Shadow Government "Money" Supply Growth from ShadowStats

Chart of U.S. Money Supply Growth

29 April, 2011

Know Anyone In Vegas? I'd Love To See The Line On This One

I didn't write this. But I wish I had. As published on ZeroHedge:

A Letter To Congress

Tyler Durden's picture




from reader T. Willerson

Letter to congress

Dear Congressman:

It’s here: Your moment at the plate. You’ve whiffed more than a few … and, yes, we’re counting. But you’ve been gifted another at-bat, and the President’s tired. Seventh inning stuff is coming out of his teleprompter, and this full-count fastball will be straight, level, and slow. You won’t see another one like this for five years.

An embattled first term president is faced with an outcome that he must, at all costs, prevent, and he’s done very little ground work ahead of it. He is about to become the first President in American history to preside over a default on the national debt, unless you vote to let him raise the limit on the financial burden we leave our children. He would ultimately be crazy to deny any reasonable option, absolutely anything, rather than live with the outcome of his refusal. Politically speaking, he’s whispered a prayer to the Greek God of Imprudence and Fiscal Insanity, raised a one-finger salute to the nation’s savers through the sunroof of a stolen golden Beemer, and revved it toward the draw-bridge that you were elected to control.



Graphic by John Lohman

America’s debt has been moving straight up since the early 1980s. In the beginning it was ok. Debt is not, in itself, a bad thing, and a reasonable amount of leverage on the balance sheet can be positive for any entity, including the United States. But we’re well past that threshold. Researchers Reinhart and Rogoff, in their exhaustive recent work, This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly, show that, historically, when debt in an economy gets above .9x, or 90% of GDP, the interest burden creates a negative cycle from which nations struggle to recover. If we include the unfunded liabilities we’ve committed to in order to support programs like Medicare and Social Security, the United States of America’s financial obligations represent 8.7x, or 871% of GDP, almost 10x the amount that Reinhart & Rogoff determined lead to ultimate economic failure. In terms that are much easier to identify with, this comes to a debt of $1,386,340 for every family in the US! When you consider the average family’s ability to pay, it all begins to rhyme with those 2007 no - doc mortgages, doesn’t it? In fact, if the US was a corporation, we’d be in bankruptcy proceedings and you, kind sir, would be holding a pink slip, a legal summons, and a scrap of paper with Dick Fuld’s cell phone number on it for advice on staying out of jail – because the truth is that he is no more guilty than you, and you no less than him, and we can stop kidding ourselves whenever you’re ready.

But, politically, you ask… what can really be done? After all it’s always the other guy. You know, that, sniff - sniff…, mean congresswoman from a lunatic district who disagrees. It’s her fault. She doesn’t understand math. And she’s just intractable. Intractable! She believes that America’s social contract (I can’t find that in the constitution… ) is more important than the critically important task of shooting Tomahawk missiles at other parents’ kids to support… uhhm… different kids that we don’t really know, in a war that’s only sort of, well... a war. I mean, the nerve of that… woman. And there are others like her. And there’s an election coming up every two years. A bigger one every four. Wait… what in God’s name did that lunatic McCain just say? … Anyway, progress is too much to expect, and after a couple years of trying, you just… roll with the punches… do what you can… Right?

When it’s time for that morning look in the mirror, you tell yourself it’s harder than you thought. Too much of it seems bigger than the promises you made to get there. In the face of disagreement, in the thrall of tight votes and divided leadership, you simply can’t get it done the way you’d hoped. So you parse the polls, you chase the cameras, you fondle your constituents, and you wonder what the view looks like from the upper chamber. You ultimately retire to the lobbying job, with one hell of a pension, and live in a way that you despised before you realized what two kids in college, vacations in Europe, and a wife with a strappy Jimmy Choo habit would cost. You’ve kicked the proverbial can down the road, and maybe you tell yourself that it’s all our political system will allow. And so it goes.

Or you find your moment - that point of crisis when rare circumstances put the bat in your hand, and you have the leverage to make a change - the kind of change that’s identified by far more than a focus-grouped slogan; the kind that alters the course of history. You can do it by simply standing firmly for the principles upon which you were elected.

