The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. – Benjamin Franklin
Colonel-General Anatoly Nogovitsyn
Georgia’s independence-leaning republics are to come under Georgian onslaught, high-ranking Russian military official has revealed.
Russia’s Deputy Chief of Staff, Colonel General Anatoly Nogovitsyn said “We have registered an increase in [Georgia’s] reconnaissance activities and preparations for armed actions in the Georgian-South Ossetian conflict zone,” Ria Novosti reported Friday.
Aug. 23 (Bloomberg) — Columbian Bank and Trust Co. of Topeka, Kansas, was closed by U.S. regulators, the nation’s ninth bank to collapse this year amid bad real-estate loans and writedowns stemming from a drop in home prices.
The bank, with $752 million in assets and $622 million in total deposits, was shuttered by the Kansas state bank commissioner’s office and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the FDIC said yesterday in a statement.
Read moreColumbian Bank and Trust of Kansas Closed by U.S. Regulators
The latest figures from pollster John Zogby show three key states have bolted from Obama, dropping him below the necessary 270 electoral votes.
Florida sent 27 electoral votes to John McCain, and both Colorado (9 votes) and New Hampshire (4 votes) went from Obama to undecided. The final tally has Obama down to 260 electoral votes – 10 shy of the necessary 270 for election.
John McCain has 173 electoral votes. There are 105 votes yet to be decided in 12 states that are too close to call, according to Zogby. Polling was done from Aug. 15-19, 2008.
For years, the data contained in the weekly Commitment of Traders Report (COT), issued by the CFTC, have indicated that several large COMEX traders have manipulated the price of silver and gold. For an equal number of years, the CFTC has reluctantly responded to public pressure over this issue with blanket denials of any wrongdoing. Many analysts have agreed with the CFTC’s position, conjuring up various ways to explain why a massive short position held by a handful of traders is not manipulative.
The recent widespread shortage of silver for retail purchase coupled with a price collapse appears to have shaken these analysts’ confidence that the COMEX silver market is operating ‘fair and square.’ Well it should, since there is no rational explanation for a significant price decline going hand in hand with product shortages other than collusive manipulation.
For any remaining doubters that COMEX silver and gold pricing is manipulated, the following CFTC data should be considered. This data is taken from a monthly report issued by the CFTC, called the Bank Participation Report. Here’s the link for the report:
http://www.cftc.gov/marketreports/bankparticipation/index.htm The relevant data is found in the July and August futures sections. I will condense it.
Aug. 22 (Bloomberg) — A failure of U.S. mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could be a catastrophe for the global financial system, said Yu Yongding, a former adviser to China’s central bank.
“If the U.S. government allows Fannie and Freddie to fail and international investors are not compensated adequately, the consequences will be catastrophic,” Yu said in e-mailed answers to questions yesterday. “If it is not the end of the world, it is the end of the current international financial system.”
Freddie and Fannie shares touched 20-year lows yesterday on speculation that a government bailout will leave the stocks worthless. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson won approval from the U.S. Congress last month to pump unlimited amounts of capital into the companies in an emergency.
Read moreFreddie, Fannie Failure Could Be World `Catastrophe,’ Yu Says
Aug. 22 (Bloomberg) — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two largest mortgage finance companies, “don’t have any net worth,” billionaire investor Warren Buffett said.
“The game is over” as independent companies said Buffett, the 77-year-old chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., in an interview on CNBC today. “They were able to borrow without any of the normal restraints. They had a blank check from the federal government.”
Regulators had long classified a private Swiss energy conglomerate called Vitol as a trader that primarily helped industrial firms that needed oil to run their businesses.
But when the Commodity Futures Trading Commission examined Vitol’s books last month, it found that the firm was in fact more of a speculator, holding oil contracts as a profit-making investment rather than a means of lining up the actual delivery of fuel. Even more surprising to the commodities markets was the massive size of Vitol’s portfolio — at one point in July, the firm held 11 percent of all the oil contracts on the regulated New York Mercantile Exchange.
The discovery revealed how an individual financial player had gained enormous sway over the oil market without the knowledge of regulators. Other CFTC data showed that a significant amount of trading activity was concentrated in the hands of just a few speculators.
Read moreA Few Speculators Dominate Vast Market for Oil Trading
Questions are arising over how long the Tamiflu retro-viral drugs being stockpiled by the New Zealand government — and many other countries — will remain an effective weapon against the next flu pandemic.
Tamiflu-resistant forms of the “ordinary” seasonal influenza are rapidly spreading and the drug may be ineffective in fighting the dominant flu strain in South Africa this winter.
World Health Organisation (WHO) data shows tests on 107 people in South Africa with the H1N1 strain — one of the three most common flu viruses in humans — found all had a mutant bug resistant to Tamiflu, the WHO said in a statement. Only one of the patients was taking Tamiflu at the time of sampling.
