Hal Row's First Talk - CEG discussion about Ward Specific Voting - The Interview

Part 1 - Billy Sudderth gives his reasoning for the formation of the Citizens for Equity in Government and Joe Brannock begins the discussion about how the current voting structure came into existence.

Part 2 -  Joe Brannock continues on with the history lesson of what happened back in the 1960s that has led us to where we are today and Billy Sudderth talks about some of the political maneuvering that took place at that time

Part 3 - Billy Sudderth continues by talking about disenfranchisement and the lack of participation that he believes is a result of the system. Joe talks about the perceptions and how he is white, republican and young and Billy is black, a senior, and a Democrat and we need to cast off the labels to be able to move things forward. He talks about how 4 people on council made a decision that shut out citizen participation. There is no entry point into the pipeline of civic service.

Part 4 - Joe Brannock talks about council people representing the City of Hickory at the same time that they are directly elected by their ward. Citizens of Hickory don't vote on members of Congress from other districts and yet these representatives represent the welfare of the entire State of North Carolina. They give out contact numbers to sign the petition: Billy Sudderth 828-308-4669 / Joe Brannock: 828-455-3789

 1967 - How we got where we are today - November 11, 2011

1961 -- A lesson in Hickory's History - November 10, 2011

Hickory City Elections: The Results are in - November 9, 2011

Press Conference on Ward Voting Referendum -- September 20, 2011

Newsletter about the City Council meeting of June 7, 2011 -- Addendum on "The Newly Proposed Ward Boundary Map" - June 8, 2011

Big thanks to Hal and WHKY for having this educational interview on First Talk. I think he did an excellent job of hosting this interview and I believe that WHKY is now in the ball game when it comes to the discussion of this issue. All anyone has asked for is to be allowed to have a public forum to discuss the Direct Ward versus At-Large issue with the public and from there the chips shall fall where they may.

Tomorrow - Hal Row's First Talk - CEG discussion about Ward Specific Voting

Tomorrow morning on 1290 WHKY radio during Hal Row's First Talk program (Link to listen on the computer) there will be a discussion by the Citizens For Equity in Government about the issue of Ward specific voting. This issue has been addressed on this blog in the following articles:


1967 - How we got where we are today - November 11, 2011

1961 -- A lesson in Hickory's History - November 10, 2011

Hickory City Elections: The Results are in - November 9, 2011

Press Conference on Ward Voting Referendum -- September 20, 2011

Newsletter about the City Council meeting of June 7, 2011 -- Addendum on "The Newly Proposed Ward Boundary Map" - June 8, 2011

I hope that you will give Hal's program a listen in the morning and if you feel like calling in then do so. This is not a racial issue or about disgruntled people in Ridgeview. It is about whether the people of Hickory have a voice in making important decisions about how we elect our leaders. It was a conflict of interest to allow the City Council to determine how they would be elected 40 years ago and it was done without the consent of the electorate. All anyone who proposes going back to Direct Ward representation  is asking for is a fair hearing. All anyone is proposing is that Citizens of Hickory be allowed to determine how City Council will be elected. They tell people that they should exercise their right to vote, but then turn around and say, "but not on this issue."

It reminds me of the Second Bad News Bears Movie, The Bad News Bears in Breaking Training, when they are playing the game in the Astrodome and the people running the stadium don't want to allow them to finish the game when they start making a comeback against the team from Texas. The kids refuse to leave the field and finally the team starts chanting that they want to play and then the coach of the Bears picks it up and starts yelling "Let Them Play" and soon the people in the stadium pick up the chant until the authorities have no choice but to "Let Them Play."

All we are saying is "Let Them Vote." It is the American way. It is what the country is supposed to be all about. It is about fairness and opportunity. There are no guarantees of outcome and no one expects any. I think that is what scares our local leaders the most. They want to control outcomes. Let me ask you one simple question. Do you like being controlled?

Protesting is an exercise of the First Amendment - Silence DoGood

In my expansive internet readings, I’ve stumbled upon two new words that I simply have to share with you, learned readers. These two new words are political in nature describing, apparently for someone, new paradigms in political thought and expression. To what end they will be used in the future is quite beyond my grasp to comprehend, but I’ll tell you what they are.

