Infact looks like they may try and blame all social hardship on Immigrants! Stay vigilant peeps this is going to get very ugly!!
This racist BS is all over Pirate News somewhere to steer clear of!!
Persistent simian stereotypes tagged to blacks are not mere small and unimportant post-racial leftovers of the bad old days, argues a UCLA psychology professor.
I cannot imagine that 10 minutes passed from the time it first appeared online to the time my phone rang early this morning. The New York Post had published a (now controversial) cartoon depicting two police officers that had shot a monkey — one of them quipping, "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill."
_________________ 'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'
“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Thu Feb 26, 2009 12:05 am Post subject:
Interesting post and excerpt from The World At War series
How did the Swiss manage to stay out of Hitler's way?
Please watch the video below from the classic "World at War" series produced by the BBC. Pay special attention to the map of Europe at time=3:49.
Do you notice something odd about the untouched area in the center of the black area defining Nazi territory? Given the fanatical efforts (almost 1 million men, 2,093 aircraft, 2,758 tanks) lost during Operation Barbarossa alone) by the Nazis - to take on anyone in their way - why was the country in the middle spared?
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Thu Feb 26, 2009 12:38 am Post subject:
Best independent pro-pay for global financial analysis there is. US Army to take power in the U.S. roughly September 2009.
We had hoped that the decanting phase would give the world’s leaders the opportunity to draw the proper conclusions from the collapse of the global system prevailing since WWII. Alas, at this stage, it is no longer possible to be optimistic in this regard (1). In the United States, as in Europe, China and Japan, leaders persist in reacting as if the global system has only fallen victim to some temporary breakdown, merely requiring loads of fuel (liquidities) and other ingredients (rate drops, repurchase of toxic assets, bailouts of semi-bankrupt industries,…) to reboot it. In fact (and this is what LEAP/E2020 means ever since February 2006 using the expression « global systemic crisis”), the global system is simply out of order; a new one needs to be built instead of striving to save what can no longer be saved.
Beginning of Phase 5 of the global systemic crisis: phase of global geopolitical dislocation
Back in February 2006, LEAP/E2020 estimated that the global systemic crisis would unfold in 4 main structural phases: trigger, acceleration, impact and decanting phases. This process enabled us to properly anticipate events until now. However our team has now come to the conclusion that, due to the global leaders’ incapacity to fully realise the scope of the ongoing crisis (made obvious by their determination to cure the consequences rather than the causes of this crisis), the global systemic crisis will enter a fifth phase in the fourth quarter of 2009, a phase of global geopolitical dislocation.
According to LEAP/E2020, this new stage of the crisis will be shaped by two major processes happening in two parallel sequences:
A. Two major processes:
1. Disappearance of the financial base (Dollar & Debt) all over the world
2. Fragmentation of the interests of the global system’s big players and blocks
B. Two parallel sequences:
1. Quick disintegration of the current international system altogether
2. Strategic dislocation of big global players.
We had hoped that the decanting phase would give the world’s leaders the opportunity to draw the proper conclusions from the collapse of the global system prevailing since WWII. Alas, at this stage, it is no longer possible to be optimistic in this regard (1). In the United States, as in Europe, China and Japan, leaders persist in reacting as if the global system has only fallen victim to some temporary breakdown, merely requiring loads of fuel (liquidities) and other ingredients (rate drops, repurchase of toxic assets, bailouts of semi-bankrupt industries,…) to reboot it. In fact (and this is what LEAP/E2020 means ever since February 2006 using the expression « global systemic crisis”), the global system is simply out of order; a new one needs to be built instead of striving to save what can no longer be saved.
Hayman Advisors LP, famous for its mortgage crisis prediction, now is warning of the imminent collapse of the European monetary union.
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The company is known to have already earned U.S. $500 million by betting on the U.S. mortgage market collapse, and now it is Europe’s turn.
“The argument that the Euro zone will find a solution contains some sense if the assumption is that the situation isn’t that bad,” Richard Howard of Dallas-based Hayman was quoted by the Bloomberg agency as saying. “But the more dire it gets, the less are the consequences of departing from the euro.”
According to Howard, it is Germany that might first decide to stop bailing out their neighbors. This, in turn, might lead to defaults, which could make the country renounce using the euro.
Some bank experts agree with the predictions and say that Germany might actually refuse a bailout in its election year.
A Societe Generale report said that the German government, facing September elections, will be forced to spend more money at home and might refuse outside requests for help.
Bernard Lietaer (born in 1942 in Lauwe, Belgium) is an economist and author. He studies monetary systems and promotes the idea that communities can benefit from creating their own local or Complementary currency, which circulate parallel with national currencies.
Bernard Lietaer, the author of "The Future of Money: Beyond Greed and Scarcity" (London: Random House, 2001) and the forthcoming "Of Human Wealth," has been active in the realm of money systems for over 25 years in a wide variety of functions.
While at the Central Bank in Belgium (National Bank of Belgium) he implemented the convergence mechanism (ECU) to the single European currency system.
During that period, he also served as President of Belgium’s Electronic Payment System. His consultant experience in monetary aspects on four continents ranges from multinational corporations to developing countries.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Future_of_Money
Note how Lieater talks about going 'beyond scarcity'.
Whatever governments do for the banks, credit will be a lot harder to obtain for businesses, for many years to come. The trickiest aspect of the current situation is the simultaneous, global nature, of the banking crisis. Please, get ready now for an unprecedented rough ride for as long as one decade. What all this means in practice is that we have now entered the period of an unprecedented convergence of the four planetary issues - financial instability, climate change, unemployment and the financial consequences of an aging society - that was described in the 2001 book, The Future of Money.
MSNBC - Russian Scholar: U.S. will collapse — next year
Category: News and Politics
MOSCOW - If you're inclined to believe Igor Panarin, and the Kremlin wouldn't mind if you did, then President Barack Obama will order martial law this year, the United States will split into six rump-states before 2011, and Russia and China will become the backbones of a new world order.
Panarin might be easy to ignore but for the fact that he is a dean at the Foreign Ministry's school for future diplomats and a regular on Russia's state-guided TV channels. And his predictions fit into the anti-American story line of the Kremlin leadership.
"There is a high probability that the collapse of the United States will occur by 2010," Panarin told dozens of students, professors and diplomats Tuesday at the Diplomatic Academy — a lecture the ministry pointedly invited The Associated Press and other foreign media to attend.
