Just a couple of quick thoughts. Firstly, the bailout funds for Greece are not going to put a single penny in the pocket of the Greek people. They are yet further transfers of taxpayers’ money from working people to rich bankers, who again are becoming rich on the basis of obviously impractical investments they made, this time in outlandish Greek government debt.
The EU now makes an evidently sensible proposal for a transaction tax on inter bank dealings – which would raise back from the bankers some tiny proportion of the money we have given them, and discourage a tiny bit multiple gambling transactions. What is truly scarey is the fact that the wealthy, who are taking our money, have the media so tied up in the UK, that the broadcast media condemned this as comprehensively and without question as a party line was reflected under Stalin. I watched many hours of news from mainstream channel to channel, and every person the BBC or Sky interviewed gave a ludicrously apocalyptic warning of the effect of this small measure. Not one supporter was brought on – even though it is a very highly supported measure among economists.
I have said it before, but democracy in the UK is now a complete charade. Our money is sucked away to the elite, and there is no media freedom to reach a mass audience with any view counter to the governing elite, even one supported by nearly every other government in Europe.
City’s influence over Conservatives laid bare by research into donations
Donations from finance account for half of payments to Tories since 2010 general election
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Read the Bureau of Investigative Journalism’s report {http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2011/09/30/hedge-funds-financiers-and-private-equity-tycoons-make-up-27-of-tory-funding/}
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Rajeev Syal, Jill Treanor and Nick Mathiason
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/sep/30/city-conservatives-donations
Abbas is punished by $200m cut in aid from US
Congress makes Palestinians pay for seeking UN recognition
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By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem
Saturday, 1 October 2011
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The United States Congress has blocked nearly $200m in aid for the Palestinians, threatening projects such as food aid, health care, and support for efforts to build a functioning state.
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The decision to delay the payments runs counter to the wishes of the Obama administration and reflects Congressional anger at Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s so far unrealised pursuit of Fatah-Hamas reconciliation and statehood recognition at the UN.
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Related articles
We are the victims of collective punishment, say Palestinians
Leading article: Unjust punishment of the Palestinians
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The freezing of the funds, which were to have been dispersed in the US fiscal year that ends today, is the most tangible sign yet of the seriousness of Congressional leaders’ threats of an even wider halt to funding in the coming year if Mr Abbas continues with his actions at the UN. It was strongly condemned yesterday by the Palestinian Authority.
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There have been persistent demands in Congress to withhold up to $600m – the average amount given by the US in bilateral assistance to the West Bank and Gaza every year since 2008 – in the next financial year over the issue.
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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/abbas-is-punished-by-200m-cut-in-aid-from-us-2363976.html
“Giving It All Away”
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Craig, you are wrong, the governments of the USA, EU, UK, are not “Giving It All Away”. They are in FACT getting paid (one way or another) vast sums to commit fraud on the whole peoples of the world. They have employed a vast array of tactics to gain the wealth of the planet. They have bought 99% of the politicians and invoke real fear in any that stand in their way. They own the mainstream media, and have many far rght wing bloggers on the web.
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I care not what anyone says, this whole vast right wing revolution to have taken on such as it has, MUST have been planned out with surgical precision decades ago. I now have just one thought on my mind…What is their end game for us ?.
I agree Mary – getting into bed with Gail Lese to undermine the the British people’s NHS has struck another link (although tentative) to the ‘sub rosa’ activities being painted on the ‘New World Order’ canvas in much the same way as Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen, has been assassinated without trial, by the ‘Emperor’s’ flying murder machines in complete disregard for the American Constitution.
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Without any doubt we realise President Obama was ‘taken out of the box’ to continue and advance American hegemony and power.
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The Arab Spring is of course a set-back to the American elites plan to dominate, conquer and control. The ‘Islamic Awakening’ is an attempt by Iran to retain resistance after a US/Israeli strike on her, intended to halt increasing energy supplies to China. Iraq and now Libya have been subdued and are now under American control forcing China to rethink her progression. To protect the American dollar we are witnessing another ‘sub rosa’ attempt to crash the Euro, so weak now recovery has become impossible without several Euro trillions of bail-out.