Thugocracy: (thug-oc’ra-cy) “A system of government that follows no constitutional principles, propped up by union thugs, who make manufactured and transported goods more expensive, leading to a socialist/Marxist take over using force and the threat of force in which an illegal alien can circumvent the Constitution to become president of the United States elected by Ineptocrats.”

So, what do you think? Pretty cool so far huh? Of course, a quick and fast Google search of that word shows that it has been slathered across the web and certain media outlets by the likes of Glenn Beck, David Petraeus (talking about Iran), and appears on quite a few blogs with a rather, shall we say, slightly right orientation. And by slightly right, I mean if your middle of the road guy is Karl Rove. The other word, married to Thugocracy is

Ineptocracy: (in-ep-toc’-ra-cy) “A system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers.”

(DoGood): If you think I might be making them up or just pulling them out of the air, the link where I found the definitions to the words can be found here: http://dancingczars.wordpress.com/2011/11/04/merriam-webster-says-thugocracy-and-ineptocracy-go-hand-in-hand/.


While there is a reference to Merriam Webster and no doubt an attempt at giving validity to the words, there is no link to Merriam Webster on that sight nor are those words listed or available on Merriam’s website in their on-line dictionary. In addition, both seem to have made an appearance in the previous decade. 2002 for Thugocracy and 2006 for Ineptocracy seems to be the first references for both.


But in the sense of both or either, it would appear that the words are used to describe those with a more liberalized political viewpoint. Contrived by those with a slightly less tolerant temprament for people who are poor, in a minority classification because of their skin pigmentation, or perhaps even, because they’re professed democrats.


Why did we need these words? I’m not really sure. The nexus of beginning puts them squarely within the Presidency of George W. Bush and the absolute control of both chambers of Congress by the Republican party. Given the obvious view of the writer as to the meaning of those words, it would appear they do not appear to be aimed at that administration or the party of ‘right’.


So in the interest of levity, I’d like to offer up some different words. Words that have been around for slightly longer than the two new ones proffered. Words that have quite a bit more meaning, for quite a few more people, and nations.

Democracy.
1.a. Government by the people; especially, rule of the majority.
   b. A government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections

2. A political unit that has a democratic government.

3. Capitalized : the principles and policies of the Democratic party in the United States .

4. The common people especially when constituting the source of political authority.

5. The absence of hereditary or arbitrary class distinctions or privileges.

(DoGood) - Notice that sentence contained under number 4 in the definition of Democracy? “The common people, especially when constituting the source of political authority.” But more about that in a bit.

Theocracy. First known to be used, 1622.
1. Government of a State by immediate divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided.

2. A State governed by a Theocracy.


Oligarchy. First known to be used, 1542.
1. Government by the few.

2. A government in which a small group exercises control, especially for corrupt and selfish purposes.

3. An organization under oligarchic control.

(DoGood) - I’m going to stop there and explain why I wrote a piece a couple of months ago that wasn’t that well received, steeped in language and meaning that apparently had all the appeal of a dentists’ drill. So why am I making another trip to the dentist? Look at the words folks. We communicate in language. Look at how they compare to the new ones I shared with you. Someone wants to attack things that we have a right to engage in, in this country, and someone(s) wants to strip you of that ability and paint those rights as sedition, communism, socialism, and being a traitor. It even says that in Thugocracy, there is no adherence to Constitutional ideals. That gives me pause to wonder what Constitution it is that this writer is reading or referencing. I have little doubt that some of you may have already seen those two words before today. I likewise realize that some of you may even agree with the meaning they convey. That’s between you and your conscience. But if you read the definition of Ineptocracy and look at the definition of Democracy, you can see that the Ineptocracy pundit stands directly against those who believe in Democracy. I’m not going to ramble on, I know, tissues all around for that, but I’ll merely leave you with the following picture, also borrowed from that same website, as testament to what is being railed against.



I look at that banner and I see a plea to stop funding the rich, the affluent, and the military industrial complex and create jobs that pay a wage so that people can earn a decent and respectable living for themselves and their families. I don’t see a demand for handouts, welfare, or food stamps. How dare they!

