Welcome to Sott.net
Tue, 26 Oct 2021
The World for People who Think

Puppet Masters
Map

Arrow Up

Dent, Faber, Celente, Maloney, Rogers - What do they say is coming in 2014?

Michael Snyder
TheEconomicCollapseBlog
Thu, 12 Dec 2013 21:45 UTC
Earth from Space
© TheEconomicCollapseBlog

Some of the most respected prognosticators in the financial world are warning that what is coming in 2014 and beyond is going to shake America to the core. Many of the quotes that you are about to read are from individuals that actually predicted the subprime mortgage meltdown and the financial crisis of 2008 ahead of time.

So they have a track record of being right. Does that guarantee that they will be right about what is coming in 2014? Of course not. In fact, as you will see below, not all of them agree about exactly what is coming next. But without a doubt, all of their forecasts are quite ominous. The following are quotes from Harry Dent, Marc Faber, Gerald Celente, Mike Maloney, Jim Rogers and nine other respected economic experts about what they believe is coming in 2014 and beyond...

-Harry Dent, author of The Great Depression Ahead: "Our best long-term and intermediate cycles suggest another slowdown and stock crash accelerating between very early 2014 and early 2015, and possibly lasting well into 2015 or even 2016. The worst economic trends due to demographics will hit between 2014 and 2019. The U.S. economy is likely to suffer a minor or major crash by early 2015 and another between late 2017 and late 2019 or early 2020 at the latest."

-Marc Faber, editor and publisher of the Gloom, Boom & Doom Report: "You have to say that we are again in a massive financial bubble in bonds, in equities, in [other] asset prices that have gone up dramatically."

-Gerald Celente: "Any self-respecting adult that hears McConnell, Reid, Boehner, Ryan, one after another, and buys this baloney... they deserve what they get. And as for the international scene... the whole thing is collapsing. That's our forecast. We are saying that by the second quarter of 2014, we expect the bottom to fall out... or something to divert our attention as it falls out."
      Read More...
Windsock

Congressmen Want to Haul Obama into Court for failure to follow the law

Daniel Halper
The Weekly Standard
Thu, 12 Dec 2013 20:00 UTC
Congressman Tom Rice of South Carolina, a Republican, is sponsoring a resolution in the House of Representatives that would, if adopted, direct the legislative body "to bring a civil action for declaratory or injunctive relief to challenge certain policies and actions taken by the executive branch." In other words, Rep. Rice wants to take President Obama to court for not faithfully executing the laws.

"President Obama has adopted a practice of picking and choosing which laws he wants to enforce. In most cases, his laws of choice conveniently coincide with his Administration's political agenda. Our Founding Fathers created the Executive Branch to implement and enforce the laws written by Congress and vested this power in the President. However, President Obama has chosen to ignore some of the laws written by Congress and implemented by preceding Presidents," Rice wrote in a letter to fellow House members to ask them to co-sponsor this resolution.

"This resolution allows the House of Representatives to bring legal action against the Executive Branch and challenge recent actions, inactions, and policies."
      Read More...
Heart - Black

Investigators describe horrifically graphic child porn on hard drive of Alexander aide

Alexis Levinson
The Daily Caller
Thu, 12 Dec 2013 13:22 UTC
Loskarn
© The Daily Caller
Loskarn attempted to hide hard drive outside his window.
Jesse Ryan Loskarn, the former chief of staff to Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander, appeared in a Washington, D.C. federal court Thursday on charges of possession and distribution of child pornography.

Alexander fired Loskarn on Thursday after learning he was under investigation.

Loskarn - who goes by his middle name - was caught during a joint investigation between the Toronto Police Service and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service into a website that was selling DVDs and streaming movies, most of which "feature young nude boys." Investigators found that Loskarn "made several purchases between November 2010 and March 2011," according to the official complaint document.

