US CORPORATE DESTROYERS URGING NEXT FASCIST FAST TRACK ATTACK 0N AMERICA

Wall Street Titans Who Crashed Global Economy in 2008 Go Big for TPP

As billionaire class and financial elites push corporate-friendly pact, new data shows empty promises and 'job-killing' reality of previous agreements

by

Jon Queally, staff writer

Executives from the financial institutions who received TARP funds, (L-R) Goldman Sachs Chairman and CEO Lloyd Blankfein, JPMorgan Chase & Co Chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon, The Bank of New York Mellon CEO Robert P. Kelly, Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis and State Street Corporation CEO and Chairman Ronald Logue testify before the House Financial Services Committee February 11, 2009 in Washington, DC. (Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

1. [CV ...a trinational, Independent Task Force on the Future of North America has developed a roadmap to promote North American security and advance the well-being of citizens of all three countries. Read more] and more ...Ted Cruz: married to the establishment

1. [CV ... Rand Paul Supports the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Trade Deal. Read more

Even as millions and millions of Americans—represented by thousands of labor, environmental, family farm, consumer, faith, Internet freedom and other advocacy organizations—continue to stand firmly in opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership, those backing the TPP, including President Obama and a large majority of the Republican caucus, still have two dedicated demographic groups pledging their allegiance to the cause and arguing the so-called "free trade agreement (FTA)" would be good for average workers and the economy overall: billionaires and Wall Street titans.
As Zach Carter of the Huffington Post reports:

Last week, dozens of New York City's power elite signed a letter to the state's congressional delegation, urging lawmakers to support the Trans-Pacific Partnership now in negotiations. Democrats in Congress largely oppose the TPP, and Republican leaders have said they don't have the votes needed to pass it without Democratic support.
But while Obama has struggled to win over members of his own party -- he has been publicly feuding with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) -- wealthy CEOs probably aren't the ideal pitchmen to skeptical Democrats. Even if their letter hails the TPP as "a catalyst for creating new jobs in the United States" that will benefit "American workers in a broad range of industries."

Fox News mogul Rupert Murdoch signed the letter. So did Steven Schwarzman, who once compared the prospect of raising taxes on private equity magnates like himself to Hitler's invasion of Poland. John Paulson, the Republican mega-donor who made a fortune betting against the housing market with Goldman Sachs, is also a signee. So is vulture investor Wilbur Ross, who spent six figures to support GOP nominee Mitt Romney in 2012 and has backed such conservative hardliners as Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and former Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.).

Other signatories include real estate billionaire Jerry Speyer, who recently attended a $100,000-per-person fundraiser to bolster former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush's White House hopes. The host of that event, private equity kingpin Henry Kravis, also signed.

News of the letter, which can be read in full here, came on the same day as new trade data released by the U.S. Census Bureau, covering the full first three years of the bilateral trade deal between the U.S. and South Korea, revealed that the U.S. goods trade deficit with that country has more than doubled since the agreement, first signed in 2007 and amended in 2010, was implemented.

What the new data shows, according to the advocacy group Public Citizen, is economic outcomes that are the opposite of the Obama administration’s "more exports, more jobs" promise used to push through that deal, which are the same promises the administration and those supporting TPP are now using as they attempt to persuade Congress to approve Fast Track authority and ram it through Congress without debate or amendment.

The new economic statistics, explains Public Citizen, offer a damning indictment of the promises on which such deals are sold:

U.S. goods exports to Korea have dropped 6 percent, or $2.7 billion, under the Korea FTA’s first three years, while goods imports from Korea have surged 19 percent, or $11.3 billion (comparing the deal’s third year to the year before implementation). As a result, the U.S. goods trade deficit with Korea has swelled 104 percent, or more than $14 billion. The trade deficit increase equates to the loss of more than 93,000 American jobs in the first three years of the Korea FTA, counting both exports and imports, according to the trade-jobs ratio that the Obama administration used to project gains from the deal." [...]
Record-breaking U.S. trade deficits with Korea have become the new normal under the FTA – in 35 of the 36 months since the Korea FTA took effect, the U.S. goods trade deficit with Korea has exceeded the average monthly trade deficit seen in the three years before the deal. In January 2015, the monthly U.S. goods trade deficit with Korea topped $3 billion – the highest level on record.

The administration has tried to deflect attention from the failure of its Korea FTA by claiming that its poor performance has been caused by economic stagnation in Korea. However, Korea’s economy has grown during each year of the Korea FTA, while U.S. exports to Korea have not.

Despite those figures and the collapse of the U.S. manufacturing sector in the age of neoliberal globalization, the repeated line from TPP supporters is that these deals are 'job creators.' As the letter from the billionaire elites to the New York Congressional Delegation stated, "TPP would be a catalyst for creating new  jobs in the United States, attracting more foreign investment to this country, and  benefitting American workers in a broad range  of industries."

But that's simply not what the evidence from past FTAs shows, said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch, in a statement on Tuesday.

"Who’s going to buy the argument about Fast Track and the TPP creating 'more exports, more jobs' when Obama’s only major trade deal, used as the TPP template, was sold under that very slogan and yet has done the opposite?"

