Is the dollar terminal?

[Original_Intent]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-0 ... shows.html

no surprises here.

[Col. Flagg]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-0 ... shows.html

no surprises here.

The 'Fed'... what a criminal operation, wow. I don't know which is bigger... its criminal activities or the ponzi scheme it has run for the past 97 years?

[Jason]

With a GOP victory almost a sure thing today and with the Fed set to announce QE2 tomorrow, things are going to be pretty dicey.

My instincts tell me that we are going to enter a period of somewhat calm. Dollar will strengthen, commodities will stabilize and possibly drop some. I think we may get 6 months to a year of an overall sense of returning to normal.

I think this will provide us one last window of opportunity to prepare, and I personally believe that when the bottom falls out, it will not be over a matter of months or weeks, but of hours.

I believe it is possible that the stock market will set record highs within the next year. I am almost certain that if the events of the next two days go as expected (huge GOP win, and Fed announcing more QE) the STOCK markets will surge. PMs and oil will either be stable or drop, food prices will rise. Unemployment will start to decrease and wages will inch upwards. Home prices will continue to drop. Overall, I believe the average Joe will perceive this as a return to normalcy and everything back on track to prosperity. (Home values dropping and food prices rising being contrary to that).
We may even see some credit markets loosen up. I think the overall perception is going to be "crisis averted" and "we the people" asserted ourselves and are back in control.

These are just my non-technical gut feelings. I am no expert on markets, but I think I am pretty perceptive as to the manipulation of the masses. If I am correct, this time period can provide us with a great blessing of a grace period of relative "prosperity" where hopefully a good number of newly awakened people can finish their preparations for the coming storm.

By this time next year, I think we will be in the thick of it and a good deal of the smoke and mirrors will have been exposed.

edit: when making this many detailed guesses, the only sure thing is that I'll get at least some of it wrong.

Interesting! Wouldn't you say that's what we've enjoyed this past two years? We were literally hours away from complete collapse of the financial system at one point if not two or three in 2008.

Social Security Administration Admits To Massive Screw Up On Wage Data: Two People Cause Entire US Income Distribution To Shift Materially in 2009

In what can easily be characterized as the most blatant error in its history (and soon, potentially, fraud), the Social Security Administration announced that as a result of several erroneous W2 filings by two people, amounting to a $32.3 billion "mistake" the entire statistical wage table released previously has been scrapped and a new one has been released, indicating that wages in the US, and especially for the top earners, dropped, instead of declining modestly, and in some cases increasing.

Social Security spokesman Mark Lassiter provided few details about the W-2 forms and declined to answer questions about how they were filed, how many were filed by the same two people, or if a hoax was suspected. “We call it erroneous, you call it fictitious. It’s the same thing,” Lassiter said. “There were some invalid, I guess is the best way to put it, W- 2s.”

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/social ... ire-us-inc

[Original_Intent]

I sure do Jason, and it really can only be taken one day at a time. I just think the "big change" tomorrow may give us one more micro business cycle of boom and bust. Fast up and faster down, imho.

[Jason]

I sure do Jason, and it really can only be taken one day at a time. I just think the "big change" tomorrow may give us one more micro business cycle of boom and bust. Fast up and faster down, imho.

Certainly possible. Although I must say....in my tests of the credit system I might add that credit offers have gone from 5 digits (consistent for nearly a decade) to low 4 digits in just the past 6 months despite no change in credit score, highest income in my life time, etc.

Without serious injections of credit (new money) into Main Street.....its going to be a dismal Christmas shopping season.

The Fed at Jekyll Island: 100 Years Later, They’re Baaack!
http://deadlinelive.info/2010/11/02/the ... re-baaack/

A Return to Jekyll Island: The Origins, History, and Future of the Federal Reserve - November 5-6, 2010

Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta and Rutgers University
November 5–6, 2010, Jekyll Island Club Hotel, Jekyll Island, Georgia

This special conference marks the centenary of the 1910 Jekyll Island meeting that resulted in draft legislation for the creation of a U.S. central bank. Parts of this draft (the Aldrich plan) were incorporated into the 1913 Federal Reserve Act. To commemorate the 100th anniversary of the drafting of the Aldrich plan, the conference will take place at the Jekyll Island Club Hotel on Jekyll Island, Georgia—the same building where the 1910 meeting occurred.

The conference's discussions focus on three themes: the origins of the Fed and lessons from the pre-1913 era, how closely the Fed's actual performance has adhered to the original vision expressed by the framers of the Aldrich plan, and what the Fed's almost 100-year track record teaches us about its role going forward.

http://www.frbatlanta.org/news/conferen ... _index.cfm

[Jason]

British Prime Minister David Cameron and French President Nicolas Sarkozy will sign two declarations at a summit in London which will lead to Great Britain and France merging military and technological resources.

The merger is being sold to the public as a way for the two European military powers to cut costs during the current manufactured economic crisis and is yet another step towards a global government which the media and political shepherds still claim doesn’t exist, despite their constant references to it, and their continued promotion of it.

The two countries will form a joint expeditionary force of around 5,000 troops, and their planes will be landing on each other’s aircraft carriers. They will also share facilities at the U.K. Atomic Weapons Establishment in England, and the Valduc facility in France, with scientists from both countries working at each facility.

The agreement is being called an “unprecedented move” for cooperation on defense and security.

http://america20xy.com/blog6/2010/11/02 ... hen-it-is/

BP Oil In Now IN The Food Chain
http://www.pakalertpress.com/2010/11/02 ... t+Press%29

LPS: Over 4.3 million loans 90+ days or in foreclosure

LPS Applied Analytics released their September Mortgage Performance data today. According to LPS:

• The average number of days delinquent for loans in foreclosure is now 484 days
• In five judicial states (NY, FL, NJ, HI and ME), the average exceeds 500 days
• Over 4.3 million loans are 90 days or more delinquent or in foreclosure
• New problem loans (60+ days delinquent) are back on the rise

According to LPS, 9.27 percent of mortgages are delinquent, and another 3.84 are in the foreclosure process for a total of 13.11 percent. It breaks down as:
• 2.64 million loans less than 90 days delinquent.
• 2.32 million loans 90+ days delinquent.
• 2.05 million loans in foreclosure process.

For a total of 7.02 million loans delinquent or in foreclosure.

This is similar to the quarterly data from the Mortgage Bankers Association.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Yesterday M&T Bank bought Wilmington Trust. From the WSJ: A Fire Sale in Wilmington

Wilmington announced that M&T Bank would buy it, in an all-stock deal, for about $3.84 a share, compared with Friday's $7.11 close. Wilmington did so while releasing results that showed third-quarter, tangible book value dropped to $3.84 compared with $7.92 in the second quarter. ... Most striking is the speed of the deterioration in the loan book.

It shows that commercial real estate - construction nonperforming assets jumped from $240.7 million at the end of Q2 to $461.9 million at the end of Q3. Quite a jump ...

In the third quarter, evidence mounted that had things were getting worse for some of our borrowers. And even some of our strongest clients began to feel the pressure. The financial conditions of more of our borrowers weakened, their cash flows tightened, and appraisals continued to show significant declines in collateral valuations. These issues manifested themselves in our credit metrics, to a significantly greater degree than in the second quarter.

By the end of the third quarter, we had evaluated more than 92% of our Commercial Real Estate/Construction and mortgage loans, and the trend line is not encouraging. It appears to us, that there is no significant economic or real estate recovery on the horizon. This gives us little assurance that our loan portfolio will strengthen significantly in the near term, and our capital position will not erode further.”

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Is there not anyplace where you can put your money to work for you and where you can feel safe, confident, and know that you’re advancing humanity and not just contributing to a few narcissists? If that investment exists, please let me know – I haven’t seen it.

And if such an investment does exist, it must earn dollars faster than the dollar is being destroyed. Gee, that means it would have to earn more than 8% in just the past three months, and it would have to earn nearly a full percent just overnight!

Is gold that investment? Does “investing” in gold promote humanity and build a future worth having for future generations? I’m going to go right back to what I said yesterday, and that is that the change that needs to happen will not happen with the ballot box – not unless you are presented with the choice of voting for someone who will place an adult in charge – someone who will enforce the rule of law and start throwing the perps into prison where they belong. Not going to happen anytime soon that I can see, and thus I know that the criminal enterprise will continue.

The FOMC meets today and will announce their Quantitative Easing plan tomorrow at 2:15 Eastern Time. Zero interest rates PLUS “they” (the “Fed” who is the private banks) are going to “print” money to buy up debt that can never possibly be repaid. This amounts to accounting fraud. It is an attempt to get something for nothing. It is an attempt to FOOL the other holders of our debts into believing that the “Fed” can really keep interest rates at zero while spending trillions they do not posses.

Again I ask, “What’s the exit strategy?”

The population is saturated with more debt than can ever be repaid. The Fed is buying up bonds and via their surrogates is propping up equities. The question is how long can the charade go on? How quickly do the numbers grow? Where does it stop? How does it stop?

So, to go back to my original question – why support the enterprise?

As much as I can, I am not. Yet we must all make the determination for ourselves how deep we’re willing to support a system that is not sustainable. Do you work within the system where your livelihood depends upon it? Are your investment choices fueling their enterprises? No doubt that it is very difficult to avoid it, the tentacles of the vampire squid are far reaching.

The outcome of Quantitative Easing will indeed be a disaster, of course. While they may be able to keep the façade up a little longer, if they do then commodities like oil and food will also go to the moon. With wages falling, increased costs for energy and food act as a tax on the consumer. There is no free lunch, all debts get repaid with interest in one way or the other – that would be the other.

And just look at how the corporate empire is doing:

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- BP returned to profitability in the third quarter, rebounding from the severe loss caused by the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, the company said Tuesday.

London-based BP said it earned $1.8 billion in the three months ended Sept. 30. While that was down from a $5 billion profit in the same 2009 quarter, it was a turnaround from the $17 billion loss incurred in the second quarter of this year -- when the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig led to the environmental disaster in the Gulf.


So, here we have a British company who created the worst environmental oil disaster ever in the United States earning $1.8 BILLION during the same quarter in which the disaster was still ongoing. Have all the people and businesses affected by that spill been made whole? This just simply pisses me off to no end. That we don’t have the leadership, the manliness to stand up to corporations is sickening. No, we have judges who say it’s okay for them to speak freely with their money. Superhuman rights. You can bet that if YOU caused such a disaster that you would be behind bars, not reporting billions in income.

Example after example of the breakdown of the rule of law. And no, just because a banker passes a law doesn’t mean that said law conforms to the natural rule of law. And that’s where the people step in. That’s where you have to decide if you’ve had enough. Are you going to support the criminal enterprise. Is Mark-to-Fantasy accounting okay with you? Is it okay with you that the banks subvert the state’s laws to create their derivatives? Is it okay with you that the politicians aren’t prosecuting the crimes that the bankers are perpetrating?

No, it’s not okay because we all pay.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... d-112.html

Gallup Surveys Shows Anemic October Consumer Spending, No Pickup in Christmas Spending Plans
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

Glitch Sparked AF Vaccine Stand-Down
http://www.military.com/news/article/gl ... ddown.html

Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather in 2025
http://www.doxtop.com/browse/e0d3358d/w ... -2025.aspx

In March 1973, Mr. Broe made headlines after his “unprecedented’’ appearance before Senate investigators looking into CIA activities in South America. Specifically, the investigators were interested in the agency’s alleged collaboration with International Telephone and Telegraph to interfere in Chilean political affairs.

ITT had worked actively against Allende’s election in 1970, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund political opposition. Once Allende was in power, the conglomerate feared its business interests in Chile would be nationalized.

Mr. Broe’s testimony marked the first time an active clandestine agent of the CIA spoke on the record for a Senate probe.

In his testimony, Mr. Broe said that he had met several times with ITT chief executive Harold Geneen and senior vice president Edward Gerrity under direct orders from Central Intelligence Director Richard Helms.

Mr. Broe, Geneen, and Gerrity discussed employing a coordinated plan between the telecommunications conglomerate and the spy agency to create fiscal instability in Chile.

“There was a thesis,’’ Mr. Broe told the Senate investigators, “that additional deterioration in the economic situation could influence a large number’’ of voters to push Allende out of office.

The ITT executives also offered to provide the CIA with funding to support an Allende presidential opponent, but Mr. Broe reportedly turned them down.

