3 Jul 2012

More than half of the euro zone is broke



















Google translation: Looks as if Slovenia is the country sechte the euro zone, which must be below the euro rescue. The largest bank in the country, Nova Ljubljanska Banka needed money badly. On Monday the European Commission in Ljubljana, the government had given the green light to support the bank with € 382.9 million. Finance Minister Janez Sustersic said in an interview on Monday, is the most important is that the capital has been increased. To stimulate the economy, the Bank needs but 500 million euros, or "much more".

Dear Person Seeking a Job: Why I Can't Hire You

Charles Hugh Smith: Potential employers have to respond to the incentives and disincentives that exist in today's world, and those do not favor conventional permanent employees.
I know you're hard-working, motivated, tech-savvy and willing to learn. The reason I can't hire you has nothing to do with your work ethic or skills; it's the high-cost Status Quo, and the many perverse consequences of maintaining a failing Status Quo.
The sad truth is that it's costly and risky to hire anyone to do anything, and "bankable projects" that might generate profit/require more labor are few and far between. The overhead costs for employees have skyrocketed. So even though the wages employees see on their paychecks have stagnated, the total compensation costs the employer pays have risen substantially.
Thirty years ago the overhead costs were considerably less, adjusted for inflation, and there weren't billboards advertising a free trip to Cabo if you sued your employer. (I just saw an advert placed by a legal firm while riding a BART train that solicited employees to sue their employers, with the incentive being "free money" for a vacation to Cabo.)

Euro Crisis Breakthrough Breakdown - Nigel Farage

Transcript:
"Well that is the 19th crisis summit that Mr Cameron has been to, as The Rolling Stones might say "The 19th Nervous Breakdown."

And that's reflected I think by the funereal mood in the chamber this morning.

Yes on that Friday morning, "breakthrough" was cried, and indeed Mr Van Rompuy parroted the word this morning, "breakthrough". Nobody believes you, the wheels are coming off. This new European Stability Mechanism, your new bailout vehicle is doomed before it starts. We have legal challenges in Ireland and in Germany. We have the Estonian Justice Minister saying it won't fit their Constitution.

The Bank Of England Made Me Do It! + UK economy will remain in recession - News Analysis

Tyler Durden's picture 
Wonder who was pushing Barclays to manipulate its rate? Why none other than the English Fed. From BBG:
  • BARCLAYS SAYS BANK OF ENGLAND CALLED ON OCT. 29, 2008 ON LIBOR
  • BARCLAYS SAYS DIAMOND MADE NOTE OF CALL
  • BARCLAYS SAYS DIAMOND RECEIVED CALL FROM PAUL TUCKER
  • BARCLAYS SAYS TUCKER SAID `CERTAIN' BARCLAYS DIDN'T NEED ADVICE
  • BARCLAYS SAYS TUCKER SAID DIDN'T ALWAYS NEED TO BE SO HIGH (Supposedly LIBOR)
  • BARCLAYS PROVIDES COPY OF DIAMOND'S CALL NOTE
  • BARCLAYS SAYS DIAMOND DIDN'T BELIEVE HE HAD GOT INSTRUCTION
  • BARCLAYS SAYS DEL MISSIER CONCLUDED INSTRUCTION HAD BEEN GIVEN
  • BARCLAYS SAYS DEL MISSIER TOLD RATE SETTERS TO LOWER RATES
In other words, a central bank was directly and indirectly involved in manipulating interest rates. Say it isn't so.

The Julian Assange Show: Anwar Ibrahim (Final Episode)

Julian Assange speaks to the leader of the Malaysian opposition - Anwar Ibrahim. As a rising internal rival to the former Prime Minister Mahathir, Anwar was imprisoned for 5 years after being smeared with sex allegations. As a result of a popular campaign in 2004, his conviction was overturned and he was released from prison. In 2008, he was again targeted for sex crimes allegations, he won the case earlier this year. With Malaysian elections looming with Anwar tipped to win, he has now been charged with unauthorized assembly. If found convicted, he will be prevented from running. Assange talks to him about how he has survived and what he sees as the future of Asia and the West. Source

Big guy 'scandals' vs small fry 'crimes' - Max Keiser with Teri Buhl

Max Keiser (who nails perfectly the state of our UK corrupt lame stream media, corporations, banks and government) co-host, Stacy Herbert, discuss 'scandals' for the big guys, 'crimes' for the small fry and they also examine, the worst businessman of the century. In the second half of the show Max talks to journalist and blogger, Teri Buhl of Teribuhl.com, about JP Morgan's $9 billion problem and the information about fraud that the SEC is currently sitting on. Source

Gulag USA: Three former NSA employees expose ‘mass illegal surveillance’ in court

