Saturday, October 9, 2010

Gary North: Ellen Brown Is Cheerleader for Hitler's Economics

See for yourselves, Tea Partiers. (Better stick to von Mises, Bastiat, Hayek, and Rothbard.)

Ellen Brown: Hitler's Cheerleader (Gary North, Gary North's Specific Answers)

"Ellen Brown is a lawyer by profession, a Greenbacker by confession, and a fan of Adolph Hitler's economics by consistency.

"She is quite open about her support for National Socialism's economics, as I shall demonstrate. What is depressing is this: she is getting a respectful hearing in Tea Party circles. Her book, The Web of Debt (2006), is widely cited on the World Wide Web. As of early October, 2010, a Google search for "Ellen Brown" and "Web of Debt" generated close to 600,000 hits. This is huge.

"Here is a tactical problem. For two generations, conservatives have been shouted down by the Left with this accusation: "Fascist!" Ellen Brown is now making this accusation plausible. Yet the great irony is this: Ellen Brown is a Leftist. There is nothing even remotely free market or conservative about The Web of Debt. It is a call for a Federally funded welfare state. She praises the New Deal. She praises John Maynard Keynes. She has only one objection to their recommended programs: governments borrowed money to fund them. She wants a welfare state that is funded entirely by paper money printed by Congress. She is about as conservative as Nancy Pelosi.

"How could her ideas be getting a hearing in Tea Party circles? It's a long story. Let me summarize it." [The article continues at the link above.]

I read several of Ellen Brown's articles at her website in the past. In every single one of them something didn't add up, and I kept scratching my head trying to figure out what was wrong with her argument. Now Gary North is taking it apart for me. He even has a section on his website dedicated to this task (it's in the free section):



... False-flag infiltrators are remnants of a left-wing American political movement of the late 19th century: the Greenbackers, named after the green currency issued by the North during the Civil War.

Gary North seems to be having fun. And apparently Max Keiser challenged him to appear on his show.

Friday, October 8, 2010

OT: Music for the Weekend - Brandenburg Concerto No. 3

by Johann Sebastian Bach, played by Freiburg Baroque Orchestra.

(I'm playing No. 4 in the chamber orchestra, but No.3 is my favorite..)

Bank of America Halts Foreclosures in All 50 States

from Zero Hedge:

"As we expected when we reported that the Delaware AG got into the foreclosure fray (Delaware not being a judicial state), it was only a matter of time before foreclosures would be halted in all 50 states. Sure enough, Diana Olick has just reported that BofA has just expanded its foreclosure halt from the 23 judicial states, to all 50 states. And so, the pendulum swings from populist anger to adulation. The only question is when will Tarp 2 be enacted now that banks are facing tens of billions in losses."

Here's a bit more info from WSJ:

"The decision by Bank of America to extend its postponement to all 50 states takes effect Saturday. The bank doesn't intend to lift the moratorium until its assessment of all documentation is complete, a spokesman said."

Thursday, October 7, 2010

HR 3808 - He's Not Signing It

From the White House Blog:


Now what?

TARP2 for the banks?

As Expected, Fed's Hoenig Says He Opposes QE2

The Kansas City Fed president Thomas Hoenig spoke today, reiterating his steadfast hawkish position that he opposed further easing by the Fed and favored the fed funds rate hike to 1%.

I don't think much of him. He is just as clueless as the rest of the Fed.

As a FOMC member who has consistently voted against the majority within the Fed, Hoenig said:

1. The recovery is proceeding modestly;

2. The Fed should raise benchmark rates to 1 percent and hold them there to see how the recovery proceeds;

3. The Fed must also keep an eye on its mandate to maintain long term price stability. As the economy continues to improve/strengthen, there will be this enormous liquidity and there will be tendencies for inflationary impulses to rise.

I have issues with all three.

1. What "recovery"? Hoenig must be seeing a different set of data than his colleagues, court economists and Wall Street analysts. I do not believe he is seeing the real world; I don't expect him to be, but what data is he seeing?

