by

The Road to Armageddon | OpEdNews

By Paul Craig Roberts
The Washington Times is a newspaper that looks with favor upon the Bush/Cheney/Obama/neocon wars of aggression in the Middle East and favors making terrorists pay for 9/11.
Therefore, I was surprised to learn on February 24 that the most popular story on the paper’s website for the past three days was the “Inside the Beltway” report, “Explosive News,” about the 31 press conferences in cities in the US and abroad on February 19 held by Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth, an organization of professionals which now has 1,000 members.

I was even more surprised that the news report treated the press conference seriously.How did three World Trade Center skyscrapers suddenly disintegrate into fine dust? How did massive steel beams in three skyscrapers suddenly fail as a result of short-lived, isolated, and low temperature fires? “A thousand architects and engineers want to know, and are calling on Congress to order a new investigation into the destruction of the Twin Towers and Building 7,” reports the Washington Times.

The paper reports that the architects and engineers have concluded that the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the National Institute of Standards and Technology provided “insufficient, contradictory and fraudulent accounts of the circumstances of the towers’ destruction” and are “calling for a grand jury investigation of NIST officials.”

The newspaper reports that Richard Gage, the spokesperson for the architects and engineers said: “Government officials will be notified that “Misprision of Treason,’ U.S. Code 18 (Sec. 2382) is a serious federal offense, which requires those with evidence of treason to act. The implications are enormous and may have profound impact on the forthcoming Khalid Sheik Mohammed trial.”

There is now an organization, Firefighters for 9/11 Truth. At the main press conference in San Francisco, Eric Lawyer,the head of that organization, announced the firefighters’ support for the architects and engineers’ demands. He reported that no forensic investigation was made of the fires that are alleged to have destroyed the three buildings and that this failure constitutes a crime.

Mandated procedures were not followed, and instead of being preserved and investigated, the crime scene was destroyed. He also reported that there are more than one hundred first responders who heard and experienced explosions and that there is radio, audio and video evidence of explosions.

Also at the press conference, physicist Steven Jones presented the evidence of nano-thermite in the residue of the WTC buildings found by an international panel of scientists led by University of Copenhagen nano-chemist Professor Niels Harrit. Nano-thermite is a high-tech explosive/pyrotechnic capable of instantly melting steel girders.

Before we yell “conspiracy theory,” we should be aware that the architects, engineers, firefighters, and scientists offer no theory. They provide evidence that challenges the official theory. This evidence is not going to go away. Read more…
Source: OpEdNews
by

Campaigning for State-Owned Banks | War of Debt

By Ellen Brown

While bank bailouts fatten Wall Street, states continue to battle the credit crisis. In the search for innovative solutions, some political candidates are proposing that states generate their own credit by setting up their own banks.

State budgets for 2010 face the largest shortfalls on record, totaling $194 billion or 28 percent of state budgets; and 2011 is expected to be worse. Unemployment has already officially hit 10 percent, and many economists expect it to rise higher. Continued high unemployment will keep state income tax receipts at low levels and increase demand for Medicaid and other essential services states provide.

The existing alternatives are spending cuts or tax increases, but both will just serve to make the downturn deeper. When states cut spending, they lay off employees, cancel contracts with vendors, eliminate or lower payments to businesses and nonprofit organizations that provide direct services, and cut benefit payments to individuals. The result is a reduction in overall demand. Tax increases also remove demand, by reducing the amount of money people have to spend.  Read more…

Source: War of Debt

by

The American Freedom Campaign Agenda

Editor’s Note: The American Freedom Agenda Act of 2007 (H.R. 3835), which addresses most of the issues outlined below, was introduced by U.S. Rep. Ron Paul on October 15, 2007. Click here to read the text of the bill.

At critical moments in our history, Americans have been called upon to protect our Constitutional guarantees of liberty and justice. We face such a moment today. The American Freedom Campaign is a non-partisan citizens’ alliance formed to reverse the abuse of executive power and restore our system of checks and balances with these ten goals:

  1. Fully restore the right to challenge the legality of one’s detention, or habeas corpus, and the right of detained suspects to be charged and brought to trial.
  2. Prohibit torture and all cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.
  3. Prohibit the use of secret evidence.
  4. Prohibit the detention of anyone, including U.S. citizens, as an “enemy combatant” outside the battlefield, and on the President’s say-so alone.
  5. Prohibit the government from secretly breaking and entering our homes, tapping our phones or email, or seizing our computers without a court order, on the President’s say-so alone.
  6. Prohibit the President from “disappearing” anyone and holding them in secret detention.
  7. Prohibit the executive from claiming “state secrets” to deny justice to victims of government misdeeds, and from claiming “executive privilege” to obstruct Congressional oversight and an open government.
  8. Prohibit the abuse of signing statements, where the President seeks to disregard duly enacted provisions of bills.
  9. Use the federal courts, or courts-martial, to charge and prosecute terrorism suspects, and close Guantanamo down.
  10. Reaffirm that the Espionage Act does not prohibit journalists from reporting on classified national security matters without fear of prosecution.
by

Will The Next War Be Fought Over Water? | NPR

Just as wars over oil played a major role in 20th-century history, a new book makes a convincing case that many 21st century conflicts will be fought over water.

