Occupy Banksters & Crony Capitalism & GREED

News Organizations Grapple With 2016 Presidential Race In Which Everyone Is Running
HP | Michael Calderone | 05/28/15

It was Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont on Tuesday, former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania on Wednesday, and ex-New York Gov. George Pataki on Thursday. After the announcement-free Friday, the political media circus that already has traveled this week to Burlington, Vermont; Cabot, Pennsylvania; and Exeter, New Hampshire, will arrive Saturday in Baltimore, where former Maryland Gov, Martin O'Malley becomes the second Democratic challenger to Hillary Clinton.

... The ballooning field has placed news organizations in uncharted territory and forced upon them difficult editorial decisions. How do you cover a Republican race that could swell to 16 candidates? How do you distinguish between the newsworthiness and the side-show? ... Read more

Euronext Breaks: All Derivative, Currency Future Trading Halted
ZeroHedge | author | 05/29/15

Usually the market breaks don't take place until after the selling begins. Today, someone in Europe got triggerhappy, and as a result moments ago the Euronext broke. Or perhaps this is just another drill for the "big one".

America Has No Enemy More Lethal Than The Neocon
ZeroHedge | author | 05/29/15

Those men who wrote our Constitution made it perfectly intelligible to anyone who cared to read it. They also left some flexibility in its articles to ensure that as time passed and circumstances changed the document would remain viable as the indispensable protector of the republic they created and of the liberty of citizens. In recent decades, however, Americans have been treated to an endless stream of politicians, academics, lawyers, and pundits who describe the opaqueness of the Founder's Constitution and the need for "experts" to decipher or infer what the document means. But their words are lies, there are no such things as universal values. There is only one value common to all men in all times and that is the universal lust for gaining and exercising arbitrary power, and that power is exactly what the Jacobin/Neocon crowd is after. ... Read more

Who Stole the American Dream? by Hedrick Smith

Pulitzer Prize winner Hedrick Smith's new book is an extraordinary achievement, an eye-opening account of how, over the past four decades, the American Dream has been dismantled and we became two Americas.

In his bestselling The Russians, Smith took millions of readers inside the Soviet Union. In The Power Game, he took us inside Washington's corridors of power. Now Smith takes us across America to show how seismic changes, sparked by a sequence of landmark political and economic decisions, have transformed America. As only a veteran reporter can, Smith fits the puzzle together, starting with Lewis Powell's provocative memo that triggered a political rebellion that dramatically altered the landscape of power from then until today.

This is a book full of surprises and revelations--the accidental beginnings of the 401(k) plan, with disastrous economic consequences for many; the major policy changes that began under Jimmy Carter; how the New Economy disrupted America's engine of shared prosperity, the "virtuous circle" of growth, and how America lost the title of "Land of Opportunity." Smith documents the transfer of $6 trillion in middle-class wealth from homeowners to banks even before the housing boom went bust, and how the U.S. policy tilt favoring the rich is stunting America's economic growth.

Why Baltimore Blew Up
RolingStone | Matt Taibbi | 05/26/15

It wasn't just the killing of Freddie Gray. Inside the complex legal infrastructure that encourages -- and covers up -- police violence

When Baltimore exploded in protests a few weeks ago following the unexplained paddy-wagon death of a young African-American man named Freddie Gray, America responded the way it usually does in a race crisis: It changed the subject.

Instead of using the incident to talk about a campaign of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of illegal searches and arrests across decades of discriminatory policing policies, the debate revolved around whether or not the teenagers who set fire to two West Baltimore CVS stores after Gray's death were "thugs," or merely wrongheaded criminals. ... Read more
*DN | Matt Taibbi: on Baltimore, Freddie Gray and How Legal System Covers Up Police Violence (05/21/15) [10:22]

Financial Insanity Grips The World
ZeroHedge | author | 05/28/15

Rare is the person who is a realist. We collectively live in a world of pretend and extend. Every one of us wants our present civilization to continue, though for countless millions the world has already turned upside down as unemployment has soared and war and terrorism proliferate. The very structure of life in our world is threatened because madmen have undermined the financial system through the creation of debt instead of wealth. We have collectively borrowed against our children's future until their very future is in doubt. ... Read more

Military "Accidentally" Sends Live Anthrax To 9 States Via FedEx
ZeroHedge | author | 05/28/15

A week after the 9/11 terrorists attacks that destroyed the Twin Towers in New York, letters laced with anthrax began to pop up across the US. By the end of November, 2001, 17 people had been hospitalized for anthrax exposure and five people were dead from inhalation. A subsequent FBI investigation pinned the entire ordeal on one Bruce Ivins who killed himself in 2008.

Fast forward to yesterday and 26 people are now being treated for exposure after live anthrax was sent via FedEx. The culprit: the US military. ... Read more

U.S. hopes Chinese island-building will spur Asian response
Reuter | David Alexander | 05/28/15

The release last week of the surveillance plane footage - showing dredgers and other ships busily turning remote outcrops into islands with runways and harbors - helps ensure the issue will dominate an Asian security forum starting on Friday attended by U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter as well as senior Chinese military officials.

... The meeting, the annual Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, will be overshadowed by the tensions in the South China Sea, where Beijing has added 1,500 acres to five outposts in the resource-rich Spratly islands since the start of this year. ... Read more

On Patriot Act Renewal and USA Freedom Act: Glenn Greenwald Talks with ACLU’S Jameel Jaffer
firstlook.org/theintercept/ | Glenn Greenwald | 05/27/15

Even in the security-über alles climate that followed 9/11, the Patriot Act was recognized as an extreme and radical expansion of government surveillance powers. That’s why "sunset provisions" were attached to several of its key provisions: meaning they would expire automatically unless Congress renewed them every five years. But in 2005 and then again in 2010, the Bush and Obama administrations demanded their renewal, and Congress overwhelmingly complied with only token opposition from civil libertarians.

hat has all changed in the post-Snowden era. The most controversial provisions of the Patriot Act are scheduled to "sunset" on June 1, and there is almost no chance for a straight-up, reform-free authorization. ... Read more

China Plans Naval Expansion Amid South China Sea Tensions
Reuters & HP | Megha Rajagopalan | 05/26/15

China outlined a strategy to boost its naval reach on Tuesday and announced plans for the construction of two lighthouses in disputed waters, developments likely to escalate tensions in a region already jittery about Beijing's maritime ambitions.

In a policy document issued by the State Council, the Communist-ruled country's cabinet, China vowed to increase its "open seas protection," switching from air defense to both offense and defense, and criticized neighbors who take "provocative actions" on its reefs and islands. ... Read more

With Greece "Nowhere Close" To Deal, Depositors Pull €300 Million From Banks In Single Day
ZeroHedge | author | 05/27/15

Greece is "nowhere close" to a deal with its creditors and will miss a May deadline to strike a compromise ahead of an IMF payment due on June 5. Meanwhile, the ECB tightens the screws on the country's banking sector by refusing to lift the ceiling on the emergency liquidity that until now has helped to offset deposit flight. ... Read more

Koch Brothers Plan to Fund 'Several' GOP 2016 Presidential Hopefuls
Bloomberg | David Knowles | date

The world's fifth and sixth richest people say they will donate money to multiple Republican presidential candidates in the coming campaign.

In a Saturday interview on the Larry Kudlow Show, a nationally syndicated radio broadcast, David Koch let it slip that the roughly $900 million that he and his brother, Charles, plan to lavish on the 2016 presidential race could find its way into the hands of more than one GOP contender. ... Read more

BraveNewFilms | Koch Brothers EXPOSED: 2014 (01/21/15) [55:54]

How the TPP Is Really a Forced Deal to Benefit the Rich
AlterNet | Leo Gerard | 05/27/15

Senators who voted last week to Fast Track ratification of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) call it a free trade deal, but really, it's forced trade imposed on protesting American workers who have endured its damaging effects for decades.

Under the free trade regime, rich and powerful corporate interests have hauled in ever-higher profits as they shipped manufacturing overseas to low-wage, no-environmental-regulation countries. Meanwhile, American workers lost jobs, health benefits, income and all sense of stability. ... Read more

ThomHartmann | Brunch with Bernie: May 22, 2015 [44:54]

Texas Flooding Called The Worst Ever By Governor
NYTimes & Reuters & HP | Jim Forsyth | 05/25/15

Texas Governor Greg Abbott on Monday likened the ferocity of flash flooding that killed at least three people to a tsunami, and authorities said a dam had given way in a state park.

Abbott declared states of disaster in 24 counties and flew over the area south of Austin to assess the damage caused by tornadoes, heavy rainfall, thunderstorms and flooding that forced evacuations and rooftop rescues and left thousands of residents without electricity. ... Read more

Four Words That Imperil Health Care Law Were All a Mistake, Writers Now Say
NYTimes | Robert Pear | 05/25/15

They are only four words in a 900-page law: "established by the state." But it is in the ambiguity of those four words in the Affordable Care Act that opponents found a path to challenge the law, all the way to the Supreme Court.

