Currency Markets Bitch Slap Reserve Bank of New Zealand; Kiwi Still Rising
June 21st, 2007WARNING: This is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any financial instrument.
The Kiwi Dollar ship of fools is riding the yen carry trade tsunami even higher. Of course, the mast has snapped, the rudder fell off and the crew is passed out drunk.
Via: Forbes:
The New Zealand dollar was higher, shrugging off reports of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) again intervening overnight in order to stem the currency’s rise, as demand for the high-yielding unit showed no sign of abating.
Last week, the RBNZ confirmed it had intervened in the foreign exchange market in response to ‘unjustified’ gains in the kiwi dollar and reports of further intervention have now surfaced for the second time since then.
The currency has been a major beneficiary of the carry trade, where investors borrow in low-yielding currencies such as the yen in order to invest in higher-yielding assets elsewhere. This has led to gains which the central bank considers are out of line with the country’s economic fundamentals.
But with the RBNZ still in rate hiking mode after recently raising interest rates to 8.0 pct, the highest among major developed countries, demand for the currency is expected to remain strong, leaving the central bank fighting a losing battle.
‘Twice in the past week or so, the Reserve Bank of New Zealand has intervened at around this level and the market is therefore on tenterhooks as to the bank’s next appearance in the marketplace,’ said Neil Mellor at the Bank of New York (nyse: BK – news – people ).
‘However, such is the zeal with which the market has embraced the New Zealand dollar – as a high yielding currency – that there is little doubting the unrelenting pressure that the RBNZ is attempting to dispel,’ he said.
Furthermore, reported comments overnight from New Zealand finance minister Michael Cullen that more monetary tightening may be needed despite a possible downturn in the housing market only served to encourage buying of the currency.
Vertical Farming in the Big Apple
June 20th, 2007I know. Urban hipsters want iPods, free love and electric SUVs. Absolutely any technology or policy that offers a glimmer of hope of keeping things going will be embraced with religious ferocity, regardless of the level of absurdity.
As more and more people give up on the political process, they will seek comfort in the dreams of a technoutopia that is somehow always just out of reach.
To people who have never produced any food in their lives, this sentence, from the article below, probably makes a lot of sense: “All produce would be organic as there would be no exposure to wild parasites and bugs.” Instead, devise an “organic” food factory that looks more like a laboratory than anything you would ever encounter outside in the messy imperfect world mother nature. (Go to the Vertical Farming page and look at the illustration at the top left. Notice the vertical farming attire? White lab coats.) Are bees “bugs”? Will they be allowed? Would they have to present ID containing biometric credentials to come and go from the farm?
Notice how the way forward requires us to embrace increasingly absurd and artificial systems?
But why stop there?
Why go through all the pain and uncertainty of child birth? After applying for the appropriate permits, paying exorbitant fees and passing several background checks, just submit your genetic material to the local hatchery (located on the 32nd floor of the vertical farm, perhaps), along with a checklist of desirable features, so your spawn can be grown in a cocoon made out of a cloned cow uterus and filled with nutrient agar. Like the man says about the sky scraper farm, it’s not quite natural, but, the plan is to make the whole complex sustainable…
As the clean, green fascism is rolled out, just keep this in mind:
Billions of people are going to be killed off so that what remains of the strategic resources of the planet may be kept under control of the elite. Survivors will be enslaved under a regime of clean, green fascism.
If you filter all of this eco fascist bullshit through those two sentences above, you’ll see this horror show for what it really is.
Total surveillance. Centralized control. Urban control grids. Biological systems that are fully abstracted from natural ecosystems.
How cool and hip and sustainable does the skyscraper farm look now?
Hint: The extermination will begin (or accelerate drastically) soon after stuff like this actually starts to rise from the filthy, decaying rubble of cities around the world.
Via: BBC:
Downtown Manhattan is hardly a place you would associate with agriculture. Rather, with its countless restaurants, cafes, shops and supermarkets this is a place of consumption.
And so every morsel, every bite of food New Yorkers munch through every day must be trucked, shipped or flown in, from across the country, and across the world.
