to me that his political career is over by the way he was discarded as an old shoe by the Bilderbergers.

What Canadians have participated in previous Bilderberg meetings?

There have been many over the years; this is just a partial list: Donald S. MacDonald, ex-Finance Minister; Conrad Black, Ralph Klein, Israel Asper of the CanWestCapital Group; Lloyd Axworthy, Isabel-Bassett, Parl. Assistant Finance Minister of Ontario; Jean Chretien, Marshall A. Cohen of Olympia & York; Stephane Dion, A.L. Flood, Chairman, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce; Louise Frechette, Deputy Secretary-General, United Nations; David Frum from the National Post; Peter C. Godsoe, Chairman and CEO, Bank of Nova Scotia; Allan E. Gotlieb, former Ambassador to the US; Michael Harris; Donald J. Johnston, Secretary-General, OECD; Preston Manning; Paul Martin; Stephen Harper; etc.

What are some of the Bilderberger objectives?

Amongst some of their more ambitious plans are the creation of a One World Government with a single globalized marketplace, policed by a world army; a single global currency financially regulated by a world bank; a universal church as an outlet to channel mankind's inherent religious belief in the direction desired by the New World Order.

All other religions of the world will be destroyed; empowering international bodies to completely destroy all national identity through subversion from within. Only universal values will be allowed to flourish in the future; creation of “the post-industrial zero-growth society” (Translation: Zero growth is necessary to destroy vestiges of prosperity and be able to divide the society into owners and slaves. When there is prosperity, there is progress, which makes repression a lot harder to execute) which is meant to bring an end to all industrialization and the production of nuclear generated electric power (except for the computer and service industries.)

The remaining Canadian and American industries will be exported to poor countries such as Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Nicaragua, etc., where slave labor is cheap. One of the principal objectives for NAFTA will then be realized; empowering the United Nations until it becomes a demure, as well as a de facto, world government. Advancing this goal by creating a direct UN tax on “world citizens,” expanding NAFTA throughout the Western Hemisphere as a prelude to creating an “American Union” similar to the European Union; establishing NATO as the UN's world army.

What are some of Bilderberger achievements?

Bilderberg proposed and decided to establish formal relations with China before Nixon's administation made it publicly known policy. At a meeting in Saltsjöbaden, Sweden, in 1973, Bilderbergers agreed to increase the price of oil to $12 a barrel, a 350% jump, in order to create economic chaos in the United States and Western Europe, as part of the “softening up” policy.

In 1983, Bilderbergers got a secret promise out of the then “ultraconservative” President Ronald Reagan to transfer $50 billion of American taxpayers' money to the Third World and communist countries through its favourite conduits, the IMF and the World Bank, in order to pay the interest the Bilderbergers owed on their loans to the Western banks. That pledge was more than kept and became known as the Brady Plan.

The Bilderberg-orchestrated decision of getting rid of Margaret Thatcher as British Prime Minister, because she opposed the wilful hand-over of British sovereignty to the European Super State designed by the Bilderbergers. And incredulously, we all watched as her own party sold her out in favour of the Bilderberg poodle — John Major.

In 1985, Bilderbergers were ordered to give full support to the Strategic Defence Initiative (Star Wars), long before it became the official policy of a US government, grounding it on the premise that it would grant unlimited riches to the Masters of the Universe.

At their 1990 meeting at Glen Cove, Long Island, in New York, they decided that taxes had to be raised to pay more towards the debt owed to the International Bankers. Bilderberg ordered President [George] Bush Sr. to increase taxes in 1990, and watched him sign off of the tax-hiking “budget agreement” that lost him the election.

The multimillion dollar sale of Ontario Hydro, whose owner at the time was the Canadian Government, was discussed for the first time at the Bilderberg meeting in King City, Toronto, Canada, in 1996. Shortly after, Ontario Hydro was broken up into five independent companies and privatised.

Leaked reports from the 2002 meeting stated that the war in Iraq had been delayed until March 2003 at a time when every newspaper im the world was expecting the attack to be launched in the summer of 2002.

Splintering of Canada

Splintering of Canada. This theme was originally scheduled for discussion in 1997, but unexpected Bilderberg media coverage in the Toronto Star, Canada's leading daily during the 1996 meeting in King City, forced the globalists to postpone their plan to 2007.

Really!!! I think our readers would love to hear the details of the plan to destroy Canada!

The long and short of it is that the Bilderbergers planned the destruction of Canada through the Quebec referendum which they themselves organised, which also ties into a billion dollar scheme they concocted to steal Canada's water supply through the Grand Canal project. Of course, to destroy Canada, these vile people needed NAFTA and GATT as a precursor to US-Canadian continental union by 2007. That's the intended result. However, as you well know, not every plan, no matter how brilliantly set up, can be executed to perfection.