In early October this year, USPIS "identified Loskarn's residential IP address on the Gnutella peer to peer network offering files with names that are consistent with child pornography broadcasting as a download candidate," according to the complaint. Investigators obtained partial downloads of the files and discovered that they were indeed videos of pornography featuring young children in sexual situations.
      Read More...
Bad Guys

The corruption of America and JP Morgan Chase

Professor Robert Reich
robertreich.org
Sun, 08 Dec 2013 00:00 UTC
Image

Robert Reich - former Secretary of Labor during the Clinton Administration

The Justice Department has just obtained documents showing that JPMorgan Chase, Wall Street's biggest bank, has been hiring the children of China's ruling elite in order to secure "existing and potential business opportunities" from Chinese government-run companies. "You all know I have always been a big believer of the Sons and Daughters program," says one JP Morgan executive in an email, because "it almost has a linear relationship" to winning assignments to advise Chinese companies. The documents even include spreadsheets that list the bank's "track record" for converting hires into business deals.

It's a serious offense. But let's get real. How different is bribing China's "princelings," as they're called there, from Wall Street's ongoing program of hiring departing U.S. Treasury officials, presumably in order to grease the wheels of official Washington? Timothy Geithner, Obama's first Treasury Secretary, is now president of the private-equity firm Warburg Pincus; Obama's budget director Peter Orszag is now a top executive at Citigroup.

Comment: The corruption in Washington and on Wall Street is, indeed, "beyond outrage".

      Read More...
Gold Bar

N. Korea sells gold in sign of imminent economic collapse: source


N.K.News
Thu, 12 Dec 2013 13:19 UTC
Gold bullion.
© CNS
Gold bullion.
North Korea has begun to sell large amounts of gold to China in a bid to tide over its economic crisis, multiple sources familiar with North Korea affairs said Wednesday.

The disposal could be an indication of an imminent economic collapse as it goes against founding leader Kim Il-sung's order to never sell the country's gold, according to the sources.

"Since several months ago, North Korea has begun to sell even its gold," one source said, asking that he not be identified. "Overseas sales of gold are a barometer of whether the North Korean economy is in a crisis or not."

It is the first time that North Korea has sold gold since its leader Kim Jong-un took power in late 2011 following the death of his father Kim Jong-il, the sources added. Kim Il-sung is the current leader's grandfather.

According to South Korean government data, North Korea holds about 2,000 tons of gold reserves worth at least US$8 billion.

North Korea's economic situation is expected to worsen following the recent purge of Jang Song-thaek -- Kim Jong-un's once-powerful uncle and guardian -- as he had handled all economic projects with foreign countries, another source said.

An economic collapse in North Korea could lead to greater economic cooperation with South Korea but also increase the risk of a military provocation against the South, experts said.

Comment: Is this just another rumour designed to force the price of gold down? The 2000 tons of gold reserves would be a surprise to many. It could well be that this number actually refers to unmined gold reserves, which happens to be estimated at 2000 tons according to another source:
Asia-Pacific consultancy the Nautilius Institute reckons the DPRK's unmined gold deposits total perhaps 2,000 tonnes.
No doubt the rumour of a sale of 2000 tons will put a downward pressure on gold prices, even though it might concern unmined reserves. No doubt the Chinese central bank is a willing buyer.

It should also be noted that South Korea, which is the source of this article, has many times in the past said that the collapse of North Korea is imminent.

      Read More...
Arrow Up

Obamacare becomes nightmare of higher premiums and deductibles

Byron York
Washington Examiner
Mon, 09 Dec 2013 18:52 UTC
Obama
© Drugchannels.net
From a distance of three and a half years, the events of March 23, 2010, the day President Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act into law, seem like something from another world.

On that day, the Democrats who gathered in the East Room of the White House for the signing ceremony could barely contain their joy. They cheered, they laughed, they shouted, they pumped their fists, they wouldn't sit down. They chanted "Fired up -- ready to go!" as they had at Obama campaign rallies. When the president recognized Nancy Pelosi, then speaker of the House, the chant turned to "Nancy! Nancy! Nancy!"