Now though, scientists at Columbia University are proposing an alternative. Their vision of the future is one in which the skyline of New York and other cities include a new kind of skyscaper: the “vertical farm”.
The idea is simple enough. Imagine a 30-storey building with glass walls, topped off with a huge solar panel.
On each floor there would be giant planting beds, indoor fields in effect.
There would be a sophisticated irrigation system.
And so crops of all kinds and small livestock could all be grown in a controlled environment in the most urban of settings.
That means there would be no shipping costs, and no pollution caused by moving produce around the country.
…
And, says the professor, vertical farming would allow some existing traditional farms to be returned to natural forests. Good news in a time of global warming.
“Even if it’s not quite natural…. a little bit factory-like in terms of its production, here’s what you’re going to get back: you’re going to get back the rest of the earth. And I’ll take that any time.”
The plan is to make the whole complex sustainable.
Related: Vertical Farm
South Carolina Treasurer, State Chairman for Rudy Giuliani’s Presidential Campaign, Indicted on Cocaine Charges
June 20th, 2007Family values.
Via: CNN / AP:
South Carolina Treasurer Thomas Ravenel, a former real estate developer who became a rising political star after his election last year, was indicted Tuesday on federal cocaine charges.
Ravenel is also the state chairman for former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s presidential campaign.
Ravenel has stepped down from his volunteer responsibilities with the campaign, according to a statement released by Mark Campbell, Giuliani’s political director.
Campbell said the campaign has no information about the accusations pending against Ravenel.
The millionaire is accused of buying less than 500 grams of the drug to share with other people in late 2005, U.S. Attorney Reggie Lloyd said.
Ravenel, 44, is charged with distribution of cocaine, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
The investigation into Ravenel arose from a drug case last year in Charleston, Lloyd said.
State Law Enforcement Division Chief Robert Stewart said his agents were aware of the allegations before Ravenel was elected in November, but they didn’t have enough information to pursue criminal charges. The case was turned over to the FBI in April.
“The investigation is just beginning,” the federal prosecutor said.
The man accused of selling Ravenel the drug, Michael L. Miller, is in custody on the same charge.
Ravenel will be allowed to turn himself in, authorities said. The treasurer’s office referred all questions to Ravenel’s lawyer Joel Collins, who did not return a message left at his office.
U.S. Terrorist Screening Center Visits Cryptogon; Reveals Activity Due to Stupidity
June 19th, 2007The U.S. Terrorist Screening Center user (host: techtrack.gov, ip: 67.108.115.178) conducted the following Google search: “national security analysis center”
The user clicked on this Google cache page of a Cryptogon story about the National Security Analysis Center, but I saw it in the log anyway (explained below). In fact, I saw two visits simultaneously. The one above along with one from something called cypresscom.net (host: 64-190-60-164.static.cypresscom.net, ip:64.190.60.164). It contained the same referrer info as the visit above, and arrived at the same time.
The techtrack.gov ip comes back to XO infrastructure in Virginia:
OrgName: XO Communications
OrgID: XOXO
Address: Corporate Headquarters
Address: 11111 Sunset Hills Road
City: Reston
StateProv: VA
PostalCode: 20190-5339
Country: US
cypresscom.net ip 64.190.60.164 comes back to:
OrgName: Cypress Communications
OrgID: CYPC
Address: 15 Piedmont Center Suite 100
City: Atlanta
StateProv: GA
PostalCode: 30305
Country: US
But look at the DNS machine names:
NameServer: LOYAL.CYPRESSCOMM.COM
NameServer: CLEAN.CYPRESSCOMM.COM
NameServer: BRAVE.CYPRESSCOMM.COM
Loyal. Clean. Brave.
(I almost don’t want to know.) UPDATE: I was just about the only one who didn’t know the Boyscout Law. Many Cryptogon readers did.
I’m not really sure why both of those visits happened at the same exact moment. And both user agent headers were the same. Does it have something to do with the fact that that the TSC user clicked the Google cache link instead of clicking the direct link to Cryptogon? Something to do with the spooky splice jobs?
Now, you might be wondering, “Kevin, how do you know it’s the Terrorist Screening Center if the hostname is techtrack.gov?”
