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Jeff Berwick
Activist Post
The Illegitimate Revenue Agency (IRS) has just announced that the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) has been postponed from July 1, 2014 until January 1, 2016.
This is good news in many ways for both those with assets that they wish to internationalize as well as for the dollar and US banking system itself but in many ways the damage has already been done.
FATCA, signed into law in 2010, ensures that, if you don’t tell the US government where your assets are and how much is there, your bank will no matter where that bank exists.  FATCA has been acknowledged as the death of the dollar by many experts including our own FATCA expert, Jim Karger, who recently stated such at our recent TDV Wealth Management Crisis Conference in both Panama and Mexico. Many foreign banks simply won’t comply. The cost and risk of complying outweighs the benefit of accepting American clients.
By requiring banks all over the world to become unpaid employees of the IRS and keep tabs on American citizens FATCA is perhaps the most egregious, overarching and draconian “law” put into effect by the US government crime organization to date.
We’ve heard story-after-story of banks all over the globe that are simply not taking on American clients. In many cases, they are telling their current American clients their accounts will soon be closed. The account holder’s crime? Being American.
But there has been some temporary reprieve for those who will be affected by the law.
The recent IRS guidelines regarding FATCA give many of the companies and financial institutions implementing FATCA another 18 months to be in compliance. Of course, as with all government laws it will be selectively enforced. Any banks not appearing to be doing their best to comply will likely find themselves in contention with the IRS. At any rate, what this effectively means is that if Uncle Sam doesn’t like you or wants your money he might come after you. Nothing new here…

A recent Thomson Reuters survey of 500 European and US tax professionals showed 74% believed there to be a lack of clarity in the IRS regulations for FATCA.  This would impede compliance, they predicted.
The notice from the IRS states:

Calendar years 2014 and 2015 will be regarded as a transition period for purposes of IRS enforcement and administration of the due diligence, reporting, and withholding provisions…

With respect to this transition period, the IRS will take into account the extent to which a participating or deemed-compliant FFI, direct reporting NFFE, sponsoring entity, sponsored FFI, sponsored direct reporting NFFE, or withholding agent has made good faith efforts to comply with the requirements of the chapter 4 regulations and the temporary coordination regulations.

For example, the IRS will take into account whether a withholding agent has made reasonable efforts during the transition period to modify its account opening practices and procedures to document the chapter 4 status of payees, apply the standards of knowledge provided in chapter 4, and, in the absence of reliable documentation, apply the presumption rules of §1.1471-3(f).

CAUSING CHAOS WORLDWIDE FOR AMERICANS
FATCA has already affected many Americans with accounts abroad.  They have seen their accounts closed at a moment’s notice, have been unable to open accounts and perhaps even worse hardly anyone even knows how to deal with the FATCA regulations even if they did want to deal with it.
I have just returned from the Cayman Islands where lawyers and accountants are running scared.
They are slowly figuring out what FATCA means to their American clients, many of whom have a large amount of assets in the Cayman Islands that they do not want to repatriate to the US or be reported to the IRS.  And, even if they wanted to adhere to all the rules under FATCA it is nearly impossible to understand and fraught with risk.
The lawyers in the Cayman Islands told me that company incorporation in the Cayman Islands is rock solid in terms of privacy and ease of setup (we will have more on that to subscribers soon) but the problem is banking in the Cayman Island.  They told me that if an American is even involved, in any way, with a company that has a bank account in the Cayman Islands they will report all information on that account to the IRS.
I informed them of a few things.
First, any American with substantial assets should be running, not walking, to get a second passport to protect against all of the capital controls coming out against Americans.  We have heard of some companies that have stopped working with Americans at all just because of the problems it causes them with their bank accounts.
Secondly, there are ways for Americans to have international structures and banking without falling under the FATCA legislation.  We enlightened dozens of people recently at our Crisis Conference on how to do this.  You can find out more by contacting TDV Wealth Management.
CONCLUSION
As you can see, the law will still go into effect…and January 1, 2016 is right around the corner. The IRS fines for FATCA non-compliance could result in fines or jailtime on individuals who fail to report. Already this coming July 1, 2014, foreign financial institutions risk being fined.
The next 18 months are merely a reprieve. Already foreigners are moving away from the dollar. The facade of the US government has fallen and the entire world recognizes that the US and the dollar is about to collapse because it cannot pay off its debts and printing money is the only way the game can continue on much longer. Countless movements are ongoing in Russia, China, the Middle East and more all moving away from the dollar and the US banking system… and this is exacerbated by FATCA.
If you were caught on your heels in the lead up to July 1, 2014, then don’t be in the lead up to the next FATCA deadline. The folks at TDV Wealth Management are ready to help you today with any questions you might have.

Anarcho-Capitalist. Libertarian. Freedom fighter against mankind’s two biggest enemies, the State and the Central Banks. Jeff Berwick is the founder of The Dollar Vigilante, CEO of TDV Media & Services and host of the popular video podcast, Anarchast. Jeff is a prominent speaker at many of the world’s freedom, investment and gold conferences as well as regularly in the media including CNBC, CNN and Fox Business.



FATCA Update: A Semi-Stay of Execution for Americans Assets and the US Dollar
Activist
Wed, 14 May 2014 20:07:00 GMT

Catherine J. Frompovich
Activist Post
Some cartoons or something thought to be ‘comedic’ or contradicts “logic” routinely have been referred to as “Frick and Frack” cartoons. This website shows numerous illustrations of what this writer would call “illogical logic.”
Nothing is more illogical, perhaps, than fracking—the newest craze in energy production that finds fossil fuel providers fracking everywhere, including backyards.

Cows graze on farmland near Wyalusing, Pa., as fracking takes place in the background.
The process extracts natural gas from shale. / AP file photo


Fracking in the backyard / Photo Source

Well water that’s been fracked. / Photo Source
How about drinking water volatility? See this YouTube video for a spectacular example: Kitchen faucet water flaming.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LBjSXWQRV8
To learn more about fracking, maybe readers will want to watch a 36 minute video “Fracking, An Inconvenient Truth.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uokmsSi7LTY .
However, what’s most important to know about fracking is what’s used to frack shale deposits to extract gas deposits. The U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce issued a report on April 18, 2011 titled, “Chemicals Used in Hydraulic Fracking” [1] wherein 750 chemicals were listed. Fourteen commonly are used, and probably are carcinogenic. They included:

• Acrylamide
• Acetaldehyde
• Benzene
• Benzyl Chloride
• Diesel
• Di (2-ethylhexyl) phthalate
• Ethylene Oxide
• Formaldehyde
• Lead [metal/mineral]
• Naphthalene
• Nitrilotriacetic Acid
• Propylene Oxide
• Sulfuric Acid
• Thiourea [genotoxic carcinogen] [5, pg.4]

According to that CEC report,

Some of the components used in the hydraulic fracturing products were common and generally harmless, such as salt and citric acid. Some were unexpected, such as instant coffee and walnut hulls. And some were extremely toxic, such as benzene and lead. Appendix A lists each of the 750 chemicals and other components used in hydraulic fracturing products between 2005 and 2009.

The most widely used chemical in hydraulic fracturing during this time period, as measured by the number of compounds containing the chemical, was methanol. Methanol, which was used in 342 hydraulic fracturing products, is a hazardous air pollutant and is on the list for potential regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Some of the other most widely used chemicals were isopropyl alcohol (used in 274 products), 2-butoxyethanol (used in 126 products), and ethylene glycol (used in 119 products). [1, pg.1] [CJF emphasis added. So why allow methanol in fracking?]

Ironically, that same CEC report went on to state:

Between 2005 and 2009, the oil and gas service companies used hydraulic fracturing products containing 29 chemicals that are (1) known or possible human carcinogens, (2) regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act for their risks to human health, or (3) listed as hazardous air pollutants under the Clean Air Act. These 29 chemicals were components of more than 650 different products used in hydraulic fracturing. [1, pg.1] [CJF emphasis added. Why are there no controls on fracking chemicals?]

