Banks buy politicians — on sale, now!

Bill Moyers on PBS, February 13, 2009

On Tuesday, February 10, 2009 Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner unveiled the Obama administration’s plan to address the crisis in the financial sector. The strategy he outlined calls for the largest Federal intervention in banks and finance since the Great Depression, flooding as much as $2.5 trillion into the system. Given its size and scope — the bill’s lack of detail drew a widely negative response from analysts and economists.

Although he thinks the details are important, Simon Johnson, Professor of Economics at MIT, worries more that Geithner and the Obama administration won’t address a big underlying problem and be tough enough on the politically powerful banking lobby.

 

Too Big To Fail?

Johnson explains to Bill Moyers on the JOURNAL that the U.S. financial system reminds him more of the embattled emerging markets he encountered in his time with the International Monetary Fund than that of a developed nation. As such, Johnson believes that the U.S. financial system needs a “reboot,” breaking up the biggest banks, in some cases firing management and wiping out shareholder value. Johnson tells Bill Moyers that such a move wouldn’t be popular with the powerful banking lobby: “I think it’s quite straightforward, in technical or economic terms. At the same time I recognize it’s very hard politically.”Without drastic action, Johnson argues, taxpayers are merely subsidizing a wealthy powerful industry without forcing necessary systemic changes: “Taxpayer money is ensuring their bonuses. We’re making sure that banks survive. And eventually, of course, the economy will turn around. Things will get better. The banks will be worth a lot of money. And they will cash out. And we will be paying higher taxes, we and our children, will be paying higher taxes so those people could have those bonuses. That’s not fair. It’s not acceptable. It’s not even good economics.”

Evil bastards

The GM genocide: Thousands of Indian farmers are committing suicide after using genetically modified crops

By Andrew Malone
Last updated at 12:48 AM on 03rd November 2008

When Prince Charles claimed thousands of Indian farmers were killing themselves after using GM crops, he was branded a scaremonger. In fact, as this chilling dispatch reveals, it’s even WORSE than he feared.

The children were inconsolable. Mute with shock and fighting back tears, they huddled beside their mother as friends and neighbours prepared their father’s body for cremation on a blazing bonfire built on the cracked, barren fields near their home.

As flames consumed the corpse, Ganjanan, 12, and Kalpana, 14, faced a grim future. While Shankara Mandaukar had hoped his son and daughter would have a better life under India’s economic boom, they now face working as slave labour for a few pence a day. Landless and homeless, they will be the lowest of the low.

Published by The San Francisco Chronicle

India’s Debt-Ridden Farmers Committing Suicide

By Jason Motlagh

Nashik, India — On a recent afternoon, Seetabai Atthre heard a faint cry from the edge of a vineyard that her family has cultivated for more than 40 years. Through the furrows, she found her husband, Vishal, smoldering on the ground next to an empty can of kerosene. He had lit himself on fire and died three days later in a local hospital.

Atthre attributes her husband’s suicide to a $5,600 debt. The farm located on the arid plains of northern Maharashtra state near the town of Nashik had not turned a profit in more than two years, and 65-year-old Vishal could no longer secure a bank loan to pay off interest on the debt.”This is wrong, and it’s killing us,” Sanjay Gangode said at a gathering of debt-ridden grape farmers in the region. “There is no future here.”

While India’s economy surges forward on the crest of globalization, thousands of farmers are taking their own lives every year to escape mounting debt and an uncertain future. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, at least 87,567 farmers committed suicide between 2002 and 2006. In Maharashtra state, there were 4,453 suicides in 2006, the last year for which statistics were made available, an increase of 527 compared with 2005. Sharp increases have also been reported in Andhra Pradesh and Chhattisgarh states.

_________________________________

Do you know what is in your food?

Is it genetically engineered?

Frequently Asked Questions

Question: Why don’t the food manufacturers and the biotech companies want you to know if your foods have been genetically engineered?

Answer: Because if they are labeled, you will start asking questions such as “Have these genetically engineered foods been safety tested on humans?” The answer to that question is NO!