Do you remember Quebec's supposedly “authentic” independence drive in 1995? It was all a hoax. Through my intelligence sources, I discovered that Quebec was to separate from Canada abruptly via a Unilateral Declaration of Independence, orchestrated by the Rockefeller-controlled Canadian politicians. Most of the key political figures on both sides, though apparently in “opposition” to each other, are connected to David Rockefeller such as Brian Mulroney, ex Prime Minister; Lucien Bouchard, separatist PQ leader brought into politics by Brian Mulroney; Preston Manning also controlled by the Rockefeller-Bilderberg combines; Jean Chretien, ex-Prime Minister, liberal party, controlled by David Rockefeller.)

Let me give you an example:

John Rae was a leading strategist for former Prime Minister Chretien's election campaign. He was also an Executive Vice-President of Power Corp. and Paul Desmarais' right-hand man.

His brother is Bob Rae, ex-NDP Premier of Ontario (who is now running for the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada), who appointed Maurice Strong to the chairmanship of Ontario Hydro, which he proceeded to dramatically cut in both skilled human resources amd generating capacity (to provide a future need for power from James Bay/Grand Canal.)

Paul Martin, former Canada's Prime Minister, rose through the ranks at Power Corp., mentored by Paul Desmarais. He also attended the 1996 meeting of the-Bilderberg Group where the dismantlement of Ontario Hydro is hotly debated.

Jean Chretien's daughter, France, is married to Andre Desmarais, son of Paul Desmarais, chairman of Power Corporation. Chretien's “advisor, counsellor and strategist” for the past 30 years has been Mitchell Sharp, who brought Chretien into politics when he was Finance Minister. Sharp has been, since 1981, Vice-Chairman for North America of David Rockefeller's Trilateral Commission. Chretien, like so many lackeys, attended the 1996 meeting of the Bilderberg Group in King City, Toronto.

However, there is much more.

Daniel Johnson, former leader of the Quebec Liberal party and Quebec Premier in 1994, also rose through the ranks of Power Corp.

Brian Mulroney needs no introduction. He is one of the most hated Prime Ministers in Canada's history. He was also a lawyer and a lobbyist for Power Corporation and a member of the board of Archer-Daniels-Midland, a Rockefeller-owned conglomerate, which was headed by Dwayne Andreas who, like Rockefeller himself, is also a member of the Bilderberg Group.

Finally, you have Mike Harris, former Premier of Ontario, close friend of George Bush and Paul Martin. Harris, like his colleague Ralph Klein of Alberta, is also a Bilderberger.

So, the former federal Conservative Party (via Mulroney), the Liberal Party (via Chretien) and the NDP (via Rae) are all tightly connected to... Paul Desmarais and Power Corp. And we have the Prime Minister, the Finance Minister, and the Prime Minister's key aide all tightly connected to... Paul Desmarais and Power Corp.

Power Corp. co-chief executives Andre Desmarais, left, and Paul Desmarais Jr., right, leave with their father, Paul Desmarais Sr., after the company's annual meeting in Montreal Thursday, May 11, 2006. Paul Desmarais Sr. was obviously one of the attendees at this year's Bilderberger meeting.

If you have ever wondered why the same experts and politicians, though apparently representing opposing ideologies, always seem to appear on news, political debates, and current event programs, all pushing the same line, now you have the answer.

Who would benefit from Quebec's separation?

The answer is the Bilderberg Group. The ultimate outcome was a planned Continental Union of the U.S. and Canada by the early 21st century, in which both would be regionalized. This would necessitate a new Constitution for the resulting United States of North America. A fundamental piece of this jigsaw puzzle was a little known “Grand Canal” water-transfer project, a scheme estimated to cost between $80 billion and $130 billion.

Never heard of the continent-wide “Grand Canal” project? GRAND being an acronym for Great Recycling and Northern Development — envisages a dike across James Bay and the creation of a new fresh-water lake through the impoundment of rivers that now empty into the bay. This fresh water would then be pumped back to the Great Lakes basin and beyond. (See the article “The planned destruction of Canada” in the March-April, 2002 issue of Michael.)

Not surprising — the Bilderbergers, the Canadian Government, and the media whores such as Conrad Black and Robert S. Prichard, president of Torstar Media Group (Toronto Star) and a 2005 Bilderberg attendee, aren't too keen to publicize it!

When I found out about Rockefeller financing every Canadian politician, I went back and re-read everything I could get my hands on regarding NAFTA. There is a lot of talk in NAFTA about “free flowing water being free.” It is obvious, isn't it! Then, why is it in the document? Because when you put up dikes, you can suddenly charge for the water.

