Occupy Banksters & Crony Capitalism & GREED

A Slow-Motion Disaster: One Community's Fight To Save Itself From Climate Change
ThinkProgress.org | Kiley Kroh | 09/25/13

"We are here to ask for your help," said Paul Fraim, Mayor of Norfolk, Virginia. "It is a threat we can no longer ignore."   Fraim was speaking to a group of elected officials and emergency planners earlier this month. The focus of their discussion: the state's lack of action on climate change, particularly as it pertains to sea level rise.

Sea level rise is a slow-moving threat that presents a tremendous risk to some of the world's most heavily-populated regions. For Fraim and his fellow residents of the Tidewater area, sea level rise isn't a problem for the distant future -- it's impacting their everyday lives right now. ... Read more

BP Oil Spill Damaged Sea-Floor Life for Miles in Gulf of Mexico
wunderground.com | Janet McConnaughey | 09/26/13

The vast 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill damaged the tiny animals that live on the sea floor for about 57 square miles around the blown-out BP oil well, with severe damage in about nine square miles of that area, says a researcher from Texas A&M-Corpus Christi.   Pollution and damage to animal life was severe nearly two miles from the wellhead and identifiable more than 10 miles away, Paul Montagna wrote in a report published Tuesday in the online journal PLOS One. ... Read more

Tracking the BP Oil Spill in the Gulf
NYTimes | author | 08/02/10 older
Interactive BP Oil Spill - Read more

Oil spill growing in the Gulf
USA Today | author | 05/19/10 older
Interactive BP Oil Spill - Read more

Nine Stories The Press Is Underreporting -- Fraud, Fraud And More Fraud
HP | Dan Froomkin | 10/20/10, updated 05/25/11

Bill Black articles, older but lots of facts!

... What we are seeing all around us are the continued effects of a vast criminal enterprise that has never been brought to account, employing a process that, as University of Texas economist James Galbraith explains, involved the equivalent of counterfeiting, laundering and fencing.

So the person with the right expertise to lead us here is a criminologist -- in particular William K. Black, one of the few effective regulators in recent history (during the savings and loan crisis of the late 1980s), a notorious knocker of heads and currently professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and author of the book, "The Best Way to Rob a Bank Is to Own One". ... Read more

"A Scam Of Unmatchable Balls And Cruelty" - Matt Taibbi On Wall Street's "Triple-Fucking Of Ordinary People"
ZeroHedge | author | 09/27/13

"This is the third act in an improbable triple-fucking of ordinary people that Wall Street is seeking to pull off as a shocker epilogue to the crisis era. Five years ago this fall, an epidemic of fraud and thievery in the financial-services industry triggered the collapse of our economy. The resultant loss of tax revenue plunged states everywhere into spiraling fiscal crises, and local governments suffered huge losses in their retirement portfolios -- remember, these public pension funds were some of the most frequently targeted suckers upon whom Wall Street dumped its fraud-riddled mortgage-backed securities in the pre-crash years.... It's a scam of almost unmatchable balls and cruelty, accomplished with the aid of some singularly spineless politicians. And it hasn't happened overnight. This has been in the works for decades, and the fighting has been dirty all the way." ... Read more
Matt Taibbi's article "Looting the Pension Funds"

Shutdown Would Shave U.S. Growth as Much as 1.4 Percentage Points in Q4
Bloomberg | Jeanna Smialek | 09/27/13

A shutdown of the U.S. government would reduce fourth-quarter economic growth by as much as 1.4 percentage points depending on its length, economists say, as government workers from park rangers to telephone receptionists are furloughed.

Mark Zandi of Moody's Analytics Inc. estimates a three-to-four week shutdown would cut growth by 1.4 points. Zandi projects a 2.5 percent annualized pace of fourth-quarter growth without a shutdown. A two-week shutdown starting Oct. 1 could cut growth by 0.3 percentage point to a 2.3 percent rate, according to St. Louis-based Macroeconomic Advisers LLC. ... Read more

Soros Adviser Turned Lawmaker Sees Crisis by 2020: Japan Credit
Bloomberg | Mariko Ishikawa | 09/27/13

Takeshi Fujimaki, a former adviser to billionaire George Soros and now a member of Japan's upper house of parliament, said a fiscal crisis in Asia's second-biggest economy is inevitable and neither a higher sales tax nor the 2020 Olympics will be able to stop it.

"I decided to become a politician because I think financial crisis will come sooner or later," Fujimaki said in a Sept. 24 interview in Tokyo. "This total debt will continue to increase. I don't think Japan can survive until 2020." Read more

Wealth Inequality, visualization

Anxiety Disorders

Looting the Pension Funds of Public Workers
Rolling Stone | Matt Taibbi | 09/26/13

In the final months of 2011, almost two years before the city of Detroit would shock America by declaring bankruptcy in the face of what it claimed were insurmountable pension costs, the state of Rhode Island took bold action to avert what it called its own looming pension crisis. Led by its newly elected treasurer, Gina Raimondo – an ostentatiously ambitious 42-year-old Rhodes scholar and former venture capitalist – the state declared war on public pensions, ramming through an ingenious new law slashing benefits of state employees with a speed and ferocity seldom before seen by any local government.

Called the Rhode Island Retirement Security Act of 2011, her plan would later be hailed as the most comprehensive pension reform ever implemented. The rap was so convincing at first that the overwhelmed local burghers of her little petri-dish state didn't even know how to react. "She's Yale, Harvard, Oxford – she worked on Wall Street," says Paul Doughty, the current president of the Providence firefighters union. "Nobody wanted to be the first to raise his hand and admit he didn't know what the fuck she was talking about." ... Read more

Obamacare: The Most Polarizing Legislation In The History Of Congress?
ZeroHedge | author | 09/26/13

While everyone knows that there is a profound ideological schism when it comes to those for and against the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, what may not be appreciated is that Obamacare was, and still is, the most contentious and polarizing legislation in the history of Congress. At least, it is according to JPMorgan. ... Read more
Obamacare - Click to zoom

Bank Of England Experiencing Technical Difficulties
ZeroHedge | author | 09/26/13

When markets break, nobody cares: after all central banks are there to protect everyone and remove all risk. But... what happens when a central bank fail? Just relesed by the BOE: News Release – Statement from the Bank of England

The Bank has been experiencing some technical IT problems today. There is no impact on critical payment and settlement services. Alternative procedures are in place where necessary. The Bank is acting to resolve these problems as soon as possible. Read more

5 Enemies of Diplomacy Hell-Bent On Sabotaging Peace Between America and Iran
AlterNet | Alex Kane | 09/25/13

Will the new Iranian president's diplomatic opening survive the onslaught from detractors like Israel, Saudi Arabia and members of the U.S. Congress?