In Water: The Epic Struggle for Wealth, Power and Civilization, journalist Steven Solomon argues that water is surpassing oil as the world’s scarcest critical resource.

Only 2.5 percent of the planet’s water supply is fresh, Solomon writes, much of which is locked away in glaciers. World water use in the past century grew twice as fast as world population.

“We’ve now reached the limit where that trajectory can no longer continue,” Solomon tells NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly. “Suddenly we’re going to have to find a way to use the existing water resources in a far, far more productive manner than we ever did before, because there’s simply not enough.”

One issue, Solomon says, is that water’s cost doesn’t reflect its true economic value. While a society’s transition from oil may be painful, water is irreplaceable. Yet water costs far less per gallon — and even less than that for some.

“In some cases, where there are large political subsidies, largely in agriculture, it does not [cost very much],” Solomon says. “In many cases, irrigated agriculture is getting its water for free. And we in the cities are paying a lot, and industries are also paying an awful lot. That’s unfair. It’s inefficient to the allocation of water to the most productive economic ends.”

At the same time, Solomon says, there’s an increasing feeling in the world that everyone has a basic right to a minimum 13 gallons of water a day for basic human health. He doesn’t necessarily have an issue with that.

“I think there’s plenty of water in the world, even in the poorest and most water-famished country, for that 13 gallons to be given for free to individuals — and let them pay beyond that,” he says.

Solomon says the world is divided into water haves and have-nots. China, Egypt and Pakistan are just a few countries facing critical water issues in the 21st century.

In his book he writes, “Consider what will happen in water-distressed, nuclear-armed, terrorist-besieged, overpopulated, heavily irrigation dependent and already politically unstable Pakistan when its single water lifeline, the Indus river, loses a third of its flow from the disappearance from its glacial water source.”

Solomon notes some good water news, too. The United States has made significant progress in curbing its water use, thanks to market forces and legislation such as the Clean Water Act.

“Our water use between 1900 and 1975 actually tripled relative to population growth,” he says. “Since 1975 to the present day, it has flat-lined. And we still had a population increase of about 30 percent and our GDP continued to grow. So it’s an amazing increase in water productivity.”

Source: NPR

by

Gaza Freedom March

By Yusif Barakat

I am in Cairo, as of December 24th, and will return on January 18, 2010 (see below).

During the “Reign of the Goddess”, the compassionate nurturer, and the procreator of life—there was peace.  When the Hebrews converted to the male God image (the warrior) we have had wars for thousands of years.  Throughout history women have promoted peace and at times refused conjugal favors until their men put down their weapons.  Unfortunately, modern women (especially American) have been conscripted and have bought into the male macho slogans: “might makes right” and “the end justifies the means”.

Fortunately, some women have remained true to the Goddess image and have maintained a vigil for Peace.  An example of this is the women who established Code Pink and are sponsoring the Gaza Freedom March.  For more information see www.gazafreedommarch.org.

There have been many men who have championed the Goddess concept as well and have promoted peace, such as, Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  One such person that I know personally is Father Peter Dougherty, who just won the International Gandhi Award.  I met Father Dougherty 20 years ago when I first got arrested for civil disobedience while protesting nuclear weapons at Williams International.

Father Dougherty is the founder of the Michigan Peace Team (formerly known as the Michigan Faith & Resistance Peace Team).   I served 10 years on the MPT Board and remain a trainer for their training in non-violent resistance in areas of conflict.   I am proud to be on a delegation from the Michigan Peace Team, along with 5 women to participate in the Gaza Freedom March.

Attached are two press releases, one from the national Code Pink and one from Michigan Peace Team.  We must break the death grip that Israel has on the Gaza Strip and all of Palestine!  View this 5 minute You-Tube video by Marice Jacobsen to see for yourself what is going on in Gaza and the Gaza Freedom March plans: www.vimeo.com/7956625.

Our intention is to raise awareness amongst the international community and inform Americans, who spend billions of dollars supporting the Israeli genocide of Palestinians.

Please forward this e-mail to your friends and participate in any way you can to create a moral awareness around the death grip Israel has on Palestine!