Now, here’s the CEC’s candor about fracking and yet no one is doing anything to stop the insanity of what’s going on regarding ‘frack’ the public:

Some of these chemicals, if not disposed of safely or allowed to leach into the drinking water supply, could damage the environment or pose a risk to human health. During hydraulic fracturing, fluids containing chemicals are injected deep underground, where their migration is not entirely predictable. Well failures, such as the use of insufficient well casing, could lead to their release at shallower depths, closer to drinking water supplies.4 Although some fracturing fluids are removed from the well at the end of the fracturing process, a substantial amount remains underground.5 [1, pg.3] [CJF emphasis added]

Congress IS to blame, as you can read from this in that report. Lobbyists’ money talks, I’d say!

While most underground injections of chemicals are subject to the protections of the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA), Congress in 2005 modified the law to exclude “the underground injection of fluids or propping agents (other than diesel fuels) pursuant to hydraulic fracturing operations related to oil, gas, or geothermal production activities” from the Act’s protections.6 Unless oil and gas service companies use diesel in the hydraulic fracturing process, the permanent underground injection of chemicals used for hydraulic fracturing is not regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). [1, pg.3] [CJF emphasis added]

Apparently, irresponsible Congress gave the fossil fuel suppliers and drillers a similar “get out of jail free card” in 2005 – similar to what Congress gave vaccine manufacturers about their toxic vaccines in 1986. This type of congressional action seems to have lobbyists’ fingerprints all over modifications to the laws to excluded underground injection fluids or propping agents. No wonder those fracking drills are popping up all over, just like three hundred or more vaccines are in the new development pipelines, especially when industries have congressionally-approved “get out of jail free cards” handed to them.
When will the gullible U.S. public, plus the monopolized media, get their heads out of the sand?
But dear readers, here’s the real slap-in-the-face to consumers’ health by every health agency and oversight department at federal, state and local levels:

Under OSHA regulations, manufacturers may withhold the identity of chemical components that constitute “trade secrets.”15 [1, pg.5] [CJF emphasis added]

What most U.S. citizens probably do not know is that under the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), the chemical industry in the U.S. can stamp “trade secret” on a new chemical and about two-thirds of the chemicals introduced since then have had that label that allows their contents to remain “unknown and secret.” Furthermore, according to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), “Industry has placed ‘confidential business information’ (CBI) claims on the identity of 13,596 new chemicals produced since 1976…” [2] Furthermore,

“The chemical industry has turned TSCA – a law once thought to protect people and the environment – into its own witness protection program, where it has safely stashed the very existence of thousands of chemicals behind the doors at EPA,” said Richard Wiles, Senior VP for Policy and Communications at EWG. “Mafia informants don’t enjoy the level of protection these secret chemicals receive under the federal toxics law,” added Wiles. [2]

Probably the most insidious and unknown releases from fracking are radioactive emitters such as Radon-222 [3] and Polonium-210[4], which are released from the shale as drilling heads penetrate the strata for thousands of feet disturbing heretofore solid walls of shale.
The other probability that accompanies fracking is inducing man-made earthquakes. The U.S. Geological Survey website “Man-Made Earthquakes Update” can acquaint readers with that possibility.

Seismicity of the coterminous United States and surrounding regions, 2009–2012.
Black dots denote earthquakes with a magnitude ≥ 3.0 are shown; larger dots denote events with a magnitude ≥ 4.0. Background colors indicate earthquake hazard levels from the U.S. National Seismic Hazard Map (NSHM). Learn more about the NSHM here.
And the last, if not most important issue, regarding fracking is this: Since fracking is so prevalent anyone who has a well as their domestic water supply should have it tested by a reputable water testing laboratory for all the regular tests, i.e, bacteria and pesticides, plus radioactive elements and, now, a panel of fracking chemicals. That ought to be done at least once a year, but every 6 months would be safer, in my opinion—similar to going to the dentist to make certain you don’t have any health problems that start with the teeth—so you can assess “how well your well really is.”
Here are some Internet sites that can help readers understand the necessity of proper well water testing. Please know that this writer has no interest in any of them and is not paid to recommend any. I do this because of my concern for the quality of both your water and overall health.
Baseline Testing / The most important thing to do before fracking begins
http://www.dontfractureillinois.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Before-Fracking-Flier.pdf
State of Maine’s Water Tests Available / A listing of numerous water tests and prices for them as an idea of what’s out there to use as a guide
http://www.maine.gov/dhhs/mecdc/public-health-systems/health-and-environmental-testing/guide.htm
New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services Environmental Fact Sheet / Water Quality Testing for Private Wells
http://des.nh.gov/organization/commissioner/pip/factsheets/dwgb/documents/dwgb-2-1.pdf
This site discusses water testing for fluoride and Nitrates-Nitrites.
https://engineering.purdue.edu/SafeWater/drinkinfo/testwater.html
Northeast Laboratory Services / Water Testing Kits
http://nelabservices.com/water-testing-kits/
Here’s to clean water!
Notes:
[1] http://democrats.energycommerce.house.gov/sites/default/files/documents/Hydraulic-Fracturing-Chemicals-2011-4-18.pdf
[2] News Release – Off the Books: Industry’s Secret Chemicals published Jan. 4, 2010 by EWG http://www.ewg.org/node/28385/print
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radon
[4] http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Factsheets/English/polonium210.html
[5] http://www.who.int/ipcs/publications/cicad/en/cicad49.pdf
Catherine J Frompovich (website) is a retired natural nutritionist who earned advanced degrees in Nutrition and Holistic Health Sciences, Certification in Orthomolecular Theory and Practice plus Paralegal Studies. Her work has been published in national and airline magazines since the early 1980s. Catherine authored numerous books on health issues along with co-authoring papers and monographs with physicians, nurses, and holistic healthcare professionals. She has been a consumer healthcare researcher 35 years and counting.
Catherine’s latest book, published October 4, 2013, is Vaccination Voodoo, What YOU Don’t Know About Vaccines, available on Amazon.com.
Her 2012 book A Cancer Answer, Holistic BREAST Cancer Management, A Guide to Effective & Non-Toxic Treatments, is available on Amazon.com and as a Kindle eBook.
Two of Catherine’s more recent books on Amazon.com are Our Chemical Lives And The Hijacking Of Our DNA, A Probe Into What’s Probably Making Us Sick (2009) and Lord, How Can I Make It Through Grieving My Loss, An Inspirational Guide Through the Grieving Process (2008).



Toxic Chemicals Used in Fracking Shale Deposits
Activist
Wed, 14 May 2014 22:54:00 GMT

image source

Joe Wright
Activist Post
While most people might be under the impression that we are far removed from the barbaric practices of the Dark Ages, a new worldwide campaign from Amnesty International exposes that we actually appear to have entered a new period of darkness that is descending upon our innate human rights.
Despite the fact that most Americans disagree with the indefinite detention and torture provisions contained within the National Defense Authorization Act, and citizens worldwide overwhelmingly believe that torture should be prohibited, the global War on Terror in the wake of 9/11 has most certainly unleashed a new wave of depraved torture techniques under the thin guise of terms such as “enhanced interrogation.” But that is only part of the story. Because of the widespread use of CIA rendition “black sites” overseas much of the very worst forms of torture are hidden in countries where it has previously been acceptable or routinely overlooked. Now that even First World Western nations are openly discussing the value of torture for intelligence gathering, and torture continues to be legitimized by the U.S. legal system, the worldwide commitment by governments to eradicate torture is waning. Consequently, the use of torture is exploding.
The Convention Against Torture was adopted by the UN in 1984. Regardless, as Amnesty International’s Secretary General Salil Shetty states: 

Governments around the world are two-faced on torture – prohibiting it in law, but facilitating it in practice…

Torture is not just alive and well – it is flourishing in many parts of the world. As more governments seek to justify torture in the name of national security, the steady progress made in this field over the last thirty years is being eroded.