2. Just as the majority of the Fed pushing for QE2 and ZIRP as far as eyes can see have no clue, neither does Hoenig. He is saying "Let's raise the rate and see what happens. If the economy tanks, oopsy."

3. The Fed's mandate has morphed into something else, in case Hoenig doesn't know. These days, the mandate is not price stability but to boost up inflation to the "desirable" level.

The Dallas Fed's Fisher also spoke today, who sounded like he was sitting on the fence for now regarding QE2.

The Fed's "good banker, bad banker" routine is getting tired. I have to admit I don't know any more which ones are good and which ones are bad. They seem all bad for the real economy, and we can't do anything about it.

Why? The Fed is "independent", remember?

HR 3808 - Barry at the White House Wants to Hear from You

From Tyler Durden at Zero Hedge:

"Bill H.R. 3808, the Interstate Recognition of Notarizations Act of 2010, which was discussed yesterday, and which according to both Reuters and the NYT may have a material impact on mitigating the impact of the High Freq Signing scandal, at least on the servicers, is now open for public comments at the white house.

"Those wishing to tell the president how they feel, may do so at the following link:

"We are confident the White House will promptly disclose all the "well-mannered" comments advising the administration on all sorts of anatomically impossible acts it should engage in should Obama sign off on this."

For more on HR 3808, here's the post from yesterday.

If you don't care about privacy, 4th Amendment, and danger of being tracked by the White House that wants to read ALL of your communications, feel free to go to the link and comment.

As Expected, They Are Slamming Gold

They are doing "whack-a-mole" on gold. After reaching $1,365.70 before the equity market opened in the US, gold is being slammed back down to $1,338. Oh I'm so scared.

Now it's back to the level of Tuesday, two days ago.

Look at the sell volume on GLD, gold ETF, today. It almost looks like a hedge fund or two blew up over margin calls.

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

It's Almost Midnight on the West Coast. Do You Know Where Your Gold Is At?


I'm sure by the time the US market opens tomorrow morning, the bullion banks will slam it back down. At least they can try...

Citigroup and Morgan Stanley had better raise their targets for gold (Citi $1,450, MS $1,512) soon. Goldman Sachs' target was $1,300, while apparently telling their 'select' clients GS was skeptical of further gold upward movement.

(Oh forget it. While I was writing the post, it went up further. Now it is $1,358.70.)

'Mortgage Fraud': HR 3808 as Litmus Test for Obama

on whom he really serves. I'm not holding my breath, though.

HR 3808 has already passed House and Senate without any public discussion, and it is ready for Obama to sign into law.

What is it, you ask? The bill requires all federal and state courts to recognize notarizations made in other states. The practical application?

"... the legislation, if enacted, could protect bank and mortgage processors from liability for false or improperly prepared documents. In other words, with one simple signature Obama has the capacity to prevent tens of billions in damages to banks from legal fees, MBS deficiency claims, unwound sales, and to formally make what started this whole mess: Court Fraud perpetrated by banks, a legal act, and to finally trample over the constitution."

Is HR3808 The Equivalent Of TARP 2 And Obama's "Get Out Of Jail" Gift Card For The High Frequency Signing Scandal? (Tyler Durden, 10/06/2010 Zero Hedge)