Hubb Wa Salaam

Yusif

P.S. I’m also attaching an article about me, titled “Jogger”, which will give you an idea of my dedication & passion for peace, along with the 2 press releases.  Please excuse any duplication of this message that you may receive as a result of my amateur attempt at computer communication.

by

Wall Street’s 10 Greatest Lies of 2009 | AlterNet

By Nomi Prins

On December 13, President Obama declared that he was not elected to help the “fat cats.” But the cats got another version of that memo. A day later, 10 of them were supposed to partake in some White House face-time to talk about their responsibilities to the rest of the country, but only seven could make it. No-shows for the “very serious discussion” — due to inclement New York weather or being too busy with internal bonus discussions to bother with the President — were Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack and Citigroup Chairman Richard Parsons.

Yes, Obama inherited a big financial mess from the Bush administration – which inherited its set-up from the Clinton administration (financial recklessness, it turns out, is non-partisan) — but he and his appointees have spent the year talking about fighting risk and excess on Wall Street, while both have grown.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner patted himself on the back for making the “difficult and necessary” decisions of fronting Wall Street boatloads of money to cover its losses and capital crunch last fall. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke (a Bush-Obama favorite) was named Time Magazine’s Person of the Year for saving the free world as we know it. And Congress is talking “sweeping reform” about a bill that leaves the banking landscape intact, save for some minor alterations. For starters, it doesn’t resurrect the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, which separated risk-taking (once non-government-backed) investment banks from consumer oriented (government-supported) commercial banks.

Meanwhile, Wall Street is restructuring (the financial equivalent of re-gifting) old toxic assets into new ones, finding fresh ways to profit from credit derivatives trading, and paying itself record bonuses — on our dime. Despite recent TARP payback enthusiasm, the industry still floats on trillions of dollars of non-TARP subsidies and certain players wouldn’t even exist today without our help.

Wall Street’s return to robustness and Main Street’s continued deterioration are the main takeaways for 2009 that stemmed from the 2008 choices to flush the financial system with capital and leave the real economy to fend for itself. Lies that exacerbate this divide only perpetuate its growth. With that, here is my top 10 list of lies. Please consider adding your own, and let’s all hope for a more honest New Year.

1) The economy has improved.

Earlier this month, Bernanke declared, “Having faced the most serious financial crisis and the worst recession since the Great Depression, our economy has made important progress during the past year. Although the economic stress faced by many families and businesses remains intense, with job openings scarce and credit still hard to come by, the financial system and the economy have moved back from the brink of collapse.”

Sure, the economy is better — if you work at Goldman Sachs or had an affair with Tiger Woods. But while Bernanke, former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Geithner turned the Federal Reserve into a national hedge fund (cheap money backing toxic assets in secrecy), and the Treasury Department into a bank insurance policy, the rest of the real economy took hit after hit — starting with jobs.

The national unemployment rate remains at double digits. Despite Washington’s bizarre euphoria about unemployment rates last month being better (they edged down in November to 10 percent from 10.2 percent in October), the number of Americans filing for initial unemployment insurance rose during the second week of December. After all the temporary holiday hires, that number will probably increase again. Plus, unemployment rates in 372 metropolitan areas are higher than they were last year.

2) If you give banks capital, they will lend it out.

On Jan. 13, 2009 Bernanke concluded that “More capital injections and guarantees may become necessary to ensure stability and the normalization of credit markets.” He said that “Our economic system is critically dependent on the free flow of credit.” He was referring to the big banks. Not the little people.

Ten months later, though, he admitted that, “Access to credit remains strained for borrowers who are particularly dependent on banks, such as households and small businesses” and that “bank lending has contracted sharply this year.”

In other words, big banks don’t share their good fortunes. Shocking. And as a result, bankruptcies are rapidly rising for businesses and individuals – a direct result of lack of credit coupled with other economic hardships like job losses.

Total bankruptcy filings for the first nine months of 2009 were up 35 percent to 1,100,035 vs. the same period in 2008. The number of business bankruptcies during the first three quarters of 2009 eclipsed all of 2008. Individual consumer filings totaled 373,308 during the third quarter of 2009 and were up 33 percent vs. the same period of 2008. Tell those people about the free flow of credit, Ben.

3) Taxpayers are being repaid.

On December 17, the Treasury Department announced: ”As a result of our efforts under EESA (the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act that spawned TARP), confidence in our financial system has improved, credit is flowing, and the economy is growing. The government is exiting from its emergency financial policies and taxpayers are being repaid.”

Even as banks rush to repay TARP in order to get the government off their backs before annual bonuses are set, the Treasury Department is helping them out. On December 11, the Internal Revenue Service gave government-subsidized banks a tax exemption that, for instance, allows Citigroup to keep the benefit of $38 billion. Three days later, Citigroup announced its $20 billion repayment of TARP. Get the math? Not exactly a taxpayer windfall.