To blame you for catastrophe, legislators first have to explain the rejection of an acceptable alternative. Barack can load the teleprompter with the righteous indignation of his Father’s Dreams and level each syllable with a stage actor’s grace. The senate can whine and Harry Reid will triangulate desperately toward that elusive line between patriotism and pandering, sensitivity and simpering, missing every second and third step along the way. You’ll have to hold through the deluge because the bully pulpit wins the news cycle, but an administration bears the blame. Deflecting reporters is a privilege of the political class, but a President is beholden to history.

Certainly you could play for a single; just get a runner on base and hope like hell that the relief pitcher isn’t as strong as he’s been for the last ten years. You could pick and pry and get just enough to say you won; aim for destabilization in the next election, and keep looking for your next shot. You could bunt something unintelligible and complicated enough to confuse the anchorman and the AARP, pick the flowers from the fertilizer, and beseechingly extend the mess into the camera lens. You could head for the primrose path with a pension and the lobbying job, and wonder, in weak moments, what your grandparents would say about abdication of duty.

Or you could rise to the challenge and do something meaningful - something that would answer that cynical question, the one that is on the lips of a generation raised to mute sound bites and soapboxes with the bored sweep of a pointer finger, but whose votes elected this President. Their question: What does any of it really mean?

If not now… when? Whether you win the next election or not…whether the next news cycle gives you a boost or not…. Will you get this chance again? The President is in a bind that no speech, no dog-wagging war, no bill, and no mindless populism can change. His back is against the 2012 wall and this time the outcome is binary. He knows it. He absolutely has to have you help him raise the debt limit.

This is legacy stuff, and it doesn’t matter which side of the aisle you claim, so keep it simple. Leave out the social invasions. Stay out of bathrooms, bedrooms, churches, and doctor’s offices. Cancel the earmarks and the garbage. Skip the things that sound good but won’t work. Shoot straight and don’t strut. Do it early. Do it clearly and forcefully, but respectfully, and explain it with logic that doesn’t require lies. Deliver it in a way that leaves no doubt about your goals, your intent, or your resolve, and leave the cigars at home. Let your most aesthetic, most intelligent, most media-savvy person front it, and limit the bill to one page.

Send the President a bill that says Federal debt, in all forms and definitions, must be less than 60% of GDP by 2016, less than 50% by 2020, and less than 40% by 2024, or, in each of those years, a bi-partisan group will cut Federal Funding at the strategic, and line item level, until the goal is met. Furthermore, debt must stay below the benchmark thereafter, short of a Declaration of War or National Emergency supported by a two thirds vote of both houses of congress. And in the case of temporary exception, anything over the maximum must receive the same two-thirds vote each year or immediately go back to the limit via the same committee.

Barack will not like this choice, and he will thrash and froth. He’ll reload the teleprompter again and again in fiery waves of verbal and emotive genius that will make you question everything you believe, and, ultimately, your congressional reason d’être. But, in the end, a solution he hates will be better than having his name on the first and only default in the history of the United States.

So plant your feet and point your finger at the bleachers. Tell the President that you don’t intend to change a word because a default now is no different than a default later, and you’d rather see him get the credit. Give him a clear choice and a good look at the filthy cesspool that lies in wait on the other side of the decision, and let him decide whether to court disaster. Then take him to the wall.

21 April, 2011

Of Myth and Legend

In 10 Examples That Should Convince Anyone That We No Longer Live In The Land Of The Free And The Home Of The Brave,

a writer posits that:

The things that you are about to read should make you mad. In fact, if none of these things make you mad there is a problem. Sadly, millions of Americans have actually embraced tyranny, and if you are not outraged by any of the items listed below than you are likely one of them.

my own added commentary is in red.

