Germany and France Demand to Know Why They Were Being Spied On

"Members of the European Union are quite upset because their relationship with the U.S. is supposed cozier than the frosty relationship between the U.S. and Russia. Germany and France seem really miffed over this whole spying deal. They thought they were exempt from surveillance because they are allies at the end of the day. 'These facts, if confirmed, would be totally unacceptable,' Minister of Foreign Affairs Laurent Fabius told Le Monde. 'We expect the U.S. authorities to stand up as soon as possible the legitimate concerns raised by the revelations of the press.' German politicians are also demanding an explanation from the U.S." Continue reading

Continue ReadingGermany and France Demand to Know Why They Were Being Spied On

The ghosts of America’s Cold War surveillance network pictured crumbling in Berlin

"These images of an abandoned NSA listening post on the outskirts of West Berlin have a special poignancy today, as it was leaks alleged that the U.S. bugs Germany, its prima facie ally, on the same scale as Communist China. The towers, antennae and geodesic domes of Teufelsberg Hill have long since stopped eavesdropping on the airwaves, but the U.S. still taps half a billion German phone calls, emails and text messages in a typical month, it was claimed. German Chancellor Angela Merkel defended governments' monitoring of Internet communications, however, and said that the U.S. cyber-snooping had helped prevent attacks on German soil." Continue reading

Continue ReadingThe ghosts of America’s Cold War surveillance network pictured crumbling in Berlin

Paul Craig Roberts: Washington Is Driving The World To The Final War

"It is not possible for a true patriot to support a government that destroys the Constitution. The United States is the Constitution. Our country is not the Obama regime, the Bush regime, or some other administration. Our country is the Constitution. The Constitution is our country. Beyond obligations to one’s own country, all humans have a responsibility to human life itself. Washington’s puppet states, such as the NATO countries, Japan, and Colombia, by providing cover and support for Washington’s aggression are enabling Washington to drive the world into World War III." Continue reading

Continue ReadingPaul Craig Roberts: Washington Is Driving The World To The Final War

“Banish Fractional Reserve Banking for Real Reform”

". . . says Thomas Mayer, a former IMF economist and former Chief Economist of Deutsche Bank Group and Head of DB Research, and now a Deutcshe Bank Senior Advisor. Mayer goes on to cite Austrian monetary and business-cycle theorist Jesus Huerta de Soto on the causal connection between fractional reserves and banking crises throughout history. He points out: 'Since there is no single state in the eurozone able to bail out banks in a systemic crisis, a banking regime without state backing is needed.' He concludes his letter with a four-step plan for 'comprehensive' banking reform that would implement just such a regime." Continue reading

Continue Reading“Banish Fractional Reserve Banking for Real Reform”

Tempers fray in France as drastic cuts loom

"President Francois Hollande has already angered much of his own Socialist base with plans to cut spending next year in absolute terms for the first time since 1958, but this may be just start of the battle. The Cour des Comptes said France is not even 'halfway' through its fiscal squeeze. The warnings came as a blizzard of grim news dashed hopes for a rapid recovery from two years of slump. A recent study by Pew Foundation said French support for the European Project has crashed from 60pc to 40pc over the past year. Just 22pc now think EU economic integration is positive." Continue reading

Continue ReadingTempers fray in France as drastic cuts loom

UN Releases 2013 World Drug War Report

"I found this paragraph absolutely stunning: 'We have to admit that, globally, the demand for drugs has not been substantially reduced and that some challenges exist in the implementation of the drug control system, in the violence generated by trafficking in illicit drugs, in the fast evolving nature of new psychoactive substances, and in those national legislative measures which may result in a violation of human rights. The real issue is not to amend the Conventions, but to implement them according to their underlying spirit.' Read that again and realize the enormity of what he is saying." Continue reading

Continue ReadingUN Releases 2013 World Drug War Report

Innovation in legal highs leaves governments in the dust

"An explosion of hundreds of new 'legal highs' in recent years has left governments around the world in the dust as lawmakers struggle to keep prohibition laws updated as more and more never-before-seen drugs flood the black market. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said Wednesday that more than 251 new psychoactive substances were available on the black market by mid-2012, a growth of more than 50 percent over 2009. The number of new psychoactive substances available on the black market today exceeds the number of controlled psychoactive substances currently prohibited by governments around the world." Continue reading

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Don’t Fall Victim to Hoarding

"Thanks to the courageous Edward Snowden, America now knows the NSA has, for seven years, collected data on many millions of our phone calls, emails and other communications, even when its top officials have testified that it had not. And things look like they are going to get even worse. Hot on the heels of the NSA revelations, now the habitually anti-tax haven and pro-tax Organization for Economic and Community Development (OECD) wants in on the action, by forcing all countries into useless data-hoarding of private information in a very big way." Continue reading

Continue ReadingDon’t Fall Victim to Hoarding

BIS Demands Global Depression?

"There is no avoiding what the Bank for International Settlements has just demanded. The top men at that august institution are demanding a global depression. And just to ensure that people especially in the West are thoroughly confused as they slip into starvation and despair, Austrian economics has been brought back into the argument. Free-market proponents didn't cause this disaster. Central bankers did, with their insistence on price fixing and monetary expansion. Determined to control all the elements of globalism, and keep them in place, they printed tens of trillions to stop a meltdown that must inevitably occur. By stretching it out, they prolong the agony for billions." Continue reading

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Der Spiegel: Public Must Fight against Prism and Tempora Surveillance

"The fact that the Americans and the British -- it is yet to be revealed who else participated -- have granted themselves this enormous power, without ever informing their own people, is a scandal of historic proportions. To the initiated, all the recent public debate about data retention, Internet privacy and the practices of Facebook and Google must have been downright amusing. The state, as it turns out, knew everything all along. The next weeks and months will show whether democratic societies across the world are strong enough to take a stand against the unlimited, totalitarian ambitions of Western secret services -- or not." Continue reading

Continue ReadingDer Spiegel: Public Must Fight against Prism and Tempora Surveillance