Skip to main content

Home/ Socialism and the End of the American Dream/ Group items matching "over-charging" in title, tags, annotations or url

Group items matching
in title, tags, annotations or url

Sort By: Relevance | Date Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
Paul Merrell

Reading the Runes in the Latest Report on Iran's Nuclear Program « LobeLog - 0 views

www.lobelog.com/eport-on-irans-nuclear-program

war & peace Iranian-nukes-myth negotiationIAEA-inspection report

shared by Paul Merrell on 21 Feb 15 - No Cached
  • The latest report from the International Atomic Energy Agency on Iran’s nuclear program contains much that is worth emphasizing. Iran is continuing to account for all its declared nuclear material (and the agency appears to have no reason to suspect the existence of undeclared nuclear material). Iran is also continuing to comply fully with the commitments it made to the United States and others on November 24, 2013 and which it has renewed since. Much of the commentary on the report on Iran will inevitably highlight Iran’s continuing failure to resolve two concerns the IAEA raised in May 2014. I, however, am surprised, that the IAEA director general omits all mention of two Iranian attempts, since the last IAEA report in mid-November, to address those and some other allegations that the IAEA is investigating. On December 2, Reuters reported that in a statement to the IAEA Iran had rejected accusations that it was stonewalling IAEA investigations. Instead, Iran had affirmed that it had given the IAEA “pieces of evidence” indicating that documents adduced by the IAEA as reasons for concern were “full of mistakes and contain fake names with specific pronunciations which only point towards a certain IAEA member as their forger.” (The member Iran probably had in mind was Israel). Yet there is no mention whatsoever of this Iranian rebuttal in the latest report, still less any detailed IAEA rebuttal of the rebuttal. Instead, the director general resorts to an exceptionally bland (and in the circumstances misleading) phrase: “Iran has not provided any explanations that enable the Agency to clarify the two outstanding practical measures [concerns].”
  • In effect Iran is being asked to prove its innocence. But when it tries to do so, the evidence it submits is rejected out of hand because it calls into question the evidence that is being used to justify the suspicion of guilt. Is that consistent with due process? Also surprising is the omission of any mention of Iran’s offer of access to a suspected nuclear site at Marivan, reported by Reuters on December 11. A controversial annex to the IAEA’s November 2011 report referred to one member state having informed the agency that major high-explosives tests were conducted at Marivan in the first part of the last decade. Since the IAEA has not taken Iran up on the offer, it presumably believes that a visit to Marivan would serve no useful purpose. If that is the case, do they not owe it to Iran to withdraw the November 2011 charge relating to Marivan? If the agency isn’t arranging a site visit, it should explain to IAEA member states that it considers the information provided by “a member state” to have been unreliable or irrelevant.
  • raise these questions not to criticise the IAEA secretariat, which continues to do a first-class job in Iran, as professional and objective as ever. Rather, I want to offset the hue and cry that opponents of a nuclear deal will raise over the reference in the latest report to Iran’s failure to provide explanations. I’m suggesting that there is more to this than meets the eye.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Turning back to the positive, Iran is continuing to allow exceptional access to centrifuge assembly workshops, centrifuge rotor production workshops, and storage facilities. This access has enabled the IAEA to conclude that centrifuge rotor manufacturing and assembly are consistent with Iran’s replacement program for failed centrifuges. In other words, Iran is not manufacturing and diverting rotors to some clandestine enrichment facility. This is highly significant. Amid the endless furor over the number of centrifuges that Iran should retain under a comprehensive agreement, the public could be forgiven for failing to appreciate that, theoretically, Iran is far more likely to “sneak out”—using a clandestine enrichment facility—than to “break out” under the eyes of IAEA inspectors, using the centrifuges it wants to retain. I inserted “theoretically” to emphasize that at this point there is no evidence that Iran intends either to break out or to sneak out. And as long as the IAEA retains access to Iran’s rotor manufacturing, assembly, and storage facilities—which it will lose if the opponents of a deal have their way—we can all feel confident of a continuing absence of intention. In essence, the latest IAEA report contains nothing that would justify the United States and its allies declining to close a deal with Iran in the course of the coming four weeks. I, for one, am rooting for their success.
Paul Merrell

Yellowstone Oil Spills Expose Threat to Pipelines Under Rivers Nationwide | Inside Climate News - 0 views