The new Iranian leader’s diplomatic moves have brought hope to those searching for an end to hostility between Iran and the U.S. In the days leading up to the annual gathering of world leaders in New York, Iranian president Hassan Rouhani proclaimed to NBC News that Iran would not seek nuclear weapons under any circumstances and penned a Washington Post op-ed in which he declared, “I’m committed to fulfilling my promises to my people, including my pledge to engage in constructive interaction with the world.” ... Read more

Truthdigger of the Week: Greg Palast
TruthDigger | Alexander Reed Kelly | 09/22/13

... Summers is undeniably right. More direction from the man whose performance in Clinton's Treasury department helped create the 2008 economic crisis and the ongoing horrors that followed runs directly against the interests of all Americans, including those in the ruling and owning class. But I and many others were looking forward to a hearing to confirm Summers. Why? Because as the Indian news service Niti Central may have been the first to point out, Summers could have been asked to publicly explain the meaning of a secret 1997 Treasury memo (viewable here) reminding him to pick up a phone and reassure the most powerful CEOs in the world that plans to tear apart laws protecting the economies of 156 nations from predatory bankers were going ahead as scheduled. ... Read more

AIG CEO Compares Anger At Wall Street Bonuses To The Lynching Of Black People In The South
ZeroHedge | Michael Krieger | 09/24/13

Over 360,000 Gun Deaths Since 9/11 -- From the Outside It Looks Like America Is a Country Gripped by Civil War
AlterNet | Henry Porter | 09/24/13

... The annual toll from firearms in the US is running at 32,000 deaths and climbing, even though the general crime rate is on a downward path (it is 40% lower than in 1980). If this perennial slaughter doesn't qualify for intercession by the UN and all relevant NGOs, it is hard to know what does. ...

... That's America, we say, as news of the latest massacre breaks -- last week it was the slaughter of 12 people by Aaron Alexis at Washington DC's navy yard -- and move on. But what if we no longer thought of this as just a problem for America and, instead, viewed it as an international humanitarian crisis -- a quasi civil war, if you like, that calls for outside intervention? As citizens of the world, perhaps we should demand an end to the unimaginable suffering of victims and their families -- the maiming and killing of children -- just as America does in every new civil conflict around the globe. ... Read more

The government is watching you

The Shadow Commander
NewYorker | Dexter Filkins | 09/30/13

Qassem Suleimani is the Iranian operative who has been reshaping the Middle East. Now he's directing Assad's war in Syria.

Last February, some of Iran's most influential leaders gathered at the Amir al-Momenin Mosque, in northeast Tehran, inside a gated community reserved for officers of the Revolutionary Guard. They had come to pay their last respects to a fallen comrade. Hassan Shateri, a veteran of Iran's covert wars throughout the Middle East and South Asia, was a senior commander in a powerful, élite branch of the Revolutionary Guard called the Quds Force. The force is the sharp instrument of Iranian foreign policy, roughly analogous to a combined C.I.A. and Special Forces; its name comes from the Persian word for Jerusalem, which its fighters have promised to liberate. Since 1979, its goal has been to subvert Iran's enemies and extend the country's influence across the Middle East. Shateri had spent much of his career abroad, first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq, where the Quds Force helped Shiite militias kill American soldiers. ... Read more

Majority of Americans say banks, large corporations benefitted most from U.S. economic policies
Pew Reasearch Center | Bruce Drake | 09/20/13

The public sees clear winners and losers as a result of the government's economic policies following the recession that began in 2008.

In the public's view, the beneficiaries of these policies are large banks and financial institutions, large corporations and wealthy people, according to a survey conducted earlier this month. Sizable majorities say government policies have helped all three at least a fair amount -- 69% say that about large banks and financial institutions, 67% large corporations and 59% wealthy people. ... Read more

The Five Craziest Arguments At Wednesday's Climate Hearing
ThinkProgress.org | Ryan Koronowski | 09/19/13

On Wednesday, EPA administrator Gina McCarthy and Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz testified before a subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee about the impact of President Obama's Climate Action Plan. The Republican side of the dais argued against doing anything about carbon pollution, but they also spent much of their time focused on inaccuracies and misconceptions about climate change.

McCarthy and Moniz, central to the president's climate plan, did their best to explain it to the assembled members. Ranking member Henry Waxman (D-CA) said this was the "first time in a long time that this committee is holding a hearing on climate change" and instead of addressing the urgency of action, GOP members wasted time complaining about how many cabinet-level officials showed up, for example. ...

Climate Change Devastating Ocean Fisherman: 'Sometimes We'll Catch 5,000 Pounds Of Jellyfish'
ThinkProgress.org | Katie Valentine | 09/24/13

For many U.S. fisherman, there's no debate about climate change. It's here, and already majorly impacting their industries.

In New Jersey, Rutgers scientists have documented for 24 years how climate change is affecting the state's oceans through weekly fish surveys. The researchers are finding fewer and fewer northern species and more and more southern species -- fish like the Atlantic croaker, which historically have rarely ventured into the cool waters surrounding New Jersey. Mackerel and clams, which were once common, are now moving north, forcing fisherman to reevaluate what they fish for.   "As far as fishermen are concerned, climate change is here. ... Read more

Extreme Energy Extraction Roadtrip -- The Scary Ways We're Ruining the Country to Get Fossil Fuels
AlterNet | Tara Lohan | 09/11/13

The view from a Cessna reveals some dirty secrets. Flying at 2,000 feet above the forests of Appalachia I can see what the steep, tree-fringed roads fail to show: unnatural flat tops, seams of coal exposed like black-topped runways, impoundments of foul water perched above homes and schools. A naked honesty is revealed. This is what we have done, what we continue to do. We deface the mountains, denature ecosystems.

This is probably not news to you. Appalachia has long been one of the centers of American energy extraction, a place whose history is almost synonymous with coal. Since the 1830s the region has shoveled 35 billion tons of coal into the furnace of our economy. This is often called "cheap" energy and, at $100/megawatt-hour, it is -- as long as you don't look too closely. ... Read more

Egypt Bans Muslim Brotherhood
AP | author | 09/23/13

An Egyptian court has banned the Muslim Brotherhood group and ordered its assets confiscated in a dramatic escalation of a crackdown by the military-backed government against supporters of the ousted Islamist president Mohammed Morsi.

The Brotherhood was outlawed for most of its 85 years in existence. But after the 2011 ouster of autocrat Hosni Mubarak, it was allowed to work openly, formed a political party and rose to power in a string of post-Mubarak elections. In March, it registered as a recognized non-governmental organization. ... Read more

*7 in 10 Americans Think Government Is For The Banks And Big Corps (Not The People)
Zero Hedge | author | 09/20/13

72% of the poor and 71% of the middle-class believe government policies (fiscal and monetary) have done little or nothing to help them. Of course, this will be eschewed by the academics (as Santelli recently exclaimed regarding the arrogance of the intellectuals) because "the people" just don't get it. But when 69% of all Americans, according a new Pew study, say large banks and financial institutions have benefited the most from post-recession government policies; communications policies are going badly awry. Despite a surging stock market, exploding home prices, and low rates spurring all kinds of subprime auto loan exuberance, there has been little change in these perceptions since July 2010. ... Read more

How Goldman secretly bet on the U.S. housing crash
McClatchy | Greg Gordon | 11/01/19 old but interesting

In 2006 and 2007, Goldman Sachs Group peddled more than $40 billion in securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages, but never told the buyers it was secretly betting that a sharp drop in U.S. housing prices would send the value of those securities plummeting.

