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To: regli who wrote (42952)	12/18/2005 12:58:19 PM
From: mishedlo	Respond to of 116555

Doha Success? globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Mish

To: regli who wrote (42952)	12/18/2005 2:37:40 PM
From: mishedlo	Respond to of 116555

Postal Inspectors Probe AmeriDebt Founder GERMANTOWN, Md. (AP) - Postal inspectors are investigating the business activities of the founder of AmeriDebt, the credit counseling firm accused of bilking thousands of debt-ridden customers, a postal spokesman said. The probe of Andris Pukke involves several organizations, including Pukke's firm DebtWorks and his brother's New York credit counseling agency called Debticated. Lou LaFleur, a postal inspector in New York, disclosed the investigation on Friday. He would not provide details. DebtWorks processed client accounts for credit counseling agencies, including AmeriDebt, a former Germantown company that was once one of the nation's largest credit counseling agencies. A Federal Trade Commission civil case against Pukke is scheduled for trial in January. The FTC alleges that AmeriDebt, a Germantown-based firm designed to help customers with heavy debt, charged hidden upfront costs and convinced customers the money was being used to pay down their debts. Regulators believe much of the $172 million in fees AmeriDebt collected was transferred to a for-profit company that Pukke controlled. The FTC claims he spent that money lavishly and tried to shield it from the commission, which hopes to use Pukke's assets to repay former AmeriDebt customers. A federal judge froze his assets earlier this year. Pukke's attorney, John Williams, did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment Saturday. channels.netscape.com

To: regli who wrote (42952)	12/18/2005 2:50:05 PM
From: mishedlo	Respond to of 116555

Covering Corn – We're All Doing It Wednesday, November 09, 2005 This year, the New York Times reports, both farmers and the federal government are covering corn at potentially record levels. Farmers are struggling to store this year's bountiful corn harvest, even buying massive tarps to cover mountains of corn that must be left outdoors. Leftover grain from last year and the two Gulf hurricanes have also hurt farmers. For their part, taxpayers will be sending farmers extra subsidy money to compensate for the low corn prices that resulted from the full harvest. EWG has tracked 10 years' worth of farm subsidies. Visitors to the site can view subsidy payments by name, town, zip code, county or congressional district at ewg.org.

To: regli who wrote (42952)	12/18/2005 3:01:50 PM
From: mishedlo	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116555

And the Constitution be damned? transcripts.cnn.com ROHRABACHER: No, that's not -- Bob, you haven't read this. No, that's not hypothetical at all. One of the cases that was involved in this, was someone who was attempting to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge and because of these wire taps, we were able to stop that. BARR: No, you're wrong there, Dana. First of all -- ROHRABACHER: And by the way, how do we know who wasn't deterred from blowing up other targets. The fact is -- BARR: Well, gee, I guess then the president should be able to ignore whatever provision in the Constitution as long as there's something after the fact that justifies it. ROHRABACHER: Bob, during wartime, you give some powers to the presidency you wouldn't give in peace time. BARR: Do we have a declaration of war, Dana?..........Well, the fact of the matter is that the Constitution is the Constitution, and I took an oath to abide by it. My good friend, my former colleague, Dana Rohrabacher, did and the president did. And I don't really care very much whether or not it can be justified based on some hypothetical. The fact of the matter is that, if you have any government official who deliberately orders that federal law be violated despite the best of motives, that certainly ought to be of concern to us. ROHRABACHER: ............you just have to make sure that the people of the United States understand that we are at war. They understand that al Qaeda slaughtered 3,000 of our citizens -- more people than the Japanese slaughtered at Pearl Harbor. BARR: Here again, this is absolutely a bizarre conversation where you have a member of Congress saying that it's okay for the president of the United States to ignore U.S. law, to ignore the Constitution, simply because we are in an undeclared war. The fact of the matter is the law prohibits -- specifically prohibits -- what apparently was done in this case, and for a member of Congress to say, oh, that doesn't matter, I'm proud that the president violated the law is absolutely astounding, ROHRABACHER: Not only proud, we can be grateful to this president. You know, I'll have to tell you, if it was up to Mr. Schumer, Senator Schumer, they probably would have blown up the Brooklyn Bridge. The bottom line is this: in wartime we expect our leaders, yes, to exercise more authority. Now, I have led the fight to making sure there were sunset provisions in the Patriot Act, for example. So after the war, we go back to recognizing the limits of government. But we want to put the full authority that we have and our technology to use immediately to try to thwart terrorists who are going to -- how about have a nuclear weapon in our cities? BARR: And the Constitution be damned, Dana?

