Economic Stories of Relevance in Today's World -- June 26, 2011

THE FINANCIAL HIJACKING OF AMERICA - Ellen Brown
How and why to escape the web of debt

This is a talk about the trillion dollar bailout of the too large to fail banks and how it relates to the underlying crisis caused by the private control of the US - and soon the world's - money supply. Brown has an intriguing theory that she sets out to prove: Congress was initially not very interested in a bailout of the banks and needed to be shown, she says, that the situation was serious and that more money than ever before had to flow from taxpayers and the Federal Reserve into the banking system. In part ONE of her talk Ellen Brown runs down the incidents that led to the collapse of Lehman Brothers. She asks whether Lehman was purposefully bombed with short and naked short sales, and then was left unsupported by fellow banks in order to prove to Congress and to us that the crisis was serious. She quotes from a NY Times headline: "Lehman had to die, it seems, so global finance could live."

In part TWO Ellen Brown covers the little known but highly consequential role of the Bank for International Settlements in Switzerland. The BIS serves as a bank for central banks and is not accountable to any national government. It plays an increasingly important role in the ever centralizing global financial system. Brown points to the risk of formalizing the money system for the world as the unregulated and unaccountable private domain of private banks - a process that is taking place right now. And you are about to hear about the Bank of North Dakota, an amazing, little known, highly successful state owned bank founded in 1919 and flourishing today. She suggests that California adopt that model to solve both the budget and the overall financial crisis - as 5 states are already planning to do. Washington, Michigan, Illinois, Massachusetts and Virginia have bills pending for state owned banks.

Ellen Brown is the author of Web of Debt, a book about the Federal Reserve. She shows how the private banking cartel has usurped the power to create money, and how we the people can take back that power. Listen / Download mp3:

Part 1 (29:04): http://www.tucradio.org/HijackingAmerica_ONE.mp3
Part 2 (29:03): http://www.tucradio.org/HijackingAmerica_TWO.mp3
Source (TUC Radio Latest Programs): http://www.tucradio.org/new.html

Ellen Brown Links:
Web of Debt: http://www.webofdebt.com/
Web of Debt Blog: http://webofdebt.wordpress.com/
Public Banking: http://publicbanking.wordpress.com/


Federal Reserve Shipped Billions to Iraq Which Were Then Stolen ... Involved in Other Unsavory Activities - Washington's Blog - June 23, 2011 - CNBC reports today: The New York Fed is refusing to tell investigators how many billions of dollars it shipped to Iraq during the early days of the US invasion there, the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction told CNBC Tuesday. The Fed's lack of disclosure is making it difficult for the inspector general to follow the paper trail of billions of dollars that went missing in the chaotic rush to finance the Iraq occupation, and to determine how much of that money was stolen.


Fed freezes policy despite slow US economy - Activist Post - June 23, 2011 - The Federal Reserve left monetary policy in neutral Wednesday as it slashed US economic growth estimates, saying the slowdown was in part due to factors that were "likely" to be temporary. The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) unanimously decided to hold its near-zero interest rate, end a $600-billion bond-buying program by June 30 and continue to reinvest its principal payments from security holdings. The central bank's decisions were widely expected by economists and experts. "The Fed is trapped between the proverbial rock and a hard place," said RDQ Economics analysts John Ryding and Conrad DeQuadros. "The economy is weaker than it would like to see and this prevents any reference to exiting from the current policy stance of near-zero rates and a massive Fed balance sheet."


Higher jobless claims indicate weak labor market - Reuters - Lucia Mutikani - June 23, 2011 - The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits rose last week, suggesting little improvement in the labor market this month after hiring stumbled badly in May. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits climbed by 9,000 to 429,000, the Labor Department said on Thursday. Economists had expected claims to come in at 415,000. The claims report, which covers the survey period for the government's closely watched data on nonfarm payrolls for June, came a day after the Federal Reserve gave a downbeat assessment of the economy. The government's employment report for June will be released on July 8. Claims for unemployment benefits increased by 15,000 between the May and June survey periods, implying another soft month for jobs after employment rose by only 54,000 in May.    "The labor market remains in a funk, it doesn't seem like it has improved much this month and the rise in claims will keep expectations for June nonfarm payrolls in check," said Ryan Sweet, a senior economist at Moody's Analytics in West Chester, Pennsylvania.