How those words became the most contentious part of President Obama's signature domestic accomplishment has been a mystery. Who wrote them, and why? Were they really intended, as the plaintiffs in King v. Burwell claim, to make the tax subsidies in the law available only in states that established their own health insurance marketplaces, and not in the three dozen states with federal exchanges? ... Read more

Durable Goods Orders Slide YoY 4th Month In A Row Despite Dramatic Upward Revisions
ZeroHedge | author | 05/26/15

After dramatically upwardly revised data from last month (but following an even more dramatic downward revision to all historical data earlier in the month) - the highly noisy series of Durable Goods Orders printed -0.5% (from +5.1% in March, revised up from +4.0%). Capital Goods Orders (non-defense Ex-Air) beat expectations MoM (printing +1.0% vs 0.3%) and was revised remarkably up from the biggest drop since 2012 to a 1.5% rise in March. Core Capital Goods Orders, however, remains negative YoY for the 4th months in a row. The last time this happened was either a recession, or the Fed unleashed QE3. ... Read more
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Chinese State Paper Warns "War Will Be Inevitable" Unless U.S. Stops Meddling In Territorial Dispute
ZeroHedge | author | 05/26/15

Just to confirm that if the US had hoped it could threaten Beijing into submission and force the Politburo into curbing its expanionist appetit, it was dead wrong, the nationalist Global Times, a paper owned by the ruling Communist Party's official newspaper, the People's Daily, said in a Monday editorial that war was "inevitable" between China and the United States unless Washington stopped demanding Beijing halt the building of artificial islands in the disputed waterway. ... Read more

How The Saudis Wag The Washington Dog
ZeroHedge | author | 05/26/15

In real democracies, governments would do what the citizens who put them in office want them to do. The United States and other Western democracies make a mockery of that ideal. But, even so, there are limits; governments cannot defy public opinion on matters of great moment indefinitely. Enabling the Saudi ruling class, and the rulers of the other Gulf states, to direct American foreign policy to the extent that they do, and to get away with whatever they please, is hardly the least of it; but neither is it the only cause for concern. ... Read more

Five big banks agree to pay more than $5 billion to settle regulatory charges
WashingtonPost | Steven Mufson | 05/20/15

Five of the world's largest banks have agreed to pay more than $5 billion in fines to settle charges made by regulatory agencies and the Justice Department that the banks had acted in concert to manipulate international interest and foreign currency exchange rates.

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch said the banks had engaged in "brazenly illegal behavior .?.?. on a near-daily basis." She added that the deal showed that the government "intends to vigorously prosecute all those who tilt the economic system in their favor [and] who subvert our marketplaces." ... Read more

ISIS Planning US Nuclear Attack In Next 12 Months: Report
ZeroHedge | author | 05/25/15

Three weeks after the first supposed attack by Islamic State supporters in the US, in which two ISIS "soldiers" wounded a security guard before they were killed in Garland, Texas, the time has come to raise the fear stakes. In an article posted in the terrorist group's English-language online magazine Dabiq (which as can be see below seems to have gotten its design cues straight from Madison Avenue and is just missing glossy pages filled with 'scratch and sniff' perfume ads ) ISIS claimed that it has enough money to buy a nuclear weapon from Pakistan and "carry out an attack inside the United States next year." Read more

Islamic State's magazine Dabiq, whose latest issue, #9

Bernanke Says "No Large Mispricings In US Securities"; These 5 Charts Say Otherwise
ZeroHedge | author | 05/25/15

Retired central banker, blogger, bond guru and hedge fund consultant Ben Bernanke just uttered the following total rubbish... *BERNANKE: NO LARGE MISPRICINGS IN U.S. SECURITIES, ASSET PRICES ...In an effort to save whoever it is that will pay him $250,000 next for these wise words, we offer five charts. Read more

N.S.A. and Other Matters Leave McConnell's Senate in Disarray
NYTimes | Jennifer Steinhauer | 05/23/15

The sleepy United States senators thought they were done voting. But then, around 1 a.m. on the Saturday before Memorial Day, Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky and presidential candidate, marched spryly to the Senate floor to let it be known that, no, he would not agree to extend the federal government's bulk collection of phone records program. Not even for one day.

With that, Senator Mitch McConnell, a fellow Kentucky Republican who only a few hours before was ebullient with the passage of a major trade package, was reduced to ordering his colleagues back to Washington next Sunday to try again to prevent the act from expiring. ... Read more

Lake Mead Water Level Mysteriously Plunges After Nevada Quake
ZeroHedge | author | 05/25/15

A 4.8 magnitude earthquake (originally reported 5.4) shook Las Vegas and surrounding areas Friday morning causing roads and bridges to be closed. The quake went little-reported outside of local news (since there was at first glance minimum damage caused) but, since the quake's occurrence, something considerably more worrisome has occurred.

In the 36 hours since the quake's occurrence, water levels at Lake Mead have plunged precipitously. While we know correlation is not causation, the 'coincidence' of an extreme loss in water levels occurring in the aftermath of one of the largest quakes in recent Vegas history does raise a suspicious eyebrow - especially when there has been no official word on the precipitous decline. ... Read more

Senate Debate Reveals Absurd Level Of Trade Deal Secrecy
HP | Ryan Grim | 05/21/15

A revealing conversation on the Senate floor Thursday showed precisely how secretive President Barack Obama's pending trade deals are, and the absurdity of arguments to the contrary.

Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) sponsored a bill that would have required the administration to post a "scrubbed" copy of the trade deals well before Congress gives the president fast-track authority to jam them easily through Congress. ... Read more

George Soros Warns "No Exaggeration" That China-US On "Threshold Of World War 3"
ZeroHedge | author | 05/22/15

While admitting that reaching agreement between the two countries will be difficult to achieve, George Soros - speaking at The World Bank's Bretton Woods conference this week - warned that unless the U.S. makes 'major concessions' and allows China's currency to join the IMF's basket of currencies, "there is a real danger China will align itself with Russia politically and militarily, and then it is not an exaggeration to say that we are on the threshold of a third world war." ... Read more

The Crash of 2016: The Plot to Destroy America--and What We Can Do to Stop It by Thom Hartmann

The United States is in the midst of an economic implosion that could make the Great Depression look like child's play. In THE CRASH OF 2016, Thom Hartmann argues that the facade of our once-great United States will soon disintegrate to reveal the rotting core where corporate and billionaire power and greed have replaced democratic infrastructure and governance. Our once-enlightened political and economic systems have been manipulated to ensure the success of only a fraction of the population at the expense of the rest of us.

The result is a "for the rich, by the rich" scheme leading to policies that only benefit the highest bidders. Hartmann outlines the destructive forces-planted by Lewis Powell in 1971 and come to fruition with the "Reagan Revolution"-that have looted our nation over the past decade, and how their actions fit into a cycle of American history that lets such forces rise to power every four generations.

However, a backlash is now palpable against the "economic royalists"-a term coined by FDR to describe those hoarding power and wealth-including the banksters, oligarchs, and politicians who have plunged our nation into economic chaos and social instability.

Although we are in the midst of what could become the most catastrophic economic crash in American History, a way forward is emerging, just as it did in the previous great crashes of the 1760s, 1856, and 1929. The choices we make now will redefine American culture. Before us stands a genuine opportunity to embrace the moral motive over the profit motive-and to rebuild the American economic model that once yielded great success.

Thoroughly researched and passionately argued, THE CRASH OF 2016 is not just a roadmap to redemption in post-Crash America, but a critical wake-up call, challenging us to act. Only if the right reforms are enacted and the moral choices are made, can we avert disaster and make our nation whole again.

This Aging Oil Pipeline Is In Great Lakes' 'Worst Possible Place' For A Spill
HP | Samantha Lachman | 05/22/15

Environmental activists say Michigan's tourism slogan -- "Pure Michigan" -- may no longer be accurate unless the state takes stronger action to prevent a 62-year-old oil pipeline from rupturing in a sensitive waterway.

The pipeline, called Line 5, is owned by the Canadian energy company Enbridge, carrying nearly 23 million gallons of crude oil and natural gas liquids every day. It passes between the state's upper and lower peninsulas, along the bottom of the Straits of Mackinac, which connects Lake Huron and Lake Michigan. East of the pipeline is the iconic Mackinac Bridge, depicted on many of the state's license plates, and Mackinac Island, an historic, no-cars resort area. ... Read more

The NSA Plan To Find Bin Laden By Hiding Tracking Devices In Medical Supplies
firstlook.org/theintercept/ | Cora Currier | 05/21/15

The National Security Agency concocted a plan to find Osama bin Laden by hiding tracking devices in medical supplies, in an attempt to cross what officials called the "non-electronic moat" surrounding the reportedly ailing terrorist leader.