Peter Kornbluh, senior analyst at the National Security Archive at George Washington University and author of a 2003 book on Chile called “The Pinochet File,’’ said in an interview that Mr. Broe was deeply “involved in operations to thwart’’ Allende’s presidency.

Kornbluh said the CIA’s connection and collaboration with ITT was one of the spy agency’s biggest blunders because it set in motion the use of corporate money to aid covert US foreign policy.

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/obitu ... t_allende/

Art of the Dynamic Shotgun Trailer - Magpul Dynamics
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XCv0X6S ... re=related

[Original_Intent]

Hilarious possibilities!

"You crashed your plane into my aircraft carrier!"
"Your aircraft carrier crashed into my plane!"

etc.

[Jason]

Hilarious possibilities!

"You crashed your plane into my aircraft carrier!"
"Your aircraft carrier crashed into my plane!"

etc.

LOL....doesn't that also fulfill a prophecy???

[Jason]

Rising Prison Population Is 'Good News' for Stocks
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... &Itemid=27

The Trilateral Commission: Usurping Sovereignty
http://www.augustreview.com/issues/glob ... 007080373/

Election Day fraud found all over U.S.!
http://beforeitsnews.com/story/247/822/ ... _U.S..html

Harry Reid Wins Senate Re-Election Amid Widespread Electronic Voter Fraud
http://theintelhub.com/2010/11/03/harry ... ter-fraud/

Goodbye Pontiac – Yet Another Sign Of How Rapidly America Is Being Deindustrialized
http://endoftheamericandream.com/archiv ... strialized

A Wild Election Day In America
http://themostimportantnews.com/archive ... in-america

Equity futures are mute following yesterday’s elections where we of course simply switched flavors of the exact same ice cream. It will obviously mean more difficulty for Obama and it may mean more difficulty for the bankers to push through their stimulus and spending – time will tell, they’re pretty darn good at corrupting so I wouldn’t bet the farm on it. The dollar is slightly lower, bonds are higher, oil is poking through $85 a barrel, and gold is flat this morning.

ADP estimates that for the month of October there were 43,000 jobs created, this is a large increase over September when they estimated a loss of 39,000 private payroll jobs. They also revised that figure higher to only a -2,000 loss figure. Personally I give the ADP report little credence as it rarely reflects what is reported by the BLS. Still, this report is used by the market to set expectations for the Employment Situation Summary that will be released this Friday. My take is that expectations are again too high for this report, largely due to the fact that October is not a month that the BLS typically adds large quantities of Birth/ Death model faux jobs.

It will be interesting to see what happens with the data after the election and QE announcement is behind us. Yesterday it was learned that the Social Security Administration erred in their calculations of income levels across the nation. They claim this overstatement error was the result of adding $32.3 BILLION onto just TWO of the top 74 wage earners in the nation! This supposedly takes that group’s average earnings down from the widely reported $500 million plus, all the way down to “only” $84 million per. Okay… so how do you make a multi-billion mistake on just two people’s incomes? How accurate is the rest of their data? What effect on supposed economic reports will this error have? Did you note that the error came just in front of the elections? How convenient. And so I am left to ponder what is the angle? Would wages have plummeted even further and that was not acceptable to report? Will it influence other data? You bet it will, and so we’ll have to be patient and see what comes out in the wash now that the election is behind us. My bet would be that the data will mysteriously begin to sour.

The market has been moving at the mercy of the currency markets. Dollar down, stocks up. We’re at a juncture at this time, for sure. The question is which direction in the short term? Again dollar down promotes increases in commodity prices, that is sending oil well beyond the danger mark of $80 per barrel. The economy is backed into a corner from which there is no escape within our debt backed money box system. If they QE the economy will be in trouble from rising price and wages that can’t possibly keep up, and if they don’t QE, then the forces of deflation will work their magic at restoring balance as they just did with the elections. Thus I think the most likely outcome from today’s meeting is to QE smaller than expected or in increments, but it will contain MUCH jawboning about how they will monitor and ACT IF NECESSARY. This is nothing but lip flapping, the proof will be in the actual quantity and I’ll bet they will make it difficult to determine how much QE they are actually doing or are going to do (and I believe they are doing FAR more QE behind the scenes that they are not admitting to).

As you look at the charts in that article note how valuations calculated by this means are approximately in the same area as valuations were prior to the market decline in the year 1929! And it shows you just how out of whack valuations were in the year 2000.

So, where we are now is simply waiting for the day that the fraud is called out again. And it’s coming because nothing was ever solved in the first place.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... d-113.html

God On The Table: Attempting A Useful Discussion Of Mankind's Spiritual Future
http://www.countercurrents.org/ruppert021110.htm

....grasping at new age!

Children without MMR vaccines should be banned from school, claims public health official
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=5462


Magnitude 6.0 - NEAR THE SOUTH COAST OF PAPUA, INDONESIA
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/ ... 0009wf.php

Flash floods strand thousands in major Thai city
http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Flash ... y_999.html

Huge volcanic blast spurs more Indonesians to flee
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_indonesia_disasters

As this record-breaking third busiest Atlantic hurricane season in history unfolded, I marveled that earthquake-ravaged Haiti managed to dodge significant rain-making tropical storms throughout the peak months of August, September, and October. Cruel fate will not allow Haiti to escape the entire season unscathed, though, as a late-season November storm already proven to be a killer--Tomas--takes aim at Haiti. Tomas has struggled mightily over the past few days, and is now a tropical depression. However, even if it does not reach hurricane strength, Tomas is still likely to bring heavy rains capable of causing disastrous flooding in defenseless Haiti. It doesn't take much rain to cause a flooding disaster in Haiti--ordinary seasonal heavy rains have killed 23 people in southern Haiti over the past month, including twelve people in Port-au-Prince this past weekend. According to the Associated Press, most of last weekend's deaths occurred when surging rivers burst through houses built in ravines. With the soils already saturated from last weekend's rains, the stage is set in Haiti for a significant flooding disaster capable of causing heavy loss of life. I believe it is 30% likely that Tomas will stay far enough west of the Haiti earthquake zone so that rains will be limited to 1 - 4 inches to the region, causing only modest flooding problems and little or no loss of life. More likely (40% chance) is the possibility of major flooding due to 4 - 8 inches of rains. Finally, I expect a 30% chance that heavier rains of 5 - 20 inches over Haiti will cause catastrophic flooding like experienced in 2008's four hurricanes. Potential flooding disasters are not possible just in the earthquake zone, but also in northern Haiti and the southwestern peninsula of Haiti. So, keep praying for the people of Haiti, they need all the help they can get.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMa ... rynum=1682

[Jason]

Another Nobel Economist Says We Have to Prosecute Fraud Or Else the Economy Won't Recover
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/

No vaccines, No School For 600 Students
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... &Itemid=39

Jobless Claims Jump, Miss Expectations, Prior Revised Higher For Umpteenth Time
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/jobles ... eenth-time

(Reuters) - Oil topped $86 a barrel on Thursday and rose to a fresh six-month high, as higher-than-expected U.S. jobless claims accelerated dollar losses after a U.S. Federal Reserve decision to pump more money into the economy of the world's top oil user.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE69541420101104

Fluoride Consumption From Tea and Toothpaste Damages Bones
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... Itemid=115

Bank of America Edges Closer to Tipping Point: Jonathan Weil

It was only last April that Bank of America Corp. was making fools out of the doomsayers who had called for its nationalization a year earlier. Taxpayers had gotten their bailout cash back. Investors who bought its shares at the bottom were making a killing. Government leaders lauded the company’s rescues, both of them, as a great success.

Now the bank may be on the verge of trouble again. Its stock has fallen 41 percent since April 15. Mortgage-bond investors are demanding untold billions of dollars in refunds. The foreclosure fiasco is metastasizing. A member of the Troubled Asset Relief Program’s oversight panel, AFL-CIO attorney Damon Silvers, openly worried at a hearing last week about the risk that Bank of America might need another bailout.

A few more months like the last one, and we may be wishing Bank of America had never returned its $45 billion of TARP money.

...(for the accountants)....

Here’s how Bank of America allocated the purchase price for that deal. First, it determined that the fair value of the liabilities at Countrywide exceeded the mortgage lender’s assets by $200 million. Then it recorded $4.4 billion of goodwill, a ledger entry representing the difference between Countrywide’s net asset value and the purchase price.

That’s right. Countrywide’s goodwill supposedly was worth more than Countrywide itself. In other words, Bank of America paid $4.2 billion for the company, even though it thought the value there was less than zero.

Since completing that acquisition, Bank of America has dropped the Countrywide brand. The company’s home-loan division has reported $13.5 billion of pretax losses. Yet Bank of America still hasn’t written off any of its Countrywide goodwill.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-0 ... -weil.html

....I talked to a BofA employee a couple weeks ago who stated that upper management were lobbying hard with key government officials. It was that person's opinion that B of A will be the first government bank after I proposed my theory to the person about QE#2, QE#3, etc being used to roll up the banks into one government bank.

Presenting The Fed's Balance Sheet Through 2012 - Fed Will Surpass China As Top Holder Of US Debt By The End Of The Month
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/presen ... bt-end-mon

....key difference though is that the Fed is buying up the debt (right to assets) with nothing vs. China who bought their portion with real goods and services. Major distinction and the biggest fraud in history!

26th Sequential Week Of Outflows From Domestic Equity Mutual Funds
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/26th-s ... tual-funds

Government Trampling on Rights of Parents
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... &Itemid=33

Opt Out of a Body Scan? Then Brace Yourself
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Opt-Out-o ... 5.html?x=0

Heavy discounts fuel only modest retail gains - Retailers report smallest sales gains in 7 months, as warm temperatures hurt sales
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Heavy-dis ... et=&ccode=

....LOL...warm temperatures - if you buy that one I have some ocean front property in Montana you might want to take a look at!

The Federal Reserve will buy $600 billion of Treasuries over the next 8 months. It will relax its 35% self-imposed limited per security. This is in addition to the $35 billion per month anticipated from mortgage securities maturing. In effect, the Fed is going to monetize the entire Treasury issue going forward.

http://www.wallstreetexaminer.com/blogs ... ahoo!+Mail

.....10 earthquakes 5+ yesterday -
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/ ... es_big.php

FDA tests confirm listeria at Texas food plant
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_produce_p ... VzdHNjb25m

From the American Bankruptcy Institute: October Consumer Bankruptcy Filings increase slightly from Previous Month. There will be close to 1.6 million consumer bankruptcy filings this year.
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

The Truth about Personal Debt They Never Told You
http://theintelhub.com/2010/11/04/the-t ... -told-you/

Creation of Debt As The Basis For Growth
http://www.infowars.com/creation-of-deb ... or-growth/

Federal Reserve Policy IS Working ... Just Not For America
http://www.blacklistednews.com/index.php?news_id=11347

The Federal Reserve plans on exporting the U.S. middle class abroad with Quantitative Easing II. QE1 cost $1.7 trillion and took the underemployment rate from 10 percent to 17 percent.
http://www.mybudget360.com/the-federal- ... easing-ii/

Let’s get something straight right off the bat… the “Fed” is OWNED (literally) by private banks. They act in THEIR interest. Understanding this is key to understanding why their actions help the banks and work AGAINST the people. Simply look at the BANK STOCKS following the FOMC announcement yesterday and you will see WHO was helped by this CRIMINAL activity. Which, by the way, is BIGGER than TARP and yet has NO CONGRESSIONAL approval or oversight. In fact, Ben Bernanke in sworn Congressional testimony said, “The Fed will not monetize the debt.” And yet that is exactly what they are doing, and yes, that is PERJURY. Yes! Bernanke should be JAILED as he is inflicting SEVERE damage to our nation.

Let’s get something else straight about yesterday’s announcement… it was NOT just $600 Billion! It was $600 billion ON TOP OF QE1, but what is clever about the announcement is that the time period only runs through the end of quarter 2 of next year! QE1 and QE2 working together amount to $110 Billion per month, or $1.32 TRILLION annualized! Effectively this means that we are PRINTING the entirety of our national deficit. Remember, we only take in approximately $2.5 Trillion in taxes, this means we are printing 50% more than that out in the open.

Effectively this makes what was $10 Billion per week in POMO activity equal to $27 Billion per week! And thus the exponential growth in numbers is incontrovertible.

