U.S. Special Forces Will Be Deployed in 120 Countries by End of 2011
August 4th, 2011Via: Counterpunch:
Somewhere on this planet an American commando is carrying out a mission. Now, say that 70 times and you’re done… for the day. Without the knowledge of the American public, a secret force within the U.S. military is undertaking operations in a majority of the world’s countries. This new Pentagon power elite is waging a global war whose size and scope has never been revealed, until now.
…
Last year, Karen DeYoung and Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post reported that U.S. Special Operations forces were deployed in 75 countries, up from 60 at the end of the Bush presidency. By the end of this year, U.S. Special Operations Command spokesman Colonel Tim Nye told me, that number will likely reach 120. “We do a lot of traveling — a lot more than Afghanistan or Iraq,” he said recently. This global presence — in about 60% of the world’s nations and far larger than previously acknowledged — provides striking new evidence of a rising clandestine Pentagon power elite waging a secret war in all corners of the world.
Research Credit: noncompliant
Feds Allowed Sinaloa Cartel to Move Cocaine Into U.S.
August 4th, 2011Via: El Paso Times:
U.S. federal agents allegedly allowed the Sinaloa drug cartel to traffic several tons of cocaine into the United States in exchange for information about rival cartels, according to court documents filed in a U.S. federal court.
The allegations are part of the defense of Vicente Zambada-Niebla, who was extradited to the United States to face drug-trafficking charges in Chicago. He is also a top lieutenant of drug kingpin Joaquin “Chapo” Guzman and the son of Ismael “Mayo” Zambada-Garcia, believed to be the brains behind the Sinaloa cartel.
The case could prove to be a bombshell on par with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ “Operation Fast and Furious,” except that instead of U.S. guns being allowed to walk across the border, the Sinaloa cartel was allowed to bring drugs into the United States. Zambada-Niebla claims he was permitted to smuggle drugs from 2004 until his arrest in 2009.
Randall Samborn, assistant U.S. attorney and spokesman for the Justice Department in Chicago, declined comment.
U.S. Wants to Build Cybersecurity Protection Plan for Cars
August 4th, 2011Better make sure your car’s firewall and antivirus definitions are up to date. *grin*
Via: Network World:
As cars and other forms of transportation increasingly rely on online systems for everything from safety to onboard entertainment, the cybersecurity threat from those who would exploit such electronic control packages has also increased.
That’s why the US Department of Transportation (DOT) today issued a Request For Information to the security industry to help it devise a roadmap to build “motor vehicle safeguards against cybersecurity threats and assure the reliability and safety of automotive electronic control systems.”
More: Hackers Unlock a Subaru Outback and Start the Engine Remotely
Facebook Comes Before Tap Water as India’s Poor Get Smartphones
August 4th, 2011Via: Bloomberg:
In a two-room shanty with no running water in northern Mumbai, Darshana Verma makes tea on a small stove. On a bench nearby, her 18-year-old son, Vishal, messages Facebook friends on the keypad of his Nokia smartphone.
“This is the Internet age,” said the 36-year-old domestic helper, who spent more than half her $300 monthly income on Samsung Electronics Co. and Nokia Oyj (NOK1V) mobile phones for her children. “Facebook is there, all these things happen there now — they make friends, maybe they can even find jobs there.”
Cheaper Internet-ready phones may make India Facebook Inc.’s biggest market after the U.S. next year with more than 50 million users, according to Nielsen Co. As Google Inc.’s rival social network also gains in popularity, companies including Pepsi Co. are boosting Internet advertising to reach the 352 million children under age 15 who are coming online.
Rawsome Farm Buying Club Raided Again
August 4th, 2011Look at all of the agencies associated with this nonsense!?
Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office:
Agencies taking part in the ongoing investigation include the U.S. Food and Drug Administration; the California Franchise Tax Board; the California Department of Food and Agriculture’s Milk and Dairy Food Safety Branch and the department’s Division of Measurement Standards; the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office; the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health; the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department, the Ventura County Department of Public Health; the Los Angeles Police Department and the Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety.
Via: Weston A. Price Foundation:
Public Health Officials today descended once again on a buying club, that specializes in raw foods. Club organizer, James Stewart was arrested at his home, the locks to his personal residence were changed, his papers, money and computer seized. At the same time, farmer Sharon Palmer and Weston A. Price Foundation volunteer chapter leader Victoria Bloch Coulter were arrested. All three were charged with Section 182A-Conspiracy to Commit a Crime. Bond for James Stewart was set at $123,000. Bail for Bloch is recommended at $60,000. Bail for Palmer is recommended at $121,000.
All this, in a state where raw milk is perfectly legal to sell, and even available through retail stores. The issue seems to be the club’s use of a herdshare or boarding agreement for its dairy goats.
Japan Launches Campaign to Weaken Yen
August 4th, 2011Warning: This is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any financial instrument.
It’s starting (again):
At a minimum, states will try unilateral capital controls in an attempt to prevent their currencies from disorderly appreciation vs. the toxic dollar.
Via: Wall Street Journal:
Japan stepped into the currency market Thursday, launching a yen-selling campaign that was backed up by ¥10 trillion (nearly $126 billion) in easing measures from the central bank, as officials say they needed to tame market speculation threatening a fragile economic recovery.
But even as authorities plowed money into the markets, traders and analysts said it was far from certain that the authorities would succeed in heading off the yen’s steady climb.
