WELCOME HOME CREW OF THE 'SPIRIT OF HUMANITY'!

BEHOLD THE DAY OF FREEDOM!

There's a big difference between inventory-driven recessions and credit-driven recessions. An inventory recession is caused by a mismatch between supply and demand. It's the result of overcapacity and under-utilization which can only work itself out over time as inventories are pared back and demand builds. Credit-driven recessions are a different story altogether. They typically last twice as long as and can precipitate financial crises. The current recession is a severe credit bust of Depression-era magnitude.

A couple of months ago, we also learned through Zero Hedge that Goldman had profited greatly from a sweetheart deal with the federal government concerning a new program instituted by the Feds known as "The Supplemental Liquidity Provider" Program ("SLP"), launched this past Thanksgiving, which was supposed to provide "market liquidity" (i.e.: an ongoing, active market) for selected groups of 500 different NYSE stocks per SLP participant. As Durden pointed out to all who were interested, it certainly appeared to him that Goldman was the only active participant in the program.

The Tel Aviv police fraud squad arrested on Sunday nine Israelis on suspicion of netting millions of dollars from U.S. pensioners in a so-called Nigerian scam.

Vice President Joe Biden said the Obama administration "misread how bad the economy was" but stands by its stimulus package and believes the plan will create more jobs as the pace of its spending picks up.

The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government—a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF’s staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent a true depression, we’re running out of time.

The June employment report suggests that the alleged ‘green shoots’ are mostly yellow weeds that may eventually turn into brown manure.

“The truth is, we and everyone else misread the economy,” confessed Bide

The country’s infrastructure has been for sale for 17 years. Roads, tunnels, bridges, electricity supply facilities, mass transit, rail transportation, airports, ports, waterways, water supply facilities, recycling/wastewater facilities, solid waste facilities, prisons, hospitals, schools, and housing -- this being of “examples” of saleable infrastructure and not the entire list of saleable items according to E.O. 12803--so the question begs: What exactly has been sold to “private parties in our nation? We would like to see the complete list. We know that many highway systems have been sold to foreign countries, but what of the other listed items? Have they been sold as well?

Mortgage defaults have surged to record levels amid rising unemployment and falling home prices. Lenders are expected to move quickly to clear up backlogs as moratoriums on foreclosures expire.

Odious debts are defined as those debts incurred by the state which are not for the needs or interest of the state but merely to strengthen the state's despotic power as well as to repress the population that fights against despotism.

We have the Obama stimulus plan, which aims to create 3 ½ million jobs by late next year. That’s much better than nothing, but it’s not remotely enough. And there doesn’t seem to be much else going on. Do you remember the administration’s plan to sharply reduce the rate of foreclosures, or its plan to get the banks lending again by taking toxic assets off their balance sheets? Neither do I.

All of this is depressingly familiar to anyone who has studied economic policy in the 1930s. Once again a Democratic president has pushed through job-creation policies that will mitigate the slump but aren’t aggressive enough to produce a full recovery. Once again much of the stimulus at the federal level is being undone by budget retrenchment at the state and local level.

Credit card companies are raising interest rates and fees seven months before new rules go into effect that will limit their ability do so, much to the irritation of Congress and consumer advocates.

Regulators shut down John Warner Bank of Clinton, Ill.; First State Bank of Winchester in Winchester, Ill.; Rock River Bank of Oregon, Ill.; Elizabeth State Bank of Elizabeth, Ill.; Danville, Ill.-based The First National Bank of Danville; Founders Bank of Worth, Ill.; and Dallas-based Millennium State Bank of Texas, bringing the number of U.S. bank failures this year to 52.

Six Illinois banks and one bank in Texas were shuttered Thursday as government regulators proposed new rules for private equity firms seeking to take over failed banks.

That's more than double the 25 which failed in all of 2008 and the three closed in 2007. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was appointed receiver of all seven. The total cost to the Deposit Insurance Fund from the seven closings will be $314.3 million, the FDIC said.

A corporation is not a person. It is an abstraction: an organizational structure that feels no remorse and has no morality, no life, no soul. Yet the modern corporation – still just an arbitrary legal entity – enjoys the same rights as you or I. It has the right to free speech, to own property, to lobby government officials and protect against self-incrimination.

"Rich get richer, poor get poorer, families on the street, govt doesn't care. God bless the usa, but can He save it?"

"This market continues to be propped up by government intervention and manipulation."

No, really?!

By the way, market manipulation is illegal.

