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Saturday, August 6, 2011

A National Debt Of $14 Trillion? Try $211 Trillion : NPR

A National Debt Of $14 Trillion? Try $211 Trillion : NPR

by NPR STAFF August 6, 2011

When Standard & Poor's reduced the nation's credit rating from AAA to AA-plus, the United States suffered the first downgrade to its credit rating ever. S&P took this action despite the plan Congress passed this past week to raise the debt limit.

The downgrade, S&P said, "reflects our opinion that the fiscal consolidation plan that Congress and the administration recently agreed to falls short of what, in our view, would be necessary to stabilize the government's medium-term debt dynamics."

It's those medium- and long-term debt problems that also worry economics professor Laurence J. Kotlikoff, who served as a senior economist on President Reagan's Council of Economic Advisers. He says the national debt, which the U.S. Treasury has accounted at about $14 trillion, is just the tip of the iceberg.

"We have all these unofficial debts that are massive compared to the official debt," Kotlikoff tells David Greene, guest host of weekends on All Things Considered. "We're focused just on the official debt, so we're trying to balance the wrong books."

Kotlikoff explains that America's "unofficial" payment obligations — like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits — jack up the debt figure substantially.

Laurence J. Kotlikoff served as a senior economist on President Ronald Reagan's Council of Economic Advisers and is a professor of economics at Boston University.
Courtesy of Boston University

Laurence J. Kotlikoff served as a senior economist on President Ronald Reagan's Council of Economic Advisers and is a professor of economics at Boston University.

"If you add up all the promises that have been made for spending obligations, including defense expenditures, and you subtract all the taxes that we expect to collect, the difference is $211 trillion. That's the fiscal gap," he says. "That's our true indebtedness."

We don't hear more about this enormous number, Kotlikoff says, because politicians have chosen their language carefully to keep most of the problem off the books.

"Why are these guys thinking about balancing the budget?" he says. "They should try and think about our long-term fiscal problems."

According to Kotlikoff, one of the biggest fiscal problems Congress should focus on is America's obligation to make Social Security payments to future generations of the elderly.

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Advocates for Self Government

Advocates for Self Government

Advocates for Self Government Logo


World's Smallest Political Quiz

The ORIGINAL Internet Political Quiz. Take the Quiz now and find out where you fit on the political map.

Sample Question: Government should not censor speech, press, media, or internet. Answers: Agree, Maybe or Disagree.

Rachel Maddow: 'I Was Wrong' About Rush Limbaugh Clip (VIDEO)

Rachel Maddow: 'I Was Wrong' About Rush Limbaugh Clip (VIDEO)

First Posted: 8/6/11 11:55 AM ET Updated: 8/6/11 11:55 AM ET

Rachel Maddow issued a correction and an unreserved apology to her viewers on Friday for a mistake she made about Rush Limbaugh.

On her Thursday show, Maddow played a clip of Rush Limbaugh that she said was from Wednesday. The clip featured Limbaugh saying that there wasn't proof that President Obama was born on August 4, 1961. Maddow used the clip as evidence of the durability of the birther theory among some conservatives.

The problem, though, was that the clip was from a year ago, not the day before. On Friday, Maddow 'fessed up.

"I'm in a massive brawl with Rush Limbaugh right now, and you know what? Rush Limbaugh wins!" she said. "I was wrong. I lose!"

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Florida Teen Dies In Jail After Being Arrested For Marijuana - Toke of the Town

Florida Teen Dies In Jail After Being Arrested For Marijuana - Toke of the Town

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ in News
Wednesday, August 3, 2011, at 3:20 pm
JUPuA.Em.jpeg


An 18-year-old Florida man has died after suffering a medical emergency while in jail on a marijuana charge. Records show that Superintendent Anthony Flowers of the Palm Beach Juvenile Detention Center instructed staff not to call 9-1-1 as young Eric Perez lay dying.