And Dave Johnson, from the Campaign for America's Future, explained in a Tuesday post how none of this "just happened" by accident, but that corporate-friendly trade policies have created these 'job-killing' conditions:

Globalization is not some kind of inevitable natural process of history that has caught up with us. This was and is the result of intentional policy choices, designed to force deindustrialization, break unions, drive down wages and benefits and increase inequality as that pay differential is pocketed by a few. This is the result of the “free market, free trade” ideology that rose up in the late 70s. Free trade policy was and is designed to give a few plutocrats and their giant corporations — “the 1 percent” — increased power over governments.

 Dean Baker, in “Globalization Was Policy, Not Something That Happened,” explained, “… inequality, like the path of globalization, is not something that happened. It was and is the result of conscious policy. We won’t be able to deal with it effectively until we acknowledge this simple fact.”

In his reporting for Huffington Post, Carter makes it clear that it wasn't only billionaires who signed the letter urging for Fast Track and TPP approval. Some, he told his readers, were "merely millionaire CEOs" like Goldman Sach's Lloyd Blankfein, Kenneth Chenault of American Express, and JP Morgan's Jamie Dimon.

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CFR Says China Must Be Defeated, & TPP Is Essential to That!

With the Rothschilds now with beacheads on every shore, there's nary a safe climate for individual liberty.
Rothschild Link Source Library (multi-lingual)
Wikipedia is consistently cleansed of Rothschild Zionist links to modern companies, people, events and concepts. NFU

Eric Zuesse
 

Wall Street’s Council on Foreign Relations has issued a major report, alleging that China must be defeated because it threatens to become a bigger power in the world than the U.S.

This report, which is titled “Revising U.S. Grand Strategy Toward China,” is introduced by Richard Haass, the CFR’s President, who affirms the report’s view that, “no relationship will matter more when it comes to defining the twenty-first century than the one between the United States and China.” He says that the report he is publishing argues that “strategic rivalry is highly likely if not inevitable between the existing major power of the day and the principal rising power.” Haass says that the authors “also argue that China has not evolved into the ‘responsible stakeholder’ that many in the United States hoped it would.” In other words: “cooperation” with China will probably need to become replaced by, as the report’s authors put it, “intense U.S.-China strategic competition.” 

Haass gives this report his personal imprimatur by saying that it “deserves to become an important part of the debate about U.S. foreign policy and the pivotal U.S.-China relationship.” He acknowledges that some people won’t agree with the views it expresses.

The report itself then opens by saying: “Since its founding, the United States has consistently pursued a grand strategy focused on acquiring and maintaining preeminent power over various rivals, first on the North American continent, then in the Western hemisphere, and finally globally.” It praises “the American victory in the Cold War.” It then lavishes praise on America’s imperialistic dominance: “The Department of Defense during the George H.W. Bush administration presciently contended that its ‘strategy must now refocus on precluding the emergence of any potential future global competitor’—thereby consciously pursuing the strategy of primacy that the United States successfully employed to outlast the Soviet Union.”

The rest of the report is likewise concerned with the international dominance of America’s aristocracy or the people who control this country’s international corporations, rather than with the welfare of the public or as the U.S. Constitution described the objective of the American Government: “the general welfare.” 

The Preamble, or sovereignty clause, in the Constitution, presented that goal in this broader context: “in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.” 

The Council on Foreign Relations, as a representative of Wall Street, is concerned only with the dominance of America’s aristocracy. Their new report, about “Revising U.S. Grand Strategy Toward China,” is like a declaration of war by America’s aristocracy, against China’s aristocracy. This report has no relationship to the U.S. Constitution, though it advises that the U.S. Government pursue this “Grand Strategy Toward China” irrespective of whether doing that would even be consistent with the U.S. Constitution’s Preamble.

The report repeats in many different contexts the basic theme, that China threatens “hegemonic” dominance in Asia. For example:

“China’s sustained economic success over the past thirty-odd years has enabled it to aggregate formidable power, making it the nation most capable of dominating the Asian continent and thus undermining the traditional U.S. geopolitical objective of ensuring that this arena remains free of hegemonic control.”

The report never allows the matter of America’s “hegemonic control” to be even raised. Thus, “hegemony” is presumed to be evil and to be something that the U.S. must block other nations from having, because there is a “traditional U.S. geopolitical objective of ensuring that this arena remains free of hegemonic control.” In other words: the U.S. isn’t being “hegemonic” by defeating aspiring hegemons. The report offers no term to refer to “hegemony” that’s being practiced by the U.S.

The report presents China as being supremacist, such as what (to quote again from the report) “historian Wang Gungwu has described as a ‘principle of superiority’ underwriting Beijing’s ‘long-hallowed tradition of treating foreign countries as all alike but unequal and inferior to China.’ Consistent with this principle, Henry Kissinger, describing the traditional sinocentric system, has correctly noted that China ‘considered itself, in a sense, the sole sovereign government of the world.’” America’s own ‘Manifest Destiny’ or right to regional (if not global) supremacy is not discussed, because supremacism is attributed only to the aristocracies in other countries, not to the aristocracy in this country.