Think of money. If you had your choice, if you could pull a genie out of a bottle, and the genie could grant three wishes, what would your three wishes be? Remember your goal is to make the most money possible? Number one, give me control over the sun. Number two, give me control over the air. Number three, give me control over water. Now, leaving our little genie aside, we know we cannot control the sun, nor can we control the air, but we can control water. On the scale of things that are required for human life, it is the most important element that can be controlled.

The Bilderbergers thought they could get away with another media blackout. Not to be. When Canadian media got wind of it, it quickly spread like wildfire. A trickle turned into a torrential downpour, and Canadians were on to them. It is one thing not to report the news, quite another to be an accomplice in the willful destruction of your own country. On record, that was their worst defeat ever.

Daniel Estulin

This article was published in the June-July-August, 2006 issue of “Michael”.

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Your Music Career

One thing all artist that are seeking label deals is this:   If you go out and show them you can make money on your own, it puts you in a much better negotiation position than if you are not making money on your own.  For example, maybe there are a couple areas you are very weak in and you negotiate with the label to support you only in your areas of need.  Labels are smart enough to know if you're making it on your own, you don't really need them.  Maybe you need one of those big million dollar buses, so you include that in your deal.

Or if your doing really well, i.e., booking 175 + shows per year and selling tons of merchandise, you could negotiate a deal whereby whatever monies they invest in you, there is no recoup of those investments or a max of 50%, but, only after they have invested enough time with you to reach agreed upon goals. 

Label trends are to walk away with a 360 deal these days.  Just make sure you have an attorney well versed in these deals and the music business before you sign one.

And the bottom line is this:  What are you and your team really happy with?   Personally, if you can gross 1-2 million annually, doing it your way, why do anything but keep on doing what you have total control over? 

I guarantee you, if you can build your dedicated fan base up to 10-25 thousand over time, you can do whatever you want as long as you keep those fans connected with you and your live music.  This is why you never stop educating and improving yourself, your music, and your band with annual updates with companies like Tom Jackson Productions. 

Live music is a lifetime production....make your productions the best ever with continuous improvements, because if you don't, I can assure you your fans will let you know.  HOW?  The will stop showing up at your gigs!

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Certain Days; Do Certain Things

Hey, What Day is It? (Getting Into The Consumers Head)

Are you planning your music marketing according to specific days of the week? You should be? Check out this post for sure-fire ways to make the most of your online promotions.

Monday
It’s Monday! Do you know who’s watching you? Monday is considered the day of fresh information. Everything is new new new! Consider this: the average 9-5er arrives at his/her desk in the morning (please refer to obese man above), turns on the computer, and tunes into msn.com for the week’s political news, reviews on which movie did best at the weekend box office, and anything else that might be hot off the press. On Monday, people want to know what they’ve missed since Friday (though is probably not much).

Do you take Mondays seriously? Treat your music like a job. Try to have something new on your page each Monday. Whether it be a blog, new shows on your calendar, a quick news update, new photos from the weekend’s show, or new video. The options are limitless and its not like you have to revamp your page every week…just do a little at a time.

Rule of thumb: If you build it, they will come. Read more about this at Drawing Traffic to your Website(s)

Wednesday
In college, my Communications professor told me something I will never forget: most people open their email on Wednesdays. Yes, this has been mentioned on Grassrootsy before, but its worth mentioning again. Wednesday is a unique day. Because it finds itself smack dab in the middle of the week, its the one day that you’re least likely to get “Out of Office” replies. More people at their desk = more people reading their email = more people visiting your website. Optimize on this. Send your newsletter on Wednesday mornings or afternoons if possible. Stop by Email Marketing – Making Sure People Read What You Write for more tips.

Rule of thumb: Send emails on Wed…in the morn or after lunch. Check out Grassrootsy’s additional blogs on Email Marketing here.

Weekends
Stats prove that few erpeople read emails and surf the internet on the weekends, but the people who do are more likely to read through an entire email and will spend more time on your web page than they would on a weekday. For example, if you sent an email on Wednesday, you might get 100 people to open and they would spend an average of 45 second skimming through what you write. But on a Saturday, only 40 people might open up the email but spend a full 3 minutes reading it entirely.

So if you’re posting a blog or sending a weekend email, make sure it’s not time-sensitive. Perhaps you can post musings, and non-essential thoughts. Take it from msn.com: Their weekend news bits are usually reposts of information that that was already used earlier in the week.

Rule of thumb: Never send an email on the weekend that you would send on a Monday or Wednesday.

