Editorial

The Fed Under Fire: new short film on the secrecy of the Federal Reserve

Goldman Sachs: "great vampire squid... jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money"

There is no warm cranny in my heart for Matt Taibbi.  He penned one of the most viciously irrational hit jobs on the 9/11 truth movement ever.  But he has now written something of value:  a hit job on an operation that deserves it, Goldman Sachs.  Taibbi's article begins:

The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it's everywhere. The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.

Any attempt to construct a narrative around all the former Goldmanites in influential positions quickly becomes an absurd and pointless exercise, like trying to make a list of everything. What you need to know is the big picture: If America is circling the drain, Goldman Sachs has found a way to be that drain — an extremely unfortunate loophole in the system of Western democratic capitalism, which never foresaw that in a society governed passively by free markets and free elections, organized greed always defeats disorganized democracy.

Taibbi acknowledges that there's nothing the ordinary  (or even extraordinary) citizen can do about Goldman's massive rip-off of investors, homeowners, taxpayers and gasoline buyers.  Still, there is some satisfaction in knowing exactly how one is being screwed.  You're still being tortured, but the hood is off and you can watch while they disembowel you. 

The rest of this Rolling Stone article is here.

Webster Tarpley: Obama is more controlled by Wall St. than any previous president

Russia Today interviewed Webster Tarpley about Obama, the economic depression, and what we have to look forward to. (Spoiler: not much.)

The Big Collapse Could Be Very Near

Passing along without comment.  I don't know enough about finance to verify the truth of what Wenzel says, but he sure sounds convincing.  Convincingly terrifying. 

from Global Research, by Robert Wenzel:

The end of the current financial system, as we know it, may be imminent. If you would have asked me even two weeks ago if collapse was imminent, I would have said it was highly unlikely, now I am saying it is possible. Bernanke may be able to patch things up short-term, if he is lucky, but in the long term the U.S. financial structure is in serious trouble. There is just too much Treasury debt that needs to be raised. An international panic out of Treasury securities, even a slow controlled panic, means the Fed will be the major buyer. This will ultimately mean record inflation.

And keep this in mind, we have never seen a collapse of a currency like the dollar. Even the hyperinflation during Germany's Wiemar Period can not serve as an example. Since the dollar is the reserve currency of most of the world, a panic out of the dollar means more dollars will return to the U.S. shores than any country has ever experienced.

Other countries have had collapsed currencies, but never in the history of world of finance has so much currency been held outside a country of issue that could come flying back, almost on a moments notice. If the panic out of the dollar starts, even if Bernanke stops printing money (unlikely), all the dollars flying back into the U.S. could cause a huge price inflation all on its own.

continue here.

The rich coughed up more dough under Reagan and Nixon than they will under Obama (graph)

Source: MoveOn.org

Why the Economic Destruction of America May Be Step One of A Global Banking Power Grab

Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, has a piece on Infowars that lays out his view that the collapse of our economy is being done intentionally from the highest (or should we say lowest) people in our government.

For obvious reasons, these people shall go unnamed, but what they’re now telling me is that the economic meltdown is merely a means to an end. It is being done deliberately, they say, at the very highest levels to achieve a well-planned outcome. What outcome is that? Global rule over all banking, of course.

How to take over the world’s finances

Imagine an international Federal Reserve that creates and controls the money supply for the entire world. The centralization of financial power into the hands of the few would be unprecedented. What power the Fed wields over the United States today, a "global Fed" could soon wield across the entire world.

Achieving such a power grab, however, is no small task. Nations will not voluntarily surrender power over their currencies…

Unless there is a crisis!

In a crisis scenario, nations will give up practically anything — freedoms, finances, and yes, even their own currencies if it means avoiding certain economic disaster. If there’s one thing that the world has learned from 9/11, it’s that the best way to grab power from the People is to either engineer a disaster or piggyback on one that occurs on its own. When faced with the fear of annihilation, the People of any nation will not merely surrender their freedoms and finances, they will beg to turn them over to any apparent "authority" who promises a solution.

