Escape from America
March 2nd, 2007Brother, I’ll drink to that!
Most people reading Cryptogon inside the U.S./Britain are familiar with nonstop feelings of impending doom and frequently asking themselves questions like:
Am I next?
Is this it?
Can I escape?
Is it too late?
Has everyone gone nuts?
Have I gone nuts?
Is this job killing me?
What booze is on sale?
etc. etc.
That was what it was like inside my head for about two years before I bought my one way ticket to New Zealand.
What was the actual escape like for me?
After a couple of hectic days of selecting what to take with me, and what to leave behind, the time arrived for me to get to the airport.
As I was groped and fondled by defenders of the Homeland at airport security, I went into a kind of dreamlike trace. “Will I make it out to the other side of this thing?” I wondered. The cacophony of the checkpoint became a sort of languid hum. The fat TSA employee started to move its lips, but I don’t remember what it said. I complied, on some instinctual level. A few minutes later, I was standing just beyond the security checkpoint, holding my shoes and belt in one hand, and my falling down pants with the other.
I exchanged a couple of brief, humiliated, what-just-happened-to-us? kind of looks with other travelers, many of whom were not Americans, and not used to being treated like that.
I walked to the appropriate Air New Zealand gate and sat down. I took my mobile phone out and called a couple of people to say one last goodbye. Then I called the voice mail system for my phone and changed the greeting to something close to this:
“Hi, you have reached Kevin. I have left the United States and don’t have any plans to return. Goodbye.”
Minutes later, hundreds of people, including me, took our seats in the belly of the large white bird. Minutes after that, it hurtled down the runway and out over the Pacific Ocean, veering South and West. I’ve never been able to sleep on aircraft before. But I did on that flight.
Once I was in Auckland, I had to catch another flight to reach the Far North, my wife (she went over a few weeks before me) and my new family. I walked to the domestic departures area in the Auckland airport and asked an Air New Zealand employee where the security checkpoint was, because I somehow wound up at the gate without passing through one.
“There is no security checkpoint for domestic flights, sir.”
You can imagine my shock at this remarkable statement.
“There’s no security checkpoint?!” I asked.
“Nope. Not for domestic flights,” she smiled.
I felt like dropping to the ground and kissing the polyester airport carpet, but I didn’t.
I took a seat and mumbled to myself, “I’m not even out of the airport and things already seem better here.” That was my first big epiphany in New Zealand, and they just kept happening. (Maybe someday I’ll write more about this. In short, if you’re having doubts about the lies you’ve been taught all your life about the U.S., run with those feelings. Run for your life.)
When I read the story below, I wondered, “How long has it been since I escaped America?” As of today, I have been in New Zealand for exactly one year. On reflection, I think back on my life in America as a vague and distant nightmare. The United States has became a vast nut house inside a debtor prison. I’m still not over the euphoria of being out.
Via: joebageant.com:
It is near midnight and the dogs sleeping in the sand under my cabana, Rex and Pluto, emit happy, gurgling growls, as if chasing imaginary rabbits in their dreams. I lie in bed just breathing in and breathing out and feeling so free that I’ve laughed out loud a couple of times tonight, something I have never done in my life. At least not while simply looking at the ceiling. Tomorrow I will not worry about losing my ass in the declining real estate market. I will not commute three nerve grinding hours a day, or nervously engorge myself in front of my laptop for hours on end. Nor will I or wake up with the crimes of the empire running like adding machine tape in my head, annotated with all the ways I contributed to those crimes by participating in the American lifestyle. After more than two years of effort, I’m outta the gilded gulag, by damned, and tell myself that I have at last quit being part of the problem — or at least as much as much as anyone can without living stark naked in a Himalayan cave and toasting insects over a dung fire.
When I arrived in Belize a few weeks ago I vowed never to write about this country, mainly because the Americans I write to are more interested in American politics, religion, class issues and the Iraq war. How the hell could anybody with more than an inch of forehead not be anxious over those things? But the contrast here is so stark it seems unavoidable to write about the view of America from Belize and Hopkins Village this one time. I must say that from down here the Empire does not look much different. No worse, no better. But the stress and stench of the empire is less in this Caribbean breeze and the mark of the beast is sharper from a distance.
The effect of moving was immediate. As one expat told me years ago what would happen, whole days go by when I do not think of America at all, much less rage against it, something I would previously considered impossible.
Husband and Wife Lawyers and 11 Top Wall Street Workers Charged in Federal Securities Fraud Scheme
March 1st, 2007Just another day at the office.
Via: Yahoo / AP:
Husband and wife lawyers and 11 top Wall Street workers were charged Thursday with making more than $15 million in illegal trading profit through an alleged federal securities fraud scheme, authorities said.
Linda Chatman Thomsen, director of the Division of Enforcement for the
Securities and Exchange Commission, said in a statement that the case was “one of the most pervasive Wall Street insider trading rings since the days of Ivan Boesky and Dennis Levine” in the mid-1980s.