Of course when you own the police force you can do whatever you damn well please, right?
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The controversial climate bill that is set to be taken up by the Senate on Monday after its passage in the House will legislate home inspections by government regulators who will demand to audit every aspect of your property under the threat of substantial and repeated fines if their visits are denied or their demands not satisfied.

The $787 billion U.S. economic stimulus package may not be able to live up to lofty expectations, painting President Barack Obama into a policy corner once the money runs out.

With only a little under 7 percent of the stimulus actually paid out so far, it is a bit early to try to measure success. However, the White House is already fielding questions about whether another spending package will be needed.

An economy bigger than Russia, Brazil, Canada, India or Spain is in imminent risk of defaulting on its debts.

Which nation am I talking about?

Not a country . . . but the state of California.

A senior Bank of England official today compared the banking system over the last 20 years to the South Sea bubble of the early 18th century and said bankers had merely "resorted to the roulette wheel" to keep up with each other.

Goldman Sachs has played a crucial role in creating every market bubble since the 1920s -- and has profited from not only the bubbles, but from the crash that followed as well, says a new expose in Rolling Stone magazine.

An article in the July 9-23 issue of the magazine, written by Matt Taibbi, lists five asset bubbles that the 140-year-old investment bank helped create -- and one that Taibbi asserts the firm is currently working to make happen.

The numbers are staggering and are aggregates of official data. They matter because various Obama administration officials including the President himself started off calling for huge stimulus packages to help generate "jobs, jobs, jobs!"

But now, I have been hearing more and more from senior Obama economic team members about the jobs they hoped for coming at the very tail end of an economic recovery. Others are talking about a GDP recovery -- but not a jobs recovery. They are admitting as well that they underestimated the severity of this recession and its impact on unemployment levels.

And all this while Goldman Sachs and other financial houses have seen their balance sheets get cleaned up and bonuses surge.

U.S. employers cut far more jobs than expected last month and the unemployment rate hit a nearly 26-year high of 9.5 percent, underscoring the likelihood of a long and slow recovery from recession.

The eurozone unemployment rate climbed to a 10-year high of 9.5 percent in May, official European Union data shows.

Some 273,000 people lost their jobs across the eurozone in May, bringing the number of out of work individuals to 15.013 million -- a rate not recorded since May 1999.

An investigator at the Securities and Exchange Commission warned superiors as far back as 2004 about irregularities at Bernard L. Madoff's financial management firm, but she was told to focus on an unrelated matter, according to agency documents and sources familiar with the investigation.

President Obama's administration is spending massive amounts of taxpayer money on subsidizing the new jobs with the assumption they will more than replace employment sure to be eliminated by carbon taxes, cap-and-trade legislation and other limits on traditional industry.

But Washington might want to examine an ominous warning from Spain, an early pioneer in pursuing the theory of "green jobs."

According to economics professor Gabriel Calzada of King Juan Carlos University in Madrid, the Spanish government's renewable energy initiatives have destroyed 2.2 jobs for every new "green" job created.

The arrest of financier Bernard Madoff Thursday for operating a "Ponzi scheme" costing investors $50 billion made the TV network news. Curiously, a lawsuit the same day against Clinton Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin for defrauding Citibank shareholders of more than $122 billion, also described as a "Ponzi scheme," got no airplay whatsoever.

While acknowledging that Madoff’s decision to plead guilty and cooperate with investigators seeking to unravel his schemes would ordinarily count in his favor, Chin underscored the political reasons for imposing the maximum sentence possible under the law. Madoff’s fraud had left his victims “doubting our financial institutions” as well as “our government’s ability to regulate,” he said.

In the mid-60s, a golden generation of highly trained whizz kids was pouring out of American universities with PhDs in maths, engineering and chemistry. "It was the generation that went on to drive the development of silicon valley in the 1970s," says Dave Parker, director of the British National Space Centre. "And those people made the moon landing happen."

In softer form, it's what former US diplomat, advisor, father of Soviet containment, and dove compared to others at that time George Kennan believed should be America's post-WW II foreign policy. In his February 1948 "Memo PPS23, he stated:

However, as I noted, there's no reason for anyone to pay that if they have good collateral to post at the discount window, given that you can do so for 1/10th or less the price.

Keep your nose to the ground and your eyes open.

Someone (or more than one someone) is in trouble.

The Fed (which is not even a government agency, but rather a private corporation consisting of mostly foreign bankers and answers to no one) dictates America's financial policies and is the obvious conduit for the banking elite to control the financial world and, in particular, the New World Order.