Rather than the “general welfare,” this document emphasizes “U.S. Vital National Interests,” which are the interests of America’s aristocrats, the owners of America’s large international corporations.

This report urges:

“The United States should invest in defense capabilities and capacity specifically to defeat China’s emerging anti-access capabilities and permit successful U.S. power projection even against concerted opposition from Beijing. … Congress should remove sequestration caps and substantially increase the U.S. defense budget.”

In other words: the Government should spiral upward the U.S. debt even more vertically (which is good for Wall Street), and, in order to enable the increased ‘defense’ expenditures, only ‘defense’ expenditures should be freed from spending-caps. Forget the public, serve the owners of ‘defense’ firms and of the large international corporations who rely on the U.S. military to protect their property abroad.

The report says that China would have no reason to object to such policies: “There is no reason why a China that did not seek to overturn the balance of power in Asia should object to the policy prescriptions contained in this report.” Only a “hegemonic” China (such as the report incessantly alleges to exist, while the U.S. itself is not ‘hegemonic’) would object; and, therefore, the U.S. should ignore China’s objections, because they would be, by definition ‘hegemonic.’ Or, in other words: God is on our side, not on theirs.

“Washington simply cannot have it both ways—to accommodate Chinese concerns regarding U.S. power projection into Asia through ‘strategic reassurance’ and at the same time to promote and defend U.S. vital national interests in this vast region.”

The authors make clear that U.S. President Obama is not sufficiently hostile toward China: “All signs suggest that President Obama and his senior colleagues have a profoundly different and much more benign diagnosis of China’s strategic objectives in Asia than do we.”

Furthermore, the report ends by portraying Obama as weak on the anti-China front: “Many of these omissions in U.S. policy would seem to stem from an administration worried that such actions would offend Beijing and therefore damage the possibility of enduring strategic cooperation between the two nations, thus the dominating emphasis on cooperation. That self-defeating preoccupation by the United States based on a long-term goal of U.S.-China strategic partnership that cannot be accomplished in the foreseeable future should end.”

The report’s “Recommendations for U.S. Grand Strategy Toward China” urges Congress to “Deliver on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, … as a geoeconomic answer to growing Chinese economic power and geopolitical coercion in Asia,” but it fails to mention that the Obama Administration has already embodied the authors’ viewpoint and objectives in the TPP, which Obama created, and which cuts China out; it could hardly be a better exemplar of their agenda. The authors, in fact, state the exact opposite: that Obama’s objective in his TPP has instead been merely “as a shot in the arm of a dying Doha Round at the World Trade Organization (WTO).” They even ignore that Obama had cut China out of his proposed TPP.

Furthermore, here is what President Obama himself told graduating West Point cadets on 28 May 2014:

“Russia’s aggression toward former Soviet states unnerves capitals in Europe, while China’s economic rise and military reach worries its neighbors. From Brazil to India, rising middle classes compete with us, and governments seek a greater say in global forums.” He was saying that these future military leaders will be using guns and bombs to enforce America’s economic dominance. This is the same thing that the CFR report is saying.

His speech also asserted: “I believe in American exceptionalism with every fiber of my being. … The United States is and remains the one indispensable nation. That has been true for the century passed and it will be true for the century to come.” (That even resembles: “Henry Kissinger, describing the traditional sinocentric system, has correctly noted that China ‘considered itself, in a sense, the sole sovereign government of the world.’” Obama is, in a sense, saying that America is the “sole sovereign government in the world.”)

He made clear that China is “dispensable,” and that the U.S. must stay on top.

However, there is a difference between Obama and the CFR on one important thing: Obama sees Russia as the chief country over which the U.S. must dominate militarily, and China as the chief country to dominate economically. But in that regard, he is actually old-line Republican, just like his 2012 opponent Mitt Romney is. 

The only difference from Romney on that is: Obama wasn’t so foolish as to acknowledge publicly a belief that he shared with Romney but already knew was an unpopular position to take in the general election.

Furthermore, whereas the CFR report ignores the public’s welfare, Obama does give lip-service to that as being a matter of concern (just as he gave lip-service to opposing Romney’s assertion that Russia is “our number one geopolitical foe”). After all, he is a ‘Democrat,’ and the authors of the CFR report write instead as if they were presenting a Republican Party campaign document. No ‘Democrat’ can be far-enough to the political right to satisfy Republican operatives. The pretense that they care about the public is therefore far less, because the Republican Party is far more open about its support of, by, and for, the super-rich. Mitt Romney wasn’t the only Republican who had contempt for the lower 47%. But even he tried to deny that he had meant it. In that sense, the CFR’s report is a Republican document, one which, quite simply, doesn’t offer the public the lip-service that Obama does (and which he politically must, in order to retain support even within his own party).

Perhaps on account of the CFR report’s condemning Obama for not being sufficiently right-wing — even though he is actually a conservative Republican on all but social issues (where China policy isn’t particularly relevant) — the report has received no mention in the mainstream press, ever since it was originally issued, back in March of this year. For whatever reason, America’s ‘news’ media ignored the report, notwithstanding its importance as an expression of old-style imperialistic thinking that comes from what many consider to be the prime foreign-affairs mouthpiece of America’s aristocracy — the CFR. The report’s first coverage was on 2 May 2015 at the World Socialist Web Site, which briefly paraphrased it but didn’t even link to it. Then, Stephen Lendman wrote about the CFR report. He briefly paraphrased it and passionately condemned it. He did link to the report. But he didn’t note the WSWS article, which had first informed the public of the CFR report’s existence — an existence which, until the WSWS article, all of America’s ‘press’ had simply ignored.