The scheme is laid out in a top-secret NSA presentation dated June 2010 and titled "Medical Pattern of Life: Targeting High Value Individual #1," which was among the files provided by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. ... Read more
Zero Dark Thirty () [2:36:59]

Public Confused Why World's Biggest Banks Admitting Criminal Fraud, Leads To Public Yawns
ZeroHedge | author | 05/21/15

1. Libor - interest rates
2. ISDAfix - swaps
3. Platts - oil prices
4. WM/Reuters - FX
5. High-Frequency Trading - equities

It was about two years ago when we summarized all the known and confirmed rigged markets. Since then things have gone from bad to worse for believers in fair and efficient markets, with not only countless more banks now admitting they rigged Libor and FX. It all culminated with yesterday's settlement in which five of the world's biggest banks, including JPM, Citi and Barclays, agreed to plead guilty in a currency-rigging probe. And, to Bloomberg's dismay, the public yawned. ... Read more

How the White House plans to help the humble bee maintain its buzz
WashingtonPost | Juliet Eilperin | 05/19/15

The humble bee -- nuisance, threat, and linchpin of the American food supply -- has won over the leader of the free world. And now President Obama is intervening on the bee's behalf as its habitat dwindles.

On Tuesday, the Obama administration will announce the first National Strategy to Promote the Health of Honey Bees and Other Pollinators, a bureaucratic title for a plan to save the bee, other small winged animals and their breeding grounds. The initiative may feel like the kind of niche interest a second-term president devotes his time to, but scientists say his attention to the busy workforce that sustains many American crops is critical. ... Read more

The Hidden 'Betrayal' In Obama's Trade Agenda
HP | Laura Barron-Lopez | 05/20/15

As Congress prepares to give President Barack Obama expedited powers to "fast-track" trade deals through Congress, many U.S. steel mills and skeptics of Obama's trade agenda are worried about steel dumping, the term commonly used to describe countries selling steel below market price.

A "vibrant steel industry," Brown said, is a "national security issue" that is being toyed with because of the failure to crack down on steel dumping and similar practices.

"China has more steelmaking capacity than the entire rest of the world combined. They can't keep their steel mills busy, because they don't have that much domestic consumption," he said. "So China is always trying to sell steel at below-market prices -- so-called 'dumping steel' is the term the trade lawyers use." ... Read more

Fall of Ramadi reflects failure of Iraq's strategy against Islamic State, analysts say
WashingtonPost | Hugh Naylor | 05/19/15

As Islamic State militants repeatedly attacked ­Ramadi this year, police solicited cash from local families and businessmen to buy weapons, one officer recalled. The Iraqi government didn't pay the police for months, he said. "We begged and begged for more support from the government, but nothing," said Col. Eissa al-Alwani, a senior police officer in the city.

The fall of Ramadi amounts to more than the loss of a major city in Iraq's largest province, analysts say. It could undermine Sunni support for Iraq's broader effort to drive back the Islamic State, vastly complicating the war effort. ... Read more
WP | Fall of Ramadi reflects failure of Iraq's strategy against Islamic State, analysts say

5 Banks To Plead Guilty To Criminal Rigging Charges, Pay $5.6 Billion For Manipulating Markets
ZeroHedge | author | 05/20/15

As the live webcast from US AG Loretta Lynch indicates, moments ago the DOJ announced five global banks including Citi, J.P. Morgan, Barclays, RBS would plead guilty to criminal charges to conspiring to manipulate FX Prices, and would pay some $5.6 billion in combined penalties to resolve a long running U.S. investigation into whether traders at the banks colluded to move foreign currency rates in directions to benefit their own positions. ... Read more

The Market's One-Sided Game Of Chicken
ZeroHedge | author | 05/20/15

That the Fed and other central banks have unleashed the speculative furies is an unassailable and baleful reality. What is going on here plain and simple is a one-sided game of chicken. The robo-traders and hedge fund buccaneers on Wall Street press the market higher on virtually no volume or conviction whenever macro-economic weakness presents itself, virtually daring the Fed to maintain is ultra-accommodative stance still longer. The casino gamblers will keep chop, chop choppin' higher until they finally lose confidence that the Eccles building is heaven's door to further riches. Then the machines will sell, sell, sell. There will be no credible Fed speakers to stop them. ... Read more

What A Cashless Society Would Look Like
ZeroHedge | author | 05/20/15

"A depression is coming? Let's put interest rates at zero. The economy is still in trouble? Let's have the central bank print trillions in new securities. The banks are not lending? Let's change the accounting rules and offer government guarantees and funds. People are still not spending? Let's have negative interest rates. The economy is still in the tank? LET'S BAN CASH TRANSACTIONS!" ... Read more

A 2016 theme emerges: Money, money, money, money, money
WashingtonPost | Dan Balz | 05/19/15

Despite the blur of activity by innumerable candidates, the 2016 presidential campaign so far is a mostly shapeless enterprise, save for one dominant factor: the prominence of money in the narrative. More than anything, money has been the defining characteristic of the race, highlighted by the political and private activities of the brand names of Clinton and Bush.

In their own ways, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Jeb Bush have brought unintentional attention to the role of money in politics and public life, to the intersection of money and political and public influence, and to the general absence of restraints, self-imposed or enforced. ... Read more

TheDoDo.com | Dying Dog Thrown In Garbage Is Unrecognizable Now

Original Iraq War Skeptics Find The Rekindled Debate Maddening
HP | Sam Stein | 05/18/15

For those lawmakers who actually voted against the war, and those journalists who reported skeptically before the attack, this is misleading at best and self-serving at worst. Watching the revisionist story take hold 13 years after they opposed the invasion is reviving the frustration and marginalization they felt back then.

"I was amazed, absolutely amazed at how people were supporting going to war on the basis of things that just weren't so," said former Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), one of a handful of members who opposed the invasion. "It was clear as it could be. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. None of the intel suggested they had anything to do with 9/11 and the whole rationale for WMD [weapons of mass destruction] was just very, very thin for anybody who read the intelligence reports." As for the 2016 candidates' comments, he said: "It is just a rewriting of history in an attempt for everybody to cover their extraordinary mistake; probably one of the most serious mistakes in the military and diplomatic history of the United States, and they were all complicit." ... Read more

Forbidden Truth: U.S.-Taliban Secret Oil Diplomacy, Saudi Arabia and the Failed Search for bin Laden by Wayne Madsen

An international bestseller, banned in Switzerland by the bin Laden family, Forbidden Truth by Jean-Charles Brisard & Guillaume Dasquie shows how US national security in Afghanistan was disastrously compromised by corporate oil interests & Saudi Arabia. Brisard wrote the 1st intelligence report on the bin Laden financial networks which was used to close down fraudulent Islamic charities funding terrorism, a report that President Jacques Chirac handed to George Bush on his visit to the US in the wake of 9/11. Forbidden Truth reveals that French intelligence gave the FBI unambiguous information that the so-called 20th hijacker, Zacarias Massaoui, was tied to Al Qaeda, a story Brisard broke to Salon magazine before Special Agent Coleen Rowley came out publicly to say the FBI stifled the investigation. John O'Neill the former head of the FBI's antiterrorism division--who perished in the World Trade Center--told Jean-Charles Brisard in 7/01, "All of the answers, all of the clues allowing us to dismantle Osama bin Laden's organization, can be found in Saudi Arabia." The result of three years of investigation by a leading French intelligence expert & investigative journalist, Forbidden Truth is the untold story of the Clinton & Bush attempts to stabilize Afghanistan so that US energy companies could build a pipeline. In particular, it details the secret hazardous diplomacy between the Bush administration & the Taliban from February to August 2001--a story still untold in the US media--talks that ultimately led the US to make threats via Pakistani intermediaries to the Taliban in 7/01 that they were going to bomb Afghanistan if the Taliban didn't comply.

Osama Bin Laden -- The Truth Be Told
HP | Michael Brenner | 05/18/15

Sy Hersh's revelations about the systematic misrepresentation by the Obama administration of how it brought Osama bin-Laden to bay are causing a stir. Justifiably so. For they puncture the carefully constructed myth of how America revenged itself and renewed itself through this act of righteous justice. Moreover, the account of unsavory chicanery in high places once again spotlights the deceit that now is the hallmark of how our government works.

A year or so after the event, I wrote a piece in The Huffington Post about the CIA-sponsored film Zero Dark Thirty which has entrenched a cartoon version of this mythic story in the popular American mind. That commentary lays out some of the logical contradictions and false notes in the official story on which the film is based. I have incorporated a condensed, slightly modified version, in the belief that it could help serve as a primer for following the argument that the Hersh reporting has triggered. ... Read more

What The Snowden Files Say About The Osama Bin Laden Raid
firstlook.org/theintercept | author | 05/18/15

The U.S. has long maintained that the raid was conducted without the knowledge of the Pakistani government, and that the critical intelligence that led to bin Laden's location came from a years-long effort by U.S. analysts and operatives to trace the path of an Al Qaeda courier.