Additionally, the FDIC gave banks including Citigroup, Bank of America, and JPMorgan Chase a holiday gift — at least a six-month break from having to raise capital to support the billions of dollars of securities (read: toxic assets – remember those?) that firms are going to have to add to their books in 2010. That will open a whole new can of worms – a glimpse into either insolvency and a replay from the too-big-to-fail scenario, or book-cooking (the Financial Accounting Standards Board, as of last year, has allowed banks to price their own assets if there’s no true market for them – fun times), or both. Meanwhile, banks can use the capital for bonus payments instead.

4) Homeowners are being helped.

Last year’s big lie was that banks would turn around and help their borrowers if they got federal money. Yet, they were under no obligation to do so, and thus, they didn’t.

Since the Obama administration released guidelines for the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) on March 4, 2009, the HAMP permanent loan modification numbers have been anemic.

Separately, by almost every measure, mortgage and credit problems are worse this year than last. There were almost a million new foreclosure fillings in the third quarter of this year, 5 percent more than in the second quarter, and 23 percent more than during the third quarter of 2008.

Plus, foreclosures are not abating. Mortgage delinquencies (borrower 60 or more days overdue) increased for the 11th quarter in a row, reaching a national average record of 6.25 percent for the third quarter of 2009. Delinquencies precede foreclosures. Compared to last year, mortgage borrower delinquencies are up 58 percent. Meanwhile, banks are sitting on properties they acquired to avoid selling them into the market and having to book the resultant loss.

5) Big banks will help small businesses.

On October 24, because a whole year had passed without this happening, Obama declared, “It’s time for our banks to stand by creditworthy small businesses and make the loans they need to open their doors, grow their operations and create new jobs.”

Small businesses, which employ half of all private sector employees, had received less than $400 million in new loans under government programs, and were granted access to just one program that buys up to $15 billion in securities tied to small business loans. According to the Small Business Administration (SBA) the number of approved loans shrunk from 124,360 in 2007 to 69,764 in 2009 (it was 93,541 in 2008).

Two months later, since that didn’t work, Obama reiterated, “given the difficulty business people are having as lending has declined, and given the exceptional assistance banks received to get them through a difficult time, we expect them to explore every responsible way to help get our economy moving again.” He asked the big bank chiefs to take “extraordinary” steps to revive lending for small businesses and homeowners.

Too bad banks don’t gear their business strategy to expectations and suggestions. Still, as a gesture of good faith, Bank of America promised to kick in an extra $5 billion more to small- and medium-sized businesses next year. JP Morgan Chase promised to increase lending by $4 billion. Goldman had already decided to go the pledge route a few weeks earlier, putting up half a billion dollars in small business “charity” to help its deservedly negative image.

To make up for what the banks aren’t doing, the Obama administration is setting aside $30 billion from the financial bailout fund to stimulate lending to small businesses.

6) The Fed values transparency.

On February 10, Bernanke told the Committee on Financial Services that he “firmly believes that central banks should be as transparent as possible. Likewise, the Federal Reserve is committed to keeping the Congress and the public informed about its lending programs and balance sheet.”

Yet, on March 5, the Fed refused to comply with a Freedom of Information Act request and lawsuit filed by Bloomberg News to disclose the details of its 11 lending facilities. In front of the Senate Budget Committee, and in response to a question from Senator Bernie Sanders, I-VT, about naming the firms that got money from those facilities, Bernanke said “No” — such disclosure would be “counterproductive” and risk “stigmatizing banks.”

Undaunted by this irony, on May 5, before the Joint Economic Committee, Bernanke reiterated, “The Federal Reserve remains committed to transparency and openness and, in particular, to keeping the Congress and the public informed about its lending programs and balance sheet.” He told PBS NewsHour on July 28 that “We are completely open to providing any information Congress wants.”

To date, the Fed has not disclosed the recipients of its cheap loans for toxic collateral.

7) History will not repeat itself.

In the beginning of the year, Obama said of Wall Street firms, “There will be time for them to make profits, and there will be time for them to get bonuses. Now is not that time.”

He also said that “part of what we’re going to need is for the folks on Wall Street who are asking for help to show some restraint and show some discipline and show some sense of responsibility.”

Yeah. Wall Street’s really into restraint….

Nine month later, as banks were racking up record profits and bonuses, Obama said the same thing, in different words, in his September 14 Federal Hall speech. “We will not go back to the days of reckless behavior and unchecked excess at the heart of this crisis, where too many were motivated only by the appetite for quick kills and bloated bonuses… the old ways that led to this crisis cannot stand…History cannot be allowed to repeat itself.”

The only problem? History was repeating itself, as he spoke. Big banks took more risk in 2009, and posted more of their profits from trading operations than they had before they nearly collapsed in 2008. Trading profits at the top five banks rose from a $608 million loss in 2008 to $118.5 billion for annualized 2009, and $61.7 billion in 2007.