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Question: Doesn’t the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) require genetically engineered foods to be safety tested like they do for new drugs and food additives before they are sold to the public for consumption?

Answer: NO! With limited exceptions, under current FDA regulations, companies are not even required to notify the agency they are bringing new genetically engineered products to the market.

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Question: How much of the food I buy in the grocery stores contain genetically engineered ingredients?

Answer: Since genetically engineered soy and corn are used in many processed foods, it is estimated that over 70 percent of the foods in grocery stores in the U.S. and Canada contain genetically engineered ingredients.

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Question: Are people all over the world eating genetically engineered foods?

Answer: No, all of the European Union nations, Japan, China, Australia, New Zealand and many other countries require the mandatory labeling of foods that contain genetically engineered ingredients. As a result, food manufacturers in all those countries choose to use non-genetically engineered ingredients.

The Campaign

Tyrants of the world, unite!

“Let the winds of doctrine blow me.” (Milton)

Russian treason bill could hit Kremlin critics

By DAVID NOWAK, Associated Press Writer

MOSCOW – A new law drafted by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s Cabinet would allow authorities to label any government critic a traitor — a move that leading rights activists condemned Wednesday as a chilling reminder of the times under Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.

The draft extends the definition of treason from breaching Russia’s external security to damaging the nation’s constitutional order, sovereignty or territorial integrity. That would essentially let authorities interpret any act against the interests of the state as treason — a crime prosecutable by up to 20 years in prison.

Prominent rights activists said passage of the bill would catapult Russia’s justice system back to the times of Stalin’s purges.

“It returns the Russian justice to the times of 1920-1950s,” the activists said in a statement, urging lawmakers to oppose what they described as the “legislation in the spirit of Stalin and Hitler.”

Stop, you’re killing me

Letter to a friend:

As you have rightly intuited, the inflammatory politics is merely symptomatic of a larger crisis — the end of the time we know and the beginning of another — as presaged by war, famine, fire, flood and reality TV.

This just in:

NATIONAL (NBC ) – Does the financial crisis have you feeling stressed out? Well, you’re not alone.

A newly released survey by the American Psychological Association shows the declining economy is causing stress levels to skyrocket.

The annual report takes a look at the stress level of Americans, and this year, stress is on the rise.

As things get worse on Wall Street, it seems Americans are hitting the wall. They’re stressed out and letting it show.

Dr. Katherine Nordal, the Executive Director for Professional Practice, says they have “irritability, depression, sleeplessness, problems concentrating…”

A new survey by the American Psychological Association finds eight out of ten Americans say the economy is now a significant source of stress.

Almost half say their stress has increased in the past year and they are now increasingly worried about their ability to provide even their families basic needs.

Dr. Nordal says, “What we’re seeing is more and more people coming in because they are more stressed about financial situations, having homes foreclosed on.”

According to the survey, women are being hit the hardest, feeling more stress than men about money, the economy, job stability, housing costs and health problems.

Since I’m the canary in the coal mine when it comes to stress, I can tell you with an uncertain amount of authority that exercise, rest, vitamins, meditation, prayer, soothing music and talking things over with trusted friends are all terrific for smoothing you out. Humor, where appropriate, can also work wonders.

That said, the sheer numbers of wobbling blobs of bobbling blubber among us — I speak, of course, of our fellow Americans — tell us that not everyone “gets” this. We therefore have a lot on our plate. Not as much as them, but you see my point.

The foregoing does not cover all those who resort to drugs and alcohol, of course, who can be counted upon to spiral out into all sorts of lunacy, not all of them comical.

You can, again, mightily empower yourself, being such a good ear and wise counsel, by helping others at this time of crisis, always bearing in mind the final temptation.

Now is my way clear, now is the meaning plain:
Temptation shall not come in this kind again.
The last temptation is the greatest treason
To do the right deed for the wrong reason.

My love to you and the gang!