insideclimatenews.org/...elines-under-rivers-nationwide

environment pipeline-river-crossings pipelinestan

shared by Paul Merrell on 22 Feb 15 - No Cached
  • At the time the Poplar pipeline ruptured, about 110 feet of it was completely uncovered along the bottom of the Yellowstone River, exposing it to damage.
  • Bridger Pipeline LLC was so sure its Poplar oil line was safely buried below the Yellowstone River that it planned to wait five years to recheck it. But last month, 3.5 years later, the Poplar wasn't eight feet under the river anymore. It was substantially exposed on the river bottom—and leaking more than 30,000 gallons of oil upstream from Glendive, Montana. An ExxonMobil pipeline wasn't buried deeply enough for the Yellowstone River, either. High floodwaters in 2011 uncovered the Silvertip pipe, leaving it defenseless against the fast-moving current and traveling debris. It broke apart in July, and sent 63,000 gallons of oil into the river near Laurel, Montana.
  • Both companies underestimated the river's power and its penchant for scouring away the earth that's covering and protecting their pipelines. That miscalculation led to the Exxon Silvertip spill and it's likely to be declared a significant factor, at a minimum, in the Poplar spill. Such misjudgments have potentially troubling implications nationwide, since pipelines carrying crude oil and petroleum products pass beneath rivers and other bodies of water in more than 18,000 places across America. Many of them are buried only a few feet below the water. "There were a lot of people who wanted to think that the last pipeline spill in the Yellowstone River in 2011 was a freak accident that would never happen again. After this most recent spill, no one believes that anymore," said Scott Bosse, Northern Rockies director for American Rivers. "The truth is, there are probably hundreds of pipelines across the country that are at considerable risk of rupturing under our rivers."
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • While corrosion is the No. 1 cause of pipeline spills, a sizable number of pipelines at water crossings have ruptured or been endangered by river scour. Among them: ► The Poplar (Jan. 2015) and Silvertip (July 2011) pipeline failures on the Yellowstone River. ► More than 20 pipeline river crossings in Montana were found to be "dangerously close to exposure" during inspections of nearly 90 pipeline crossings in 2011, according to one report. Many of them have since been reburied significantly deeper. The Poplar pipeline was not among the crossings tagged as being close to exposure. ► Nearly half of the 55 oil and gas pipelines that cross the Missouri River were found to have sections buried 10 feet or less below the riverbed, according to the Wall Street Journal. A study by the U.S. Geological Survey, meanwhile, found that the Missouri riverbed had deepened by nine to 41 feet in 27 places because of severe scouring during the 2011 floods. ► An Enterprise Products Partners LLP pipeline that was uncovered by river scouring and ruptured in August 2011. The line spilled more than 28,350 gallons of a gasoline additive into the Missouri River in Iowa. ► A June 2012 spill in Alberta, Canada, where an oil pipeline owned by Plains Midstream Canada failed along the Red Deer River and released more than 122,000 gallons of light crude. Investigators concluded that the pipe was uncovered by scour during high flood waters and subjected to vibrations from the river flow that led a weld to fail.
  • Three Enbridge Corp. crude oil pipelines crossing Minnesota's Tamarac River were exposed by floodwater erosion years ago, and were still exposed in mid-2014. None of the pipes had failed at that point, but one was being propped up by steel legs, according to an MPR News account. Federal regulations aren't much help. The only rule that addresses pipe burial at major river crossings requires petroleum pipelines to be laid at least four feet below the riverbed at the time of construction. Once a pipeline's installed, there are no requirements regarding burial depth. There is no rule requiring exposed pipelines to be reburied, though a spill under those conditions would invite regulatory penalties for leaving the line exposed to hazards. What's more, federal rules put the pipeline companies in charge of identifying all threats that could cause a spill in highly populated or environmentally sensitive areas, and the companies get wide latitude in deciding what to do about them, according to Rebecca Craven, program manager at the Pipeline Safety Trust, a nonprofit group that tracks pipeline risks and regulations.
  • Indeed, the required four-foot minimum initial burial depth for pipelines can be completely eliminated by natural erosion over time or by a single flood event. Active free-flowing rivers can carve with enough ferocity to lower their riverbeds by 20 feet or shift the waterway onto an entirely new path, which can add new stresses to the pipeline or put the river over pipe that has less cover or lacks reinforcement or protective cement casings. The hotly debated Keystone XL oil pipeline project would cross nearly 2,000 rivers, streams and reservoirs in Montana, South Dakota and Nebraska, according to one estimate. The route takes the pipe across the Missouri and Yellowstone rivers, where owner TransCanada has pledged to install the pipeline 35 feet below the riverbeds.
  • See Also: Ruptured Yellowstone Oil Pipeline Was Built With Faulty Welding in 1950sIce Hinders Cleanup of Yellowstone Oil Pipeline SpillExxon Overlooked, Masked Safety Threats in Years Before Pegasus Pipeline BurstDilbit in Exxon's Pegasus May Have Contributed to Pipeline's Rupture
  • Paul Merrell on 22 Feb 15
     
    One of the hidden costs of oil dependence. 
Paul Merrell

Negative Interest Rates Show Desperation of Central Banks Washington's Blog - 0 views

www.washingtonsblog.com/...st-rates-sign-desperation.html

banksters negative-interest-rate cashless-societies

shared by Paul Merrell on 30 Jan 16 - No Cached
  • Japan has joined the EU, Denmark, Switzerland and Sweden in imposing negative interest rates. Indeed, more than a fifth of the world’s GDP is now covered by a central bank with negative interest rates.
  • And negative rates will eventually come to America. Central bankers are implementing negative interest rates to force savers to buy assets … so as to artificially stimulate the economy. Specifically: A negative interest rate means the central bank and perhaps private banks will charge negative interest: instead of receiving money on deposits, depositors must pay regularly to keep their money with the bank. This is intended to incentivize banks to lend money more freely and businesses and individuals to invest, lend, and spend money rather than pay a fee to keep it safe. Next up: The war on cash. Postscript: Ironically, the Fed has gone to great lengths to DISCOURAGE banks from lending to Main Street.
Paul Merrell