POTI, Georgia (AP) – Russian forces blocked the only land entrance to Georgia’s main port city on Thursday, a day before Russia promised to complete a troop pullout from its ex-Soviet neighbor.
Armored personnel carriers and troop trucks blocked the bridge to the Black Sea port city of Poti, and Russian forces excavated trenches and set up mortars facing the city. Another group of APCs and trucks were positioned in a nearby wooded area.
Although Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has promised that his forces would pull back by Friday, Russian troops appear to be digging in, raising concern about whether Moscow is aiming for a lengthy occupation of its small, pro-Western neighbor.
Aug. 22 (Bloomberg) — Two U.S. cities will become virtual fortresses during the Democratic and Republican nominating conventions, protected by airplanes, helicopters, barriers, fences and thousands of police officers, National Guard troops and Secret Service agents.
In Denver, where Democrats assemble next week, police are spending $18 million on equipment alone and will be bolstered by National Guard troops and hundreds of officers from surrounding suburbs. In St. Paul, Minnesota, site of the Sept. 1-4 Republican nominating convention, police are calling on 80 law- enforcement agencies to provide 3,000 officers to supplement the city’s 500-person force.
Congress earmarked $100 million for security at the two meetings, where federal and local authorities are trying to guard against any dangers to candidates or convention-goers.
MOSCOW, August 21 (RIA Novosti) – Russia is ready to supply Syria with defensive weapons, the Russian foreign minister said on Thursday following a meeting between the two countries leaders in Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi.
Read moreRussia says ready to supply Syria with defensive weapons
(NaturalNews) I recently received great news from the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) that after a long fourteen year battle between OCA, public interest and family farmer groups against Monsanto’s Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH), Monsanto has announced on August 6th that they will sell off their controversial rBGH. This is very good news since rBGH has been fed to cattle since the early 1990’s and has been implicated in a wide array of health issues, some very serious ones for both the animals themselves and anyone who consumes anything from the animals who are fed rBGH.
rBGH is said to be responsible for a number of health issues ranging from premature puberty in children to colon, prostate and breast cancer to increased antibiotic residues and elevated levels of a potent cancer tumor promoter called IGF-1.
Highly recommended videos:
– Life running out of control – Genetically Modified Organisms
– The World According to Monsanto – A documentary that Americans won’t ever see.
rBGH is a genetically engineered variant of the natural growth hormone produced by cows. It is manufactured by Monsanto and sold to dairy farmers under the trade name Posilac. This hormone forces cows to increase milk production by about 10%, but it also increases the incidences of mastitis, lameness as well as reproductive issues.
Read moreMonsanto Defeated on rBGH Animal Drug After 14 Year Battle
As gold prices tumbled from their highest level ever, investors and collectors loaded up on one-ounce “American eagle” gold-bullion coins. The buying spree came to an abrupt halt this week after the U.S. Mint stopped selling the coins for the first time since production began 20 years ago.
David Gothard
“Due to the unprecedented demand…our inventories have been depleted,” the Mint — part of the U.S. Treasury Department — told its dealers Friday. “We are therefore temporarily suspending all sales of these coins.”
The move shocked sellers and collectors of the coins, which are the most widely traded in the U.S. Suppliers became angry as they turned away customers. Theories about the decision’s underlying cause ran rampant — from investors in gold futures to Russia’s invasion of Georgia.
“This whole thing started about the time the Ruskies made their move,” a collector noted in an Internet chat room called goldismoney.info. “It may very well be that the USGovt is preparing for the real financial meltdown by hoarding all remaining gold flows.”
The Mint says it simply was wiped out. It has sold 311,000 ounces of the coins this year — about 50% more than in all of 2007. In the first few weeks of August alone, buyers snapped up 63,500 ounces.
“We are working diligently to build up our inventory and hope to resume sales shortly,” the Mint wrote in a memo to dealers.
The United States Mint
The U.S. Mint has stopped selling American eagle gold-bullion coins.
With what moral authority do these mainstays of the neoconservative, corporate elitist, greedy, self-interested Washington regime speak, when in their own closet there are skeletons labelled Abu Ghraib, Iraq, Guantanamo, mass murder, war crimes, illegal invasion, torture, illegal detention, disrespect for international law, denial of due process, rape…?
Read morePravda: Bush, Cheney and Rice; Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels
VANCOUVER, B.C. – The U.S. financial crisis has cut so deep – and the government has taken on so much debt in misguided attempts to bail out such companies as Fannie Mae (FNM) and Freddie Mac (FRE) – that even larger financial shocks are still to come, global investing guru Jim Rogers said in an exclusive interview with Money Morning.
Indeed, the U.S. financial debacle is now so ingrained – and a so-called “Super Crash” so likely – that most Americans alive today won’t be around by the time the last of this credit-market mess is finally cleared away – if it ever is, Rogers said.