By Madison Ruppert: The National Security Agency (NSA), which has recently been protected from having to disclose their relationship with the search engine giant and data mining powerhouse Google, is back in court over the case Jewel v. NSA.
The case, which was reinstated by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in late 2011, is challenging the NSA’s now well known massive warrantless surveillance program.
This case is more important than ever with the NSA pouring a whopping $2 billion into a heavily fortified data center which will almost certainly be used to monitor the communications of Americans. The National Counterterrorism Center’s new guidelines allowing extended data retention make matters even worse, if you can imagine such a thing.
Three former employees of the NSA, William E. Binney, Thomas A. Drake, and J. Kirk Wiebe, have come forward with evidence to back up a case being valiantly fought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
In a motion filed in the 9th Circuit on July 2, the three whistleblowers, all former intelligence analysts, confirmed the fact that, “the NSA has, or is in the process of obtaining, the capability to seize and store most electronic communications passing through its U.S. intercept centers, such as the ‘secret room’ at the AT&T facility in San Francisco first disclosed by retired AT&T technician Mark Klein in early 2006,” according to the EFF.

LIBORgate: Diamond v Tucker at Treasury Select Committee + Barclay's Diamond Goes M.A.D. Over Lie-borgate Details

After resigning as CEO of Barclays this morning, Bob Diamond may yet exact some revenge on the government when he testifies tomorrow in front of the Treasury Select Committee.
There are two LIBOR fixing scandals – the first involves traders massaging the settling of LIBOR rates a few basis points, mere hundreths of a percent, off market reality to flatter their trading books. It appears to have been going on for years and not just at Barclays. This was not so petty corruption.
The second LIBOR fixing scandal is of a different order altogether – it involves the wholesale systematic substantial misrepresentation of true LIBOR, with the encouragement of the Treasury, the FSA and in particular the Bank of England. The policy was to under-report LIBOR rates at much lower levels than were actually trading in the market. This deliberate policy was to cover-up the increased risks to the UK banking system revealed by higher LIBOR rates.
It is emerging that Gordon Brown’s economic adviser in Downing Street, Shriti Vadera, an ex-UBS investment banker, circulated a paper on ”Reducing Libor” at the height of the banking crisis, which she argued would be “a major contribution to the stability of the banking system and to the health of the economy”.
That message will have gone out to the Treasury in Whitehall, the regulators and the Bank of England. They in turn will have given a nod and a wink to the investment banks. Bob Diamond is reportedly furious that the “lowballing” of LIBOR rates by Barclays – which was explicitly encouraged by the authorities to stabilise already panicked markets – is being used against Barclays. Bob Diamond is expected to testify tomorrow that the Bank of England’s deputy governor Paul Tucker encouraged the “lowballing”.

Global Terror Update - Tim Price

Whistleblower Reveals Himself: Warns of False Flag at Olympics + Caller Jim Reveals Martial Law Drill in St. Louis

The undercover journalist who blew the whistle on G4S, the security company responsible for the 2012 Olympics, along with shocking plans for an evacuation of London, has revealed his identity following fears for his safety.

'Lee Hazledean' -- the whistleblower who exposed how he had infiltrated G4S as an employee and uncovered how security preparations for the Olympics were so poor that they were inviting a terrorist attack, has revealed himself to be Ben Fellows, an acclaimed director who has worked with Stanley Kubrick. Fellows has also appeared in numerous popular television and theatre shows.

Fellows made the decision to reveal his identity, after having gone under a pseudonym for the purposes of radio interviews conducted over the last week, because of fears over his safety.

Ruchir Sharma on the Latest and Greatest of Emerging Markets and Breakout Nations!

Mexico has reportedly elected a new leader, the opposition candidate from the former ruling party, who is promising to put the country back in the big leagues of emerging economies. We'll talk to author of "Breakout Nations: In Pursuit of the Next Economic Miracles," Ruchir Sharma, about what it takes to be an emerging economy and where some of the up-and-coming countries are likely to emerge from.

Trans Pacific Partnership: Corporate Escape From Accountability - Paul Craig Roberts

Information has been leaked about the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), which is being negotiated in secret by US Trade Representative Ron Kirk. Six hundred corporate “advisors” are in on the know, but not Congress or the media. Ron Wyden, chairman of the Senate trade subcommittee that has jurisdiction over the TPP, has not been permitted to see the text or to know the content.
The TPP has been called a “one-percenter” power tool. The agreement essentially abolishes the accountability of foreign corporations to governments of countries with which they trade. Indeed, the agreement makes governments accountable to corporations for costs imposed by regulations, including health, safety and environmental regulations. The agreement gives corporations the right to make governments pay them for the cost of complying with the regulations of government. One wonders how long environmental, labor, and financial regulation can survive when the costs of compliance are imposed on the taxpayers of countries and not on the economic activity that results in spillover effects such as pollution.
Many will interpret the TPP as another big step toward the establishment of global government in the New World Order. However, what the TPP actually does is to remove corporations or the spillover effects of their activities from the reach of government. As the TPP does not transfer to corporations the power to govern countries, it is difficult to see how it leads to global government. The real result is global privilege of the corporate class as a class immune to government regulation.