Cashless Society War Intensifies During Global Epocalypse Washington's Blog - 0 views

www.washingtonsblog.com/...nsifies-global-epocalypse.html

banksters negative-interest-rate cashless-societies

shared by Paul Merrell on 30 Jan 16 - No Cached
  • In the fall of 2015, the world descended into an economic apocalypse that will transform the globe into a single cashless society. This bold prediction is based on trends in nations all over the earth as shown in the article below. As we enter 2016, we are only beginning to see this Epocalypse form through the fog of war. The war I’m talking about is the world war waged furiously by central banks against the Great Recession as the governments they supposedly serve fiddled while their capital burned. The governments and banks of this world advanced rapidly toward forming cashless societies throughout 2015. The citizens of some countries are already embracing the move. In other countries, like the US, citizens fear the loss of autonomy that would come from giving governments and their designated central banks absolute monetary control.
  • The Epocalypse that I’ve been describing in this series will overcome that resistance during 2016 and 2017 as it wrecks economic havoc to such a degree that cash hold-outs will be ready for whatever holds the greatest promise of saving them from their collapsed monetary systems, fallen banks, deflated stocks and suffocating debt. One has only to think about how quickly and readily American citizens forfeited their constitutional civil liberties after 9/11 when George Bush and congress decreed that search warrants were not necessary if the government branded you a “terrorist.” If this sounds like some wild conspiracy theory, consider the following: no less Sterling standard of global economics than The Economist predicted thirty years ago that by 2018 a global currency would rise like the phoenix out of the ashes of the world’s fiat currencies:
  • Charging people to keep their money in the bank is hard to do so long as cash is available, as people may just withdraw all of their money from those banks in the form of the national cash and squirrel the cash away. In order to penetrate the twilight zone of economics, central banks need to abolish cash to terminate this escape route. Then they can force savers to spend, thereby increasing the flow of money through the economy, by raising the cost of holding money in a bank account as high as it takes to get people to spend their money. No sense letting perfectly good money waste away in an expensive bank account. Transitioning into a cashless society is the ultimate central planner’s dream as it gives central banks total control over money, and money is their proprietary product.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The drive to breach the national boundaries of money and establish a global cashless society has become a World War on cash with IMF backing to go digital and global.
Paul Merrell

Ecuador signs deal with Sweden for Assange questioning | Reuters - 0 views

www.reuters.com/...-assange-idUSKBN0TW0G120151213

surveillance state Assange Ecuador Sweden deal litigation

shared by Paul Merrell on 16 Dec 15 - No Cached
  • Ecuador and Sweden have signed a pact that would allow WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to be questioned by Swedish authorities at Ecuador's embassy in London where he has been holed up for more than three years since facing sexual assault charges, the Quito government said.The legal agreement was signed in the Ecuadorean capital after half a year of negotiations."It is, without doubt, an instrument that strengthens bilateral relations and will facilitate, for example, the fulfillment of judicial matters such as the questioning of Mr. Assange," the foreign ministry said in a weekend statement.Assange, 44, took refuge in the embassy building in June 2012 to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning over allegations of sexual assault and rape against two women in 2010. The Australian denies the accusations.
  • Assange says he fears Sweden will extradite him to the United States where he could be put on trial over WikiLeaks' publication of classified military and diplomatic documents five years ago, one of the largest information leaks in U.S. history. Britain, which has accused Ecuador of preventing the course of justice by allowing Assange to remain in its embassy in the upmarket central London area of Knightsbridge, welcomed the agreement."It is for the Swedish Prosecutor to decide how they now proceed with a legal case," a spokeswoman for the British Foreign Office said.
Paul Merrell

Report reveals 9 Israel lobby tactics to silence students | The Electronic Intifada - 0 views

electronicintifada.net/...lobby-tactics-silence-students

war & peace Israel BDS anti-BDS student-faculty-retaliation

shared by Paul Merrell on 31 Oct 15 - No Cached
  • Lawyers have responded to nearly 300 incidents of “censorship, punishment, or other burdening of advocacy for Palestinian rights” filed by Palestine solidarity activists on more than 65 US campuses in the last year and a half. Palestine Legal and the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) detail the assault in a new 124-page report, “The Palestine Exception to Free Speech: A Movement Under Attack in the US.” “As the movement for Palestinian rights is growing in the US, so too are concerted efforts to silence any and all criticism of Israel,” said Radhika Sainath, staff attorney with Palestine Legal and cooperating counsel with CCR. A video featuring students and members of faculty who have experienced silencing, repression and intimidation was also released by Palestine Legal and CCR and can be viewed above.
  • The report, which is the first of its kind, documents the suppression of Palestine advocacy in the US and identifies nine separate tactics Israel lobby groups use to crush Palestine solidarity activism — especially on campuses. The groups say that 85 percent of the hundreds of incidents to which Palestine Legal has responded since 2014 involving the targeting of students and scholars “include baseless legal complaints, administrative disciplinary actions, firings, harassment and false accusations of terrorism and anti-Semitism.” Such tactics have a chilling effect on speech, the report says. “These strategies … [result in] intimidating or deterring Palestinian solidarity activists from speaking out. The fear of punishment or career damage discourages many activists from engaging in activities that could be perceived as critical of Israel,” the report says. Sainath told The Electronic Intifada that “on the one hand, we’ve seen that peoples’ lives and reputations have been destroyed because of speaking out critically about Israel’s policies — one example is professor Steven Salaita, [whose story] is covered in the report.” Salaita was fired from the University of Illinois after he expressed his criticism of Israel’s attack on Gaza in the summer of 2014.
  • Meanwhile, lawyers and students say they are bracing for an array of dirty tactics being planned by Israel lobby groups. Earlier this year, Republican party mega-donor Sheldon Adelson, along with Haim Saban, billionaire supporter of the Democratic party, poured tens of millions of dollars into Israel lobby groups on campus with the explicit intent of suppressing Palestine rights-based organizing. “One of the things that we’re concerned about and preparing for is a wave of anti-boycott legislation,” Sainath said, “as well as increased efforts to stop students from introducing referendums or resolutions for Palestinian rights.”
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • Also today, Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) released a 79-page report, “Stifling Dissent: How Israel’s Defenders Use False Charges of Anti-Semitism to Limit the Debate over Israel on Campus.” It lays out in detail the methods that Israel lobby groups use to stifle debate about Palestine. It also includes numerous case studies and accounts of employment discrimination against US professors who have been targeted for their political views on Israel. Tallie Ben-Daniel, academic advisory council coordinator for JVP, told The Electronic Intifada that the report grew out of concerns over “the climate of repression” around speech critical of Israel, especially following Salaita’s firing.
  • Ben-Daniel said that young Jews “are more critical of Israeli state policy than ever before, and are building coalitions through their Palestine solidarity work — and yet are silenced by the very organizations that are supposed to represent them on campus.” One section of JVP’s report “details how Jewish students are subjected to a political litmus test on Israel in order to participate in Jewish institutional life on campus.” Organizations such as Hillel, JVP points out, demand that their members abide by guidelines which prohibit co-sponsoring or supporting events of speakers who are critical of Israeli policies and who support the Palestinian-led boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign. Ben-Daniel added that JVP’s report “only tallies the cases that gained national attention — there are innumerable more Jewish students who in all probability do not participate in institutional Jewish campus life because of this litmus test.” JVP says that the report is meant to educate and provide resources to students and faculty alike who may be facing repression or silencing on campus and in classrooms.
  • Paul Merrell on 31 Oct 15
     