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America is out of control and even the EU cannot and will not interrupt her forty year plan.
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Before a strike can take place on Iran, the ‘New World’ war rooms are planning in my opinion to neutralise Pakistan’s nuclear capability, hence the many drone strikes near and over the Pakistan border with Afghanistan. In another area and as part of the plan appeasement towards Russia in the form of $billions set aside for so called replenishment of the space station is happening right now. Vladimir Putin will bargain for Russia’s rightful place in this ‘New World’ madness.
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Public opinion in all this is of course irrelevant, inconsequential and insignificant; we, the people are not soldiers and even two million marching against the Iraq war and a hundred thousand in Egypt, Yemen and Bahrain can be contained by either military might or terror from false-flag operations.
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The world is moving in the wrong direction and we have to be prepared to reverse that or leave generations under Orwell’s predictions.
Indoors away from the heat and watching old clips of the elegant couple Astaire and Rogers. The first lines of the second verse of Let’s Face the Music and Dance seems apposite for the present times –
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Before the fiddlers have fled
Before they ask us to pay the bill
And while we still
Have the chance
Let’s face the music and dance
“Vladimir Putin will bargain for Russia’s rightful place in this ‘New World’ madness.”
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Even if Putin does not want Russia to be apart of this “‘New World’ madness”, he has no choice in it at all. There are MANY very powerful people in Russia who are already an integral part and are members of this “‘New World’ madness”, along with these two.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/georgeosborne/4903011/George-Osborne-Visit-to-Russian-Yacht-with-Mandelson-a-mistake.html
@Simon (30 Sep)
“Blaming the banks, bond markets or rating agencies for the crisis in Europe is every bit as barmy […]”
US banks helped Greece and Italy hide their true level of debt by devising cross currency swaps at FICTIONAL exchange rates.
Source: http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,676634,00.html
Anon,
Are you too stupid to read the article rather than just the headline? It is the people who are giving it all the way, the the bankers, coerced or duped by the puppet politicians.
Come on! Just give ’em the money. Heck it’s only paper. Actually not even that.
The only difference between Britain and Greece, as far as solvency is concerned, is that Britain has its own currency that it can print ad lib, whereas the Greeks, stupidly, joined the Euro and then borrowed their brains out in Euros, which they are not allowed to print.
The people who should be punished are the damn-fool bankers who bought crap Greek bonds. I mean who’d trust a Greek bearing bonds?
What’s needed is laws to prevent bankers controlling politicians with two-million-pound-a-year pay-offs on leaving office.
The best thing would be to elect some independents to Parliament who would impeach the crooked bastards and have them sent to the Tower for beheading as in the good old days.
Giving what all away to whom? Get real, Craig – you’d have to be native to buy this shite!
Jobcentres to send poor and hungry to charity food banks:
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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jobcentres-to-send-poor-and-hungry-to-charity-food-banks-2356578.html
…snd it’s a Christian run charity. Great- no doubt followed by a surge of stupidity- just when I thought the human race was getting somewhere. Here we are again…
Craig – talking about the meek acceptance of the elite’s talking points, it was mentioned in the Radio-4 news this morning that people no longer can be forced to retire at 65, and this was a Good Thing, because people lived much longer now. Further, it explained that people lived on average 30 years longer than they did 100 years ago.
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They found themselves with insufficient time to point out that infant mortality was vastly higher 100 years ago, or that dying of old age struck people at about the same age then as it does now. Nobody bothered to say that, if one lived until retirement age instead of dying pretty early on, that also means they have spent a lifetime -paying into the system- as well as collecting a pension.
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Back to your transaction tax, the STET or Tobin tax, it would prevent massive churning in the market to artificially make ramps and dips for the big players to long and short sell over, very often in terms of seconds or less. Anyone not knowing what I’m on about and interested, please say and I’ll elaborate – but this is a huge part of our market instability, why the little guy has no chance at all, and why such massive amounts are being skimmed out of the system.