The 10 Most Dangerous Foods to Eat While Driving

• By Tony Borroz tonyatautopia@gmail.com">
• July 17, 2009  | 
• 3:06 pm  | 
• Categories: Autopia WTF? Dept.
• 
  

Insurance.com has come up with a list of the 10 most dangerous things eat behind the wheel. Seriously. Topping the list is the one thing we’ve all shoved into our faces during the morning commute.

Before we get to that, though, we should explain why Insurance.com thought this was important enough to investigate. Hagerty Classic Insurance, the folks who let you cover that ‘57 Chevrolet Bel Air or 1935 Dusenberg SJ in your garage, ran an applicant through the DMV. It discovered the guy had a restraining order barring him from having food within his reach while driving. Apparently the guy had been in several accidents while stuffing his maw.

Wait, it gets better (and by that we mean infuriatingly worse). Insurance.com decided to draw up a list of things you absolutely, positively should not sip, slurp, chomp or chew behind the wheel. Here from the home office in Cleveland are the ” The 10 Most Dangerous Foods to Eat While Driving”.

It should be said this is by no means scientific; it’s a rundown of things actuaries don’t think you ought to have in your hand (or mouth) when driving. That said, the list is more frightening than the repair bill we got when our Jag needed a transmission rebuild.

1. Coffee. It’s hot. It can spill. That’s bad. That said, we’re guilty of this. So are you. Admit it.
2. Hot soup. It’s hot. It can spill. That’s bad.
3. Tacos. Very messy.
4. Chili. It’s hot. It can spill. That’s bad. And it’s very messy.
5. Hamburgers. Greasy hands and a steering wheel do not mix.
6. Barbecued food. Um, that should go without saying.
7. Fried chicken. You think burgers are greasy?
8. Jelly or cream-filled donuts. Ever bitten into one and not had it squirt all over the place?
9. Soft drinks. Big threat of spillage, says Insurance.com, and unacceptable risk of “fizz up your nose.” Huh?
10. Chocolate. It melts on your fingers, which makes a mess on the steering wheel.

Allow us to make a special shout out here to item number two: Soup. Soup? Are you kidding? Who in their right mind thinks it’s OK to eat soup while driving a two-ton projectile? And who the hell is trying to spoon chili down their gullet in traffic? Good lord, people. It’s a CAR. Do not take that call from Joe in accounting, do not try to read that Brad Pitt cover story in Wired and do not try to munch a freakin’ taco. Just DRIVE.

Soup? To quote the great Tom Wolfe, “It’s enough to make the Fool Killer hang his head in shame at the missed opportunities.”

Photo: Flickr / jk5854

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Mysterious, Glowing Clouds Appear Across America’s Night Skies

By Alexis Madrigal

• July 16, 2009  | 
• 1:00 pm  | 
• Categories: Earth Science, Space

Mysterious, glowing clouds previously seen almost exclusively in Earth’s polar regions have appeared in the skies over the United States and Europe over the past several days.

Photographers and other sky watchers in Omaha, Paris, Seattle, and other locations have run outside to capture images of what scientists call noctilucent (”night shining”) clouds. Formed by ice literally at the boundary where the earth’s atmosphere meets space 50 miles up, they shine because they are so high that they remain lit by the sun even after our star is below the horizon.

The clouds might be beautiful, but they could portend global changes caused by global warming. Noctilucent clouds are a fundamentally new phenomenon in the temperate mid-latitude sky, and it’s not clear why they’ve migrated down from the poles. Or why, over the last 25 years, more of them are appearing in the polar regions, too, and shining more brightly.

“That’s a real concern and question,” said James Russell, an atmospheric scientist at Hampton University and the principal investigator of an ongoing NASA satellite mission to study the clouds. “Why are they getting more numerous? Why are they getting brighter? Why are they appearing at lower latitudes?”

Nobody knows for sure, but most of the answers seem to point to human-caused global atmospheric change.

Noctilucent clouds were first observed in 1885 by an amateur astronomer. No observations of anything resembling noctilucent clouds before that time has ever been found. There is no lack of observations of other phenomena in the sky, so atmospheric scientists are fairly sure that the phenomenon is recent, although they are not sure why.

Over the last 125 years, scientists have learned how the clouds form. At temperatures around minus 230 degrees Fahrenheit, dust blowing up from below or falling into the atmosphere from space provides a resting spot for water vapor to condense and freeze. Right now, during the northern hemisphere’s summer, the atmosphere is heating up and expanding. At the outside edge of the atmosphere, that actually means that it’s getting colder because it’s pushed farther out into space.

It’s not hard to see how a warming Earth could change those dynamics: as the globe heats up, the top of the atmosphere should get colder.