Meshing with the Kremlin’s view
The prediction from Panarin, a former spokesman for Russia's Federal Space Agency and reportedly an ex-KGB analyst, meshes with the negative view of the United States that has been flowing from the Kremlin in recent years, in particular from Vladimir Putin.
Putin, the former president who is now prime minister, has likened the United States to Nazi Germany's Third Reich and blames Washington for the global financial crisis that has pounded the Russian economy.
Panarin didn't give many specifics on what underlies his analysis, mostly citing newspapers, magazines and other open sources.
He also noted he had been predicting the demise of the world's wealthiest country for more than a decade now.
Prediction: Alaska will return to Russian control
But he said the recent economic turmoil in the United States and other "social and cultural phenomena" led him to nail down a specific timeframe for "The End" — when the United States will break up into six autonomous regions and Alaska will revert to Russian control.
Panarin argued that Americans are in moral decline, saying their great psychological stress is evident from school shootings, the size of the prison population and the number of gay men.
Turning to economic woes, he cited the slide in major stock indexes, the decline in U.S. gross domestic product and Washington's bailout of banking giant Citigroup as evidence that American dominance of global markets has collapsed.
"I was there recently and things are far from good," he said. "What's happened is the collapse of the American dream."
Panarin insisted he didn't wish for a U.S. collapse, but he predicted Russia and China would emerge from the economic turmoil stronger and said the two nations should work together, even to create a new currency to replace the U.S. dollar.
Asked for comment on how the Foreign Ministry views Panarin's theories, a spokesman said all questions had to be submitted in writing and no answers were likely before Wednesday.
Persuasive?
It wasn't clear how persuasive the 20-minute lecture was. One instructor asked Panarin whether his predictions more accurately describe Russia, which is undergoing its worst economic crisis in a decade as well as a demographic collapse that has led some scholars to predict the country's demise.
Panarin dismissed that idea: "The collapse of Russia will not occur."
But Alexei Malashenko, a scholar-in-residence at the Carnegie Moscow Center who did not attend the lecture, sided with the skeptical instructor, saying Russia is the country that is on the verge of disintegration.
"I can't imagine at all how the United States could ever fall apart," Malashenko told the AP.
Isize=18]Trillions Have Disappeared Into The Ether[/size]
Posted: March 7 2009
No winners only losers of asset values, bailouts given to the intentionally self-destructive, shareholder value vaporized, the tip of the iceberg thus far, why do we pay AIG's bills?, indexes continue to report big shrinkages, hyperinflation wont repair anything, questions of credit and capital, what they are and what they are not. A bleaker future painted for younger people.
Recently, a public radio host sponsored an economics professor from MIT. Since he was the former chief economist for the World Bank, you know that he was an Illuminist mouthpiece, a disinformation specialist for the powers of darkness. He was asked where all the money went that has been lost by the tens of trillions in various asset classes such as real estate and the stock market. He was asked if it just disappeared into the ether, and he said basically that this is in fact what happened, like there were no winners, but only losers as the values of assets plummeted. He does not want you to know about where all the money really went.
But we'll be more than glad to tell you where it all went, and that is into the private bank accounts of the executives and employees of Illuminist banks, investment banks and brokerage houses around the world from profits generated by flimflam investment sales, commissions, fees, spreads and government bailout money, all of which was paid out in the form of salaries, bonuses and dividends. The money represented by these trillions in losses that supposedly disappeared into the ether were also paid to insider shareholders like Angelo Mozillo, who bailed out of their stocks leaving the remaining sucker-dupe shareholders holding the bag, to the shareholders of large financial companies and business corporations that took the form of corporate outlays for dividends and stock buy-backs that should never have been paid because their toxic waste holdings rendered their companies bankrupt, as well as to the sovereign wealth funds of foreign dollar surplus reserve nations who are in alignment with the Illuminati and whose potential "losses" on fraudulent derivatives, which they overpaid for by the trillions (when they are finally marked-to-market), have been backed by the US taxpayers, who are now having all these losses shoved up their collective derrieres.
All that money that has been lost is now being created out of thin air to fund inane bailouts of financial companies that intentionally self-destructed, or to back or bail out Illuminist aligned financial institutions and sovereign wealth funds who purchased the snake oil derivatives with bogus AAA ratings. All that money that has been magically created out of thin air via our inherently evil, European-style, debt-based fractional reserve banking system, which was set up in America in 1913 via the privately owned Fed, will now debase our currency further to the point where we will eventually experience Weimar-like hyperinflation, and the final weight of the lost buying power that will be experienced via the stealth tax of inflation will be borne by US taxpayers.
Of course, when the Illuminist mouthpiece-economist was asked where all the money would come from to fund the bailouts, he just said that the US, via its currency's reserve status, had the privilege of borrowing the money by selling its debt to other nations with dollar forex reserves via treasury bonds. During the entire dialogue, there was absolutely no discussion about what the ramifications are for taxpayers when their government continues to borrow money that can never be repaid. Not only will all this bailout money, that is being created out of thin air, fail to get our economy going again, it will also exacerbate a myriad of already insurmountable problems created by the intentional destruction of the world economy by the Illuminati to clear the slate for purposes of setting up a world government.
If this so-called economist would also disappear into the ether like he claims the money from the losses did, he would be doing us all a favor. Of course, he could then just materialize out of thin air like the money for all the bailouts, and we would then be stuck with him again anyway.
Barack "Nero" Obama will now play his Marxist FDR fiddle to the accompaniment of the sound of rolling printing presses while Rome (the US) burns to the ground. He will now not only save our economy with "hope' and "change," he will save our medical care system as well, while tens of millions of illegal aliens, who work under the table and do not pay taxes, and whose money is largely sent overseas and not spent in the US, continue to bankrupt our public welfare systems and hospitals, including Medicaid. Those who do not take out their Nero-insurance via gold, silver and their related assets will become crispy critters in the ensuing conflagration that will leave nothing but glowing cinders in its wake.
In the financial markets, whenever you have losers, you also have winners. Someone sold the losing asset to someone else, receiving full value for it before the loss was incurred, with full value often being a fraudulent and fictitious figure calculated with mark-to-model values based on bogus assumptions and even more bogus financial ratings and appraisals. The winners are always the Illuminist banks, investment banks and brokerage houses who sold bogus paper at full value, and whose executives and employees take all the profits off the table via salaries and bonuses before the losses come back to haunt them when things like SIV's and municipal auction rate securities. The bailouts are intended to prevent such losses from hitting Illuminist creditors by transferring the losses to the taxpayers, whose government creates money out of thin air to fund the bailout of such losses. The resulting monopoly money will eventually result in hyperinflation, the collapse of the dollar, the loss of the reserve status of the dollar which the economist chimed about, the downgrading of US treasury bonds, and, via higher interest rates and risk re-evaluation that will become necessary to bring this profligate flow of monopoly money under control, the collapse of the bond market, the real estate market, and the hundreds of trillions in interest rate swaps. The thermonuclear financial meltdown cometh, so be ready with gold, silver and their related assets. What has transpired thus far is just the tip of the iceberg that will send the US Titanic down to Davy Jones Locker.