The Intercept is publishing a number of documents from the Snowden archive related to the Abbottabad raid and the hunt for bin Laden, which neither explicitly prove nor disprove any aspect of Hersh's account. However, the documents reference a number of things that are relevant to the debate, including the tracking of Al Qaeda couriers in Pakistan and the existence of intelligence gathered from the Abbottabad compound, as well as the impact of the raid on U.S.-Pakistani counterterrorism partnerships.... Read more

A New Design for Antarctic Research
The new Halley VI Antarctic Research Station, the first fully-relocatable research station, launched this year and was designed by Hugh Broughton Architects with AECOM for British Antarctic Survey (BAS).
According to information provided by the architects, the modules are supported on giant steel skis and hydraulically driven legs. The legs allow the station to rise up out of the snow to avoid being buried, and as the ice shelf moves out towards the ocean, the modules can be lowered onto the skis and towed to a new, safer location further inland. Interior photos

Antarctic Ice Shelf Is A Few Years From Disintegration: NASA
HP & Reuters | Alex Dobuzinskis | 05/15/15

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The last intact section of one of Antarctica's mammoth ice shelves is weakening fast and will likely disintegrate completely in the next few years, contributing further to rising sea levels, according to a NASA study released on Thursday.

The research focused on a remnant of the so-called Larsen B Ice Shelf, which has existed for at least 10,000 years but partially collapsed in 2002. What is left covers about 625 square miles (1,600 square km), about half the size of Rhode Island. ... Read more

Washington's Shadowy Energy Partnership With Azerbaijan Exposed
ZeroHedge | author | 05/18/15

Ten Members of the U.S. Congress -- along with 32 of their staff members -- received secret payments from Azerbaijan's state-owned oil company to travel to Baku in 2013, to cover the cost of travel, including souvenirs of "silk scarves, crystal tea sets and Azerbaijani rugs." ... Read more

GregPalastOffice | BP Blow-out Cover-Up (04/20/12) [6:29]

Vultures' Picnic: In Pursuit of Petroleum Pigs, Power Pirates, and High-Finance Carnivores by Greg Palast

This is the story of the corporate vultures that feed on the weak and ruin our planet in the process-a story that spans the globe and decades.

For Vultures' Picnic, investigative journalist Greg Palast has spent his career uncovering the connection between the world of energy (read: oil) and finance. He's built a team that reads like a casting call for a Hollywood thriller-a Swiss multilingual investigator, a punk journalist, and a gonzo cameraman-to reveal how environmental disasters like the Gulf oil spill, the Exxon Valdez, and lesser-known tragedies such as Tatitlek and Torrey Canyon are caused by corporate corruption, failed legislation, and, most interestingly, veiled connections between the billionaires of financial industry and energy titans. Palast shows how the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, World Trade Organization, and Central Banks act as puppets and bandits for Big Oil.

With Palast at the center of an investigation that takes us from the Arctic to Africa to the Amazon, Vultures' Picnic shows how the big powers in the money and oil game slip the bonds of regulation over and over again, and simply destroy the rules that they themselves can't write-and take advantage of nations and everyday people in the process.

12 Years of Bush Presidencies = 747,000 Net New Private Sector Jobs
HP | Paul Abrams | 05/17/15

As former Governor Jeb Bush (R-FL) flails about trying to use his family name to attract financial and elite support while also desperately trying to distance himself from his brother's disastrous record, there is another problem he cannot run away from: The 12 Bush years were the worst on record for net new private sector job creation. Not just the worst, but no one has even come close to being the second worst.

Not just the worst, but no one has even come close to being the second worst.

That's it. Less than 1 million new private sector jobs in 12 years of Bush presidencies. President Obama creates as many new private sector jobs in 3-4 months as the Bushes did in 12 years.

To understand this more fully, the Bushes averaged 5,190 new jobs per month for 12 years. No, not 51,000 that would be considered terrible, awful and devastating. But one-tenth of that, 5,190. There are no words to describe how abysmal that is. ... Read more

David Stockman: "We Are Entering The Terminal Phase Of The Global Financial System"
ZeroHedge | author | 05/18/15

"What happened in each of those episodes was a short-run break in the system, collapse of confidence and flight to gold. What I think we are facing now is a terminal phase of a monetary system that isn't viable, stable or sustainable. Therefore gold has but one characteristic - massive upside in the years ahead." ... Read more

This Is What A $240/Share AAPL Would Look Like In Context
ZeroHedge | author | 05/18/15

If Carl Icahn, whose $6.8 billion in AAPL holdings makes him nearly a 6x bigger holder of the stock than the Swiss National Bank, is correct and AAPL is truly worth $240/share today, or about $1.4 trillion, roughly equivalent to 9% of US GDP, then this is how AAPL would rank if it were a sovereign nation (and yes, we know comparing market cap to GDP is idiotic, but so is everything else these days).

For the purists, at $240/share, AAPL would be 2.2x larger than the entire market cap of the Italian or Swedish stock market, 1.9x larger than all Spanish public companies combined, it would be almost the same size as the market cap of all Swiss companies, and is just about 70% of the market cap of Germany or France.

As Chicago Pays Victims of Past Torture, Police Face New Allegations of Abuse at Homan Square
DemocracyNow | author | 05/15/15

More victims have come forward to detail recent abuse inside Homan Square, a secret compound used by Chicago police for incommunicado interrogations and detentions which some have described as the domestic equivalent of a CIA black site overseas. Exclusive video obtained by The Guardian shows a Chicago man named Angel Perez being taken inside a "prisoner entrance." Perez says police handcuffed his right wrist to a metal bar and then sexually assaulted him with a metal object, believed to be a handgun barrel. Perez says the officers also threatened to "go after" his family members, including his father who is battling cancer. Perez is now the 13th person to describe his detainment at the secret police site to The Guardian. Like many detainees, he apparently was never formally arrested -- neither booked, nor permitted access to an attorney, nor charged. Now, Perez and four others have filed a lawsuit against the Chicago Police Department. We are joined by the reporter who broke the Homan Square story, Spencer Ackerman, national security editor at The Guardian.

We Are Seneca Lake: Josh Fox & Fracking Opponents Fight Natural Gas Storage Site in Upstate NY
DemocracyNow | author | 05/15/15

On Wednesday, Josh Fox, director of "Gasland," the documentary which exposed the harms of the fracking industry, was arrested along with 20 other people after forming a human barricade at a natural gas storage facility in upstate New York. The action was part of a long-standing campaign against plans by Crestwood Midstream to expand gas storage in abandoned salt caverns at Seneca Lake, a drinking water source for 100,000 people. We speak to Fox and air his new documentary short, "We Are Seneca Lake.

The Greatest Water Crisis In The History Of The United States
ZeroHedge | author | 05/15/15

What are we going to do once all the water is gone? Thanks to the worst drought in more than 1,000 years, the western third of the country is facing the greatest water crisis that the United States has ever seen. Lake Mead is now the lowest that it has ever been since the Hoover Dam was finished in the 1930s, mandatory water restrictions have already been implemented in the state of California, and there are already widespread reports of people stealing water in some of the worst hit areas. But this is just the beginning.

Right now, in a desperate attempt to maintain somewhat "normal" levels of activity, water is being pumped out of the ground in the western half of the nation at an absolutely staggering pace. Once that irreplaceable groundwater is gone, that is when the real crisis will begin. If this multi-year drought stretches on and becomes the "megadrought" that a lot of scientists are now warning about, life as we know it in much of the country is going to be fundamentally transformed and millions of Americans may be forced to find somewhere else to live. ... Read more
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Running Dry: A Journey From Source to Sea Down the Colorado River by Jon Waterman

In 1869, John Wesley Powell led a small party down the Green and Colorado Rivers in a bold attempt to explore the Grand Canyon for the first time. After their monumental expedition, they told of raging rapids, constant danger, and breathtaking natural beauty of the American landscape at its most pristine.

Jon Waterman combines sheer adventure and environmental calamity in this trailblazing cautionary account of his 2008 trip down the overtaxed, drying Colorado. Dammed and tunneled, forced into countless canals, trapped in reservoirs and harnessed for electricity, what once was untamed and free is now humbled, parched, and so yoked to human purposes that in most years it trickles away 100 miles from its oceanic destination.

