Yearly Archives: 2013

Lavabit chief predicts ‘long fight’ with feds (Q&A)

"Ladar Levison can't talk for legal reasons about the specifics of why he shut down Lavabit, his encrypted Web e-mail company, but he was hardly tight-lipped about the subject. Levison, a San Francisco native and an enthusiastic beach-and-sand volleyball player who moved to Texas to go to college, currently resides in Dallas. In an phone interview about the decision to shutter Lavabit, Levison spoke about the connection between Lavabit and the Patriot Act, how he thinks the laws regarding privacy ought to change, and how the American government is failing to uphold the U.S. Constitution." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingLavabit chief predicts ‘long fight’ with feds (Q&A)

U.S. E-Mail Services Close and Destroy Data Rather Than Reveal Files

"The shutdown of two small e-mail providers on Thursday illustrates why it is so hard for Internet companies to challenge secret government surveillance: to protect their customers’ data from federal authorities, the two companies essentially committed suicide. In effect, both businesses destroyed their assets — in part or in full — to avoid turning over their customers’ data. Such public displays are far more difficult for large companies to make, and help explain why the most public efforts to challenge secret government orders have come from small companies and nonprofits." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingU.S. E-Mail Services Close and Destroy Data Rather Than Reveal Files

Border Patrol agent who shot Mexican teenager dead will not be charged

"U.S. authorities will not bring charges against a Border Patrol agent in Arizona who shot dead a rock-throwing Mexican teenager two years ago because the fatal injury did not occur in the United States, the Justice Department said on Friday. An unidentified Border Patrol agent shot Ramses Barron, a 17-year-old Mexican citizen, through the border fence in Nogales, Arizona, in the early hours of January 5, 2011. Over the past five years, U.S. border agents have fired into Mexico at least 10 times, killing six Mexicans, according to a report released earlier this year by the Washington Monthly and the Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingBorder Patrol agent who shot Mexican teenager dead will not be charged

In Switzerland, Marijuana Use Helps Keep Prisons Calm and Safe

"A recent study published in the International Journal of Drug Policy estimates that 50 to 80 percent of inmates in Swiss prisons use marijuana. Prison staff told researchers they found marijuana to be a relatively safe drug and that cracking down on consumption would have more negative effects than positive ones. Surveys of detainees and guards revealed similar opinions on marijuana use, with both groups describing the effects of marijuana as analgesic, calming and a way to decrease the traumatic prison experience." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingIn Switzerland, Marijuana Use Helps Keep Prisons Calm and Safe

Jeffrey Tucker: Is Bitcoin Real or Not?

"Certainly government can regulate exchange between government currencies and Bitcoin. It can also regulate income in Bitcoin the same as with other currency. This is not some tax-free nirvana in the making. The government can also oversee contractual regulations and securities activities in Bitcoin. However, Bitcoin itself is a peer-to-peer system of cryptographically guarded exchange, and it lives on a distributed server model. It is not a company. It is not a stock. It is not a product. It is a ledger that no one in particular runs or owns. It is not possible for Bitcoin as such to be destroyed any more than government can destroy algebra." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingJeffrey Tucker: Is Bitcoin Real or Not?

Peter Schiff: What Doesn’t Kill Gold Makes It Stronger

"In July, the gold net-short positions reached record highs. When gold began to rebound last month, a massive number of shorts were left exposed and many still remain exposed. Gold shorts are stuck holding the losing bet on an asset that is going to do the opposite of what they anticipated. If the price rally continues, these traders will feel increasing pressure to unwind their shorts before their losses become catastrophic. This 'short squeeze,' as it is known in finance, will reverse the vicious cycle and could send gold dramatically higher than when the correction started." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingPeter Schiff: What Doesn’t Kill Gold Makes It Stronger

A territorial tax system would help U.S. exports, jobs and prosperity

"Germany, a territorial tax country where wage levels are higher than in the U.S. and which has the highest job-creating 12-month trade surplus in the world of $248.5 billion, has its record lowest unemployment rate in 21 years. Germany doesn’t subject its citizens living abroad on top of the tax they pay their host countries, so Germans relocate abroad and capture foreign markets. Americans, unable to survive this double taxation, stay home, and the U.S. continues to lose export market share. The 'fruits' of the U.S. world-wide tax systems are a $721.8 billion 12-month world-trade deficit and $315 billion trade deficit with China." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingA territorial tax system would help U.S. exports, jobs and prosperity

Bill Bonner: The Bottom Is Still Ahead for This Bear Market

"The last top in Treasury prices (and a bottom for yields) occurred in 1946. Yields rose for the next 34 years. Now the Treasury market appears to be topping out again… and is headed for a new high in yields… which may not arrive until 2047. It may be a long way off… or right around the corner. Either way, it will be hell getting there. The Detroit pension disaster is just the first of many. Wait until long-term interest rates hit 5%… or 10%. How many companies, cities and pension funds will still be solvent? We’ll see! But wait. You don’t think the Fed will sit on its hands and let the markets take over, do you? Taper off? Forget it." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingBill Bonner: The Bottom Is Still Ahead for This Bear Market

America’s Fastest-Growing Cities Since The Recession

"An analysis of post-2007 population trends by demographer Wendell Cox in the 111 U.S. metro areas with more than 200,000 residents reveals something both very different from the conventional wisdom and at the same time very familiar. Virtually all of the 20 that have added the most residents from 2007 to 2012 are in the Old Confederacy, the Intermountain West and suburbs of larger cities, notably in California. The lone exception to this pattern is No. 15 Portland. The bottom line: growth is still fastest in the Sun Belt, in suburban cities and lower-density, spread out municipalities." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingAmerica’s Fastest-Growing Cities Since The Recession

Fast-food worker protests help labor unions, not labor

"Terrance is not your typical minimum wage worker. Most minimum wage workers move on after a couple of years, because turnover in the fast-food industry is rapid. When I asked NPR how to get in touch with Terrance, I was given the name of his publicist. A minimum-wage worker with a publicist? That’s something. Worker centers such as NYCC should stop masquerading as friends of workers and admit they are paid by unions to do work that unions are not allowed to do. Higher minimum wages will price the young and unskilled out of jobs, and add to their difficulties in finding employment." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingFast-food worker protests help labor unions, not labor