The never ending story of desperate times, as our government in behalf of American taxpayers, this past week threw another $30 billion lifeline to AIG, the beleaguered insurance giant and CIA front and money laundering operation, that lost $62 Billions in just the fourth quarter.
We estimated it will cost $500 billion before the bailout is completed. They were insuring mortgage backed securities and other debt against default. Taxpayers have already supplied $17 Billion.
There is no question AIG has become a bottomless pit and it is illegal and unfair for the American taxpayers to foot their bills. Essentially AIG is holding the government at gunpoint. You either bail us out or the system collapses. What makes matters worse is government really does not know how the money is being spent.
The “Second Great depression” began on 2/01/09.
We expect the Dow over the next few years to go to 3,800 to 4,200, if we are lucky. If we replicate what happened in the “Great Depression” the Dow will go to 1,260 to 1,450, an 89% retracement.
Here and on radio we have been warning you that many insurance companies will go bankrupt unless the government steps in to save them. The stock of almost every company has been falling and some severely. If you have cash values in life policies or annuities you might cash them out and put the proceeds in gold and silver coins and shares. For those who have to have insurance, use pure insurance, term insurance also known as mortgage insurance.
S&P/Case-Shiller index says, prices in twenty US cities fell 18.5% on December Y o Y, the fastest drop on record. Sales of existing homes, which account for 90% of the market, fell in January to the lowest level since 1977, and new home sales were the lowest since 1963 when records began.
Each day it becomes more evident that the call for tariffs and subsides are getting louder and louder. Politicians are coming under increasing pressure from constituents to in-act protectionist laws, and rightly so. Free trade, globalization, off-shoring and out-sourcing have destroyed our industrial base. A revolt is coming and coming fast. Next year we will see legislation, perhaps sooner. Never before, even under British mercantilism has transnational conglomerates, from the US, Europe and Japan developed their manufacturing base on the soil of another countries in such a massive scale to make extraordinary profits, keep their profits free from taxation in offshore banking centers and at the same time destroy the core manufacturing of western countries. The end of globalization would bring the US and others back to life, and once under way will exert major pressure for higher gold prices.
How can investors have any faith in corporate America? At Pacific Brands Solomon Trujillo received $20 million as he left the company and the board gave themselves raises as workers were being thrown out on the street. This is a scene reminiscent of “Annie” and the infamous “Daddy Warbucks.”
As this transpires it looks like the US 2009 fiscal deficit will be close to $2 trillion. That as CDS default swaps on US Treasuries rise 100 bps or $100,000 for insurance on a $10 million five year Treasury note. It cost only $5,000 to do this a year ago. We do not see a default yet, as government will print money and float more debt. The loss will be in the form of inflation. Most all of the Treasury’s financing is short-term, which is a very vulnerable position. In fact recently the 30-year bond was reintroduced and we’ll have 7-year Treasury notes, which we haven’t seen since 1993. As we have reported previously it won’t be long before government borrowing crowds out lending to the private sector. The only way to avoid that is to have the Fed buy and monetize the debt and create hyperinflation and that is a work in process. As Ron Paul told Ben Bernanke recently, “credit is not capital.” You cannot recapitalize the banking system by printing more money or extending credit. Credit and capital should come from savings, not from raising a magic wand. We need 15% savings, not the current 2.5%. Once you see savings over 10% you will know we’ll be ready to exit depression. Banks will be ready to expand by retaining earnings, increasing deposits, by writing off losses and then by making sound loans.
We will remain in depression until this can be accomplished. Waste, errors and maleinvestment have to be cleared off the decks. As long as government and the Fed and other central banks bail out banks, financial firms and others we will have hyperinflation and repairing the system will not be accomplished. A depression is a health-restoring event. It purges the system of excesses.
The ADP job loss report estimate of 697,000 was much worse than the expected fall of 525,000 and the largest loss since 2001. Worse yet, the January report was revised from 522,000 from 614,000.
We saw the president of GE on CNBC Thursday morning telling the world what a wonderful company he runs. For his efforts the stock traded off $0.03 to $6.66. We recommended a short at $33.49. GE is another Enron, AIG, etc., one of the biggest users of credit default swaps, a large package of toxic garbage.
Moody’s may cut ratings on Wells Fargo and JP Morgan of which we are both short. Their derivatives are blowing up. Their troubles are in the trillions.
The 466 companies in the S&P 500 have reported a 58% fall in earnings on average.
On Thursday JP Morgan Chase fell $2.70, a new low, to $16.60. AIG lost $0.08 to $0.35 per share. Citigroup fell $0.11 to $1.02. Wells Fargo fell $1.59 to $10.55 and Bank of America fell $0.42 to $3.17. We are short JPM $39.36; C at $44.10 and WF at $59.65. The blue chips are getting crushed and you haven’t seen anything yet. A 4,000 Dow is a lock. The question is will it hold there”? Honestly, we do not think so. The damage is so extensive it could take ten years for the market to recover. Thank goodness I’m not still a broker. Gold was $255 in June 2000 when we started this odyssey and we are still a long way from being finished. The elitists will be lucky to just end up in jail and lose their ill-begotten wealth. Why do you think the intelligent people in the world are buying all the gold they can get their hands on? Gold is the only safety net, the only way out.
Our government calls U6 unemployment at 13.9%. We are now calling it at 16-1/2% and it is accelerating.
Commercial paper issuance outstanding fell $44.2 billion, to stand at $1.480 trillion. That is down from $2.2 trillion 21 months ago.
Unsecured financial issuance fell $35.9 billion, the biggest drop since a record $93.5 billion five weeks ago.
The FDIC is considering lowering special assessment on banks to 10 bps from 20 bps.
Blackstone (BX), which we shorted at $38.00 has written down to zero the value of billions of dollars of LBO debt that it bought from Deutsche Bank last year.
Private equity/LBO debt is the unspoken catastrophe waiting to happen to bank balance sheets and pension funds. The highest bid for any of it is $0.70. Banks are sitting on hundreds of billions of it as well.