    A sign that BDS is beginning to make Israeli government truly worried about economic impacts, the Adelson/Saban big donations for anti-BDS work on U.S. college campuses. 
Paul Merrell

Killing Off Community Banks - Intended Consequence of Dodd-Frank? | WEB OF DEBT BLOG - 0 views

ellenbrown.com/...nded-consequence-of-dodd-frank

banksters consolidation Dodd-Frank community-banks too-big-to-fail too-big-to-jail too-big-to-regulate

shared by Paul Merrell on 25 Oct 15 - No Cached
  • The Dodd-Frank regulations are so lethal to community banks that some say the intent was to force them to sell out to the megabanks. Community banks are rapidly disappearing — except in North Dakota, where they are thriving.  At over 2,300 pages, the Dodd Frank Act is the longest and most complicated bill ever passed by the US legislature. It was supposed to end “too big to fail” and “bailouts,” and to “promote financial stability.” But Dodd-Frank’s “orderly liquidation authority” has replaced bailouts with bail-ins, meaning that in the event of insolvency, big banks are to recapitalize themselves with the savings of their creditors and depositors. The banks deemed too big are more than 30% bigger than before the Act was passed in 2010, and 80% bigger than before the banking crisis of 2008. The six largest US financial institutions now have assets of some $10 trillion, amounting to almost 60% of GDP; and they control nearly 50% of all bank deposits.
  • Meanwhile, their smaller competitors are struggling to survive. Community banks and credit unions are disappearing at the rate of one a day. Access to local banking services is disappearing along with them. Small and medium-size businesses – the ones that hire two-thirds of new employees – are having trouble getting loans; students are struggling with sky-high interest rates; homeowners have been replaced by hedge funds acting as absentee landlords; and bank fees are up, increasing the rolls of the unbanked and underbanked, and driving them into the predatory arms of payday lenders. Even some well-heeled clients are being rejected. In an October 19, 2015 article titled  “Big Banks to America’s Firms: We Don’t Want Your Cash,” the Wall Street Journal reported that some Wall Street banks are now telling big depositors to take their money elsewhere or be charged a deposit fee. Municipal governments are also being rejected as customers. Bank of America just announced that it no longer wants the business of some smaller cities, which have been given 90 days to find somewhere else to put their money. Hundreds of local BofA branches are also disappearing.
  • Hardest hit, however, are the community banks. Today there are 1,524 fewer banks with assets under $1 billion than there were in June 2010, before the Dodd-Frank regulations were signed into law. Collateral Damage or Intended Result?
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • Obviously, making the big banks bigger also serves the interests of the megabanks, whose lobbyists are well known to have their fingerprints all over the legislation. How they have been able to manipulate the rules was seen last December, when legislation drafted by Citigroup and slipped into the Omnibus Spending Bill loosened the Dodd-Frank regulations on derivatives. As noted in a Mother Jones article before the legislation was passed: The Citi-drafted legislation will benefit five of the largest banks in the country—Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo. These financial institutions control more than 90 percent of the $700 trillion derivatives market. If this measure becomes law, these banks will be able to use FDIC-insured money to bet on nearly anything they want. And if there’s another economic downturn, they can count on a taxpayer bailout of their derivatives trading business.
  • Regulation is clearly inadequate to keep these banks honest and ensure that they serve the public interest. The world’s largest private banks have been caught in criminal acts that former bank fraud investigator Prof. William K. Black calls the greatest frauds in history. The litany of frauds involves more than a dozen felonies, including bid-rigging on municipal bond debt; colluding to rig interest rates on hundreds of trillions of dollars in mortgages, derivatives and other contracts; exposing investors to excessive risk; and engaging in multiple forms of mortgage fraud. According to US Attorney General Eric Holder, the guilty have gone unpunished because they are “too big to prosecute.” If they are too big to prosecute, they are too big to regulate.
Paul Merrell

Israel Sued in US over Flotilla Attacks. Civil Law Suit against the State of Israel | Global Research - Centre for Research on Globalization - 0 views

www.globalresearch.ca/...5501501

war & peace Israel Gaza-Freedom-Flotilla litigation

shared by Paul Merrell on 16 Jan 16 - No Cached
  • Four people, including three Americans, have filed a civil suit against the state of Israel, seeking compensatory damages for injuries suffered during an attack aboard a U.S. ship in international waters during the year 2010. At a Washington press conference, Tuesday, the plaintiffs said they wanted compensation for “the harm and distress, injuries and losses caused by the attack”. Israel has refused to acknowledge responsibility and liability for the attack and is yet to pay compensation to victims aboard the Challenger I, which was part of a Freedom Flotilla set to deliver humanitarian aid and medical supplies to the Gaza Strip, which was and still remains under an Israeli blockade. According to the complaint, the U.S. ship has never been returned by Israel and is still being held there. Israeli special forces stormed the ships and killed nine civilians aboard another ship in the flotilla, the Turkish Mavi Marmara. That event has since frozen relations between Israel and Turkey. That case was referred to the International Criminal Court by the Union of the Comoros because the Turkish vessel was sailing under its flag.
  • The family of a 19-year old American-Turkish national, Furkan Dogan, who was killed in the Mavi Marmara raid, last October, sued former Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak on war crimes charges. The latest lawsuit filed Monday is the first U.S. case brought against Israel relating to the Freedom Flotilla. The plaintiffs and their attorneys spoke to Anadolu Agency, following a press conference that announced the suit: “States are generally immune from suit in United States courts. But that immunity is waived in a number of circumstances. When agents of foreign governments commit wrongful acts in the United States that cause personal injury, and egregious acts against U.S. nationals anywhere in the world, they are not entitled to immunity,” said lawyer Steven Schneebaum. He noted that both exceptions apply to the facts of Challenger I case because a U.S. flagged ship falls under U.S. jurisdiction. The case is ground-breaking as it relies on an exception in American law that allows lawsuits to be brought against foreign states, in limited cases.
  • According to professor Ralph Steinhardt, a member of the plaintiffs’ legal team, Israel’s sovereignty does not allow it to attack American flagged civilian ships and attack those on it. “The attack on Challenger I was a patent violation of international law, including the laws of war, human rights, and the law of the sea,” according to the George Washington University international law professor. A UK-based international lawyer representing the plaintiffs, Sir Geoffrey Nice, described the case against Israel as “a real test” for the rule of international law. “This case, alongside the others, the one in the International Criminal Court and the one in California would have the following very clear political outcome: If Israel has enjoyed special privileged status of impunity because of protection by the United State of America, then that impunity is on the way out,” he said.
Paul Merrell

The New Snowden? NSA Contractor Arrested Over Alleged Theft Of Classified Data - 0 views

www.mintpressnews.com/...221187

surveillance state NSA zero-day-exploits leak arrest prosecution Martin

shared by Paul Merrell on 07 Oct 16 - No Cached
  • A contractor working for the National Security Agency (NSA) was arrested by the FBI following his alleged theft of “state secrets.” More specifically, the contractor, Harold Thomas Martin, is charged with stealing highly classified source codes developed to covertly hack the networks of foreign governments, according to several senior law enforcement and intelligence officials. The Justice Department has said that these stolen materials were “critical to national security.” Martin was employed by Booz Allen Hamilton, the company responsible for most of the NSA’s most sensitive cyber-operations. Edward Snowden, the most well-known NSA whistleblower, also worked for Booz Allen Hamilton until he fled to Hong Kong in 2013 where he revealed a trove of documents exposing the massive scope of the NSA dragnet surveillance. That surveillance system was shown to have targeted untold numbers of innocent Americans. According to the New York Times, the theft “raises the embarrassing prospect” that an NSA insider managed to steal highly damaging secret information from the NSA for the second time in three years, not to mention the “Shadow Broker” hack this past August, which made classified NSA hacking tools available to the public.
  • Snowden himself took to Twitter to comment on the arrest. In a tweet, he said the news of Martin’s arrest “is huge” and asked, “Did the FBI secretly arrest the person behind the reports [that the] NSA sat on huge flaws in US products?” It is currently unknown if Martin was connected to those reports as well.
  • It also remains to be seen what Martin’s motivations were in removing classified data from the NSA. Though many suspect that he planned to follow in Snowden’s footsteps, the government will more likely argue that he had planned to commit espionage by selling state secrets to “adversaries.” According to the New York Times article on the arrest, Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea are named as examples of the “adversaries” who would have been targeted by the NSA codes that Martin is accused of stealing. However, Snowden revealed widespread US spying on foreign governments including several US allies such as France and Germany. This suggests that the stolen “source codes” were likely utilized on a much broader scale.
Paul Merrell

Ex-Wells Execs Hit With $59MM In Fines Over Fake Account Scandal; Stumpf Barred For Life | Zero Hedge - 0 views

www.zerohedge.com/...unt-scandal-stumpf-barred-life

banksters fraud litigation convictions penalties

shared by Paul Merrell on 24 Jan 20 - No Cached
  • Nearly four years after Wells Fargo's reputation was terminally crushed by the humiliating fake accounts scandal, the punishment for Warren Buffett's favorite bank and its (mostly former) employees is still being doled out, and moments ago the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency announced $59 million in civil charges and settlements with eight former Wells Fargo senior executives on Thursday, including the payment of a $17.5 million fine by John Stumpf, the bank’s former CEO, who also agreed to a lifetime industry ban. Carrie Tolstedt, who led Wells Fargo’s community bank for a decade, faces a penalty of as much as $25 million.
Paul Merrell

'Bibi to prison': Thousands demand Netanyahu resignation over corruption in Israel - RT World News - 0 views

www.rt.com/...yahu-corruption-protest-israel

Israel Netanyahu corruption demonstrations

shared by Paul Merrell on 10 Dec 17 - No Cached
  • Thousands of Israelis took to the streets of Tel Aviv calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over corruption charges. The so-called ‘March of Shame’ attracted more than 10,000 people on Saturday, Ynet News reported. The protestors on Tel Aviv's Rothschild Boulevard chanted "Shame, shame, shame," "Bibi Netanyahu to Maasiyahu Prison," and "We will not give in until you give up."
  • Smaller anti-Netanyahu protests were organized in other locations in Israel as well, including Nahariya, Hadera, Afula, Netanya, Rishon LeZion, Modi'in, Jerusalem and Be'er Sheva.
  • Netanyahu has been questioned in two cases, with poilce suspecting the PM of received lavish gifts from businessmen and negotiating a deal for more favorable coverage with a newspaper owner.
Paul Merrell