Goldman's sales and its clandestine wagers, completed at the brink of the housing market meltdown, enabled the nation's premier investment bank to pass most of its potential losses to others before a flood of mortgage defaults staggered the U.S. and global economies.   Only later did investors discover that what Goldman had promoted as triple-A rated investments were closer to junk. ... Read more

*Lawrence Wilkerson, Former Colin Powell Aide, Blasts McCain, Graham: 'Bordering On Being Traitors'
HP | Peter Finocchiaro | 09/22/13

... Wilkerson, a retired Army colonel, served as as Colin Powell's chief of staff during the lead-up to the Iraq invasion in 2003, when Powell served as Secretary of State. He has since become a vocal critic of the Bush administration's foreign policy.

During a recent interview with The Real News Network, Wilkerson took aim at McCain and Graham for what he saw as similarly aggressive postures toward negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program. Asked what were the biggest obstacles to a deal, Wilkerson first named Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose "extremely right-wing government" Wilkerson accused of being too inflexible. ... Read more

CHICAGO CARNAGE: 13 SHOT ON BASKETBALL COURT
HP | author | 09/20/13

Thirteen people, including a 3-year-old boy, were shot on Thursday night in a park on Chicago's South Side, the Chicago Tribune reported.   The shootings reportedly occurred at a basketball court in Cornell Square Park in the city's Back of the Yards neighborhood. ... Read more

7 in 10 Americans Think Government Is For The Banks And Big Corps (Not The People)
Zero Hedge | author | 09/20/13

72% of the poor and 71% of the middle-class believe government policies (fiscal and monetary) have done little or nothing to help them. Of course, this will be eschewed by the academics (as Santelli recently exclaimed regarding the arrogance of the intellectuals) because "the people" just don't get it. But when 69% of all Americans, according a new Pew study, say large banks and financial institutions have benefited the most from post-recession government policies; communications policies are going badly awry. Despite a surging stock market, exploding home prices, and low rates spurring all kinds of subprime auto loan exuberance, there has been little change in these perceptions since July 2010. ... Read more

Fukushima Earthquake 2013: Quake Reported Near Damaged Nuclear Plant
HP | author | 09/19/13

RT reports a moderate earthquake has struck near the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan. A 5.3-magnitude earthquake has hit the Japanese prefecture that is home to the nuclear power plant crippled in the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami.   The U.S. Geological Survey says the quake struck early Friday at a depth of about 13 miles (22 kilometers) under Fukushima Prefecture and about 110 miles (177 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo.   The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center did not issue an alert. ... Read more

The Dead Rhetoric of War
Truthdig.com |Chris Hedges | 09/16/13

The intoxication of war, fueled by the euphoric nationalism that swept through the country like a plague following the attacks of 9/11, is a spent force in the United States. The high-blown rhetoric of patriotism and national destiny, of the sacred duty to reshape the world through violence, to liberate the enslaved and implant democracy in the Middle East, has finally been exposed as empty and meaningless ...

... It was only an insightful question by a reporter, and an offhand remark by Kerry that opened the door to a Russian initiative, providing the Obama administration a swift exit from its mindless bellicosity and what would have been a humiliating domestic defeat. ...

... Twelve long years of fruitless war in Afghanistan and another 10 in Iraq have left the public wary of the lies of politicians, sick of the endless violence of empire and unwilling to continue to pump trillions of dollars into a war machine that has made a small cabal of defense contractors and arms manufacturers such as Raytheon and Halliburton huge profits while we are economically and politically hollowed out from the inside. The party is over. ... Read more

The Startling Size of US Military Operations in Africa
MotherJones | Nick Turse | 09/06/13

The Pentagon's Africa Command will tell you there's one military base on the entire continent. Don't believe them.

They're involved in Algeria and Angola, Benin and Botswana, Burkina Faso and Burundi, Cameroon and the Cape Verde Islands. And that's just the ABCs of the situation. Skip to the end of the alphabet and the story remains the same: Senegal and the Seychelles, Togo and Tunisia, Uganda and Zambia. From north to south, east to west, the Horn of Africa to the Sahel, the heart of the continent to the islands off its coasts, the US military is at work. Base construction, security cooperation engagements, training exercises, advisory deployments, special operations missions, and a growing logistics network, all undeniable evidence of expansion--except at US Africa Command. ... Read more

Tiny Home Assembled In Just One Day Has A Big Surprise Inside
HP | Shana Ecker | 09/17/13

Sometimes a home's exterior can be, well, misleading. And usually that's a bad thing, but sometimes there is an exception. That's the case with the portable home ÁPH80 designed by Spanish architecture firm Ábaton. From the back, the simple construction of a grey cement board gives it the appearance of a garden shed, but step around to the front and you'll see this jewel box of a tiny home in full glory. ... Read more
Tiny House - Click to zoom

Secret Quarter-Billion-Dollar Koch Brothers Political Operation Revealed
AlterNet & Politico.com | Steven Rosenfeld | 09/12/13

Politico.com, the Washington insider website, has the money-in-politics scoop of the year: It has unmasked a previously unknown political money laundering operation, set up by the energy billionaires and libertarian Koch brothers, that raised $256 million and secretly spent almost all of it last year against Democrats.

"The group has about 200 donors, each paying at least $100,000 in annual dues," Politico reported, saying Freedom Partners would soon be filing papers with the IRS disclosing its existence. "It raised $256 million in the year after its creation in November 2011, the [IRS] document shows. And it made grants of $236 million--meaning a totally unknown group was the largest sugar daddy for conservative groups in the last election, second in total spending only to Karl Rove's American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS, which together spent about $300 million." ... Read more

Underpaid 83-Year-Old Professor Died Trying to Make Ends Meet by Working Night Shift at Eat an' Save
AlterNet | Daniel Kovalik | 09/18/13

On Aug. 16, I received a call from a very upset Margaret Mary. She told me that she was under an incredible amount of stress. She was receiving radiation therapy for the cancer that had just returned to her, she was living nearly homeless because she could not afford the upkeep on her home ...

... Meanwhile, I called Adult Protective Services right after talking to Margaret Mary, and I explained the situation. I said that she had just been let go from her job as a professor at Duquesne, that she was given no severance or retirement benefits, and that the reason she was having trouble taking care of herself was because she was living in extreme poverty. The caseworker paused and asked with incredulity, "She was a professor?" I said yes. The case- worker was shocked; this was not the usual type of person for whom she was called in to help. ...

... As amazing as it sounds, Margaret Mary, a 25-year professor, was not making ends meet. Even during the best of times, when she was teaching three classes a semester and two during the summer, she was not even clearing $25,000 a year, and she received absolutely no health care benefits. Compare this to the salary of Duquesne's president, who makes more than $700,000 with full benefits. ... Read more

6 Things You Need to Know About the Woman Who May Soon Be the Most Powerful Economist on Earth
AlterNet | Lynn Stuart Parramore | 09/18/13

With Larry Summers knocked out of the running for Federal Reserve chair, attention has turned to Janet Yellen, considered his main rival for the job. So far, what most Americans know about her is that she is not Larry Summers, which is no small point. Summers is a crony capitalist with strong ties to Wall Street, a history of poor judgment and multiple conflicts of interest that make him uniquely unsuited to lead the Fed. That he will not should be a relief to all. But who is Yellen in her own right?