Now that the High Frequency Signing (HFS, not to be confused with HFT) scandal is mainstream, and virtually every single foreclosure in the US in the past several years is under question, with the impact on mortgage servicers (who just happen to be the TBTF banks) could be just as dire as the fallout from the credit crunch, it appears that the get out of jail card for the banking syndicate has once again materialized, this time in the form of bill HR3808: Interstate Recognition of Notarizations Act of 2009, sponsored by Republican representative Robert Aderholt. The bill, it turns out, has passed both congress and senate, and is now quietly awaiting for Obama's signature to be enacted into law. In summary, the bill requires all federal and state courts to recognize notarizations made in other states. That's the theoretical definition: the practical one - the legislation, if enacted, could protect bank and mortgage processors from liability for false or improperly prepared documents. In other words, with one simple signature Obama has the capacity to prevent tens of billions in damages to banks from legal fees, MBS deficiency claims, unwound sales, and to formally make what started this whole mess: Court Fraud perpetrated by banks, a legal act, and to finally trample over the constitution. Will Obama do it? Potentially - the banking lobby certainly has enough power over him and his superiors, the members of the FOMC. On the other hand, the populist revolt that will surely follow the enactment of such a law will certainly end any dreams of a second term, and potentially of a completed first one. The drama is now on: will Obama openly side on behalf of the bankers (without a "blame the republicans" fall back this time) or of the foreclosure "victims" (granted, the bulk of whom are deadbeat homeowners who should never have owned a home to begin with). We doubt a decision will be reached before the midterms, although quite a bit now hangs in the balance." [The article continues.]

The article cites Reuter's article explaining the conundrum, and a very curious special procedure in the Senate that allowed the bill to be rushed through, even to the surprise of the sponsor of the bill. It passed the Senate one day before the recess, on September 27 without any discussion.

Zero Hedge ends the article with this remark:

"Unfortunately even if the prompt Senatorial passage of the bill was the bankers' plan all along, they may have shot themselves in the foot by leaving it up to the president to determine if America is now a banker corporatocracy (what some may call a fascist regime), or still a place that believes in laws and regulations, as broken as they may be, in broad daylight. Our sense, is that this bill will not pass, although we have on many occasions in the past underestimated the degree of corruption in this country. On the other hand, should tens of millions of Americans have a crystallized image of one person who in their view will be "responsible" for their inability to pay their mortgage bill on time, then we just may be one step closer to the full societal collapse that many predict will accompany the end of Keynesianism.

"The ball is now in the president's court."

Now, will he, or won't he, sign this into law?

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Stuxnet and Deep Water Horizon Rig

From's Security Lab blog:

Q: Did Stuxnet sink Deepwater Horizon and cause the Mexican oil spill?
A: No, we do not think so. Although it does seem Deepwater Horizon indeed did have some Siemens PLC systems on it. also thinks this malware was created by a government.

Now, do you remember one curious response of Obama after the oil rig sank? He dispatched SWAT teams to secure other oil rigs and platforms as if he thought it was a terrorist attack on Deepwater Horizon. Or was it a terrorist attack, using Stuxnet that some unknown government created?

It's getting curiouser and curiouser.

Schmidt: It's Google Policy "to Get Right Up to the Creepy Line"

Google's CEO Eric Schmidt strikes again.

The creepy line? As many in the comment section wonder aloud, just which side of the "creepy line" is Google approaching?

Eric Schmidt: Google gets close to 'the creepy line'
(Shane Richmond, 10/05/2010 Telegraph UK)






Your "permission" may amount to nothing more than having cookies on your PC.

One of the Google founders, Sergey Brin, said in September that Google wants to be "the third half of your brain".

"Creepiness" is now the culture of Google, actively promoted by the top management. How times have changed.

Monday, October 4, 2010

Bank of Japan Will Buy Anything and Everything, Almost

Bank of Japan has just said it will buy long-term government bonds, commercial paper, asset-backed commercial paper, corporate bonds, index ETFs, funds that invest in REITs. To do that, the bank will set up a special fund (35 trillion yen total - about 419 billion USD) on its balance sheet.

Nikkei spikes on those words..

They LOWERED the rate to zero, too. (0% to 0.1%, to be precise. It was 0.1%.)

As rubiofromitaly at Yahoo board says, "That is the sayonara wave for we are going down the toilet all together....kumbaya."

Climategate Update: Chicago Climate Exchange Flatlining

Ah, some poetic justice meted out by a free market...