“The prevailing theory and most plausible explanation is that CO2 buildup, at 50 miles above the surface, would cause the temperature decrease,” Russell said. He cautioned, however, that temperature observations remain inconclusive.

The global changes that appear to be reshaping noctilucent cloud distribution could be much more complex, said Vincent Wickwar, an atmospheric scientist at Utah State University whose team was first to report a mid-latitude noctilucent cloud in 2002. Temperature does not explain their observations from around 42 degrees latitude.

“To get the noctilucent clouds you need temperatures that are about 20 degrees Kelvin colder than what we see on average up there,” Wickwar said. “We may have effects from CO2 or methane but it would only be a degree or a fraction of a degree.”

Instead, Wickwar’s explanation is that a vertical atmospheric wave discovered in their LIDAR data lowered the temperature in the region above their radar installation near Logan, Utah. But then you have to ask, he noted, “Where’d the wave come from?”

They don’t really have an answer yet. Other facilities around the world with similar LIDAR capacity haven’t reported similar waves. And the Rocky Mountains, near Wickwar’s lab, can cause atmospheric waves, which could be a special feature of his location.

Other theories abound to explain the observed changes in the clouds. Human-caused increases in atmospheric methane, which oxidizes into carbon dioxide and water vapor, could be providing more water for ice in the stratosphere. Increases in the amount of cosmic or terrestrial dust in the stratosphere could also increase the number of brightly shining clouds.

Two years into Russell’s NASA project, more questions exist than firm answers. They will have at least three and a half more years, though, to gather good data on upper atmospheric dynamics.

The recent observations of noctilucent clouds at all kinds of latitudes provide an extra impetus to understand what is going on up there. Changes are occurring faster than scientists can understand their causes.

“I suspect, as many of us feel, that it is global change, but I fear we don’t understand it,” Wickwar said. “It’s not as simple as a temperature change.”

Image: 1. The sky over Omaha on July 14th, snapped by Mike Hollingshead at Extreme Instability 2. Noctilucent clouds lit up the Paris sky behind the Bastille Day fireworks show at the Eiffel Tower. Captured by flickr user, breff 3. A rendering of the noctilucent clouds created from data obtained by Russel’s NASA project, AIM. Video: NASA.

WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal’s Twitter, Google Reader feed, and book site for The History of Our Future; Wired Science on Facebook.

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Potential Neurotoxin Could Be in Our Food???

• By Brandon Keim brandon@earthlab.net">
• July 17, 2009  | 
• 2:04 pm  | 
• Categories: Environment, Government
• 
  

Long after a potentially neurotoxic flame retardant is off the market, it could linger in our food chain.

One of the most comprehensive analyses yet of human exposure to PBDEs, or polybrominated diphenyl ethers, shows that the chemical — long used in everything from computers to sleeping bags — enters humans through their diets, not just their household.

“The more you eat, the more PBDEs you have in your serum,” said Alicia Fraser, an environmental health researcher at Boston University’s School of Public Health who headed the new study, published this month in Environmental Health Perspectives.

PBDEs are chemical cousins of polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, which are known to cause birth defects and neurological impairments. PCBs were banned throughout the world by the mid-1970s, when PBDEs were gaining popularity as flame retardants. PBDEs were soon found in most plastic-containing household products.

By the late 1990s, trace amounts of PBDEs had been found in people all over the world, with the highest exposures measured in the United States. Researchers became nervous: Low doses caused neurological damage in laboratory animals, and the highest human PBDE levels were found in breast milk.

Whether PBDEs posed an immediate threat to humans was uncertain. Direct testing is unethical, and population-wide epidemiological studies are difficult to run. But there’s enough reason for concern that the European Union banned two of the three most common PBDE formulations in 2004.

The Environmental Protection Agency, which in January admitted that it lacked the ability to establish basic standards of chemical safety, has not followed suit, but three states — California, Washington and Maine — have banned PBDEs since 2007. Many manufacturers have either stopped or plan on stopping their use.

“They are persistent in the environment. They don’t get broken down. Therefore, it takes a really long time for the contamination to leave our environment and our bodies,” said Fraser. “Even though we don’t know the health effects at this point, most people would want policies that would stop us from being exposed to them.”

But though well-advised, these bans won’t eliminate the threat. Most PBDE exposure research has focused on how people can absorb it from dust and other indoor sources that would ostensibly be eliminated once PBDE-containing products were discarded. Much less attention has been paid to PBDEs in food.

Fraser’s team analyzed biological samples from 2,000 people, provided by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The same data was used in 2004 to establish baseline estimates of PBDE exposure in Americans, but that study didn’t look for patterns in food consumption. Fraser’s team found that PBDE levels were 25 percent higher in meat-eaters than vegetarians.