NatGeo | Running Dry (04/28/10) [1:40]

NatGeo | Chasing Rivers: The Colorado, Part 1 (11/10/14) [24:00]

RT | CrossTalk: Remembering Victory (05/08/15) [24:14]

RT | #Victory70: Largest May 9 parade in Russian and Soviet history since WW2 (05/09/15) [1:31:15]

Thirty Million Gallons Under the Sea
Harpers Magazine | Antonia Juhasz | June 2015

One morning in March of last year, I set out from Gulfport, Mississippi, on a three-week mission aboard the U.S. Navy research vessel Atlantis. The 274-foot ship, painted a crisp white and blue, stood tall in the bright sunlight. On its decks were winches, cranes, seafloor-mapping sonar, a machine shop, and five laboratories. Stowed in an alcove astern was Alvin, the federal government's only manned research submarine. "Research vessel Atlantis outbound," A. D. Colburn, the ship's captain, reported into the ship radio.

The water was calm and the bridge crew quiet as they steered us into open water. For the next fourteen hours, we would sail toward the site of BP's Macondo well, where, in April 2010, a blowout caused the largest offshore-drilling oil spill in history. Once there, Atlantis's crew would launch Alvin and guide it to the bottom of the ocean, reaching depths as great as 7,200 feet below the surface. Over the next twenty-two days they would send the submersible down seventeen times, to gather animal, plant, water, and sediment samples. Their goal was to determine how BP's spill had affected the ocean's ecosystem from the seabed up. I would get the chance to join them in the submarine as they went closer to the Macondo wellhead than anyone had gone since the blowout. ...

Jeb Bush Confronted By College Student: 'Your Brother Created ISIS'
HP | Marina Fang | 05/13/15

A college student told likely GOP presidential candidate Jeb Bush on Wednesday that his brother, former President George W. Bush, was to blame for the rise of the Islamic State.

The heated confrontation took place at a town hall meeting in Reno, Nevada, according to The New York Times. Ivy Ziedrich, 19, a student at the University of Nevada, approached the former Florida governor to question him about comments he had made during the event. Bush had argued that the Obama administration's weak foreign policy was responsible for the rise of the terrorist group, also known as ISIS, in the Middle East. ... Read more

The $60 Billion Question: Can Afghanistan Take The Taliban And ISIS On Its Own?
HP | Akbar Shahid Ahmed | 05/13/15

American taxpayers have spent $62.5 billion on Afghanistan's military and police forces since the U.S. invaded that country in 2001. It could all go to waste -- or, worse, to extremists -- if the Afghan and U.S. governments don't increase their vigilance, according to the top watchdog for U.S. efforts in Afghanistan.

"The evidence strongly suggests that Afghanistan lacks the capacity -- financial, technical, managerial or otherwise -- to maintain, support and execute much of what has been built or established during more than 13 years of international assistance," said John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, in an address at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on Wednesday. ... Read more

*Why There Has Been No Recovery (In One Simple Chart): A Harvest Of Corruption
ZeroHedge | author | 05/14/15

Who Is The Biggest Energy Company in the World?
ZeroHedge | author | 05/14/15

PetroChina just surpassed Exxon Mobil to become the largest energy company in the world, on a market cap basis. Now the question becomes: can PetroChina retain its status as the world's largest energy company? ... Read more
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Amtrak Train Derails In Philadelphia, Killing At Least 6
HP | Andrew Hart | 05/13/15

At least six people were killed -- and eight individuals remain in critical condition -- after an Amtrak train traveling from Washington to New York City derailed in Philadelphia on Tuesday night.

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter described the wreckage and dangerous debris from the six overturned cars as an "absolute disastrous mess." "I have never seen anything like it in my life," Nutter said. ... Read more

Senate Democrats Knock Down Obama's Trade Bill (Trans-Pacific Partnership or TPP)
HP | Laura Barron-Lopez | 05/13/15

Senate Democrats dealt a stinging blow to President Barack Obama Tuesday by blocking legislation that would grant him authority to fast-track international trade deals.

Democrats, including several who favor Obama's trade agenda, banded together to prevent the Senate from considering legislation that grants the president so-called Trade Promotion Authority, which would bar Congress from amending or filibustering trade agreements negotiated by the administration. Fifty-two senators voted to start debate on the bill, short of the 60 needed to overcome a Democratic filibuster. Forty-five senators voted against the plan. ... Read more

The Detail in Seymour Hersh's Bin Laden Story That Rings True
NYTimes | Carlotta Gall | 05/12/15

... But others, including top Pakistani generals, insisted that this was not the case. American officials at first said Bin Laden resisted the SEALs; the Pakistanis promptly leaked that he wasn't armed. Then came differing stories from the SEALs who carried out the raid, followed by a widening stream of new details from government reports -- including the 336-page Abbottabad Commission report requested by the Pakistani Parliament -- and from books and interviews. All of the accounts were incomplete in some way. ... Read more

Brig Usman Khalid informed CIA of Osama's presence in Abbottabad
thenews.com.pk | Amir Mir | 05/12/15

ISLAMABAD: Pulitzer prize winning American journalist Seymour Hersh's most recent claim that a former Pakistani intelligence official had actually informed the Americans about the Abbottabad hideout of al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden (OBL), has given credence to the notion that a former ISI official provided the information about Osama's location in exchange of US$ 25 million bounty as well as the US citizenship with a new identity. ... Read more

The Killing of Osama bin Laden by Seymour M. Hersh
London Review of Books | Seymour M. Hersh | 05/12/15

It's been four years since a group of US Navy Seals assassinated Osama bin Laden in a night raid on a high-walled compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. The killing was the high point of Obama's first term, and a major factor in his re-election. The White House still maintains that the mission was an all-American affair, and that the senior generals of Pakistan's army and Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) were not told of the raid in advance. This is false, as are many other elements of the Obama administration's account. The White House's story might have been written by Lewis Carroll: would bin Laden, target of a massive international manhunt, really decide that a resort town forty miles from Islamabad would be the safest place to live and command al-Qaida's operations? He was hiding in the open. So America said. ... Read more

They Know Everything About You: How Data-Collecting Corporations and Snooping Government Agencies Are Destroying Democracy by Robert Scheer

They Know Everything About You is a groundbreaking exposé of how government agencies and tech corporations monitor virtually every aspect of our lives, and a fierce defense of privacy and democracy.

The revelation that the government has access to a vast trove of personal online data demonstrates that we already live in a surveillance society. But the erosion of privacy rights extends far beyond big government. Intelligence agencies such as the NSA and CIA are using Silicon Valley corporate partners as their data spies. Seemingly progressive tech companies are joining forces with snooping government agencies to create a brave new world of wired tyranny.

Life in the digital age poses an unprecedented challenge to our constitutional liberties, which guarantee a wall of privacy between the individual and the government. The basic assumption of democracy requires the ability of the individual to experiment with ideas and associations within a protected zone, as secured by the Constitution. The unobserved moment embodies the most basic of human rights, yet it is being squandered in the name of national security and consumer convenience.

Robert Scheer argues that the information revolution, while a source of public enlightenment, contains the seeds of freedom's destruction in the form of a surveillance state that exceeds the wildest dream of the most ingenious dictator. The technology of surveillance, unless vigorously resisted, represents an existential threat to the liberation of the human spirit.

The US Is In Recession According To These 7 Charts
ZeroHedge | author | 05/13/15

The evidence continues to mount... "Most since Lehman" has become the new meme for macro-economic data in the US as day after day brings another lacklustre superlative to be dismissed with some excuse by the cognoscenti of sell-side economists... Read more
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Greece Effectively Defaults To IMF Using SDR Reserves To "Repay" Fund; 1 Month Countdown Begins
ZeroHedge | author | 05/12/15

Greece tapped emergency reserves in its holding account at the IMF in order to make a 750 million euro payment to the Fund on Monday meaning that, as predicted, the IMF is now paying itself. Athens has one month to replenish the account. Meanwhile, the Fund has indicated it wants no part of another Greek bailout. And just to confirm how terminal the situation for Greece is, MarketNews just reported that Greece now has a paltry €90 million in cash reserves left. The end of the world's most drawn out tragicomedy is finally nigh. ... Read more

Seymour Hersh's Bin Laden Raid Bombshell Draws White House, Media Pushback
HP | Michael Calderone | 05/11/15

Hersh's 10,000-word article, published in the London Review of Books, prompted pushback from the White House and from journalists, who rebutted his claims online, on cable news, and on Twitter.