The present article is the first one to quote the CFR report, instead of merely to paraphrase and attack it. The quotations that were selected are ones presenting the report’s main points, so that readers here can see these points stated as they were written, rather than merely as I have interpreted them. My interpretation is in addition to, rather than a substitute for, what the report itself says.

———-

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of  They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity, and of Feudalism, Fascism, Libertarianism and Economics.

source

Mystery of the Knights Templars

29 April, 2015 - 04:23 Bryan Hilliard

Protectors or Treasure Hunters on a Secret Mission?

The Knights Templars were a secret society whose true purpose remains a mystery or is at least vigorously debated among scholars and historians to this day.  The Templars left behind many clues of their actions which have been passed down through generations, hidden in ancient manuscripts and discovered by archeologists in the modern era.  Their story is one that has captured the fascination and curiosity of people throughout the ages – were they sent to the holy land in Jerusalem to protect Christians on pilgrimages, or were they sent there on secret missions by higher authorities in order to unearth lost artifacts and buried treasure under temples and sacred holy sites? 

Artist’s impression of a Templar Knight (Wikimedia Commons)

The Knights Templars were members of a religious military order of Christian knighthood founded around 1118-1119 in Jerusalem by the French knight Hugh des Payens.  For nearly two centuries this organization was the most powerful order in the medieval world.  They were the first standing army in Europe since the fall of the Roman Empire and by the time they reached their pinnacle of power in 1300, it is said they numbered in the tens of thousands.  In the beginning, there were a total of nine founding knights who made up the organization and were all related to one another through blood or marriage.  As both monks and soldiers, they were a paradox without precedent since there had never been praying priests who took up arms who also took vows of poverty, obedience and celibacy.  Knights Templars did not surrender unless they were outnumbered three to one and believed that since they were fighting for God they would be immediately sent up to heaven upon falling in battle.

BaldwinII ceeding the location of the Temple of Solomon to Hugues de Payns and Gaudefroy de Saint-Homer. The fourth person is Warmund, Patriarch of Jerusalem. (Wikimedia Commons).

Today in Europe, there are hundreds of former templar sites scattered across the continent showing how influential they were centuries ago.  At their peak, there were approximately 15,000 Templars houses with a network stretching from England to Egypt with the center of power situated in the then heart of the medieval world, France.  Conventional history says the Knights Templar’s purpose was to protect travelers traveling along the coast of the Mediterranean to Jerusalem.  In the middle ages, pilgrimages were made by westerners who had been guaranteed their safety in the city and templars protected them through the passes and mountains.  In addition to protection of the pilgrims, Templars also defended the Christian kingdom of Jerusalem and other holy sites as part of their duty.

• The intriguing carvings of the impressive Rosslyn Chapel.
• Walking the Camino de Santiago - Retracing the footsteps of our ancestors.

Crusades and Escort Service

For two hundred years, the Crusades were fought in the name of God and were considered to be a clash of civilizations.  Enemies were formed between the Christian west and Muslim east, which have endured to this day.  In 1065, Jerusalem was taken by the Turks and the Christians were treated badly enough to where, throughout Christendom, people were stirred to fight and recapture the city.  Another reason for the Crusades stems from the Church‘s desire to block any Islamic incursion into Christian lands.  On November 27th 1095, Pope Urban II gave a speech in which he exhorted Christians to rise up against Muslims in the Holy Land.  At this point in time, Muslims controlled Spain and parts of Eastern Europe.  Thousands responded to the call and took up the sword but only around 1,000 ever made it to Jerusalem.  The western Christians united with the Byzantines in the east and in 1099, the Crusaders, led by Godfrey of Bouillon, captured Jerusalem back from the Turks after a five week siege.  When the holy sites were in Christian hands, Westerners began traveling to the area in record numbers.  Outside the city walls, life was dangerous and there became a need for an escort service which is when the first Knights Templars came forward. 

Pope Urbanus ll preaching the First Crusade. (Wikimedia Commons).

Banking Back Home

During the third crusade, the Christians were decimated at the battle of Hattin.  It was the single worst military disaster in the holy land and one of the worst defeats for Christianity.  The Templars were all put to the sword by their Muslim conquerors who would go on to take the city of Jerusalem a few months later.  Subsequent crusades by later generations would come to be known as failures.  When they returned home after the first crusades in 1128, the Templars were rich and influential and answered to no one but the pope.  They also did not have to pay taxes and were allowed to cross through the borders of European countries unrestricted.  From 1150 on, they stopped guarding the road to Jerusalem.  Instead they devised a system which allowed pilgrims to travel without cash and valuables that might otherwise make them targets.  The Templars entered into the banking business and the Temples (local lodges) were established throughout Europe, drawing deposits of massive wealth.  The services the templars offered became the model for today’s banking system, money transfers, pension plans and traveler’s checks.  Their wealth made them the prominent bankers of their age and the first western multi-national corporation.  The most controversial service the Templars offered was the issuance of high profile loans.  Princes and commoners alike banked with the Templars, and many states became indebted to them.  The church, adamantly against usury at this time, looked the other way.