Though the channels of food contamination by PBDEs haven’t been conclusively established, it’s possible that “the old products are being moved to landfills, and PBDEs could enter the environment that way,” said Fraser. Earlier this year, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that PBDEs were present in all U.S. coastal waters and the Great Lakes, with the highest levels found near urban and industrial areas.

That PBDEs would be highest in meat products makes sense, as the chemicals accumulate in fat, and it wouldn’t be hard for PBDEs to enter their feed and water.

Fraser suggested that the United States adopt chemical regulations similar to those in the European Union, which in 2007 mandated that chemicals be thoroughly tested and proven safe before used. That’s the opposite of the U.S. system, where chemicals are assumed to be safe until it’s proved otherwise.

“The industry is finding new products to use as flame retardants, and we don’t know the health and safety implications of those products either,” said Fraser. “We need to test the health and safety implications of products before they go into use, not after.”

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Stuck on the No-Fly or Selectee Lists

Ryan Singel 09.26.05

The Transportation Security Agency uses two different watch lists. The best known is the no-fly list, a list of people who are not allowed to get on a plane. The other is called the selectee list and contains the names of people whose boarding passes will always be marked with SSSS and who have to undergo intensive extra screening of their person and carry-ons.

According to TSA documents obtained by the Electronic Privacy Information Center, call-center employees were at one time told they could only clear the names of those who incorrectly matched the no-fly list. Travelers who were on the selectee list were simply told that they were not on the no-fly list and there could be a number of reasons they were selected for extra screening. The boilerplate language did not mention the possibility that their names matched those on a watch list different from the no-fly list.

The TSA has since revised its policy and now helps those whose names are similar to those on both the no-fly and selectee list, according to spokeswoman Deirdre O'Sullivan. TSA can't remove names from the no-fly list, but it can put names on a cleared list, which can help travelers bypass red tape.

Erroneous entries on the watch lists can only be removed by the law enforcement or intelligence agency that put the name on the list.

If someone who is actually on either list contacts the TSA, the TSA now will refer the match to the Terrorist Screening Center, which will then ask the appropriate law-enforcement or intelligence agency to review the record for accuracy. This policy was put into place this summer.

O'Sullivan suggested that travelers who continually experience difficulty getting a boarding pass not call, but instead fill out a form available on the TSA's website.

As of August 2005, 26,000 people have submitted that form, O'Sullivan said.

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Banking Philosophy

An example of banking philosophy

To seize the belongings of all nations and individuals
This is the real reason for poverty in the world

^français

In reading the following article of Louis Even, first published in 1941, one will quickly realize that the plan of the Financiers to seize the people's wealth and the farmers' land has been going on for a long time. But today, one can clearly see that this plan has been fully realized. The people owe all of their country's wealth to the Bankers through national debts, and a majority of the farmers of developed countries have disappeared; those remaining must work night and day to pay interests to the Bankers. Let us all read again this important document that enlightens us all on the real reasons for poverty in the world.

by Louis Even

Here is the full text of an article published in the United States Bankers' Magazine in 1892. It was recently re-published in the New Era and in the Social Crediter, where we took it:

“We must go forward cautiously and consolidate each acquired position, because already the inferior social stratum of society is giving unceasing signs of agitation.

“Therefore, prudence dictates to us a line of conduct that seems to give in to the will of the people, until the execution of our plans be well-enough established for us to be able to declare our intentions without having to fear any organized resistance.

“Our confidence men shall have to closely watch the Farmers Alliance and the Knights of Work, and take steps immediately, either to control both associations in accordance with our interests, or to break them.

“Our men will have to attend the Convention that will be held in Omaha on the 4th of July, and be in charge of all activities. Otherwise, this Convention could muster such an antagonism to our plans that we would have to resort to force to overcome it.

Now, at the present time, using violence would be premature. We are not yet ready to confront such an assault. Money must first of all seek maximum protection in schemes and in legislation.

“Let us make use of the courts. Let us go forward as fast as possible at perceiving debts, at foreclosing (depriving of recourse to justice when a certain time limit has been transgressed) on debentures and mortgages.

“When, through the law's intervention, the common people shall have lost their homes, they will be more easy to control and more easy to govern, and they shall not be able to resist the strong hand of the Government acting in accordance with the orders of the central power of imperial wealth, under the control of the leaders of finance.

“Our top leaders are perfectly aware of the truth. They are presently working at establishing an imperialism of the capital to rule the world. But while they are implementing this plan, they must keep the people busy with political antagonisms.

“We'll therefore speed up the question of reform in the custom rates by the political organization called the Democratic Party; and we'll put the spotlight on the question of protection and of the reciprocity by the Republican Party.