Druckenmiller Blasts "The Biggest Redistribution Of Wealth From The Poor To The Rich Ever"
ZeroHedge | author | 09/19/13

Reflecting on exactly what was said yesterday, Duquesne's Stanley Druckenmiller is initially perplexed as Bernanke explained 'financial conditions' - not interest rates - have prompted the decision to forestall any taper. His confusion is that financial conditions are actually slightly better than they were in June and "a stock market at an all-time high would suggest we don't have a problem with financial conditions." ...

... At 15:00 min, he explains how this is the biggest redistribution of wealth from the middle class and the poor to the rich ever - "who owns assets" he asks rhetorically... Read more

Druckenmiller Blasts "The Biggest Redistribution Of Wealth From The Poor To The Rich Ever" (short version) (09/19/13) [2:00]

The 1% Took an Even Bigger Slice of the Pie in 2012
Time Magazine | Denver Nicks | 09/10/13

The richest 1% of Americans collected a greater share of household income last year than at any time in the last century, according to a new analysis of IRS data going back to 1913.

In 2012, 19.3% of all household income in the U.S. went to the top 1% of earners, their greatest share since 1928. Incomes for the top 1% rose nearly 20% last year, while incomes for the remaining 99% increased by just 1%. ... Read more
Wealth Inequality - Click to zoom

There Have Been More Mass Shootings Since Newtown Than You've Heard About
HP | Katy Hall | 09/17/13

When 13 people died in a shooting rampage at the Navy Yard in Washington, D.C., on Monday, the story made front page news. Many of the mass shootings that have happened since the massacre of elementary school students and teachers in Newtown, Conn., last December didn't.

The FBI's definition of mass murder is the slaying of four or more people. There have been at least 17 such tragedies already this year where the victims were gunned down, but shootings related to drug or gang violence often get less attention than those perpetrated by a crazed gunman. ... Read more
US Mass Shooting - Click to zoom

We've Had So Many Mass Shootings In The U.S., We've Had To Redefine The Term
HP | Nick Wing | 09/17/13

... Monday's violence marked the sixth mass shooting since the one in Newtown, Conn., in December, according to some counts. It was also the first publicly recognized by Obama since the elementary school massacre, which claimed the lives of 27, including 20 children.   There have been six mass shootings over the past nine months -- and at least 20 during Obama's presidency. That may be disturbing. But some would argue even that startling figure grossly underreports the number of shooting sprees.

The growing number of mass killings over the past five years left the country in search of a term that would distinguish mass murder by gun from those using other weapons. Mass shooting has gained favor as the obvious choice. Though the FBI doesn't specifically define mass shooting, it does define mass murder, calling it a single incident in which a perpetrator kills four or more people, not including himself or herself. ... Read more

Bernanke Saves Companies $700 Billion as Verizon Leads Sales
Bloomberg | Lisa Abramowicz | 09/18/13

America's companies, from Apple Inc. (AAPL) to Verizon Communications Inc., are saving about $700 billion in interest payments with the Federal Reserve's unprecedented stimulus. ... Read more

What Happened At The Last Big Fed Announcement
ZeroHedge | author | 09/18/13

Judging by the market's reaction to the June FOMC statement and press-conference, Nanex shows the four things that US market participants can expect to happen over the next few hours:

Grand Theft Auto V Is the Most Expensive Game Ever--and It's Almost Obsolete
BusinessWeek | Joshua Brustein | 09/18/13

The release of Grand Theft Auto V yesterday brought to the forefront an apocalyptic scenario. The end-times theme isn't part of the blockbuster video game's setting, a fictionalized Los Angeles that's havoc-filled but otherwise enduring. The apocalypse is part of the non-pixelated reality for gamers living through the final weeks in the eight-year reign of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. ... Read more

25 Fast Facts About The Federal Reserve
ZeroHedge | author | 09/16/13

The Fed is the biggest Ponzi scheme in the history of the world, and if the American people truly understood how it really works, they would be screaming for it to be abolished immediately.

Amid the 100 year anniversary of the creation of the Federal Reserve, it is absolutely imperative that the American people understand that the Fed is at the very heart of our economic problems. It is a system of money that was created by the bankers and that operates for the benefit of the bankers. The American people like to think that we have a "democratic system", but there is nothing "democratic" about the Federal Reserve. ... Read more
FED - Federal Reserve - Click to zoom
Federal Reserve

The 1% Took an Even Bigger Slice of the Pie in 2012
Time Magazine | Denver Nicks | 09/10/13

The richest 1% of Americans collected a greater share of household income last year than at any time in the last century, according to a new analysis of IRS data going back to 1913.

In 2012, 19.3% of all household income in the U.S. went to the top 1% of earners, their greatest share since 1928. Incomes for the top 1% rose nearly 20% last year, while incomes for the remaining 99% increased by just 1%. ... Read more

Richest 1 percent earn biggest share since '20s
AP | Paul Wiseman | 09/10/13

The gulf between the richest 1 percent and the rest of America is the widest it's been since the Roaring '20s.   The very wealthiest Americans earned more than 19 percent of the country's household income last year - their biggest share since 1928, the year before the stock market crash. And the top 10 percent captured a record 48.2 percent of total earnings last year.

U.S. income inequality has been growing for almost three decades. And it grew again last year, according to an analysis of Internal Revenue Service figures dating to 1913 by economists at the University of California, Berkeley, the Paris School of Economics and Oxford University. ... Read more

*Government Agencies Rearranging Deck Chairs on the Titanic: Why there has only been cosmetic solutions to banking crisis (09/16/13) [35:11]

*Government Agencies Rearranging Deck Chairs on the Titanic: Why there has only been cosmetic solutions to banking crisis, Part 2 (09/16/13) [1:33:24]

*PBS Frontline | The Warning, Brookley Born (10/13/09) [55:16]

*Inside Job - The Movie, by Charles Ferguson [1:48:27]

The 1% Took an Even Bigger Slice of the Pie in 2012
Time Magazine | Denver Nicks | 09/10/13

The richest 1% of Americans collected a greater share of household income last year than at any time in the last century, according to a new analysis of IRS data going back to 1913.

In 2012, 19.3% of all household income in the U.S. went to the top 1% of earners, their greatest share since 1928. Incomes for the top 1% rose nearly 20% last year, while incomes for the remaining 99% increased by just 1%. ... Read more

25 percent of New Jersey residents living in poverty
Channel 7 News | author | 09/09/13

The study released Sunday by the Legal Services of New Jersey Poverty Research Institute concludes that more than two million people in New Jersey are struggling to meet their basic needs. Their numbers have increased since the beginning of the economic recession by more than 300,000. ... Read more

Syria Conflict Indicates Armageddon, Say One Third Of Americans
HP | author | 09/14/13

Most things aren't really the end of the world, but one-third of Americans who were surveyed believe that the Syria conflict is an indication that our days are numbered. A biblical passage which prophesies the destruction of Damascus and links it to the coming of Armageddon is leading many people to think that the current violence is an apocalyptic omen.