Why would the Fed even make these figures public? Because they can’t hide it anymore and because they WANT TO CREATE THE PERCEPTION OF INFLATION IN YOUR MIND. This is literally INSANE, it is Narcissistic Disorder at its finest. It is self-destructive as there is no way it can ever be stopped – no exit strategy. Remember Vietnam? No exit strategy. Any General worth his salt will tell you straight up – YOU NEVER ENTER A BATTLE WITHOUT AN EXIT PLAN. You MUST think at least two moves in advance. Well, we are all in battle and there definitely is no exit plan, not one that can actually work in practice.

Now, with all that I’m going to tell you that QE2 will fail as miserably as QE1! Imagine if they were to take that money and instead of using it to effectively prop up bankrupt banks, they were to refund taxes to the PEOPLE to be used to pay down their existing debt. This would not only help the people, but that money would pour into the banks with velocity, thus making the entire system healthy. That’s what is so nuts about what is going on. By giving the money to the banks, the money DOES NOT GO WHERE IT IS NEEDED. The banks use the hot money to speculate in the markets running up commodities that act as a DRAG on the economy.

Furthermore, the money WILL NOT STAY IN THE UNITED STATES! The “Fed” has now created the BIGGEST CARRY TRADE IN HISTORY. The carry trade created by Japan was HUGE, but this is WAY BIGGER. Countries like Australia are raising interest rates while our “Fed” is using trillions to artificially buy our rates down. This sets up an interest rate differential that the holders of hot money use to arbitrage the difference. They literally take the money from the United States, CARRY IT to Australia where any benefit of its use benefits THEM. This also massively pressures the price of worldwide commodities, creating BUBBLES. These bubbles circle back around to SQUICK the CITIZENS of the United States. A normal, HEALTHY deflation would make things like oil and building materials cheaper. But that won’t be allowed to happen with these CRIMINALS still in power. And least you think that the election changed all that, guess what, I’m already reading that new Republicans are talking about INCREASING spending on defense. Now there’s some kind of change to the change you can believe in!

And so, if you are one of the Americans who is underwater in your home, your retirement diminished, and you are tossing and turning at night worrying about losing your home and not having ANYTHING during your retirement, guess what… you now are facing $4 gasoline again! Here’s a daily chart of oil, it has broken a bullish flag and is making a bee line for $95 a barrel. Does it stop there?

You KNOW that this price increase is a BUBBLE in the making as the price is rising despite FALLING DEMAND. Proof once again came yesterday on the weekly petroleum report that showed FALLING OIL IMPORTS, oil refineries working at very low capacity, and RISING OIL INVENTORIES despite the falling imports. This equals falling demand, and you can see on the chart of inventories that we are approaching all time high inventory levels, breaking out of a sideways consolidation period:

And any savings you have is literally being DESTROYED.

Since June of this year, your money weighed against a basket of other depreciating currencies has now fallen 15%! And it is in process of a 5th wave down that is breaking major support. That support is the bottom trendline of a huge pennant that you can see on the monthly chart:

A break of that pennant from a technical point of view is targeting an area that is a disaster for the people of our nation. And keep in mind that this is an index measured against other countries who are also printing – it’s not measured against anything REAL. And thus the true devaluation of your money is reaching extremes, we are rapidly approaching the key area where the loss of confidence occurs.

And it’s not just our nation, obviously. Take a look at what’s happening in Ireland right now. Bonds and Credit Default Swaps are blowing out! The cost of borrowing is shooting through the roof.

And I still haven’t talked about the continuing fraud occurring in the banks that’s being ignored and swept under the carpet for now. But all these debt rooted problems have not gone away, they are festering and beginning to boil over. They are creating tensions around the globe in regards to trade, and don’t look now, but ahead of the next G20 meeting in Soul, the two Koreas are taking pot shots at one another.

And did you see the reaction of bonds to yesterday’s announcement? The long bond PLUMMETED straight down, causing long term interest rates to RISE.

What does that tell you? And by the end of this month the “Fed” will become the world’s largest holder of Treasury debt! Larger than China! And what’s clear about this is that NO ONE ELSE IS WILLING TO BUY OUR DEBT AT THIS LOW OF A RATE. Therefore, it is up to us to MONETIZE it. This is a SPIRAL from which there is NO ESCAPE. The more we print to devalue our money, THE LESS OTHERS WILL WANT TO FINANCE OUR DEBTS. The less they want to finance, the more we have to print. THIS SPIRAL WILL CONTINUE ALL THE WAY INTO A LOSS OF CONFIDENCE EVENT.

And so, let’s circle back around to stocks. Just yesterday I linked you to an article and published a chart showing that stocks are as overvalued already as they were just prior to the 1929 stock market crash - and that's based upon FRAUD. Pour more gasoline onto that fire and you ABSOLUTELY HAVE A BUBBLE. All bubbles burst. This one will be no different other than we are now creating bubbles during the end of the game.

And as I’ve always said, we must correctly recognize the fundamentals in order for the technical analysis to work. Have the fundamentals changed? Well yes, they did change back in early 2009 when mark-to-fantasy accounting fraud was allowed again, and at the same time $1.7 Trillion in QE was implemented. Since that time, stocks while not anywhere near their 2007 highs have nonetheless plowed over massive overbought, divergent, and screamingly negative market and economic signals to get us to where we closed yesterday, which was with a reconfirmed DOW Theory buy signal when the Industrials closed above the April closing high, as the Transports did the day earlier. Thus, the hot money is in fact pushing through the technical landscape, MANIPULATING the price higher. And now the amount of hot money potentially pouring into stocks and commodities just went up by 150%.

I want to note that the larger and more meaningful indices of the S&P 500 and the Russell 2000 have yet to break their April highs. That is yet another divergence, a very important one. It indicates that the hot money is effective at running up narrow ranges of the market, but is not as effective at running up the broader market.

And thus while the hot money is flooding in, I still remain extremely BEARISH on equities. They are in a bubble. They could very well scream higher into a bubble blow off – great, they are going to do so without my money going along for the ride. This is true even though I watch the markets constantly, day in and day out. I shutter to think what’s going to happen to those who do not. I personally think that the whole thing is a criminal enterprise – it is going to come to an end, and it’s going to end badly for them. I absolutely will not participate in advancing the criminal’s agenda. My goal in life is to be able to know on my death bed that I did not what was necessarily in my own best financial interest, but that I did what was right for everyone’s interest. That’s why I continue to write the truth about the economy and about the markets.

Thus you have a decision to make. Do you join the crowd in promoting and working for the creation of the private bank’s bubbles, or do you work to promote stability and sanity? I can only tell you from experience that working inside of the bubble is a wheel that will consume your life and leave you empty in the end.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... 4-qe2.html

Chinese President Hu overtakes Obama as world's 'most powerful'
http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/285921/ch ... t-powerful

Video: Military build-ups around the world – USA Leading us In To World War 3
http://www.pakalertpress.com/2010/11/04 ... t+Press%29

Bill Gates Funds Approval of GM Mosquitoes to Combat Dengue
http://www.activistpost.com/2010/11/bil ... of-gm.html

Confidential United Nations Afghanistan Security Reports August-October 2010
http://publicintelligence.net/confident ... ober-2010/

[loquaciousmomma]

Bruce Delahorne, a marketing executive who flies frequently, said he was also recently going through a standard metal detector at O’Hare — no body imager in sight — when the old rules abruptly changed.

Mr. Delahorne said: “They had one of the T.S.A. staff announcing loudly: ‘Take everything out of your pockets. If you have a wallet, take it out. A handkerchief, out.’ I asked the guy, ‘Can you explain the reason for the new process?’ He said there was nothing new. ‘We have always done this.’ ”

Well, no they haven’t, as you and I and Mr. Delahorne all know. Mr. Delahorne said he thought, “O.K., I get it. This guy is reading from the card, not talking to me.”

So, Mr. Delahorne said, “I did what they told me to. But on the other side of the metal detector, I said to another screener, ‘Could you explain to me why the procedure is now different at this airport, like having to remove a wallet that never set off the metal detector?’ And he said, ‘No, no. The process has always been the same, at every airport.’ ”

Sounds like the old Soviet Union...

[Jason]

MONTREAL - Great balls of fire were reported swooping recently over Eastern Canada and several U.S. states and there are different theories about what caused the sightings.

Even NASA's on the case.

An agency spacecraft got a closer look at one of the possible sources when it made a scheduled flight past the Hartley 2 comet on Thursday.

It took closeup pictures of the comet, which is roughly 1.2 kilometres wide and spews deadly cyanide gas.

The comet made one of its closest passes by Earth this week, flying by at a still-reassuring distance of 18 million kilometres from our planet.

http://www.cbc.ca/cp/national/MG1621.html

Deadly Hurricane Tomas has intensified into a dangerous Category 1 hurricane with 85 mph winds this morning, and is lashing Haiti, eastern Cuba, and the southwestern coast of the Dominican Republic with torrential rains. Observations from the Gran Piedra, Cuba radar show that the eye of Tomas is skirting the tip of the southwestern Peninsula of Haiti, and the winds of the powerful eastern eyewall of the storm are pounding the western end of the peninsula. An Air Force hurricane hunter aircraft just left Tomas, and measured top surface winds of 86 mph at 7:13am EDT. Satellite loops of Tomas show an impressive Central Dense Overcast (CDO) of high cirrus clouds with very cold tops has pushed into the lower stratosphere above Tomas and has flattened out, hiding the surface center from view. An eye is not yet visible on satellite imagery, but is apparent on radar. The latest center fix at 7:08am EDT found that the pressure had risen slightly to 988 mb, which may be a sign that interaction with the mountainous terrain of southwestern Haiti may have caused some disruption of Tomas. However, Tomas should resume intensifying this afternoon now that the eye has moved past the southwestern tip of Haiti, as wind shear is a moderate 10 - 20 knots, and SSTs are a very warm 29.5°C.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMa ... rynum=1685

Haiti quake victims told to flee approaching hurricane
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-11700977

At least 64 people have been killed in the latest eruption of Indonesia's Mount Merapi volcano - more than doubling the death toll since it became active again last week.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11699945

Chemtrails – The List of Patents For Stratosperic Arial Spraying Programs!
http://www.sovereignindependent.com/?p=9344

In U.S., 14% Rely on Food Stamps

Some 42,389,619 Americans received food stamps in August, a 17% rise from the same time a year ago, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which tracks the data. That number is up 58.5% from August 2007, before the recession began.

http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2010/11/ ... od-stamps/

The tunnel people of Las Vegas: How 1,000 live in flooded labyrinth under Sin City's shimmering strip
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... strip.html

UN calls for higher taxes to combat climate warning
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id ... _article=1

What happened on Election Day?
http://underthemountainbunker.wordpress ... ction-day/

The Price Of Oil Is Going Up, The Price Of Food Is Going Up And Now Here Comes Quantitative Easing
http://endoftheamericandream.com/archiv ... ive-easing

Faulty BP pipelines in Alaska are at risk for future spills, explosions

According to ProPublica's Abrahm Lustgarten, a 4-week-old internal maintenance report obtained by the investigative news service reveals that at least 148 BP pipelines on Alaska's North Slope received an "F" grade on the company's own system of upkeep grading. Pipes receive an F when inspectors determine that at least 80 percent of their walls are corroded and at risk of rupture. These pipelines, in Lustgarten's telling, "carry toxic or flammable substances," and "many of the metal walls of the F-ranked pipes are worn to within a few thousandths of an inch of bursting," increasing the likelihood of future spills and/or explosions.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20 ... explosions

Harry Potter Fans and Black Magic Decimating India's Owls

NEW DELHI (Reuters Life!) - Die-hard fans of the best-selling Harry Potter stories are seriously threatening India's owl population, as demands for the ultimate wizarding accessory increase, a wildlife group says.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=12051594

QEII: Who really owns US Treasury Debt
http://www.angrybearblog.com/2010/11/qe ... ry+Bear%29

US econ growth gauge rises to 4-week high- ECRI
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSNLL5ME6MM20101105

The Employment-Population ratio declined to 58.3% in October from 58.5% in September. This is disappointing news.

The Labor Force Participation Rate also declined to 64.5% in October from 64.7% in September. This is the percentage of the working age population in the labor force. The participation rate is well below the 66% to 67% rate that was normal over the last 20 years.

The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (some-times referred to as involuntary part-time workers) fell by 318,000 over the month to 9.2 million, partially offsetting large increases in the prior 2 months. These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job.