8) The pay czar will fight against – pay.

Treasury Department pay czar Ken Feinberg was supposedly appointed to keep a lid on excessive compensation for companies sitting on federal bailouts. Two problems with that: first, the Treasury Department continues to ignore the fact that the TARP portion of the bailout was only a tiny portion of the full bailout, and second, Wall Street was pushing back and winning at every turn.

For instance, after announcing he’d cap compensation for the top 25 execs at AIG, on October 23, Feinberg gave three of them a pass. These men were apparently “particularly critical to the company’s long-term financial success.” Turning to his other role as Wall Street’s mouthpiece, Feinberg made excuses for AIG. “AIG compensation practices are unique. We took into account independent, very credible opinions of others to come up with a package that we think will help AIG thrive.” That’s nice.

But he’s not kidding about thriving – those three employees will receive bonuses of about $4 million, $5 million and $7 million. AIG’s new CEO, Robert Benmosche, who joined AIG in August and got his pay approval out of the way on October 2, is bagging $10.5 million in annual compensation, including $3 million in cash, $4 million in stock options and $3.5 million in annual performance bonuses.

Then, on November 12, Feinberg said he was “very concerned” about scaring away top talent at the seven firms that took the biggest bailouts. Way to keep a lid on it, Ken.

But to be fair, it’s not really Feinberg’s fault. New York Fed and Treasury Department officials have been urging him to dial back restrictions for AIG folks in 2010 as well. Why? Because restricting pay will make it harder for the government to get back its loans to AIG. Right. Somehow paying these people stupid sums of money is the only way to get our money back. Because their “talent” worked out so well going into last year.

Elsewhere on Wall Street, the top six banks are getting set to pay out $150 billion in bonuses ($10 billion more than in 2008). GS is leading the pack in terms of bonus increases; it will dole out a projected $22 billion in compensation in 2009, compared to $11.8 billion in 2008 and $20.2 billion in 2007. JPM put aside $29.1 billion for 2009, compared to $24.6 billion in 2008 and $29.9 billion in 2007. Wells Fargo is spending $26.3 billion this year, compared to $23.1 billion in 2008 and $25.6 billion in 2007.

9) The lobbyists made us do it.

Going back to the big bank love fest at the White House earlier this month, execs promised to do better on regulation matters, citing a “disconnect” between their steadfast support for regulation and the fact that their lobbyists were pushing for as little new regulation as possible.

Really? Because this disconnect cost the financial sector $334 million so far this year for 2,560 lobbyists; a pittance compared to bonuses, but still, hard-taken cash. I’m sure another $334 million is coming to fight for stricter regulation in the New Year. Not.

10) Citigroup is the picture of health and too-big-to-fail is over.

Once the nation’s largest bank, later its largest bailout recipient, the firm exited its TARP obligation on December 14 with CEO Vikram Pandit stating, “Once Citi repays the $20 billion of TARP trust-preferred securities and upon termination of the loss-sharing agreement, it will no longer be deemed to be a beneficiary of ‘exceptional financial assistance’ under TARP beginning in 2010.” (Read: I don’t want to hear about compensation caps anymore!)

He went on to say that, “By any measure of financial strength, Citi is among the strongest banks in the industry, and we are in a position to support the economic recovery.”

Shareholders didn’t feel the same way. Citigroup shares already trading well below those of its main competitors have fallen 13.5 percent since that announcement. One of their key clients, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, accused the firm of misleading them over a $7.5 billion investment. Plus, in order to come up with the money to pay back the government, they had to raise it in the markets, thus diluting their stock – all to keep their petulant star employees happy at bonus time.

The Citigroup story should be examined for the other big banks. They may talk tough about paying back the government, but underneath they are hurting. And their pain will become our cost again – because nothing fundamental has changed this year, and that means – floating on our public money, these banks are actually still ticking time bombs.

Bonus Lie: Goldman Sachs is sorry.

On November 17, Lloyd C. Blankfein said he was sorry about his firm’s role in the financial crisis. “We participated in things that were clearly wrong and have reason to regret, we apologize.” He didn’t say he was sorry the firm is still floated on $43 billion of total subsidies including FDIC guarantees for debt it raised, that were logically supposed to aid consumer oriented banks, and the $12.9 billion it got through the AIG bailout.

Yet the firm has the highest percentage of trading revenue of all the banks that got assistance; in other words, the revenue most linked to risk-taking, at 79 percent, or $38 billion out of $47 billion for annualized 2009. This is up from 41 percent, or $9 billion in 2008, and 68 percent in 2007 and 2006. And as noted before, Goldman leads the bonus sweepstakes for 2009. The firm is probably not very sorry about all of that.