Hersh on Monday brushed off the criticism in an interview with The Huffington Post. "If I worried about the reaction to what I write, I'd be frozen," he said. Hersh said that journalists "should be very skeptical of someone who says what goes against what every newspaper and magazine believed." ... Read more

Newsy | White House, Journalists Pan Hersh's New Bin Laden Theory (05/11/15) [2:27]

Seymour Hersh Article Alleges Cover-Up in Bin Laden Hunt
NYTimes | Matthew Rosenberg | 05/11/15

Four years after a Navy SEAL team killed Osama bin Laden in his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, lingering questions remain about the raid and what led up to it. Now, in a 10,000-word article in The London Review of Books, the journalist Seymour M. Hersh challenges nearly every facet of the semiofficial narrative that has emerged over the years, alleging a vast cover-up that involves hundreds, possibly thousands, of people and goes all the way to President Obama himself. ... Read more

Pope Warns "Powerful People Don't Want Peace Because They Live Off War
ZeroHedge | author | 05/12/15

... The Pope has a rather depressing message for the world's children: the world's most powerful people don't want peace:

Newsy | Texas 'Jade Helm 15' Conspiracy Theory Splits Politicians (05/09/15) [2:39]

Seymour Hersh: Obama's Entire Account Of bin Laden's Death Is One Big Lie; This Is What Really Happened
ZeroHedge | author | 05/11/15

The last time famed US investigative journalist Seymour Hersh made news in the global media was with his massive, 5000-word expose from December of 2013 "Whose sarin?" revealing the true motives behind the Syrian near-war of 2013 including what we had said from the very beginning: the very professionally created YouTube clips showing the consequences of what was said to have been an Assad poison gas attack, were nothing but a fake (subsequent reports identified the propaganda source as Rami Abdul Rahman of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, whose entire operation has been funded by an unidentified European country.)

Fast forward to today when in a report whose word count doubles his previous record for the London Review of Books, Hersh targets a topic near and dear to the hearts of many Americans: the story of the capture and death of Osama bin Laden. Or rather the completely false and, according to Hersh, fabricated story, one made up entirely by the US president and spoon fed for popular consumption with the aid of a Hollywood blockbuster whose entire plot line is, if Hersh is correct, one big lie as well. ... Read more

*Seymour Hersh Claims Obama Lied About Bin Laden Raid
www.lrb.co.uk | Seymour M. Hersh | 05/__/15

It's been four years since a group of US Navy Seals assassinated Osama bin Laden in a night raid on a high-walled compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. The killing was the high point of Obama's first term, and a major factor in his re-election. The White House still maintains that the mission was an all-American affair, and that the senior generals of Pakistan's army and Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) were not told of the raid in advance. This is false, as are many other elements of the Obama administration's account. The White House's story might have been written by Lewis Carroll: would bin Laden, target of a massive international manhunt, really decide that a resort town forty miles from Islamabad would be the safest place to live and command al-Qaida's operations? He was hiding in the open. So America said. ... Read more

Congress Tells Court That Congress Can't Be Investigated For Insider Trading
firstlook.org/theintercept | Lee Fang | 05/09/15

In a little-noticed brief filed last summer, lawyers for the House of Representatives claimed that an SEC investigation of congressional insider trading should be blocked on principle, because lawmakers and their staff are constitutionally protected from such inquiries given the nature of their work.

The legal team led by Kerry W. Kircher, who was appointed House General Counsel by Speaker John Boehner in 2011, claimed that the insider trading probe violated the separation of powers between the legislative and executive branch.

In 2012, members of Congress patted themselves on the back for passing the STOCK Act, a bill meant to curb insider trading for lawmakers and their staff. "We all know that Washington is broken and today members of both parties took a big step forward to fix it," said Rep. Bill Johnson, R-Ohio, upon passage of the law. ... Read more

F.E.C. Can't Curb 2016 Election Abuse, Commission Chief Says
NYTimes | Eric Lichtblau | 05/02/15

The leader of the Federal Election Commission, the agency charged with regulating the way political money is raised and spent, says she has largely given up hope of reining in abuses in the 2016 presidential campaign, which could generate a record $10 billion in spending.

"The likelihood of the laws being enforced is slim," Ann M. Ravel, the chairwoman, said in an interview. "I never want to give up, but I'm not under any illusions. People think the F.E.C. is dysfunctional. It's worse than dysfunctional." ... Read more

All the Presidents' Bankers: The Hidden Alliances that Drive American Power by Nomi Prins

... All the Presidents' Bankers sheds new light on pivotal historic events--such as why, after the Panic of 1907, America's dominant bankers convened to fashion the Federal Reserve System; how J. P. Morgan's ambitions motivated President Wilson during World War I; how Chase and National City Bank chairmen worked secretly with President Roosevelt to rescue capitalism during the Great Depression while J.P. Morgan Jr. invited Roosevelt's son yachting; and how American financiers collaborated with President Truman to construct the World Bank and IMF after World War II.

Prins divulges how, through the Cold War and Vietnam era, presidents and bankers pushed America's superpower status and expansion abroad, while promoting broadly democratic values and social welfare at home. But from the 1970s, Wall Street's rush to secure Middle East oil profits altered the nature of political-financial alliances. Bankers' profit motive trumped heritage and allegiance to public service, while presidents lost control over the economy--as was dramatically evident in the financial crisis of 2008. ...

The Latest Outrageous Example of the Pentagon, DEA and Private Companies Conspiring to Track Everything You Do
AlterNet | Bill Blunden | 05/08/15

Guess what the malware software is really for?

... A report published by Privacy International as well as an article posted by Vice Motherboard clearly show that both the DEA and the United States Army have long-standing relationships with Hacking Team, an Italian company that's notorious for selling malware to any number of unsavory characters.

Federal records indicate that the DEA and Army purchased Hacking Team's Remote Control System (RCS) package. RCS is a rootkit, a software backdoor with lots of bells and whistles. It's a product that facilitates a covert foothold on infected machines so intruders can quietly make off with sensitive data. The aforementioned sensitive data includes encryption keys. ... Read more

Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Monday, May 11 [11:21]

HBO | John Oliver: Paid Family Leave (05/10/15) [12:20]

*TRNN | Jamie Henn Co-Founder of 350.org says: NOAA Warns Record High Levels of Co2 in the Atmosphere (05/11/15) [6:32]

TRNN | Vijay Prashad: Is Assad on the Brink of Defeat? (05/10/15) [7:21]

*TYT | More Proof Obama's TPP Deal Favors The Rich (05/10/15) [4:02]

TYT | Congress Quietly Made Insider Trading Legal... For Themselves (05/10/15) [6:48]

TYT | Top Election Regulator: I Have ZERO Power To Regulate Elections (05/10/15) [6:41]

TYT | Richest Congressman: The World Is Jealous Of Our Poor (05/10/15) [8:23]

RT | CrossTalk: Teetering Ukraine (05/11/15) [23:47]

The Meatless Monday Winner Even Carnivores Will Love
HP | author | 05/04/15

Watch Bernie Sanders Explain In 30 Seconds Why Elites Love Voter Apathy
AlterNet | Zaid Jilani | 05/08/15

American voter turnout has long lagged behind that of most countries. A new Pew survey released this month found that among developed countries the United States had higher voter turnout in the last national election than only Japan, Chile, and Switzerland: This lower voter turnout has consequences -- it is a well-established fact that the groups of people that do not vote tend to have more progressive views. Thus lower voter turnout tends to benefit conservative political parties. ... Read more
*Bernie Sanders Explains Why Elites Don't Want You To Vote (05/07/15) [0:23]

Americans Not In The Labor Force Rise To Record 93,194,000
ZeroHedge | author | 05/08/15

In what was an "unambiguously" unpleasant April jobs payrolls report, with a March revision dragging that month's job gain to the lowest level since June of 2012, the fact that the number of Americans not in the labor force rose once again, this time to 93,194K from 93,175K, with the result being a participation rate of 69.45 or just above the lowest percentage since 1977, will merely catalyze even more upside to the so called "market" which continues to reflect nothing but central bank liquidity, and thus - the accelerating deterioration of the broader economy. ... Read more
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There Will Be More Silence in the Face of Tyranny if We Continue to Look the Other Way
HP | Charles M. Sennott | 05/08/15

We will see more murders like the public beheading of the American freelance journalist James Foley, more messengers detained like the Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian who is being held on trumped up accusations in a Tehran prison simply for reporting the story of a changing Iran, and there will be more horrific attacks like the one at Charlie Hebdo in Paris.

This dark vision for the future will be our own fault if we allow the attack on journalism around the world to go unchecked for another decade, if we continue to look the other way and ignore how killing the messenger erodes democracy and threatens a free, open society. ... Read more

Man Loses Leg To Flesh-Eating Bacteria After Stepping In Gulf Of Mexico
HP & ABC | James Gerken | 05/07/15

When Zach Mody stepped into the Gulf of Mexico last month to take a photo of the sunset, the water splashed over his foot, which had a small cut on it. "I didn't think anything about it," he told local ABC-7 affiliate WZVN.