The number of workers only able to find part time jobs (or have had their hours cut for economic reasons) declined to 9.154 million in October, from the record 9.472 million in September. This is still very high.

These workers are included in the alternate measure of labor underutilization (U-6) that decreased to 17.0% in October from 17.1% in September. The high for U-6 was 17.4% in October 2009. Still grim.

According to the BLS, there are 6.206 million workers who have been unemployed for more than 26 weeks and still want a job. This was up from 6.123 million in September. It appears the number of long term unemployed has peaked ... although this may be because people are giving up.

The number of long term unemployed is staggering - still over 6 million people who are looking for a job.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Gearing up for housing correction version 2.0 – 7 charts showing a 10 to 15 percent decline in home prices for U.S. housing in 2011.

We’ve reached peak debt. It is unlikely that we will be allowed to take out $50,000 in zero percent credit card debt, finance a BMW with zero percent for 7 years, and buy a $750,000 home on an option ARM all on an income of $100,000 in the next few years. Those days are over.

The housing bubble was a criminal enterprise. Forget all these theories and economic models trying to explain it away and dilute blame, the housing bubble needs to have some serious RICO investigations. It was a sophisticated and complicated money laundering operation. The banks robbed the taxpayers and just look at the home prices above. The purpose is rather clear. Home prices will decline further in 2011 but the question is by how much. 10 to 15 percent seems to be a reasonable expectation given the headwinds we are facing with foreclosures, jobs, and the deleveraging of debt. Now that the too big to fail have sunk their fangs into the taxpayer wallet and are guaranteed not to fail, they’ll be more open to dumping homes on the market at fire sale prices.

http://www.doctorhousingbubble.com/7-ch ... e+SoCal%29

Reality? Here’s our economy in a nutshell. Below are two graphs… the first one shows the raw number of total workers who manufacture any kind of real goods in this country (now including McDonald's hamburgers), while the second chart shows total government workers! Note that despite a doubling in the size of our population, we still employ the same number of people actually making things as we did in the year 1942:

Okay, so we’re not fooled for a second into believing that the economy is actually producing meaningful employment. We’re not fooled for a second into believing that printing money will bring prosperity either. What it will bring is higher numbers… higher imports, higher exports, higher oil costs, higher food costs, higher everything AS MEASURED IN DOLLARS, EXCEPT… your wages.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... d-115.html

[Jason]

There were 140 failures in 2009. This makes 143 and counting in 2010 ...

Bair's valkyries ride
someday this war's gonna end
today is that day
by Soylent Green is People

From the FDIC: Grandpoint Bank, Los Angeles, California, Assumes All of the Deposits of First Vietnamese American Bank, Westminster, California

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Note: this is an unofficial list of Problem Banks compiled only from public sources.

Here is the unofficial problem bank list for Nov 5, 2010.

Changes and comments from surferdude808:

The number of institutions on the Unofficial Problem Bank List remained unchanged this week at 894 as there were four additions and four removals. However, aggregate assets increased to $416.5 billion from $410.7 billion.

Removals this week are the failures that include K Bank, Randallstown, MD ($592 million); Pierce Commercial Bank, Tacoma, WA ($242 million); Western Commercial Bank, Woodland, CA ($111 million); and First Vietnamese American Bank, Westminster, CA ($52 million).

Additions this week are Superior Bank, Tampa, FL ($3.4 billion Ticker: SUPR); The Suffolk County National Bank of Riverhead, Riverhead, NY ($1.7 billion Ticker: SUBK); Essex Bank, Tappahannock, VA ($1.2 billion Ticker: BTC); and Community Central Bank, Mount Clemens, MI ($543 million Ticker: CCBD).

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

The Most Dangerous Place On Earth: The Brutal Drug War Raging On The U.S. Border
http://endoftheamericandream.com/archiv ... u-s-border







...by design...

[lundbaek]

The $US has got to be destroyed before Americans and other peoples will accept a single world currency. The questions of interest are when and how.

[Jason]

The $US has got to be destroyed before Americans and other peoples will accept a single world currency. The questions of interest are when and how.

Maybe they already did and the $US was it????

[Jason]

When Will U.S. Leaders Confess To The American People That America Carries Out False-Flag Attacks As Part of Its Foreign Policy?
http://www.blacklistednews.com/index.php?news_id=11394

One Piece Of Moderately Good Economic News And 14 Pieces Of Bad Economic News That Are So Horrifying You Might Not Want To Read Them Standing Up
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/arch ... tanding-up

Russian activist disappears after exposing vaccination plans for Russia, Ukraine and Belarus
http://info-wars.org/2010/11/07/russian ... d-belarus/

Obama, Gates And Clinton In Asia: U.S. Expands Military Build-Up In The East
http://theintelhub.com/2010/11/08/obama ... -the-east/

Nuclear Plants in New York and Vermont Shut Down, Tensions Rising?
http://theintelhub.com/2010/11/08/nucle ... e-company/

Mexico mass grave: 18 kidnapped tourists found
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-11705372

Gibbs threatens to pull Obama from India talks after press dispute
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20 ... ss-dispute

Eugenics, 'rising from Nazi tomb'
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... &Itemid=38

...google prescott bush and eugenics and hitler

Vaccine scandal latest to erode trust in China's health system
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... &Itemid=39

Removing the Mercury From Your Teeth
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... &Itemid=38

AT&T moves into US health business
http://www.globaltelecomsbusiness.com/A ... iness.html

The End Game
http://www.frontlinethoughts.com/pdf/mwo110510.pdf

On Inflation, Saving, and the Nature of Money
http://www.activistpost.com/2010/11/on- ... money.html

Most bank fails in one year since S&L crisis, FDIC bleeds red
http://www.activistpost.com/2010/11/mos ... nce-s.html

The Mortgage Loan Foreclosure Mess: Yves Smith on the Banks' Gluttony; Problems with MERS and Sloppy Securitizations
http://ataxingmatter.blogs.com/tax/2010 ... ttony.html

Court Finds Bank Of America Can Not Foreclose On Property Which Has Existing IRS Tax Lien
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/court- ... s-tax-lien

Protestors Block Nuclear Waste ‘Train of Death’ Despite 17,000 Police, £50 Million Security
http://publicintelligence.net/protestor ... -security/









TSA official slipped white powder into fliers' bags, told them they'd been caught with coke and were under arrest
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/11/04/ts ... ipped.html

Let them eat cheese: anger as Ireland plans handouts of cheddar to the poor
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010 ... eese/print

Ireland Update: "Relying on the kindness of strangers"
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Catherine Austin Fitts: The Looting Of America
http://www.infiniteunknown.net/2010/11/ ... Unknown%29










Statin drugs cause liver damage, kidney failure and cataracts, says BMJ
http://www.naturalnews.com/030317_stati ... amage.html

Mount Merapi In Indonesia Erupts Yet Again
http://themostimportantnews.com/archive ... -yet-again

Dead, dying coral found near BP spill called 'smoking gun'
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40029074/ns ... nvironment

Pentagon awards $630m Afghanistan contract to controversial supplier
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... plier.html

Following Insider Trading Scandal, FrontPoint On Verge Of Collapse After LPs Pull Half Of Their Holdings
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/follow ... to+zero%29

Las Vegas city has 3 times the rentals of Los Angeles city and L.A. has 6 times the population – U-Haul rate trends and home sales higher in Las Vegas than peak months of the bubble driven by absentee investors.
http://www.mybudget360.com/las-vegas-ci ... ome-sales/

Jesse Ventura's "Conspiracy Theory": Wall Street
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/jesse- ... to+zero%29

Is An ATM Cash Shortage Coming?

While we have no way to confirm or refute the validity of this statement presented by a supposed ATM business insider on Steve Quayle.com, it does bring up an interesting point regarding how banks may be conserving "petty cash." Of course, if this perspective is true, it validates concerns about bank capitalization, and explains the reason why the FDIC recently expanded insurance on checking accounts from $250,000 to infinity in an attempt to get Americans to put their money in their friendly naighborhood bank. Of course, that this contradicts everything that the Fed Chairman is trying to do by getting Americans to spend (or buy Netflix at a 1,000 P/E) instead of putting the money in the bank, is precisely the reason why Sheila Bair's relationship with Geithner and Bernanke is, shall we say, tenuous.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/atm-ca ... age-coming

ATMs Crash Across The Country After “Bank Holiday” Warning

Following rumors of a “bank holiday” that could limit or prevent altogether cash withdrawals later this week, Twitter and other Internet forums were raging yesterday about numerous ATMs across the country that crashed in the early hours of Sunday morning, preventing customers from performing basic transactions.

It’s unknown whether the crashes were partly a result of a surge of people trying to withdraw their money in preparation for any feared bank shutdown, or if mere technical glitches were to blame. The fact that the problem affected numerous different banks in different parts of the U.S. would seem to indicate the former.

The Orange County Register reported that the problems were “part of a national outage” which prevented people from performing simple transactions such as cashing checks and withdrawing money.

“Computer issues” were blamed for similar issues in Phoenix Arizona, while in Birmingham Alabama, Wells Fargo customers’ online banking accounts and ATMs displayed incorrect balances.

The banks primarily affected were Wells Fargo, Chase and Bank of America, but according to blogger Phil Brennan, who studied Twitter feeds and other Internet message boards that were alight with the story, numerous other financial institutions were also affected, including US Bank, Compass, USAA, Suntrust, Fairwinds Credit Union, American Express, BB&T on the East Coast and PNC.

“Twitter is going crazy with reports of ATMs and online accounts going down as of 01:00 hours EST of the 7th of November 2010,” writes Brennan. “This is happening to many banks all across America. Some are trying to say that it is a computer glitch to do with the change in Daylight Savings Time, but I will call BS on this as we manage to put our clocks back over here in the UK without knocking out ATMs and online accounts nationally.”

http://www.infowars.com/atms-crash-acro ... y-warning/

....may be an interesting week in finance after all.....

Spot Gold Passes $1,400
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/spot-gold-passes-1400

World Bank President says Gold has Role in next Monetary System
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

Despite the count, I still do not rule out a triggering event that pops the bubble without notice. In fact I think the odds of an event that impacts the markets severely is quite high and getting higher. Fraud, when it ends, usually ends suddenly.

The head of the World Bank (criminal central) published an Op-Ed in the Financial Times this morning, here’s the key quote, "…should also consider employing gold as an international reference point of market expectations about inflation, deflation and future currency values.”

A gold standard? Yes, you are now being prepped. Remember, gold is THE most highly manipulated substance on the planet, it is FRAUD CENTRAL, and it is OWNED BY THE SAME CRIMINALS who have been wearing their DEBT PUSHING outfits. More proof of that is coming to light all the time, just check out this interview Max Keiser did with Jim Willie… part 1 is below, you can click through the video to the other two parts if you like, but this is important information on the depth of the criminal conduct (ht Jeff):





What’s most important is WHO controls the production of our money. Private bankers should run BANKS not our money system - that belongs to US not to them. They would be quite content to run a debt backed system for a few decades, steal everyone’s productive efforts, and then control them with gold backed money for a couple more decades, rinse & repeat for eternity.

Will we be smart enough to break free from their control?

Money, after all, is all about control.

And what kills me is how many people still can’t fathom what happened on Jekyll Island in the year 1910. This is CONSPIRACY FACT, a fact which the “Fed” celebrated at the scene of the crime this weekend, Bernanke was in attendance and even spewed more central banker drivel. Yes, they are MEETING TO CONSPIRE AGAINST YOU!!! Again, this is not theory, it is fact. It’s all about WHO controls the money, which is all about who gets the rewards from YOUR productive efforts.

For those who have yet to understand what the “Fed” is, it is a group of “Federal Reserve Banks” which are OWNED by PRIVATE banks, which are owned by a very small minority of PRIVATE INDIVIDUALS. They state the ownership trail in such a manner as to obscure the truth, but the truth is simply that. This never should have been allowed, banks should be private, but the money system belongs to the people. However, since the private banks have committed robbery and massive fraud, I have nothing against TEMPORARILY nationalizing the large banks in order to run them through receivership and wring out the criminal elements and infinite leverage. Put Bill Black in charge and stand back.

Remember, the “Fed” does nothing in your best interest, anything they do is in their interest, the damage to you only minimized by their fear that you may rise up against them.