Amnesty International is seeking to address this erosion of human rights through a new global campaign simply called: Stop Torture. Their video and press release are posted below. For people of good conscience, it is a depressing and revolting subject, but we need to act now to thwart further abuse. We can do this by telling governments around the world that torture is never acceptable under any circumstances, nor are justifications for torture-light going to be tolerated.
People inside the system also need to begin refusing to cooperate with such directives, understanding that history has never been kind to previous regimes and their enforcers who have felt justified opening the floodgates of torture under calls for stronger national security.
Lastly, we can never forget that what is permitted in times of war has a way of trickling down into the everyday lives of the people supposedly being protected from the threat of terrorism. One only has to look at the growth of the police state and the increasingly brutal police tactics and treatment of average citizens to see that this cancer is already spreading.
From Amnesty International:
Since 1984, 155 states have ratified the UN Convention Against Torture, 142 of which are researched by Amnesty International. In 2014, Amnesty International observed at least 79 of these still torturing – more than half the states party to the Convention that the organisation reports on. A further 40 UN states haven’t adopted the Convention, although the global legal ban on torture binds them too.
Over the last five years, Amnesty International has reported on torture and other forms of ill-treatment in at least 141 countries from every region of the world – virtually every country on which it works. The secretive nature of torture means the true number of countries that torture is likely to be higher still.
In some of these countries torture is routine and systematic. In others, Amnesty International has only documented isolated and exceptional cases.  The organization finds even one case of torture or other ill-treatment totally unacceptable.
The Stop Torture campaign launches with a new media briefing, Torture in 2014: 30 Years of Broken Promises, which provides an overview of the use of torture in the world today.
The briefing details a variety of torture techniques – from stress positions and sleep deprivation to electrocution of the genitals – used against criminal suspects, security suspects, dissenting voices, political rivals and others.
As part of the campaign Amnesty International commissioned a Globescan survey to gauge worldwide attitudes to torture. Alarmingly, the survey found nearly half (44%) of respondents – from 21 countries across every continent – fear they would be at risk of torture if taken into custody in their country.
The vast majority (82%) believe there should be clear laws against torture. However, more than a third (36%) still thought torture could be justified in certain circumstances.
“The results from this new global survey are startling, with nearly half of the people we surveyed feeling fearful and personally vulnerable to torture. The vast majority of people believe that there should be clear rules against torture, although more than a third still think that torture could be justified in certain circumstances. Overall, we can see broad global support amongst the public for action to prevent torture,” said Caroline Holme, Director at GlobeScan.
Measures such as the criminalisation of torture in national legislation, opening detention centres to independent monitors, and video recording interrogations have all led to a decrease in the use of torture in those countries taking their commitments under the Convention Against Torture seriously.
Amnesty International is calling on governments to implement protective mechanisms to prevent and punish torture – such as proper medical examinations, prompt access to lawyers, independent checks on places of detention, independent and effective investigations of torture allegations, the prosecution of suspects and proper redress for victims.
The organization’s global work against torture continues, but will focus in particular on five countries where torture
is rife and Amnesty International believes it can achieve significant impact. Substantive reports with specific recommendations for each will form the spine of the campaign.

• In Mexico the government argues that torture is the exception rather than the norm, but in reality abuse by police and security forces is widespread and goes unpunished. Miriam López Vargas, a 31 year-old mother of four, was abducted from her hometown of Ensenada by two soldiers in plainclothes, and taken to a military barracks. She was held there for a week, raped three times, asphyxiated and electrocuted to force her to confess that she was involved in drug-related offences. Three years have passed, but none of her torturers have been brought to justice.

• Justice is out of reach for most torture survivors in the Philippines. A secret detention facility was recently discovered where police officers abused detainees ‘for fun’.  Police officers reportedly spun a ‘wheel of torture’ to decide how to torture prisoners.  Media coverage led to an internal investigation and some officers being dismissed, but Amnesty International is calling for a thorough and impartial investigation which will lead to the prosecution in court of the officers involved.  Most acts of police torture remain unreported and torture survivors continue to suffer in silence.

• In Morocco and Western Sahara, authorities rarely investigate reports of torture. Spanish authorities extradited Ali Aarrass to Morocco despite fears he would be tortured. He was picked up by intelligence officers and taken to a secret detention centre, where he says they electrocuted his testicles, beat the soles of his feet and hanged him by his wrists for hours on end. He says the officers forced him to confess to assisting a terrorist group. Ali Aarass was convicted and sentenced to 12 years behind bars on the basis of that “confession”. His allegation of torture has never been investigated.

• In Nigeria, police and military personnel use torture as a matter of routine. When Moses Akatugba was arrested by soldiers he was 16 years old. He said they beat him and shot him in the hand. According to Moses he was then transfered to the police, who hanged him by his limbs for hours at a police station. Moses says he was tortured into signing a “confession” that he was involved in a robbery. The allegation that he confessed as a result of torture was never fully investigated. In November 2013, after eight years waiting for a verdict, Moses was sentenced to death.

• In Uzbekistan, torture is pervasive but few torturers are ever brought to justice. The country is closed to Amnesty International. Dilorom Abdukadirova spent five years in exile after security forces opened fire on a protest she was attending. On returning to Uzbekistan, she was detained, barred from seeing her family, and charged with attempting to overthrow the government.   During her trial, she looked emaciated with bruising on her face. Her family are convinced she had been tortured.

“Thirty years ago Amnesty led the campaign for a worldwide commitment to combat torture resulting in the UN’s Convention Against Torture. Much progress has been made since, but it is disheartening that today we still need a worldwide campaign to ensure that those promises are fulfilled,” said Salil Shetty.
Please visit http://www.amnesty.org/en/stoptorture to learn more.
Twitter: #StopTorture
Recently from Joe Wright:

• Outraged Albuquerque Citizens Demand Arrest of Police Chief
• Campus Activists Shut Down Condoleezza Rice Speech At Rutgers
• No-Fly List Under Fire as Evidence Shows it was Used to Recruit Snitches