“By dividing the electorate this way, we'll be able to have them spend their energies at struggling amongst themselves on questions that, for us, have no importance whatsoever, and on which we only touch upon as instructors of the common flock.

“It is thus that, through discreet acts, we can maintain what was so generously projected and executed with such a remarkable success.”

*           *           *

Commentaries are unnecessary on a text that speaks for itself. Let us take the date into consideration: 1892 — one year before the crisis of 1893. We now have in our possession three documents relative to this 1893 crisis.

1. The 1891 document, the confidential leaflet of the bankers, encouraging mortgages on properties, in anticipation of the crisis that the bankers would launch a little later on to grab all of the mortgaged properties. Besides, here is the text:

“We are authorizing our loan officers from the Western States to loan on properties, monies repayable by September 1t, 1894. No fatal date is to exceed this date.

“On September 1st, 1894, we shall categorically refuse all loan renewals.  On that day, we shall demand the repayment of our money, under penalty of foreclosure on collaterals.

“The mortgaged properties will become ours. (Money will have become scarce beforehand, and the repayments will have become generally impossible.) We'll thus be able to acquire, at a price agreeable to us, two-thirds of the farms west of the Mississippi and thousands more east of this great river.

“We'll even be able to possess three quarters of the western farms as well as all the money in the country.  The farmers will then become land tenants only, just like in England.”

2. The above-mentioned 1892 document in which the Bankers expose their philosophy.

3. The March 11, 1893 leaflet, since then called: “The Panic Circular”, addressed by the American Bankers' Association to all national banks throughout the United States:

“The interests of national banks require immediate financial legislation by Congress (the United States Government). Silver, silver certificates, and Treasury bonds (that is to say, all the Government's money) must be retired, and National Bank Notes made the only money.

“This will require the authorization of $500 million to $1 billion of new bonds as the basis of circulation. You will at once retire one-third of your circulation (your paper money) and call in one-half of your loans. Be careful to make a monetary stringency among your patrons, especially among influential businessmen.

“Advocate an extra session of Congress to repeal the purchasing clause of the Sherman Law, and act with other banks of your city in securing a large petition to Congress for its unconditional repeal per accompanying form. Use personal influence with your Congressmen, and particularly let your wishes be known to your senators.

“The future life of national banks, as fixed and safe investments, depends upon immediate action, as there is an increasing sentiment in favor of Government legal-tender notes and silver coinage.”

The very-well organized Bankers' Association won the day over an ignorant public solely organized for political struggles of colours. A special session of the Congress was convened expressly to demolish the ever-increasing confidence of the people towards a government-issued money.

To force the people and the governments to kneel down in front of the banks, an extreme scarcity of money had to be created. The whole of America felt this scarcity. It was the crisis that was called the “Panic of 1893”. Planned in the offices of the makers and the destroyers of money, this crisis sowed ruins and pains in every corner of the country.

                                                                                                 Louis Even

This article was  published in the January-February, 2003 issue of “Michael”.

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Cheney's role in the CIA-Congress fight is a sideshow

Tue, 07/14/2009 - 5:20pm

By Dov Zakheim

There are several issues at play regarding the so-called secret CIA programs to target and kill al-Qaeda leadership. The first is whether the CIA should have told the Congress what it planned prior to actually fleshing out a complete program. One could argue that the Congress, or at least its senior leaders, should have been informed immediately upon the CIA's consideration of such an effort. But one could argue to the contrary that, until the program was fully formulated -- with the various legal, international, and other concerns fully resolved -- there was nothing to inform the Congress about. Indeed, one might assert that informing the Congress -- with the attendant risk of leaks -- would have damaged that CIA program prematurely, and, far more importantly, would have sullied America's reputation abroad on the basis of a hypothetical policy that might never have come into being. The proof of this latter consideration is that, in the end, the program never got off the ground.

As for Mr. Cheney, while the press delights in attacking him, and he appears to delight in goading the press, he should not be at the center of this issue. Rather, the debate should be about both whether the United States can and should even consider a program to kill those who wish to massacre thousands upon thousands of our citizens, and at what point in the process of formulating such a program the Congress should be informed.

Reasonable people can debate these issues. For my part, I feel that with respect to sensitive programs of this nature, the probability of a leak resulting from informing the Congress about them must be balanced against the likelihood of their actually being approved for execution. When a program's fate is highly in doubt, the risk of a leak is high, and the consequences of that leak certain to be highly damaging. Thus, it may be better to wait until the program is more fully defined before informing the Congress of its existence.

Ultimately, the question of whether to mark terrorists for death will not really go away until al-Qaeda and its copycat organizations are defeated. What Mr. Cheney may or may not have done nearly a decade ago is a sideshow in this debate, nothing more.