Maybe I’m being too hard on everyone. Maybe all those toxic assets we all forgot about have value now. Maybe bank profits are based on something real. Maybe the increasing reserves against increasing credit losses aren’t happening. Maybe those foreclosures aren’t really happening. Maybe banks aren’t sitting on homes because they don’t want to dump them into the market and ruin the fantasy that prices have hit bottom. Maybe eight million jobs are waiting on the other side of 2010. Maybe I should just send a holiday card to Goldman saying thanks for everything. I’m sorry I ever quit. Maybe Lloyd Blankfein really is God.

Or maybe, the next mammoth pillage will be the one that makes a difference. But I truly don’t want us to have to find out. May 2010 be the start of a more insightful decade.

Source: Alternet

by

The 28th Amendment: Fact or Fiction? | Snopes

Proposed 28th Amendment to the United States Constitution:

“Congress shall make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to the Senators and Representatives; and, Congress shall make no law that applies to the Senators and Representatives that does not apply equally to the citizens of the United States.”Q: Does this text represent the actual 28th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution?

A: No. The U.S. Constitution has only 27 amendments, the last of which (a limit on Congressional pay increases) was ratified in 1992.

Q: Does this text represent a proposed 28th Amendment?

A: This item is a “proposed 28th amendment” only in the very loose sense that any change to the U.S. Constitution suggested since the ratification of the 27th Amendment is a “proposed 28th Amendment.” However, when this piece hit the Internet back in 2009 it was just a bit of online politicking, not something that had been introduced or proposed as a potential amendment by any member of Congress.

In August 2013, nearly four years after this item began making the rounds on the Internet, two Congressmen (Ron DeSantis of Florida and Matt Salmon of Arizona) did introduce a joint resolution (H.J.RES.55) similar to one of its elements, proposing an amendment to the Constitution stating that “Congress shall make no law respecting the citizens of the United States that does not also apply to the Senators and Representatives.” That bill died in committee, and it is exceedingly unlikely that any such broadly worded amendment could ever pass muster in Congress without the underlying idea being subject to a good many qualifications.

Q: Could this amendment be passed without Congress’ voting on it?

A: Possibly, not not likely. Article 5 of the U.S. Constitution specifies two procedures for amendments. One method is for two-thirds of states legislatures to call for a constitutional convention at which new amendments may be proposed, subject to ratification by three-fourths of the states. The constitutional convention method allows for the Constitution to be amended by the actions of states alone and cuts Congress out of the equation — no Congressional vote or approval is required. However, not once in the history of the United States have the states ever called a convention for the purpose of proposing new constitutional amendments.

The other method for amending the Constitution (the one employed with every amendment so far proposed or enacted) requires that the proposed amendment be approved by both houses of Congress (i.e., the Senate and the House of Representatives) by a two-thirds majority in each, and then ratified by three-fourths of the states. It’s probably safe to speculate that the odds that a supermajority of both houses of Congress would pass an amendment which placed such restrictions upon them are very low indeed.

Q: Can members of Congress retire with full pay after serving only a single term?

A: No. This is a long-standing erroneous rumor which we have covered in detail in a separate article.

Q: Are members of Congress exempt from paying into Social Security?

A: No. As noted in our article about Congressional pensions, although Congress initially participated in the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) rather than Social Security, since 1984 all members of Congress have been required to pay into the Social Security fund.

Q: Are members of Congress exempt from prosecution for sexual harassment?

A: No. The passage of Public Law 104-1 (the Congressional Accountability Act of 1995, also known as CAA) made a variety of laws related to civil rights and workplace regulations applicable to the legislative branch of the federal government. Section 1311(a) of the CAA specifically prohibits sexual harassment (as well as harassment on the basis of race, color, religion, or national origin).

Q: Are members of Congress exempt from the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (i.e., “Obamacare”) health care legislation?

A: No. One of the provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act passed by Congress is a requirement that lawmakers give up the insurance coverage previously provided to them through the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program and instead purchase health insurance through the online exchanges that the law created:

An August 2013 ruling by the federal Office of Personnel Management (OPM) was widely and inaccurately reported as exempting members of Congress from the requirement that they give up their Federal Employees Health Benefits Program coverage and instead purchase health insurance through online exchanges. That reporting was incorrect: Lawmakers are still required to purchase health insurance through government-created exchanges; what the OPM’s ruling actually declared was that members of Congress and their staffs did not have to give up the federal subsidies covering part of the costs of their insurance premiums which they had previously been receiving (and which are afforded to millions of other federal workers).

An October 2011 variant of this item is prefaced by a statement made by Warren Buffett: “‘I could end the deficit in 5 minutes. You just pass a law that says that anytime there is a deficit of more than 3% of GDP, all sitting members of Congress are ineligible for re-election.’” This quote came from a 7 July 2011 CNBC interview in which the Oracle of Omaha addressed the then-current issue of raising the debt limit. The rest of the message however, has nothing to do with Warren Buffett.