And that is why they fund programs like food stamps where there are now 42 million Americans (13.5% of the population) surviving on them. The number of people on food stamps increased by 17% in the past year alone. How’s that for economic recovery?

And the Department of Labor is now asking once again for an extension to Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) funding. Without authorizing more billions, emergency unemployment benefits will end for millions this month. Will they be extended? Certainly, the central bankers must keep the revolution down and will do so as long as they can get away with debasing our money, effectively taxing us all to compensate for their thievery.

That tax works to spike the cost of energy and food as the hot money pouring into the banks is exported around the world and is speculated in commodities that translate to higher costs for the majority of people.

JPM just put out a chart (criminals reporting on the havoc caused by themselves) showing the percentage of income spent on food and energy by income levels. What’s perfectly clear is how money debasement and Quantitative Easing work against the lower income brackets:

And here’s what JPM’s own analysts conclude:

“When the Fed considers the possible consequences of a falling dollar resulting from QE2, it should perhaps focus on food and energy prices as much as on traditionally computed core inflation. First, the food/energy exposures of the lower 2 income quintiles are quite high (see chart). Second, the core CPI has a massive weight to “owner’s equivalent rent”, which suggests that the imputed cost of home occupancy has gone down. Unfortunately, this is not true for families living in homes that are underwater, and cannot move to take advantage of it (unless they choose to default and bear the consequences of doing so). Due to the housing mess, there has perhaps never been a time when traditionally computed core inflation as a way of measuring changes in the cost of things means less than it does right now.”





No problem because the stock market is rising… more food stamps for everyone!

There’s only one way to end the fraud and criminal activity. Don’t expect someone to save you, help’s not coming. It has to emanate from the very people who are being victimized… the people down on Main Street:

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... d-118.html




....setting the stage and push into the new age.....and probably a global gold backed currency!





The Solution....ONLY Solution -

[Jason]

The Effects of ObamaCare
http://www.investorsinsight.com/blogs/j ... acare.aspx

Markets alert for credit crunch 2.0
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comm ... h-2.0.html

China Says Fed Easing May Flood World Economy With ‘Hot Money’
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-1 ... oney-.html

Clear Capital: home prices drop 5% in three months
http://www.housingwire.com/2010/11/08/c ... ahoo!+Mail

Ceridian-UCLA: Diesel Fuel index declines in October, "Signals Weaker Holiday Season"
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

The REAL Unemployment Rate Is 22%
http://dailybail.com/home/chart-shock-t ... is-22.html

1.2 Million Unemployed Want A Job But Have Given Up Looking
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/0 ... ahoo!+Mail

An Advance Look At The Upcoming POMO Schedule: Up To $130 Billion In Hot Brian Sack Liquidity Injections In A Month
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/advanc ... ions-month

Warsh Says Federal Reserve's Asset Purchases May Fail to Benefit Economy
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-0 ... onomy.html

September Wholesale Inventories Accumulate Faster Than Expected, Grow By 1.5% On Expectations Of 0.7%, Suspicious Destocking Seen In Alcohol Products
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/septem ... -suspiciou

Goodbye Ambac
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/goodbye-ambac

Ireland's Next Blow Could Be Home Loans
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 29366.html

Don’t Count on Global Governance
http://www.project-syndicate.org/commen ... 50/English

Al Gore's Cap-and-Trade Pumpkin Dies, No One Notices, Not Even Glen Beck
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

A Recipe for Fascism
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/a_r ... _20101108/

At Legal Fringe, Empty Houses Go to the Needy
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/09/us/09 ... ml?_r=1&hp

U.S. deploying drones in Yemen to hunt for Al-Qaeda, has yet to fire missiles
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 04454.html

Drone Surveillance Program Targeting Americans?
http://www.activistpost.com/2010/11/unm ... .html#more

The US has extended an air cargo ban to cover Somalia as well as Yemen and banned ink and toner cartridges from passenger flights, in the wake of last month's failed bomb plot.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11713958

Fighting Fluoride
http://www.lewrockwell.com/miller/miller35.1.html

(Reuters) - Novartis AG plans to seek regulatory approval within 18 months for a pioneering tablet containing an embedded microchip, bringing the concept of "smart-pill" technology a step closer.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6A754720101108

Mystery Missile Launch Seen off Calif. Coast

A Navy spokesperson told KFMB it wasn't their missile. He said there was no Navy activity reported in the area Monday evening.

On Friday night, Vandenberg Air Force Base, in California, launched a Delta II rocket, carrying an Italian satellite into orbit, but a sergeant at the base told KFMB there had been no launches since then.

Ellsworth urged American to wait for definitive answers to come from the military.

When asked, however, what he thought it might be, the former ambassador said it could possibly have been a missile test timed as a demonstration of American military might as President Obama tours Asia.

"It could be a test-firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile from a submarine … to demonstrate, mainly to Asia, that we can do that," speculated Ellsworth.

Ellsworth said such tests were carried out in the Atlantic to demonstrate America's power to the Soviets, when there was a Soviet Union, but he doesn't believe an ICBM has previously been tested by the U.S. over the Pacific.

Officially, at least, the projectile remains a mystery missile.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/11/ ... 6716.shtml

Missile Shot Off Los Angeles Still a Mystery for Pentagon Officials
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/11 ... officials/



....simply fascinating....a missile launched and all the media can talk about is who launched it.....what I would like to know is - Where did it go????

President Obama is in Jakarta, Indonesia, but that nation's most active volcano--Mount Merapi on Java--is spewing enough ash to potentially cut the President's visit short. Merapi (literally "Mountain of Fire" in Javanese) has been erupting since late October, and the mountain's pyroclastic flows and ash have been blamed for the deaths of over 150 Indonesians since the eruption began. The capital city of Jakarta lies about 250 miles west-northwest of Merapi, and received ash from the volcano over the weekend. At Jakarta's Soekarno-Hatta Airport, airlines canceled 36 flights on Saturday, and an additional 50 flights on Sunday. The airport handles about 900 flights per day. The Indonesian Disaster Management Office reported that volcanic ash from Merapi fell in Jakarta and some nearby areas such as Bogor and Puncak on Saturday night, but only in very light falls. No flights were canceled yesterday, as the ash cloud remained about 50 miles to the south of the city.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMa ... rynum=1690



ForeclosureGate Could Force Bank Nationalization
http://www.rightsidenews.com/2010110912 ... ation.html

Bank of America edges closer to tipping point?
http://www.bankreorealestate.com/indust ... point.html

Consider Gold in Overhaul of Bretton Woods, World Bank Head Writes in FT
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-0 ... -says.html

World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates
http://www.usda.gov/oce/commodity/wasde/latest.pdf

Below is a daily chart of oil futures on the left, and gold futures on the right. Both of these charts are of great concern – oil is targeting $95 a barrel, and gold appears to have shifted into a parabolic climb that you can see is now proceeding straight up. That move in gold is classic, I’ve underlined three slopes… it starts out climbing, moves into a steeper climb, and then finally enters a parabolic climb, moving farther away from the primary uptrend line. Parabolic moves can go a long way, especially in precious metals, but eventually this latest move will be erased as it is simply not sustainable on this path. Be careful if you are playing with gold or silver here:

I am stunned at the level of FRAUD that is being perpetrated across America (and most of the world). YOU ARE A VICTIM, YOU ARE BEING ROBBED, the FRAUD is RAMPANT.

IF YOU ARE AN INVESTMENT PROFESSIONAL, LISTEN UP.

Retirement funds are saturated with fraudulent paper – not just derivatives, but stocks and bonds as well. I’m going to run down just a small portion of the fraud below, if you are managing any type of investment funds you need to be aware of the fraud that’s present, it WILL unwind at some point.

Yesterday after the close Ambac (once the biggest monoline insurers) filed for bankruptcy. This company was built upon fraud to begin with, one half of its business was legitimate, the other half was all fraud. The legitimate business was insuring municipal bonds. The fraudulent business was insuring mortgages, including pools of mortgage derivatives. It was insuring those mortgages WITHOUT ANYWHERE NEAR SUFFICIENT ASSETS to actually pay in the event of default. This FRAUD was quickly obvious as the housing market began to unwind and its stock plummeted as you can see in this monthly chart of ABK stock:

As a part of the COVER-UP of the FRAUD that was prevalent, ABK broke itself into parts now calling itself “the Ambac Financial Group.” Note the word “Group.” What they did is ILLEGAL, they moved the good parts into new SHELL corporations while leaving behind the bad assets and liabilities in the old corporation. Despite being blatantly obvious and illegal, OUR GOVERNMENT did NOTHING.

Why is this shell game so destructive and illegal? Because the FRAUD leaves the investors who were defrauded in the first place holding a bag that is entirely empty – this bag is $1.6 billion in size (you may own ABK in your investment portfolio – and corporate crooks like Jim Cramer were just advising you to buy this stock even though bankruptcy was known). In other words, the shell game is an attempt to save the good assets for themselves while trying to leave former investors with little or nothing.

And here’s the result of the latest bankruptcy filing last night:

Guess what? The SHELL GAME is being played at nearly all the big banks too! The most obvious is Citi, who again with the blessing of OUR GOVERNMENT created a shell company to offload their crap assets. This way those crap "assets" could rot while isolating their good assets for themselves. Again, this leaves the investors out in the cold.

Could a good attorney “pierce the corporate veil” and get to the good assets? In a functioning system the answer is clearly yes they could. However, in this system the FRAUD is so pervasive that should it be exposed for what it is then the entire financial system WOULD COLLAPSE. That part is FOR REAL. That is why the patsies in OUR government are letting the crooks get away with it – it is because they have no spine to do what is right. The further away we get from fixing it, the harder it gets to do the right thing. There are no adults present, and it is making us all victims of their crimes multiple times over.

So, if you are an investor, WHY WOULD YOU LET ANY OF THESE COMPANIES HAVE ANY OF YOUR MONEY? If you do, you are a two-time fool.

The shell game is a completely different FRAUD than CONTROL FRAUD which is also RAMPANT.

Forclosuregate is exposing the methods of the criminals. Yesterday depositions began regarding the processing of interbank transfers. PLEASE take a few minutes and at least listen to the FRAUD that was occurring with the transfer of notes. We’re talking about so many illegal misrepresentations that it is simply AMAZING that it had not been exposed before:

So I ask, where are the real officers of NTC, and WHEN DO I GET TO SEE THEM WEARING ORANGE JUMPSUITS?

I bet you know the answer to that, NOT ONE PERSON is doing jail time for FRAUD that is so rampant that it literally could bring down our entire financial system and is clearly a VERY LEGITIMATE THREAT TO OUR NATIONAL SECURITY, unlike all the FALSE FLAG scare tactics being used to make you submit to full body pat-downs at the airport, which is simply justification to rob you of your tax dollars so that the TSA is forced to buy the latest look through your clothes gizmo that makes the financiers and military industrial complex rich.

So, in the hard economic times created by the real criminals, if you are cutting someone’s hair without a license, then you are subject to armed invasion, handcuffing, and arrest.

Yesterday I was watching the local evening news and saw a video about six local police officers who completely destroyed the front door of a guy’s home, dragged him out of his house and placed him in handcuffs in front of his neighbors. A homeowner. His crime? One of his neighbors smelled pot coming from his house and called police. Without any research, they send in six fully armed police who don’t even knock on his door to ask him a question straight up… they just kick it in, stick a rifle in his face, and put him in handcuffs. Turns out he is ill and has one of these medical marijuana permits from the state – something the police could have easily known if only they looked BEFORE they kicked down his door.

This is similar to an episode you may recall happened to a neighbor less than a block from where I live. The police led this early morning raid with stun grenades and wound up using automatic gun fire to kill the guys dog who was in the back yard. Turns out the guy wasn’t even home. His crime? Allegedly selling prescription drugs – a bad offense to be sure, but bullets flying in my neighborhood? Police leading with stun grenades? No research, no intelligence gathering at all, or they would have known he was not home.

POLICE OFFICERS AND MILITARY LISTEN UP! You are beginning to see more public pushback against these tactics. This is because THEY ARE WRONG. If you are being asked to take part in activities like this, you need to provide ADULT leadership for your units. REFUSE to act in an inappropriate manner against the very public you serve! You will find that doing the right thing will restore the TRUE RULE OF LAW, and that you will earn the people’s respect. By doing the RIGHT THING, you will live a life of virtue, your soul clean from knowing that you are protecting society, not protecting those who are DEFRAUDING IT.