Perez, 18, had been screaming and vomiting all night long, but jailers at the Palm Beach Juvenile Detention Center didn't call 9-1-1 until well after dawn, reports Carol Marbin Miller at the Miami Herald.

A detention center healthcare log shows the youth was not examined by a medical professional until 7:51 a.m. Four minutes later, lockup staff called a "Code White," meaning the young man's condition was critical, the log shows.

After the 2003 scandal involving the death of young Omar Paisley, who also died before paramedics could help him, the state had posted signs throughout 22 youth detention centers authorizing guards to call 9-1-1 at the first hint of an emergency.

In a cruel twist of irony, administrators promised in 2003 and 2004 that they would "treat every child as if he were your own" after guards waited three days before calling an ambulance for the doomed Paisley.

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U-Roy - Stop that train

World Leaders - Maybe let me see your knickers

The Nature of Battle - An Epic Aniboom Animation by Nat Dart

Evanescence meets Ron Paul

The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name (Official, W/ Lyrics)

KELLY THOMAS WAS MURDERED BY POLICE!

Genesis (take #1)

CLONE Short Film

When Men Become Truly Free

Did You Know: War on Drugs Edition

S & P AA+ rating on U.S. Sovereign Debt not Low Enough

Afghan comedy series mocks 'rampant corruption'

Friday, August 5, 2011

Berlin: Islamic 'Honor' Killing Bloodbath, Mother and sister of ex-wife Shot dead - Atlas Shrugs

Berlin: Islamic 'Honor' Killing Bloodbath, Mother and sister of ex-wife Shot dead - Atlas Shrugs:

Friday, August 05, 2011

The silence of the media on the relgious motivation of gendercide and gender apartheid is inhumane, disgusting and criminal. Lwsuits have been filed in Dearborn, Michigan against law enofrcemtn for covering up honor kilings and the the Islamic honor murder of Fatima Abdallah in Florida remains classfied as suicide by coffe table.

Please join us on August 24th for Aqsa Parvez Memorial Grove dedication in memory of honor killing victims worldwide.This is the first initiative of its kind, dedicated to calling attention to this enforcement of the most savage elements of Islamic law against women: wives, daughters, and sisters. One can't even begin to fathom the lost dreams and ideals and promises and hopes for a full life extinguished by the tyrannical, hatemongering macho culture of Islamic supremacism.

Demand the world's condemnation of Islamic misogyny, gender apartheid and the dehumanization of women. This should be the first of tens of thousands of memorials, but the point of the memorials does not end simply with the memorials themselves. The memorials show that we have not forgotten and will not forget these girls. And the memorials are just a part of a larger determination to show the Islamic world that we simply will not allow this barbaric practice of Islamic honor killing to stand in the West. We will plant millions of groves.

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When everyone has a sacred cow, no one has any meat

When everyone has a sacred cow, no one has any meat

By Mencken’s Ghost

August 4, 2011

To see what notions the statist destroyers of America are hatching to ensure that prosperity and individual liberty never rise from the dead, I listen to both leftist and rightist media.

Leftist television was all aglow recently about our munificent and benevolent president giving women free birth control, although it is free stuff that has bankrupted the nation.

Naturally, rightist talk radio was aghast about this latest giveaway. But a drive-time host on Arizona’s most popular rightist talk-radio station found time to also rant about local school districts charging a fee of around $100 for kids who participate in organized sports. He didn’t see his intellectual contradiction, although it was just as obvious as Phoenix’s Camelback Mountain.

When everyone has a sacred cow, no one has any meat to eat. Or stated differently, when no one wants to cut his pet program, subsidy, entitlement, handout, or defense contract, the nation will never climb out of bankruptcy.

It probably takes an intellectual to recognize an intellectual contradiction, and the talk-show host, a former high school jock, is anything but an intellectual. That’s a compliment, for as history shows, intellectuals have inflicted great harm on the world and nation.