A LifeWay Research poll asked 1,001 people if they agreed with the statement, "I believe the battles in Syria are all part of the prophecies of the Book of Revelation," and 32 percent of them said yes. ... Read more

Federal Reserve Nomination: Larry Summers' Exit Could Open The Door For Chief Rival Janet Yellen
HP | Julie Pace | 09/15/13

Lawrence Summers, who was considered the leading candidate to succeed Ben Bernanke as Federal Reserve chairman, has withdrawn from consideration, the White House said Sunday.

GOOD ... Read more

16 Major Firms May Have Received Early Data From Thomson Reuters
RollingStone | Matt Taibbi | 09/05/13

Readers may recall an ugly story that broke earlier this summer, when New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman rebuked the news/business information firm Thomson Reuters for selling access to key economic survey data two seconds early to high-frequency algorithmic traders. The story strongly suggested that some Thomson Reuters customers were using their two-second head start (an eternity in the modern world of computerized trading) to front-run the markets. ... Read more

We've Got a Billionaire Bailout Society--And the 99% May Never Recover From It In Our Lifetimes
AlterNet | Les Leopold | 09/12/13

The odds are that we in the bottom 99 percent may never see a recovery in our lifetimes. That's because our nation has evolved into something entirely new: a billionaire bailout society.

We are entering a disastrous new era in which all the economic gains go to the top 1 percent, according to data from economists Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty. They report that, "Top 1% incomes grew by 31.4% while bottom 99% incomes grew only by 0.4% from 2009 to 2012. Hence, the top 1% captured 95% of the income gains in the first three years of the recovery.... In sum, top 1% incomes are close to full recovery while bottom 99% incomes have hardly started to recover." (In 2012, $394,000 is the cutoff to make it into the top 1 percent.). ... Read more

Ayman Al-Zawahri, Al Qaeda Leader, Calls For Attacks Inside U.S. For 9/11 Anniversary
HP | Maamoun Youssef | 09/13/13

Al-Qaida's leader on Friday marked the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks by calling on Muslims to strike inside the United States, with big attacks or small, using any opportunity they can to "bleed" America financially.

In an audio message released two days after the 12th anniversary of the attacks, Ayman al-Zawahri said America is not a "mythic power" and that the mujahedeen -- Islamic holy warriors -- can defeat it with attacks "on its own soil."

Al-Zawahri, the successor to Osama bin Laden, used the anniversary to argue that the United States can be defeated by targeting its economy. At the same time, he also addressed the ongoing upheaval in the Arab world. Pointing to a power struggle going on within the rebellion against Syria's regime, he warned jihadi fighters in that country's civil war not "compromise" with more secular or moderate rebel factions, who he said would eventually turn against the al-Qaida-linked radicals. ... Read more

10 Reasons Millennials Are the Screwed Generation
AlterNet | Alex Henderson | 09/12/13

... Millennials -- those born between the early 1980s and the late 1990s/early 2000s -- in the United States inherited a country that is broken in many respects. From the worst economy in 80 years to a post-9/11 surveillance state to a dysfunctional healthcare system, Millennials have been given a raw deal. And fighting to get the country back on track will be an enormous task for them. ...

TEPCO Official Admits Fukushima "Out Of Control"
ZeroHedge | author | 09/13/13

... Unfortunately, the lies, like the radiation in the plant, are now finally seeping through and more are becoming fully aware of just how serious the catastrophe truly is, and drove yet another steak through the heart of the official narrative by Prime Minister Abe as they "flatly contradict" his assurances. ... Read more
Radiation Scale - Click to zoom
Fukushima, Radiation Scale (09/13/13)

Fukushima "not under control", says TEPCO official
channelnewsasia.com | author | 09/13/13
Read more

Tennis players in the SI Swimsuit issue
Swim Daily | Andy Gray | 09/06/13

It's the most exciting weekend of the year for tennis fans as the U.S. Open concludes with the women's championship on Saturday and the men's final on Sunday. SwimDaily figured we'd get into the U.S. Open spirit by looking back at the 10 tennis players who have appeared in the swimsuit issue -- Steffi Graf (1997), Anna Kournikova (2004), Serena Williams (2004), Venus Williams (2005), Maria Sharapova (2006), Maria Kirilenko (2009), Daniela Hantuchova (2009), Tatiana Golovin (2009), Ana Ivanovic (2010) and Rafael Nadal (2012). ... Read more

A Plea for Caution From Russia: What Putin Has to Say to Americans About Syria
NYTimes | Vladimir V. Putin | 09/11/13

RECENT events surrounding Syria have prompted me to speak directly to the American people and their political leaders. It is important to do so at a time of insufficient communication between our societies.

Relations between us have passed through different stages. We stood against each other during the cold war. But we were also allies once, and defeated the Nazis together. The universal international organization -- the United Nations -- was then established to prevent such devastation from ever happening again. ... Read more
Letter from Vladimir V. Putin - Click to zoom
Letter from Vladimir V. Putin (09/12/13)

Larry Summers and the Secret "End-Game" Memo
Greg Palast | author | 08/22/13

When a little birdie dropped the End Game memo through my window, its content was so explosive, so sick and plain evil, I just couldn't believe it.

The Memo confirmed every conspiracy freak's fantasy: that in the late 1990s, the top US Treasury officials secretly conspired with a small cabal of banker big-shots to rip apart financial regulation across the planet. When you see 26.3% unemployment in Spain, desperation and hunger in Greece, riots in Indonesia and Detroit in bankruptcy, go back to this End Game memo, the genesis of the blood and tears. ... Read more or at Vice: Read more
End Game Memo            Another Memo

The Fed, Lawrence Summers, and Money
NYTimes | Louise Story | 08/10/13 older

Jeremy I. Bulow, an economics professor at Stanford University, wife always said about Larry: "With Larry, it's hard to be happy if you want to have the most money because you'll never have the most money,"... Read more

Secret Agenda in Syria? Larry Summers and Cronies Opening the World to Criminal Banksters
AlterNet | Ellen Brown | 09/04/13

Iraq and Libya have been taken out, and Iran has been heavily boycotted. Syria is now in the cross-hairs. Why? Here is one overlooked scenario.

In an August 2013 article titled " Larry Summers and the Secret 'End-game' Memo," Greg Palast posted evidence of a secret late-1990s plan devised by Wall Street and U.S. Treasury officials to open banking to the lucrative derivatives business. To pull this off required the relaxation of banking regulations not just in the US but globally. The vehicle to be used was the Financial Services Agreement of the World Trade Organization.