You heard it here first. The entire private equity industry is going to get wiped out and with them the banks and pension funds will be injured as well. Many corporations will get hit as well, such as GE Capital.
The President’s Stimulus Plan has brought little confidence or trust to the market. CEO Magazine’s Confidence Index, broke its own record for the third time in the past four months, 95% rated the current business and employment conditions as bad; 69% don’t expect improvement anytime soon and 77% expect unemployment to worsen over the next quarter.
S&P says that credit quality continued to deteriorate with downgrades leading upgrades 49 to 6 in just the first three weeks of the month. Thus far first quarter downgrades outpace upgrades 14.3 to 1. This will be the worst quarter on record. It was 8.9 to 1 in the first quarter of 2008 and 14.1 to 1 in the first quarter of 2001.
There will be lots of analysts, economists and stockbrokers out of work soon. We estimate 70% will lose their jobs. They will lose 75% of their clients’ assets, as a result of staying the course and telling their dumb clients you don’t have losses until you take them, which is idiotic. They are looking for the rebound that will never come. The feast presented to the financial industry by the de-regulation of the banking industry and the lack of regulation of the derivatives industry is drawing to a close. It is only a matter of time before we get Glass-Steagell back. The greedy crooks in banking and Wall Street are about to be faced with payback. Once we hit bottom and no one knows where that will be, we could drag along the bottom for ten or more years. Recovery depends on whether the Illuminists ‘ arrange a war for us, as they did in 1941 with WWII. Once the Dow reaches 4,000 we will give you a better idea of where we are headed. It is wake up time. Our standard of living will fall 50% or more. We will revert to a lifestyle that we grew up in the 1940s and 50s. Many will have to walk a mile or two to school in rain and snow. No more bus rides. All those McMansions may become boarding houses. There will be 1 TV in the home and one used car in the garage. Credit will be difficult to get and home purchases will have to be accompanied by 20% or more down.
The business of living from paycheck to paycheck will end. 600,000 or more people are losing their jobs every week. Many have lost high paying jobs, jobs that may never be replaced again. These big hitters are taking any kind of job they can get to put food on the table to delay the inevitable exhaustion of savings. There will be many unhappy people. As a boy in the 1940s and 50s I heard thousands of stories of the depression and hardship. It was still in everyone’s minds. Everyone had a very sad story. Today after making $30 or $100 an hour, $12.00 an hour doesn’t cut it. More than 100 million Americans will be flat broke. This is going to be a tragedy of epic proportions. This is why we do 20 hours of radio programming a week to warn and prepare people for what is happening to them.
A major assist has to come from trade tariffs on goods and services. That at least will keep slave labor goods from flowing into the country. We will no longer have to compete with countries that subsidize industry or perpetually lower the value of their currencies.
Young Americans face a bleak future. The bright, strong and hard working will survive and eventually prosper. We did, so you can.
What is going to make the difference between the have’s and have nots are dehydrated and freeze dried foods, a water filter and assault weapons. After those items are looked after next is the accumulation of gold and silver related assets. You must have gold and silver coins if you have excess funds. Your very survival will depend on them. You will have to help other members of your family and friends who wouldn’t listen, graciously. Not everyone is as smart as you are. You have a gift and you must share it. That will allow those around you to survive and will lead to future success for your children and grandchildren. All the value in assets you lose will be offset by your ownership of gold and silver. Some of you may become very wealthy, but that is not what this is all about. It is about preservation of life and capital.
In just three months the phenomenon of states rights, the 10th Amendment, has become a major issue across America. Scores of states are in the process of introducing bills and resolutions declaring their sovereignty over the president’s actions. This is in reaction to massive public outcry of the faux-stimulus legislation and all the federal strings attached, which directly strips states of their rights under the constitution. States have begun refusing all or part of the stimulus money because of the constitutional infringements and additional unfunded liabilities they impose on the states.
This is now known as the 10th Amendment movement, something we’ve talked about since the 1960s but few were listening. It is a grassroots, conservative movement to defend the separation of powers as originally set forth by our Founders in the Constitution. This movement is going to eventually stop federal usurpation of power and deal the Illuminists a mortal blow. The actions of our president and Congress betray a transformational liberalism known as Marxism that should put every thinking American on notice.
It looks like the big hitters are hiding in Goldman Sachs, IBM,w and Google shares. Their charts are almost identical. Wait until GS breaks, then all three will break.
Gold price suppression still at work and you can benefit from it now, how we would love to be hangmen to the criminals who caused this financial crisis, fiat currency now used to plifer wealth, Dow will never return to 14000, stimulus for hyperinflation, trillions lavished on bankster-gangsters, Japan's lost decate
For once we can thank the criminal miscreants in the gold cartel for all their suppressive efforts. As they buy time for themselves so they can bail out of dollar-denominated paper assets and roll the proceeds over into gold, silver and other real tangible assets on the cheap via the scheme we have referred to often as the Big Sting Two, they are also letting everyone else in the general public have more time to learn about gold and silver while precious metals are still affordably priced. These financial sociopaths are giving newsletter writers like us, and the hard money community in general, more time to educate the public about the nature of money, about inflation and about what they can do to protect themselves and their financial future with gold, silver and their related assets. In the end, their criminal enterprise will turn out to be self-defeating.
The more gold and silver the public has a chance to acquire in order to protect themselves against the corrosive effects of hyper-stagflation and a high risk financial environment, followed by the devastating impact of deflation and depression, the more people there will be to fight effectively against the move toward world government as the elitists destroy the world economy to pave the way for their One World Disorder. The more gold and silver we, the general public, own, the less power the elitists will have over us as the world financial system unravels and these fiends attempt to enslave us in a one-world police state which they intend to create out of the ensuing social, political and financial chaos. What they will get out of the ensuing chaos is violence, social upheaval and revolution, followed by trials, recriminations, confiscations of their property and striped suits.
If the public is in need of hangmen, we will gladly volunteer our services to pull the pins on the trap doors to ensure that these malevolent, megalomaniacal miscreants receive their final comeuppance.