Crusader coins of the kingdom of Jerusalem, Denier in European style with Holy Sepulchre. British Museum, 2007. (Wikimedia Commons).

Decline of the Templars

With the fall of the Holy Land to the Muslims in 1187, the Templar order lost its founding purpose and became a target for unhappy debtors.  With the failure of the crusades and subsequent closures of the passage to the holy land, there no longer became a reason for the Knights Templars to exist.  Imagine a standing army roaming Europe that answered to no one and with no battle to fight.  This attracted attention and due to the wealth and political power the Templars had, they were seen as a threat to the power structure.  During the early 14th century, the order experienced a sudden decline.  In 1302, King Philip IV of France came into conflict with the pope.  Needing cash for his wars, he waged a vicious and skillful campaign aimed at suppressing the Templars, gaining their wealth while simultaneously, striking a blow against the papacy.  
On Friday October 13, 1307, all the Knights Templars in France were arrested by agents of King Philip and he ordered any still residing in the country to be thrown into prison where they were tortured until confessing to accusations of heresy, homosexuality, and dishonest business activities.  They were charged with capital offenses and their properties seized.  More than likely, many of the confessions were meaningless but following these admissions, a Papal command was issued by Pope Clement V to all Christian sovereigns in 1312 which ordered that all Knights Templars be disbanded.  The order of the Templar Knights went underground and their movements have been shrouded in mystery ever since.  Friday the 13th is linked with this historical event.

Execution of the Templars in the presence of Philip ‘the Fair’. Bedford Master 1415-1420, France. (Wikimedia Commons).

Conspiracy

After Clement’s edict in 1312, the Templars virtually vanished from the pages of history.  Of the hundreds, possibly thousands of Templars who were not arrested, there is little record of what happened to them.  There is documentation that their large fleet of ships vanished and it’s possible that they fled to Scotland since the country was something a Templar stronghold at the time.  They might have gone to Switzerland or hidden in the Alps which bordered southern France (its endless mountain range would have been a perfect hiding spot for treasure).  Some survivors of the Templar order can be traced and they simply changed their name becoming the Knights of Christ in Portugal for example.
But of all the mysteries surrounding the Knights Templars, the most puzzling one concerns their time spent in Jerusalem. The Templars literally disappeared there for nine years and what they did in their time there remains mostly unknown.  There were nine middle aged monks who were hardly in a position to protect travelers coming in and out of Jerusalem.  There also doesn’t seem to be a written account of any pilgrims being guarded by the Templars.  In 1867 a clue came to light when a British archaeological team excavated under the site of the temple mount in Jerusalem.  There, they uncovered tunnels extending vertically from a mosque for some twenty five meters which fanned out horizontally under the dome of King Solomon’s temple.  Templars spurs and various pieces of armaments were found as proof that the tunnels had been used by them.  A prevailing theory is that the Knights Templars were digging under the Temple for treasure left there by the Jews after the invasions by the Romans in 70 AD.  Other theories suggest the knights were guarding the Holy Grail and in possession of major treasures.  The biblical temple of Solomon once housed the Ark of the Covenant and Ten Commandments.  There are early masonic writings in the 1800’s citing documents which allegedly link the Templars with the arc of the covenant and treasure buried in the Temple of Solomon.   Regardless of which theory is the right one, when they emerged again in Europe they were more wealthy, powerful and influential than ever.
Featured image: Image of the Templar Knights ( brother-servant, brother and brother-knight priest). Ukraine, 1870. (Wikimedia Commons).
By Bryan Hilliard

References:

1.)  Wasserman, James. "Secret Societies: The Knight Templars and the Assassins." Secret Societies: The Knight Templars and the Assassins. N.p., 8 Dec. 2006. Web. 3 Dec. 2013. <http://jameswassermanbooks.com/templar-lecture.html>.
2.)  Timbers, Alex. "Knights Templar." Knights Templar. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Dec. 2013. <http://morrischia.com/david/portfolio/boozy/research/knights_20templar.html>.
3.)  The Templar code. Dir. Marcy Marzuki. Perf. Various. A & E Television Networks :, 2009. DVD.
4.) The Bible's buried secrets. Dir. Gary Glassman. Perf. Various. WGBH Boston Video, 2009. DVD.
5.)  The Knights Templar. Dir. Steven R. Talley. Perf. various. A & E Television Networks :, 2005. DVD.
6.)  Ralls, Karen. Knights Templar encyclopedia: the essential guide to the people, places, events, and symbols of the Order of the Temple. Franklin Lakes, NJ: New Page Books, 2007. Print.
7.)  "Templarhistory.com » Blog Archive » Philip IV – 1268 – 1314." Templarhistory.com » Blog Archive » Philip IV – 1268 – 1314. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Dec. 2013. <http://blog.templarhistory.com/2010/03/philip-iv-1268-1314/>.
8.)  "Who Were the Knights Templar?." History.com. A&E Television Networks, 26 July 2011. Web. 1 Dec. 2013. <http://www.history.com/news/who-were-the-knights-templar>.
9.)  The Templar code. Dir. Marcy Marzuki. Perf. Various. A & E Television Networks :, 2009. DVD.
10.)  "World Of The Wicked." World Of The Wicked. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Dec. 2013. <http://2012data.webs.com/knightsofthetemplar.htm>.
11.)  Hammer, Josh ua. "Smithsonian.com." Smithsonian magazine. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Dec. 2013. <http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/What-is-Beneath-the-Temple-Mount.html>.
12.)  Ralls, Karen. Knights Templar encyclopedia: the essential guide to the people, places, events, and symbols of the Order of the Temple. Franklin Lakes, NJ: New Page Books, 2007. Print.
13.)  The Templar code. Dir. Marcy Marzuki. Perf. Various. A & E Television Networks :, 2009. DVD.