Our transcendent splendor,

Brian J. Flanagan

It has happened here

 

List of Journalists Arrested at the RNC

Posted on September 10.2008 by Josh Stearns

During and before the Republican National Convention police in St. Paul arrested numerous journalists, including Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman and her staff, members of a number of independent video groups, an AP photographer and staff from local broadcast stations and newspapers around St. Paul.

Arresting and detaining journalists for doing their jobs is a gross violation of free speech and freedom of the press. Journalists must be free to do their jobs without intimidation. On September 5th, local citizens delivered more than 60,000 letters to St. Paul City Hall calling on Mayor Chris Coleman and local law enforcement officials to drop all charges against journalists arrested while covering protests outside the Republican National Convention.

Below we have begun collecting names of journalists who were charged and links to news reports about their arrests. This is a growing list. If you have information about a journalist who is not listed here please email Josh Stearns at jstearns@freepress.net.

Name	Outlet	Arrested	Charge
Sharif Abdel Kouddous	Democracy Now!	Sept 1 and Sept 4	Suspicion of felony riot and unlawful assembly
Nicole Salazar	Democracy Now!	Sept 1	Suspicion of felony riot
Amy Goodman	Democracy Now!	Sept 1	Obstruction of a legal process and interference with a peace officer.
Matt Rourke	Associated Press	Sept 1	Gross misdemeanor riot charge
Edward Matthews	Univ. of Kentucky (journalism student)	Sept 1	Riot charge
Britney McIntosh	Univ. of Kentuky (journalism student)	Sept 1	Riot charge
Jim Winn	Univ. of Kentuky (journalism advisor)	Sept 1	Riot charge
Lambert Rochfort	PepperSpray Productions	Sept 3	Held without charge
Joe LaSac	PepperSpray Productions	Sept 3	Held without charge
Stephen Maturen	Minnesota Daily	Sept 4	Peppersprayed and ziptied – only held momentarily.
Jonathan Malat	KARE 11	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Tom Aviles	WCCO	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Amy Forliti	Associated Press	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jon Krawczynski	Associated Press	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Dean Treftz	U-Wire (national college wire service)	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jeff Schorfheide	Badger-Herald	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Matt Snyders	University of Iowa / former reporter for Daily Iowan	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Christopher Patton	Daily Iowan	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Rick Rowley	Big Noise Films	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jon Wise	MyFox	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Alice Kathloff	MyFox	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Art Hughes	Public News Service	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jerry Snook	Westwood One	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Ben Garvin	St. Paul Pioneer Press	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jason Nicholas	New York Post	Sept 1	Unlawful assembly and obstructing the legal process
Wendy Binion	Portland IndyMedia	Sept 2	Felony conspiracy to riot
Geraldine Cahill	The Real News	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Ania Smolenskaia	The Real News	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Suzanne Hughes	The Uptake	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Ted Johnson	Variety	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Alice Kalthoff	MyFoxdfw.com	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
John P Wise	MyFox	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Eileen Clancy	I-Witness Video	August 26	Unknown
Anita Braithwaite	Glass Bead Video Collective	August 26	Unknown
Olivia Katz	Glass Bead Video Collective	August 26	Unknown
Nick Brooks	Downtown Express	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly and interfering with legal process
Sam Stoker	Association of Alternative Newsweeklies	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Paul Demko	Minnesota Independent	?	Unknown
Emily Forman	I-Witness video group	?	Unknown
Malisa Jahn	I-Witness video group	?	Unknown
Elizabeth Press	Democracy Now!	?	Unknown
Sheila Regan	Twin Cities Daily Planet	?	Unknown
Seth Rowe	Sun Newspapers	?	Unknown
Mark Skinner	University of Nevada Las Vegas Rebel Yell reporter	?	Unknown
Vlad Teichberg	Glass Bead Video Collective	?	Unknown
Nathan Weber	Chicago Freelance Photographer	?	Unknown
Tony Webster	Twin Cities Independent Media	?	Unknown
Alex Lilly	Portland Indymedia	?	Unknown
Charlie B	MTV Think blogger	?	Unknown
Andy Birkey	Minnesota Independent	?	Unknown
Matt Nelson	University of Iowa Photojournalism student	?	Unknown
Mark Ovaska	Rochester freelance photographer	?	Unknown
Chad Davis	Freelance Photographer	?	Unknown
Dawn Zuppelli	Rochester IndyMedia	?	Unknown

Free Press

Don’t Panic

It’s a wonderful life.