Rest assured that these miscreants already own, and are acquiring with great speed, ever greater private reserves of gold and silver in all forms, because they, of all people, know that gold and silver are the only real money in a world full of "worthless paper," paper which they themselves created in order to rip off the hard-working masses. By various methods of fraud and deceit, they are using fiat currencies to pilfer the wealth, which the common folk have earned with their blood, sweat and tears. As Dr. No, Representative Ron Paul, said recently: "It's immoral to transfer wealth from the productive to the non-productive members of society." But that is precisely what these lazy louts intend to do to you if you allow them to. Incidentally, they are only lazy when it comes to earning an honest living. When it comes to plundering and raping the public through criminal enterprise, they are anything but lazy. Don't be lazy louts like them when it comes to earning honest gains via gold, silver and their related assets. You must buy precious metals to protect yourself, along with freeze-dried food, water filters, weapons and ammunition, and keep buying them until you run out of resources as the economy goes belly up. These are your only salvation aside from God Almighty Himself, and He also expects you to take action and prepare for what lies ahead.
Posted: Thu Mar 19, 2009 1:33 am Post subject: The Fed Did Indeed Cause The Housing Bubble
Interesting insider evidence that the conditions leading to the 'Credit Crunch' were deliberately engineered:
The Fed Did Indeed Cause The Housing Bubble
By Catherine Austin Fitts
18 March, 2009
Catherine Austin Fitts' Blog
To: The Wall Street Journal
Re: “The Fed Didn’t Cause the Housing Bubble”
By: Alan Greenspan, former Chairman of the Federal Reserve
Dated: Wednesday, March 11, 2009
In his article on your opinion page, “The Fed Didn’t Cause the Housing Bubble,” Alan Greenspan attributes the housing bubble to lower interest rates between 2002 and 2005. That’s amazing to me.
My company served as lead financial advisor to the Federal Housing Administration between 1994 and 1997. I watched both the Administration and the Federal Reserve aggressively implement the policies that engineered the housing bubble. These are described at my website and in my on-line book,Dillon Read & the Aristocracy of Stock Profits (http://www.dunwalke.com).
One story, for example, is the following:
“In 1995, a senior Clinton Administration official shared with me the Administration’s targets for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage volumes in low- and moderate-income communities. We had recently reviewed the Administration’s plans to increase government mortgage guarantees — most of these mortgages would also be pooled and sold as securities to investors. Even in 1995, I could see that these plans would create unserviceable debt loads in communities struggling with the falling incomes expected from globalization. Homeowners would default on mortgages while losses on mortgage-backed securities would drain retirement savings from 401(k)s and pension plans. Taxpayers would ultimately be hit with a large bill . . . but insiders would make a bundle. I looked at the official and said that the Administration was planning on issuing more mortgages than there were houses or residents. “Shut up, this is none of your business,” the official snapped back.”
One of the dirty little secrets behind the housing bubble is the long standing partnership of narcotics trafficking and mortgage fraud and the use of the two in combination to target and destroy minority and poor communities with highly profitable economic warfare. This model is global. It is operating in counties throughout the world as well as in US communities.
Of all the actions that the Federal Reserve took to engineer this housing bubble, the one that I would note is Mr. Greenspan’s efforts to pacify Congresswoman Waters regarding allegations of government sponsored narcotics trafficking at a time when open Congressional hearings would have contributed to an important discussion of the operations engaging in mortgage fraud in minority communities. See, “Financial Coup d’Etat,” Chapter 16, Dillon Read & the Aristocracy of Stock Profits which was written in 2005 and published in April 2006, drawing from an article I first published in May 1999.
“On December 18, 1997, the CIA Inspector General delivered Volume I of their report to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence regarding charges that the CIA was complicit in narcotics trafficking in South Central Los Angeles. Washington, D.C. ’s response was compatible with attracting the continued flow of an estimated $500 billion–$1 trillion a year of money laundering into the U.S. financial system. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan in January 1998 visited Los Angeles with Congresswoman Maxine Waters — who had been a vocal critic of the government’s involvement in narcotics trafficking — with news reports that he had pledged billions to come to her district. In February Al Gore announced that Water’s district in Los Angeles had been awarded Empowerment Zone status by HUD (under Secretary Cuomo’s leadership) and made eligible for $300 million in federal grants and tax benefits.”
Alan Greenspan is a liar. The Federal Reserve and its long standing partner, the US Treasury, engineered the housing bubble, including the fraudulent inducement of America as part of a financial coup d’etat. Our bankruptcy was not an accident. It was engineered at the highest levels.
Your publication of Greenspan’s breezy and bogus history of the housing bubble insults your readership.
Best Regards,
Catherine Austin Fitts
Assistant Secretary of Housing - Federal Housing Commissioner, Bush I
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2009 7:32 pm Post subject:
Finance crisis 'could lead to war', Bilderberg warns
Finance crisis 'could lead to war', IMF warns
By Kirsty Walker
Last updated at 3:07 PM on 24th March 2009
Dominique Strauss-Kahn
Dire warning: Dominique Strauss-Kahn says the global economic crisis could push millions into poverty
The global financial crisis could lead to social unrest and even war, the head of the International Monetary Fund warned yesterday.
Dominique Strauss-Kahn said that the billions already pumped into the world economy risked disappearing into thin air unless there is massive reform of the financial sector.
And he dealt a severe blow to Gordon Brown's plans for another debt-funded Budget giveaway by warning that the money might melt 'like snow in the sun'.
At a meeting of the International Labour Organisation, Mr Strauss-Kahn warned that the global economic crisis is 'dire' with the threat of millions being pushed into poverty.
The managing director of the global financial watchdog went on to warn governments against ploughing yet more fiscal stimulus into their ailing economies. He said: 'You can put in as much stimulus as you want.
'It will just melt in the sun as snow if at the same time you are not able to have a generally smaller financial sector than before but a healthy financial sector at work.'
The IMF has called on countries to pump 2 per cent of their gross domestic product into their economies in an attempt to reverse the global downturn.
Of the international situation, Mr Strauss-Kahn added: 'Bluntly the situation is dire. All this will affect dramatically unemployment and beyond unemployment for many countries it will be at the roots of social unrest, some threat to democracy, and maybe for some cases it can also end in war.'
Chancellor Alistair Darling last week told MPs that 3.4 per cent of Britain's national wealth is already being spent on stimulating the economy.
The Prime Minister is said to want another large-scale stimulus, and is about to embark on a world tour to drum up support for his approach ahead of next month's G20 summit. But the Confederation of British Industry has also warned that the move is 'unaffordable'.
In a pre-Budget submission to Mr Darling, it took the unusual step of serving notice that it would refuse to support any further 'fiscal stimulus' because the public finances are in such a dire state.