In Review of the Terrorist Screening Center (Redacted for Public Release) Audit Report 05-27 June 2005 Office of the Inspector General Appendix IV Terrorist Screening Center Response, under IT Operations, Grasshopper will find exactly two sentences that have not been redacted:
For SBU connectivity, each of the partner agencies has brought its system into TSC space and used those paths to pass data to and from the home systems. Purely unclassified connectivity is provided by the Techtrack system.
Grasshopper may also refer to page 14 of the Michigan Chapter of The Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials – International, Inc. – APCO International Newsletter from May/June 2005 which mentions the “possible terrorist alert” handling codes and procedures for law enforcement. This information was provided by the Terrorist Screening Center. Note the email address and domain name to which questions about the TSC should be sent. That’s right. It goes to techtrack.gov. That thing is some kind of TSC gateway to the public Internet.
(Now, I don’t know about you, but I think that the Michigan Chapter of The Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials – International, Inc. f#@*%d up big time by placing that document on the Internet. Let me know if they remove that information.)
Since the number of people being added to the terrorist watch list is “out of control” there is an increasing chance that you might find yourself in a situation where a cop is handling you according to the directives on page 14 of that document above. In short, NOT volunteering information to pigs is more important than ever, since the Homeland’s Magic 8-Ball might have you listed with the “handling codes” 3 or 4. If that system lists you with the “handling codes” 1 or 2, you’re going to be arrested/detained on terrorism related offenses regardless of what you say or don’t say to the cop.
Note to the TSC user (and other clueless computer users) about trying to avoid showing up in server logs by using Google cache:
Google caches only the text of the Web page. All the external files (Javascript, Cascading Style Sheets, images, Flash, etc.) are not saved by Google. If a Web site deletes its style sheet, for instance, and the old page is viewed in Google’s cache, it will render without the style sheet. Same thing for images, etc.
When a browser requests a file from a Web server, that request is stored in the Web site’s logs. So it is only if a Web page has no external files that you will not show up in someone’s Web log by viewing Google’s cache.
Thanks Terrorist Screening Center user. Because of your stupidity, we learned some interesting information about how evil works today.
The Plan to Disappear Canada
June 19th, 2007Via: The Tyee:
If the machinations going on in this country regarding so-called “deep integration” were instead a communist conspiracy to take over the country (you will, of course, have to try hard to imagine this) the news media would be blaring the story.
Pundits would pontificate, editorialists would erupt, security forces would be unleashed.
Instead, a virtual conspiracy to make the country disappear through assimilation into the U.S. gets barely a mention.
But news of the scheme — formally called the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP) — is finally breaking out of the secret chambers of the ruling elite and the federal government. This is both good news and bad. It’s good that ordinary citizens are finally getting a glimpse of the betrayal of their country. The news is bad because it reflects just how much of this scheme is already being implemented.
Given the meetings of CEOs and politicians to advance the scheme politically, as well as all that must go into its actual implementation, there is simply too much activity to keep secret.
The American Culture Bomb: Satire from the Onion and a Long Forgotten U.S. Army War College Essay
June 19th, 2007Before we get to the Onion, let’s look at a few excerpts from Constant Conflict, a 1997 Parameters (U.S. Army War College) essay that was written by then Major Ralph Peters.
In summary, the U.S. military is aware that “American Culture” is a strategic weapon that is capable of defeating an enemy, or entire populations, without necessarily having to kill them. The U.S. military, however, must and will kill in order to allow “American Culture” into a society in order to repurpose it. Military failures will result from failing to thrust, “that bayonet into an enemy’s heart.”
Let’s look at a few passages from Constant Conflict:
Information destroys traditional jobs and traditional cultures; it seduces, betrays, yet remains invulnerable. How can you counterattack the information others have turned upon you? There is no effective option other than competitive performance. For those individuals and cultures that cannot join or compete with our information empire, there is only inevitable failure (of note, the internet is to the techno-capable disaffected what the United Nations is to marginal states: it offers the illusion of empowerment and community). The attempt of the Iranian mullahs to secede from modernity has failed, although a turbaned corpse still stumbles about the neighborhood. Information, from the internet to rock videos, will not be contained, and fundamentalism cannot control its children. Our victims volunteer.