           

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Don't Be Fooled by the Federal Reserve's Anti-Audit Propaganda - By Ron Paul

EDITORIAL

By Ron Paul - March 09, 2015

In recent weeks, the Federal Reserve and its apologists in Congress and the media have launched numerous attacks on the Audit the Fed legislation. These attacks amount to nothing more than distortions about the effects and intent of the audit bill.

Fed apologists continue to claim that the Audit the Fed bill will somehow limit the Federal Reserve's independence. Yet neither Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen nor any other opponent of the audit bill has ever been able to identify any provision of the bill giving Congress power to dictate monetary policy. The only way this argument makes sense is if the simple act of increasing transparency somehow infringes on the Fed's independence.

This argument is also flawed since the Federal Reserve has never been independent from political pressure. As economists Daniel Smith and Peter Boettke put it in their paper "An Episodic History of Modern Fed Independence," the Federal Reserve "regularly accommodates debt, succumbs to political pressures, and follows bureaucratic tendencies, compromising the Fed's operational independence."

The most infamous example of a Federal Reserve chair bowing to political pressure is the way Federal Reserve Chairman Arthur Burns tailored monetary policy to accommodate President Richard Nixon's demands for low interest rates. 

Nixon and Burns were even recorded mocking the idea of Federal Reserve independence.

Nixon is not the only president to pressure a Federal Reserve chair to tailor monetary policy to the president's political needs. In the fifties, President Dwight Eisenhower pressured Fed Chairman William Martin to either resign or increase the money supply. Martin eventually gave in to Ike's wishes for cheap money. 

During the nineties, Alan Greenspan was accused by many political and financial experts – including then-Federal Reserve Board Member Alan Blinder – of tailoring Federal Reserve policies to help President Bill Clinton.

Some Federal Reserve apologists make the contradictory claim that the audit bill is not only dangerous, but it is also unnecessary since the Fed is already audited. 

It is true that the Federal Reserve is subject to some limited financial audits, but these audits only reveal the amount of assets on the Fed's balance sheets. The Audit the Fed bill will reveal what was purchased, when it was acquired, and why it was acquired.

Perhaps the real reason the Federal Reserve fears a full audit can be revealed by examining the one-time audit of the Federal Reserve's response to the financial crisis authorized by the Dodd-Frank law. This audit found that between 2007 and 2010 the Federal Reserve committed over $16 trillion – more than four times the annual budget of the United States – to foreign central banks and politically influential private companies. Can anyone doubt a full audit would show similar instances of the Fed acting to benefit the political and economic elites?

Some fed apologists are claiming that the audit bill is part of a conspiracy to end the Fed. As the author of a book called End the Fed, I find it laughable to suggest that I, and other audit supporters, are hiding our true agenda. Besides, how could an audit advance efforts to end the Fed unless the audit would prove that the American people would be better off without the Fed? And don't the people have a right to know if they are being harmed by the current monetary system?

For over a century, the Federal Reserve has operated in secrecy, to the benefit of the elites and the detriment of the people. It is time to finally bring transparency to monetary policy by auditing the Federal Reserve.

This article contributed courtesy of the ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity.

Source thedailybell

Too Big to Fail Banks Ranked

Friday, March 06, 2015

JPMorgan Chase has earned the distinction of being the largest bank among those deemed too-big-to-fail for the sake of the U.S. financial and economic systems, according to a new government report (pdf).

The federal Office of Financial Research (OFR) ranked 12 U.S. financial institutions based on their “total exposures.”

No. 1 was JPMorgan Chase followed by Citigroup, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

The remaining six banks were U.S. Bancorp, PNC Financial Services, Bank of New York Mellon, HSBC N.A. Holdings, State Street and Capital One.

Among the conclusions produced in the report are findings that “the largest U.S. banks generally scored highest for all systemic risk indicators,” and that “several of the largest banks scored high in systemic importance because they dominate specific businesses, such as payments and asset custody services.”

The authors of the OFR report based their findings on data collected by the Federal Reserve System. That data was significant, they said, because it provides additional transparency that helps to quantify important aspects of the banking system.

Their evaluation was made by comparing scores on the banks’ sizes, global activity, complexity, interconnectedness, and dominance in certain areas of customer service.

