Spanish town of Rasquera leases land for marijuana plantation

A tiny Spanish country town believes it has found a way to make unemployment, debt and economic crisis disappear in a puff of smoke – by leasing out its land for marijuana plantations.

The town hall of Rasquera in Catalonia on Wednesday voted to sign a €1.3m (£1.1m) agreement with a cannabis association in nearby Barcelona to plant marijuana for its 5,000 members.

It will allow the association to plant on a seven-hectare stretch of town hall land – roughly the size of 10 football pitches. "This is a chance to bring in money and create jobs," explained mayor Bernat Pellisa of the Catalan Republican Left party, as older townsfolk worried that he was turning Rasquera into a drugs mecca.

Pellisa said he had sought legal advice that the scheme, part of a set of "anticrisis" measures passed at a packed town hall meeting, did not break Spain's ambiguous cannabis laws.

"The produce will only go to members of the association and it won't all be cannabis," he added. "There will be crop rotation with cereal and sugarbeet."

The Barcelona Personal Use Cannabis Association (ABCDA), part of a mushrooming movement of private marijuana clubs in Spain, will pay the town €650,000 a year for the right to grow its annual supply there.

'Israel leads needy Obama into Iran strike'

After the fiascos of Iraq and Afghanistan, America's next catastrophic mistake is likely to be a war with Iran, former US Attorney General, lawyer and peace activist Ramsey Clark Source

Starve Iranians to stop nukes say Israeli officials!

West should adopt North Korean model vis-à-vis Tehran, hunger in Iran could prompt regime to 'consider whether nuclear adventure is worthwhile', Jerusalem official says
Iran's citizens should be starved in order to curb Tehran's nuclear program, officials in Jerusalem said Wednesday ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's upcoming trip to Washington.

"North Korea is halting its nuclear program in order to receive aid in food, and this is what should be done with Iran as well," one unnamed official said.

"Suffocating sanctions could lead to a grave economic situation in Iran and to a shortage of food," the source said. "This would force the regime to consider whether the nuclear adventure is worthwhile, while the Persian people have nothing to eat and may rise up as was the case in Syria, Tunisia and other Arab states."

Billionaire Hugo Salinas Price - Central Banks Smashed Gold

Today multi-billionaire Hugo Salinas Price told King World News that central banks were definitely behind the smash in the gold price yesterday.   He also said people should ignore it and continue buying gold and silver.  But first, here is what Hugo Salinas Price had to say when asked about the plunge in gold yesterday:  “I definitely think the central banks were behind it.  I look at the graph of the gold price yesterday and when it collapses down $100 in about an hour, that is not natural market action.  I think people are getting used to this.  This is standard procedure and it doesn’t worry me at all.” 

Hugo Salinas Price continues: “The paper money people (central bankers), the fiat money people all over the world who are keeping us in this game, they are now in retreat.  What you saw yesterday was a ‘Rear guard action.’  In reality, the gold and silver forces are overcoming them and overrunning them. More HERE

Next Leg Of The Ponzi Revealed - Foreign Central Banks To Begin Buying US Stocks Outright Starting Today

Submitted by Tyler Durden: 

We were speechless when we read this from Bloomberg.

The Bank of Israel will begin today a pilot program to invest a portion of its foreign currency reserves in U.S. equities.

The investment, which in the initial phase will amount to 2 percent of the $77 billion reserves, or about $1.5 billion, will be made through UBS AG and BlackRock Inc. (BLK), Bank of Israel spokesman Yossi Saadon said in a telephone interview today. At a later stage, the investment is expected to increase to 10 percent of the reserves.

A small number of central banks have started investing part of their reserves in equities. About 9 percent of the foreign- exchange reserves of Switzerland’s central bank were invested in shares at the end of the third quarter, the Swiss bank said on its website.

The investment will be made in equity index trackers and will include between 1,500 to 2,000 shares, among them stocks like Apple Inc. (AAPL), Saadon said.

More from Globes:

Anonymous hackers ratted out by infiltrators

A law enforcement operation that ended with the arrest of 25 hackers in Europe and South America was not the result of police intelligence but rather an informers’ job within the hacker community, claims Anonymous.

As well as launching a cyber-assault on Interpol’s website, the hacker group appears to be conducting its own investigation in order to find out how police managed to break through its veil of anonymity.

In a statement on Anonymous’ Spanish-language website, the group said that the arrests were down to the “carelessness” of the parties involved. They had apparently given “personal details to spies and people who were not members” of the organization.

“This wave of arrests was not the product of intelligence or technical wizardry on the part of Interpol, like they want you to believe. They were done using a much more deplorable technique: the use of spies and informants within the collective,” says Anonymous.

John Taylor Warns Of A "Highly Disastrous, Totally Uncontrollable Inflationary Conflagration"

Submitted by Tyler Durden: All this money sloshing around is nothing but kindling. This is enough to start one hell of a large inflationary fire, but probably not until we have a deflationary panic first – which will add even more kindling to the pile. The progression from the $1.5 billion Chrysler rescue to the current multi-trillion dollar worldwide financial support operations seems to parallel the march from the first US forestry service attempts to limit forest fires about a century ago to the far more sophisticated efforts possible today. Although the forestry service is successful limiting small fires, the longer they suppress them, the higher the probability of a highly disastrous, totally uncontrollable conflagration. Studies have shown that the onset of that catastrophe is almost totally unpredictable. By suppressing small fires, the forests approach an unstable state where the dead wood, resulting from the natural cycle of birth and death in the wild, is piled high, ready to explode into flames if the conditions are right. The central banks and other governmental authorities have piled the money so high that bubbles are popping up everywhere. This might be different than the explosion in the cost of a can of beans in Zimbabwe, but it is an inflation nevertheless and it impoverishes those who do not own these inflating assets. Furthermore, as those assets are in a bubble, a sharp reversal in price could appear at any time, just like the fire might begin in the forest. With so many bubbles and so much kindling, volatility in price is a sure thing. As research has shown that the timing of these dramatic breakdowns, whether a forest fire, an earthquake, or a market crash cannot predicted, or mitigated as it runs its course, the time to control these crises is way before they start. The US Forestry Service knows that, please tell Bernanke!

Charles Hugh Smith: If The Market Rolls Over Here....

If this rally runs out of steam, history suggests the next move down could plumb depths not seen in years.

If the market rolls over here, the next bottom might be a lot lower than most players think possible. After all, the "news" is all positive: Europe's debt crisis is now resolved; employment in the U.S. is trending up, GDP is growing nicely, etc. etc. etc.

As food for thought, here are two charts, courtesy of frequent contributor B.C., that suggest the good news might not only be priced in, but it might abruptly cease flowing.

The first chart is of the S&P 500 from 1973 to the present. The current rally has stalled right at a multi-year line of resistance, and a potential A-B-C pattern in a long-term channel suggests a return visit to the March '08 lows around 666, or perhaps even lower.

Bernanke Live: Fed Chairman Returns to Capitol Hill for Monetary Policy Report Money Policy & Economy

Please click on the Image for link to the LIVE Feed

WASHINGTON, DC. Thursday, March 1, 2012

Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke told House lawmakers Wednesday that the Fed plans to hold U.S. interest rates at the current rate until late 2014.  Thursday, he presents his semi-annual monetary policy testimony to Senate members.

Today, Chairman Bernanke's testimony is again indicating that recent signs of strength in the U.S. economy will not change the Fed’s view that “exceptionally low” interest rates are likely to be warranted at least to the end of 2014.  He has also refrained from saying that additional policy easing is under consideration.

Copyright Dictatorship and Bank Blitz "Help (yourself to) Greece!" - Max Keiser

Pirating Repo Man and jack-booted accountants 

here to help you. In the second half of the show, Max talks to J.S. Kim of SmartKnowledgeU.com about silver, gold and market manipulation. Source

Federal Lunacy: Obama's Endless Wars for Profit with Paul Craig Roberts

The US is famous for going to other countries with goals ranging from retaliation to installing democracy to stopping a civil war. And quite often the US government and the military alike are surprised at what they find: that people in those countries don't want them there and, in many cases, will risk or sacrifice their lives to make sure they leave.

Jim Rogers Speaks At The University Of Alabama. "Learn Chinese"

Police battle rail protesters in Turin

Anti-rail protesters clashed with police on Wednesday in northern Italy as they demonstrated against a high-speed rail link between Lyon in France and Turin.

The clash broke out when police evicted protesters who for two days had blocked a stretch of highway between Turin and Bardonecchia.

As police cleared their barricades, protesters set fire to tyres and threw rocks at police, who responded by launching tear-gas grenades. Source

Ron Paul's Tough Questions for Hillary Clinton

MF Global White Knight blows the lid off of the JP Morgan Shadow Banking Mafia

US regulators are holding roundtable talks today about how to protect customer's money. To keep it from basically being stolen. This is in the aftermath of the MF Global collapse of course. We'll speak to a lawyer by the name of James Koutoulas who represents 8000 MF Global customers in the bankruptcy. He says new US regulations won't stop firms from going the way of MF Global so long as they can go to the UK to take on virtually unlimited leverage. He tells us how MF Global was getting around the US leverage limits this way, similar to AIG in 2008, and why it's going on unchanged. We will talk as well about re-hypothecation, and how "churning" allows brokerage firms to leverage up like banks. 

And, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke gave his economic check up to lawmakers today which meant a reacquaintance with republican presidential hopeful and federal reserve executioner hopeful, Ron Paul. He asked the Fed Chairman if he does his own shopping

Sean Stone: "We are in a state of martial law"

North Korea has announced it is prepared to end its nuclear program and missile tests in exchange for food assistance from the United States. The country thought of as a menace several years ago seems to have taken the backseat when it comes to nuclear threats. The Iranian government insists their nuclear program is for energy purposes, and no evidence has surfaced that Iran has a weapons grade nuclear enrichment program. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has gone on record saying Israel will confront any terrorism originating in Iran. Filmmaker Sean Stone joins us for more. Source

EUROZONE CRISIS: IGNORE THE SPIN – THE ECB IS BUYING BONDS AGAIN, & TURKEY IS ABOUT TO GO BANG

As Monti says eurocrisis is abating, banks hoover up record LTRO, ECB buys Portugal bonds, and S&P draws local contagion map. This is an abating crisis?

You may have believed all that Brussels bollocks about the ECB’s eurozone bond buying programme being at an end. Well…it isn’t. After Portugal’s 10- year bonds fell to less than half their face value, I can reveal that SuperMario dived in to stop things turning into a rout. And if necessary, the Italian Stallion will do so again.

Meanwhile, the banks described constantly by Brussels as ultra-safe stole a record 530 billion euros from SuperMario’s ECB, so great was their desire to lend to eurobusiness. The only problem being that, thus far, there’s zero evidence of so much as one centime being lent to business. Whatever can they be using this money for?

Ron Paul beats Obama in polls

Texas Congressman Ron Paul would win a presidential race against incumbent Barack Obama, according to a tracking poll released Monday by Rasmussen Reports.

According to polling figures published Monday by Rasmussen, a hypothetical two-person contest between President Obama and Republican Party hopeful Ron Paul would yield a victory for the Texas congressman. The statistics released by the group this week put Paul as the favorite over the current commander in chief by two percentage points, a 43-to-41 percent win, reports the agency.

Although Representative Paul has placed close to passing Obama in past polls, this marks the first time in a Rasmussen report that the congressman has statistically proven himself as the winner when pitted right against the president. Recent polling from Rasmussen also suggests that the only other candidate that could be considered the victor in a make-believe match-up with Obama right now would be former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, who also won in a recent poll by a two percentage point margin. Rasmussen has put Obama as the victor in a race against only Romney according to all other reports released since 2012 began.

Iran ready to be paid in gold, national currencies for oil

Tehran announced Tuesday that it is ready to receive payment for oil supplies in gold as well as the national currencies of importer countries. That’s according to Mahmoud Bahmani, Governor of the Central Bank of Iran.

In trade operations with foreign countries Iran does not limit itself to dollars, and any state is free to use its own currency, Bahmani is quoted as saying by Russia's Itar-Tass news agency. He also added that if any client state wants to pay in gold, Iran would accept it without hesitation.

In 2012 the US toughened sanctions against the country that attempt to obstruct the activities of the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Washington warned that sanctions would also be applied against international banks that use US dollars in deals with Iran. As a result, countries that buy Iranian oil have faced the problem of how to pay for it. Now, the Islamic country is working to accommodate its clients through the offer to accept their national currencies.

NDAA Blows Up In Obamas Face!

Obama demanded that congress ad the secret arrest black bag section to the NDAA and he demanded that he be given the power. Then he told the public he was fighting it and would veto it. That way he could over throw the republic and pose as its savior. Now the public is waking up and states are moving to block it. The tyrants have given the people the wake up call they needed, sometime worse is better. Source