To: regli who wrote (42952)	12/18/2005 3:10:12 PM
From: mishedlo	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116555

An impeachable offense The following list of articles and text compiled by Pituophis on the FOOL Looks like the country is buzzing with outrage over the revelation that Bush is illegally spying on Americans. I don't find the revelation particularly "stunning", as some of today's editorials describe it. What I do find somewhat stunning is the way that Bush arrogantly admits to it. The Huffington Post put together a list of editorals condemning Bush's criminal actions - a google finds many more. Democrats and Republicans are outraged at the way Bush has, so thoughtlessly and unilaterally, suspended the Bill of Rights. This is clearly an impeachable offense. ================================== LA Times: Bigger brother PRESIDENT BUSH WAS CAVALIER on Friday night when he told Jim Lehrer on PBS that a report about the National Security Agency eavesdropping on U.S. citizens was "not the main story of the day." He is entitled to his own news judgment, but it reveals a lot about his willingness to disregard constitutional safeguards and civil liberties while pursuing the war on terrorism. To the rest of us, the revelation in the New York Times that the National Security Agency has been eavesdropping on people within the United States without judicial warrants was stunning. In one of the more egregious cases of governmental overreach in the aftermath of 9/11, Bush secretly authorized the monitoring, without any judicial oversight, of international phone calls and e-mail messages from the United States. The news came on the same day that Congress voted not to extend controversial aspects of the soon-to-expire Patriot Act, and on the heels of disturbing reports that the Pentagon's shadowy Counterintelligence Field Activity office has been keeping tabs on domestic antiwar groups, including monitoring Quaker meetings, under the guise of protecting military installations. The program is reminiscent of official efforts to spy on antiwar groups in the 1960s.................... latimes.com ================================= Pittsburg post gazette: Big Brother Bush / The president took a step toward a police state ...........the idea of the Department of Defense maintaining files on American war protesters, perhaps with easy cross-reference to the NSA's records based on the results of their monitoring of phone calls and e-mails of potentially those same protesters, makes possible a very serious violation of Americans' civil rights. Without a serious leap of imagination, particularly with the list of those under surveillance not available to anyone outside the NSA and the Pentagon, it is also possible to project that political critics of the Bush administration could end up among those being tracked. The Nixon administration, a previous Republican administration beleaguered by war critics, maintained "enemies lists." The White House needs to tell the Pentagon promptly to destroy the records of protesters as required, within three months. It also needs promptly to tell the NSA to return to following the rules, to get the approval of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court before monitoring Americans' communications. The idea that all of this is being done to us in the name of national security doesn't wash; that is the language of a police state. Those are the unacceptable actions of a police state...................... post-gazette.com =================================== Washington Post: Spying on Americans ............As with its infamous torture memorandum, the administration appears to have taken the position that the president is entitled to ignore a clearly worded criminal law when it proves inconvenient in the war on terrorism. That argument is not as outlandish in the case of FISA as it is with respect to the torture laws, since administrations of both parties have always insisted on the executive's inherent power to conduct national security surveillance. Still, FISA has been the law of the land for 2 1/2 decades. To disrupt it so fundamentally, in total secret and without seeking legislative authorization, shows a profound disregard for Congress and the laws it passes. What's more, Mr. Bush's general assurances that the program is legal offer no indication of what legal authority, if any, permits this surveillance of what he described as "the international communications of people with known links to al Qaeda and related terrorist organizations." In the torture context, the administration abandoned the argument that the president could simply disregard laws prohibiting brutal interrogations and moved on to other legal theories. There is reason to think something similar has happened here. Does the administration now claim that warrantless surveillance of hundreds of people by an agency generally barred from domestic spying is consistent with FISA? Does it claim that the congressional authorization to use military force against al Qaeda somehow unties the president's hands? Other than claiming it has done nothing illegal, the administration is not saying. Congress must make the administration explain itself. In the aftermath of the revelations, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said hearings on the matter would be a high priority in the coming year. That's good. It should be unthinkable for Congress to acquiesce to such a fundamental change in the law of domestic surveillance, particularly without a substantive account of what the administration is doing and why............. washingtonpost.com ====================================== NY Times: This Call May Be Monitored ... nytimes.com Kansas City Star: Surveillance puts rights at risk kansascity.com Denver Post: Domestic liberties require protection denverpost.com more: huffingtonpost.com boards.fool.com