The Dominoes are falling all around us -- MF Global is the Canary in the Coal Mine

Mathematical impossibilities and the current mega-leveraged markets. Get out of paper. The criminals who are running the economic markets look at us as rabble who are ripe for harvest. They are going to economically rape us. This interview between Warren Pollock and Independent Investment Banker Ann Barnhardt whose primary investments were in livestock and grain. She says it is a no-brainer to get out of the market, because there is no integrity in the market. You cannot react to these markets, because the market (CME) is not fulfilling its fiduciary responsibility.


‘Going Galt’: Hedge Broker Shuts Down Firm With Chilling Letter About the Market - The Blaze - Jonathon M. Seidl - November 18, 2011 - Ann Barnhardt describes herself as a an “an old-school commercial hedge broker specializing in CATTLE and GRAIN.” And she just shut down her business by delivering a passionate and chilling open letter posted on her website. “I could no longer tell my clients that their monies and positions were safe in the futures and options markets – because they are not,” she writes. And then she unloads:


"The Entire System Has Been Utterly Destroyed By The MF Global Collapse" - Presenting The First MF Global Casualty - Zero Hedge - Tyler Durden - November 17, 2011

Presented without comment, merely to confirm that the market as we know it, no longer exists.
BCM Has Ceased Operations (source)
Posted by Ann Barnhardt - November 17, AD 2011 10:27 AM MST

Dear Clients, Industry Colleagues and Friends of Barnhardt Capital Management,

It is with regret and unflinching moral certainty that I announce that Barnhardt Capital Management has ceased operations. After six years of operating as an independent introducing brokerage, and eight years of employment as a broker before that, I found myself, this morning, for the first time since I was 20 years old, watching the futures and options markets open not as a participant, but as a mere spectator.

The reason for my decision to pull the plug was excruciatingly simple: I could no longer tell my clients that their monies and positions were safe in the futures and options markets – because they are not. And this goes not just for my clients, but for every futures and options account in the United States. The entire system has been utterly destroyed by the MF Global collapse. Given this sad reality, I could not in good conscience take one more step as a commodity broker, soliciting trades that I knew were unsafe or holding funds that I knew to be in jeopardy.

The futures markets are very highly-leveraged and thus require an exceptionally firm base upon which to function. That base was the sacrosanct segregation of customer funds from clearing firm capital, with additional emergency financial backing provided by the exchanges themselves. Up until a few weeks ago, that base existed, and had worked flawlessly. Firms came and went, with some imploding in spectacular fashion. Whenever a firm failure happened, the customer funds were intact and the exchanges would step in to backstop everything and keep customers 100% liquid – even as their clearing firm collapsed and was quickly replaced by another firm within the system.

Everything changed just a few short weeks ago. A firm, led by a crony of the Obama regime, stole all of the non-margined cash held by customers of his firm. Let’s not sugar-coat this or make this crime seem “complex” and “abstract” by drowning ourselves in six-dollar words and uber-technical jargon. Jon Corzine STOLE the customer cash at MF Global. Knowing Jon Corzine, and knowing the abject lawlessness and contempt for humanity of the Marxist Obama regime and its cronies, this is not really a surprise. What was a surprise was the reaction of the exchanges and regulators. Their reaction has been to take a bad situation and make it orders of magnitude worse. Specifically, they froze customers out of their accounts WHILE THE MARKETS CONTINUED TO TRADE, refusing to even allow them to liquidate. This is unfathomable. The risk exposure precedent that has been set is completely intolerable and has destroyed the entire industry paradigm. No informed person can continue to engage these markets, and no moral person can continue to broker or facilitate customer engagement in what is now a massive game of Russian Roulette.