It’s a miracle that this man has not been blown to pieces like Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen.
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Afghanistan Haqqani militant Haji Mali Khan captured
The other main Haqqani figures are Jalaluddin Haqqani and his sons Siraj and Badruddin
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A senior leader of the militant Haqqani network, Haji Mali Khan, has been captured in Afghanistan, the Nato-led international force Isaf has said.
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He was detained during an operation by Afghan and coalition forces in Paktia province on Tuesday, Isaf said.
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He was heavily armed but did not resist, it added.
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/…http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-15136007
Clark. This too.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/oct/01/families-queue-for-food-handouts
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Do you think that these articles are being put in the corporate media as some kind of conditioning to make those in need to accept food handouts as being the norm in future and that benefits are going to be drastically reduced or even stopped?
Craig, No, I am not the one that is “too stupid”, if I were I would have joined the Lib Dems and then moved onto the SNP. The bankers are just greedy, they do what bankers do, make money!, that is their job, I don`t blame them. What did you expect them to do when deregulation happened and fueled the financial crisis, of course there is much more to it then that. What you have just said…”It is the people who are giving it all the way” applies to you, not me, remind me again, who did YOU ask people to vote for at the last election!!!. Yes, I did read the whole article, you are wrong in saying “Giving It All Away”, it should read…Being taken all away. How can the people be “Giving It All Away” when there is no choice on offer, a three (in truth a one) party state is all that is on offer.
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Indeed, if you read your post to me, you agree with what I wrote, you said…”puppet politicians”, so you see, that to be “puppet politicians” they must have strings, so who is pulling their strings, that is one of the points I was making in my post!. I have to say, your reply to me doesn`t make any sense, you wrote it because I said you were wrong, and you once again are wrong, add it to a long list of YOU being politically wrong. I wonder which party you will move onto when the SNP let you down Craig, you know, like the Lib Dems did.
“Jobcentres to send poor and hungry to charity food banks”
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Yes, the tories have been talking about this for awhile, part of “Cameron`s Big Society”. They will be giving well out of date cans by the supermarkets, distributed from church halls and delivered by unpaid volunteers. Of course the volunteers will be given torches to find their way around the woods to find the sick and disabled and the unemployed living under plastic bags and discarded torn tarpaulins. This due to the tories taken all their money from them and then doubling council house rents to £140.00 per week (thats another tory plan in the pipeline).
Re: “Firstly, the bailout funds for Greece are not going to put a single penny in the pocket of the Greek people.”
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Actually, they are supposed to take many pennies out of the pockets of the Greek people.
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The bailout funds would provide long-term loans to enable the Greek Government to pay off shorter term loans that are coming due; the capacity to pay off the long-term loans being achieved by the implementation of severe austerity measures.
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Without a bailout, Greece would default leaving the Greek people free of the stupid debts run up by corrupt governments promising all good things to everyone equally, as in the UK (e.g., many years screwing around at uni at public expense to be followed by useless white collar government jobs generating non-functional income).
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Either way, the cost of Greece’s insane policy of borrowing money it cannot repay will be transferred to citizens, mainly Germans, throughout the Eurozone. In the event of a default, money will have to be raised to bail out the banks that lent the money they knew the Greeks could not repay.
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If there’s no default, the money raised will be used to push repayment of the loans into the far-distant future where no Greek politician will give it a thought. In other words, its default now or default later. Better sooner than later.
Craig, Their is an excellent article on Euro finances by Dr Tarpley on
tarpley.net
But whatever the outcome, the banks that lent what the Greeks could not pay should suffer without limit, i.e., they should be allowed to go bankrupt, if necessary. As it is, their shares are rocketing up on the expectation of a bailout agreement.