Survive the collapse of society as we know it

Dmitry Orlov advises: 

What I generally tell people is that, during the collapse, most people will lose most of their money...the important thing is to avoid losing all your money at once, but to coast down gently, while coming up with ways to survive without money, by relying on personal connections and relationships, home production of various kinds, barter, favors, gifts, and so forth.

I made the horrific discovery in August, 2007, that our world is ruled by a criminal cabal that is engineering the destruction of the world economy, to force us into servitude and a one world fascist dictatorship.  I have seen nothing since then to make me change my mind about this. In fact, due to the amazing gullibility and complacency of the American people, the plan is unfolding even faster than I expected. 

Since late 2007 I've been urging friends to investigate 9/11 and the shadow government.  I sold what I had in the stock market in August '08 and started advising people to stock up on non-perishable food in September.  If you have land, a vegetable garden is an excellent idea. 

Does this seem too far out to believe?  Ask yourself:  If I were a victim of propaganda, how would I know?  Their control is not yet complete.  There are still ways to learn the truth if you are determined to do so.  The story of my awakening is here.

In a book published in 1970 by former FBI agent, BYU professor and Salt Lake City police chief Skousen, the author warns: 

...a gigantic complex of political and economic power which would cover the whole earth...is on the verge of becoming a total reality.

Skousen's book was based on the writings of Carroll Quigley, Bill Clinton's history professor at Georgetown University, who wrote in 1966: 

...the powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole.

Georgia Congressman and Democrat Larry P. McDonald said: 

The drive of the Rockefellers and their allies is to create a one-world government combining supercapitalism and Communism under the same tent, all under their control... Do I mean conspiracy? Yes I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent.

McDonald candidly discussed this vast conspiracy on Crossfire in May 1983 and was killed four months later in the shootdown of KAL 007 over the USSR.  The video of McDonald on Crossfire is here.

J. Edgar Hoover: 

The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists.

There are more of us than there are of them.  My hope was, that if enough of us could wake up before it was too late, we had some chance of forestalling a terrible fate.  My blog has had 12,500 unique visitors in the past two months, and the Rock Creek Free Press distributes 18,000 copies every month, but this is miniscule compared to the influence of our corrupt and complicit mainstream media. 

I strongly urge you to investigate for yourself.  I am happy to suggest books, websites and documentaries which will be helpful.

Here are some thoughts about what to do with your remaining assets, from someone who lived through the collapse of the Soviet Union. 

Jon Stewart slices, dices and eviscerates CNBC

How do people like Cramer keep their jobs?  Clearly their accuracy in predicting the market has nothing to do with it.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

CNBC Gives Financial Advice

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Joke of the Day

Are you an obedient taxpayer? Happy to bail out the banksters?

Bailout exceeds cost of all US wars combined (plus the New Deal and NASA)

from the Rock Creek Free Press:

According to CRS, the Congressional Research Service, all major US wars (including such events as the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Civil War, the Spanish American War, World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan, the invasion of Panama, the Kosovo War and numerous other small conflicts), cost a total of $7.5 trillion in inflation-adjusted 2008 dollars.

Casey Research, of Vermont, (no relation) has analyzed the costs of the government bailouts of the housing crisis, the credit crisis and others and has concluded that the total is $8.5 trillion, which is more than the cost of all US wars, the Louisiana Purchase, the New Deal, the Marshall Plan and the NASA Space Program combined.

Bureau of Labor Statistics: we are falling off a cliff

We are so screwed

In Paul Craig Roberts' most recent column, the former Wall St. Journal editor lays out the gravity of the situation for the USA:

The unreality in which the US government operates is beyond belief.  A  bankrupt government  that cannot pay its bills without printing money is rushing headlong into wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran.  According to the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Analysis, the cost to the US taxpayers of sending a single soldier to fight in Afghanistan or Iraq is $775,000 per year!  