» The government has made an "absolute mockery" of Bradley Manning's right to a speedy trial - Bradley Manning Support Network - 0 views

www.bradleymanning.org/...nnings-right-to-a-speedy-trial

liberties speedy trial bradley manning

shared by Paul Merrell on 09 Oct 12 - No Cached
  • It’s appropriate that David Coombs’ longest motion of this trial yet, which argues for dismissal of all charges, details PFC Bradley Manning’s extraordinarily and illegally long pretrial confinement. The prosecution’s repeated and unjustifiable delays point “unmistakably to the conclusion that PFC Manning’s statutory and constitutional speedy trial rights have been trampled upon with impunity.”
  • “As of the date of this motion, PFC Manning has been in pretrial confinement for 845 days. Eight hundred forty-five days…. With trial scheduled to commence on 4 February 2013, PFC Manning will have spent a grand total of 983 days in pretrial confinement before even a single piece of evidence is offered against him. To put this amount of time into perspective, the Empire State Building could have been constructed almost two-and-a-half times over in the amount of time it will have taken to bring PFC Manning to trial.” The Rule for Court Martial (RCM) 707 affords 120 days from arrest to arraignment to constitute a speedy trial. However, Bradley was arraigned nearly two years after his arrest and will have been imprisoned for nearly 1,000 days if his court-martial begins as scheduled on February 4, 2013.
  • Paul Merrell on 09 Oct 12
     
    I've read the 117-page brief. This is an outrageous violation of our Constitution.
Paul Merrell

DOJ confirms Holder OK'd search warrant for Fox News reporter's emails - Open Channel - 0 views

openchannel.nbcnews.com/...-for-fox-news-reporters-emails

liberties surveillance state journalism Obama Holder

shared by Paul Merrell on 27 May 13 - No Cached
  • The Justice Department pledged Friday to to review its policies relating to the seizure of information from journalists after acknowledging that a controversial search warrant for a  Fox News reporter’s private emails  was approved “at the highest levels” of the Justice Department, including “discussions” with Attorney General  Eric Holder.
  • The statement, confirming an NBC News account of Holder’s role, defended the secret warrant to obtain reporter James Rosen’s emails as a legitimate step to obtain evidence as part of an investigation of Stephen Kim. A former intelligence analyst, Kim has since been indicted under the Espionage Act for leaking classified information to Rosen about North Korea. He has denied the charges.
  • Nevertheless, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, Holder “understands the concerns that have been raised by the media and has initiated a re-evaluation of existing department policies and procedures.” The official said the department must strike “the appropriate balance” between preventing leaks of classified information and “First Amendment rights,”adding that passage of a new media shield law “and appropriate updates to the department”s internal guidelines” will help achieve that.   The statement comes  amid a firestorm of criticism from news media groups over the Rosen search warrant and a secret subpoena for the phone records of AP reporters. It also comes one day after President Obama addressed the issue in a major speech on counter-terrorism policy, saying "I am troubled by the possibility that leak investigations may chill the investigative journalism that holds government accountable," Obama said. "Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs."
  • Paul Merrell on 27 May 13
     
    Re "President Obama addressed the issue in a major speech on counter-terrorism policy, saying "I am troubled by the possibility that leak investigations may chill the investigative journalism that holds government accountable," Obama said. "Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs." That's unless they're not working with a mainstream media company, of course. Witness continuing U.S. efforts to extradite and prosecute Wikileaks founder Julian Assange under the Espionage Act because of the massive leak of classified documents to Wikileaks for which Private Bradley Manning is being prosecuted.
Paul Merrell

At Comverse, Many Smart Business Moves and Maybe a Bad One - New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...21options.html

surveillance state NSA Israel Verint Converse

shared by Paul Merrell on 15 Jun 13 - No Cached
  • Mr. Alexander transformed a communications software company, Comverse Technology, from a start-up to a market leader with annual sales of more than $1 billion.That made Mr. Alexander, known as Kobi, a pioneer and hero in Israel’s emerging high-tech industry. These days, though, Mr. Alexander is also referred to by another title: fugitive. Mr. Alexander, 54, is believed to have fled the United States after he and two other former Comverse executives were charged earlier this month with securities, mail and wire fraud by federal prosecutors in Brooklyn. A warrant has been issued for his arrest.Yet the odds are that it will be a long time before Mr. Alexander explains himself in a courtroom, if ever.
  • Mr. Alexander is an Israeli citizen and is a former military officer there. And in late July, according to prosecutors, Mr. Alexander wired $57 million to an account in Israel.While the United States has an extradition treaty with Israel, it is unclear whether the treaty covers the crimes that Mr. Alexander is accused of, law professors said. Furthermore, given Mr. Alexander’s stature and record of military service, Israel may be reluctant to readily hand him over, they add.
  • Another Comverse subsidiary, Verint Systems, which provides more than 25 percent of Comverse’s revenues, is also looking into its options practices.
Paul Merrell