The American Dream
April 21, 2011

Do you know people that still believe that America is a free country? Do you have friends or family that are proud to live in “the land of the free and the home of the brave”? If you do, just show them this article. Of course, "showing it" to them will accomplish nothing. Most won't read it, if at all, before pointing out how wrong you are for your lack of faith. The things that you are about to read are enough to make the blood of any red-blooded American boil. We don’t live in a free country anymore. Instead, we live in a “Big Brother” police state control grid that is becoming more restrictive every single day. Most of our politicians seem to be control freaks that are obsessed with running every single little detail of our lives. These days there has to be a “rule” or a “regulation” for everything. The radical social engineers in the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany and communist China never even dared to try some of the things that are going on in America today. Indeed, more than a year before this country "entered" World War II, FDR had accomplished, "with the stroke(s) of a pen", nearly everything a totalitarian could want. We are all being treated little better than cattle and we are all being taught that it is best to just sit in our homes and absorb all of the television “programming” that is being provided for us. We even participate by assisting the government in inculcating the message in our young (which we "sold" into the "system" that FDR created), making certain that our kids know form birth that their lives and their bodies are not their own, and more importantly, that we, as parents have no power to protect them. Meanwhile, our public schools have become little more than prison grids. Our children are being taught to enjoy living as docile slaves in a world where imagination, liberty, freedom and adventure are all greatly discouraged.

Unfortunately, none of this is an exaggeration. Our politicians love to give speeches about “liberty” and “freedom”, but they always seem to have excuses to justify the endless parade of liberty-killing laws that they are imposing on all the rest of us.

Almost all of the freedoms listed in the Bill of Rights have been severely eroded. In fact, a number of them are almost totally gone at this point.

The things that you are about to read should make you mad. But they probably won't. Between the conditioning you've been subjected to and a lifetime of forced ingestion of fluoride to make you more docile, you might well be incapable of getting mad enough to take action. In fact, if none of these things make you mad there is a problem. Sadly, millions of Americans have actually embraced tyranny, and if you are not outraged by any of the items listed below than you are likely one of them.

The following are 10 examples that show that we no longer live in the land of the free and the home of the brave….

#1 According to the ACLU, state police in Michigan are using “extraction devices” to download data from the cellphones of motorists that they pull over. This is taking place even if those pulled over are not accused of doing anything wrong.

The following is how an article on CNET News describes the capabilities of these “extraction devices”….

The devices, sold by a company called Cellebrite, can download text messages, photos, video, and even GPS data from most brands of cell phones. The handheld machines have various interfaces to work with different models and can even bypass security passwords and access some information.

#2 In the state of New York, the Department of Health has designated wiffle ball, dodge ball, kick ball, freeze tag, red rover, frisbee tossing and tug of war as “risky recreational activities“. Any organization or program that allows kids to enjoy these games during the summer will now be subject to strict government regulation according to the New York Daily News….

Under the new rules, any program that offers two or more organized recreational activities – with at least one of them on the risky list – is deemed a summer camp and subject to state regulation.

Why this should be surprising escapes me. We were trained (for perspective, I'm a "boomer") to train our kids to pass on the training by insisting their children wear bicycle helmets, knee and elbow pads, etc., and even to train their babies that they must submit to being bound,(gagging will come later); tied down in their carseat, or "Mommy will get in trouble".

#3 At one public school in the Chicago area, children have been banned from bringing their lunches from home. Yes, you read that correctly. Students at that particular school are absolutely prohibited from bringing lunches from home. Instead, it is mandatory that they eat the food that the school cafeteria serves. Home-prepared lunches might omit "nutrients" that would further the conditioning to which we are all subjected.

#4 Would you like to have your face scanned and your ID recorded every time you attend a public event? Don’t laugh. The San Francisco Entertainment Commission is actually proposing a new rule which “would require all venues with an occupancy of over 100 people to record the faces of all patrons and employees and scan their ID’s for storage in a database which they must hand over to law enforcement on request.”

Stock up with Fresh Food that lasts with eFoodsDirect (AD)

10 Examples That Should Convince Anyone That We No Longer Live In The Land Of The Free And The Home Of The Brave 161008pptv3

#5 In Delaware, police and state government officials recently tore a basketball hoop right out of a family’s front yard and carted it away because it was “too close” to the street. They even extracted the pole for the basketball hoop out of the ground and took that away too.

#6 In Missouri of all places, two young girls named Abigail and Caitlin Mills were recently taught a lesson on how to be good citizens in the emerging totalitarian control grid going up all over the United States. After a complaint from a neighbor, the city of Hazelwood cracked down on the two girls and told them that they must stop selling girl scout cookies in their own front yard.