New Worldwide Campaign to Stop Torture
Activist
Wed, 14 May 2014 22:54:00 GMT

Editor’s note: Mark Leibovit is one of the investment world’s top-rated gold timers, and helps investors anticipate and benefit from both the ups and the downs of the precious metals markets with his Leibovit VR Gold Letter (available to WND readers at a huge discount).
*****
From Bloomberg News:
Einhorn finds dinner chat with Bernanke ‘frightening’
David Einhorn, manager of the $10 billion Greenlight Capital Inc., said he found a recent dinner conversation with former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke scary.
“I got to ask him all these questions that had been on my mind for a long time,” Einhorn said in an interview today with Erik Schatzker and Stephanie Ruhle on Bloomberg Television, referring to a March 26 dinner with Bernanke. “It was sort of frightening because the answers were not better than I thought they would be.”
Einhorn, 45, has been critical of Bernanke’s willingness to leave interest rates near zero for more than five years. The hedge-fund manager has said the benefits of low rates diminish over time until they are more harmful than helpful and that the Fed’s stimulus has led to income inequality. Bernanke, a former Princeton University economics professor, stepped down this year after eight years helming the U.S. central bank. …
*****
From King World News:
‘This is what’s going to happen when all hell breaks loose’
Forty-two-year market veteran John Hathaway, co-portfolio manager of the Tocqueville Gold Fund, spoke with King World News about what to expect when “all hell breaks loose.” Hathaway is one of the most respected institutional minds in the world today when it comes to gold, and also discussed the bullion banks’ secretive involvement in the gold market, including such banks as JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.
Hathaway: “It’s scary that Bernanke can be so complacent and say to David Einhorn (hedge fund manager and president of Greenlight Capital) that there is no risk of hyperinflation. There has to be some risk. The Fed is arrogant, it’s complacent, and there is erroneous thinking. You pretty much name the accusation and the Fed is guilty as charged.
“But I am also watching the U.S. Dollar Index. Normally when you have geopolitical tensions, there is a kind of Pavlovian, kneejerk rush into the dollar. Up to now we have seen quite the opposite. The continued weakness in the dollar is saying to me that America’s protective cover for geopolitical risks is certainly not what it used to be.”
King World News: “When you see the dollar hitting 19-month lows, and very close to hitting two-year lows in this environment, investors are beginning to say, ‘Something is wrong here.’”
Hathaway: “This is definitely not what we would expect to see based on the history of how the dollar has traded. But the dollar is now in an area where it has mounted countertrend rallies. The reality is that the foreign exchange market is pretty tough to control. I’m sure central planners are in there trying to manipulate currency rates. So the dollar is the canary in the coal mine. It’s something for everybody to watch because it is certainly anomalous that the dollar would be so weak at a time when investors are circling the wagons.
“The carry trade, to me, is something that is never talked about. But if you think about it, when you have borrowed gold, which these guys have done, and used it as a funding mechanism for lots of different things, the reckless borrowing and leveraging of gold has now become an incredibly crowded trade.
“This is especially true when the price of gold is weak because you have low funding costs in terms of lease rates, and then on top of that you’ve got your basis risk going your way because you are short that currency. In a rising market that is not a factor, but it was certainly a factor back in the late 1990s when we saw the whole syndrome of central bank selling, gold companies hedging, and a 20-year bear market. So it was a free-for-all in terms of abusing the gold market with that type of trade and leverage.”
*****
From Mining.com:
Embry: Hold onto gold as ‘currency event’ likely
John Embry, chief investment strategist at Sprott Asset Management LP, said last month that the rally at the beginning of the year was encouraging, but to remember that sentiment for gold is still extremely negative. He says the stock market’s new highs are a result of the Fed “jamming cash into the economy.” With nowhere else to go, cash is creating bubbles in stocks, real estate and bonds, he warns.
Q: “Gold has fallen back down over the last month. Do you think optimism for a fast recovery in gold has fizzled out?”
Embry: “I believe that is probably a fair assessment of what has happened since. I think that the decline in the last month has hurt confidence in the West. But I can assure you that the Eastern interests are rubbing their hands and piling into all the physical gold they can get. Once they realize that there is a limited amount remaining for them to pour their U.S. dollars into, I believe the price will move up sharply.”
*****
From MoneyandMarkets.com:
Putin, gold and silver: What you need to know right now
According to Larry Edelson with Weiss Research:
It’s a fait accompli. War and bankrupt economies go hand in hand. When desperate, like the governments of the United States and Europe are now, strange things start to happen.
You only need look at the historical record. The collapse of Rome was accompanied by many different civil rebellions and international conflicts. Ditto for the Ottoman Empire. The British Empire, when it fell on desperate times. For Spain. For Germany.
For every major economic power throughout history, when governments became bankrupt and desperate for cash, they imploded by attacking others and their very own citizens, through sleight-of-hand tax increases, through confiscatory policies that first racked everyone’s money, then confiscated it, through loss of civil liberties, through propaganda and more, lots more.
Weakened, they lash out. They prepare to rally the people, they look for distractions, reasons to spend even more money, all with the aim of consolidating the national psyche. This is what the United States is doing now. Russia is doing the same thing. Putin is rallying the national psyche. The Russian economy, weakened internally by corruption, by alcoholism, by declining revenues from the three-year bear market in commodities, is not in much better shape than Europe or the United States. So the battlefield is now prepped. Russia versus the West. Russia versus Europe and the United States.
*****
From Got Gold Report:
Gold trade nearly net long Comex gold futures
The “Got Gold Report’s” Gene Arensberg says that what he calls “the gold trade,” the biggest operators in the gold business, have cut their usual short positions to almost nothing, indicating that they see little downside risk to the gold price. Arensberg’s commentary is headlined “Gold Trade Nearly Net Long Comex Gold Futures.”
*****
From the American Enterprise Institute:
Coins that go clunk: 50th anniversary of the disappearance of silver money
The year 2014 is a little noticed 50th anniversary: the anniversary of the disappearance of U.S. silver coins from circulation in 1964. In that year, the American people decided that silver was probably going to be a better store of value than paper dollars, regardless of the pronouncements of the central bankers and politicians of the time. The people were right. At silver’s year-end 1960 price of 91 cents an ounce, the 0.77 ounces of silver in a silver dollar had been worth about 70 cents. But by late 1963, it was worth a dollar. Today, with silver at approximately $20 an ounce, the silver in a silver dollar is worth more than $15. (Silver has been as high as $49 an ounce.)
Up to the 1960s, American dimes and quarters (as well as half-dollars and silver dollars in those days) rang when you dropped them on a table. Now they go clunk. This change from coins made of silver, it might be said, is of little practical importance. Yet it symbolizes a profound shift in the behavior of the U.S. government with respect to money, a precursor to the immensely destructive Great Inflation of the 1970s.
Long before the 1960s, all the gold coins and bullion of American citizens had been confiscated by their government under its diktat of 1933. At the same time, the same government defaulted on the bonds it had promised to pay in gold. It took the extreme, indeed despotic, step of making any possession of gold coins or bullion by American citizens illegal and a punishable, criminal offense! It became harder for Americans to protect themselves against money printing. This law, which today is hard to believe, was real, and lasted four decades, until 1974.
*****
From King World News:
What’s really happening in Ukraine and the war on gold
An outspoken hedge fund manager out of Hong Kong spoke with King World News about what is really happening in Ukraine and the ongoing war in the gold market. William Kaye, who 25 years ago worked for Goldman Sachs in mergers and acquisitions, also discussed the relentless propaganda coming out of the Western mainstream media outlets:
“To make gold an asset of serious interest again to a range of investors, we have to get through the next big number which is $1,400. That’s pretty important. We talked about this a while back and I was skeptical at the time that we would get through $1,400 in the short term and we didn’t. The defense of that number was extreme.
“When gold was approaching $1,400 we weren’t seeing the type of tightness in the market that you would want to see in order to break that key level. And then, after a reversal in which gold went below $1,280, we started to see real tightness in the gold market once again.
“So we started to see backwardation in gold, and we also saw GOFO [Gold Forward Offered] rates which were negative. In that situation, people are holding on to their gold and not lending it into the system. Every time they have taken the gold price to $1,280 or below we see the reemergence of those symptoms of tightness.
“If we see increased geopolitical tensions and the reemergence of India fully coming back into the gold market, these are the types of things that can act as a catalyst to move gold through key resistance levels. There have been clear signs of renewed Indian buying, which is interesting because you wouldn’t think that prior to a new government being installed, which is expected to be more gold-friendly, that you would see mass buying.
“I believe the renewed buying is from dealers who anticipate more gold demand and want to be in a position to fill it when a lot of these controls get relaxed and the tariffs come down. So that could be one of the driving forces for the gold market. And if we see that increased Indian demand along with robust Chinese demand and strong demand from Russia and Eastern Europe, then the cartel could be put on their back foot. We are not there yet but over the long term I anticipate far higher gold and silver prices than we see currently.”
*****
Special offer: WND readers can get a huge discount on the insider investor newsletter produced by top-rated gold market timer Mark Leibovit, the Leibovit VR Gold Letter.