A physician assistant who spoke with WZVN offered a description of Mody's symptoms that closely matches an infection known as necrotizing fasciitis. It's not clear what specific type of bacteria Mody was exposed to, but according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, several types of bacteria can cause necrotizing fasciitis. Most commonly, the infection is caused by group A Streptococcus. Most cases of necrotizing fasciitis "occur randomly and are not linked to similar infections in others," the CDC explains. ... Read more

Deutsche Bank's Head Of Global Credit Strategy Explains Why "This Is Not Capitalism"
ZeroHedge | author | 05/07/15

"... part of the problem today is that over the last 15-20 years, capitalism has been propped up every time it's about to go through one of the cyclical creative destruction phases. Compounded up that's left us with a big mess to clear up across the globe and a lot of sub optimal resource allocation. So across a lot of the Western World we're left with too much debt, too much inequality, low real wage growth, limited conventional tools to help the economy to de-lever, QE and ZIRP and a political backlash against the mainstream." ... Read more

NSA Phone Surveillance Not Authorized, U.S. Appeals Court Says
HP & Reuters | author | 05/07/15

A federal appeals court on Thursday said a National Security Agency program that collected the records of millions of Americans' phone calls was not authorized by Congress.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said a lower court judge erred in dismissing a lawsuit challenging the program's constitutionality, and returned the case to the judge for further proceedings. It also upheld the denial of a preliminary injunction to block the collection of phone records under the program. ... Read more

The Big Bamboozle: 9/11 and the War on Terror

From the perspective of a Boeing 767 captain and former "special activities" contract pilot, Philip Marshall straps the reader into the cockpits of hijacked commercial airliners to tell the story of the most sophisticated terrorist attack in history. Based on a comprehensive ten-year study into the murders of his fellow pilots on 9/11, he explains how hijackers, novice pilots at the controls of massive guided missiles, were able to beat United States Air Force fighters to iconic targets with advanced maneuvering, daring speeds and a kamikaze finish. But, as Marshall explains, the tactical plan was so precise that it rules out car-bombers and shoe-bombers known as al Qaeda, KSM and Osama bin Laden. So then, who was it? That's what you are about learn. Backed by official NTSB, FAA and black box recordings, Marshall finds the most capable and most documented group of conspirators buried deep within a Congressional Inquiry's report and retraces their work in gripping detail. Fasten your seatbelt--- the sad truth is that all of the solid evidence points to a dark collaboration between members of the Bush Administration and a covert group of Saudi government officials. This is a game changer that will finally set the record straight on the most horrific crime in US history. ...

False Flag 911( How Bush Cheney and the Saudis Created the Post-911 World)

From the flight deck of a Boeing 767, airline captain Philip Marshall pulls back the veil of deception surrounding the 911 attacks. In gripping, authoritative detail he recreates the hijacked flights, including all their technical challenges, exploding the myths behind official accounts of pilot training and tactical planning. His finding: the mission could not have been carried out by any known terrorist group. Explaining for the first time the hijackers' mysterious trips to Las Vegas, where and how they could have been trained, and the document that actually states a political motive for the attacks, he finds abundant evidence implicating a nexus of Saudi officials, American contractors and, most unthinkably, members of the Bush administration. Analyzing 911 in terms of its original tactical plan, Marshall concludes that the attack partially failed, and that its failures could ultimately serve to bring the creators of the Post 911 World to light, if not to justice.

You Can't Point A Finger At Saudi Arabia, And Not Have 5 Fingers Pointing Back To The U.S.
opednews.com | Jon Gold | older, 01/23/15

For this article, I'm going to skip the partnerships between the CIA, Saudi Arabia, and the Pakistani ISI during the Afghanistan/Russia War to support the Mujahideen against the Soviet Union. Instead, I'm going to move past that time, and into the 90's where a lot of interesting things took place.

First, we'll take a look at what was called "Vulgar Betrayal" In 1996, "the most significant US government investigation into terrorist financing before 9/11, is launched. This investigation grows out of investigations Chicago FBI agent Robert Wright had begun in 1993, and Wright appears to be the driving force behind Vulgar Betrayal. ... Read more

Guess Who Owns $1.1 Billion In Apple Stock
ZeroHedge | author | 05/07/15

The Swiss National Bank had a rough quarter in Q1 as the decision to abandon the increasingly unsustainable EURCHF floor (an event which marked an implicit admission that central banks are not all-powerful after all) blew a $32 billion hole in the central bank's euro reserves.

More interesting than the massive loss was the line item in the SNB's balance sheet which shows that 18% of the bank's assets are held in foreign stocks. ... Read more
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The Texas Job Recession Is Now Literally "Off The Chart"
ZeroHedge | author |05/07/15

On one hand, the government's Department of Labor reported earlier today that in the past week just 265K people were laid off: the lowest number since early 2000. On the other, private data aggregator Challenger reported that in April, there were a whopping 61,582 job cuts, a 68% surge from March, and up 53% from a year ago. This was the highest monthly total since May 2012 and the highest April total since 2009! ... Read more
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IL Governor Rauner's Pal Made $625,000 Per Hour Last Year and Then Gave $10 Million to Rauner Campaign to Attack Unions and Cut Worker Pay
HP | Robert Creamer | 05/06/15

The New York Times reported yesterday that Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner's chief political backer, Ken Griffin, made $1.3 billion last year as manager of the hedge fund Citadel Capital. Griffin made as much personally as 26,000 average Americans making the median wage. He made as much as 16,000 civil engineers.

Griffin made $625,000 per hour. By the way, he also benefited from the federal tax law that allows hedge fund managers to pay a maximum of 20 percent tax rate on their income. That means that Griffin probably paid a lower income tax rate than his secretary.

Not only did Griffin donate $2.5 million to Rauner's campaign for governor. He also contributed millions to right-wing Super-PACs -- including one controlled by the notorious Charles and David Koch.

And he contributed $10 million -- half of a $20 million campaign war chest -- that Rauner plans to use to run opponents against members of the legislature who dare to oppose his policies that are aimed at destroying unions and cutting worker wages and pensions. Read more

Bernie Sanders To Introduce Bill To Break Up The Big Banks
HP & Reuters | author | 05/05/15

Bernie Sanders, a self-described socialist U.S. senator who has launched a bid for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, said on Tuesday he will introduce a bill to break up the biggest banks, a position far to the left of the party's front runner, Hillary Clinton.

Calls for Wall Street's largest firms to be cut down were numerous after taxpayers spent billions of dollars to prevent the financial system from collapse during the 2007-09 financial crisis, but they have since gradually died down. Under the Sanders proposal, regulators on the existing Financial Stability Oversight Council would compile a list of institutions that are 'too big to fail' and implicitly rely on government support during a crisis. ... Read more

On Flash Crash Anniversary Scapegoat Sarao Says "I Did Nothing Wrong Apart From Being Good At My Job"
ZeroHedge | author | 05/06/15

While the rest of the world, or at least 1% of it, is enjoying the ongoing "wealth effect" propping up the increasingly more rickety "markets" built on the backs of $22 trillion in central bank assets, or more than the GDP of the US and Japan combined, earlier today Nav was fighting if not for his life then certainly his freedom when he told a London court he had done nothing wrong, the Flash Crash was not his fault, and was just good at his job. "I've not done anything wrong apart from being good at my job. How is this allowed to go on, man?" Sarao said at Westminster Magistrates' Court. ... Read more

Samples of Israeli Horrific Brutality and War Criminality in Gaza
firstlook.org/theintercept/ | Glenn Greenwald | 05/05/15

The Israeli group Breaking the Silence issued a report this morning containing testimony from Israeli soldiers about the savagery and criminality committed by the Israeli military during the attack on Gaza last summer. The Independent has a good article describing the report's findings: "The Israeli military deliberately pounded civilian areas in the Gaza Strip with incessant fire of inaccurate ordinance" and "was at best indifferent about casualties among the Palestinian population." At best.

This should surprise nobody who paid any attention to the brutal Israeli destruction of Gaza or, for that matter, countless Israeli attacks before that. The U.N. has said that 7 out of 10 people killed by the Israelis were civilians, "including 1,462 civilians, among them 495 children and 253 women"; video of Israelis killing four Gazan boys as they played on a beach sickened anyone decent. ... Read more

*Why the Trans Pacific 'Trade Deal' Is a Terrible Deal for American Workers
AlterNet | Robert Reich | 05/03/15

Have we learned nothing from thirty years of failed trickle-down economics? By now we should know that when big corporations, Wall Street, and the wealthy get special goodies, the rest of us get shafted.

The Reagan and George W. Bush tax cuts of 1981, 2001, and 2003, respectively, were sold to America as ways to boost the economy and create jobs. They ended up boosting the take-home pay of those at the top. Most Americans saw no gains.