…
In this age of television-series franchising, videos, and satellite dishes, this young, embittered male gets his skewed view of us from reruns of Dynasty and Dallas, or from satellite links beaming down Baywatch, sources we dismiss too quickly as laughable and unworthy of serious consideration as factors influencing world affairs. But their effect is destructive beyond the power of words to describe. Hollywood goes where Harvard never penetrated, and the foreigner, unable to touch the reality of America, is touched by America’s irresponsible fantasies of itself; he sees a devilishly enchanting, bluntly sexual, terrifying world from which he is excluded, a world of wealth he can judge only in terms of his own poverty.
…
Contemporary American culture is the most powerful in history, and the most destructive of competitor cultures. While some other cultures, such as those of East Asia, appear strong enough to survive the onslaught by adaptive behaviors, most are not. The genius, the secret weapon, of American culture is the essence that the elites despise: ours is the first genuine people’s culture. It stresses comfort and convenience–ease–and it generates pleasure for the masses.
…
Secular and religious revolutionaries in our century have made the identical mistake, imagining that the workers of the world or the faithful just can’t wait to go home at night to study Marx or the Koran. Well, Joe Sixpack, Ivan Tipichni, and Ali Quat would rather “Baywatch.” America has figured it out, and we are brilliant at operationalizing our knowledge, and our cultural power will hinder even those cultures we do not undermine. There is no “peer competitor” in the cultural (or military) department. Our cultural empire has the addicted–men and women everywhere–clamoring for more. And they pay for the privilege of their disillusionment.
…
There will be no peace. At any given moment for the rest of our lifetimes, there will be multiple conflicts in mutating forms around the globe. Violent conflict will dominate the headlines, but cultural and economic struggles will be steadier and ultimately more decisive. The de facto role of the US armed forces will be to keep the world safe for our economy and open to our cultural assault. To those ends, we will do a fair amount of killing.
…
The bayonet will still be relevant; however, informational superiority incisively employed should both sharpen that bayonet and permit us to defeat some–but never all–of our enemies outside of bayonet range. Our informational advantage over every other country and culture will be so enormous that our greatest battlefield challenge will be harnessing its power. Our potential national weakness will be the failure to maintain the moral and raw physical strength to thrust that bayonet into an enemy’s heart.
Now that we understand the strategic military nature of the “American Culture” bomb, here’s the same lesson (in the form of satire) from the Onion.
After 5 Years In U.S., Terrorist Cell Too Complacent To Carry Out Attack
Five years after settling in southern California and trying to blend into American society, a six-man terrorist cell connected to the militant Islamist organization Army of Martyrs has reportedly grown too complacent to conduct its suicide mission, an attack on the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.
According to cell leader and boat owner Jameel al-Sharif, the potentially devastating operation, which involves breaching the station’s reactor core and triggering a meltdown that could rival the Chernobyl disaster, “can wait.”
“We remain wholly committed to the destruction of America, the Great Satan,” al-Sharif said. “But now is not a good time for us. The season finale of Lost was such a cliff- hanger that we have to at least catch the first episode of the new season. After that, though, death to the infidels.”
“Probably,” added al-Sharif, who noted that his nearly $6,000 in credit-card debt from recent purchases of a 52-inch HDTV and a backyard gas grill prevents him from buying needed materials for the attack.
Though the members of the cell said that they “live only to spill the blood of crusaders who oppress Muslims,” they cited additional reasons for the delay, including an unexpired free Netflix trial and nagging lower-back pain.
“I think I’m entitled to a little time to fully enjoy the in-dash MP3 adapter and heads-up display that Allah, in His infinite wisdom, has seen fit to provide me with,” munitions expert Mohammed Akram said of the 2006 Mercury Mariner that is intended to be used as a car bomb during the attack. “Also, I have nine months left on the lease. But after that, I am more than willing to load it with explosives and go to my glory in its all-leather interior and heated seats.”