NEW TIME POLL: Support for the Leaker-and His Prosecution | TIME.com - 0 views

swampland.time.com/...the-leaker-and-his-prosecution

surveillance state NSA polls

shared by Paul Merrell on 15 Jun 13 - No Cached
  • More than half of Americans approve of a former intelligence contractor’s decision to leak classified details of sprawling government surveillance programs, according to the results of a new TIME poll. Fifty-four percent of respondents said the leaker, Edward Snowden, 29, did a “good thing” in releasing information about the government programs, which collect phone, email, and Internet search records in an effort, officials say, to prevent terrorist attacks. Just 30 percent disagreed. But an almost identical number of Americans —  53 percent —  still said he should be prosecuted for the leak, compared to 28% who said he should not. Americans aged 18 to 34 break from older generations in showing far more support for Snowden’s actions. Just 41 percent of that cohort say he should face charges, while 43 percent say he should not. Just 19 percent of that age group say the leak was a “bad thing.”
  • Overall, Americans are sharply divided over the government’s use of surveillance programs to prevent terrorist attacks, according to the results of the poll. Forty-eight percent of Americans approve of the surveillance programs, while 44 percent disapprove, a statistical tie given the poll’s four-point margin of error.
  • A majority of the poll’s respondents say that the surveillance programs have helped protect national security, with 63 percent saying they’ve had “some” or a “great deal” of impact in protecting the country. Just 31 percent says they’ve done “not much” or “nothing at all.” A narrow plurality of those polled, 48 percent to 43 percent, believe that the federal government is striking the right balance between protecting Americans’ privacy and protecting their physical well-being or that the government should be doing more to prevent terrorism.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Nearly 60 percent believe the revelations will not force the government to curtail the surveillance program. But 76 percent of Americans believe there will soon be additional disclosures that the spying programs are bigger and more widespread than currently known. Americans are largely split on partisan grounds as to whether Obama is more careful about respecting privacy than President George W. Bush. Twenty-eight percent said Bush was more careful, one-quarter sided with Obama, and 42 percent say there has been little difference between the two.
Paul Merrell

Feds May Have To Reveal FISA Phone Records In Murder Case | Techdirt - 0 views

www.techdirt.com/...hone-records-murder-case.shtml

surveillance state NSA criminal discovery

shared by Paul Merrell on 14 Jun 13 - No Cached
  • There's been a lot of focus elsewhere concerning the FISA rulings that were leaked, showing that the government is scooping up the details of pretty much every phone call. However, a case concerning some guys who were trying to rob an armored truck may lead to some interesting revelations related to what the government collects. Daryl Davis, Hasam Williams, Terrance Brown, Toriano Johnson, and Joseph K. Simmons were charged with trying to rob a bunch of armored Brink's trucks, in which one of the robberies went wrong and a Brink's employee was shot and killed. As part of the case against the group, the DOJ obtained call records. However, during discovery, the government refused to hand over call records for July of 2010, claiming that when they sought them from the telco, the DOJ was told that those records had been purged. Terrance Brown's lawyer is now claiming that since it appears the NSA has sucked up all of this data for quite some time, it would appear that the government should, in fact, already have the phone records from July 2010, which he argues would show that he was nowhere near the robbery when it happened. Defendant Brown urges that the records are important to his defense because cell-site records could be used to show that Brown was not in the vicinity of the attempted robbery that allegedly occurred in July 2010. And, relying on a June 5, 2013, Guardian newspaper article that published a FISA Court order relating to cellular telephone data collected by Verizon,1 Defendant Brown now suggests that the Government likely actually does possess the metadata relating to telephone calls made in July 2010 from the two numbers attributed to Defendant Brown.
  • The court agrees that, under the law, the government may need to produce those records. Here, Defendant asserts that, under Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), due process requires the production of the July 2010 telephone records because they are anticipated to be exculpatory in that they are expected to show that Defendant Brown was not physically located at the scene of the alleged attempted Brink’s truck robbery in July 2010. In view of Defendant Brown’s Motion and the requirements of FISA, it is hereby ORDERED and ADJUDGED that the Government shall respond to Defendant Brown’s Motion and, if desired, shall file an affidavit of the Attorney General of the United States. That order was actually issued Monday, only giving the government until yesterday to comply. At the time of posting, the government's reply has not yet shown up in PACER, though it may pop up soon. I'm guessing that they'll try to either get some sort of extension or explain why those records are somehow inaccessible -- but it could get interesting.
  • Paul Merrell on 14 Jun 13
     
    This is definitely one to watch. The Court's order is short but definitely enlightening. The defendant's trial is already under way, so the Court set a very short response time, and required the Feds to concurrently file the affidavit of the Attorney General if the Feds want to claim that disclosure would harm national security. She has also ordered that the Feds concurrently explain any belief that thre information was lawfully gathered, citing some specific portions of the FISA Act that are at the heart of the government's claim of right to compel telcos to disclose the information to the Feds.    Then the court decides whether the Feds must produce the records anyway. Tough position for the government because it would be extremely difficult to argue that the phone call metadata itself is classified, since they are by law "business records" of a private party, the telco.  And this sets the stage for a flood of habeas corpus petitions by persons already convicted seeking new trials with NSA surveillance records disclosed. Easiest way out for the Feds is to claim that the records do not exist, but someone will have to sign a statement under penalty of perjury file to that effect.  If the Court orders disclosure, the Feds have a right of immediate appeal. So this one could win up in the Supreme Court very quickly (days, not months). Reading the Court's order, the judge seems predisposed to order production of the records. So stay tuned to this channel. I'm reminded that about a week ago, an MSNBC reporter blogged that he didn't think that the PRISM story "has legs" that will keep it in the news very long. He was wrong. 
Paul Merrell

Army Ousts Egypt's President - Morsi Decries 'Complete Military Coup' - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...egypt.html