“What is so alarming about the conduct alleged in the SEC’s case isn’t just the scope of the scheme … but, sadly, who is at the center of it,” she said.
Besides the lawyers, defendants including registered representatives, compliance personnel and hedge fund portfolio managers, improperly relied on hundreds of tips during five years of illegal trading, she said.
“And this conduct didn’t occur in obscure boiler rooms — but rather at what are commonly considered `top tier’ Wall Street firms,” Thomsen said.
U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia said Wall Street professionals repeatedly traded on secrets revealed to them by insiders at UBS Securities LLC and Morgan Stanley and Co.
Among financial professionals charged criminally in U.S. District Court in Manhattan was Mitchel Guttenberg, an executive director and institutional client manager at UBS.
Garcia said Guttenberg, who worked in UBS’s equity research department, accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars as he sold nonpublic information to two men regarding upcoming upgrades and downgrades in UBS analysts’ securities recommendations.
The men, David Tavdy and Erik Franklin, used the UBS inside information to each earn more than $4 million by executing profitable trades in various brokerage accounts they controlled, Garcia said.
The attorneys, Randi Collotta, 30, who worked for Morgan Stanley & Co. Inc. in Manhattan, and her husband, Christopher Collotta, 34, who worked in private practice, were also among those criminally charged. Civil charges against 11 individuals and three entities were brought in a complaint filed by the SEC.
In an indictment, prosecutors said Randi Collotta was an associate in Morgan Stanley’s global compliance division when she passed inside stock tips to her husband, who gave it to others, resulting in illegal profits of hundreds of thousands of dollars between September 2004 and August 2005.
After others made money from the tips, they paid Christopher Collotta cash that represented a portion of their profits, the indictment said.
Guttenberg, Tavdy, Franklin and the Collottas all were charged with conspiracy to commit securities fraud and securities fraud, which carry potential penalties of up to 25 years in prison. It was not immediately clear who would represent them at an initial court appearance along with five others arrested Thursday.
The four other criminal defendants have pleaded guilty to conspiracy, securities fraud and commercial bribery charges, prosecutors said.
CNN Archivist On BBC’s Absurd Lost 9/11 Tapes Claim
March 1st, 2007Via: Infowars:
“I’m an archivist with the CNN News Library in Atlanta, and I can tell you with absolute certainty, the mere idea that news agencies such as ours would “misplace” any airchecks from 9/11 is preposterous . CNN has these tapes locked away from all the others. People like myself, who normally would have access to any tapes in our library, must ask special permission in order to view airchecks from that day. Multiple tapes would have been recording their broadcast that day, and there are also private agencies that record all broadcasts from all channels – constantly – in the event that a news agency missed something or needs something . They don’t just have one copy… they have several. It’s standard procedure, and as soon as the second plane hit, they would start recording several copies on other tapes machines all day long.
The only information they need to give out is the source of the collapse claim. No one is saying the BBC is “part of the conspiracy,” we’re saying that someone gave that reporter the information ahead of time. The source of that information is the only thing they can reveal that would be meaningful.”
U.S. Funding “The Terrorists”
February 28th, 2007Do you get it yet?
Via: New Yorker:
To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda.
China: Remote Controlled Pigeons
February 28th, 2007Why not have the rat brain slices control the flying rats?
Via: Wired:
Scientists with the Robot Engineering Technology Research Center of east China’s Shandong University of Science and Technology say they implanted micro electrodes in the brain of a pigeon so they can command it to fly right or left or up or down.
The implants stimulated different areas of the pigeon’s brain according to signals sent by the scientists via computer, and forced the bird to comply with their commands.
BBC Reported Building 7 Collapse 20 Minutes Before It Fell
February 28th, 2007I sat on this story for a day because I wanted to make sure that the clip is authentic.
It is authentic.
BBC’s lame response is as good as the clip itself, in my opinion: “We’re not part of a conspiracy. Nobody told us what to say or do on September 11th….” Oh yeah: “We no longer have the original tapes of our 9/11 coverage (for reasons of cock-up, not conspiracy).” HAHAHA!
Via Infowars:
An astounding video uncovered from the archives today shows the BBC reporting on the collapse of WTC Building 7 over twenty minutes before it fell at 5:20pm on the afternoon of 9/11. The incredible footage shows BBC reporter Jane Standley talking about the collapse of the Salomon Brothers Building while it remains standing in the live shot behind her head.
Minutes before the actual collapse of the building is due, the feed to the reporter mysteriously dies.
UPDATE: Time Stamp Confirms BBC Reported WTC 7 Collapse 26 Minutes In Advance
Dow Jones Industrial Average “Tabulation Trouble”
February 28th, 2007The New York Stock Exchange should be cordoned off and sealed with “CRIME SCENE” tape!
As the black boxes were flushing the DOW30 issues yesterday, the system that calculates the Dow Jones Industrial Average experienced—wait for it—“tabulation trouble.”