Cell member Sayyid al-Tantawi, a Cairo-born former physics professor who was able to obtain employment at San Onofre as a reactor technician, once routinely worked 18-hour days so he could secretly obtain security codes and detailed schematics of the facility. But since his promotion to senior project manager last November, al-Tantawi has grown accustomed to perks such as higher pay, mandatory vacation time, delegation of responsibilities, and long lunches with other managers.
“Don’t get me wrong, I totally wish swift and painful death to all American pigs, especially that jerk [general manager] Dave [Landis],” al-Tantawi said. “But I’m no longer the new guy—why bust my ass all day long anymore? When I get home after a day at work, I don’t savor staying up all night designing dirty-bomb triggering mechanisms like I did when I first got here. Sometimes I just want to pop in a CD by that soulful infidel Chris Daughtry and relax.”
Al-Tantawi added that due to the sedentary nature of his job, he would have to “lose a few pounds, Allah willing” before being able to fulfill his most challenging task: infiltrating the reactor’s spent fuel storage area and draining its coolant, thereby triggering a fire and releasing radioactive material.
Indeed, general preparedness appears to be the cell’s greatest stumbling block.
“Five a.m. is when the facility is most vulnerable to attack, when the morning shift security personnel replace the overnight crew,” said Adib Dhakwan, the cell’s second-in-command. “Unfortunately, Starbucks doesn’t open until six, and I don’t know about you, but if I don’t have that first cup of coffee, forget it.”
Despite the terrorists’ successful assimilation into American society, the FBI has been monitoring the activities of the “San Clemente Six” since late 2005. According to declassified intelligence documents, the cell’s status was recently downgraded to “low risk,” due in part to a near absence of cell phone chatter to parties other than Moviefone, and last month’s online purchase of a hammock.
Related: Americans Unready to Revolt, Despite Revolting Conditions
Related: The Education of Cindy Sheehan
Oil Industry Scales Back Refinery Plans
June 18th, 2007Everyone knows that the biofuel scam only results in higher food prices, and now, the oil cartel is saying, “With all the biofuel, we don’t need to invest if more refining capacity.”
The food and energy scarcity issues are being engineered into a kill off mechanism that also generates massive profits. Anyone who can’t see this, at this late state of the game, is an idiot. This is not the folly of empires. This is, cold, calculated genocide.
So, as what remains of the topsoil is used to fuel your car, and the prices of everything skyrockets, keep a few of these recent Cryptogon stories in mind:
Energy Scarcity vs. Cost of the War in Iraq
U.S. Legislation Would Bring Wind Power to ‘Grinding Halt’
Canary Island to be Powered Solely by Renewables
Plastic Micro Wind Turbines Available for Sale
Billions in Oil Missing in Iraq
Remote New Zealand Tidal Power Project
The Power Crisis Mythology, the 40% Efficient Solar Cell and the Cost of the War in Iraq
Clean Energy and Turning What’s Left Into Trash
Don’t want to read it all? Here it is in a nutshell:
Billions of people are going to be killed off so that what remains of the strategic resources of the planet may be kept under control of the elite. Survivors will be enslaved under a regime of clean, green fascism.
Via: Yahoo / AP:
A push from Congress and the White House for huge increases in biofuels, such as ethanol, is prompting the oil industry to scale back its plans for refinery expansions. That could keep gasoline prices high, possibly for years to come.
With President Bush calling for a 20 percent drop in gasoline use and the Senate now debating legislation for huge increases in ethanol production, oil companies see growing uncertainty about future gasoline demand and little need to expand refineries or build new ones.
Oil industry executives no longer believe there will be the demand for gasoline over the next decade to warrant the billions of dollars in refinery expansions — as much as 10 percent increase in new refining capacity — they anticipated as recently as a year ago.
Biofuels such as ethanol and efforts to get automakers to build more fuel-efficient cars and SUVs have been portrayed as key to countering high gasoline prices, but they are likely to do little to curb costs at the pump today, or in the years ahead as refiners reduce gasoline production.
A shortage of refineries frequently has been blamed by politicians for the sharp price spikes in gasoline, as was the case last week by Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., during debate on a Senate energy bill.
“The fact is that Americans are paying more at the pump because we do not have the domestic capacity to refine the fuels consumers demand,” Inhofe complained as he tried unsuccessfully to get into the bill a proposal to ease permitting and environmental rules for refineries.