The government plunged into the market Thursday morning via the Bank of Japan, causing the yen to drop against other key currencies. The dollar quickly jumped to ¥78.20 from ¥77.13 and the euro rose to ¥111.80 from ¥110.72.
To underscore its conviction, the government continued selling yen through the day, pushing the dollar to ¥79.48. Mid-afternoon Thursday in Asia, the dollar was at ¥79.44.
Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda said at a hastily called news conference the measure was meant to stop speculative, excessive yen moves.
“If this movement continued, it would have adverse effects on the stability of Japan’s economy and financial conditions at a time when Japan is making various efforts to recover from the [March 11] disaster,” Mr. Noda said. The March 11 earthquake and tsunami severely disrupted corporate Japan’s supply chains, while the damage to its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has led to power supply constraints.
Related: Switzerland Tries to Slow Rise of Franc; Cuts Interest Rate
U.S. Borrowing Tops 100% of GDP
August 4th, 2011Via: AFP:
US gross debt shot up $238 billion to reach 100 percent of gross domestic product after the government’s debt ceiling was lifted, Treasury figures showed.
On Tuesday, the Treasury had to add more than $200 billion of commitments immediately after President Barack Obama signed into law an increase in the debt ceiling.
The liabilities had been temporarily taken off the federal government’s balance sheet since May 16, when the Treasury reached the $14.29 trillion official cap.
It then used extraordinary measures to remain under the legal limit while deeply polarized Republicans and Democrats battled over raising the debt ceiling and reining in the country’s massive deficit.
The new borrowing took total public debt to $14.58 trillion, over end-2010 GDP of $14.53 trillion, putting the United States in a league with highly indebted countries like Italy and Belgium.
China to New Zealand: Embrace Your Status as an Authorized Mr. Lee’s Greater Hong Kong Franchisee
August 4th, 2011*sigh*
Via: New Zealand Herald:
China is launching a public relations offensive in New Zealand and the rest of world, saying the West has nothing to fear from China’s rapid economic growth and investment.
The Chinese embassy’s political counsellor Cheng Lei held a rare press conference this morning at the embassy in Wellington, reading out a statement then answering question. [sic]
He said similar briefings were taking place at other embassies around the world.
He said the Chinese Government encouraged Chinese companies to invest globally and there was a great deal of confidence in the New Zealand system and people.
He said that there was a minority of xenophobes in New Zealand who were”reasonably fearful” of any Chinese investments regardless of what kind of enterprise, how much capital was involved, or what the benefit was to the local community.
Mr Cheng hoped the media would educate New Zealanders as to what Chinese investment meant for the economy.
A Little House Of Secrets On The Great Plains
August 3rd, 2011Via: Reuters:
The secretive business havens of Cyprus and the Cayman Islands face a potent rival: Cheyenne, Wyoming.
At a single address in this sleepy city of 60,000 people, more than 2,000 companies are registered. The building, 2710 Thomes Avenue, isn’t a shimmering skyscraper filled with A-list corporations. It’s a 1,700-square-foot brick house with a manicured lawn, a few blocks from the State Capitol.
Neighbors say they see little activity there besides regular mail deliveries and a woman who steps outside for smoke breaks. Inside, however, the walls of the main room are covered floor to ceiling with numbered mailboxes labeled as corporate “suites.” A bulky copy machine sits in the kitchen. In the living room, a woman in a headset answers calls and sorts bushels of mail.
A Reuters investigation has found the house at 2710 Thomes Avenue serves as a little Cayman Island on the Great Plains. It is the headquarters for Wyoming Corporate Services, a business-incorporation specialist that establishes firms which can be used as “shell” companies, paper entities able to hide assets.
Wyoming Corporate Services will help clients create a company, and more: set up a bank account for it; add a lawyer as a corporate director to invoke attorney-client privilege; even appoint stand-in directors and officers as high as CEO. Among its offerings is a variety of shell known as a “shelf” company, which comes with years of regulatory filings behind it, lending a greater feeling of solidity.
“A corporation is a legal person created by state statute that can be used as a fall guy, a servant, a good friend or a decoy,” the company’s website boasts. “A person you control… yet cannot be held accountable for its actions. Imagine the possibilities!”
Among the entities registered at 2710 Thomes, Reuters found, is a shelf company sheltering real-estate assets controlled by a jailed former prime minister of Ukraine, according to allegations made by a political rival in a federal court in California.
The owner of another shelf company at the address was indicted in April for allegedly helping online-poker operators evade a U.S. ban on Internet gambling. The owner of two other firms there was banned from government contracting in January for selling counterfeit truck parts to the Pentagon.
Europe’s Money Markets Freeze as Crisis Escalates in Italy and Spain
August 3rd, 2011Via: Telegraph:
The European money markets have begun to seize up as pressure mounts on the Italian and Spanish banking systems, tracking the pattern seen during the build-up towards the financial crisis in 2008.
The three-month euribor/OIS spread, the fear gauge of credit markets, reached the highest level in two years today, jumping 7 basis points to 40 in wild trading.
“Europe’s money markets are undoubtedly starting to freeze up,” said Marc Ostwald from Monument Securites.
“It’s not as dramatic as pre-Lehman but it is alarming and shows the pervasive degree of fear in the markets. People are again refusing to lend except on a secured basis.”
