Puppet Masters

Attorney Asks for Dismissal in WikiLeaks Case

Jessica Gresko
Seattlepi.com
Thu, 15 Mar 2012 08:14 UTC

© Patrick Semansky / AP
FILE - In this file photo taken Dec. 22, 2011, Army Pfc. Bradley Manning is escorted from a courthouse in Fort Meade, Md. Manning was scheduled to appear in a military courtroom at Fort Meade, near Baltimore, on Thursday March 15, 2012 and Friday. During his most recent hearing in late February, no trial date was set, though the timing was discussed. A military judge is expected to set a firmer schedule this week.

Fort Mead, Maryland - An attorney for an Army private accused of leaking hundreds of thousands of pages of classified information asked a military judge Thursday to dismiss the charges, arguing the government bungled the handover of documents to the defense.

The request came during a hearing for Pfc. Bradley Manning at a military courtroom at Fort Meade, Md., near Baltimore. Military prosecutors say Manning, a 24-year-old Oklahoma native, downloaded and sent to the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks a vast store of sensitive documents and diplomatic cables. The military says Manning indirectly aided al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula by giving information to the WikiLeaks site.

Banks Worsening Foreclosure Crisis, A Study

Presstv.com
Sat, 17 Mar 2012 08:04 UTC

Banks might be indulging a bad habit that could be worsening the foreclosure crisis, according to recent research from economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.

The economists, Thomas Fitzpatrick and Stephan Whitaker, did some analysis of the Ohio real estate market and found a disquieting trend. Banks seem to be over-valuing many of the homes they foreclose on, making it less likely that homeowners can get a loan modification and more likely that they'll end up losing their property.

It is not clear how or why banks are getting an inflated idea of the value of so many properties - especially since foreclosed homes tend to drag down real estate prices for the whole neighborhood - but the trend seems to be real. Fitzpatrick and Whitaker note that at foreclosed-home auctions in the Cleveland area, banks routinely sell their properties for much less than what they paid to buy them from the sheriff, meaning banks are high-balling their estimates of what those homes are worth.

China's Impending Financial Crash

Gwynne Dyer
Straight.com
Wed, 14 Mar 2012 17:03 UTC

Building a skyscraper is the ultimate expression of economic confidence, and more than half of the 124 skyscrapers currently under construction in the world are being built in China. But confidence is often based on nothing more than faith, hope, and cheap credit, and a frenzy of skyscraper-building is also the most reliable historical indicator of an impending financial crash.

The Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building, the twin symbols of New York's emergence as the world's financial capital, were started at the end of the "Roaring Twenties" but completed in the depths of the Great Depression. The Petronas Towers in Malaysia were built just before the Asian financial crash of 1998. Burj al-Khalifa in Dubai, now the world's tallest building, was just starting construction when the Great Recession hit in 2008.

Treacherous Gulf States offered $5 billion bribe to Russia for yes vote on Syria

Voltairenet
Sat, 17 Mar 2012 05:18 UTC

"Well then I offered him $6 billion."

"What did he say?"

"He told me to #&!% off..."

Informed diplomatic sources have reported to the Wayne Madsen Report (WMR) that Bahrain, representing the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), offered Russia a bribe of $5 billion if it did not use its veto in the Security Council to defeat an Arab League-sponsored resolution calling for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down. In the February 4 vote on the resolution, Russia, along with China, used their vetos to shoot down the resolution. U.S. ambassador to the UN Susan Rice called the vetoes "disgusting" and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton referred to the Russian and Chinese action as "despicable," with Germany's UN ambassador Peter Wittig calling the vetoes a "disgrace."

But in what could be termed disgusting, despicable, and disgraceful was the reported offering of a $5 billion bribe for Russia's yes vote by Bahrain's Foreign Minister Shaikh Khalid bin Ahmed bin Mohammed Al Khalifa during a trip to Moscow prior to the UN Security Council vote. Our sources report that the Russian government flatly turned down the offer of the money, which was bundled by Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman.