- Danny Biederman, Noel Brinkerhoff

To Learn More:

Systemic Importance Indicators for 33 U.S. Bank Holding Companies: An Overview of Recent Data (by Meraj Allahrakha, Paul Glasserman, and H. Peyton Young, Office of Financial Research) (pdf)

15,559 Sign Petition Opposing Merger to Create New “Too-Big-to-Fail” Bank (by Ken Broder, AllGov California)

Bailout Helped Banks “Too Big to Fail” Get Bigger (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)

▶ GONE GOLD -- The Powerful Story Of Repatriation - YouTube

Published on Mar 1, 2015

What do Switzerland, England, Austria, Netherlands, France, Belgium, Mexico, Poland, Italy. Australia, Ecuador, Romania and the tiny country of Azerbaijan have in common? They all want to know where their gold is, and they all have burgeoning gold repatriation movements in various stages of progress. Peter Boehringer, the father of the gold repatriation movement in Germany, and founder of the website Goldseiten.de joins us to discuss the great global awakening as nations begin asking, where is our PHYSICAL gold? We want it back!

Another Unsolved Gold Crime: Did the Banking Cartel also Steal Armenia's Gold?

Take Your Money And Run!! Global Central Bank Conspiracy Exposed - Next Step: Confiscating Your Bank Deposits

February 26, 2015 By Susan Duclos - All News PipeLine "The bottom line: what we have now is a worldwide conspiracy between the central banks and our policymakers who are determined to keep the system managed in their interest at all costs. But who will lose in the end because of this merger? We will as a collective people." - Gregory Mannarino, Seeking Alpha In the first video below Gregory Mannarino exposes the "lethal combination" of central banks morphing with politics as the global central banks, specifically the Federal Reserve, who in their own words must take "extraordinary measures," to prop up a failing system. Mannarino asserts that their desperation has gotten so bad that the Fed is requiring banks to buy debt (since 2012) which directly exposes depositors to an asset that can never be paid back. We are informed that these measures will assure the banks' survival in the worst of time as he asks "what about yours?" In the second video below, author, attorney, speaker, and activist Ellen Brown joins Dan Schultz at New Culture Radio, and tells us the next step in their disastrous plans, the legal mechanisms already in place, is to confiscate depositors funds. As has been explained before, once money is deposited into a bank it no longer belongs to the depositor who is then considered a "creditor" and when the banks can no longer pay their bills, those depositors are last in line behind their other creditors.

via allnewspipeline

This Is What Happens To Gold In A Hyperinflationary Currency Crisis: Ukraine Edition

Preliminary:

Ukraine Sends Gold to US for "Safekeeping"! Yikes, don't they know the US Fed has Stolen Germany's Gold? ----- March 16. 2014

Charleston Voice: What Happened to Ukraine's Gold? - YouTube

Dec 4, 2014 ... Who's who in Ukraine's new neo-Nazi, fascist government ... Was The Price Of Ukraine's "Liberation" The Handover Of Its Gold To The Fed?

Charleston Voice: Swiss Kid Explains Ukrainian Gold Transport By US

Aug 11, 2014 ... The Ukraine's gold reserves weigh in at 42.3 tonnes, and are worth 1.3 billion Euros. A leading figure of the former ministry of finance has ...

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/25/2015

As Ukraine's socio-economic situation goes from wost to worst-er, today's announcement by President Poroshenko that the government will take actions to stabilize the currency (which as we previously noted, appears to be heading for hyperinflation) has Ukrainians rushing for the exits into precious metals... with only one goal in mind - wealth preservation.

This is what gold does in a fiat-currency crisis. Now if only Ukraine actually still had some gold...

Furthermore, according to RIA, on Tuesday, Ukrainian television channel Ukraina announced that with the new exchange rate, the minimum wage in Ukraine stands at around $42.90 per month, which according to the channel, is lower than in Ghana or Zambia.

There are currently no plans to raise the minimum wage until December.

Behold hyperinflation:

"Food prices among producers rose 57.1 percent, with the price for grains and vegetables rising 91 percent from January 2014 to January 2015, while the official inflation rate over the period totaled 28.5 percent.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian consumers responded to economic difficulties by cutting their spending in hryvnias by 22.6 percent, which amounts to an almost 40 percent decrease in real consumption."

Nothing to fear though: we are sure all that hard-earned US taxpayer-lent money will be safe and sound.

source Zero Hedge

Allen West, Another Republican Neo-Con

 Kelleigh Nelson February 16, 2015

Allen West, Another Neo-Con 

Our 'neoconservatives' are neither new nor conservative, but old as Babylon and evil as Hell. -Edward Abbey, American author

And I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I found none. Therefore have I poured out mine indignation upon them; I have consumed them with the fire of my wrath: their own way have I recompensed upon their heads, saith the Lord GOD. Ezekiel 22:30-31

Allen West's Military Service

Allen Bernard West was born in Georgia, graduated from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, and then joined the United States Army in 1983. He was deployed to Kuwait in 1991, and Iraq in 2003. In 2003, West was charged in an incident that involved the beating and simulated execution of an Iraqi police officer. He was fined $5,000, accepted a Non-judicial punishment and after 20 years of service, was allowed to retire as a lieutenant colonel after an Article 32 hearing.

