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US: Why the Foreclosure Deal May Not Be So Hot After All

Matt Taibbi
Rolling Stone
Thu, 09 Feb 2012 11:58 UTC
AG's
© Mark Wilson/Kevin Winter/Getty Images
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and California Attorney General Kamala Harris, who agreed to join more than 40 other states in a nationwide settlement, announced today.

So the foreclosure settlement is through.

A few weeks back, I was optimistic about it - I had been worried that it was going to contain broad liability waivers for all sorts of activities, and I was pleasantly surprised when I heard that its scope had essentially been narrowed to robosigning offenses.

However, now that the settlement is finalized, and I've had time to think about it and talk to people who know far more than I do about this, I'm feeling pretty queasy.

It feels an awful lot like what happened here is the nation's criminal justice honchos collectively realized that a thorough investigation of the problem would require resources they simply do not have, or are reluctant to deploy, and decided to accept a superficially face-saving peace offer rather than fight it out.

So they settled the case in a way that reads in headlines like it's a bite out of the banks, but in fact is barely even that. There will be little in the way of real compensation for stuggling homeowners, and there are serious issues in the area of the deal's enforceability. In fact, about the only part of the deal we can be absolutely sure will be honored in full is the liability waiver for the robosigning offenses.
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Bad Guys

US, California: LAPD Pioneers High-Tech Crime-Fighting 'War Room'


CBS News Los Angeles
Wed, 08 Feb 2012 01:53 UTC

The LAPD is fighting crime from a high-tech war room that gives it eyes all over the city. The surveillance hub is now a model for police forces around the world and KCAL9 got an exclusive tour inside from Chief Charlie Beck.

"We are targets on our own soil," says Beck. "We have to be ready."

What began as a grass roots idea following the 9/11 terrorist attacks is now a state-of-the-art real-time analysis critical response center. It's called RACR, and it's located in the heart of downtown Los Angeles.

"This is a system that cuts through the red tape, that gets information to the people that need it," says Chief Beck. He calls it "the brains of the department, twenty-four/seven."

Police in the activity center monitor live feeds of city and traffic cameras, counter-terrorism information, and real-time crime mapping, with cutting edge software.
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Attention

Russia: Gorbachev Talks! (And Putin Won't Like What He's Saying.)

Fred Weir
The Christian Monitor
Thu, 09 Feb 2012 00:00 UTC
Mikhail Gorbachev, a man who knows something about losing control of Russia, met with students today and warned of swelling protests against Vladimir Putin if he retakes the presidency.


It may be time to add a familiar old face to the gallery of fresh pro-democracy leaders that's been created by Russia's growing anti-Putin street protest movement: the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev.

Mr. Gorbachev, now an octogenarian, was one of the first Russian political figures to start warning - more than a year ago - that Vladimir Putin's autocratic, top-down Kremlin-centric regime risked repeating many of the errors that led to the downfall of the USSR and could face a mass challenge from the streets if it failed to implement democratic reforms.

Now that protest movement has materialized and Gorbachev, who faced a popular groundswell of opposition in the dying days of the Soviet Union, is advising Mr. Putin to drop his bid for election to a third presidential term in March 4 polls and leave.

With society turning against him, Putin is no longer able to handle the burdens of the presidency, Gorbachev said during a meeting with students at Moscow's International University today.
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War Whore

Propaganda Alert! Iran Helping al Qaeda? War "Hysteria" Builds

Tucker Reals
CBS News
Fri, 03 Feb 2012 06:02 UTC
Iran US flags
© CBS/AP
Reported concerns among some U.S. officials that Iran may have essentially freed a group of al Qaeda militants held for almost a decade under house arrest in the Islamic Republic are adding Friday morning to the escalating war-rhetoric pouring out of Washington and Israel.

According to The Wall Street Journal, some government officials believe Iran's move to allow the men greater freedom - which may include permission to leave the country - suggests the nation's hardline rulers are trying to bolster a link between themselves and the radical Muslim terror group as Western pressure mounts on both entities.


Comment: In other words, unsubstantiated rumors from unnamed sources, AKA Propaganda.


The report is particularly disconcerting as it follows closely on the heels of America's intelligence chief James Clapper warning U.S. lawmakers that Iran is, "more willing to conduct an attack in the United States" as sanctions hit its economy and talk of Israel attacking its military and nuclear installations gains volume.
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MIB

Germany Expels Four Syrian Diplomats in Spy Case

Nicholas Kulish and Alan Cowell
The New York Times
Thu, 09 Feb 2012 00:00 UTC
Guido Westerwelle
© Reuters//Guido Krzikowski
German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle.
As tensions mount between Western nations and Syria, the German authorities said Thursday that they had ordered the expulsion of four Syrian diplomats after arresting two men accused separately of spying on opponents of President Bashar al-Assad.

The police here arrested the two men on Tuesday, saying they were "strongly suspected of investigating Syrian opposition members in Germany for a Syrian intelligence service over a period of years."

The men were identified, under standard German procedures, only as Mahmoud El A., 47, of Lebanese descent, and Akram O., 34, a Syrian.

State and federal police officers searched the homes of six other suspects "believed to be involved in espionage," prosecutors said.

In a statement on Thursday, Guido Westerwelle, the German foreign minister, said the four diplomats - three men and a woman who were not identified by name - had been given three days to leave Germany. Mr. Westerwelle did not go into detail about the expulsions, but officials said the embassy personnel were suspected of carrying out activities incompatible with their diplomatic status, a formulation that usually refers to espionage.
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Dominoes

Greek deputy minister quits over EU/IMF bailout terms

David Stamp
Reuters
Thu, 09 Feb 2012 13:29 UTC
Greek deputy labour minister, Yannis Koutsoukos
© Syracuse University
Greek deputy labour minister, Yannis Koutsoukos
A Greek deputy minister resigned on Thursday in an early sign of resistance to tough austerity and reform measures which party leaders accepted as the price of a new international bailout.