The world has never seen such total mindlessness.  Napoleon’s and Hitler’s march into Russia were rational acts compared to the mindless idiocy of the United States government.

Obama’s war in Afghanistan is the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party.  After seven years of conflict, there is still no defined mission or endgame scenario for US forces in Afghanistan.  When asked about the mission, a US military official told NBC News, "Frankly, we don’t have one."  NBC reports: "they’re working on it."  

Speaking to House Democrats on February 5, President Obama admitted that the US government does not know what its mission is in Afghanistan and that to avoid "mission creep without clear parameters," the US "needs a clear mission."

How would you like to be sent to a war, the point of which no one knows, including the commander-in-chief who sent you to kill or be killed?  How, fellow taxpayers, do you like paying the enormous cost of sending soldiers on an undefined mission while the economy collapses?

What possible explanation is there for the Executive branch and the Congress to collude in destroying America?  Is there no one to stand up for the American worker or taxpayer or soldier? 

Once again, we will be asked to believe that this crisis was caused by incompetence--just like Iraq, Katrina and 9/11.  There must be no Ph.Ds in government, no one who understands economics, finance or even logic.

Once again, no heads will roll, there will be no demotions for this so-called incompetence.  Instead we see the prime villains--the bankers who first pleaded for less government oversight and then exploited that lack of oversight to build a huge debt bubble and destroy the economy--we see these same people being rewarded with trillions of dollars from the US treasury.  Dollars they can, and do, use for luxury vacations and enormous bonuses for themselves.

Rational economists such as Karl Denninger have argued that the banks need to fail.  In the words of Mexican banker Hugo Salinas Price:

There is no other way out of this swamp of excessive debt - and we state this categorically - other than by the cancellation of enormous amounts of debt, as noncollectable.

If the banks are too big to fail, why was there no anti-trust activity to prevent these behemoths from robbing us? 

It is not incompetence, it is an intentional sinking of the American middle class, ie, everyone other than the super-rich.  In this context, the middle class includes your surgeon, your accountant, your real estate broker. 

Americans who have lost their jobs, now will have time to go on the internet and explore the origins of our failed banking system, and might ask themselves why a private corporation, the Federal Reserve, was given the power to control the US economy. 

Has the Fed fulfilled its mission responsibly?  If not, why is it allowed to continue acting as king and monarch of of a soon to be former SuperPower?

The answer was given to me by film maker Laurel Jensen, who worked in the Reagan White House.  In June of 2008 she told me:

The President is only a PR guy.  He meets every Wednesday afternoon with representatives of the major banking families, who give him his marching orders.  He then goes and sells that plan to the American people.

Have you ever seen an article in the mainstream media seriously questioning the role of the Fed?  Are its decisions subjected to any kind of oversight? 

Of course not, for they are the controllers, dictators and rulers of this world.  Our visible government--Obama, Biden, Hillary--are just the public face of this cabal, the functionaries installed in power by the cabal's PR arm (aka the mainstream media) to implement its desires. 

And 98% of Americans are still oblivious to this. 

Yes, we are screwed.

Voters grade Obama’s first year: the view from January 2010

WASHINGTON, Jan. 20, 2010—It was one year ago today that America’s first black President swept into office amid great joy and hoopla.  Barack Obama won handily, garnering more than twice the number of electoral votes, and ten million more popular votes than John McCain.  On the night he won the presidency, women fainted and Jesse Jackson broke down and cried.  After eight years under G.W. Bush, the nation was ready for a change, and Obama—slim, smiling, erudite—was everything that America longed for.

The Creek is touring the nation to ask voters to assess Obama’s first year in office.   

We spoke to Tiffany Nguyen, who was ringing up groceries at a Safeway in Phoenix, AZ.   She was hesitant to criticize Obama, even though three years ago she was a real estate agent making $250,000 per year. 

