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@dianhow; You must be talking about the old PBS that existed before the G.W. Bush administration and their attack on the Board of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting kicking out long time Progressive supporters and replacing them with Right Wing idealist who had never liked their Left slant on issues ! The various current PBS news programs, and once critically acclaimed investigative studies like Front Line, are now carbon copies of the various network government propaganda sideshows. The result is a public media that cheerfully Rubber Stamps all of government's policies and agendas no questions asked !
Arthur Sulzburger; "A free press is not a privilege but an organic necessity in a great society"
Thom, these banks are essentially a toxic side effect of a far greater problem, the corruption of our government starting at the bottom and rising to the highest levels. All of this was once concealed in the shadows leaving the involvement of various elected officials open to conjecture by a few individuals in Congress that fully endorsed the rule of law and viewed this kind of behavior as a direct violation of the oath of office. These indiscretions were once addressed by ethics committees in both houses of Congress, committees that were consigned to the dust bin of history when the corruption became all consuming and necessary to continue the lifetime careers of various key individuals in Washington.
I cannot understand how the Teapartiers detest the "Guv'ment," but put their trust in Corporate Oligarchs who run the "Guv'ment." How can we get enough of these t-partiers to shoot themselves in both feet so they can't make it to the polls?
And just to add a little fuel to the US electoral fire, ...how about Jon Stewart for Pres? Why are the Dems sitting around in deference to Hillary's candidacy and letting the Con-Pubs control all campaigning messaging. Hillary - time to get off 'the throne" and get in the race. AND please, let's have some OTHER dems to challenge her.
The rich and powerfull created the system folks ,do you want this to go on ? Or have you hade enough yet .
evolutionrevolution.net
Nothing breeds appropriate behaviour faster than the light of public scrutiny .Put some sunshine on this ?
Eliminate the invisibility of money make every single transaction open to public scrutiny ! Uncover the money trail if you knew the truth of what's going on there would be a massive uprising around our planet .People would never put up with all that's going on everything would change .Dare we do this design a international money system that is totally transparent ,visible .
The light of truth ,show me a man's bank account and I will show you the man .Can we develope an enlightened society based on truth and fairness ,why not ? The established system hate this idea as the truth will set you free .People of power Governments,Corporations will fight tooth and nail to keep these ideas away from any economic system they devise .The simple truth the plain truth would change everything .Someone else said I'am the truth and the light .We forgot his ideas but now we remember the true meanings of the teachings .Time to change the world me thinks .
evolutionrevolution.net
I have been Financially Victimized, in the past. SPD was willing to testify, on my behalf. The Prosecuting Attorney, however, was NOT willing to go to court over >$20,000. That might not be much to some people --- BUT it is more than 1 year's worth of SSA Payments, to me.
?What is DOJ's Bottom Line --- before pursuing litigation?
?How corrupt must an Institution be?
It might be as simple as public pressure. Consider the FCC's recent capitulation to public pressure. The telecommunication industry lobbied hard for a pay-to-play tier speed service, plus they had their man sitting as the FCC chairman.; however, the public submitted 4 millions complaints to FCC. These complaints forced the FCC to protect the internet as public utility.
If we are take the reason given for the FCC change in direction on internet protection seriously, then we must conclude that public pressure forced the change of heart. Public consent with less than 1% of the population participating countered corporate lobbying because of the focused effort.
If less than 1% of the population could influence the FCC, imagine if 10% of the population put pressure on the "Justice" Department to indict bank execs and others that help facilitate financial crimes of that magnitude.
Figure out the how and why people challenged the FCC in mass, and try to duplicate that toward the Justice Department. My skepticism is starting to turn into optimism with this use of public consent to dictate the direction of government institutions. I believe that's what Democracy is suppose to look like.
chuckle8 - Money is not physical. It all started with the end of the gold standard in 1971. At that moment, money not only became not physical in itself, but had no physical surrogate. When I say money is not physical, I mean you can’t see it, touch it, send it, hold it or store it. Money is nothing more than an accounting notation. That dollar bill you have in your wallet is not money. It is a receipt from the federal government, saying the government owes the holder a dollar. In that sense it is similar to a check you might write, which tells your bank to credit the recipient’s account. Think of that dollar as like the title to your house. The title is not the house. The title merely states that you own the house. A dollar bill is just a “title” to an invisible, non-physical dollar. If you believe in Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) you would be correct regarding taxes. They believe you tax at the Federal level in order to control aggregate demand. As I said before we pay enough in taxes to State and Local Gov'ts which helps with agregate demand. If what you are worried about is inflation, then look to oil prices. Inflation in the US has been controlled for years via interest rates by The Fed. I'll also repeat what I said before, Federal Taxes pay for nothing. When you pay taxes, your bank account (Call it “Point A”) is debited, and the Treasury’s account (Call it “Point B”) is credited. There never is a time when money moves between Point A and Point B. That tax check you mail is just a set of instructions telling the federal government to debit your checking account and to credit it own account — which it just as well could do without your instructions. Similarly, when the federal government spends, it does not send money anywhere. It merely instructs banks to credit certain checking accounts, while it debits its own accounts. Simplified, the federal deficit is the difference between the credits to the “Taxes” account and the debits to the “Spending” account. And none of this adds to the so called "Federal Debt".
Be nice if we could sue our politicians or whoever for not doing their jobs. Or, maybe we can. Seems people sue the FEC all the time, which is how we wound up with Citizen's United. So why not sue the DOJ? Can it be done? Might get some attention by our media if someone did it.