To: regli who wrote (42952)	12/19/2005 10:24:24 PM
From: shades	Respond to of 116555

Which currency should it hold alongside gold? What is the function of these reserves? Black gold? Regli - when you pull up to the gas station to fill your gas tank - and when you turn on your heat or AC in your house and power up your stereo or TV - you want it all to work smoothly and efficiently - do you really care who has the most metal molecules in a vault somewhere? I think keynes made the point that trading gold in and out of central bank vaults across lines on a map would act as a mechanism that when a nation no longer was productive - they would have to "get on the ball" again and PRODUCE to stay in the game of life. He lived in an era where he saw men shoot each others heads off - because that is easy - rather than upping the ante in global trade with new goods and services like bhagwati is certain will continue happening today. This makes sense from an elementary level - you don't want your fat kid sitting around sucking down the hamburgers while he watches sponge bob all day and never does anything - you want him to PRODUCE and make the world better. This same concept applies to patents - the logic being exclusive rights gives the incentive to people to PRODUCE thereby in time giving us all a better world. I have seen that good idea twisted and turned into the backs of the citizens it was supposed to serve however. Keynes probably thought - hmmm - it doesn't do much for the poor working suckers in china or africa if they just keep producing and producing and fatboy westerner sucks down the efforts of thier labor and never gets off his bottom save for the occassional macy's trip - but that is what we have Regli - that is the way it is - and gold is not going to change that as keynes hoped - we have a military that protects oil platforms - like that fat kid bully in the sand box - he didn't have to trade you peanut butter sandwiches for your bologna ones - he knocked you and that other geek upside the head and took both sandwiches for no productive effort of his own. Honest gold policies advanced by keynes would take the worthless shopping machines we have in this country - refuse to give them all those 600 dollar jeans they pay for from china unless they did something useful for the world too - but its so much easier for her husband to go over to IRAQ and shoot some people than for him to come up with a new idea or product that makes the world better for us all no? New ideas and products are hard - violence is easy eh? I just read the Mogambo Guru again: 321gold.com The only guys who are NOT rushing around in panic are the guys who have taken possession of physical gold bullion. They know EXACTLY where their gold is, and we have enough firepower to keep it, too. And one of these days real soon there will be lots and lots of guys who will ring our doorbells ("ding dong!") and who will say things like "Please please please PLEASE PLEASE please please sell me some of your gold!" and who want to buy it at absurdly high prices. And if you are buying gold right now, then one day that will be YOUR doorbell ringing, and you can decide for yourself if you will sell them a little of your gold for some big, BIG money, or chase them off with a mighty shotgun blast and your laughter ringing in their ears. Now I think the mogambo doesn't realize that if his scenario even partly materializes - those guys knocking at the door will not be BEGGING PLEASE - they will have ar15's trained on his head and his shotgun is not going to do much for him. See Regli its like this, if you didn't build carnivore or star one or whatever - there are so many millions of citizens in your place willing to do so. If you didn't go over to iraq and protect oil platforms and run nukular subs - there are a lot of citizens that are willing to do so. If you are not about putting an ar15 in mr. mogambos face to protect the system - there are so many others that are - and gold just doesn't matter in that reality - never did.