"He did say that we are the ones we’ve been waiting for,” she said, during a break between customers.  "Since we’ve been here all along, if we haven’t done it yet, there’s not much point in waiting for ourselves any more, now is there?”

Fred Hernandez of Gainesville, FL saw his son leave for duty in Iraq in 2005, and now, five years later, wonders when he will be coming home. 

“I got all swept up in Obamania and even sent his campaign a few dollars,” said Hernandez. 

“When Obama said “I’m asking you to believe,” I did believe.  I wanted so badly to believe. I believed that my son would be coming home for good.  But the Army keeps sending him back.” 

“I guess I believed the wrong thing,” sighed Hernandez, as he loaded used cinder blocks into his truck to sell at the flea market.  

The McGillicutys of Denver live out of their van parked next to the Platte River. 

“I hated Bush with a vengeance,” opined Brenda, as she cradled her daughter.  “I quit my job so I could volunteer fulltime for Obama.  I saw it as our last chance—another Republican president was gonna finish us off.  And I loved Obama’s spirit of hope, of optimism.  When he said “Yes, we can!”  I imagined  the whole country pulling together to undo the damage of the Bush years.”

“But then the economy crashed, and I couldn’t find another job.  Food stamps were eliminated to pay for the bailout, and when our ARM reset, we couldn’t make the payments.” 

Brenda let out a long breath.  “I guess the question I should have asked was:  Yes we can what?”

Despite the grim assessment of these embittered voters, there are those who are pleased with Obama’s performance.  Former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson was interviewed while receiving a foot massage on the deck of his villa on the newly renamed Paulson Island in the Caribbean.  Surveying the waves crashing on the sparkling white beach, Paulson lauded Obama’s pro-active leadership in drumming up support for the economic bailout of fall 2008.

“We dodged a bullet,” said Paulson.  “And we have Obama to thank for insuring that our current financial system has been saved.  Perhaps the tide didn’t lift all boats, but it lifted the boats that count.”

Our final interview was conducted via phone with the inmate of a prison cell in an undisclosed location.  Former Rock Creek Free Press editor Matt Sullivan is being held on undisclosed charges.  He was given just one minute to speak to us. 

“Obama was so vague with his promises that he was a kind of electoral Rorschach test:  voters saw in him whatever they wanted to see in him," said Sullivan. 

“There was lots of feel-good talk about hope and inspiring slogans like “This is our moment” and “change you can believe in,”  but what we never heard—and voters never demanded—was a commitment from Obama to restore the Constitution, to investigate the crimes of the Bush administration, and to get rid of Patriot Acts 1 and 2, the Military Commissions Act, NSPD 51 and 53. 

"These Orwellian laws allowed them to arrest me and hold me without access to a lawyer or to any visitors.  I’m a native born American and I have yet to be charged with a crime.”

I pressed Sullivan to elaborate, but, his time almost up, he said only “Tell my kids I love them.”

Note:   This will be the last column from Sheila Casey.  She has been relocated to a secure location for questioning while her threat to national security is assessed. 

Porn kings ask for $5 billion bailout

Times must be tough indeed, Americans have given up on sex.  Or have they decided its cheaper to get their kicks at home, with their own wives?  Maybe the recession will turn out to be good for American marriages, as millions of husbands forsake the double D, 19 year old actresses of the porn films for the real flesh and blood women who love them. 

This blonde is from the Girls Gone Wild website.  She seems to think that her belly is quite alluring.   

I had to look twice to make sure this news item wasn't from the Onion.  Who needs comedy when our headlines bring us this?

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Another major American industry is asking for assistance as the global financial crisis continues: Hustler publisher Larry Flynt and Girls Gone Wild CEO Joe Francis said Wednesday they will request that Congress allocate $5 billion for a bailout of the adult entertainment industry.