West made an agonizing moral decision to save his men from a likely ambush. To do so, he shot off a pistol next to the head of a suspect, forcing him to confess vital lifesaving intelligence. Col. West didn't do that to punish the man, but to save lives, and it worked. However, the military considered his actions to be harsh interrogation tactics.

West reported his actions to his superiors, and he had to know it would cost him his career. He very well could have ended up in prison as well as having the instance cost him personal agonies. Yet, he made the right decision and it saved his men.

In 2004, Col. West returned to Afghanistan as an adviser to the Afghan army, an assignment he finished in November 2007. During his Army career, he was honored many times, earning a Bronze Star, three Meritorious Service Medals, three Army Commendation Medals (one with Valor), and a Valorous Unit Award. He received his valor award as a Captain in Desert Shield/Storm, was the US Army ROTC Instructor of the Year in 1993, and was a Distinguished Honor Graduate III Corps Assault School.

West Runs for Congressman

In 2008, when Col. West ran for representative in Florida's 22nd Congressional District, he lost to Democrat Ron Klein.

West was one of 32 black Republican candidates for Congress in 2010. He said he supported the Tea Party movement and rejected the notion that the movement was motivated by racism, saying the accusation was a creation of liberal critics and the news media. West was described as a "tea party star." His stance on Islamic terrorists convinced many patriotic and conservative Americans to support him for Congress. He has even spoken out about Islamists infiltrating the military. He raised $5.4 million and stated that 97% of his donations came from individuals, and I was happy to be one of those individuals. I thought West was truly a Constitutional conservative, but once again, I was wrong.

Congressman West became a member of the congressional Tea Party Caucus in February 2011. 

However, the TP Caucus died a quick death and was all but defunct by 2012.

On February 1, 2012, West announced that he would run for reelection from the new 18th Congressional District, which consists of a majority of the previous 16th Congressional District. He had been redistricted. He received a primary challenge from Martin County Sheriff Robert Crowder, but won the primary. Crowder later endorsed Democrat Patrick Murphy, a political newcomer and a Republican until 2011. Unfortunately, West lost his re-election bid to Murphy, and it was not only because of being redistricted, but because he had lost his grassroots Tea Party support. Here is why he lost that support:

Allen West voted for the Pigford II farm payouts to non-existent black farmers against his constituents' wishes, and the TP people were quite angry about it. Allen apologized and admitted he didn't do his homework.

Allen West supported Speaker John Boehner's plan for cutting spending and raising the debt ceiling, even though his fellow Tea Party supporters were very skeptical. (Link) Cut Cap and Balance raised the debt limit against his constituents' wishes. (Link)

When Congressman West was interviewed on the Laura Ingraham show after the debt vote, Ingraham asked him how he felt about his Tea Party supporters being very angry at him for his vote. He actually answered her by calling his Tea Party supporters, "Schizos." (Video recording)

Allen West voted against cutting 100 Million from Obama care, against his constituents' wishes. (Link)

Allen West voted for the horrid NDAA and insists there is nothing in the bill that would allow military arrest and detention of American citizens. I've read the bill and hundreds of others have too. (Link) Allen West was on the NDAA committee. (Link) And why was there a provision that would allow the president to order the death of an American citizen without a trial? (Link) Again, this was against the wishes of his constituents.

Col. Allen West has capitulated on his anti-Islam stance. (Link) He wrote a letter to members of the Interfaith Alliance which was in contrast to his previous speeches stating his stance on Islamic terrorists.

These various votes cost West his Tea Party backing. Here's a link to West's Congressional voting record.

West's New CEO Position

On Tuesday, February 12, 2015, the Tea Parties in northern Texas hosted an event to welcome former Congressman Allen West to Texas. He has been named the CEO of the formerly conservative National Center for Policy Analysis, (NCPA) a national policy think tank based in Dallas. Since the libertarian Koch brothers gave the organization $570,000, the NCPA is singing a different tune. (The Koch brothers are planning to spend $1 billion on the election in 2016, partly for a Rand Paul presidency. (Link) David Koch is on the board of Trustees of Rockefeller University. He is also on the board of Earthwatch Institute, an environmental, sustainability, Agenda 21 group. See this map of Koch's many connections. David Koch also supports gay marriage and stem-cell research. He is also on the board of the globalist new age Aspen Institute formerly headed by new age environmentalist, and UN Agenda 21 author, Maurice Strong.) 

Under the "About" category in the NCPA website, you'll find dozens of their experts, and the first person listed is Bob McTeer, who is best known for his 36-year career with the Federal Reserve System, including 14 years as President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and member of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC). 

Another expert is Estelle James, PhD, who is a consultant to the World Bank, USAID and other international organizations. Previously she was Lead Economist at the World Bank and Director of the Bank's flagship course on pension reform. She has also served on the Governing Board of the new pension fund in Kosovo and the President's Commission to Strengthen Social Security in the U.S. 

NCPA (Allen West) Invites Traitor to Lecture in Dallas

Finish reading article

Also:

Allen West Wrong on Nullification and Supremacy Clause