In fact, the long stagnation of American wages began with Reaganomics. Wages rose a bit under Bill Clinton, and then started plummeting again under George W. Bush. Trickle-down economics proved a cruel hoax. The new jobs created under Reagan and George W. Bush paid lousy wages, the old jobs paid even less, and we ended up with whopping federal budget deficits. ... Read more

*US Trade Deficit Soars To Worst Since Financial Crisis; Will Push Q1 GDP Negative
ZeroHedge | author | 05/05/15

After shrinking notably in Feb, March's US Trade deficit exploded. Against expectations of a $41.7bn deficit, the US generated a $51.4bn deficit - the worst since Oct 2008 and the biggest miss on record. Exports rose just $1.6bn while imports soared $17.1bn with the goods deficit with China soaring from $27.3bn to $37.8bn in March. Ironically, just as the "harsh winter" was found to lead to a GDP boost due to a surge in utility spending, so the West Coast port strike which was blamed for the GDP drop, was actually benefiting the US economy as it lead to a plunge in imports. In March, however, the pipeline was cleared, and US imports from China soared by over $10 billion to $38 billion. End result: prepare for upcoming Q1 GDP downgrades into negative territory. .... Read more

Greek Deal In Limbo After "Serious Disagreement" Between EU, IMF
ZeroHedge | author | 05/05/15

On the heels of Monday's news that the IMF may demand a write-off of Greek debt by European creditors before the organization will disburse its portion of a €7.2 billion aid tranche to Athens, it now appears the situation has deteriorated further with unnamed Greek officials reporting "serious disagreements" between the IMF and the EU which may make a compromise "impossible" by the critical May 12 deadline. ... Read more

The Obscene Amounts of Money the 10 Highest-Paid Hedge Fund Managers Just Made
AlterNet | Michael Arria | 05/05/15

Alpha Magazine has released its "Rich List," the annual rundown of the Unites States' highest-earning hedge fund managers and there's an interesting development. The top earners underwent a 45% drop in earnings during 2014, which prompted the magazine to invoke, "harsh memories of the global financial crisis [that] pervaded Wall Street."

Yes, the top hedge fund managers only pulled down a "paltry" $11.62 billion combined in 2014, around the same amount they were able to bag in 2008 and only a little more than half of what they generated in 2013. Head of Appaloosa Management David Tepper fell from Number 1 to 11th, taking in a "mere" $400 million. "In total, it was a rough year for hedge fund industry honchos," Jeff Cox wrote at CNBC.

How The NSA Converts Spoken Words Into Searchable Text
firstlook.org/theintercept/ | Dan Froomkin | 05/05/15

Top-secret documents from the archive of former NSA contractor Edward Snowden show the National Security Agency can now automatically recognize the content within phone calls by creating rough transcripts and phonetic representations that can be easily searched and stored.

The documents show NSA analysts celebrating the development of what they called "Google for Voice" nearly a decade ago. Though perfect transcription of natural conversation apparently remains the Intelligence Community's "holy grail," the Snowden documents describe extensive use of keyword searching as well as computer programs designed to analyze and "extract" the content of voice conversations, and even use sophisticated algorithms to flag conversations of interest. ... Read more

Bill Gross: "This Is All Ending"
ZeroHedge | author | 05/04/15

"When does our credit based financial system sputter / break down? When investable assets pose too much risk for too little return. Not immediately, but at the margin, credit and stocks begin to be exchanged for figurative and sometimes literal money in a mattress." We are approaching that point now as bond yields, credit spreads and stock prices have brought financial wealth forward to the point of exhaustion. A rational investor must indeed have a sense of an ending, not another Lehman crash, but a crush of perpetual bull market enthusiasm. ... Read more

Path to Paradise - The Untold Story of the World Trade Center Bombing [VHS]

An HBO production, amazing actors, superb dialog. A bomb-making expert from Iraq attempts entry to the U.S. without a visa. He states he's leaving Iraq for political asylum in the U.S. The INS agent questions him a bit, looks over his fishy looking passport. She approaches her superior with the asylum application and urges that "he should be detained". "Jails are full. You want to take him home?" her boss retorts. The film shows just how these terrorists jumped through about any and every loophole in the system under the guise of religious freedom. Bomb-making right in the apartment. Operating right under the nose of the FBI and other law enforcement agencies. Anti-American propaganda tapes found in an apartment which, truth be told, is not against the law. And of course there was the chilling prophetic line at the end: "Next time we'll bring them both down." ... Read more

How to Solve America's Biggest Problems with Bernie Sanders!
How to Solve America's Biggest Problems with Bernie Sanders!
Austin Indymedia | author | 04/11/15

Ben Carson Is Running for President. Read These 6 Stories About Him Now.
MotherJones | Sam Brodey | 05/04/15

The doctor is in: Conservative darling Dr. Ben Carson officially announced that he's running for president on Sunday in interviews with TV stations in Ohio and Florida. On Monday, he's expected to address supporters in his hometown of Detroit. He will be the fourth Republican to officially enter the race, joining Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), and Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

Carson's candidacy is the culmination of months of fundraising and advocacy by grassroots activists anxious for him to run for president. Carson, a former head of neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University whose unlikely rise was the subject of a cable TV movie, has never before held elected office. He is popular among DC-loathing tea partiers and Christian conservatives, but his political inexperience and past gaffes will likely make it difficult for him to win over the GOP establishment. ... Read more

Future President Ben Carson Wrote 6 Books. We Read Them So You Don't Have To.
MotherJones | Tim Murphy | 01/27/15

Former neurosurgeon Ben Carson rallied Republicans at the Iowa Freedom Summit on Saturday, stirring up speculation once more that the conservative activist will seek his party's presidential nomination next year. Carson has never run for office and only recently registered as a Republican, but as the author of six books over more than two decades, he does have a considerable paper trail--and it's starting to get him into trouble. ... Read more

Climate Desk | Mapping Deforestation with Google Earth (older, but good) [1:08]

16 Signs That The Economy Has Stalled Out And The Next Economic Downturn Is Here
ZeroHedge | author | 05/01/15

If U.S. economic growth falls any lower, we are officially going to be in recession territory. On Wednesday, we learned that U.S. GDP grew at a 0.2 percent annual rate in the first quarter of 2015. That was much lower than all of the "experts" were projecting. And of course there are all sorts of questions whether the GDP numbers the government feeds us are legitimate anyway. According to John Williams of shadowstats.com, if honest numbers were used they would show that U.S. GDP growth has been continuously negative since 2005. ...

Brace for a flood of foreclosures when boom-era HELOCs turn 10
msn.com | Jerry Kronenberg | 04/27/15

Millions of Americans will soon see monthly bills shoot up on home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) taken out during the housing boom, because HELOCs are going to start making homeowners pay both interest and principal, not just interest. That's bad news because many consumers are already underwater, meaning they owe more than their places are worth, a RealtyTrac study shows.

"A lot of people were using their homes as ATMs during the bubble, and that -- coupled with the fact that home values have since gone down -- has backed a lot of them into a corner," says Daren Blomquist of RealtyTrac, which recently analyzed home equity lines of credit on millions of properties. ... Read more

How Shale Is Becoming The Dot-Com Bubble Of The 21st Century
ZeroHedge | author | 05/01/15

As I review the financials of one of the largest shale producers in the United States, Whiting Petroleum (WLL), I can't help but notice the parallels to the .COM era of 1999 which, to some extent, has already returned to the technology and biotech sectors of today. Back then, the faster you burned cash to capture customers regardless of earnings to drive your topline, the higher your valuation. The theory was that after capturing the customers (in energy today, it is the wells) spending would slow and so would customer additions allowing companies to generate cash. By the way, a classic recent case is none other than Netflix (NFLX) which, in the past was exposed for accounting gimmicks that continue even today.

What is worse is WLL continues to grow production even though prices have collapsed and cash generation is in decline. In fact, year over year cash generated from operations fell 30% despite production growing some 70% plus percent. Does this sound like a company you want to invest in or like one that is run efficiently? So, let's review: .com companies did the same and the majority went bankrupt so if WLL and other E&P companies continue to spend cash well above their operation capacity, not because they want to but because they have to, it will lead to the same result as it did in 2000... POP! ... Read more

The Uncounted; World Bank-Backed Energy Giant Threatens A Way Of Life
HP | Barry Yeoman | 05/01/15

The Tata group, one of India's largest conglomerates, promised to be a good neighbor when it took on the job of building the nation's first "ultra mega" coal-fired power plant. ICIJ and The Huffington Post estimate that 3.4 million people have been physically or economically displaced by World Bank-backed projects since 2004. For email updates on our investigation, sign up below. The plan was to build the plant along the Gulf of Kutch, an inlet of the Arabian Sea that provides a living for fishing clans that harvest the coast's rich marine life. Tata assured the World Bank Group, which was putting up $450 million to help finance the project, that there was little reason to worry about the giant plant's impact on people living and working nearby.

Tata reported that "the fishing potential of the Gulf of Kutch is significant," but there were "no local fishing activities in the coastal waters fronting the project." The "nearest small fishing community," it said, was located "outside the project area." ... Read more

Chernobyl Fallout 25: Pripyat, Nuclear Ghost Town (04/26/11) [26:14]