The "end-game" would require not just coercing support among WTO members but taking down those countries refusing to join. Some key countries remained holdouts from the WTO, including Iraq, Libya, Iran and Syria. In these Islamic countries, banks are largely state-owned; and "usury" -- charging rent for the "use" of money -- is viewed as a sin, if not a crime. That puts them at odds with the Western model of rent extraction by private middlemen. Publicly-owned banks are also a threat to the mushrooming derivatives business, since governments with their own banks don't need interest rate swaps, credit default swaps, or investment-grade ratings by private rating agencies in order to finance their operations. ... Read more

Wes Clark - America's Foreign Policy (10/03/07) [7:36]

In D.C., small tax debts lead to misery, loss of homes
Washington Post | author | 09/10/13

The District's century-old tax lien program has turned into an often predatory system of debt collection for well-financed, out-of-town investors who have turned $500 delinquencies into $5,000 debts - then foreclosed on homes when families couldn't pay, a Post investigation has found.

As the housing market soared, the investors scooped up thousands of liens in every corner of the city, then started charging homeowners legal fees and other costs that far exceeded their original tax bills, a gamechanger that has made it more difficult for families to save their homes. Tax lien purchasers have foreclosed on nearly 200 houses since 2005 and are now pressing to take 1,200 more, many owned free and clear by families for generations. ... Read more

The Geopolitics of Gas and the Syrian Crisis: Syrian "Opposition" Armed to Thwart Construction of Iran-Iraq-Syria Gas Pipeline
Global Research | Dmitry Minin | 06/03/13

... In the apt expression of F. William Engdahl, "Natural gas is the flammable ingredient that is fueling this insane scramble for energy in the region." A battle is raging over whether pipelines will go toward Europe from east to west, from Iran and Iraq to the Mediterranean coast of Syria, or take a more northbound route from Qatar and Saudi Arabia via Syria and Turkey. Having realized that the stalled Nabucco pipeline, and indeed the entire Southern Corridor, are backed up only by Azerbaijan's reserves and can never equal Russian supplies to Europe or thwart the construction of the South Stream, the West is in a hurry to replace them with resources from the Persian Gulf. Syria ends up being a key link in this chain, and it leans in favor of Iran and Russia; thus it was decided in the Western capitals that its regime needs to change. The fight for «democracy» is a false flag thrown out to cover up totally different aims. ... Read more

The Startling Size of US Military Operations in Africa
MotherJones | Nick Turse | 09/06/13

When considering the scope and rapid expansion of US military activities in Africa, it's important to keep in mind that certain key "African" bases are actually located off the continent. Keeping a semblance of a "light footprint" there, AFRICOM's headquarters is located at Kelley Barracks in Stuttgart-Moehringen, Germany. In June, Süddeutsche Zeitung reported that the base in Stuttgart and the US Air Force's Air Operations Center in Ramstein were both integral to drone operations in Africa.

Key logistics support hubs for AFRICOM are located in Rota, Spain; Aruba in the Lesser Antilles; and Souda Bay, Greece, as well as at Ramstein. The command also maintains a forward operating site on Britain's Ascension Island, located about 1,000 miles off the coast of Africa in the South Atlantic, but refused requests for further information about its role in operations. ... Read more
Africa Command: U.S. Strategic Interests and the Role of the U.S. Military in Africa

*Lehman Recovery Seen as Justifying $2 Billion Bankruptcy
Bloomberg | Erik Larson | 09/11/13

Lehman's demise "ignited a worldwide conflagration that almost brought down the global financial system," said Miller, who filed the Chapter 11 petition at 2 a.m. on Sept. 15, 2008, in New York after the bank failed to win U.S. government aid or attract a buyer. "The consequences were unknown."

... In exchange for that eye-popping payday, $2 billion in fees and expenses approved by the judge in charge of the case, Lehman creditors are poised to get 18 cents on the dollar by 2016, from an estate valued at $65 billion, according to a liquidation plan approved in December 2011. Miller, 80, estimated that recovery may rise to as much as 22 cents as the value of Lehman's assets increases over the next three years to about $80 billion. ... Read more
Dick Fuld - Click to zoom
Dick Fuld CEO of Lehman Brothers

Bernie Sanders: Billions for 'Another War,' but No Money for Needs at Home
Bill Moyers |John Nichols | 09/06/13

In an age of deep partisan divisions, the broadest opposition to United States military intervention in Syria is not coming from Republicans. Or Democrats.   Independent voters are the most determined foes of President Obama's proposal to launch missile strikes in response to reports that the Syrian government employed chemical weapons in that country's brutal civil war. While Republicans and Democrats surveyed for the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll expressed strong opposition to the president's proposal -- by margins of 55-43 and 54-42, respectively -- independents were against the plan 66-30. Read more

Map All the Countries John McCain Has Wanted to Attack (Sad)
MotherJones | Tim Murphy | 09/06/13

Even before he was caught playing poker on his iPhone at a Senate hearing on Wednesday, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) had already sent a message: Anything less than an extensive aerial assault on the Syrian regime by American forces would be an unacceptable approach to the conflict in the Middle East. This was hardly surprising. Over the last two decades, McCain has rarely missed an opportunity to call for the escalation of an international conflict. Since the mid-1990s, he's pushed for regime change in more than a half-dozen countries--occasionally with disastrous consequences. ... Read more

Hagel answering questions in front of Congress: "Blaa blaa blaa sequestration. Did I say Sequestration? Did I say Sequestration enough??"

*These Disgraced Wall Street Kingpins Are Living Quite Nicely 5 Years After Crisis
HP | Alison Fitzgerald | 09/10/13

Five years after the near-collapse of the nation's financial system, the economy continues a slow recovery marred by high unemployment, hesitant consumers and sluggish business investment.

Many of the top Wall Street bankers who were largely responsible for the disaster -- and whose companies either collapsed or accepted billions in government bailouts -- are also unemployed. But since they walked away from the disaster with millions, they're juggling their ample free time between mansions and golf, skiing and tennis.   Meantime, the major banks that survived the crisis, largely because they were saved with taxpayer money after being deemed "too big to fail," are now bigger and more powerful than ever. Read more

142 Wrights Rd., Aspen CO - Lewis

Bank of America, Ken Lewis retired in September 2009 with a going-away package worth $83 million, even though the company was largely dependent on the federal government for its survival. He had already banked at least $86.4 million from Bank of America stock sales between 2000 and 2008, according to SEC filings. He also brought in $52.4 million in salary and bonuses in that time.

He and his wife Donna sold their house in Charlotte, N.C., in January for $3.15 million and their mountainside mansion in Aspen for $13.5 million, $3.35 million less than what they paid for it in 2006.

They appear now to have only one home, a $4.1 million condo in a beachfront high-rise in Naples, Fla.

Miley Cyrus - Wrecking Ball (09/09/13) [3:42]

Elizabeth Warren Calls Supreme Court Right-Wing, 'Pro-Corporate'
HP | Ashley Alman | 09/09/13

In a speech at an AFL-CIO convention on Sunday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) criticized the Supreme Court for being too right-wing and serving the interests of Big Business over the needs of Americans.   In voicing her support for the labor movement and promoting an agenda aimed at defending working families, Warren warned of conservative-leaning justices and a "corporate capture of the federal courts."