Criminal fat-cats game the system and leave taxpayers holding the bag.

As for me, I believe we were born to serve the rich.

Being a Midwestern boy at heart, I prefer to serve them with barbecue sauce.

Mm-mm, good!

Gives new meaning to ‘blow hole’

Whale-Protection Cuts Sought
NOAA Scales Back Proposed 30-Mile Speed Limit Zones

Mama whale & calf

One of the leading causes of death for right whales, this one with a calf off the coast of Florida in February 2005, is collision with a ship.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

The Bush administration yesterday proposed scaling back protected zones for endangered whales in the Atlantic Ocean, yielding to cargo companies’ concerns about new speed limits for ships in these areas.

The proposal, unveiled yesterday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, could end more than a year of wrangling between federal fisheries scientists and the White House over new measures to protect the North Atlantic right whale. About 300 of the whales remain, and researchers say their tiny population has been reduced further by fatal collisions with large ships.

WP

… the heavens fall.

You got a problem with that.

Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich. (Napoleon)

The global financial crisis is set to get worse, with a large US bank likely to collapse in the next few months, a former IMF chief economist has warned.

Kenneth Rogoff’s comments came as shares in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac sank on a report that the home lenders would, in effect, be nationalised.

Despite hopes that the US economy had turned the corner, Mr Rogoff claimed it was “not out of the woods”.

“I would even go further to say ‘the worst is to come’,” he said.

“We’re not just going to see mid-sized banks go under in the next few months,” said Mr Rogoff, who held the IMF role between 2001 and 2004.

“We’re going to see a whopper, we’re going to see a big one, one of the big investment banks or big banks.”

BBC

———–

Meet the rich

The gap between rich and poor is wider than ever. But that doesn’t seem to bother Britain’s wealthiest earners. In an extract from their new book, Polly Toynbee and David Walker describe the jaw-dropping arrogance they encountered when they asked some of the fat cats to justify their lives of luxury.

From the marbled 20th floor of a glass tower in Canary Wharf the view of the river is breathtaking. It snakes down to the Thames barrier, glinting in the sunset. Close to the new city lie the serried ranks of East End estate blocks. The view is typical of London: glossy new wealth nestling close to old and persisting penury. Precious little money has trickled down from this gilded new town in the sky to its neighbours below.

Unjust Rewards

The view is a reminder of the widening gap. History, many like to believe, is a Whiggish tale of wealth, social progress and fairer distribution, an onward march: we all wear the same clothes, meet on equal terms on Facebook. Yet background predicts who will run the banks and who will clean their floors. It’s not happenstance; it is largely pre-programmed. General mobility is a myth. The top 10% of income earners get 27.3% of the cake, while the bottom 10% get just 2.6%. Twenty years ago the average chief executive of a FTSE 100 company earned 17 times the average employee’s pay; now it is more than 75 times.

———-

Not Keeping Up With Our Parents: The Decline of the Professional Middle Class

by Nan Mooney

From Publishers Weekly
Young people who were raised to believe that a college education guarantees them a spot in the middle class are instead grappling with rising levels of debt, stagnant wages and ballooning basic expenses, argues Mooney, [who] suggests that college graduates who choose creative or service professions, such as journalism, teaching and social work, generally find themselves in low-paying jobs that, paradoxically, require high-priced educations and even graduate degrees. The struggle to pay off student loans sets off a spiral of financial insecurity, as these educated professionals face escalating costs for housing, health insurance and child care.