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Tea Party Congressman | Terrorist Label | Jeff Landry | The Daily Caller

Tea Party Congressman | Terrorist Label | Jeff Landry | The Daily Caller

Tea party congressman flips Biden’s ‘terrorist’ label back on Democrats

Rep. Jeff Landry, Louisiana Republican, told The Daily Caller that Vice President Joe Biden should think twice before labeling him and other tea partiers “terrorists” or “hostage-takers.”

He hints that he thinks Biden, President Barack Obama and other Democrats might be more deserving of the label themselves.

“Let’s think about it: In my lifetime, I have created jobs and I have paid taxes in the private sector and I have helped move our economy forward,” Landry remarked.

“What have they done? You’ve still got above 9 percent unemployment, we’re running record deficits and on Tuesday the president signed the largest increase of United States debt in history,” he continued. “Now, you tell me who’s terrorizing the country?”

When TheDC directly asked if by that he’s saying Obama and the Democratic Party are the real terrorists, Landry replied, “No. I’m not going to engage in political sniping.”

Landry added that he’s pretty sure tea partiers don’t fit with any dictionary definition of terrorists. “You look up the definition of terrorist, I don’t know what the exact definition would be: I don’t have Webster’s in front of me,” he said. “But, you think it would be someone who inflicts harm on another.”

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Rick Santelli Slams MSNBC Ezra Klein for Claiming Markets ‘Unfair’ | Video | TheBlaze.com

Rick Santelli Slams MSNBC Ezra Klein for Claiming Markets ‘Unfair’ | Video | TheBlaze.com

Posted on August 5, 2011 at 4:48pm by Buck Sexton Buck Sexton

Rick Santelli, the man who’s 2009 firebrand speech on government spending is considered a seminal moment in the Tea Party’s founding, gave MSNBC analyst and Washington Post columnist Ezra Klein a stern lesson in free markets on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” Friday morning.

Klein made some assertions about the financial crisis, including that most people agree two economists he cited have “done the best work on financial crises,“ and then offered up that the role of the Federal Reserve is ”often overlooked.”

Klein continued on and quoted one of his favorite economists calling for another ”round of significant inflation,“ and then asked Santelli to respond to the assumption that a recession would cause money to move around in a way that is ”unfair.”

That was enough to get Santelli riled up, and he responded to Klein that:

“money doesn’t move around in ways that are unfair, money moves around because people that have it control or invest it…its theirs and they put it in places…any outside outsider looking at that process and using words like unfair just don’t understand markets and capitalism.”

Klein replied that Santelli’s response was besides the point. But that didn’t stop Santelli from delivering some strong parting shots as the segment closed:

” What we have is a bunch of entities that should have failed, it would have brought religion to the system, it would have been a good thing, but we prohibited that from happening.”

Cops That Shot Mentally Retarded Asking For Help In The Back With A Shot...

Renton Police Believe Cartoonist Likely A Department Employee!

Fake War on Drugs-The U.S. Government is The Real Kingpin (Part 1 of 2)

Unschoolers learn what they want, when they want - CNN.com

Unschoolers learn what they want, when they want - CNN.com:

By Jacque Wilson, CNN
August 3, 2011 8:46 a.m. EDT

"(CNN) -- Six-year-old Karina Ricci doesn't ever have a typical day. She has no schedule to follow, no lessons to complete.
She spends her time watching TV, doing arts and crafts or practicing the piano. She learned to spell by e-mailing with friends; she uses math concepts while cooking dinner.
Everything she knows has been absorbed 'organically,' according to her dad, Dr. Carlo Ricci. She's not just on summer break -- this is her life year round as an at-home unschooler."

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Bill Hicks - Deficit (Jesse Helms)

Obama is a disappointMINT!

Ron Paul: You Can't Argue with History - Gold Is Money and the Dollar Will self destruct

Cop and Judge Campaign for Marijuana Legalization!

The Cops Brutally Murder Another Innocent Man

For 36 Years Federal Govt. Has Been Growing Marijuana & Dispensing It As...