And speaking of FRAUD, read this and weep for your nation:

Nov. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Goldman Sachs Group Inc., the bank that makes the most revenue trading stocks and bonds, lost money in that business on two days in the third quarter and made more than $100 million on seven days.

Losses on Goldman Sachs’s trading desks were between $25 million and zero on two days during the period that ended on Sept. 30, according to a filing today by the New York-based company with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm’s traders made between $75 million and $100 million on 24 days, the filing showed.


Gee, that’s nice. How do you suppose it's possible to make millions upon millions each and every day, day after day? Two losing days? Now, if you can’t see the FRAUD that’s occurring here, then you are BLIND, or you work for the government and fear that exposing this FRAUD will bring down our financial system.

I say the sooner we bring it down, the sooner we can rebuild it. A few tweaks aren’t going to do it.

Everywhere I look I see FRAUD. I have never seen so much out in the open rampant FRAUD, I can’t even fathom that we have degenerated to the depths that we have. To end the FRAUD, it will require that EVERYONE do what is truly right – not just what some supervisor or banker backed law dictates. There is a universal law of humanity. Each individual needs to take personal responsibility and pledge to themselves and to future generations that they will not support the ongoing capricious FRAUD.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... d-119.html



The Solution....ONLY Solution -

[Jason]

Couple informational links -

http://www.teamlaw.org/HistoryOutline.htm

http://www.teamlaw.org/Mythology.htm#FreedomToFascism

[Jason]

Soros Bets on U.S. Financial Collapse
http://www.usasurvival.org/ck11.08.10.html

Chávez the Cocaine Capo?
http://www.american.com/archive/2010/no ... caine-capo

One of the more vigorous debates going on right now is the back and forth over the prospects for inflation and deflation. Underlining this debate is the growing awareness that there is a large debt problem in the US and other developed countries around the world, and there is no easy way out of it.

Unlike previous recoveries from cyclical post-WII recessions, where the economy emerged vigorous and prepared to grow out of debt incurred during the preceding downturn, it is fairly clear the US economy reached a pivot point in the first decade of the 21st century. The downturn in 2001 gave way to a comparatively weak recovery. The downturn in 2007 through 2009 saw the beginning of significant deleveraging in the private sector, something that hasn’t happened since the Great Depression.

Despite the efforts by the Federal Reserve to revive credit growth, overall credit continues to contract. And despite the efforts of the federal government to stimulate the economy, it appears the effects of the stimulus programs on growth will be short-lived. As it becomes clearer that the economy will not grow itself out of the debt burden in the private and public sectors, there is a growing awareness that the public debt situation is as unsustainable as the housing market was.

Going forward, the inevitable resolution of this debt issue is probably the most important issue facing investors today. However, this is hardly a problem that has not been faced before. Societies and governments have taken on too much debt many times in the past, and the result, often through much political wrangling and market turmoil, has usually involved significant economic hardship or currency debasement—or a combination of both.

Many investors today seem to think that the debt problem in the US will ultimately result in high inflation, as the government attempts to lower the real cost of the debt through printing more money, thereby causing prices to rise. As prices rise, the relative debt burden decreases.

That has certainly been the basic strategy of the Fed and the government since 1933, when President Roosevelt first devalued the dollar against gold in an effort specifically intended to get prices rising again. However, while the manipulation (i.e., devaluation) of the value of money has worked to stimulate the economy and prices on many occasions since then, it has had much less of an effect this time around.

The reason lies in the amount of credit (i.e., debt) in the economy, which has been building up for decades, and the fact that the amount of debt it is now decreasing. While the Fed has lowered interest rates to near zero and offered vast sums to banks and other institutions, private sector lending and borrowing continue to contract.

This trend of contracting credit is not solely the result of banks being unwilling to lend. Credit contraction is also a rational response of tens of millions of people and businesses faced with high amounts of debt backed up by assets that are now worth less than they were at their peak. They are not looking to borrow more, regardless of the interest rate. Finally, credit contraction and deleveraging is an expected response of a demographic population bulge headed towards retirement.

While the economy is currently in the grips of deflationary forces as credit continues to contract, this process will not go on forever. At some point the deleveraging of the private sector will slow down, and debt levels will stabilize. The main questions are “How far will the deleveraging process go?” and “Where will the cost be felt?”

During the depression, most of this deleveraging process occurred while the dollar was fixed to gold. Prices fell dramatically as demand for goods and services plunged, and defaults soared. Roosevelt devalued the dollar in 1933 hoping to change consumer dynamics.

This time around, the cost of deleveraging is felt in the value of the dollar and the value of debt on the balance sheets of banks and other creditors. The government’s activism in countering the recession has to some extent blunted the impact of deleveraging by transferring some of the cost to the dollar. Other central banks have joined in with various stimulus packages and currency debasement processes. This is the reason gold has reached a new record high, not only as measured against the US dollar, but against many other currencies as well.

However, just because the value of the dollar has absorbed some of the cost of deleveraging and declined against gold, this does not necessarily mean inflation is just around the corner. Until the private sector stops deleveraging, there is very little chance for significant price inflation and surging treasury yields.

http://www.sitkapacific.com/files/Sitka ... Letter.pdf

Will You Be Able To Heat Your Home This Winter? Millions Of American Families Will Not
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/arch ... s-will-not

G20 draws up two-tier bank plan

Please use the link to reference this article. Do not copy & paste articles which is a breach of FT.com's Ts&Cs (http://www.ft.com/servicestools/help/terms) and is copyright infringement. Send a link for free or email [email protected] to purchase rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ff3f3a4a-ec46 ... z14tkWlDnH

People briefed on the agenda for the G20 summit, which begins in Seoul on Thursday, said officials had concluded that global regulators should focus on big banks with global ­businesses, stripping out domestically focused institutions ­without the reach of the in­dustry’s cross-border companies.

Nonetheless, the G20 will press ahead with the creation of two separate systemic bank lists, the first with an estimated 20 global banks whose failure would pose a risk to the international financial system. The ­second would be a country-by-country list of banks that are systemically important within their home economies, but pose little danger to the world.

“That could be true of banks in China or Japan, many of which are huge but have relatively little in the way of assets outside their domestic markets,” said one person briefed on the G20 agenda. The change is important because banks on the main list will be subjected to more regulatory scrutiny and obliged to hold more capital.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ff3f3a4a-ec46 ... z14tkLURIN

The fifth plank of the Communist Manifesto is:
Centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.

World Bank President: My Words Were Manipulated, I Don't Support A Return To The Gold Standard
http://af.reuters.com/article/metalsNew ... dChannel=0

IMF warns austerity measures may have to be reconsidered
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/econ ... dered.html

Nearly 59 million lack health insurance: CDC
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/us_usa_healt ... U5bWlsbA--

Chromium plume spreads in Calif. town's water
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101109/ap_ ... brockovich

The world's best underwater photographs 2010
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/g ... 0&index=15

Mystery missile launch reported off California coast
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11721981

Magnitude 6.3 - SOUTHEAST INDIAN RIDGE
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/ ... 0008jr.php

Angry Student Protesters Storm Tory HQ In London
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/angry- ... -hq-london

Live feed on the riots
http://wwitv.com/tv_channels/b5791.htm

Bank Crisis Spreads To Brazil, Where Banco Panamericano Plunges After Warning Liquidation Could "Destabilize" System
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/bank-c ... ion-could-

Irish Bund Spreads Pass 600bps, 100bps Wider In A Week
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/irish- ... wider-week

Interpreting The Silver Move Yesterday

The game is rigged. The small guy cannot compete. Today's margin raise in #Silver is an example. You cannot compete with the unintended consequences of flawed market structure no matter how smart you are.

They have unlimited cash for margin borrowed at fed discount window. You have a 20% rate Mastercard with unredeemable points (capital one lies).

They tell their creditor, the US Treasury, what assets on their books are worth (mark to myth). You get told what yours are worth by the banks or some objective 3rd party and must pony up the cash to cover the difference.

They have no need to assess VaR, their balance sheet is infinite. You have to think about your next pay check and must decide whether 2 cars are really 1 too many.

When the comex raises margins, all these things force you to puke your longs, and incentivizes them to add to shorts.

And somehow the info comes out post floor hours, during the thinnest trading time of all. Not hard to push a market on news like that. But more telling is that the silver market drops precipitously before the close.

Your superior intelligence and bankroll mgt is no match for their fed sponsored balance sheet. You will not win in the long run.

Casinos change decks midgame too you know.

If you’re right, they raise margins, prevent physical delivery, tax sales, make ownership illegal. You cannot win.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/guest- ... -yesterday

Jobless Claims At 435K On Expectations Of 450K, To Be Revised Worse Next Week, As NSA Number Deteriorates By 28K
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/jobles ... orates-28k

IMF calls on UK to plan for surprises

The International Monetary Fund has called on the government to prepare a “contingency plan” should the UK economy dip back into a prolonged recession or accelerate more quickly than expected.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/2d7d7e18-ec0f ... z14st9Ucqk

Wall Street Collects $4 Billion From Taxpayers as Swaps Backfire

The subprime mortgage crisis isn’t the only calamity Wall Street created that’s upending the finances of U.S. states and cities.

For more than a decade, banks and insurance companies convinced governments and nonprofits that financial engineering would lower interest rates on bonds sold for public projects such as roads, bridges and schools. That failed promise has cost more than $4 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, as hundreds of borrowers from the Bay Area Toll Authority in Oakland, California, to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, quietly paid Wall Street to end agreements since 2008.

California’s water resources department this year spent $305 million unwinding interest-rate bets that backfired, handing over the money to banks led by New York-based Morgan Stanley. North Carolina paid $59.8 million in August, enough to cover the annual salaries of about 1,400 full-time state employees. Reading, Pennsylvania, which sought protection in the state’s fiscally distressed communities program, got caught on the wrong end of the deals, costing it $21 million, equal to more than a year’s worth of real-estate taxes.

“It was brilliant, and it all blew up on me,” said Brian Mayhew, chief financial officer of the Bay Area Toll Authority, the state agency that gave Ambac Financial Group Inc., the New York-based bond insurer that filed for bankruptcy this week, $105 million to end $1.1 billion of interest-rate agreements. The payments equal more than two months of revenue on seven bridges the authority oversees around San Francisco.

Budget Deficits

The termination payments to Wall Street firms come at the worst possible time. The longest recession since the Great Depression left states facing budget gaps of $72 billion next fiscal year, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. U.S. cities saw their general fund revenue fall the most since at least 1986 in the budget year that ended June 30, according to the National League of Cities.

Wall Street banks and insurers peddled financial derivatives known as interest-rate swaps to governments and nonprofits that bet they could lower the cost of borrowing. There were as much as $500 billion of the deals done in the $2.8 trillion municipal bond market before the credit crisis, according to a report by Randall Dodd, a senior researcher on the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, published by the International Monetary Fund in June.

$4 Billion

Borrowers from New York to California are now paying to get out of agreements. Altogether, they have made more than $4 billion of termination payments to firms including New York- based Citigroup Inc., New York-based JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America Corp. since the beginning of 2008, according to a review of hundreds of bond documents and credit-rating reports by Bloomberg News.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-1 ... kfire.html

Food price fears as US warns on crop yields

The spectre of inflation loomed over agricultural markets after the US slashed key crop forecasts and warned of shortfalls in grains.

The agriculture department on Tuesday cut estimates of US corn yields for a third successive month, forecast record soyabean exports to China and warned of the slimmest cotton stocks since 1925.

“The combined production shortfalls and dramatic potential stock drawdowns mean a much tighter supply picture than just a few months ago,” the agency said in a separate grains report.

Benchmark Chicago corn futures soared above $6 a bushel for the first time since August 2008, before ending lower. Soyabeans rose 4.3 per cent and New York cotton futures posted a record above $1.51 a pound. The price rises have revived fears of a repeat of the global food crisis of 2007-08.

In Europe, milling wheat surpassed a peak reached after ­Russia banned grain exports in August in response to a devastating drought.

Abdolreza Abbassian, senior grains economist at the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation in Rome, said the report was “alarming”.

“It reiterates the tightening of the overall situation as we go into 2011, which means eventually even those basic food commodities that haven’t risen so much could be influenced,” he said. The FAO food price index is nearing the highs set in mid-2008.