From Mary’s link:
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“There are around 13 million people in Britain living in poverty, which is defined as earnings of 60% of the national average. Of those, four million are suffering nutritionally related consequences. And the big new group who are really suffering are working families.”
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This is stupid! There is NO shortage of wealth, just huge inequality. Go to the local recycling centre, and look at the stacks and stacks of tellys, computers, and slightly malfunctioning domestic appliances. Look at the bins full of two year old mobile ‘phones. Look outside homes in better-off areas, and see all the skips, full from refitting. Look at all the flashy high-street chain stores.
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This government is losing it. Idiots. People will not take this forever. Four million (and rising) hungry, angry people are a force to be reckoned with.
Off topic: Richard Stallman cites Murder in Samarkand in the Guardian (paragraph 17):
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-free-software-stallman?INTCMP=SRCH
“There is NO shortage of wealth”
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Correct, but 13 million people have no means of getting any because neither they nor anyone in their family is worth employing at reasonable wage.
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Why?
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Because jobs are being off-shored to places such as China where the average wage is about one quid an hour.
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So unless you are proposing to have ca. 20% of the population permanently on welfare at a rate in excess of 60% of the national average earnings, you have to come up with a scheme to bring back the jobs.
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What do you propose?
Meantime, of course, jobs at less than 60% of national average earnings are going in many cases to the millions of legal and illegal immigrants from poor countries to whom 60% of national average earnings look OK. In fact, many immigrants are probably in the underground economy, getting less than minimum wage and paying not tax.
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So for a start, I’d end mass immigration and require the illegals to leave.
Alfred Are you talking about Canada or the UK?
Some of the NY protesters having been pepper sprayed earlier by a NYPD cop Anthony Bologna, aka Tony Baloney, hundreds have now been arrested and charged. The evil M-Pyres do not like and will not tolerate protest or dissent. I say Pyres because they will inevitably collapse and burn to ashes.
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2 October 2011
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Hundreds of Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested
Demonstrator Henry-James Ferry (not pictured): “‘The police moved in with orange mesh barricade”
{Continue reading the main story
US EconomyHow did the US debt get so bad?
US: From boom to bust explained Watch
Could US stagnate like Japan?
US economic growth rate at 1.3%}
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More than 700 people from the Occupy Wall Street protest movement have been arrested on New York’s City’s Brooklyn Bridge, police say.
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They were part of a larger group crossing the bridge from Manhattan, where they have been camped out near Wall Street for two weeks.
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Some entered the bridge’s roadway and were met by a large police presence and detained, most for disorderly conduct.
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The loosely-organised group is protesting against corporate greed.
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They say they are defending 99% of the US population against the wealthiest 1%.
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Occupy Wall Street called for 20,000 people to “flood into lower Manhattan” on 17 September and remain there for “a few months
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-15140671
“Not Red Ed”
http://williambowles.info/2011/09/30/labouring-under-an-illusion-by-william-bowles/
“What do you propose?”
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Socialism or Barbarism, your choice, there no others.
Thanks Mary and Clark for putting the facts in plain sight which will go viral in the UK. Seeds of dissent have been sown and I await the inevitable massive increase in membership of this UK group supporting our friends across the pond:
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http://www.facebook.com/groups/221094241283802/
Canspeccy, well, I’m no expert, but shorter working hours and not raising the retirement age could help; the UK has long hours compared to Europe, spread the work around a bit. Rather than cutting the public sector so much, the extravagantly paid consultancy jobs could go, and fund more people actually doing stuff. The rich could be taxed a bit more, and corporations could be made to pay their proper share. Oh yes, devalue the GB Pound; imports would fall, exports would rise, manufacturing would increase and the UK wouldn’t be so attractive to immigrants. Reduce the effective 67%+ tax rate implemented through housing benefit to encourage employment, support part-time work, offer horrible jobs on a one-day-a-week mix-and-match basis rather than all-or-nothing, to make such work less soul-destroying, and stop wasting so much stuff… You know, various, assorted, doesn’t look too hard really, that’s why I call them “idiots”.