The NSA Is Building the Country's Biggest Spy Center (Watch What You Say)

James Bamford
Wired.com
Thu, 15 Mar 2012 19:24 UTC

The spring air in the small, sand-dusted town has a soft haze to it, and clumps of green-gray sagebrush rustle in the breeze. Bluffdale sits in a bowl-shaped valley in the shadow of Utah's Wasatch Range to the east and the Oquirrh Mountains to the west. It's the heart of Mormon country, where religious pioneers first arrived more than 160 years ago. They came to escape the rest of the world, to understand the mysterious words sent down from their god as revealed on buried golden plates, and to practice what has become known as "the principle," marriage to multiple wives.

Today Bluffdale is home to one of the nation's largest sects of polygamists, the Apostolic United Brethren, with upwards of 9,000 members. The brethren's complex includes a chapel, a school, a sports field, and an archive. Membership has doubled since 1978 - and the number of plural marriages has tripled - so the sect has recently been looking for ways to purchase more land and expand throughout the town.

But new pioneers have quietly begun moving into the area, secretive outsiders who say little and keep to themselves. Like the pious polygamists, they are focused on deciphering cryptic messages that only they have the power to understand. Just off Beef Hollow Road, less than a mile from brethren headquarters, thousands of hard-hatted construction workers in sweat-soaked T-shirts are laying the groundwork for the newcomers' own temple and archive, a massive complex so large that it necessitated expanding the town's boundaries. Once built, it will be more than five times the size of the US Capitol.

Comment: Caveat Lector: Wired Magazine and Wired.com is owned by a company which produces drones and is heavily invested in facilitating the widespread use of domestic drones for spying on, tracking, arresting and ultimately eliminating American citizens.

Attack of the Drones

Iran sanctions seen spurring more Saudi oil sales to U.S.

Matthew Robinson and Jonathan Saul
Reuters
Fri, 16 Mar 2012 13:58 UTC

Saudi Arabia is preparing to extend this year's unexpected jump in oil sales to the United States, adding to speculation about the response of the world's top oil exporter to sanctions against Iran and a rally in prices.

The kingdom's shipments to the United States have quietly risen 25 percent to the highest level since mid-2008, according to preliminary U.S. government data, a sizeable leap that appears at least partly related to the imminent completion of a major expansion at its joint-venture Motiva refinery in Texas.

But some say the scale of the increase, plus other U.S. data showing Gulf Coast inventories are still subdued, suggest the potential for a political dimension as well, evoking comparisons to 2008 when the OPEC kingpin was driving up production to knock oil prices off record highs near $150 a barrel.

The surge appears set to continue. Vela, Saudi Arabia's state oil tanker company, has booked at least nine very large crude carriers (VLCCs) capable of carrying 2 million barrels of crude each from the Middle East Gulf to the U.S. Gulf since the start of March, the biggest such wave of fixtures in years, analysts say.

Comment: Notable for its absence is any mention of the US stockpiling due to it's (read Israel's) plans more war in the region.

Will SWIFT ban on Iran strangle Spain?

RT
Fri, 16 Mar 2012 13:50 UTC

With the upcoming EU electronic banking transactions ban on Iran, the Islamic Republic might face a crude economic pinch. However, in an attempt to pressure Tehran, technocrats in Brussels might actually be leading Spain to the scaffold.

SWIFT, the world's biggest electronic banking system, is preparing to cut off Iranian financial firms, including the country's Central Bank, blacklisted by the EU. The move is part of the European plan to impose an embargo on Iranian oil this summer over Tehran's nuclear program.

The EU and US are hoping to force Iran to the negotiating table by targeting its oil revenues.
But the measure is expected to backfire on average Europeans, particularly in Spain, which imports over 1.5 million barrels of oil from Iran daily.

Iran Takes 'Urgent Steps' As Saturday Cut-Off Looms

NewsMax
Fri, 16 Mar 2012 13:39 UTC

The sanctions vice is tightening on Iran, cutting it out of key global financial networks, but Tehran is taking urgent steps to withstand the pressure over a nuclear program the West suspects is intended to produce bombs.