Some versions of this item include a statement asserting that the children and staffers of U.S. Congressmen are exempt from paying back student loan obligations. That statement is false.

Later versions of this item have been prefaced with the statement that “Governors of 35 states have filed suit against the Federal Government for imposing unlawful burdens upon them. It only takes 38 (of the 50) States to convene a Constitutional Convention.” Actually, only 34 states are required to convene such a convention.

Source: Snopes

by

Superstar CBS Reporter Blows the Lid Off the Swine Flu Media Hype and Hysteria | Mercola.com

Sharyl Attkisson is a CBS News correspondent and investigative reporter. She’s covered Capitol Hill since February 2006 and has been a Washington-based correspondent there since January 1995. She was also part of the CBS news team that received the Edward Murrow Award in 2005 for overall excellence. Additionally, she received an Outstanding Investigative Journalism Emmy in 2002 for a series on the Red Cross.

In case you didn’t realize it, Sharyl Attkisson is the investigative reporter behind the groundbreaking CBS News study that found H1N1 flu cases are NOT as prevalent as feared.

In fact, they’re barely on the radar screen.

How did this startling information come about, and why is the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) painting a different picture entirely? I spoke directly with Sharyl Attkisson to find out.

Two Videos

The first video is an amazing interview I did with Sharyl about ten days ago and what the bulk of this article is based on.

The second video is brand new and was done at noon yesterday in which I was videoed in the CBS studio in downtown Chicago. Sharyl was gracious enough to invite me to be on with Dr. Bernadine Healy, the former director of the NIH. We both were in agreement about the swine flu and opposed to the stance the CDC is taking, but we had different views on mammograms.

Please also watch the second interview as it is very entertaining.

Getting Started on the Swine Flu Trail

Ms. Attkisson says:

“The reason I looked into this is a couple of months ago, I got tips from three or four different segments of public healthcare, with folks telling me the CDC has recommended that they go ahead and stop testing for and counting swine flu cases.

Each different entity that contacted me was concerned, thinking that this should not be happening. They really felt that it was necessary for the swine flu to continue to be tracked in some details. So I went about trying to find out why this decision was made and what the ramifications would be.

… I started by contacting the CDC and the HHS and asking some basic questions. I felt like I pretty much got stonewalled with some of the information I really needed to get at, especially what I needed from the states data, and information on the rationale behind this decision to stop counting and testing for swine flu.”

Because the CDC did not initially respond to Attkisson’s requests, she contacted all 50 states directly, asking for their statistics on state lab-confirmed H1N1 prior to the halt of individual testing and counting in July. She also asked states, one by one, to help explain the rationale behind the CDC’s decision to stop tracking H1N1 cases.

Attkisson continues:

“One of my good sources within the government said to me that they’re either trying to, in his opinion, over-represent the swine flu numbers or under-represent by not counting them anymore. He said, “You need to find out which it is.” And so to find out which it might be, I really wanted to see the data that the CDC had at the time it made the decision to quit counting the cases.”

What Her Investigative Report Reveals

If you listen to most media outlets and even to government agencies, you get the impression that virtually every person who has visited their physician with flu-like symptoms in recent months has H1N1, with no testing necessary because, after all, there’s an epidemic.

We are all being led to believe that every case diagnosed as “swine flu” or even as “flu-like illness” is, in fact, swine flu.

But Attkisson’s investigation revealed a very different picture right from her first contact with individual states. She explains:

“Across the country, state by state, they were testing [for H1N1] until CDC told them not to bother. They were testing, in general, the cases most likely to be believed to have been swine flu based on a doctor’s diagnosis of symptoms and risk factors such as travel to Mexico.

These special cases were going to state labs for absolute confirmation with the best test — not the so-called ‘rapid testing,’ but the real confirmation test.

Of those presumed likely swine flu cases out of approximately every hundred of what was tested, only a small fraction were actually swine flu. In every instance, perhaps the biggest number of cases that were swine flu was something like 30%. The smallest number was something like 2% or 3%.

Maybe there’s one state where it was just 1%.

The point is, of the vast majority of the presumed swine flu cases recognized by trained physicians, the vast majority were not flu at all. They weren’t swine flu or regular flu; they were some other sort of upper respiratory infection.

And here is the clincher that it seems the CDC just doesn’t want the American public to know …

The CDC explained that one of the reasons they quit counting was because of all the flu that’s out there, most are swine flu. Well, that’s true. Most of the flu that was out there was indeed swine flu, but they failed to say that most of the suspected flu was nothing at all. And I think that’s the caveat the public just didn’t know,” Attkisson explains.