Instead it called on the Chancellor to concentrate on confidence-building measures to support jobs, businesses and investment through the recession.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Wed Mar 25, 2009 12:47 pm Post subject:
The guy who invented derivative markets has said blow them up or burn them down
The Bottom Line / Blow them up or burn them down
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1071068.html
By Dafna Maor
There are those who say the present financial crisis was caused by a lack of transparency. One of the less transparent things today for suffering consumers and investors is the wisdom of their economic leaders.
In all the tumult surrounding the U.S. government's efforts to rescue and provide incentives, it's not at all clear which wise person will solve the crisis. The world economic leadership lacks a truly radical voice to present us with a completely different approach to dealing with the crisis and the global economy. All the prescriptions presented so far are nothing but old medicine, if not just home remedies. The question of transparency was raised in a clear and scathing manner last week by none other than Myron Scholes, the Nobel Prize-winning economist. Scholes said derivatives products traded over the counter - not in an organized market - should be shut down completely. Speaking at a panel discussion at New York University's Stern School of Business, he said the "solution is really to blow up or burn" the over-the-counter market and start over......
Scholes Advises ‘Blow Up’ Over-the-Counter Contracts
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103
By Christine Harper March 6 (Bloomberg) -- Myron Scholes, the Nobel prize- winning economist who helped invent a model for pricing options, said regulators......
The world economic leadership lacks a truly radical voice to present us with a completely different approach to dealing with the crisis and the global economy.
ISTR that the World Bank sacked the only guy making real-politic sense quite a while back:-
BTW, loved that Martin Lewis / Oystar link - just the job for MoD-defined 'middle-class re.vo.lootionaries' ;-) _________________ "We will lead every revolution against us!" - attrib: Theodor Herzl
"Timely Demise to All Oppressors - at their Convenience!" - 'Interesting Times', Terry Pratchett
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Thu Mar 26, 2009 8:00 pm Post subject:
Throughout this spectacular 'crisis' I've noticed that so many of the headlines we see in the paper are a little bit wrong. Change just one word, say 'collapse' to 'fraud', or 'mistake' to 'crime', and you get the true sense through in the article.
For those that don't know the individual journalists often don't write the headline for their articles. It's usually the section editor or sub-editor that decides on a choice of words to fit nicely between the ads etc. in the page layout software.
I think this is wrong and sometimes 'subs' as they are called, tone down a punchy headline that looks too controversial.
Anyway - yet another one today
Mervyn King threat is 'defining moment', claim Tories
Mervyn King warning is 'defining moment', claim Tories
Deputy Labour leader pressed on whether government will run away due to the Bank of England governor's threats about what he's going to do to her if there are further budget giveaways
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/mar/25/harriet-harman-william- hague-pmqs
Quote:
What game is She playing?
A time of national uncertainty. The Prime Minister is out of the country in Latin America. While he's away his deadly rival slips into Buckingham Palace for secret talks with the Queen. A telling photograph of the meeting is conveniently slipped out to the media, just hours after the Governor has pulled the plug on the PM's economic policy. Meanwhile, a hatchet-faced junior officer with an army of loyal fighters ready to strike heads for the House of Commons to "stand in" for the absent leader. His friends make discreet inquiries about the availability of retirement villas in the south of France. Stay tuned.
UPDATE: Not to belabour this motif, but the City has gone on a bond strike this morning for mysterious reasons. And Harriet was wearing pinstripes.
http://broganblog.dailymail.co.uk/2009/03/what-game-is-she-playing.htm l
Quote:
King pulls the rug out from under Brown
Stunned looks in the Commons a short while ago. Mervyn King dropped a bombshell in his evidence to the Treasury Select, namely that he doesn't think there is a case for another fiscal stimulus. At a stroke he appears to have demolished Gordon Brown's reasoning for the G20 summit and the Budget by saying we can't afford another injection into the economy. These are the key quotes:
"I'm sure the government will want to be cautious in this respect. There is no doubt we are facing very large fiscal deficits over the next 2-3 years.
"Given how big those deficits are, I think it would be sensible to be cautious about going further in using discretionary measures to expand the size of those deficits.
"The level of the fiscal position in the UK is not one that would say: 'Well, why don't we just engage in another significant round of fiscal expansion?'"
This is a major twitch of the Governor's eyebrow. The significance of Mr King's statement will send shockwaves through Westminster. He has blown a hole in Mr Brown's political strategy. Does the PM defy the Governor and press on regardless of the possible impact on the markets? Or does he run up the white flag? I gather mr King has been wanting to get this off his chest for some time. I'm sure his motives are honourable, but I can't help recalling those stories - vehemently denied - about how Mr Brown kept him waiting for his nomination...
http://broganblog.dailymail.co.uk/2009/03/king-pulls-the-rug-out-from- under-brown.html
Posted: Wed Apr 08, 2009 3:54 pm Post subject: MADOFF, MOSSAD, AIG AND 9/11
Quote:
FOLLOW THE MONEY / MADOFF, MOSSAD, AIG AND 9/11
The Madoff investigation is very similar to the 9-11 investigation in that evidence of a larger conspiracy is being avoided and ignored. It is possible that the billions that Madoff stole, and is still unaccounted for, was being used to finance Israel’s vast global spy and sabotage network Mossad with connections to both AIG and quite possibly 9/11 itself: Allen L Roland
Talk about red flags! I always felt there was something fishy about the Madoff scandal as if the government was going to great lengths to portray this as a simple one man Ponzi scheme while avoiding the very real possibility of a major conspiracy.
Fourwinds10.Com questionably wrote that Russian intelligence had weighed in on the Madoff scandal and reported that ~ " Madoff was the chief financier for a vast Israeli spy and sabotage network ( Mossad ) set up by former Israeli Security Agency (Shin Bet) director Jacob Perry (Yaakov Peri) who ‘transformed’ himself into one of America’s most powerful businessman and led what FSB sources call the ñìåðòîíîñíàÿ øàòèÿ 7 which references the leaders of this American-Israeli cabal who besides Madoff and Perry include:
Henry Taub, Hungarian born American-Israeli who created the giant United States payroll company ADP which continues to funnel to Israeli intelligence services financial records for nearly every US citizen.
Maurice Greenberg, American-Israeli who was the former chairman and CEO of American International Group (AIG), the World's 18th largest public company and its largest insurance and financial services corporation which has (so far) funneled over $180 billion in US taxpayer money directly to Israel.
Larry Silverstein, the American-Israeli billionaire who secured a lease for the World Trade Center buildings in New York on July 24, 2001, insured them for $3.55 billion spread among 24 different insurance companies, and after their destruction 2 months later on 9/11 collected $4.55 billion for Israel.