The price gains will benefit farmers, who the USDA said would earn record amounts for corn this season. But consumers could face pain. Carlsberg, the brewer, on Tuesday warned of price increases as costs swelled for malt and barley. As northern hemisphere farmers contemplate next year’s crop plans, surging prices could generate a so-called battle for acreage among different crops.

Dan Basse, president of AgResource, a Chicago crop forecaster, said: “The world cannot afford to lose any more crop production going forward.”

Ricardo Leiman, chief executive of Noble, the trading house that is one of the top oilseed processors in China, cited “enormous demand” there because of “stronger economy, stronger habits, very strong feed milling margins and very strong prices domestically”.

The USDA said corn yields in the US, the world’s largest grower and exporter, would be 154.3 bushels per acre, down 1.5 bushels from an October forecast that was also a sharp downward revision. At 827m bushels, stocks left over from this year’s harvest would be the lowest in 15 years. Record US ethanol production has added to demand.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/249211fc-ec1d ... z14tmr04cR

2 lawsuits challenge US Defense of Marriage Act
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/2-la ... riage-act/

Exclusive: Multiple independent lab tests confirm oil in Gulf shrimp
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/acti ... lf-shrimp/

One Dead After Explosion at Tonawanda DuPont Plant

TONAWANDA, NY (WKBW) - One person is confirmed dead and another seriously injured after 10,000 gallon tanker exploded at the DuPont plant on River Road in Tonawanda.

The tanker, which is normally filled with the chemical known as poly vinyl fluoride, exploded around 11:10 a.m., but was empty.

http://www.wkbw.com/news/local/Explosio ... 65313.html

Barack Obama: We Must Embrace Globalism And The Emerging One World Economy
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/arch ... ld-economy

HSBC North American Unit Still Under Investigation for Money Laundering
http://publicintelligence.net/hsbc-nort ... aundering/

Secret Revealed: Spying Costs $80 Billion a Year
http://www.wibw.com/home/headlines/Secr ... 35944.html

Homeland Security’s probes of people requesting info were political
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/07/dhs- ... political/

'US world's biggest arms seller'
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/150343.html

Army-backed party sweeps 'rigged' polls
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/n ... nid=161995

The Results Are In – Monsanto Wins Elections by a Landslide!
http://farmwars.info/?p=4538&utm_source ... rm+Wars%29

15-year-old raped in court: Rapist gets probation, teen gets 12 months

The verdict was “a travesty gross enough to make a blind statue cry,” argues an editorial at theNew York Daily News.

http://www.federaljack.com/?p=17996

BP OIL SPILL COVER-UP
http://www.federaljack.com/?p=17998

Obama hails Indonesia as example for world
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11723650

Obama in Jakarta. Secret Files: Indonesia's US Backed Special Forces Engaged in "Murder and Abduction"
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... leId=21852

Barack Obama Declares That Globalization Is Good And High U.S. Unemployment Is The “New Normal”
http://themostimportantnews.com/archive ... new-normal

NFIB Report Shows Lack of Sales Still #1 Problem of Small Businesses, Inflation Barely Registers
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

1.5+ Million Non-Business Bankruptcy Filings in Fiscal 2010, 14% Increase
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

Lupe Fiasco Calls MTV “Illuminati’s Favorite Network”
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=5533

After spending some time looking at the video I’m now in the camp that it was not a missile or rocket, it was in fact an aircraft in level flight leaving behind a thick contrail. The reason it looks like it is going straight up is due to the curvature of the Earth, an effect I point out to friends and family all the time around the Seattle area. This illusion occurs only when the aircraft is at high altitude and coming almost directly at the viewer. The aircraft is actually quite far away and at a very high altitude. To understand the illusion, you need to imagine yourself standing on a small ball and then picture an aircraft flying at a constant altitude above that ball. Another tip-off for me is the way in which the contrail is being carried sideways by the upper level winds, especially at the beginning near the horizon… the contrail does not come from the ground and this “smearing” of the contrail by the winds shows that it is at altitude and not close to the ground.

The reaction to this, though, is interesting and it did even fool me at first due to the way it was presented by a news channel as being a missile launch even with “expert” testimony. It’s a great lesson in illusions and also in being a witness. I have personal experience as I am a trained expert in witness interviewing for aircraft accident investigations. Witnesses are notoriously inaccurate in their assessments, and that’s just one of the reasons that people should not jump to conclusions too quickly. Aircraft accident investigators are trained to not jump to conclusions as they can bias your mind and blind you to the facts – something that is very easy to do, all humans including myself are susceptible as we desire to place a label on the unknown quickly. That said, if some new facts or information come along, then I’m willing to change my mind! And the one disturbing thing about this incident is the distinct lack of information from the government – they should have, and still have not provided, a flight number to go along with that aircraft. Air Traffic Control should be able to easily match that video’s time to a specific flight number, and I’m sure they have – why not tell us? That lack of transparency bothers me. But that seems to be the way of our modern government – they want to know and track everything you do, but everything they do is a secret. That is a warning sign about our government, transparency should be 180 degrees the other way around.

Economy improving? Tell that to the 42 million on food stamps. Rates rising? Gee, I thought QE2 was supposed to lower rates?

Remember that trade figures are measured in DOLLARS, and not in real goods and services. This distorts the figures, especially when large moves in the value of the dollar are occurring. A falling dollar will give the illusion of increased trade. If the dollar falls 2%, but trade only increases 1%, then REAL TRADE has actually fallen 1%! And there you have it. Oh, and trade deficits are never a good thing, only fools believe that having a “reserve currency” allows one the luxury of buying things from others without paying in REAL money. All debts get repaid with interest in one way or the other. We are going to experience the other.

And to back up the monetary factor, import prices are on the rise – I can tell you though that the way our government measures price is flawed in many ways:

Highlights
Import prices rose a sharp 0.9 percent with export prices extending a run of agricultural-based increases. Pressure on October import prices is centered in petroleum which swung 3.3 percent higher following a 1.5 percent decrease the month before. Pass through is limited with import prices for capital goods unchanged and down a half percent for consumer goods. The overall year-on-year rate is stable at plus 3.6 percent.

Rates on the export side are definitely on the climb. Export prices rose 0.8 following similar increases in the two prior months. Prices for agricultural exports have risen an average of 3.0 percent in each of the last three months! Record prices for many soft commodities, which many attribute to QE2, are a key feature right now of the financial markets. On-year export prices are up 5.8 percent with agricultural exports up 15.7 percent.

Oh yeah, let’s throw a few trillion more onto skyrocketing food and oil prices, that’ll “save” the economy! Just remember, the bankers are acting in THEIR own interest, not in yours, you have NO ONE looking after YOUR interests besides you.

Weekly Jobless Claims fell from the prior week’s 457,000 (revised to 459k) to 435,000. Again, this number being above 350k is horrid, yet we have been so conditioned to high numbers that this sounds better just because it’s below 450k. Truth is that it’s still inside of the same old sideways range. Yet again, people believe what they want to believe, closing their eyes to the uncounted millions:

Highlights
Jobless claims are clearly on the decline in what is good news for everyone. In a November 6 week free of special factors, initial claims fell 24,000 to a much lower-than-expected level of 435,000 (prior week revised slightly higher to 459,000). The four-week average really shows improvement, down 10,000 to 446,500 for a month-to-month improvement of about 15,000.

Continuing claims also continue to come down, 86,000 lower in the October 30 week to 4.301 million. The four-week average of 4.388 million is down more than 100,000 from a month ago. The unemployment rate for insured workers edged another tenth lower to 3.4 percent.

Today's report is a strong kick-off for November jobs expectations and extend momentum from October's strong payroll gains. A strengthening U.S. jobs market is now combining with QE2 to set up a new economic equation.

Not mentioned is the fact that in the unadjusted data claims actually ROSE by 29,000. There are 3.8 million (!) people currently drawing Emergency Unemployment Compensation. Those benefits expire this month unless Congress extends the program. Failing to extend this program will remove approximately $4.6 Billion per month from the basic economy (3.8 million X $308 per week) and will leave those millions basically destitute, thus driving up costs in other areas. Will the new political landscape change things in this regard? I doubt it… look for it to be renewed – not due to the humanitarian cloak, but rather due to self-preservation on the part of both the elites and the politicians.

More evidence of broken markets came yesterday when ZeroHedge released a study showing that there were 549 individual stock flash crashes so far this year! My take is that HFT madness is allowing the criminals to artificially and INTENTIONALLY produce these flashes that allows their computers to scalp money from these price swings. The computers need volatility to arbitrage.

And wouldn’t you know it – both JPMorgan and Bank of America had PERFECT trading quarters last quarter! No days did they have losses, this follows Goldman’s report of sadly losing money on two trading days! Talk about RIGGED markets and FRAUD. This fact alone is such a HUGE CLUE that the end is near, that people in the future will look back on us idiots today and wonder what in the hell we were thinking!? Future generations will be amazed that we allowed such outright theft to occur and that the people did nothing for so long to put an end to it. EMBARRASSING really, I hope my grandkids don’t laugh at me – at least they’ll know that I was pointing out such folly to others.

There were several bearish candles produced in the financials and in commodities – the most bearish of which occurred in silver when the margin requirements were raised to trade silver.

This says to me that the powers that be don’t possess enough real silver to control the markets and that there is a run occurring within the precious metals markets. Controlling margin will be their first step in VISIBLE manipulation, it will fail and then we will see more desperate acts to keep the markets for precious metals down. Of course these markets are simply reacting to the “Fed’s” insanity – they are the root of the problems. What’s most important is WHO controls the production of YOUR money!

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... -1110.html

London Silver Update: "Only Entities Short Are Fed-Backed Banks. Nobody In Their Right Mind Would Be Short Here"

The last time Eric King's London source spoke up, and determined the $25.50 threshold as that past which a massive squeeze was coming, he/she was spot on. This time we learn that Asian demand for physical silver continues to be relenteless, the squeeze on the shorts will not end, and that nobody but the Fed-backed banks continues to short the metal (and if exchanges are enforcing margin changes how about changing those position limits, eh CFTC?). In other words, rumors of silver's death appear to be largely exaggerated.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/london ... ind-would-

Commodity Margin Hikes Continue: Next Up - Soybeans
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/commod ... t-soybeans

The 3rd Quarter in Review, and More Importantly How the Shadow Inventory System in the US is Disguising the Equivalent of a Dozen Ambac Bankruptcies!
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/month- ... lent-dozen

The "Current Housing Recession is Rivaling the Great Depression’s Real Estate Downturn [and] Will Easily Eclipse It In the Coming Months"
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/curren ... l-easily-e

POMO Schedule Announced: $105 Billion In 18 Monetizations Through December 9

The Fed's marching orders to the Primary Dealers are now public: $105 billion in 18 nearly daily operations over the next month. Let the Fed frontrunning begin. Also, still wondering why the 30 Year turned around today: the Fed will buy back today's 30 Year issue (and others) next Friday, and of course someone just got wind of this ahead of the POMO announcement. Lastly, as the Fed no longer wants to be seen as gaming the "Tendered to Submitted" ratio, Brian Sack is actually releasing how much of any given bucket he will buy back, so to telegraph absolutely everything about his Dow 36,000 intentions. And just in case one POMO a day is not sufficient, on November 29, the Fed will hold two. The second one is footnoted as follows: "This operation is tentatively scheduled to begin around 1:15 PM and close at 2:00 PM." Whatever you do, don't be short on November 29. Which of course means, be short, as nobody will be short.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/pomo-s ... december-9

...well we probably won't see a decline in the stock market over the next month....

Imagine if you were a source of new money.....you created money against the IOU people offered to sign in order to get the money. You now own the asset for the cost of printing up your money against the IOU. In order for the people to obtain that asset from you they have to pay you back the money you created (which is a wash) AND interest which is your profit. If they don't pay you back then you get the asset. The money to cover the interest cost is never created so somewhere someone is not going to have the money to pay back the creator of the money thus losing rights to the asset. Eventually all assets will at one point or another be borrowed against thus giving you complete ownership of every asset in the system. Not even getting into the little bit of side printing for yourself....

[Jason]

Little note on California....spending jumped to $11 billion in Oct (catch up payments) while Revenue declined to $6.15 billion (about 700 million less than September)....to add $5 billion to the deficit in one month. And that was pulling in $1.1 billion more in personal tax (40-50% of tax revenue) over October of last year (keep pulling forward). All the other categories (Retail, Corporate, Other) were also down year over year. The downward spiral continues.....