Pelosi, of course, would be swept out of the speakership in the Republican landslide a few months later -- a result that was based, in part, on the voters' unhappiness with Obamacare. And today, some of the other Democrats in the East Room are now afraid for their jobs -- because of the voters' unhappiness with Obamacare.
      Read More...
Black Cat

Sebelius asks for investigation of flawed website

Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar
Real Clear Politics
Wed, 11 Dec 2013 10:01 UTC
Sebelious
President Barack Obama's top health official is asking for an investigation into the administration's botched rollout of HealthCare.gov.

The website was supposed to have been the online portal to insurance coverage under the new health care law, but technical problems turned it into a frustrating bottleneck for millions of consumers. It's working better now after two months of repairs.

Comment: And while we are on the subject, why does Kathleen Sebelius still have a job?

      Read More...
Briefcase

Former EPA senior offical who claimed to be CIA illegally collected pay and bonuses in 2010

Lenny Bernstein
Washington Post
Wed, 11 Dec 2013 21:52 UTC
EPA
© iStock/Skyhobo
The Environmental Protection Agency was warned as early as July 2010 that a senior executive who claimed to be a CIA agent was collecting pay and bonuses not allowed by law but took no action for years, according to a new report from the agency's inspector general.

Auditors warned EPA administrators that continuing "retention bonuses" for John C. Beale, which were not authorized, had pushed his salary above the legal maximum, according to the report, obtained Tuesday by The Washington Post.
      Read More...
Newspaper

The story behind "that Obama selfie"

Roberto Schmidt
Agence France-Presse
Wed, 11 Dec 2013 00:00 UTC
Selfies
© AFP/Roberto Schmidt
U.S. President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron pose for a picture with Denmark's Prime Minister Helle Thorning Schmidt next to US First Lady Michelle Obama during the memorial service for South African former president Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg.
So here's the photo, my photo, which quickly lit up the world's social networks and news websites. The "selfie" of three world leaders who, during South Africa's farewell to Nelson Mandela, were messing about like kids instead of behaving with the mournful gravitas one might expect.

In general on this blog, photojournalists tell the story behind a picture they've taken. I've done this for images from Pakistan, and India, where I am based. And here I am again, but this time the picture comes from a stadium in Soweto, and shows people taking a photo of themselves. I guess it's a sign of our times that somehow this image seemed to get more attention than the event itself. Go figure.

Anyway, I arrived in South Africa with several other AFP journalists to cover the farewell and funeral ceremonies for Nelson Mandela. We were in the Soccer City stadium in Soweto, under a driving rain. I'd been there since the crack of dawn and when I took this picture, the memorial ceremony had already been going on for more than two hours.
      Read More...
Light Sabers

NSA uses Google cookies to pinpoint targets for hacking

Ashkhan Soltani, Andrea Peterson, and Barton Gellman
Washington Post
Tue, 10 Dec 2013 21:28 UTC
Image
© Washington Post
A slide from an internal NSA presentation indicating that the agency uses at least one Google cookie as a way to identify targets for exploitation.
The National Security Agency is secretly piggybacking on the tools that enable Internet advertisers to track consumers, using "cookies" and location data to pinpoint targets for government hacking and to bolster surveillance.

The agency's internal presentation slides, provided by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, show that when companies follow consumers on the Internet to better serve them advertising, the technique opens the door for similar tracking by the government. The slides also suggest that the agency is using these tracking techniques to help identify targets for offensive hacking operations.

For years, privacy advocates have raised concerns about the use of commercial tracking tools to identify and target consumers with advertisements. The online ad industry has said its practices are innocuous and benefit consumers by serving them ads that are more likely to be of interest to them.

The revelation that the NSA is piggybacking on these commercial technologies could shift that debate, handing privacy advocates a new argument for reining in commercial surveillance.
      Read More...
Amazon Smile
Revolt! T-shirts