Deputy Labour Minister Yannis Koutsoukos, a member of the socialist PASOK party and former trade union leader, said he was quitting because the measures were "painful for working people," and accused Greece's foreign lenders of blackmail.

He released his resignation letter to Prime Minister Lucas Papademos after the premier announced that leaders of the three parties in his coalition had signed up to conditions demanded by the European Union and IMF.

Parliament must approve the agreement in a vote expected to be held on Sunday or Monday.

"Our lenders ignored the arguments and concrete proposals made by the Labour Ministry and in a blackmailing way are crushing the edifice of labour relations," Koutsoukos wrote.
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Bad Guys

Hungary's Government Tightens Grip on Arts

Julia Michalska
Theartnewspaper.com
Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:05 UTC
Right-wing leadership stands accused of controlling the cultural sector for political ends

Image
© Unknown
Viktor Orban at the opening of an exhibition that he commissioned at the Hungarian National Gallery.
Already under attack from the European Commission for its policies on banking, the law and the media, Hungary's national conservative government is now facing a tide of protest from the arts community. The government, led by Viktor Orban, stands accused of systematically replacing key figures in cultural institutions, staging pro-government exhibitions, rethinking permanent museum displays and replacing historic statues to fit its political agenda. "The fact that an authoritarian government wants to control the arts is in itself not surprising," says the Hungarian economist Janos Kovacs. "But it's incredible that this is happening in the middle of the European Union without provoking angry reactions in Brussels."

Comment: Sounds like the drumbeat of Ponerology in that pathological individuals insert themselves into various institutions in an attempt to control ideas of the common populace and in this case, by erasing history for nefarious purposes. These individuals truly believe their subjective view of the world and, in turn, strive to impose it upon others. For more information on Ponerology - The Science of Evil, see these Sott links:

Political Ponerology: A Science on The Nature of Evil adjusted for Political Purposes

Ponerology: The Study of Evil - Interview with Marian Wasilewski

For information regarding an authoritarian mindset see:

Hypocrisy of the Authoritarians

For more on the author of Political Ponerology, Andrew Lobaczewski

Sott.net Interview with Andrew Lobaczewski

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Chess

Palestinian Rivals Agree to Form Unity Government

Ali Sawafta
Reuters
Mon, 06 Feb 2012 08:33 UTC
Mahmoud Abbas
© Reuters/Mohamad Torokman
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas smiles during a Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) executive committee meeting in the West Bank city of Ramallah January 30, 2012.
The leaders of rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas signed a deal in Qatar on Monday to form a unity government of independent technocrats for the West Bank and Gaza, headed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

The move, following the failure of exploratory Israeli-Palestinian talks aimed at reviving stalled peace negotiations, was condemned by Israel, which says the Islamist Hamas cannot be part of any peace efforts.

The accord signed by President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal is supposed to pave the way for Palestinian presidential and parliamentary election possibly later this year, and to rebuild the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip following a 2008-2009 Israeli offensive against Hamas.

It was not known whether the deal would be implemented. No timetable was set. A reconciliation pact Fatah and Hamas struck in May 2011 has had little substantive result but both sides said they were serious about carrying out the new accord.

Abbas' Palestinian Authority supports a negotiated peace with Israel that would give Palestinians an independent state in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and in Gaza, co-existing alongside the Jewish state.
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Airplane

Pakistan: Second US Drone Strike In 2 Days; 3 Dead


NPR
Wed, 08 Feb 2012 11:29 UTC
drone missle
© cnn.com
A U.S. drone fired two missiles at a house in Pakistan's northwest tribal region, killing three suspected militants in the second such attack in as many days, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

The back-to-back strikes could be an indication the drone program is picking up steam again after a slowdown caused by tensions with Pakistan over accidental American airstrikes that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers last year.

The U.S. held off on carrying out drone strikes for over six weeks after the deadly accident on Nov. 26. There have been a handful of attacks since they resumed in January, but the last two are the first consecutive strikes since the border incident.

The house hit before dawn on Thursday was located in the main bazaar in Miran Shah, the biggest town in the North Waziristan tribal area, the country's main sanctuary for Taliban and al-Qaida militants, said Pakistani intelligence officials. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
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Laptop

Bill C-11 Has Disgruntled Canadians Taking Action

Chase Kell
The Right Click
Wed, 08 Feb 2012 00:00 UTC
Image
© Reuters
A reporter's laptop shows the Wikipedia blacked out opening page.
When news of the threat Bill C-11 potentially poses broke nearly three weeks ago, the majority of Canadian observers took a hard stance against this Canadian SOPA-like anti-piracy legislation.

Comments from our Bill C-11 blog were unequivocally opposed to this bill passing through the House of Commons. Tweets responding the the blog echoed that same sentiment. And the poll placed on our SOPA topic page saw an astounding 94 per cent vote against online piracy regulations.

But it's not enough to simply draw a line in the sand and choose a side.

The 'Stop Bill C-11: Fight Harper's proposed Copyright Act - Defend Your Data' Facebook page is encouraging followers to contact their local MPs and voice their displeasure. Several of the near 2,500 followers have done just that, and the general response has been rather positive.

One follower commented on the page, stating she "just got a reply from the NDP leader, regarding my letter of concern about C-11. I can copy and paste the entire thing out, but in short, they will not be backing the bill as it is currently written."
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