"You follow this pro-corporate trend to its logical conclusion, and sooner or later you'll end up with a Supreme Court that functions as a wholly owned subsidiary of big business," Warren said. ... Read more

$52.6 Billion, The Black Budget
WashingtonPost | author | 08/29/13

Top secret spending can be divided into four main categories: data collection, data analysis, management, facilities and support and data processing and exploitation. The CIA and NRO are heavy on data collection while the NSA and NGP focus on data processing and exploitation as well as auxiliary functions like management, facilities and support.

... Each agency has a unique breakdown of expenses that reflect the priorities of its mission. There is no specific entry for the CIA's fleet of armed drones in the budget summary, but a broad line item hints at the dimensions of the agency's expanded paramilitary role, providing more than $2.5 billion for "covert action programs" that would include drone operations in Pakistan and Yemen, payments to militias in Afghanistan and Africa, and attempts to sabotage Iran's nuclear program. ... Read more

Report: NSA has had access to most smartphone data
Aljazeera | author | 09/08/13

The National Security Agency (NSA) has the ability to crack protective measures on iPhones, BlackBerry and Android devices, giving it access to users' data on all major smartphones, according to a report Sunday in the German news weekly Der Spiegel. The NSA has reportedly been able to access smartphone contacts, call lists, SMS traffic, notes and location information.

Read more

Here's Why John Kerry's Vow Against 'War' In Syria Means Nothing
HP | Nick Wing | 09/06/13

Secretary of State John Kerry made the case to Congress this week for military intervention in Syria, following a devastating chemical weapons attack allegedly carried out by Syrian government forces last month.

While there is some degree of uncertainty as to what the proposed U.S. action would seek to achieve, one thing is crystal clear: The Obama administration doesn't believe a military strike on Syria would constitute an act of war.   "We don't believe we are going to go to war in the classic sense of taking American troops and America to war," Kerry said. ... Read more

The True History of Libertarianism in America: A Phony Ideology to Promote a Corporate Agenda
AlterNet | Mark Ames | 09/06/13

Every couple of years, mainstream media hacks pretend to have just discovered libertarianism as some sort of radical, new and dynamic force in American politics. It’s a rehash that goes back decades, and hacks love it because it’s easy to write, and because it’s such a non-threatening “radical” politics (unlike radical left politics, which threatens the rich). The latest version involves a summer-long pundit debate in the pages of the New York Times, Reason magazine and elsewhere over so-called “libertarian populism.” It doesn’t really matter whose arguments prevail, so long as no one questions where libertarianism came from or why we’re defining libertarianism as anything but a big business public relations campaign, the winner in this debate is Libertarianism. ... Read more

Bombing Syria: A Running Guide to the Debate
MotherJones | Asawin Suebsaeng | 09/03/13

... "It is on occasions like this that I am grateful that I am no longer a White House aide." Gary Sick, who served on the National Security Council during the Ford, Carter, and Reagan administrations, wrote this on his Tumblr on Saturday. ... Read more

*US and UK spy agencies defeat privacy and security on the internet
TheGuardian | Glenn Greenwald | 09/05/13

US and British intelligence agencies have successfully cracked much of the online encryption relied upon by hundreds of millions of people to protect the privacy of their personal data, online transactions and emails, according to top-secret documents revealed by former contractor Edward Snowden.

The files show that the National Security Agency and its UK counterpart GCHQ have broadly compromised the guarantees that internet companies have given consumers to reassure them that their communications, online banking and medical records would be indecipherable to criminals or governments.   The agencies, the documents reveal, have adopted a battery of methods in their systematic and ongoing assault on what they see as one of the biggest threats to their ability to access huge swathes of internet traffic -- "the use of ubiquitous encryption across the internet". ... Read more

N.S.A. Foils Much Internet Encryption
NYTimes | Nicole Perlroth | 09/05/13

The National Security Agency is winning its long-running secret war on encryption, using supercomputers, technical trickery, court orders and behind-the-scenes persuasion to undermine the major tools protecting the privacy of everyday communications in the Internet age, according to newly disclosed documents.

The agency has circumvented or cracked much of the encryption, or digital scrambling, that guards global commerce and banking systems, protects sensitive data like trade secrets and medical records, and automatically secures the e-mails, Web searches, Internet chats and phone calls of Americans and others around the world, the documents show. ... Read more

Whistleblowers
TheGuardian | author | 06/24/13

"A person who reports or informs on a wrongdoer, as in a government agency"
Read more

Obama Administration Says Syria Strike Wouldn't Be 'War,' But Here's Proof It's Not That Simple
HP | Nick Wing | 09/06/13

How many people have to die before a war is a war? ... Read more

How the Bank Lobby Loosened U.S. Reins on Derivatives
Bloomberg | Silla Brush | 09/04/13

One by one, Gary Gensler’s supporters deserted him. Now the chief U.S. regulator of derivatives was being summoned by Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew to explain why he refused to compromise.

... The July 3 meeting in Lew’s conference room with a view of the White House grew tense, according to three people briefed on it. Gensler argued his plan was vital if the U.S. hoped to seize meaningful authority over financial instruments that helped push the global economy to the brink in 2008, taking down American International Group Inc. (AIG) and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and igniting the worst recession since the 1930s. ... Read more

*PBS Frontline: The Warning, The Financial Collapse - Brooksley Born [56:17]

*Oh Magog! Why End-Times Buffs Are Freaking Out About Syria
MotherJones | Tim Murphy | 09/04/13

In early 2012, best-selling novelist Joel Rosenberg came to Capitol Hill for a meeting with an unidentified member of Congress to discuss the end of the world. "I thought the topic was going to be the possible coming war between Israel and Iran," Rosenberg explained on his website. "Instead, the official asked, 'What are your thoughts on Isaiah 17?'"

For the better part of an hour, Rosenberg says, the writer and the congressman went back forth on something called the "burden of Damascus," an Old Testament prophecy that posits that a war in the Middle East will leave Syria's capital city in ruins—and bring the world one step closer to Armageddon. As Rosenberg put it, "The innocent blood shed by the Assad regime is reprehensible and heart-breaking and is setting the stage for a terrible judgment." ... Read more

Wes Clark - America's Foreign Policy (10/03/07) [7:36]

The Redirection
New Yorker | Seymour M. Hersh | 03/05/07 old, but a great article

In the past few months, as the situation in Iraq has deteriorated, the Bush Administration, in both its public diplomacy and its covert operations, has significantly shifted its Middle East strategy. The “redirection,” as some inside the White House have called the new strategy, has brought the United States closer to an open confrontation with Iran and, in parts of the region, propelled it into a widening sectarian conflict between Shiite and Sunni Muslims. ... Read more

The Syria Intervention Plan Is Being Pushed by Oil Interests, Not Concern About Chemical Weapons
AlterNet | Nafeez Ahmed | 09/03/13

On 21 August, hundreds - perhaps over a thousand - people were killed in a chemical weapon attack in Ghouta, Damascus, prompting the US, UK, Israel and France to raise the spectre of military strikes against Bashir al Assad's forces.   The latest episode is merely one more horrific event in a conflict that has increasingly taken on genocidal characteristics. The case for action at first glance is indisputable. The UN now confirms a death toll over 100,000 people, the vast majority of whom have been killed by Assad's troops. An estimated 4.5 million people have been displaced from their homes. International observers have overwhelmingly confirmed Assad's complicity in the preponderance of war crimes and crimes against humanity against the Syrian people. The illegitimacy of his regime, and the legitimacy of the uprising, is clear.