I have learned over the last week that MF Global is almost certainly the mere tip of the iceberg. There is massive industry-wide exposure to European sovereign junk debt. While other firms may not be as heavily leveraged as Corzine had MFG leveraged, and it is now thought that MFG’s leverage may have been in excess of 100:1, they are still suicidally leveraged and will likely stand massive, unmeetable collateral calls in the coming days and weeks as Europe inevitably collapses. I now suspect that the reason the Chicago Mercantile Exchange did not immediately step in to backstop the MFG implosion was because they knew and know that if they backstopped MFG, they would then be expected to backstop all of the other firms in the system when the failures began to cascade – and there simply isn’t that much money in the entire system. In short, the problem is a SYSTEMIC problem, not merely isolated to one firm.

Perhaps the most ominous dynamic that I have yet heard of in regards to this mess is that of the risk of potential CLAWBACK actions. For those who do not know, “clawback” is the process by which a bankruptcy trustee is legally permitted to re-seize assets that left a bankrupt entity in the time period immediately preceding the entity’s collapse. So, using the MF Global customers as an example, any funds that were withdrawn from MFG accounts in the run-up to the collapse, either because of suspicions the customer may have had about MFG from, say, watching the company’s bond yields rise sharply, or from purely organic day-to-day withdrawls, the bankruptcy trustee COULD initiate action to “clawback” those funds. As a hedge broker, this makes my blood run cold. Generally, as the markets move in favor of a hedge position and equity builds in a client’s account, that excess equity is sent back to the customer who then uses that equity to offset cash market transactions OR to pay down a revolving line of credit. Even the possibility that a customer could be penalized and additionally raped AGAIN via a clawback action after already having their customer funds stolen is simply villainous. While there has been no open indication of clawback actions being initiated by the MF Global trustee, I have been told that it is a possibility.

And so, to the very unpleasant crux of the matter. The futures and options markets are no longer viable. It is my recommendation that ALL customers withdraw from all of the markets as soon as possible so that they have the best chance of protecting themselves and their equity. The system is no longer functioning with integrity and is suicidally risk-laden. The rule of law is non-existent, instead replaced with godless, criminal political cronyism.

Remember, derivatives contracts are NOT NECESSARY in the commodities markets. The cash commodity itself is the underlying reality and is not dependent on the futures or options markets. Many people seem to have gotten that backwards over the past decades. From Abel the animal husbandman up until the year 1964, there were no cattle futures contracts at all, and no options contracts until 1984, and yet the cash cattle markets got along just fine.

Finally, I will not, under any circumstance, consider reforming and re-opening Barnhardt Capital Management, or any other iteration of a brokerage business, until Barack Obama has been removed from office AND the government of the United States has been sufficiently reformed and repopulated so as to engender my total and complete confidence in the government, its adherence to and enforcement of the rule of law, and in its competent and just regulatory oversight of any commodities markets that may reform. So long as the government remains criminal, it would serve no purpose whatsoever to attempt to rebuild the futures industry or my firm, because in a lawless environment, the same thievery and fraud would simply happen again, and the criminals would go unpunished, sheltered by the criminal oligarchy.

To my clients, who literally TO THE MAN agreed with my assessment of the situation, and were relieved to be exiting the markets, and many whom I now suspect stayed in the markets as long as they did only out of personal loyalty to me, I can only say thank you for the honor and pleasure of serving you over these last years, with some of my clients having been with me for over twelve years. I will continue to blog at Barnhardt.biz, which will be subtly re-skinned soon, and will continue my cattle marketing consultation business. I will still be here in the office, answering my phones, with the same phone numbers. Alas, my retirement came a few years earlier than I had anticipated, but there was no possible way to continue given the inevitability of the collapse of the global financial markets, the overthrow of our government, and the resulting collapse in the rule of law.

As for me, I can only echo the words of David:

“This is the Lord’s doing; and it is wonderful in our eyes.”

With Best Regards-
Ann Barnhardt

Economic Stories of Relevance in Today's World -- December 11, 2011

City of Hickory takes over operations at Airport - River Hawk Aviation OUT - December 8, 2011 - ... the tale of this sordid mess with River Hawk obtaining a transfer of contract through the previous operator Profile Aviation. The City had every right to cancel the contract and went against Aviation Legal Counsel's wishes in granting the transfer of lease to a company that had previously operated a couple of other FBO's into bankruptcy. City Officials had been informed of several issues, but chose to ignore the warning and proceed ahead with the transfer of contract in late 2007.