This spring, refiners, hampered by outages, could not keep up with demand and imports were down because of greater fuel demand in Europe and elsewhere. Despite stable — even sometimes declining — oil prices, gasoline prices soared to record levels and remain well above $3 a gallon.
Consumer advocates maintain the oil industry likes it that way.
“By creating a situation of extremely tight supply, the oil companies gain control over price at the wholesale level,” said Mark Cooper of the Consumer Federation of America. He argued that a wave of mergers in recent years created a refining industry that “has no interest in creating spare (refining) capacity.”
Rationing Mechanisms In Place: Credit Cards Cut Off Gas Purchases
June 18th, 2007Credit card companies are limiting fuel purchases because of credit card fraud?
Oh sure, that sounds perfectly reasonable to many zombie consumers. And you could take this article at face value and move on, but I wouldn’t. It’s easy to see how this will be used as a gas rationing system.
After a declaration of emergency, perhaps the use of cash to pay for gas won’t be allowed. Only terrorists pay for gas with cash, or a global warming carbon tax will need to be collected, or a gas shortage has resulted from the deliberately engineered chaos of Peak Oil, etc. Fill in the blank with justifications that could be used. The point is, with a few mouse clicks, this system could be used to lock people down, by the millions, in an extremely efficient manner… Assuming the communications infrastructure—that makes the lock down possible—stays up.
Still waiting for clarity on the brink of oblivion?
Via: Yahoo / AP:
So you’re at the gas station filling up your vehicle, and without warning the gas pump shuts off. What? The tank isn’t full, and you know your credit card isn’t over its limit.
“Using my Visa card, I commonly hit a limit and I would be standing there scratching my head,” Shawn Bloomfield, who pumps premium gas into his SUV, said from his home in Allentown, Pa. “I would always assume it is the gas station setting a limit on how much gas I could purchase. It felt like a ration scenario.”
As the price of gasoline continues to rise, rules to prevent credit card fraud at the nation’s pumps are confusing consumers who just want a full tank of gas.
Caps on transaction amounts — or the total dollar amount of gas a customer can pump into their car — are limiting some drivers of gas-guzzling vehicles.
“When I go to the gas station I now have to use two credit cards just for one tank of gas,” said Paul Brisgone of Oxford, Pa. “Kind of defeats the convenience of pay-at-the-pump.”
Brisgone, a field operations manager for a telecommunications company, said he alternates between three different credit cards — two Visa and one MasterCard — when filling up the 32-gallon tank in his Ford F-150 pickup.
“When I can go 400 miles a day, it inconveniences me if I need a full tank of gas and can’t get one,” Brisgone said.
Credit card companies say the policies, which aren’t new, are designed to ensure that merchants and consumers are protected from fraudulent transactions that could occur at a gas pump.
When a customer uses their credit card at a cardholder-activated terminal, such as a gas pump, the transaction is authorized without knowing the final bill of sale.
Typically, consumers who use their credit card are not liable for any fraudulent purchases, and gas merchants are not liable either.
But credit card companies have established a protective layer by setting caps on how much gas a consumer can pump at any one given time.
Cryptogon Reader Signs Up for Hosting with Blue Host
June 17th, 2007Thanks to the reader who decided to host ronpaulunderground.com with Blue Host. Cryptogon receives $65 dollars!
Israel Plans Attack on Gaza
June 17th, 2007Via: Times Online:
ISRAEL’s new defence minister Ehud Barak is planning an attack on Gaza within weeks to crush the Hamas militants who have seized power there.
According to senior Israeli military sources, the plan calls for 20,000 troops to destroy much of Hamas’s military capability in days.
The raid would be triggered by Hamas rocket attacks against Israel or a resumption of suicide bombings.
Barak, who is expected to become defence minister tomorrow, has already demanded detailed plans to deploy two armoured divisions and an infantry division, accompanied by assault drones and F-16 jets, against Hamas.
The Israeli forces would expect to be confronted by about 12,000 Hamas fighters with arms confiscated from the Fatah faction that they defeated in last week’s three-day civil war in Gaza.