You wouldn't buy our shitty cars

You probably thought it was smart to buy a foreign import of superior quality, with better mileage and resale value. Maybe you even thought that years of market share loss might prod us into rethinking our process and redesigning our products with better quality in mind. But you forgot one thing: we spend a shitload of money on lobbyists. So now you're out $25 billion, plus the cost of your Subaru. Maybe next time you'll buy American like a real man. Either way, we’re cool.

We're the big three. We don't need to compete.

Is the world ruled by a Satanic cult?

I think you will find this woman's experiences interesting.  Interesting and horrifying.  Evidently the New World Order is already in place and ruling -- just not out in the open yet.

Svali escaped from the Satanic Illuminati cult.

They will force a two year old child to kill a kitten -- or else be shocked mercilessly.  As they get older they are forced to kill larger things, even human babies. 

This corroborates a book I've been reading by researcher Dave McGowan, "Programmed to Kill."  It's the worst thing I've ever read.  The evil of 9/11 is nothing compared to this:  the ritual rape, torture and murder of children, while nations everywhere refuse to prosecute the murderers, despite abundant evidence of their crimes.  

The sadists doing this are the same ones who control our planet from behind the scenes. Through their centuries-old control of banking, they have made vast amounts of money out of nothing, thanks to the sleight of hand known as fractional reserve banking, and now control governments, education, and the media.

There is a reason why you never learned in school exactly where money comes from.  

"Permit me to issue and control the money of the nation and I care not who makes its laws." — Mayer Amschel Rothschild, a prominent European banker in the eighteenth century

"This Federal Reserve Act establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the President (Wilson) signs this bill, the invisible government of the Monetary Power will be legalized." — Hon. Charles A. Lindbergh, Sr., Dec. 23, 1913

"We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated governments in the civilized world. We are no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominate men. I have unwittingly betrayed my country." — President Woodrow Wilson, 1916

"The drive of the Rockefellers and their allies is to create a one-world government combining super capitalism and Communism under the same tent; all under their control... Do I mean conspiracy?  Yes I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent." — Congressman Larry P. McDonald, 1976.  McDonald died when Korean Airlines flight 007 was shot down in 1983.

"Freedom is the absence of awareness of restraint." — David Rockefeller

"The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists." — J. Edgar Hoover

Why do you suppose there has been such a concerted media effort to paint conspiracy theorists as wacked out looney tunes moonbats?  Because there is a conspiracy, it is huge, and it's completely evil.  By having hipsters like Bill Maher and South Park characters mock conspiracy theorists, the sheep who can't think for themselves adopt that point of view as their own -- and refuse to take anyone seriously who has figured out the conspiracy.

Go ahead and mock if you want to.  Soon enough the truth will be painfully evident for all to see--if you can't see it now. 

Quotes from Carroll Quigley, Bill Clinton's prof at Georgetown University

These quotes are from Quigley's massive 1,348 page opus "Tragedy and Hope,  published in 1966.

"...the powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of the system was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basle, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world's central banks which were themselves private corporations. Each central bank...sought to dominate its government by its ability to control Treasury loans, to manipulate foreign exchanges, to influence the level of economic activity in the country, and to influence cooperative politicians by subsequent economic rewards in the business world."

"There does exist, and has existed for a generation, an international Anglophile network...I know of the operations of this network because I have studied it for twenty years and was permitted for two years, in the early 1960's, to examine its papers and secret records."

"More than fifty years ago the Morgan firm decided to infiltrate the Left-wing political movements in the United States. This was relatively easy to do, since these groups were starved for funds and eager for a voice to reach the people. Wall Street supplied both. The purpose was not to destroy, dominate, or take over but was really threefold: (1) to keep informed about the thinking of Left-wing or liberal groups; (2) to provide them with a mouthpiece so that they could "blow off steam," and (3) to have a final veto on their publicity and possibly on their actions, if they ever went "radical."

Buy food, seeds, guns

I've been reading a lot lately on Market Ticker, a site recommended to me by my brother in law, who was up here last month with a group of investors demonstrating on the lawn of the Capitol against the hand-out, er "bail-out" for Wall St. 