As states grappling with budget shortfalls try to force Amazon.com Inc. to collect sales tax, the online retail giant is systematically retaliating. The latest target is Hawaii. Amazon sent a note to its Hawaii-based affiliates informing them they will no longer earn commissions starting Tuesday.

The company is cutting off affiliates in states that are trying to classify Seattle-based Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) as a physical retailer — required to collect sales tax — based on its connection to locally based affiliates.

Gov. Linda Lingle has until Tuesday to inform the Legislature of her intent to veto House Bill 1405, or until July 15 to sign it or let it become law without her signature.

The law would go into effect July 1.

In a move set to infuriate and send many Zero Hedge readers over the top, the NYSE has taken action to make sure that nobody will henceforth be able to keep track of the complete dominance that Goldman Sachs exerts over the New York Stock Exchange. This basically ends our weekly Program Trading updates disclosed every Thursday indicating that Goldman has singlehandedly captured all of NYSE's program trading.

As many as one in five U.S. hotel may default on their loans by the end of 2010 as the recession forces companies to spend less on travel and perks, according to Kenneth Rosen, an economist at the University of California.

The value of hotel properties in default or foreclosure almost doubled to $17.3 billion in the second quarter through June 24 from $9 billion at the end of the first quarter, data compiled by Real Capital Analytics Inc. show. The New York-based research firm, which began tracking distressed commercial property in November, expects hotel defaults to increase by as much as $2 billion next quarter, said analyst Jessica Ruderman.

Citigroup Inc has increased interest rates on up to 15 million U.S. credit card accounts just months before curbs on such rises come into effect, the Financial Times reported citing people close to the situation.

Citigroup had upped rates on 13 million to 15 million credit cards it co-brands with retailers such as Sears, the paper said.

Only five months after Inauguration Day, the focus of Washington's economic and domestic policy is already shifting. This reflects the emergence of much larger budget deficits than anyone expected. Indeed, federal deficits may average a stunning $1 trillion annually over the next 10 years. This worsened outlook is stirring unease on Main Street and beginning to reorder priorities for President Barack Obama and the Democratic congressional leadership. By 2010, reducing the deficit will become their primary focus.

On June 24, the World Trade Organization announced an upwardly revised estimation of how much world trade will contract in 2009. The organization’s March estimate predicted a record contraction of 9 percent by volume. The current estimate is negative 10 percent or greater. Announcing the revision as a “huge drop,” WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy told Reuters TV, “I’m afraid I can’t read any good news in my trade numbers.”

THE Queen is seeking the first increase in the annual civil list for nearly 20 years to plug a looming £5m-a-year funding gap for the royal household.

Palace officials have told the Treasury they need the dramatic rise to the £7.9m grant because they are exhausting their cash reserves and cannot make further cuts in spending.

The demand is likely to pitch the palace into political controversy. Ministers have rejected earlier appeals for extra funds towards the upkeep of the royal palaces.

Congressman Ron Paul gives the latest exciting news on his legislation to audit the Federal Reserve and explains the possible next steps for the bill.

Shouldn’t we have a Financial Branch of government? A group of fiscal experts entirely devoted to keeping the US’s fiscal house in order?

Well, we actually do, but instead of installing a branch of smart, genuine financiers interested in benefiting the American people, we installed a bunch of greedy crooks intent on stealing as much of the public’s money as possible with no consequences what so ever.

Ladies and Gentleman, I present to you America’s Financial Branch of the Government: Goldman Sachs.

Sen. Daniel K. Inouye's staff contacted federal regulators last fall to ask about the bailout application of an ailing Hawaii bank that he had helped to establish and where he has invested the bulk of his personal wealth.

Ruth Madoff is in the clear -- for now.

Ruth will not be prosecuted for the massive Ponzi scheme that won her husband Bernard Madoff a 150-year prison sentence, sources told The Post yesterday.

Bernard Madoff, sentenced to a prison term six times longer than those given the chief executives of WorldCom Inc. and Enron Corp., will likely serve his time in a harsher prison than those white-collar inmates.

Sentenced to 150 years, Madoff will probably be sent to a medium- or high-security prison, probably in the northeastern U.S, according to lawyers and prison consultants. Even worse for Madoff, fellow inmates serving life sentences may want “to make a name for themselves” by harming the ex-money manager, a former inmate said. The Federal Bureau of Prisons, which will decide where he’s jailed, may isolate Madoff to protect him from other prisoners.