Anthony Watts at Watts With That blog posts:

Chicago Climate Exchange still flatlining – employee cuts
(8/13/2010 Watts With That)

From the “unsustainable business” department, who wants carbon at 10 cents a ton? Apparently, nobody. Data below as of August 8 2010:


From Reuters, news of layoffs. At least their carbon footprint will be lower…

ICE cuts staff at Chicago Climate Exchange-sources

* ICE to cut around half of 50-person CCX workforce

* 1st round of layoffs began July 23, more to come in autumn

* Sources cite U.S. climate inaction as main reason for cuts

* ICE collecting feedback on what to do with climate bourse

[The entire post at the link above.]

Oh BTW, "global COOLING" is what Bilderbergers were apparently concerned about, not "global warming". Wonder why the food futures have been going up? Wonder why the super rich are reported to be buying gold by the ton?

And Algore is still peddling global warming, and so is this despicable organization called (warming: the link goes to their graphic promo video where they blow up children to reduce carbon footprint).

More on Stuxnet: 'Insider and Government Job'

according to

Stuxnet worm could have been inside job (10/01/2010

"Delegates at the Virus Bulletin 2010 conference in Vancouver have heard that the Stuxnet worm could have been an inside job.

"Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos, told that the worm may have been written by someone with detailed knowledge of Siemens' computer systems, possibly a current or former employee.

""The message I got was that it appears to have been written by someone with inside knowledge of how Siemens' systems work," he said.

"...The malware contains the date 9 May 1979, which coincides with the execution of an Israeli businessman in Iran. But Cluley explained that this date is also, for example, the birth date of actress Rosario Dawson, and could be a red herring.

"Cluley also said that the evidence for this being a targeted attack on Iran is patchy, since Symantec reported that more attacks had been reported in India and Indonesia than in Iran.

"Mikko Hyppönen, chief research officer at F-Secure, told that, based on the evidence he'd seen, the Stuxnet worm looks like a government attack, although conference presentations focused on the technical details of the attack rather than the motive.

"The obvious conclusion from Stuxnet is that there isn't any clear motive other than sabotage," he said.

"Crucially no-one has found a way that anyone could make money from this, which makes criminal involvement unlikely. If you look at the level of difficulty and complexity behind Stuxnet, it has to be a government effort."

[Emphasis is mine. The entire article at the link above.]

Spending so much effort (and time and money, probably) on a complex project for no financial gain. That surely fits the definition of a government job...

May 9, 1979 also happens to be the day when a Unabomber bomb injures Northwestern University graduate student John Harris, according to Wikipedia.

James Grant: Let's Plan for the Death of the Federal Reserve

Yes, let's!

Below is a clip posted at Zero Hedge (10/01 2010).

It's a James Grant interview on Bloomberg TV, discussing how to manage the dissolution of the ultimate TBTF (too big to fail) bad bank, the Federal Reserve. His suggestions include:

  • Appoint Ron Paul as the executor;
  • Outsource $2.2 trillion portfolio management to competent private hands;
  • Central economic planning to be undone by the executor.
His other points:
  • Banks having to draw up plans for their own demise - it has nothing to do with reality.
  • We have been on the road to socialization of credit for many decades, and we're kind of there now.
  • Taxpayers will bail out again these insolvent banks.
  • Regulators are more risk-averse, more backward-looking.
  • One of the America's great strength is, has been, the capacity to deal with failure; almost any society can deal with successes. Ability to confront error, admit it, and to reprice it, and then to try the next thing, try to form a business in the face of error, in the face of his own failings.
(True! Just look at Silicon Valley...)

Don't let them - the White House, the government, court historians and economists and MSM, anyone - make you cower in fear or resignation.

Sunday, October 3, 2010

What's With This "Terror" Threat in Europe?

The US State Department and the UK Foreign Office warn of "terrorist" attacks similar to the 2008 Mumbay attack in France and Germany, with the Foreign Office saying "an attack is highly likely".

News of this "terror" threat came out of nowhere about two weeks ago.

According to ABC News exclusive, targets have already been selected with the help of Al-Qaeda in Pakistan.

Doesn't it make you wonder... "Really?"

WHO really selected the targets, anyway?