She gives even more striking examples of the numbers the investigative report revealed. For instance:

  • In Florida, 83 percent of specimens that were presumed to be swine flu were negative for all flu when tested!
  • In California, 86 percent of suspected H1N1 specimens were not swine flu or any flu; only 2 percent were confirmed swine flu.
  • In Alaska, 93 percent of suspected swine flu specimens were negative for all flu types; only 1 percent was H1N1 flu.

Freedom of Information and Getting the Truth Out
It is not easy for journalists to access this type of information, and they often have to wait weeks, months or even years for information from the CDC and the FDA — information that is readily available and supposed to be clearly public.

Attkisson expands on the difficulties she faced in trying to get simple data regarding swine flu cases in the United States:

“They [CDC’s public affairs] quit communicating with me when I pressed on why I couldn’t get certain information. They just wouldn’t answer my emails anymore. So I had to file a Freedom of Information request, which is usually my last choice because I know I was going into a deep black hole many times and I’ll never get an answer.

But in this case, I got an interesting response on October 19 from the CDC when I had asked for some simple, public documents that would have been easy for them to obtain too quickly.

Journalists are allowed to ask for expedited processing of their Freedom of Information request because, for obvious reasons, they’re working on a story that may have public impact or be of public interest. The agencies are not supposed to use the Freedom of Information Law to obstruct or delay the release of this information.

This may be the first time I was denied that expedited processing from Freedom of Information that we’re entitled to as members of the press; a letter from HHS or Health and Human Services (the CDC is under HHS) said to me that one of the reasons they’re denying my expedited processing is because this is not a matter of ‘widespread and exceptional media or public interest.’

In other words, the CDC doesn’t think these questions about swine flu prevalence and these other things that we’ve been asking are, at least in their opinion in this letter, not a matter of widespread and exceptional media or public interest.”

Yet, while the CDC expressed that questions about swine flu prevalence were not a matter of widespread media or public interest, the President had declared the swine flu a national public health emergency!

The inconsistencies at the CDC are nearly incomprehensible.

The Ramifications of the Swine Flu Policy

According to Attkisson’s CBS News study, when you come down with chills, fever, cough, runny nose, malaise and all those other “flu-like” symptoms, the illness is likely caused by influenza at most 17 percent of the time and as little as 3 percent! The other 83 to 97 percent of the time it’s caused by other viruses or bacteria.

So remember that not every illness that appears to be the flu actually is the flu. In fact, most of the time it’s not.

Curiously, the CDC still advises those who were told they had 2009 H1N1 (and therefore should be immune to getting it again) to get vaccinated unless they had lab confirmation.

But because very few people have actually had a lab-confirmed case of H1N1 (and in most cases those people told they had swine flu probably did not), this means nearly everyone is still being advised to get the swine flu vaccine.

Attkisson has been one of the few to speak out against this flawed system and point out the serious ramifications that come when a public health agency is secretive about their health data.

Attkisson says:

“From a public and journalistic standpoint, I believe the mistake comes when you don’t fully disclose to the public as you go and discover the mistakes. Try to disclose and fix things that come up.

Everybody understands that there isn’t a perfect system, but I think you need to be upfront with them, explain what you’re doing, and explain what you’re discovering. If you’ve made a mistake or you feel like you need to correct something, say that, too, but don’t just try to keep information from the public.”

I couldn’t agree more, and Attkisson’s CBS News report has stood out like a bright light of truth among all the clouds of misinformation.

If you’d like to learn more about the report and its findings, you can read all the details in the past article CBS Reveals that Swine Flu Cases Seriously Overestimated.

Source: Mercola.com

Resources:
H1N1 Videos

by

Immunization H1N1 Vaccine Commentary | Liberty International

Be aware the H1N1 swine flu is being touted by government and health agencies worldwide as the next pandemic and are selling millions of vaccines.

In our opinion the fear of pandemic is being intentionally created without considering the side effects and possible health consequences of this and other vaccines which remain controversial at best.

Additionally, the nasal mist introducing a live virus which may make the receiver contagious if they breath or sneeze near others. Become informed!

You can view a few selected videos here and download a State of Oregon brochure and find out more about personal, religious or medical exemptions.

Nobody can force you or your child to take a vaccine!

by

Ron Paul Rocks on CNBC Squawk Box 11/13/2009

A basic truth is that we may only loan what we have. If we have a dollar, we may loan a dollar. Yet, under the fraud of fractional reserve banking, banks loan ten times the money they actually have.

Fractional reserve banking is a Ponzi scheme whereby banks create money out of thin air through fraudulent book keeping, loaning non-existent money out at interest. It is no different than counterfeiting. In collusion, factional reserve banks counterfeit up to 10 times the amount of money that they actually have deposited, and charge interest on it all. Since money represents labor, fractional reserve bankers are effectively robbing the value of everyone’s labor through this fraudulent scam.