Agents Go Door To Door, Issue $400 Fines For Owning A Dog

Jackson Man Jailed For Shingling

Jackson Man Jailed For Shingling

By Molly Miles, Reporter - email

The shingles that Andrew Espey put up two years ago are holding up well, but the legal battle that came with them is far from over.

It all started when Espey decided to re–shingle his roof after discovering a leak.

Espey says, "The building inspector came along and told me I couldn't do it. He told me I had to quit and take off the shingles and start over because they have a code."

A Minnesota state residential code says that new asphalt shingles cannot be installed without first removing exist shingles, and on one section of the roof Espey was installing new shingles over the old.

Espey says, "They didn't tell me I couldn't overlay shingles when I got my permit...I didn't even know they had such a code."

The city served him a stop work order, but he ignored it and finished the job.

Espey says, "I was kind of getting disturbed a little bit, somebody telling me what I can do on my home."

Nevertheless, on March of last year he was found guilty of four counts of violating building code and two counts of violating a stop work order, fined over $2000 and sentenced to 90 days in jail, 60 with good behavior.

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Nearly Three Quarters Believe Global Warming Data Falsified

Nearly Three Quarters Believe Global Warming Data Falsified

By Bob Ellis on August 4th, 2011

I’ve been watching the number of people who believe in anthropogenic global warming (AGW) fall for several years now.

At first, many if not most people were willing to give scientists the benefit of the doubt. After all, scientists and other “professionals” have a reputation of being concerned with facts, not opinions and agendas. Right or wrong, the general public has a historical perception of scientists as being objective and above personal biases.

But as people began to learn more about this apocalyptic prediction, their confidence in the scientific community in general and this hypothesis in particular began to drop. People began to realize how little actual solid evidence there is for AGW, and how much of the hypothesis is based on computer models.

The public started to see that while most of the predictions concerning AGW are so far out into the future as to be unverifiable, some were short term…and have been woefully missed by these computer models. As public belief in this idea began to drop, the so-called scientific community began to overplay its hand, and soon we were hearing scientists tell us that anything and everything was a sign, was proof of global warming: if it’s hot, that proves global warming; if it’s cold, that proves global warming; if it rains, that proves global warming; if it snows, that proves global warming; if there’s a drought, that proves global warming. Uh huh. Yes, too many people are preoccupied with Survivor and Lady Gaga, but only a few of us are thatstupid and disengaged intellectually.

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10 LAPD officers sue, saying department has traffic-ticket quotas - latimes.com

10 LAPD officers sue, saying department has traffic-ticket quotas - latimes.com

August 4, 2011 | 11:52 am

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/.a/6a00d8341c630a53ef014e887a6712970d-800wi


Ten Los Angeles motor officers have sued the city alleging that their supervisors retaliated against them for resisting traffic-ticket quotas, according to a court filing reviewed Thursday.
Attorneys for officers Philip Carr, Timothy Dacus, Kevin Cotter, Peter Landelius, Kevin Ree, Kevin Riley, Josh Sewell, Vincent Stroway, James Wallace and Jason Zapatka -- all of the West Traffic Division -- filed suit a week ago in Los Angeles Superior Court.
Among their allegations is that LAPD supervisors punished them for refusing to follow orders to implement traffic ticket quotas. They also allege that the amount of traffic tickets they produced was the basis for an illegal comparison among fellow West Traffic Bureau motor cops.
The punishments included being denied overtime and other unspecified benefits, as well as being given negative performance reviews.
The LAPD did not immediately comment on the allegations.
Ticket quotas are illegal under state law, since they can pressure police to write spurious tickets to meet the goal. The line between setting a quota and pushing officers to increase their productivity is a delicate one for field supervisors, who are often under pressure themselves to generate more citations.
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Thursday, August 4, 2011

Documents: Feds allegedly allowed Sinaloa cartel to move cocaine into U.S. for information - El Paso Times

Documents: Feds allegedly allowed Sinaloa cartel to move cocaine into U.S. for information - El Paso Times

U.S. federal agents allegedly allowed the Sinaloa drug cartel to traffic several tons of cocaine into the United States in exchange for information about rival cartels, according to court documents filed in a U.S. federal court.