I went down and joined them.  Usually I demonstrate with leftists.  But now a whole new swath of Americans are getting a rude wake up to the lawlessness in our so called "government,"  as their 401ks shrivel along with their hopes for their children.

Karl Denninger of Market Ticker paints a grim picture of the future awaiting us unless this madness is stopped.  I don't understand everything he says, but I understand enough to realize that we are heading for very dark times.  The same criminals who have stolen two elections and brought you 9/11 and an invasion of two innocent countries, are now robbing us blind. 

Come on now, did you really think that a regime that thought nothing of decimating an entire people -- the Iraqis --  would be any kinder to us?  Iraq had something they wanted:  oil.  They took it.  We have something they want:  assets.  They take those too. 

The looting and plundering of the rest of the world wasn't of much concern to most Americans.  If millions had descended on Washington screaming for impeachment, perhaps we'd be in a different position now. 

But that didn't happen.  And now it is our turn to be looted and plundered. 

Yes, the middle class will be destroyed. No, it's not an accident.

Published in the November, 2008 Rock Creek Free Press.

Economist and financial guru Karl Denninger has been railing for weeks about the lunacy of the bailout bill and the devastation it will bring to our financial markets.

Here's the key passage from Denninger's post on Market Ticker from Wednesday:

Oil will collapse in price to $20/bbl.  Unfortunately nobody will have any money to buy gasoline, or a car, so it won't matter.  As in The Depression millions of automobiles will be scrapped after being abandoned by their owners for lack of insurance and registration fee money.  Cheap scooters will become the dominant form of transportation for those with jobs, as they will be all most people can afford.

As credit collapses distribution of food and other essentials will break down.  Unable to access credit, trucking companies will be unable to get goods to market.  The current distribution system for food requires travel of over 500 miles from production to consumption; this is untenable in a market where stable credit is unavailable.  Food distribution will be severely impacted and in some areas may break down below critical levels.

Unemployment will reach 25% within two years.  Median income will fall by 30% nationally.  Foreclosures will reach 20 million homes.  The government will step in with HOLC-style remediation but it won't matter - the unemployed won't be able to pay irrespective of the price.

House prices will fall to well under $100,000 nationally on a median basis but with lending all but non-existent you'll need 50% down.  A few people will make out like bandits near the bottom, being able to buy up homes for $10,000 each in blocks of 10 at a time - for cash.  60% of America will be renters; nearly half of all homeowners will ultimately lose their homes to foreclosure.

Civil unrest will break out in major cities when incomes fall but the cost of food and essential services fail to come down materially, leaving millions of Americans hungry, broke and homeless.  Unlike in the 1930s America will not quietly stand in soup lines - instead they will riot, loot and burn.  The National Guard will be called up but will find it impossible to exert meaningful control without shutting down all commerce in the affected areas. The decision will be made to cordon off the cities and deny entry to anyone who does not live in that specific neighborhood, essentially shutting down commercial activity.  GDP will fall by 30%.

Congress had no choice but to pass the bailout

In a conversation with Frank Shafroth, Chief of Staff to Congressman Jim Moran of northern Virginia, I learned why Moran voted for the bailout.  According to Shafroth, Bernanke and Paulson were going to do what they wanted, whether a bill was passed or not.  Earlier this week, before the bill passed, they injected $630 billion (or 90% of the total demanded in the bill) in "liquidity" into the market--to no discernible effect. 

Shafroth said that at least with a bill, Congress will get some degree of transparency and accountability, and the American people will get some degree of ownership.  With the bailouts that already occurred (with Fannie and Freddie for example) it was a straight give away with nothing in return. 

I asked him if the bill was really then nothing but a formality.

"I wouldn't put it that way," he said.  But sure sounds like it. 

What I don't understand, (maybe some of you can enlighten me) is why Bernanke and Paulson pushed so hard to get the bill passed when they can just take the money anyway.