That ‘frightening’ chat with Ben Bernanke
Mark Leibovit
Thu, 15 May 2014 01:14:31 GMT

• Politics
• US

By: Samuel Eaton May 14, 2014

Wentzville, MO – An ObamaCare processor operated by Serco with a 1.2 billion dollar contract is paying its employees in a Wentzville, Missouri process center to do nothing, according to a Serco employee and whistleblower.
The whistleblower claims that despite not having enough work for their current employees Serco is still hiring. “They want to hire more people even though we still don’t have work to keep the people we have busy.” He claims that hundreds of employees sit staring into computer screens with little or nothing to do.

“There are weeks that a data entry person would not process an application.”

The whistleblower goes on to say:

“They’re told to sit at their computers and hit the refresh button every ten minutes.”

The goals set for the processors are to handle two applications a month and sometimes they are unable to even do that. The whistleblower claims that throughout several states Serco has 1,800 employees vying for 1 to 30 applications that appear in the database.
Why would Serco have so many employees working on a handful of applications? According to the whistleblower, Serco gets paid based on the number of workers they have employed, which means they want employees to show up even if there is nothing to do.
Serco refused to respond to the whistleblower’s comments.
Read more: http://benswann.com/obamacare-processors-getting-paid-to-do-nothing/#ixzz31kK5mxrX
Follow us: @BenSwann_ on Twitter

Breaking: Charleston South Carolina Becomes 9th Republican Party to Censure Lindsey Graham

• Politics
• US

By: Joshua Cook May 13, 2014

The Charleston County Republican Party voted to censure Sen. Lindsey Graham by the vote of 39- 32 tonight. This makes the 9th local Republican Party to censured Graham this election season.
The Charleston County Party is located in the “low country” which is considered a Graham stronghold.
The fact that Graham was censured by executive committeemen who represents voters in their precincts shows how weak and vulnerable Graham really is.
A poll recently conducted by Wenzel Strategies, the same firm that Sen. Rand Paul used for his victory, shows state senator Lee Bright as the most likely challenger to face Graham in a runoff if Graham stays below the 50 percent threshold.
Lee Bright won the Charleston County Republican Party straw poll last week and has strong grassroots support there.
Benswann.com’s Joshua Cook exclusively reported the first reading of the censure resolution, an approximate 29-point resolution that exposes Graham’s progressive voting record of big government expansion and disregard of civil liberties.
The “Censure Graham movement” has caught fire throughout the state. The only question is: who will be the 10th county Party to censure Sen. Lindsey Graham?
Read Other Stories

• Lexington County GOP Becomes the 8th to Censure Sen. Lindsey Graham
• Graham Support Crumbles: Pickens County is the 7th Republican Party to Censure Lindsey Graham (Interviews)
• Breaking: The Republican Liberty Caucus endorses U.S. Senate candidate Lee Bright against Lindsey Graham
• SOUTH CAROLINA COUNTY GOP CENSURES SENATOR LINDSEY GRAHAM
• Lindsey Graham to be Primaried by Female, Tea Party Favorite: Nancy Mace

Read more: http://benswann.com/breaking-charleston-south-carolina-becomes-9th-republican-party-to-censure-lindsey-graham/#ixzz31Zco5VEQ
Follow us: @BenSwann_ on Twitter

» Banks And Police Conspire To Track Your Movements Alex Jones’ Infowars: There’s a war on for your mind!.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tRR44HwjTs]

LPR (License Plate Reading) Systems are growing in police departments across the country at an alarming rate, but did you know banks are tracking ATM customers and storing that data for police use? This has serious Big Brother implications. Infowars Reporter Staff Sgt Joe Biggs breaks it all down.

This article was posted: Monday, May 12, 2014 at 5:18 pm

https://shine.yahoo.com/ellen-good-news/mom-pays-off-every-student-s-balance-following-son-s-denial-of-school-lunch–184851942.html

http://www.thedailysheeple.com/benghazi-commission-the-end-of-hillary-clintons-political-career_052014

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5i4tuuy1jsw&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Cruz Releases Definitive List of 76 ‘Lawless’ Obama Actions | The Daily Caller.

Ted Cruz Releases Definitive List of 76 ‘Lawless’ Obama Actions

2:04 PM 05/07/2014

Patrick Howley

Political Reporter

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz released a definitive list Wednesday of 76 “lawless” Obama administration actions and abuses of power.

Cruz’s “The Legal Limit Report No. 4,” obtained by The Daily Caller, delves into little-known and little-reported details of President Obama’s executive actions. Cruz was set to discuss his report at the Federalist Society in the Promenade Ballroom of the Mayflower Hotel in Washington at 2:15 PM Wednesday.

“Of all the troubling aspects of the Obama presidency, none is more dangerous than the President’s persistent pattern of lawlessness, his willingness to disregard the written law and instead enforce his own policies via executive fiat,” Cruz stated in the report’s introductory remarks.

“President Obama has openly defied [rule of law] by repeatedly suspending, delaying, and waiving portions of the laws that he is charged to enforce. When President Obama disagreed with federal immigration laws, he instructed the Justice Department to cease enforcing the laws. He did the same thing with federal welfare law, drug laws, and the federal Defense of Marriage Act,” Cruz wrote. “In the more than two centuries of our nation’s history, there is simply no precedent for the White House wantonly ignoring federal law and asking others to do the same.”

Cruz details 76 specific actions over eight chapters. We’ve listed eight of them, as chronicled by Cruz, below:

1. “Obama implemented portions of the DREAM Act by executive action”

2. “Ended some terror asylum restrictions”

3. “Recognized same sex marriage in Utah despite a Supreme Court stay on a court order allowing the institution”

4. “Illegally revealed the existence of sealed indictments in the Benghazi investigation”

5. “Illegally delayed Obamacare verification of eligibility for healthcare subsidies”

6. “Ordered Boeing to fire 1,000 employees in South Carolina and shut down a new factory because it was non-union”

7. “Terminated the pensions of 20,000 non-union Delphi employees in the GM bankruptcy.”

8. “Government agencies are engaging in ‘Operation Choke Point,’ where the government asks banks to ‘choke off’ access to financial services for customers engaging in conduct the Administration does not like—such as ‘ammunition sales.’”

See the full report:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/222704929/Ted-Cruz-Legal-Limit-Report-4

Follow Patrick on Twitter

Tags: Barack Obama, Ted CruzRead more: http://dailycaller.com/2014/05/07/ted-cruz-releases-definitive-list-of-76-lawless-obama-actions/#ixzz31QpBkoty

Ted Cruz: Legal Limit Report 4

Check out @AmyMek’s Tweet: https://twitter.com/AmyMek/status/465146894541672449

http://www.governamerica.com/news/2506-biotech-industry-slips-pro-gmo-propaganda-into-children-s-school-textbooks

http://rt.com/news/158136-renewable-energy-protest-berlin/#.U28JknoEXtw.twitter

http://www.ijreview.com/2014/05/136219-top-trey-gowdy-quotes/

‘Impeach Obama’ campaign moves mainstream.
 

‘IMPEACH OBAMA’ CAMPAIGN MOVES MAINSTREAM

‘Now we have the Benghazi select committee’

Published: 2 hours ago

 BOB UNRUH About | Email | Archive

Talk of impeaching Barack Obama has been broached by members of Congress, media, community activists, truckers and others from both left and right over the past several years.