The allegations are part of the defense of Vicente Zambada-Niebla, who was extradited to the United States to face drug-trafficking charges in Chicago. He is also a top lieutenant of drug kingpin Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman and the son of Ismael "Mayo" Zambada-Garcia, believed to be the brains behind the Sinaloa cartel.

The case could prove to be a bombshell on par with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' "Operation Fast and Furious," except that instead of U.S. guns being allowed to walk across the border, the Sinaloa cartel was allowed to bring drugs into the United States. Zambada-Niebla claims he was permitted to smuggle drugs from 2004 until his arrest in 2009.

Randall Samborn, assistant U.S. attorney and spokesman for the Justice Department in Chicago, declined comment.

The court in Chicago had a status hearing on Wednesday and ordered the government to respond to allegations in Zambada-Niebla's motion by Sept. 11.

According to the court documents, Mexican lawyer Humberto Loya-Castro, another high-level Sinaloa cartel leader, had his 1995 U.S. drug-trafficking case dismissed in 2008 after serving as an informant for 10 years for the U.S. government.

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House Of Cards


David House: Gov't 'Scared' of Hackers

Welcome to the Recovery

The US Dictatorship and its White House Servant ‘President’

The US Dictatorship and its White House Servant ‘President’

by Finian Cunningham


If there is one thing that the office of President Barack Obama demonstrates it is that democracy does not exist in the United States. This may seem a rather outlandish statement. For many people, the fact that the 44th president is the first black man to preside over the White House – with its American colonial-style architecture – is a tribute to the triumph of US democracy.

But many other more telling facts indicate that Obama is but a figurehead of an unelected government in the US. This unelected power of corporate elites – commercial, financial, military – governs with the same core policies regardless of who is sitting in the White House. Whether these policies are on social, economic or foreign matters, the elected president must obey the direction ordained by the unelected elite. That kind of untrammeled power structure conforms more closely in practice to dictatorship, not democracy.

As Michael Hudson and Ellen Brown reveal in their analyses of the US budget debacle, Obama is pathetically doing the bidding of Wall Street – much like an errand boy [1] [2].

Brown writes: “The debt crisis was created, not by a social safety net bought and paid for by the taxpayers, but by a banking system taken over by Wall Street gamblers. The gamblers lost their bets and were bailed out at the expense of the taxpayers; and if anyone should be held to account, it is these gamblers.

“The debt ceiling crisis is a manufactured one, engineered to extort concessions that will lock the middle class in debt peonage for decades to come. Congress is empowered by the Constitution to issue the money it needs to pay its debts.”

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Ron Paul “Creation Of Super Congress Is Monstrous!” « RunRonPaul.com

Ron Paul “Creation Of Super Congress Is Monstrous!” « RunRonPaul.com

August 4, 2011 by Trevor Lyman

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"The Real Enemy Is Washington! The Real Terrorist Are The Ones We Elected!"