Egypt Arab Spring Morsi

shared by Paul Merrell on 03 Jul 13 - No Cached
  • CAIRO — Egypt’s military on Wednesday ousted Mohamed Morsi, the nation’s first freely elected president, suspending the Constitution, installing an interim government and insisting it was responding to the millions of Egyptians who had opposed the Islamist agenda of Mr. Morsi and his allies in the Muslim Brotherhood.
  • Under a “road map” for a post-Morsi government devised by a meeting of civilian political and religious leaders, the general said, the Constitution would be suspended, the head of the Supreme Constitutional Court would become acting president and plans would be expedited for new elections while an interim government was in charge. The general, who had issued a 48-hour ultimatum to Mr. Morsi on Monday to respond to what he called widespread anger over the administration’s troubled one-year-old tenure, said the president’s defiant response in a televised address on Tuesday had failed “to meet the demands of the masses of the people.”
  • Security officials said the military’s intelligence service had banned any travel by Mr. Morsi and senior Islamist aides, including the Muslim Brotherhood’s supreme guide, Mohamed Badie, and his influential deputy, Khairat el-Shater.
  • Paul Merrell on 03 Jul 13
     
    In excess of a million Egyptians have been demonstrating for days seeking the ouster of the Morsi government and its attempt to impose Sharia law on Egypt. Once again, the Egyptian military chooses to side with the people rather than the current government. 
Gary Edwards

Doug Casey on American Socialism - Casey Research - 0 views

www.caseyresearch.com/...doug-casey-american-socialism

Doug-Casey Socialism economic-ruin

shared by Gary Edwards on 20 Oct 12 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 20 Oct 12
     
    "Doug Casey on American Socialism"  .  Awesome interview, especially the discussion on Liberalism and how the socialist Norman Thomas decided to co-opt the term as an effective replacement for the disreputable socialism.  Links to the Thomas 1932 socialist platform that Casey points out has pretty much been put into place.   Good discussion.  Focus on an article published by socialist apologist and idiot, Allan Colmes.
  • Paul Merrell on 20 Oct 12
     
    I agree that Colmes is far from the sharpest knife in the drawer. In my opinion, he was largely a Fox News invention to give Shawn Hannity a far weaker opponent to argue against that Hannity's idiocy could still overcome. There are in reality liberals that Hannity could never have gone toe-to-toe with. (That's not an endorsement of liberalism; it's commentary on the quality of Hannity's arguments.) The show was mostly a variant of the straw man logical fallacy; the fact that Colmes lacked the ability to think critically or communicate effectively made Hannity "win" the pseudo-debate in the eyes of those unable to think critically themselves. I have some criticism of Casey's remarks that apply more generally to my experience of strict Libertarians and perhaps even farther to strict adherents to any "ism." My criticism boils down to a couple of examples of hard issues usually avoided by strict Libertarians. -- The Disabled: When discussing Social Security disability benefits, Casey changes the subject from the genuinely disabled to a short rant about those whose disability claims are bogus and the "ambulance chasing" lawyers who pursue their claims. But if pressed to the wall and forced to answer, I strongly suspect that Casey would admit that there are people, likely the majority of Social Security disability benefits, whose claims are genuine. The net effect of his relevant argument: an impression that he has a Darwinian view that he would leave the disabled dying in the streets without sustenance or medical care. That kind of society is unacceptable to me. Perhaps it is to Casey too, but if so I think it was incumbent on him to offer a solution for the genuinely disabled. (In fairness, I'll note that at one point Casey hinted but did not forthrightly say that he would favor financial assistance for single mothers in Harlem.) -- Medical Care: I agree that our health care system is badly broken. But again Casey is long on criticism but short on realistic idea
Paul Merrell

Erdogan Purge Against Gulenists Could Prove Lucrative « LobeLog - 0 views

lobelog.com/ulenists-could-prove-lucrative

war & peace Turkey purge Gulen

shared by Paul Merrell on 27 Oct 16 - No Cached
  • The power struggle between the Turkish state and the Fethullah Gulen-led Hizmet Movement continues to reverberate in Turkey. The number detained, arrested, jailed, and dismissed from their jobs since the July 15 coup attempt has reached well over 100,000, 40,000 of whom have been detained on suspicion of having links with Hizmet. One third of the highest-ranking armed forces officers have been dismissed. Almost every major institution—military, judiciary, media, education, business—has been affected. The differences between the Gulenists and the state, especially with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP), first burst into the open in December 2013 when alleged Hizmet-linked judiciary officials ordered the arrest on corruption-related charges of 52 people suspected of ties to the AKP, Erdogan, and members of his family. The government retaliated by sacking scores of judicial, prosecutorial, and police officials allegedly tied to Hizmet. The conflict escalated from there. Although the western media to date has been focused on the human-rights, political, and security implications of the purge, relatively little attention has been paid to the financial repercussions, notably the huge windfalls the state and AKP-associated companies stand to gain from the carving up of alleged Gulenist-linked enterprises. Indeed, the purge of suspected Hizmet followers and sympathizers has spread to an array of companies also thought to have ties with Hizmet.
Paul Merrell

A Need to Clear Up Clinton Questions - Consortiumnews - 0 views

consortiumnews.com/...-to-clear-up-clinton-questions

Auction-2016 Hillary emails Libya-testimony perjury criminal-prosecution

shared by Paul Merrell on 06 May 16 - No Cached
  • As the Democrats glumly line up for Hillary Clinton’s belated coronation, the risk remains of potential criminal charges over her Libyan testimony or her careless emails, as ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern describes.
« First ‹ Previous 221 - 240 of 319 Next › Last »
Showing 20▼ items per page