We Can’t Make It Here

There’s a Vietnam Vet with a cardboard sign
Sitting there by the left turn line
Flag on his wheelchair flapping in the breeze
One leg missing and both hands free
No one’s paying much mind to him
The V.A. budget’s just stretched so thin
And now there’s more coming back from the Mideast war
We can’t make it here anymore

That big ol’ building was the textile mill that fed our kids and it paid our bills
But they turned us out and they closed the doors
We can’t make it here anymore

See those pallets piled up on the loading dock
They’re just gonna sit there ‘til they rot
‘Cause there’s nothing to ship, nothing to pack
Just busted concrete and rusted tracks
Empty storefronts around the square
There’s a needle in the gutter and glass everywhere
You don’t come down here unless you’re looking to score
We can’t make it here anymore

The bar’s still open but man it’s slow
The tip jar’s light and the register’s low
The bartender don’t have much to say
The regular crowd gets thinner each day
Some have maxed out all their credit cards
Some are working two jobs and living in cars
Minimum wage won’t pay for a roof, won’t pay for a drink
If you gotta have proof just try it yourself Mr. CEO
See how far $5.15 an hour will go
Take a part time job at one your stores
Bet you can’t make it here anymore

There’s a high school girl with a bourgeois dream
Just like the pictures in the magazine
She found on the floor of the laundromatA woman with kids can forget all that
If she comes up pregnant what’ll she do
Forget the career, forget about school
Can she live on faith? Live on hope?
High on Jesus or hooked on dope
When it’s way too late to just say no
You can’t make it here anymore

Now I’m stocking shirts in the Wal-Mart store
Just like the ones we made before
‘ Cept this one came from Singapore
I guess we can’t make it here anymore

Should I hate a people for the shade of their skin
Or the shape of their eyes or the shape I’m in
Should I hate ‘em for having our jobs today
No I hate the men sent the jobs away
I can see them all now, they haunt my dreams
All lily white and squeaky clean
They’ve never known want, they’ll never know need
Their shit don’t stink and their kids won’t bleed
Their kids won’t bleed in their damn little war
And we can’t make it here anymore

Will work for food will die for oil
Will kill for power and to us the spoils
The billionaires get to pay less tax
The working poor get to fall through the cracks
So let ‘em eat jellybeans let ‘em eat cake
Let ‘em eat shit, whatever it takes
They can join the Air Force, or join the Corps
If they can’t make it here anymore

So that’s how it is, that’s what we got
If the president wants to admit it or not
You can read it in the paper, read it on the wall
Hear it on the wind if you’re listening at all
Get out of that limo, look us in the eye
Call us on the cell phone tell us all why

In Dayton Ohio or Portland Maine
Or a cotton gin out on the great high plains
That’s done closed down along with the school
And the hospital and the swimming pool
Dust devils dance in the noonday heat
There’s rats in the alley and trash in the street
Gang graffiti on a boxcar door
We can’t make it here anymore

- James McMurtry

First, kill all the speculators

Gentle reader: I am not seriously suggesting that all speculators be taken out and put down like rabid dogs.

True, they did sink their fangs into millions of home owners and are now bleeding us all white at the pump, but we must respect the law.

So, let us inquire: If they’re willing to do these things, what else are they up to?

Let’s look into that, shall we?

These people have names and faces.

Publish them on the Internet and in the media.

Stick cameras in their faces.

Shame them and shun them.

Put them in prison with the child predators.

Make their lives a living hell, for a change.

O, what fun we shall have!

______________________

Speculators, not OPEC, ‘causing oil price spike’

A former Iraqi oil minister says record high oil prices are more to do with speculators, including central banks, than supply and demand.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is pressuring G8 leaders to push for OPEC to increase oil supply.

Isam Chalabi was Iraq’s oil minister before the first Gulf War and has more than 40 years experience in the industry.

He says Mr Rudd’s strategy will not work.

“The question of prices today is not related to supply and demand fundamentals – everybody knows that,” he told AM.

“Everybody has said so and hence it is not a matter of increasing supplies because whoever is in need of oil has been able to get it, so there is no need of problem of getting the oil.”

_________

WP

CNN

Telegraph

BusinessWeek

Guardian