Mort Zuckerman, Canadian born American-Israeli billionaire who through his vast publishing empire has direct control over 70 percent of the news reported in the United States.
Edouard de Rothschild, French born American-Israeli member of the all powerful European Rothschild Banking Empire and director of the Rothschild & Cie Banque reported by the FSB to hold nearly 80% of the wealth stolen by Israel from the United States Government and its citizens.
These reports further state that Madoff was ‘convicted’ in a ‘one of a kind’ designed trial in which his guilty plea kept all evidence against Israel’s betrayal of the United States from being entered into official American records as it was deemed by the Obama administration as ‘too incendiary’ for the American people to know about and would, most certainly, unleash an Israeli backlash many Russian Military Analysts state would leave ‘many US cities in ruin’. " http://fourwinds10.com/siterun_data/government/fraud/israel/news.php?q =1237329300
... ...
I'm beginning to wonder whether this section of 911forum is getting sufficient attention. The worms that crawl out of this mess can point the way to the 911 culprits, given enough rope, IMO.
After the Barclays leaks demonstrating their venality, it's becoming clearer who the main culprits are and looks like Barclays are relatively small-fry compared to the Madoff/AIG/Goldman-Sachs scam.
This blog needs archiving (after story on telegraph relayed via AJ on prisonplanet):-
About this Site: Born on March 26, 2009, this website is an open forum for facts and discussion about what part Goldman Sachs and their executives played in the current Global Economic Crisis. This site is NOT affiliated with Goldman Sachs, nor has this site been approved by Goldman Sachs. In fact, Goldman Sachs has threatend to file a lawsuit to shut down this website.
Information: If you have helpful links, articles or any kind of information relevant to exposing Goldman Sachs for it's part in the worldwide financial crisis, please email me Mike@GoldmanSachs666.com
and
Quote:
Did Goldman Sachs Scam the System with AIG?
Editor's Note: If you want to read it like it is, you need to follow Karl Denninger. He prepared a piece titled Goldman (and other banks') "Hedges" - What Karl points out is just how easy it was for Goldman Sachs to rip off the system or at least work within rules that filled their pockets with money they claimed . . . not to be material. Here is an excerpt from Karl's piece.
Because if that's how Goldman hedged they got paid twice and the taxpayer literally got robbed.
Someone in Congress needs to look into this now; there are already rumblings of investigation. Those rumblings need to get a lot louder and turn into subpoenas, not "polite inquiries."
If in fact Goldman (or anyone else) was "hedged" against a possible credit loss from their CDS with AIG and they were able to collect on that hedge (no matter what it was) those payments through AIG need to be clawed back immediately as nobody is entitled to be paid twice for the same risk and reap what amounts to a windfall profit by quite literally engineering a multi-billion dollar transfer of funds from the Taxpayer to the firm!
This is not small potatoes either - we're talking $100 billion+ in aggregate with these various banks on a worldwide basis.
We the people deserve answers on this right now and if persons in our government handed these banks $100 billion dollars of our tax money for what was a covered bet, allowing them to collect twice on a risk that had not yet been realized (when at most they were entitled to collect once via their private hedging activity) every single person involved in that scandal must be immediately removed from office, prosecuted if possible, and every nickel of those funds must be clawed back by whatever means are necessary.
Loads more 'boring insider stuff' on the blog. _________________ "We will lead every revolution against us!" - attrib: Theodor Herzl
"Timely Demise to All Oppressors - at their Convenience!" - 'Interesting Times', Terry Pratchett
Bilderberg's main global bank holding company. Engages in investment banking, securities and investment management.
Quote:
What Does Goldman Know That We Don't?
Commentary by Michael Lewis
Jan. 17 2008 (Bloomberg)
What's odd about the subprime crash is Goldman Sachs Group Inc. A single firm took a position contrary to the rest of Wall Street. Giant Wall Street firms are designed for many things, but not, typically, to express highly idiosyncratic views in the market.
Even more surprising is how little Wall Street seems to have dwelled on how and why Goldman Sachs made its killing. There are insane conspiracy theories -- for instance, that former Goldman chief executive officer and current U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson tipped his old pals, etc. (But then, how did HE know?)
There is also the widely held opinion that people who work at Goldman Sachs are just smarter than ordinary people -- hence the lust to hire former Goldman employees to run other Wall Street firms, as Merrill Lynch & Co. did. (But why would any trader who could systematically beat the market waste his time at Goldman Sachs?)
So far as I can tell, there has been only one attempt to explain this strange event, and that was by a journalist, Kate Kelly of the Wall Street Journal.
This Little Piggy
Ms. Kelly's very good piece offered up the sort of irrelevant details -- this little piggy ate which sandwich for lunch as the market crashed, which trader went to the gym at which odd hour to relieve the incredible stress of gambling with billions of dollars of other people's money -- that leaves the reader, along with employees of Goldman Sachs, feeling as if someone inside Goldman must have spilled the beans.
But Goldman didn't cooperate with the Journal, was actually a tiny bit miffed about the article, and now says the Journal exaggerated the bonuses paid to certain traders and the profits made by certain departments. That's Goldman's only complaint, however, and so the Journal story is probably true, as far as it goes. The only trouble is that it doesn't go far enough.
Briefly, the Journal story runs as follows:
By the end of 2006, the people creating and selling subprime mortgages and other so-called CDOs (collateralized debt obligations), had put Goldman Sachs in exactly the same position as every other Wall Street firm. Left to their own devices, traders in subprime-mortgage bonds would have sunk Goldman just as they sank Merrill Lynch, Citigroup Inc., Bear Stearns Cos. and every other major Wall Street firm.
Smart Guys
Enter two smart guys who trade Goldman's proprietary books to argue to the CEO and chief financial officer that the subprime market feels soft and that Goldman should short it. This they do, in such massive quantities that they more than offset the long positions in subprime held throughout the rest of the firm, leaving Goldman short the subprime market and in a position to make billions when it crashes. End of story..............
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aEXlKAu61sYU&refer =home
...just when they believe it won’t happen again, they are slammed in the teeth...