And now Washington Post commentator Paul Waldman says it’s going mainstream.
“Now we have the Benghazi select committee, and a select committee is what you form when there may be crimes and misdemeanors to uncover,” he points out.
“It has no other business to distract it, and it will be led by Trey Gowdy, a former prosecutor who excels at channeling conservatives’ outrage,” Waldman wrote. “To be clear, this doesn’t mean that [House Speaker John] Boehner or the party establishment he represents want impeachment, not by any means. They realize what a political disaster it was when they did it in 1998, and they understand that the effects would likely be similar if it happened again.”
But Waldman writes that “there are multiple Republican members of Congress who have at least toyed with the idea, and the committee’s hearings could build pressure in the Republican base for it.”
Among the people who have raised the prospect are Watergate reporter Bob Woodard, actor Steven Seagal, Ambassador Alan Keyes, Code Pink Co-founder Medea Benjamin and Oliver North, the former Marine Corps lieutenant colonel first known for his testimony as a National Security Council staff member under President Reagan.
“Tragically, this administration has gotten away with things that any other president would have been impeached for,” North said. “There’s no doubt in my mind.”
Waldman noted that National Review writer Andrew McCarthy is coming out with a book titled “Faithless Execution: Building the Political Case for Obama’s Impeachment.”
The select committee hearings, said Waldman, will “provide an institutional pathway and the requisite media attention necessary to air all sorts of dramatic allegations about the administration (supported by evidence or not).”
Read the definitive case for removing Barack Obama from office in “Impeachable Offenses” by Aaron Klein and Brenda J. Elliott.
Non-stop coverage would follow, and talk radio hosts would stir up the Republican base, he said.
“All that would make many in the House conclude that coming out in favor of impeachment is the safest political play to make. And isn’t it the logical extension of everything they’ve been saying for the last five years about this socialist anti-American liberty-destroying president?” Waldman wrote.
“In all seriousness, an impeachment drive would be, in many ways, another iteration of the central conflict of this period of our political history, the one between a tea party pushing the GOP to ever more radical tactics and a party establishment warning of political catastrophe if they go too far.”
Among those raising the issue has been Seagal, whose dozens of films feature action and violence but also have an underlying theme of seeking justice. He said Obama would be impeached if the truth about the Benghazi attack was revealed.
His charge came Feb. 22 in an appearance at the Western Conservative Conference in Phoenix
“Never in my life did I ever believe that our country would be taken over by people like the people who are running it this day,” said Seagal.
“I think that when we have a leadership that thinks the Constitution of the United States of America is a joke, when we have a president who has almost 1,000 executive orders now, when we have a Department of Justice that thinks that any kind of a judicial system that they make up as they are going along can get by with whatever they decide that they want to do – like Ted Nugent said the Fast and the Furious, what’s happening with the Fast and the Furious? What’s happened with the truth about any of the greatest scandals of American history that have happened right before our eyes?” Seagal said.
“If the truth about Benghazi were to come out now, I don’t think that this man would make it through his term. I think he would be impeached,” he said.
Seagal has company in his worries.
Sign the petition urging Congress to pursue impeachment right away!
One group is calling on Americans to converge on Washington on May 16 to protest Obama’s presence. They plan to stay until he and other Washington officials are gone.
The event, organized by U.S. retired Col. Harry Riley, is called Operation American Spring.
Riley said the goal is to remove “corrupt” leaders who violate the Constitution and Bill of Rights, including Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, House Speaker John Boehner, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Attorney General Eric Holder.
“The out-of-control government leadership must be stopped,” Riley wrote on his Patriots for America website, where he launched the campaign for the rally.
Riley’s plans seems to align mostly with what another retired military leader, Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely, has advocated.
As WND reported, Vallely said it’s time for millions of Americans to “stand up” to a federal government that is “conducting treason … violating the Constitution, violating our laws.”
He’s calling for marches, a legislative vote of “no confidence” in President Obama and congressional leaders, even citizen arrests, drawing inspiration from the 33 million Egyptians who stood up to their government and removed Muslim Brotherhood officials from office.
Riley explains his inspiration comes at least partly from Georgetown professor Jonathan Turley’s congressional testimony.
The liberal professor has represented members of Congress in a lawsuit over the Libyan war, represented workers at the secret Area 51 military base and served as counsel on national security cases. He now says Obama is a danger to the U.S. Constitution.
Read the definitive case for removing Barack Obama from office in “Impeachable Offenses” by Aaron Klein and Brenda J. Elliott.
He was addressing a House Judiciary Committee hearing Dec. 4. Chairman Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., asked him: “Professor Turley, the Constitution, the system of separated powers is not simply about stopping one branch of government from usurping another. It’s about protecting the liberty of Americans from the dangers of concentrated government power. How does the president’s unilateral modification of act[s] of Congress affect both the balance of power between the political branches and the liberty interests of the American people?”
Turley replied: “Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The danger is quite severe. The problem with what the president is doing is that he’s not simply posing a danger to the constitutional system. He’s becoming the very danger the Constitution was designed to avoid. That is the concentration of power.”
Congress already is addressing charges that Obama is violating the Constitution.
WND reported when Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., said Obama’s actions have reached “an unprecedented level, and we’ve got to do something about it.”

“Assume that a statute said you had to provide two forms of ID to vote. Can the president require three forms? Can the president require one form? Can you suspend all requirements? If not, why not?” he said. “If you can turn off certain categories of law, do you not also have the power to turn off all categories of law?”
Gowdy cited Obama’s decisions to ignore certain immigration laws, even though Congress did not approve the changes. He also cited arbitrary changes to the Obamacare law and Obama’s “recess appointments” of judges even though the U.S. Senate was not in recess.
His proposal is for Congress to take the White House to court over the president’s actions, through a resolution proposed by Rep. Tom Rice, R-Ga., that would authorize the House to sue the Obama administration. It has 30 co-sponsors.
Rice said that because of “this disregard of our country’s checks and balances, many of you have asked me to bring legal action against the president.”
“After carefully researching the standing the House of Representatives has and what action we can take, I have introduced a resolution to stop the president’s clear overreach,” he said.
A Fox News interviewer asked Gowdy if Obama could refuse to enforce election laws.
“Why not?” asked Gowdy, “If you can turn off immigration laws, if you can turn off the mandatory minimum in our drug statutes, if you can turn off the so-called Affordable Care Act – why not election laws?”
WND reported that it was at the same hearing that Michael Cannon, director of Health Policy Studies for the Cato Institute, said there is “one last thing to which the people can resort if the government does not respect the restraints that the Constitution places of the government.”
“Abraham Lincoln talked about our right to alter our government or our revolutionary right to overthrow it,” he said.
“That is certainly something that no one wants to contemplate. If the people come to believe that the government is no longer constrained by the laws, then they will conclude that neither are they.”
Cannon said it is “very dangerous” for the president to “wantonly ignore the laws, to try to impose obligations upon people that the legislature did not approve.”
Several members of Congress also contributed their opinions in an interview with talk-show host Sean Hannity.
See the Hannity segment:

Talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh says Obama won’t be impeached. But Limbaugh also is making the case that the Constitution is in crisis, an emergency for which the founders probably created the impeachment process.
“You can’t impeach the first black president,” he said on his radio show recently. “No matter how corrupt or lawless.”
But he said the danger is very high, citing Boehner’s recent comments that the House wouldn’t adopt amnesty legislation this year because the president probably wouldn’t follow it.
“This is the president of the United States effectively nullifying the legislative branch of government,” an outraged Limbaugh said. “He’s basically saying … and he has in practically these words, said this, ‘I got a pen and I got a phone and if they don’t do what I want I’m going to it anyway.’
“That’s not a ho-hummer to me. That is major. If the chartered body in our government that makes the law decides not to because they don’t think it’ll matter, because the executive branch will just ignore it, I mean that’s a breach of serious proportion,” he said.
“That is a constitutional challenge and crisis that is very real that nobody apparently has the courage to do anything about because of the president’s race,” he said.
Ambassador Alan Keyes, however, wrote in a WND column that Limbaugh isn’t right about impeachment.
“When Rush Limbaugh says that ‘efforts to try to have Obama impeached or held personally responsible for these scandals is a bunch of wasted effort,’ he is saying that, on account of the politics of our times, this fundamental aspect of the U.S. Constitution no longer matters. With all due respect to Rush Limbaugh (and my respect for him is sizable and sincere), I beg to differ. The judgment about ‘wasted effort’ depends on what we’re trying to achieve. If politics is just a partisan game, with no goal but to score points for one side or the other, it may be reasonable to conclude that impeachment is a wasted effort. After all, the Democrats who control the U.S. Senate will never allow Obama to be removed from office. Doesn’t this make impeachment impossible? ”
He continued: “Mr. Limbaugh is right to assume that impeachment is inherently political. In this respect his view accords with that of Alexander Hamilton, who wrote (in Federalist No. 65) that ‘… the subjects of its jurisdiction are those offenses which proceed … from the abuse or violation of some public trust. They are of a nature which may with peculiar propriety be denominated POLITICAL, as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself.’”
But Keyes said: “The difference between Limbaugh and Hamilton, however, is that when Mr. Limbaugh speaks of politics he is referring to the competition of partisan factions. But for Hamilton politics means the business of citizens, i.e., individuals characterized by their concern for the common good of their society as a whole, not just their own personal, factional, partisan interests. From Hamilton’s perspective, the way elected representatives handle such offenses is therefore a test of their concern for the common good. If they act, or refuse to act, based solely on whether by doing so they advance their personal or factional agenda, they show their contempt for the well-being of the nation as a whole. They thereby prove themselves unfit for the offices (duties) they hold, whether or not they are ever called to account for their dereliction.”
Get “Taking America Back,” Joseph Farah’s manifesto for sovereignty, self-reliance and moral renewal
Polls have revealed American support for impeachment is growing, and rock legend and gun-rights defender Ted Nugent said there’s “no question” Obama should be impeached.
Referring to Obama, Nugent says: “There’s no question that this guy’s violations qualify for impeachment. There’s no question.”
He blasted “the criminality of this government, the unprecedented abuse of power, corruption, fraud and deceit by the Chicago gangster-scammer-ACORN-in-chief.”
“It’s so diabolical,” he said.
Nugent made his comments in an interview with radio host Alex Jones.

Even Code Pink co-founder Medea Benjamin called for the impeachment of Obama over his policy of permitting drone strikes on American citizens overseas who are members of terrorist organizations.
On WABC Radio’s “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio,” Benjamin affirmed she believes the drone warfare is an impeachable offense.
Among members of Congress, the idea has been getting more attention.

A recent comment was from Rep. Paul Broun, a Georgia Republican who is seeking to replace the retiring Sen. Saxby Chambliss.
A video from a forum featuring candidates for Chambliss’ seat shows Broun and two others, Derrick Grayson, an engineer, and Eugene Yu, a businessman, raising their hands when asked whether they would support impeachment.
A forum moderator asked the candidates: “Obama has perjured himself on multiple occasions. Would you support impeachment if presented for a vote?”
Broun, Grayson and Yu raised their hands.
Others who have commented on impeachment:
Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa; Rep. Blake Farenthold, R-Texas; Rep. Steve Stockman, R-Texas; Rep. Bill Flores, R-Texas; Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif.; Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla.; Rep. Kerry Bentivolio, R-Mich.; Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas; Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla.; Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah; Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C.; Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn.; Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas; Rep. Trey Radel, R-Fla.; and Rep. Ted Yoho, R-Fla.
Stockman even handed out in Congress copies of a book that has been described by its authors as the “articles of impeachment” for Barack Obama. Stockman suggested that special investigations and possibly prosecutions are needed in response to Fast and Furious, Benghazi and other Obama scandals.
Rep. Bill Flores, R-Texas, was speaking at a town hall meeting when he considered the idea. A video of his comments was posted at the Western Center for Journalism.
“I’ve looked at the president. I think he’s violated the Constitution. I think he’s violated the Bill of Rights,” he said.

He said at some point a decision must be made.
“I think if the House had an impeachment vote, it would probably impeach the president.”
But he noted there are only 46 members of the GOP in the U.S. Senate, where an impeached president would be put on trial.
To obtain a conviction, the prosecuting team must have 67 votes, and he wasn’t sure even all of the GOP members would vote to convict.

WND previously reported Coburn’s statement that Obama is “perilously close” to qualifying for impeachment.
Speaking at the Muskogee Civic Center in Oklahoma, the senator said, “What you have to do is you have to establish the criteria that would qualify for proceedings against the president, and that’s called impeachment.”
Coburn said it’s “not something you take lightly, and you have to use a historical precedent of what that means.”
Visit WND’s online Impeachment Store to see all the products related to ousting Obama.

Earlier, Bentivolio said it would be a “dream come true” to impeach Obama.
Bentivolio told the Birmingham Bloomfield Republican Club Meeting, “You know, if I could write that bill and submit it, it would be a dream come true.”
He told constituents: “I feel your pain and I know. I stood 12 feet away from that guy and listened to him, and I couldn’t stand being there. But because he is president I have to respect the office. That’s my job as a congressman. I respect the office.”
Bentivolio said his experience with the president caused him to consult with attorneys about what it would take to remove Obama from office.
Cruz responded to a question about impeachment after a speech.
“It’s a good question,” Cruz said. “And I’ll tell you the simplest answer: To successfully impeach a president you need the votes in the U.S. Senate.”

In May, Inhofe suggested Obama could be impeached over a White House cover-up after the attack in Benghazi, Libya, on Sept. 11, 2012.
He told listeners of “The Rusty Humphries Show”: “Of all the great cover-ups in history – the Pentagon papers, Iran-Contra, Watergate, all the rest of them – this … is going to go down as the most egregious cover-up in American history.”
But even with that searing indictment, Inhofe stopped short of calling for impeachment.
Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, has offered tentative support for impeachment.
“I’m not willing to take it off the table, but that’s certainly not what we’re striving for,” he told CNN.
One Republican actually has come out and called for the impeachment of Obama, and he did it more than two years ago, before he became a congressman.
Rep. Ted Yoho, R-Fla., posted on his website in June 2011 a list of reasons for impeachment.
Other figures who have discussed impeachment include Glenn Beck, Watergate investigative reporter Bob Woodward, WND columnist Nat Hentoff and a panel of top constitutional experts.
And Fox News host Judge Jeanine Pirro launched a scathing, on-air indictment of Obama, calling for his impeachment.
On Saturday night’s broadcast of “Justice with Judge Jeanine,” Pirro uncorked a blistering verbal assault on Obama in connection with his handling of the fatal onslaught of the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, on Sept. 11, 2012, and the subsequent cover-up.
“Mr. President, it’s called an abrogation of duty,” Pirro said. “You have not taken your oath to honestly and faithfully execute the duties of your office. As commander in chief, you have NOT protected us. This dereliction of duty as commander in chief demands your impeachment.”
Watch a 90-second clip of Judge Jeanine Pirro calling for Obama’s impeachment:

Woodward said: “If you read through all these emails, you see that everyone in the government is saying, ‘Oh, let’s not tell the public that terrorists were involved, people connected to al Qaida. Let’s not tell the public that there were warnings.’ And I have to go back 40 years to Watergate when Nixon put out his edited transcripts to the conversations, and he personally went through them and said, ‘Oh, let’s not tell this, let’s not show this.’ I would not dismiss Benghazi. It’s a very serious issue.”
Additionally, radio host Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor and one-time presidential candidate, predicted Obama won’t serve out his second term because of his complicity in a cover-up over Benghazi.
See Dennis Kucinich advocate for impeachment over Libya:
 

 
Sign the petition right away!