Al-Qaeda in Pakistan? Oh how convenient... So that's why the US have been bombing Pakistan, a US ally, ever since Obama became the president of the US?

If the authorities know that much, why don't they arrest them, instead of issuing warning to the public that there may be terrorist attacks in France or Germany or both, and the attacks are highly likely?

Or do they want the attacks to happen?

"Wag the dog" big time for....?

November election in the US?

Proposed severe budget cut in the UK?

Scaring the uppity citizens in Europe and the US who have started to defy the governments?

Is this basically the same operation that FBI has been doing (FBI informants encouraging so-called "terrorists" to take action, like this one), only on an international scale?

Ooops... CIA may have done something like that already, in Mumbay...

J.P.Morgan Chase Reopens Underground Gold Vault

Is "gold mania" coming?

J.P. Morgan reopens vault amid gold demand: report
(10/03/2010 MarketWatch)

TOKYO (MarketWatch) -- J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM 38.81, +0.75, +1.97%) has reopened an underground gold vault in New York amid soaring demand and prices for gold bullion, according to a report in The Financial Times published Sunday. The vault had been closed since the 1990s. Deutsche Bank AG (DB 55.12, +0.19, +0.35%) and Barclays PLC's (BCS 19.10, +0.25, +1.33%) Barclays Capital are also considering opening new vaults in London, the report said. J.P. Morgan opened its first vault in Asia for precious-metals storage in Singapore late last month. Meanwhile, prices for gold continue to climb, with gold for December delivery up $1.50 at $1,319.30 an ounce on Globex in Tokyo's Monday morning trading. The contract closed at a record $1,317.80 in New York on Friday after tapping a high of $1,322.

Stuxnet Followup: Stick It to Russians

It has wrecked havoc in Iran, it has moved to China and is doing the same, as I posted a few days ago.

No one supposedly know where Stuxnet, a virus that targets industrial control systems built by Siemens, originated, though there are not many nations in the world that are capable of programming something like this.

DEBKAfile, a website in one of such nations, insinuates that it was Russians who planted the virus:

"debkafile's intelligence sources report from Iran that dozens of Russian nuclear engineers, technicians and contractors are hurriedly departing Iran for home since local intelligence authorities began rounding up their compatriots as suspects of planting the Stuxnet malworm into their nuclear program.

"Among them are the Russian personnel who built Iran's first nuclear reactor at Bushehr which Tehran admits has been damaged by the virus.

"One of the Russian nuclear staffers, questioned in Moscow Sunday, Oct. 3 by Western sources, confirmed that many of his Russian colleagues had decided to leave with their families after team members were detained for questioning at the beginning of last week. He refused to give his name because he and his colleagues intend to return to Iran if the trouble blows over and the detainees are quickly released after questioning.

"According to our sources, these detentions were the source of the announcement Saturday, Oct. 2, by Iranian Intelligence Minister Heidar Moslehi that several "nuclear spies" had been captured. "The enemy had sent electronic worms through the internet to undermine Iran's nuclear activities," he said. This was the first high-level Iranian admission that the Stuxnet virus had been planted by foreign elements to sabotage their entire nuclear program - and not just the Bushehr reactor. The comprehensive scale of the damage is attested to by the detention of Russian nuclear experts also at Natanz, Isfahan and Tehran.

"...The prime aim of their interrogation is to find out if Russian intelligence knowingly planted the destructive worm in Iran's nuclear facilities, possibly for under-the-counter pay, or were the unwitting carriers of equipment on order by Iran that had been previously infected.

"debkafile's Western sources report that the hundreds of Russian scientists, engineers and technicians employed in Iran were responsible for installing the Siemens control systems in Iran's nuclear complex and other facilities which proved most vulnerable to the cyber attack.

"They were the only foreigners with access to these heavily guarded plants. At Bushehr, for instance, the Russian personnel enjoyed full access to all its systems."

Uh huh. Sure. It may be easy to bribe Russians to do things like plant the virus. The obvious question is, WHO BRIBED Russians?

And of course, the usual question: Cui bono?