CCTV monitors classrooms at one in 14 schools, according to a survey.
The poll of teachers also found that almost a quarter feared there might be more cameras hidden around the campus that they did not know about.
Most said their schools were fitted with surveillance cameras. Almost 80 per cent said there were cameras at the entrance and more than 7 per cent said there were some in classrooms.
Nearly 10 per cent of teachers polled by the Association of Teachers and Lecturers said there were cameras in the lavatories.
Big brother is watching you: One in 14 schools is monitored by CCTV
NEW YORK (AP) — A Goldman Sachs analyst has recommended a short-selling strategy for shares of Citigroup Inc., noting the bank is still heavily exposed to the troubled mortgage and consumer credit markets.
In short-selling, an investor borrows shares of a company and sells them, betting the stock will go down. The investor then buys back the shares, repays the loan and — if the strategy worked — pockets the difference as a profit.
Read moreGoldman Sachs analyst recommends shorting shares of Citigroup
Wastewater is most commonly used to produce vegetables and cereals (especially rice), according to this and other IWMI reports, raising concerns about health risks for consumers, particularly of vegetables that are consumed uncooked.
As developing countries confront the first global food crisis since the 1970s as well as unprecedented water scarcity, a new 53-city survey conducted by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) indicates that most of those studied (80 percent) are using untreated or partially treated wastewater for agriculture.
In over 70 percent of the cities studied, more than half of urban agricultural land is irrigated with wastewater that is either raw or diluted in streams.
Read moreMetropolitan Wastewater Ends Up In Urban Agriculture
Fears that the cost of living in America is rising out of control were heightened today after official data showed that factory gate prices increased at their fastest rate for 27 years.
US producer prices — a measure of the price of goods as they leave the manufacturer — rose 1.2 per cent in July compared with the month before. The increase represented a 9.8 per cent jump from July last year.
WASHINGTON, Aug 20 (Reuters) – U.S. consumers should brace for the biggest increase in food prices in nearly 20 years in 2008 and even more pain next year due to surging meat and produce prices, the Agriculture Department said on Wednesday.
Food prices are forecast to rise by 5 percent to 6 percent this year, making it the largest annual increase since 1990. Just last month, USDA forecast food prices would climb between 4.5 and 5.5 percent in 2008.
Read moreUS food prices to post biggest rise since ’90, says USDA
The Russian aircraft carrier “Admiral Kuznetsov” is ready to head from Murmansk towards the Mediterranean and the Syrian port of Tartus. The mission comes after Syrian President Bashar Assad said he is open for a Russian base in the area. The “Admiral Kuznetsov”, part of the Northern Fleet and Russia’s only aircraft carrier, will head a Navy mission to the area. The mission will also include the missile cruiser “Moskva” and several submarines, Newsru.com reports.
(NaturalNews) Two new studies showing that vaccines increase the risk of diabetes have been published in the Open Pediatric Medicine Journal.
In a prior study, published in the journal Autoimmunity, Dr. J. Bartholomew Classen of Classen Immunotherapies and David Carey Classen of the University of Utah compared more than 100,000 children who had received between one and four doses of the hemophilus vaccine with more than 100,000 unvaccinated children. The Classens found that after seven years, children in the vaccination group had a 26 percent higher risk of developing diabetes than children in the non-vaccine group. This amounted to an extra 54 cases of diabetes per 100,000 children vaccinated.
Syria has recently test launched a series of surface to surface missiles and rockets, Channel 2 news reported Monday.
The test launch was detected by Israel’s radar systems, including the Oren Yarok (green pine) and Oren Adir (magnificent pine) radars which activate Israel’s Arrow anti-ballistic missiles, Channel 2 reported.
Syria has some 1,000 models of Scud missiles with a range of 300 to 700 kilometers. The Syrian missiles are capable of striking targets anywhere in Israel. The Syrian military can fit the missiles with chemical warheads, and may have conducted experiments with biological warheads as well.
In addition to the Scud missile arsenal, Syria also possesses SS21 missiles with a range of 80 kilometers but with much higher precision than the Scuds.
The biggest threat facing Israel, however, is Syria’s arsenal of thousands of rockets with a range of nearly 100 kilometers, some of which can reach as far as the Haifa bay. The rockets are more accurate than the Scud missiles.
In response to Syria’s drill, the Israel Defense Forces and the Israel Air Force anti-aircraft unit conducted an exercise simulating a possible Syria missile attack.
We already know about the lies orchestrated by the White House to justify the invasion of Iraq . But there is a bigger secret that has not yet hit the mainstream media. And it probably never will until it’s too late. Those of you who read my book already know about it because I discuss it at length. For those of you who haven’t had a chance to read America’s Financial Apocalypse , I’m going to expose this secret now.