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/05/impeach-obama-campaign-moves-mainstream/#fTzGScCIOJ9RqvPj.99

Tony Cartalucci
New Eastern Outlook
After the brutal massacre of over 40 anti-regime protesters in the southern port city of Odessa – most of whom were burned to death after being trapped within the city’s Trade Unions House – the Western narrative of “Russian aggression” driving the current unrest in Ukraine is ringing particularly hollow.
Unable to spin the massacre carried out by the very ultra-right Neo-Nazi mobs that propelled the current unelected regime into power, both the West’s media machine and its politicians have attempted to remain as ambiguous as possible regarding the recent brutality resulting from what Kiev calls “anti-terror” operations.
The US condemned the violence in Odessa, but failed to identify the provocateurs or assign blame and instead called for an “investigation” into the deaths – the diplomatic equivalent of shrugging one’s shoulders. This response comes in sharp contrast to the West’s politically motivated responses to alleged government-sanctioned violence elsewhere in the world, most notably in Libya in 2011, and currently in Syria.
Additionally, as evidence emerges regarding the details of the Odessa massacre, only Russian news sources are covering it, while the West neither confirms nor denies reports, but rather misinforms its audiences through lies of omission. A particularly damning RT report titled, “Radicals shooting at people in Odessa’s burning building caught on tape,” stated:

New video has emerged online which shows a man shooting at the windows of Odessa’s burning House of Trade Unions. At least 39 anti-government activists died in the flames on May 2 in the building besieged and set ablaze by radicals.
A man in the video is wearing a bulletproof vest and is shooting several times in the direction of the burning House of Trade Unions.

The article would also report that:

Another video of the same man shows him speaking on the phone passionately arguing that he and his people are unarmed, while having to confront armed anti-government protesters. The man introduces himself as sotnik Mykola (“sotnik” is what Maidan group leaders in Kiev call themselves).

The report, complete with multiple videos and photographs, portrays a massacre of horrific and intentional brutality, trapping anti-regime protesters inside a building, torching it, and firing at the victims as they attempted to escape from being burned to death. The US’ calls to “investigate” the deaths and its refusal to acknowledge that the regime it has elected to back was responsible for the massacre, only further weakens its hand as the crisis continues to unfold.
Unelected Regime Blames Security Forces
In response to the violence in Odessa, Ukraine’s unelected prime minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, has blamed his own security forces for the violence. The BBC reported in its article, “Ukraine unrest: PM blames security service over Odessa,” that:

Some 42 people died in Odessa on Friday, most of them in the fire at the Trade Unions House, where separatist protesters had barricaded themselves in following running street battles with pro-Kiev activists.
Mr Yatsenyuk said the security service and law enforcement office had done “nothing to stop this crackdown”, saying they were “inefficient and they violated the law”.
The police chief of the Odessa region had been removed, he said, and the prosecutor’s office had started an investigation into “every single police officer”.

However, the new police chief appointed for Odessa only further confirmed the identity of the attackers that left over 40 dead while revealing the regime’s complicity in both the massacre and a wider agenda of coordinating with ultra-nationalists like the Neo-Nazi Right Sector faction.
In RT’s article, “Newly appointed Odessa police chief vows to revise release of anti-Kiev activists,” it states:

Addressing a pro-Kiev rally, Odessa’s new head of police spoke against ‘separatism’ and vowed to revise the earlier release of pro-autonomy activists.
Ivan Katerinchuk was appointed following deadly clashes and a fire on Friday that killed dozens in the southeastern port city.
Local media reported that a few hundred people attended the rally near the Odessa interior ministry on Sunday. Some of them were heavily armed with wooden and metal bats, chains, shields, and helmets.

It also states (emphasis added):

When speaking about the 67 released anti-government activists, he said that all will be investigated and it will be determined if they broke any laws.
He called on the Right Sector to exercise restraint and select individuals who will represent the group in order to easily communicate with it about further actions from police.

Clearly Right Sector, the Neo-Nazi militant front that spearheaded the so-called “Euromaidan” protests and the resulting putsch, are present in Odessa and working in coordination with Ukrainian security forces loyal to the regime in Kiev. This includes both the outgoing and the newly appointed police chief of Odessa. The Western media has not attempted to refute RT’s reports, and instead has elected to avoid mentioning altogether any relevant developments related to the Odessa massacre.
Wave of Fury Sweeps Ukraine
Over 60 anti-regime protesters who escaped the Trade Unions House blaze were arrested in addition to the 40 plus killed by Right Sector and other pro-regime factions in Odessa. After the massacre, anti-regime sentiment reached a fevered pitch. Protesters stormed the Odessa police station holding the survivors arrested earlier, prompting security forces to release them. While the newly appointed police chief of Odessa vows to “revise” the releases, it appears the city he resides over is divided and that further attempts to reassert Kiev’s control there will only result in more violence.
Meanwhile, the positions of anti-regime protesters elsewhere across the country have only hardened. Eastern cities like Slavyansk are standing firm against full-scale military operations launched by the regime in Kiev to consolidate their power across the rest of the country. Heavily armed gunships, armored vehicles, and special forces have been operating around the edges of towns and cities in the east of Ukraine, but have thus far been unable to enter them. The Western media, eager to report on progress made by Kiev, can only report on outer checkpoints and remote positions being taken by security forces.
The BBC’s report titled, “Ukraine unrest: PM blames security service over Odessa,” claims:

The BBC’s Sarah Rainsford, in the regional capital, Donetsk, says that while it appears the Ukrainian forces have sealed off the roads in and out of the town, they are moving around it and concentrating on smaller towns nearby.

Neo-Nazi Militants Rebranded as “Football Hooligans”
Lacking a cohesive military, Kiev has heavily depended on militant groups like Right Sector. Reeling from negative headlines since the height of the “Euromadain,” the regime is now attempting to portray Neo-Nazi militant groups as “football hooligans” operating beyond their control – even as officials like Odessa’s new police chief openly calls for closer coordination with them.
This is a familiar formula used across much of Europe’s racist, bigoted, nationalist movements, many of which are closely affiliated with Neo-Nazi groups active in Ukraine. The English Defense League (EDL), for example, draws direct parallels with Neo-Nazism, so much so that its own founder abandoned the movement after claiming it was in fact co-opted by Neo-Nazis. In the The Times article, “EDL chief Tommy Robinson quits after ‘neo-Nazi hijack of group’,” it states:

Tommy Robinson, the founder of the English Defence League, unexpectedly quit the organisation yesterday after claiming that it had been hijacked by extremists, including neo-Nazis.

The EDL’s composition of football hooligans and Neo-Nazis is repeated elsewhere. In a January 2014 Spiegel Online article titled, “‘Prepared to Die’: The Right Wing’s Role in Ukrainian Protests,” it described Ukraine’s Svoboda Party in relation to other Neo-Nazi groups across Europe:

The Svoboda party also has excellent ties to Europe, but they are different from the ones that Klischko might prefer. It is allied with France’s right-wing Front National and with the Italian neo-fascist group Fiamma Tricolore. But when it comes to the oppression of homosexuality, representative [Igor] Myroshnychenko is very close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, even if he does all he can to counter Moscow’s influence in his country.

In the coming days and weeks, Right Sector and Svoboda’s militant street front will continue coordinating with Kiev’s more heavily armed security forces in an attempt to consolidate its power across much of Ukraine. Already, the unelected government has declared its intention to deploy “special forces” to Odessa to rectify what it calls an “outrageous failure” to stop anti-regime protesters. This indicates that the “failure” was not the loss of life during clashes, but the failure to crush anti-regime sentiment across Odessa.
The regime and its Western sponsors will attempt to cover up, spin, and otherwise disassociate themselves from the inevitable atrocities that will be carried out as they attempt to do so. Portraying Neo-Nazi militants as “football hooligans” that are spontaneously taking to the streets and “coincidentally” helping Kiev eliminate its political opponents appears to be the narrative of choice and will almost certainly lead to both more incidents like the massacre in Odessa, and a greater backlash against the unpopular, struggling regime in Kiev.
Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”, where this first appeared.

Spinning the Odessa Massacre
TFAdmin
Wed, 07 May 2014 13:05:50 GMT

http://www.ijreview.com/2014/05/136959-new-york-senator-take-parenting-classes-well-fail-kid-school/