Much of the strategy currently at play was candidly described in a 2008 US Army-funded RAND report, Unfolding the Future of the Long War (pdf). The report noted that "the economies of the industrialized states will continue to rely heavily on oil, thus making it a strategically important resource." As most oil will be produced in the Middle East, the US has "motive for maintaining stability in and good relations with Middle Eastern states". ... Read more

MCCAIN BAILS ON WAR DEAL: NOT HAWKISH ENOUGH!
HP | author | 09/04/13

Sen. John McCain says he doesn't support the latest Senate resolution to authorize military force against Syria.   McCain is an outspoken advocate of intervention against Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime and wants more than cruise missile strikes and other limited action.

The Arizona Republican threatened earlier this week to vote against a White House draft resolution unless President Barack Obama promised greater support to Syria's rebels. McCain then expressed support after meeting Obama at the White House. ... Read more

Who The US Imports Crude Oil From
ZeroHedge | author | 09/04/13

Because latetly there has been some confusion that the US is "energy independent"...
Click to zoom

Former Senior White House Official On Larry Summers Nomination: 'It Really Does Need To Be Stopped'
HP | Ryan Grim | 09/04/13

A former senior White House official who worked closely with Larry Summers is worried that his brusque manner would make him unable to govern the Federal Open Market Committee, and questions the wisdom of naming him chairman of the Federal Reserve, a role that may not play to his strengths. ...

Japan Promises Action at Fukushima as 300 Tons of Contaminated Water Seep into the Pacific Ocean Daily
AlterNet | Justin McCurry | 09/03/13

Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, has promised to act quickly to address the buildup of huge quantities of contaminated water at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Those doubts were fuelled by evidence that the plant is seeping up to 300 tonnes of contaminated water into the Pacific Ocean every day. In a separate incident, a water storage tank was found to have leaked about 300 tonnes of highly toxic water, some of which could have found its way into the sea.

At the weekend, radiation near another tank was measured at 1,800 millisieverts an hour -- a level that could kill an unprotected person in just four hours -- and 18 times higher than previously thought. ... Read more

Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Tuesday, September 04 [12:43]

TRNN | Patrick Cockburn: US strike against Syria will further entangle America, as each military action will make it more difficult to retreat (09/04/13) [10:59]

Charts: How Big Debt on Campus Is Threatening Higher Ed
MotherJones | Dave Gilson | 09/03/13

The explosion of college tuition and student debt is leaving more grads with big bills and doubts about their futures. Some back-to-school stats: ... Read more

"Tower of Basel, The Shadowy History of the Secret Bank that Runs the World" by Adam LeBor
NYTimes | Michael Hirsh | 07/19/13

Adam LeBor's history of the Bank for International Settlements, 'Tower of Basel,' reads a little like a financial version of 'Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead,' the Tom Stoppard play that places two minor characters in 'Hamlet' in the forefront of the action while the drama's major events unfold incomprehensibly in the background. In LeBor's telling, the B.I.S., an obscure 'bank for central banks' set up in Basel, Switzerland, in 1930 to facilitate World War I reparations payments from Germany, has been a critical, if secretive, actor in the global economy for more than 80 years. Today, he writes, it is 'the most important bank in the world,' an institution with virtually no accountability, and yet 'for decades it has stood at the center of a global network of money, power and covert global influence.' ... Read more

9 Scary Facts About the Yosemite Fire
MotherJones | Maggie Severns | 08/28/13

No one knows what started the Rim Fire, the 160,000 187,000 acre blaze that's ripping through the western side of Yosemite National Park. But 3,700 firefighters have been dispatched to try to stop it using helicopters, bulldozers, and flame retardants. Although the situation is starting to look up -- 20 23 percent of the fire is now contained, up from 7 percent just two days ago -- the authorities predict the fire will keep spreading, and fast, in days to come. ...

Though this season hasn't been a particularly bad season for wildfires so far, there's reason to be concerned that fires will only grow larger and more frequent as hot, dry weather becomes increasingly common in the West. Fire season now lasts two months longer and destroys twice as much land as it did 40 years ago, according to Thomas Tidwell, the head of the United States Forest Service, who testified to the Senate committee on energy and natural resources earlier this summer. ... Read more

The 8 Groups in America That Are the Most Screwed-Over by Predatory Capitalism
magazine | author | date

We live in a society that allows one man to make $15 million a day while a low-income mother gets $4.50 a day for food, and much of Congress wants to cut the $4.50.   Are political and corporate leaders even remotely aware of the conditions of society beneath the wealthiest 10% or so?   The following are some of the victims of an economic system that has forgotten the majority of its people.

Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II. Sample Chapters to read

Contamination levels skyrocket at Fukushima plant, up nearly 2,000% -- NHK: Quadrillions of becquerels already released; "Gov't needs to take charge entirely"
ENENews | author | 08/31/13

Tanaka said there is a much larger ongoing problem at the plant: massive amounts of contaminated ground water reaching the sea. But that problem cannot even be rated under the IAEA's International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale because it is unknown exactly how much ground water is escaping, how contaminated it is and what effect it is having on the sea and marine products. [...] "I'm baffled," he said. Read more

Radioactive water may contaminate entire Pacific Ocean in 6 years
Arirang News | author |08/28/13

This graphic shows the gradual contamination of the Pacific Ocean due to leaks of radioactive water from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan.   The simulation, which was run by a German marine research institute, shows the ENTIRE Pacific waters being polluted by radioactive water in just six years. ... Read more

West Coast of North America to Be Hit Hard by Fukushima Radiation
Washington Blog | author | 08/20/13

An ocean current called the North Pacific Gyre is bringing Japanese radiation to the West Coast of North America: ... Read more

The Agency That Could Be Big Brother
NYTimes | James Bamford | 12/25/05 old, but good

DEEP in a remote, fog-layered hollow near Sugar Grove, W.Va., hidden by fortress-like mountains, sits the country's largest eavesdropping bug. Located in a "radio quiet" zone, the station's large parabolic dishes secretly and silently sweep in millions of private telephone calls and e-mail messages an hour.   Run by the ultrasecret National Security Agency, the listening post intercepts all international communications entering the eastern United States. Another N.S.A. listening post, in Yakima,Wash., eavesdrops on the western half of the country. ... Read more

Is Detroit dumb and lazy?
AlterNet | Martin Berg | 08/31/13

Detroit's emergency manager called Detroit "dumb, happy, lazy and rich."

How else can you explain such careless invective from Kevyn Orr, one of the country's top corporate bankruptcy lawyers, the "expert" who holds the future of city's 700,000 residents in his hands?   It took Orr a couple of weeks to apologize, ascribing his remarks to a "slip of the tongue." What emerges when our tongues slip? Exactly what we really think. ... Read more

4 Veggie Burgers That Don't Suck
MotherJones | Maddie Oatman | 07/03/13

Mushroom Burgers with Barley (vegan)