The futures were not reflecting the values of the underlying stocks because the average was not updating! The article states, “Some traders noticed a discrepancy between futures contracts tied to the Dow industrials and the index, which directly tracks the stocks.”
NO SHIT!
That thing is such a massive scam that it’s incredible that anyone has any confidence in it at all.
If a casino tried a stunt like this the owners would be frog marched out of the place in handcuffs!
Via: Wall Street Journal:
The sudden, sharp decline by the Dow Jones Industrial Average shortly before 3 p.m. Eastern time today was triggered by a tabulation delay by Dow Jones data systems, which calculates the average. There was a temporary lag in calculation of the 30 large-stock average due to a surge in order flows as the market continued to tumble in afternoon trading, much like a clogged pipe. Just before 3 p.m., Dow Jones Indexes switched over to a backup system to calculate the average, which nearly instantly registered the huge move.
Dramatic Decline
“There was a huge disconnect between the Dow futures and the Dow average†of about 200 points, said Brian Williamson, an equity trader at Boston Company Asset Management. Similarly, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq both fell, but the decline isn’t nearly as dramatic (see chart).
The glitch wasn’t the cause of the decline, but it did cause the drop to register far more quickly than it otherwise would have. Other indexes fell at the same time, but more gradually. Some traders noticed a discrepancy between futures contracts tied to the Dow industrials and the index, which directly tracks the stocks. Usually, the futures contracts closely track the overall average.
DOW ENDS DOWN 416 POINTS
February 27th, 2007The tapped-out U.S. consumer was like the iceberg that pierced the hull of the Titanic. We moved through a brief phase where the band kept playing and the tumblers were refilled with booze, again and again. (This was when the writing on the wall became crystal clear to people like you and me and we began to calmly move to the exits.)
It’s getting clearer, and clearer now, as the hull begins to creak, the subprime mortgage market collapses, real estate prices fall and it becomes increasingly difficult to leave the U.S. But, as I said before, there are no rewards for those who wait for clarity on the brink of oblivion.
Congratulations to those of you who have eliminated your reliance on luck and minimized the impact of factors that are completely beyond your control. Your hard work is paying off.
Via: Yahoo / AP:
Stocks plummeted Tuesday, briefly hurtling the Dow Jones industrials down nearly 550 points as Wall Street succumbed to a global market plunge sparked by growing concerns that the U.S. and Chinese economies are cooling and that equities prices have become overinflated.
A 9 percent slide in Chinese stocks, which came a day after investors sent Shanghai’s benchmark index to a record high close, set the tone for U.S. trading. The Dow began the day falling sharply, and the decline accelerated throughout the course of the session before stocks took a huge plunge in late afternoon as computer-driven sell programs kicked in.
The Dow fell 546.02, or 4.3 percent, to 12,086.06 before recovering some ground in the last hour of trading to close down 415.86, or 3.29 percent, at 12,216.40, according to preliminary calculations. Because the worst of the plunge took place after 2:30 p.m., the New York Stock Exchange’s trading limits, designed to halt such precipitous moves, were not activated.
The decline was the Dow’s worst since Sept. 17, 2001, the first trading day after the terror attacks, when the blue chips closed down 684.81, or 7.13 percent.
The drop hit every sector of stocks across the market. Riskier issues such as small-cap and technology stocks suffered the biggest declines.
Investors’ dwindling confidence was knocked down further by data showing that the economy may be decelerating more than anticipated. A Commerce Department report that orders for durable goods in January dropped by the largest amount in three months exacerbated jitters about the direction of the U.S. economy, just a day after former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said the United States may be headed for a recession.
U.S. DURABLE GOODS ORDERS PLUNGE BY RECORD 7.8%
February 27th, 2007Via: CNN:
New orders for U.S.-made durable goods fell by a much worse-than-expected 7.8 percent in January, as a steep drop in civilian airliner orders helped push orders for nondefense goods to their biggest monthly decline on record, a government report showed Tuesday.
The Commerce Department reported that excluding volatile transportation orders, which are heavily skewed by aircraft, durable goods orders fell 3.1 percent January, their steepest drop since July 2005, following a downwardly revised 2.8 percent gain in December.
U.S. Troops to Forgo Training in Rush to Iraq
February 27th, 2007Via: CNN:
Rushed by President Bush’s decision to reinforce Baghdad with thousands more U.S. troops, two Army combat brigades are skipping their usual session at the Army’s special training range in California.
They are now making preparations to leave their home bases.
Some in Congress and others outside the Army are beginning to question whether that decision means the Army is cutting corners in preparing soldiers for combat.
The desert training was designed specially to prepare soldiers for the challenges of Iraq.
Army officials say the two brigades will be as ready as any others that deploy to Iraq, even though they will not have the benefit of training in counterinsurgency tactics at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, California, which has been outfitted to simulate conditions in Iraq for units that are heading there on yearlong tours.