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Obama Deception

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how can I help?

That uncomfortable silence after a friend has told you his bad news or a rant of how overwhelmed she is. Break ups and broken arms and melt downs. Even for our best friends we don't always know what to say or do to make it better. We fumble to fill the space with salving words, or sometimes worse, with solutions. When really, all we need to do is ask: How can I help?

This phrase works for tragedies and boo boos and bad days.
It quells panic. It can create urgency or buy time.
It's effective with strangers and lovers.
Everyone understands it.

I learned this from my friend Michelle, who's a super-sensitive Irish Italian social worker (read: hardwired to be helpful.) And even though she's full of bright ideas and anecdotes, she has the presence to just pause and ask, How can I help?

It creates a soft space to meet.
It invites collaboration.
It empowers everyone.

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A Force of One: The Federal Reserve

by  Chuck Norris

07/14/2009

I agree with Judge Andrew Napolitano, who said last week, "We know more about the CIA than we do about the Federal Reserve."
   
The Federal Reserve is the Freemasonry of government agencies. It is a virtual secret society unto itself -- a group of unelected brokers who hold the value of our dollar in the palms of their hands. This one agency, with its power to raise and lower interest rates, has exercised more control over the economy than any other government body.
   
So with that type of single-handed power, why should we be surprised that the U.S. Senate blocked a bill last week to audit the Federal Reserve? 'Tis true! Rep. Ron Paul and more than half of his colleagues in the House co-sponsored the Federal Reserve Transparency Act, HR 1207, which they hope to have hearings on soon. On the Senate side, Sens. Jim DeMint, Mike Crapo and David Vitter co-sponsored S 604, companion legislation introduced by Bernie Sanders. But it was stopped cold before even being introduced on the floor on "procedural grounds."

   
So why does this federal agency need a complete auditing? It's very simple: America is in the worst economic situation since the Great Depression; the value of the dollar is tanking on the world market; and the Federal Reserve wields the greatest power to control it, with virtually no accountability -- let alone that the American people and even Congress have virtually no knowledge of what those inside are doing day to day.
   
The way I see it, there are two primary problems with the Federal Reserve. First, its very existence is a sheer contradiction of the 10th Amendment to the Constitution. As Ron Paul explained last week: "Our Founding Fathers never intended for a single entity such as the Federal Reserve to have this much power. In fact, there is no authority in the Constitution for the federal government to create a central bank, to enact legal tender laws, or to print paper money. The Tenth Amendment is quite clear that 'The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
   
Secondly, the Federal Reserve is flat-out bad for the economy in the long run because it creates false fronts or temporary escalations in the free market, which eventually cycle around and lead to downturns or more need for other Fed fixes. Even if it creates several cycles of credit rushes (which it deems as "signs of prosperity"), sooner or later, the false foundation crumbles and we find ourselves in an economic hole that the Fed can't bail us out of -- which is exactly where we are now in this recession.
   
The fact is the Federal Reserve is one of the best examples of government control run amok and its oppression over its people. It rules by dangling carrots, cheap rates and loans before the American public, which in turn oppresses people by their inability to resist further debt. The Fed is the dealer in greed and debt, and its drugs are easy money and credit. Under the Federal Reserve System, Americans and our economy have to return to the Federal Reserve for repeated fixes like a drug addict. Otherwise everything goes into the tank.
   
If we can get the flow of the Federal Reserve under control, others drawing from its wells will become more manageable and accountable. Its open market operations and dealings with central banks and foreign powers at the very least must have oversight!
   
But you can bet that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are going to fight to prevent the passing of any legislation that regulates the Federal Reserve, because they are in cahoots with the White House and also don't want the trade secrets of the Federal Reserve revealed nor its power restricted. Why? Because its power benefits them, plain and simple. It is being used right now by the Obama administration and the Democratic majority in Congress for political expedience and special interests.
   
Henry Ford was probably right when he said, "It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning."
   
That's why I believe, along with Ron Paul and others, that the Federal Reserve needs to be abolished. The U.S. ran just fine without it -- before its inception, in 1913. We had financial crises before its existence and after it, but its intervention has been proved historically only to make things worse. Our Founders never would have tolerated its abusive power or methods of bribery. It is a detriment to not only the economy but also the very existence of a representative form of government and all Americans who want to experience true freedom.
   
In the meantime, however, until some act of God or the people do away with that self-regulating and fraudulent government agency, the least we can do is get the Federal Reserve under control by passing HR 1207 in the House and S 604 in the Senate. Write today to demand that your representatives support the bills that require an audit of the Federal Reserve.

Posted via email from kleerstreem's posterous