The SWIFT system, which handles most cross-border payments, said in Brussels on Thursday it would disconnect Iranian institutions blacklisted by sanctions from its messaging system on Saturday at 1600 GMT, after a European Union order and pressure from the United States.

Money exchange houses in the Gulf said they were ceasing dealing in the risky Iranian rial, in another blow to Tehran's trading channels.

Meanwhile, Reuters shipping data showed that vessels carrying at least 360,000 tons of grain are lined up to unload in Iran, in a sign Tehran is stockpiling huge amounts of food to blunt the impact of tougher Western sanctions.

Why Republicans Aren't Mentioning the Real Cause of Rising Prices at the Gas Pump

Robert Reich
Information Clearing House
Fri, 16 Mar 2012 13:31 UTC

Gas prices continue to rise, which is finally giving Republicans an issue. Mitt Romney is demanding the President open up more domestic drilling; the super PAC behind Rick Santorum just released a new ad in Louisiana blasting the President on gas prices; and the GOP is attacking the White House on the Keystone XL Pipeline.

But the rise in gas prices has almost nothing to do with energy policy. It has everything to do with America's continuing failure to adequately regulate Wall Street. But don't hold your breath waiting for Republicans to tell the truth.

As I've noted before, oil supplies aren't being squeezed. Over 80 percent of America's energy needs are now being satisfied by domestic supplies. In fact, we're starting to become an energy exporter. Demand for oil isn't rising in any event. Demand is down in the U.S. compared to last year at this time, and global demand is still moderate given the economic slowdowns in Europe and China.

But Wall Street is betting on higher oil prices in the future - and that betting is causing prices to rise. The Street is laying odds that unrest in Syria will spill over into other countries or that tensions with Iran will affect the Persian Gulf, and that global demand will pick up as American consumers bounce back to life.

These bets are pushing up oil prices because Wall Street firms and other big financial players now dominate oil trading.

Financial speculators historically accounted for about 30 percent of oil contracts, producers and end users for about 70 percent. But today speculators account for 64 percent of all contracts.

Top Iran official calls for cooperation from West in return for 'transparency'

CNN Wire Staff
CNN
Sat, 17 Mar 2012 12:59 UTC

Geneva, Switzerland -- Iran says it wants more clarity from the IAEA before it allows inspectors into the Parchin military complex south of Tehran, one of Iran's most influential officials said Wednesday.

Iran denies it conducted any nuclear experiments there, even though it is suspected of having tested explosives for a nuclear device in the early 2000s. High-level diplomats told CNN's Christiane Amanpour it's believed Iran abruptly stopped any work toward weaponizing its nuclear program after 2003. But weapons inspectors want to make sure.

"If the Western community is asking us for more transparency, then we should expect more cooperation," said Mohammad Javad Larijani, a member of a powerful political clan in Iran and an adviser to the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Government, aided by mainstream media: lie upon lie upon lie....

ReRan

Now i show that the above article is showing active 25 minutes ago which makes me wonder if Sahib ( Charitarth Ahlawat) jumped the gun on the...

Rowan Cocoan

Barclays was beautiful! The Next Day city workers did their thing! NYC finally woke their asses up! The demonstration follows a mob of...

Nada

I see a new market for fake IDs, this time claiming age of 17.

Yupo

Slappy looks old...I guess selling your soul to the devil has consequences...

Bezel Bub

Puppet Masters

Attorney Asks for Dismissal in WikiLeaks Case

Banks Worsening Foreclosure Crisis, A Study

China's Impending Financial Crash

Treacherous Gulf States offered $5 billion bribe to Russia for yes vote on Syria

The NSA Is Building the Country's Biggest Spy Center (Watch What You Say)

Iran sanctions seen spurring more Saudi oil sales to U.S.

Will SWIFT ban on Iran strangle Spain?

Iran Takes 'Urgent Steps' As Saturday Cut-Off Looms

Why Republicans Aren't Mentioning the Real Cause of Rising Prices at the Gas Pump

Top Iran official calls for cooperation from West in return for 'transparency'

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