#7 As I have written about previously, federal bureaucrats have outlawed the incandescent light bulbs that we all grew up with and will be forcing us to switch over to new CFL (compact fluorescent lamp) light bulbs that are more expensive and that are actually worse for the environment. One new study conducted by scientists in Germany has shown that the new CFL light bulbs that we are being forced to use contain poisonous carcinogens that are likely cause cancer. In fact, the German scientists say that these CFL bulbs should be “kept as far away as possible from the human environment”. "Mercury grenades" are a more correct appellation for the devices. Don't believe it? Read the "instructions" on breakage cleanup.

#8 Many states are aggressively seizing “unclaimed” safe deposit boxes and are selling off the contents and using the money to pay state government bills. In the state of California, they are now going after safe deposit boxes if the owners have had “no contact” with the bank for just 3 years. Other states are being nearly as aggressive. If you have a safe deposit box that you have not opened in a while you need to go check on it right away. No different than "asset forfeiture", which you probably supported, since it was only taking the "ill-gotten gains" of drug dealers, etc. CAUTION: Don't buy too much cold medicine, or you, too, will be so classified, and it won't matter how recently you've accessed your "safety" deposit box (it's only a means of hiding incriminating stuff, anyway, right?).

#9 One Mississippi state judge recently issued an order for state officials to gather and deliver to him the names of every single child that is being homeschooled in the state. The frightening thing is that the judge did this all on his own. Nobody requested this information and there is no case pending for which this information would be required.

#10 The TSA had promised that they were going to stop groping little children at airports, but apparently that is not the case. For example, one 6 year old little girl made headlines recently when a TSA worker touched all of her private areas before allowing her to get on an airplane. Her parents were forced to stand aside and watch this outrage take place. Once again reinforcing that our kids' bodies are not their own, that they MUST allow sexual predators to molest them, and that parents have no power to protect them from the predators.

So what do all of you think about this list?

11 April, 2011

Some Things You Just Have to See

Like the calendar for the House Ways and Means Committee, Subcommittee on Social Security: http://waysandmeans.house.gov/Calendar/?EventTypeID=149&CatagoryID=4772

On Apr 13, 2011, the Subcommittee will examine the impacts of identity theft, the role of SSNs in abetting identity theft, and options to restrict its use. In addition, the role of the SSN in administering Social Security programs and how the Social Security Administration protects SSNs will be considered, along with legislative proposals to limit the use of SSNs.

Call your ... (ok, "representative") ... and tell him (or her) what limits you'd like to see.

The April 14 hearing will focus on the "progress" made and challenges created by E-Verify, including the potential burdens on employees, employers and the SSA. (How about burdens upon Liberty?) The Subcommittee will examine how the current shortcomings of the system could be improved to ease the verification process during this critical time of job creation. Finally, the Subcommittee will also review other proposals to expand employment eligibility verification, including enhancing the Social Security card with tamper-proof, counterfeit-resistant or biometric features and increasing enforcement through the sharing of taxpayer wage information.

STOP THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

09 April, 2011

Damage Control

They can't hide it anymore. Too many instances, in too many places, too... "public". What to do?
Damage control. Put it right there in front of everybody: Put it on 60 Minutes. If you haven't seen http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7361572n&tag=related;photovideo, it's worth the 14+ minutes.

Essentially, what I've been saying for nearly 8 years (and yes, I'm not the only one), e.g., that foreclosing banks are thieves; that they don't own the Note that their(?) mortgage supposedly secures; that they have no right to "foreclose"; has now been "exposed" by Scott Pelley.

Oh, sure, Courts (especially bankruptcy courts) have, over the last couple of years, have thrown out foreclosures and mortgages for just such reasons, but those were proclaimed (by the thieving class) as occasional mistakes. Besides, the "foreclosees" (victims) are just deadbeats, trying to get something for nothing, right?

But as of of April 3, 2011, everyone should be aware.

Of course, the subliminal message behind 60 Minutes' "exposé was "(psst!) You can settle with your bank...". You know, the bank that doesn't own your note; that has no standing to "foreclose" on you in the first place.

DON'T FALL FOR IT! You CAN challenge them. You CAN make them prove they own, AND HOLD, your note. You CAN make them prove standing.

DO IT! For your children.
For your country.