I think we should sue our officials or not doing their Jobs. Their salaries should go back to the Government. HSNB should be sued for the money they cheated us (taxpayer) out of.
When the Economy fails due to their improprieties they should be the first to be stood up against the wall.
HSBC is run by asia
Although it has British origin
Asian moral precepts are not the same as those in the west
Hong Kong and Shaghai Bank has been allowed to become too large
As we will witness as china begins to dominate the geopolic sphere
Exactly the same series of events here in Denmark. The taxation authorities have known since 2010 and they too obviously turned a blind eye.
Too Big to FAIL = Break them up ..as we did AT & T NO monopolies. We are now a nation owned lock stock & barrel by Powerful Massive corps - Lobbyists - Billionaires - ( Kochs Rauners etc ) even foreign CO.'s. WE must Bring back Glass Steagal Veto Keystone XL Pipeline NO TPP End GATT Nafta CAFTA anti US trade deals .
Btw 1981 Reaganomics deregulation- 80's 'scam' of 'borrowing' from our SS trust fund ' to hide huge debt- 1986 total amnesty w- open borders- Reagans secret deaL with Iran - Selling guns to Iran contras ) to release our hostages as soon as Carter was Ouit of office - Reagan sworn in . It was PAYBACK FOR Irans GUN purchase. Check these fact if you care to Listen to Hartmann Goldman check out pbs news hour M-F 6-7 pm News NO BS .
Who wants answers???
Nobody I guess?!?!?!
This taxation issue is so easy to fix
Tax obligation should be applied to expenditure only with exemption for the retired, disabled and others as determined
End of!
kipopp -- That arcane, useless, waste of time law is why we have to pay taxes.
The only reason money came into existence 4000 years ago (which includes creating new dollars) is to pay for the commons. I think paying for the commons could be called taxes. I think creating new dollars without restraining it by the revenue taken in has always led to failed economies. One of those failed economies brought us Hitler.
Only little people pay taxes. They have to pay for the privilege of being enslaved by the rich.
One fact is not well known and that is that the U.S. created Islamic radicalism in the Eisenhouer era to fight the Soviet supported Arab nationalists like Abul Nassar and then the Soviets in Afghanistan.. There's a good story about this at Mother Jones http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2006/01/cold-war-holy-warrior
Thom's right though. To use violence offensively is almost always politically self defeating, look, for example, how 9/11 hurt the cause of radical Islam and the left - so much so that many people suspect it of having been an inside job by right wingers or the Mossad.
The only problem is most Americans approve of the of drone strikes. (What's a few dead Arabs? Only good one's a dead one you know ) Ob ama won't stop using drone attacks until the American people tell him in no uncertain terms that they don't want them and even if that means Al Quaeda has a safe haven in Pakistan or somewhere. Every president will be more afraid of the appearance of being soft on terrorism than the opprobrium of the Pakistanis - or any foreign people.
Thus the target of our campaigns against drone strikes must not be the president but the American people - who Noam Chomsky called "the most powerful political force in the world".
Apparently the star namers are back.
Do not pay to have a star named. It is a total scam. The reason they say it will be recorded in the copyright office is because anything printed in a book is copyrighted. But the names you buy are not official in any sense, and will not be recognized by the International Astronomical Union. Even astronomers are not allowed to name stars.
Reply to #16: Glorious, when?
Thanks, Tom. You've just helped me select the text for my new bumper sticker. it reads: "IT'S NOT OUR WAR!"
DTschak
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Thom - There is a great right wing argument for a minimum wage, I don't understand why you left wing talking heads ignore it. Makes me wonder if your part the scam. There is a cost of labor, it has nothing to do with profit or lose. That minimum cost is the minimum level of education, housing, food, healthcare and retirement. If the work each person does for 40 years doesn't cover those cost, then someone else has to. If the government is covering part of that cost for a working person, then that is not a free market, is is corporate welfare. If the pizza shop doesn't have enough profit to pay the cost of labor, it should go out of business and let a better business move in.
Another way to look at this, take away ALL subsidies to working people, no housing or food. See how quickly hungry and cold working people form unions and fix the problem themselves!
As one who grew up obsessed with butterflies, gathering their caterpillars to watch their life cycles in the comfort of my home and photographing them going through all their changes, I feel personally violated by what Monsanto has done to Monarchs. These magnificent creatures were very much a part of my life, and the news of their near-extinction feels like a sucker punch to my gut. We need to put Monsanto out of business! And if we can't learn how to live by nature's rules, we are all doomed. - AIW
Yes, Saudi Arabia needs to hunt down the monster they helped create, and David Koch should pay to dismantle the House of Representative's Frankenstein, the Tea-Party. It was Koch who provided the funding for the group that organized the Baggers....Americans for Prosperity. Like that will happen!
I do love a good extended literary metaphor. In the novel, the monster (ISIS, I guess), doesn't start off evil. He's actually very smart. But people treat him badly, so he rises to those standards. He's also physically superior to his creator. He brings that up to Dr. Frankenstein (Saudi Arabia?) many times, saying basically, "You can't kill me. You can't outrun me. You might as well talk to me."
Eventually the monster asks for only one thing in order to get him to leave everyone alone: a bride. So Dr. Frankenstein agrees to make another, female monster. But the doctor destroys that before it is complete.
Later on, the monster (ISIS?) succeeds in not only killing Dr. Frankenstein, but killing the people he loves and ruining his reputation.
Anyway, just thought I'd share. This novel is always fun to teach.