Sources -
http://www.sco.ca.gov/Press-Releases/20 ... ummary.pdf
http://www.sco.ca.gov/Files-ARD/CASH/fy1011_oct.pdf

also unemployment debt is at $8.5 billion (only about $300 million from the peak achieved during last winter) and we are just starting into the unemployment season (November - March).

Source -
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/repo ... ssched.htm

California Discloses A $25.4 Billion Budget Hole, Asks If It Should Pass The "Huge Challenge" To "Future Californians"
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/califo ... -future-ca

Gonzalo Lira And The Boiling Frog: Effects Of QE2 On The Bottom 80% Of The U.S. Population

The recently announced Quantitative Easing 2 policy of the Federal Reserve has had and will have a profound effect on the dollar—and a profound effect on the American people: Especially the bottom 80%. In a word, QE2 will make four fifths of the American people poorer. Bernanke’s stated purpose in QE2 is to spark consumer spending, and thereby reignite the economy. But QE2 will have the paradoxical effect of making basic necessities—food, housing, clothing, transportation—more expensive for everyone. This will mean that basic necessities will take a bigger bite out of household incomes, reducing consumption, rather than stimulating it. So like a frog dropped in a pot of cold water that's had the heat turned up, the American people—especially the bottom 60% to 80% of the population—will slowly be boiled to death in the stew of QE2. —Gonzalo Lira

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/gonzal ... population

[Jason]

The man who made Goldman Sachs a household name (using some very helpful and lurid imagery), has found a new target: Bank of America, JP Morgan, Wells Fargo and Citi.... And the "Rocket Docket." Quote Taibbi: "The Rocket Docket exists to launder the crime and bury the evidence by speeding thousands of fraudulent and predatory loans to the ends of their life cycles, so that the houses attached to them can be sold again with clean paperwork. The judges, in fact, openly admit that their primary mission is not justice but speed." And here comes the trademark Taibbi visual: "the foreclosure crisis is Too Big for Fraud. Think of the Bernie Madoff scam, only replicated tens of thousands of times over, infecting every corner of the financial universe. The underlying crime is so pervasive, we simply can't admit to it — and so we are working feverishly to rubber-stamp the problem away, in sordid little backrooms in cities like Jacksonville, behind doors that shouldn't be, but often are, closed." Pure genius.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/more-o ... mainstream

Prepare for another staple pricing readjustment courtesy of central clearing "risk management": minutes ago the ICE hiked its Clearing Member outright margin for Sugar (SB and SBC) from $2,150 to $3,550, a substantial 65% increase in margin requirements. Little by little more exchanges refuse to take on liquidity risk. In essence what the CME, the ICE, LCH and everyone else is doing by hiking margins (in addition to forcing a brief period of selling) is to offset liquidity risk, although not risk of more rounds of liquidity, but of the Fed's withdrawal of liquidity. If tomorrow Bernanke were to announce QE is over, all those who have so far enjoyed massive unbooked profits in their options accounts on margin, will see their NAV collapse and margin calls will provide the double whammy to a complete asset liquidation wipeout. Yet unlike in the case of silver, where the margin requirement was modest, here the jump is very material. That said, now that silver margins have been tightened, gold should follow shortly - surely, that is the prudent thing to do. On the other hand, ongoing delays in gold margin increase will make the whole recent margin readjustment somewhat odd - after all, what better way to keep another buying surge in check then not announcing how much gold margins will go up by. Once the news is out there, buyers will be able to process and adjust accordingly. As long as this information is merely anticipated, it will continue to be a far bigger brake to a parabolic move higher in gold than if it had been already disclosed and processed.

And gold is not the only thing. Here are other agirulctulra products that will soon see their margins demands surge as well.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/ice-bo ... margins-65

[Jason]

Looking at the unemployment stats found here (current debt/borrowing)-
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/repo ... ssched.htm

and here (by state)-
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/repo ... mp_utf.htm

with last months unemployment bank acct balances here -
http://www.ncsl.org/?tabid=17835

Across the board have $2.1 billion drop last month (declining balances and increasing debt). Starting next month I'll start to be able to do good year over year comparisons (my borrowing data is sporadic going back past October of 2009 - when I started diving into it and collecting data).....with the 2nd link above you can get bank account data on monthly basis going back nearly a decade.....but on the borrowing side, 1st link, its not stored so if you don't collect it on a daily basis.....you don't get the data (some data for sporadic dates can be found on the web but nothing consistent).

So basically a year ago the bank accounts dropped by $1.2 billion in October versus a $1.3 billion drop this October.....but I don't know how much borrowed money was injected into the bank accounts in October of 2009 versus October of 2010 where I know that net debt increased by $800 million (October debt borrowed minus difference in bank account for October).

Anyways next month will be more interesting comparison wise. Last year was pretty horrific unemployment wise.....

Hawaii should start borrowing from the Fed this month....

fyi - also Matt does a really good job covering the housing fraud in the article linked to in the previous post (link to Zero Hedge where you can link to original article....aww shucks here it is (skip Zero Hedge)....another FYI - Matt has tremendous talent but his vernacular is poor (word of warning fwiw).....

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/ne ... how_page=0

[Jason]

....now imagine that magnified 10 fold by a Zion society!

side note - interesting that its named the ARK hotel....and the publicity.....and the movie 2012 with Ark's built by the Chinese....probably just a coincidence!

[Jason]

Citizens United: Our Mammoth Task
http://www.followthemoney.org/blog/?em=105

'Toxic Toy Crisis' Requires Fresh Solutions, Experts Say
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 123941.htm

U.S. Challenges Iran, Equipping Gulf States with More Ballistic Missiles
http://defense-update.com/wp/20101111_a ... +Update%29

Photos of the MTs-255 Tactical Revolver Shotgun
http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2010 ... rm+Blog%29

Taurus Tactical Operator
http://gunnuts.net/2010/11/12/taurus-tactical-operator/

Eggs Freshly Poisoned, Bombs Freshly Packed
http://sitrep.globalsecurity.org/articl ... mbs-fr.htm

Former Marine up for Medal of Honor
http://www.military.com/news/article/fo ... honor.html

The team at Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital did a national survey of 1,900 primary care doctors in 2009 about their contacts with drug companies.

They found 84 percent reported some type of relationship with drug companies, compared with 94 percent in 2004.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6A82AL20101109

....ahh improvement....or maybe just new tactics?

QE II Bet Starts to Unravel
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

The mainstream is finally discussing the “tough Choices” that we are going to have to make. Well, I’m going to keep this extra short and extra easy to understand…

The central bankers and their minions would have us all believe that the tough choice we have to make is in the composition of how little we have to spend, and how much we need to tax. That is a FALSE choice, DO NOT FALL FOR IT!

Any decision made along those lines SUPPORTS THEIR DEBT BACKED MONEY SCHEME.

REAL ANSWERS are only found when looking outside of their scheme…

The REAL ANSWER to solving IMPOSSIBLE MATH EQUATIONS is to change WHO controls the production of our money!

Thus the TOUGH CHOICE THE PEOPLE REALLY HAVE TO MAKE is deciding when and how to bring about changing WHO’s in charge of the production of our money!

When you look here, you will find completely palatable choices, and you will find math that can work – it’s well past time to look, and to stop being distracted with FALSE CHOICES.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... oices.html

Obama Administration: U.S. Troops To Stay In Afghanistan Until At Least 2014
http://themostimportantnews.com/archive ... least-2014

German people in unprecedented rebellion against government: 1000 injured in protests in nuclear protests: police at breaking point
http://birdflu666.wordpress.com/2010/11 ... ing-point/

Veteran Suicide Rate Higher Than Afghan War Casualties
http://publicintelligence.net/veteran-s ... asualties/

Palin adviser is lobbyist for George Soros: report
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/pali ... rge-soros/

41 Facts About The History Of Central Banks In The United States That Our Children Are No Longer Taught In School
http://endoftheamericandream.com/
http://www.blacklistednews.com/index.php?news_id=11456

Genetically altered mosquitoes thwart dengue spreaders
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn1 ... aders.html

Pentagon Readies New Ship-Killers for Pacific Showdown
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/11 ... er+Room%29

Protesters bomb police station with cart full of burning cannabis: report
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/prot ... -cannabis/

EU President Declares End of Nation States
http://deadlinelive.info/2010/11/12/eu- ... on-states/

Red alert over bizarre North Korean plan to attack G20 summit with balloons filled chemical weapons
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... loons.html

Throwing Good Money at Bad Land
http://www.ewg.org/Throwing-Good-Money- ... +Topics%29

National Average Mortgage Rates: Historical Data
http://mortgage-x.com/general/historical_rates.asp

[Jason]

So, what you are seeing is pressure, both revenue pressure and margin compression. This is a result of a debt saturated economy at the base, and the pushing of hot money on top. The hot money isn’t used to pay down debt, it’s used to speculate around the globe, running up the price of commodities. Higher commodity price equals higher input costs for businesses who were inappropriately building inventory due to bad signals given off by the “Fed” and their bad data. Now we’re seeing the effects in a few stocks – it’s showing up in Dean Foods, in Campbell Soups, in Cisco, and now Disney. This will continue to bleed from one company to the next.

In the meantime, bonds yields are moving higher with prices moving lower – especially on the long end of the curve. Borrowing costs should be higher, but debt saturated government, business, and populace cannot handle higher rates – especially the government who has borrowed short – they MUST keep the short end low.

Of course the entire process of the government of the people borrowing money from private banks, which they make from thin air, and paying them interest on it is so ridiculous a concept as to make the mind boggle in the fact that this practice is accepted by the people who must labor to pay for that nonsense. In effect the citizens of this country labor just for the “privilege” to use the money system – a system that does not belong to the banks, it belongs to the people!

The people were sold out by Congress – plain and simple.

And that’s why any solution presented to help “solve” our debt saturation problem is either tax more or spend less. WHAT NONSENSE!

....

Meanwhile over in Europe CDS for the PIIGS has blown out to new all-time highs. Yet the Euro is higher compared to the dollar – what’s that tell you? Problems in Europe are the same as they are here, they were created by the same people in the exact same manner.

And since those debt pushing problem creators are running up commodities to uncomforting levels, they must then turn around and attempt to put out their own fires. First it was changing margin requirements on silver, yesterday it was raising margin requirements on Sugar, cocoa, coffee, and cotton. These changing requirements are STEP TWO OF PRICE CONTROLS. Step one being to prop the price higher to create inflation – but oops, not that much. And yet that’s not enough inflation, so we’re going to throw $110 billion a month on top. Look for new margin requirements soon on Gold, and don’t be surprised to see outright price controls on things like gasoline in the future as the “Fed” attempts to manage every facet of the economy. Sure, like they can set prices for everything, like any of this has anything at all to do with the real problem in the first place – absolutely nuts.

And the stinky turds still swirling in the toilet bowl of foreclosuregate have a special smell indeed. What a mess, and the smell I’m getting is that the administration is going to attempt to sweep it all under the carpet. If they do, forget the rule of law – it will be a free-for-all as if it isn’t already.

Bring on the Revolution – I’m ready.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... -1112.html

Bank Failures #144 & 145: Georgia
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

A few excerpts from home builder D.R. Horton's conference call:

CEO Don Tomnitz:

As we look to fiscal 2011, we ... expect another very challenging year for the homebuilding industry, as the fundamental drivers of demand, the overall economy, job growth, and consumer confidence are still very weak. In addition, we do not expect any stimulus in fiscal 2011 similar to the federal tax credits that were in effect last year.

All of these factors make it likely that our sales and closing volumes will be below our volumes in fiscal 2010.

Rising foreclosures, significant existing home inventory, high unemployment, tight mortgage lending standards, and the weak consumer confidence ... the real key is that the traffic count in our sub-divisions is down, and I don’t think there is a lot of pricing adjustment that we can do, it’s just a function of the lack of traffic. So until there is some consumer confidence, until we start to grow jobs, I think we’re going to continue to be faced with rather flat demand just simply because buyers don’t feel confident about the future and they’re not going out there looking for a house in the numbers that they were certainly when the tax credits were there.

Until the excess housing inventory is absorbed, the home builders will be under pressure. There is still a long way to go ...

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Report: Ireland pressed to accept aid "within days"
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... t-aid.html