‘We now have more idle men, women than at any time since Great Depression’ - US News and World Report - Motimer Zuckerman - June 20, 2011 - The Great Recession has now earned the dubious right of being compared to the Great Depression. In the face of the most stimulative fiscal and monetary policies in our history, we have experienced the loss of over 7 million jobs, wiping out every job gained since the year 2000. From the moment the Obama administration came into office, there have been no net increases in full-time jobs, only in part-time jobs. This is contrary to all previous recessions. Employers are not recalling the workers they laid off from full-time employment. The real job losses are greater than the estimate of 7.5 million. They are closer to 10.5 million, as 3 million people have stopped looking for work. Equally troublesome is the lower labor participation rate; some 5 million jobs have vanished from manufacturing, long America's greatest strength. Just think: Total payrolls today amount to 131 million, but this figure is lower than it was at the beginning of the year 2000, even though our population has grown by nearly 30 million. The most recent statistics are unsettling and dismaying, despite the increase of 54,000 jobs in the May numbers. Nonagricultural full-time employment actually fell by 142,000, on top of the 291,000 decline the preceding month. Half of the new jobs created are in temporary help agencies, as firms resist hiring full-time workers. Today, over 14 million people are unemployed. We now have more idle men and women than at any time since the Great Depression. Nearly seven people in the labor pool compete for every job opening. Hiring announcements have plunged to 10,248 in May, down from 59,648 in April. Hiring is now 17 percent lower than the lowest level in the 2001-02 downturn. One fifth of all men of prime working age are not getting up and going to work. Equally disturbing is that the number of people unemployed for six months or longer grew 361,000 to 6.2 million, increasing their share of the unemployed to 45.1 percent. We face the specter that long-term unemployment is becoming structural and not just cyclical, raising the risk that the jobless will lose their skills and become permanently unemployable.



A European's Warning to America - The perils of following us toward greater regulation, higher taxes and centralized power - Wall Street Journal - March 11, 2011 - Why is a European politician urging America to avoid Europeanization? As a Briton, I see the American republic as a repository of our traditional freedoms. The doctrines rooted in the common law, in the Magna Carta, and in the Bill of Rights found their fullest and most sublime expression in the old courthouse of Philadelphia. Britain, as a result of its unhappy membership in the European Union, has now surrendered a large part of its birthright. But our freedoms live on in America. Which brings me to my country's present tragedy. The fears that the American patriot leaders had about a Hanoverian tyranny were exaggerated. The United Kingdom did not develop into an absolutist state. Power continued to pass from the Crown to the House of Commons. Until now. Nearly two and a half centuries after the Declaration of Independence, the grievances it adumbrated are belatedly coming true. Colossal sums are being commandeered by the government in order to fund bailouts and nationalizations without any proper parliamentary authorization. Legislation happens increasingly through what are called standing orders, a device that allows ministers to make laws without parliamentary consent—often for the purpose of implementing EU standards. How aptly the British people might today apply the ringing phrases of the Declaration of Independence against their own rulers, who have "combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws." So you can imagine how I feel when I see the U.S. making the same mistakes that Britain has made: expanding its government, regulating private commerce, centralizing its jurisdiction, breaking the link between taxation and representation, abandoning its sovereignty. You deserve better, cousins. And we expect better.


The Chinese Government Is Buying Up Economic Assets And Huge Tracts Of Land All Over The United States - The American Dream - June 19, 2011 - In 2011, America is for sale and the communist Chinese are eager buyers. The Chinese government is using sovereign wealth funds and Chinese state-owned enterprises to buy up economic assets and huge tracts of land all over the United States. Many of our politicians hail all of this “foreign investment” as something that is “good for America”, while many others see something much more sinister going on here. In any event, this is a trend that is rapidly accelerating and that is causing great concern among patriotic Americans.    In my recent article entitled “China Wants To Construct A 50 Square Mile Self-Sustaining City South Of Boise, Idaho“, I examined a potential deal that Sinomach (a company controlled by the Chinese government) wants to do with the government of Idaho. There will be more on this deal in a minute. But first it is important to note that this is a phenomenon that is happening all across the United States. For example, a Chinese investment group is buying up a very large chunk of real estate in Toledo, Ohio... Even more disturbing is what has been happening down in Texas recently. The Chinese have been gobbling up our oil and gas fields. The following is a quote from one local Texas news source about one of these deals….


Can the US grow its way out of a currency collapse?