So Madoff got 150 years. Best interview I’ve heard on this was with an ex-con named Larry Levine, who now evidently does big business consulting with other white collar criminals on their time inside the Big House. He paints a chilling picture of what Madoff can expect inside:

Delinquency rates on the least-risky mortgages more than doubled in the first quarter from a year earlier as U.S. efforts to help homeowners failed to keep pace with job losses that pushed more borrowers toward foreclosure.

The American taxpayer was going to make money on the investments in assets related to Bear Stearns, AIG, Citigroup, Bank of America, ad nauseum, correct?

To cover the loss of manufacturing jobs, our government has invented the catch phrase "service economy". This is the idiotic notion that we don't need to actually sell manufactured products; that we can grow and prosper our nation by doing each other's laundry for a fee. To conceal the loss of manufacturing jobs, the government has legislated into existence thousands upon thousands of useless paper-shuffling jobs, and declared their necessity by fiat. The most obvious is the income tax which has been so obfuscated by the government that half of you had to rely on an outside expert to figure out just what all those incomprehensible words really meant.

History is repeating . . . Sound money is again being trashed, which is causing the collapse of the American empire.

Fannie Mae reported a steep increase in the percentage of home mortgages with overdue payments.

The government-backed mortgage investor said in a monthly summary released Monday that 3.42% of the single-family mortgages it owns or guarantees were 90 days or more delinquent in April, up from 3.15% a month before.

Fannie's main rival, Freddie Mac, reported last week that its single-family delinquency rate for May was 2.62%, up from 2.44% in April.

Reporting from Indianapolis and Denver -- The last time Indiana missed its deadline for passing a budget and had to shut down the government was during the Civil War.

But on Monday, as lawmakers raced to hammer out an agreement over school funding, state agencies began preparing 31,000 workers to be temporarily out of a job. Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels has warned residents that most of the state's services -- including its parks, the Bureau of Motor Vehicles and state-regulated casinos -- would be shuttered unless a budget is passed today.

Indiana is one of five states -- along with Arizona, California, Mississippi and Pennsylvania -- bracing for possible shutdowns this week as time runs out for lawmakers to close billion-dollar gaps in their fiscal 2010 budgets.

It is inaccurate to call the current slump a “recession”, which suggests a mismatch between supply and demand that is part of the normal business cycle. In truth, the economy has stumbled into a multi-trillion dollar capital hole that was created by the reckless actions of the nation’s largest financial institutions. The banks blew up the system and now the country has slipped into a depression.

American International Group Inc (AIG.N) revised its 2008 annual report to add a new risk factor that shows it may recognize valuation losses on a credit default swap (CDS) portfolio held by its troubled financial products unit.

Signs that home prices may have bottomed have stirred hope on Wall Street that the economy is on the mend, yet tight credit and a new foreclosure wave cast doubt on any looming housing revival.

Sales of previously owned U.S. homes rose for a second straight month in May, realty data on Tuesday showed, while the U.S. government and Federal Reserve have designed a number of programs to alleviate a battered housing market.

Unfortunately, when it comes to the pathological and the mentally deranged, the specter of a stiff prison sentence serves as zero deterrent. The streets are littered with evil predators searching for their next victims. It's best we know that and not fall into a false sense of security because, "Phew! Bernie's in jail!"

The problem with sticking it to business in these three major ways is that, ultimately, business doesn't get stuck. Tax-wise, a company is just a bunch of incorporation papers; all taxes are paid by people -- customers, shareholders and employees. And guess who would bear most of the burden of these tax increases? It's the U.S. employees of the companies being taxed.

Research has shown that when business taxes are raised by a dollar, 70 to 92 cents comes out of employees' pay. When workers wake up to that fact, they may decide this is one time they don't want the White House beating up on business.

Look, we can rant and rave about market manipulation and government-sponsored games. We can petition the SEC, the FBI and Congress. We can demand that they stop it all we want.

But they haven't and likely won't until and unless America gets pissed off enough to force them to act.

So how do we make that happen, yet remain within the law?

Its not that hard, and in the intermediate and longer-term it would be incredibly positive for our economy and nation.

We go on a consumption strike until and unless our demands are met.

"Dr. David Bronner, CEO of the Alabama Retirement Systems, the 43rd largest investment fund in America, spoke at Rotary Club here yesterday. He is one of the most respected fund controllers in the United States today by his peers.

Bronner had the following to say: