At least 17 killed in Syria as Channel 4 news reporter says he was 'deliberately set up to be shot'

Channel 4 News chief correspondent Alex Thomson claimed Syrian rebels tried to lead him and his colleagues into a trap so they would be killed by government forces, to discredit the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.

Alex Thompson, Channel 4 News's chief correspondent, said he was driven out into the centre of no-man's land was a deliberate move by rebels to get them killed.

Nigel Farage MEP "Unless you abolish your democracy some terrible thing will happen to you!" - KWN Audio interview

Nigel Farage Member of the European Parliament - KWN Audio interview link
Fear mongering, they say "Unless you abolish your democracy some terrible thing will happen to you!"

Jackass EURO 2012 and Fiat Guernica - Its all downhill from here... Banzai7

Obama scapegoats Euro for miserable US economy - Michael Hudson

Republicans have given President Obama a lot of heat for the gloomy US economy. The recent jobs numbers released by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics have fallen short of what was predicted and President Obama has resorted to blaming the European financial crisis. So who or what is to blame for the dreary US economy? Michael Hudson, economics professor for the University of Missouri, joins us with more. Source

JP Morgan and the Vatican Bank and Cuckoo Trading - Max Keiser with Pierre Jovanovic

Max Keiser and co-host, Stacy Herbert, discuss 'wash trades,' debt crises and the speculation on JP Morgan's growing debt problem in London. In the second half of the show Max talks to Pierre Jovanovic of Jovanovic.com about JP Morgan 'firing' the Vatican, whether or not Jamie Dimon will last the year and what the future holds for French bonds. Source

Pierre Jovanovic: An apocalypse - Who is Blythe Masters?

Bernanke warning: Taxmaggedon is real

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke testified before Congress this week and warned lawmakers that America’s economic future is landing flat on their shoulders.

During a Thursday meeting with congressional leaders in Washington, DC, Chairman Bernanke revealed that the dire dilemma of an “Taxmaggedon” coming to America is not just real but likely to rear its ugly head very soon if Capitol Hill can’t find a way to control the country from crashing off of the “fiscal cliff.”

Bernanke’s warning centered on a call for Congress to quickly address the issue of $1.2 trillion scheduled spending cuts and tax breaks entered during the George W. Bush administration that are slated to expire at the end of the year. Should Congress not figure out a way to handle the problem, American taxpayers are expected to pay around $310 billion more in 2012.

According to the Fed, it’s up to Congress to come up with a solution — one that doesn’t involve ignoring the problem of Taxmaggedon.

“What is particularly striking here is that this is all pre-programmed,” Chairman Bernanke said this week. “If you all go on vacation, it’s still going to happen, so it’s important to be thinking about that and working with your colleagues to see how you might address that concern at the appropriate time.”

Iceland economy grows at fastest pace in four years

by Niklas Pollard

Iceland's economy expanded in the first quarter at its fastest pace since its near-meltdown, powered by a surge in exports, tourism and domestic consumption.

Gross domestic product (GDP) grew 2.4 percent quarter-on-quarter in the first three months of the year to put annual economic growth at 4.5 percent in the period, the highest since the first quarter of 2008, data from the statistics office showed on Friday.

"It shows that the economy is growing rather rapidly, at least in an international comparison, at the moment," Islandsbanki Chief Economist Ingolfur Bender said.

"The increase is broad-based, driven by consumption, investment and exports."

Growth for the fourth quarter of 2011 was 1.9 percent on the quarter and 2.7 percent on the year.

The recovery has gathered momentum more quickly than expected after the small nation became a byword for the excesses of the liquidity boom which preceded the 2008 meltdown.

Steve Levitt: Like a True Chicago Boy, Likes People to Go to Jail so Markets Can Be Free

Yves here. Readers reacted positively to the inaugural report by the S.H.A.M.E Project on Malcolm Gladwell. S.H.A.M.E. , stands for “Shame the Hacks who Abuse Media Ethics.” Its approach is to provide information about the background and funding sources of well-recognized journalists and pundits so that the public will be in a better position to recognize bias and hidden agendas in their reporting and analysis.

This second report, on the widely-read economist Steve Levitt, overlaps strongly with NC’s beat. Note that this dossier format is the one S.H.A.M.E. plans to use for future releases.

By S.H.A.M.E Project

Steven D Levitt - Co-author of #1 Bestseller Freakonomics; Economics Professor at the University of Chicago

Named one of Time magazine’s “100 People Who Shape Our World,” Steven Levitt, author of Freakonomics, is generally assumed to be a harmless, quirky pop economist for trivia nerds. However, Levitt has a history of attacking teachers’ unions, advocating for the privatization of prison labor, defending online gambling and occasionally crossing over the fringe-right line by promoting climate change denialism (Angelo: at least thats one thing to his credit) and, some have argued, racial eugenics. A dyed-in-the-wool Milton Friedman neoliberal from the same “Chicago Boys” network that brought you the “shock doctrine,” Levitt’s idea of economics Utopia is a world in which “the market” solves all our problems and government is restricted to protecting property rights.

UK banks sitting on £40bn of undeclared losses

Britain's banks are sitting on a £40bn black hole of undeclared losses that are preventing them from making vital loans to businesses and households.

By Philip Aldrick:

PIRC, the shareholder advisory group, has analysed the 2011 accounts of the UK's top five banks to calculate how much they expect to write off as bad debt in the coming years but have yet to take against profits.

Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) was in the worst condition, PIRC found, with £18bn of undeclared losses that would wipe out more than a third of its capital buffer and potentially force the 82pc state-owned lender back to the taxpayer for another rescue.

HSBC had ($16bn) £10bn in undeclared losses, Barclays £6.7bn, Standard Chartered $3.6bn (£2.3bn) and Lloyds Banking Group £2.9bn. PIRC presented its numbers to all the banks and said none disputed them.

Gonzalo Lira "Deflationary Debt 'Death' Spiral"- Eurozone Marriage turned Orgy and a Latin American Divorce!

Spain is poised to seek a bailout for its banks possibly as early as tomorrow, according to media reports. Different estimates put the money needed for a Spanish bank bailout at anywhere from 27 to 100 billion euros. Meanwhile, figures show Greece's economy shrank at a rate of six-point-five percent for the first time in three months this year. There appears to be a collapse going on regardless of what Europe's technocrats and politicians say. What is this going to look like? Well, Gonzalo Lira says he's seen this all before in Latin America.

Barak the Plumber