Group items tagged politics - Occupy Movement Informationbase

shared by Stephen Boyle on 12 Jan 12 - Cached

shared by Stephen Boyle on 18 Apr 12 - No Cached

shared by Stephen Boyle on 23 Mar 12 - No Cached

Justice Department Director of the Office of Information Policy, Melanie Ann Pustay (pictured above), called on Congress to weaken the Freedom of Information of Act [FOIA] and strengthen the ability of the federal government to prevent the disclosure of documents deemed critical to the safety of the nation's cybersecurity and infrastructure.
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In Fiscal Year 2011, agencies were faced with an increase in the number of incoming FOIA requests, which rose from 597,415 in Fiscal Year 2010 to 644,165 in Fiscal Year 2011. Notably, the Department of Homeland Security experienced a 35% increase in the number of incoming requests.
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Under provisions of the FOIA, anyone may compel agencies of the government to surrender copies of federal records. According to applicable exceptions to the law, a petitioner is entitled to receive the requested documents unless the disclosure would demonstrably negatively impact national security, violate personal privacy, or unnecessarily reveal business secrets or other confidential decision-making considerations.
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shared by Stephen Boyle on 12 Jan 12 - No Cached

- Stephen Boyle on 12 Jan 12
  
  Citizens United vs FEC changed this by allowing corporations to contribute money into campaign funding and not placing any limit on such funding.
  
  <div class="cArrow"> </div><div class="cContentInner">Citizens United vs FEC changed this by allowing corporations to contribute money into campaign funding and not placing any limit on such funding.</div>
  
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Because it is illegal for corporations to donate money directly to a congressional campaign,
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businesses create political action committees, called PACs
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Lobbyists help members of Congress analyze how their votes on particular bills will affect their chances to be reelected. They also analyze the chances that different bills, or proposed laws, have of passing Congress. Lobbyists supply members of Congress with information concerning the subject matter of congressional bills. When congressional committees hold hearings, lobbyists testify, or speak, before the committees in an effort to influence the passing of a law their clients want.
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According to Parenti, "Lobbyists make themselves so helpful that members of Congress sometimes rely on them to perform tasks normally done by congressional staffs. Lobbyists will draft legislation, write speeches, and plant stories in the press on behalf of cooperative lawmakers."
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shared by Stephen Boyle on 09 Mar 12 - No Cached

In 2002 Warren Buffett famously referred to derivatives as 'financial weapons of mass destruction.' But beyond that headline, few in the media took the time to actually communicate what Buffett was really saying, and the risks that the unregulated derivatives markets posed to the banking system.
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It would have been more effective to have nationalized the banks and cut the risk out at the source, but the new president Obama was badly advised to say the least, by advisors he himself appointed, who were in fact long time insiders in the creation of the risk situation itself.
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In the case of the 2008-9 crisis, Bush-Obama failed to dictate terms, and essentially allowed the banks to do whatever they wished to keep going without reforming the system, taking huge sums of money and paying off their bets while maintaining their bonuses and most of their positions. And this was a monumental political failure indeed, and history will probably not be kind.
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it appears that the money in derivatives was too good for even Mr. Warren Buffett to pass up. Berkshire Profit Falls 30% On Insurance, Derivatives.
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