Government Destroyers

Government Overregulation Threatens Economic Growth

An Open Challenge to Rachel Maddow - Coordination Problem

An Open Challenge to Rachel Maddow - Coordination Problem


Dear Ms. Maddow,
On your show of August 3rd, you argued that Herbert Hoover was responsible for the deepening of the Great Depression because of his commitment to what we would now call "austerity" and his refusal to act aggressively and use government spending to prop up the economy. Your portrayal of Hoover as a proto-Tea Partier committed to free markets and laissez-faire is, however, historically inaccurate.
One need only glance at Hoover's own writings to see your mistake. In his acceptance speech upon receiving the GOP nomination in 1932, he said: "We might have done nothing. That would have been utter ruin. Instead, we met the situation with proposals to private business and the Congress of the most gigantic program of economic defense and counter attack ever evolved in the history of the Republic." Over the course of that year, Hoover proposed a variety of new spending programs as well as the largest peacetime tax increase in US history. His set of programs foreshadowed the New Deal, and even FDR's advisor Rex Tugwell admitted: "When it was all over, I once made a list of New Deal ventures begun during Hoover’s years as secretary of commerce and then as president…. The New Deal owed much to what he had begun." Government spending over Hoover's presidency increased by 47%, hardly evidence of a refusal to act or a commitment to austerity. Of course the Smoot-Hawley tariff and a near-prohibition of immigration are hardly the acts of a man committed to small government. Finally, Hoover was convinced that maintaining high wages was the key to prosperity, and he successfully convinced major employers to not cut wages in the early 30s. The result, of course, was the 25% unemployment that characterized his presidency.
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Report: Obama Administration Added $9.5 Billion in Red Tape in July - US News and World Report

Report: Obama Administration Added $9.5 Billion in Red Tape in July - US News and World Report

Yikes! Look who just endorsed Obama for 4 more years

Yikes! Look who just endorsed Obama for 4 more years: "By

Aaron Klein
© 2011 WND"

It may be early in the campaign season, but the Communist Party USA already has seen fit to endorse Barack Obama for the 2012 election.

While noting he is disappointed with "some aspects" of the Obama administration's domestic and foreign policy, Sam Webb, chairman of the Communist Party USA, threw his support behind Obama's re-election bid.

In an article last week at People's Weekly World, the official newspaper of the Communist Party USA, Webb discussed the need for a third party consisting of the so-called working class and labor as well as "racially and nationally oppressed people, women, youth, immigrants, seniors, gay and straight."

Get "The Manchurian President" AUTOGRAPHED only at WND's Superstore!

Webb, however, recognized that such a party is not likely to emerge by next year.

"Millions who have to be at the core of this party still operate under the umbrella of the Democratic Party, albeit increasingly in an independent fashion," he noted.

Webb said that for communists there are major differences between Democrats and Republicans. He urged his supported to continue to back the Democrats.

Wrote Webb: "Neither party is anti-capitalist, but they aren't identical either. Differences exist at the levels of policy and social composition. And despite the many frustrations of the past two years, the election of Barack Obama was historic and gave space to struggle for a people's agenda."

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Before You Enlist! (2011 revision)

Williams, Oregon Tops State's Concentration Of Medical Marijuana Growers

Williams, Oregon Tops State's Concentration Of Medical Marijuana Growers

By JEFF BARNARD 08/ 3/11 05:52 AM ET

WILLIAMS, Ore. -- Medical marijuana has taken root in this idyllic town like nowhere else in Oregon.

Nearly 20 percent of the population is registered to grow pot legally, and an untold number deals it illegally, creating stark contrasts in a bucolic burg where children still ring the bell to start the school day and pancake breakfasts draw a crowd at the local community center.

The Associated Press analyzed the locations of registered pot grower in Oregon based on their ZIP codes and found that Williams by far has the heaviest concentration. More than 400 of the town's 2000 residents are authorized by the state to grow up to six plants each.

The proliferation of pot became the talk of the town last summer when new Google Earth satellite images showed little green circles in neat rows all over the valley.

"My daughter showed me on her iPhone," said Neil Sinnott, owner of a local cafe. "She said, `Dad, look what your neighbors are doing.'"

Six-foot-tall fences that screen marijuana gardens from public view have become so common that a local pastor uses them as landmarks for giving directions. One resident is trying to capitalize on the growing popularity of medical marijuana by starting a testing lab. A variety of marijuana grown here, called Williams Wonder, is cherished among pot connoisseurs.

Though big-city Portland has cafes where medical marijuana users smoke pot while singing karaoke, it is the rural communities of southwestern Oregon like Williams that have the highest percentages of folks smoking it, growing it and caring for others who use the drug.