Quote:
Sucker rallies (or bull traps) in a bear market are a time-honoured tradition. Bear markets see many rebounds, ranging from feeble rises of maybe 10 per cent over a period of a couple of weeks to ones that last years and recoup anywhere from 50 per cent to even over 100 per cent from the low. Call it from the little sucker to the really big sucker. Little suckers bring a wave of short-term euphoria that “This is the end of the bear,” while really big suckers make everyone forget about the previous drop, and then just when they believe it won’t happen again, they are slammed in the teeth. The former are wonderful for nimble traders; the latter are wonderful for those who possess a healthy skepticism and realize that this is a nice party but it will eventually end badly.
http://news.goldseek.com/UnionSecurities/1239307225.php
_________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Sun Apr 19, 2009 9:34 pm Post subject: A former City of London financial analyst
"It's a Wild West Casino"
Sex, drugs, drink and greed in the City of London
A former City of London financial analyst has exposed the "greed, arrogance, insider-trading" of his former colleagues - not to mention the drink, drugs and visits to strip clubs.And City Boy author Geraint Anderson blames bankers' greed for the current economic crisis.
“The crisis that has occurred, that is going affect millions of lives across the world, was a crisis created by bankers,” he says. “And those bankers did what they did was because they were greedy, ruthless people, who wanted to increase their bonus even if it meant bad long-term consequences for us all.”
So it is a little surprising to learn that Anderson worked at a hub of international banking, the City of London for 12 years.
The former financial analyst describes himself as “just a left-wing hippy who fell into the job by mistake”. In fact, he is the son of Labour politician Donald Anderson, now Baron Anderson of Swansea, so perhaps not as hippy as all that.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned credit crunch losses could reach $4 trillion (£2.75tn), damaging the financial system for years to come.
One year ago, the IMF estimated that total losses from the credit crunch would be $1 trillion, which has been exceeded, showing how rapidly the financial meltdown has escalated.
--
So are we looking at a linearly escalating meltdown -- giving $7 trillion by this time next year -- or an exponential meltdown giving $16 trillion? _________________ Simon - http://www.patriotsquestion911.com/
Colchester Town is busy tonight, the most I've seen in a while, is it the weather alone thats brought them out? _________________ 'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'
“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”
MAY DAY: Europeans Begin to See Red
By Julio Godoy
ATHENS, Apr 30 (IPS) - European unions are facing a difficult choice this May Day between holding protests to protect workers' interests, or holding off to avoid a further deepening of the economic recession.
The dilemma is before all European unions, but their national histories and their structures are leading them to act differently despite efforts to coordinate responses to the economic crisis.
In Athens, graffiti calling for May Day protests is all over the city's walls. Athens has been seeing violent demonstrations since December, when a 15- year-old was shot dead by police officers in the course of a demonstration.
The riots marked the build-up to a general strike called against privatisation, tax increases and pension cutbacks imposed on instructions from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Now, more violent protests are expected May Day in Athens and other Greek cities. Police and union leaders in Germany and France are also warning of violent protests.
"On May Day evening, there will be leftist extremists who will violently attack police forces and private property," Berlin police chief Dieter Glietsch warned at a press conference earlier this week.
"What is happening in Greece since December could happen in France," Georges Martin, spokesperson for the French Workers' General Union told IPS. "A social bomb is waiting to explode in France."
There have been explosions before. Immigrant youth have carried out violent demonstrations during the Christmas and New Year season for years now, burning private automobiles and attacking police patrols.
"All these explosions waiting to happen in Europe have a common reason: the social consequences of globalisation," says Jean Techau from the German Foundation for Foreign Policy in Berlin.
"The global economic crisis is affecting all European states at the same time," Techau told IPS. "This has never happened before."
Techau says Spain and France are seeing a dramatic rise in unemployment, a sharp economic downturn, ethnic segregation of immigrants, and public finances eroded by large deficits.
"The risk of social revolt is in both countries very large," Techau said.
In Spain, May Day unions will protest jointly against de-localisation of industries, mass layouts and reduction of salaries. "To face the crisis, more employment, more public investment and more social protection" goes one slogan.
Michael Sommer, president of the German Unions' Federation, has warned that "if business corporations react to the crisis with mass layoff of workers, it is very likely that social revolt take place." Sommer said this was not a threat, but a comment on the prevailing atmosphere.
Mathias Platzeck from the Social Democratic Party, governor of the federal state of Brandenburg, has warned of "a widespread sense of injustice among the German population."
This has been provoked by state packages amounting to some 500 billion euros (650 billion dollars) to rescue large banks from insolvency. Banks are seen as having provoked the crisis in the first place due to irresponsible lending and investment.
The government has also approved two programmes to stimulate domestic demand, amounting to some 100 billion euros, but has refused unions' calls to reduce tax on low-income classes and to raise salaries.
On the contrary the government, facing a debt of well over 1,600 billion euros, may have to freeze public servants' salaries and pensions, and increase tax in the near future - measures likely to affect middle and low income people.
This sense of injustice has been expressed in large demonstrations. In the financial capital Frankfurt, where most national and international banks maintain large offices, a large demonstration was held Mar. 28 under the banner: 'We do not pay for your crisis'.
Platzeck, formerly the SPD president, said in a radio interview that the financial crisis had shattered Germans' confidence in capitalism.
"More than half the (formerly communist-ruled) East German population do not trust the market economy," Platzeck told the public radio Deutschland Funk. "Forty percent of East Germans even believe that a state-ruled economy is needed."
Others say people are still willing to give their governments more time. "Yes, there is widespread social discontent, but it is accompanied by a sense of patience," Dieter Rucht from the group 'Civil society, citizenry and political mobilisation in Europe' told IPS.
German workers are giving government plans to stimulate domestic demand time to deliver, Rucht said. "Most people are willing to wait and see how these programmes work." But if unemployment rises dramatically and people see their savings affected by the crisis, "then social revolt might be inevitable."
Germany is facing the sharpest economic recession in modern history. The government admitted Apr. 23 that its economic output will fall at least 6 percent this year. Some economic forecasts suggest that unemployment might rise to five million by next year - 10 percent of the labour force.
In France, unions have a long tradition of violent demonstrations and strikes. This year they have so far called two one-day general strikes, that were supported by the majority of workers. For May Day, the eight largest French unions have joined forces to hold massive demonstrations in the largest cities, especially in Paris.
"For workers, it is better to collectively express our anger with the social situation rather than leave room for individual, desperate actions," Annick Coupé, spokesperson of the union Solidaires told IPS.
Since March this year, workers have been kidnapping managers and CEOs in what has been dubbed "bossnapping", in protest against mass layoffs or the shutting down of industrial facilities. Top executives from corporations such as Sony, Caterpillar, 3M and Scapa have been temporarily kidnapped by their workers.
Several opinion polls suggest that more than half the people consulted support such actions. (END/2009)
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