Now four years later we are back to square one. In taking over the airport can we be assured that it will be run competently? Will this reacquisition cost tax payers anything? With the harm to the viability of the airport that has been caused, will those who placed the city in this position admit fault? Have any lessons been learned here?


Banks’ Q4 Earnings: Look Out Below! - Barron's.com - Avi Salzman - December 5, 2011 - Banks’ trading and investment banking results are expected to be lousy again in the fourth quarter, and today Wells Fargo analyst Matt Burnell got out the axe and started cutting his expectations. Burnell slashed his fourth quarter EPS estimates for the banks by an average of about 10%. Burnell is also worried about bank performance for the next couple of years, and cut estimates for 2012 and 2013 by an average of 1% “due to our concerns over a continuation of similar risk aversion in the future.”


Gary Gensler: A U-Boat Sent into the CFTC? - MFG Facts - When Gary Gensler was nominated to head the CFTC, most Americans had never heard of him. Yet he had been cruising the inner Beltway of D.C. and halls of influence for years, under the radar of most.  Genlser succeeded Brooksley Born who was given a very rough time by the club of Summers, Rubin, Greenspan and others when she sounded alarm bells on the rapid and unregulated growth of off-exchange derivatives. Born sought at least transparency as they “could pose potentially serious dangers to our economy.” Although appointed by Clinton, she never got his support and resigned from her post. For more on her prescient warnings, view this fascinating PBS documentary.  As more collapses happen, the failure to regulate off exchange derivatives from CDO’s to re-purchase agreements are increasingly understood to be a prime source of financial collapse....


Contagion Catastrophe - Europe is closer than you think to bringing down the American—and, therefore, the global economy - National Journal - By Jim Tankersley  - December 2, 2011 - This is the worst-case scenario from Europe, and it just might come true: Italy defaults on its debts. Every major Italian bank collapses. Recession grips the eurozone. Sovereign defaults and bank failures ripple across the Continent. Saddled with bad loans to nations and lenders in Europe, American banks hemorrhage cash. Credit freezes in the United States. Multinational companies, unable to raise money, curb U.S. investment and hiring. Wall Street demands, but fails to get, new bailouts. The entire developed world plummets into recession and, quite possibly, depression. This, in contrast, is the placid warning that President Obama gave Americans about the threat: “If Europe is contracting,” he said on Monday, “then it’s much more difficult for us to create good jobs here at home.” There’s still a chance that Europeans, through some combination of fiscal and monetary action, can stop the crisis before it shatters the feeble U.S. recovery. But the worst case is so much worse than Obama’s description, and Washington has failed to prepare voters for the possibility. “The [potential] shock we’re talking about is of very large magnitude,” says Viral Acharya, a New York University professor who studies financial risk extensively. “If you’re just having an Armageddon coming your way, [America’s] buffers may not be adequate.”


Barack Obama is Destroying Our Economy on Purpose - Worldview Radio - Brannon Howse - March 9, 2011 : A pair of radical Columbia University professors by the name of Richard Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven wrote an article in the radical magazine known as The Nation. The article was published on May 2, 1966 and laid out what is now known as the "Cloward-Piven Strategy". The plan calls for the destruction of capitalism in America by swelling the welfare rolls to the point of collapsing our economy and then implementing socialism by nationalizing many private institutions. Cloward and Piven studied Saul Alinsky just like Hillary Clinton and President Obama. Listen as Brannon and his guest James Simpson explain how Cloward and Piven inspired the creation of ACORN that Obama worked for as a community organizer. This interview must be e-mailed all over the country. Americans must awaken and understand the goal of these radicals and what is to come if they succeed. Time is of the essence. Obama is not over his head as some have claimed; he knows exactly what he is doing. Understand the Cloward-Piven Strategy, the rules of Saul Alinsky and their Cultural Marxist worldview and you will understand that what is occurring is not by mistake.
Download the MP3

Bob Chapman - SBG Report - Part 1 - December 10, 2011

Bob Chapman - SBG Report - Part 2 - December 10, 2011