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Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Chinese Credit Rating Agency Downgrades U.S. Rating To Single A

Italy struggles through debt crisis

Jeremy Kyle - Unemployment Theme...

Judge Judy - Here's Who You Support With Taxes

The Short, Unhappy Lives of Fiat Currencies

The History of Ernesto Che Guevara - A Short Story

The Fed's Big Secret: Money is Worthless

Just Keep Wasting ALL Our Resources Busting Grow Ops While! Child Rapist...

Gross US Debt Surges By $240 Billion Overnight, US Debt To GDP Hits Post World War II High 97.2%, Official Debt Ceiling Increase Only $400 Billion | ZeroHedge

Gross US Debt Surges By $240 Billion Overnight, US Debt To GDP Hits Post World War II High 97.2%, Official Debt Ceiling Increase Only $400 Billion | ZeroHedge

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 08/03/2011 18:06


Two things happened when the Senate voted in the "Bipartisan" plan into law yesterday: i) deferred debt on the Treasury's balance sheet finally caught up with reality, and ii) as a result of i) America's Debt/GDP just hit a post World War 2 High of 97.2%. Becasue as the Daily Treasury Statement as of last night indicates, total US marketable debt surged by $124.6 billion, while debt in intragovernmental holdings (Social Security, Government Retirement Accounts, etc), soared by $113.6 billion, for a combined one day change of $238.2 billion,the single biggest one day increase of US debt in history. Obviously this is a result of massive underfunding and disinvestment in the various government retirement accounts as well as due to deferred debt which was to be booked since the debt was breached on May 16. However, how marketable debt could increase by a whopping $125 billion without any actual auction settlement is slightly confusing. Just as confusing is that according to the endnote in the debt subject to limit calculation, the new ceiling is not the $900 billion increase as requested, but only $400 billion more than the $14.294 billion previous, or at $14.694 billion. We hope this is some Treasury type or misunderstanding as this new ceiling will be breached in a month. And the last thing we need is this whole debt ceiling drama back again in September. One thing there is no confusion about, however, is that based on the latest gross debt number of $14.581 trillion, and the justreported Q2 GDP of $15.003 billion, total US debt to GDP is now a post World War II high of 97.2% (and that excludes the GSE off balance sheet debt).

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Photography is Not a Crime - Penn Station - NYC - May 25, 2011

Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and the U.S. Terror State by Anthony Gregory

Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and the U.S. Terror State by Anthony Gregory


Being a U.S. war criminal means never having to say sorry. Paul Tibbets, the man who flew the Enola Gay and destroyed Hiroshima, lived to the impressive age of 92 without publicly expressing guilt for what he had done. He had even reenacted his infamous mission at a 1976 Texas air show, complete with a mushroom cloud, and later said he never meant this to be offensive. In contrast, he called it a "damn big insult" when the Smithsonian planned an exhibit in 1995 showing some of the damage the bombing caused.

We might understand a man not coming to terms with his most important contribution to human history being such a destructive act. But what about the rest of the country?

It’s sickening that Americans even debate the atomic bombings, as they do every year in early August. Polls in recent years reveal overwhelming majorities of the American public accepting the acts as necessary.

Conservatives are much worse on this topic, although liberals surely don’t give it the weight it deserves. Trent Lott was taken to the woodshed for his comments in late 2002 about how Strom Thurmond would have been a better president than Truman. Lott and Thurmond both represent ugly strains in American politics, but no one dared question the assumption that Thurmond was obviously a less defensible candidate than Truman. Zora Neale Hurston, heroic author of the Harlem Renaissance, might have had a different take, as she astutely called Truman "a monster" and "the butcher of Asia." Governmental segregation is terrible, but why is murdering hundreds of thousands of foreign civilians with as much thought as one would give to eradicating silverfish treated as simply a controversial policy decision in comparison?

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