The Constitutionally deplorable intentions of the United States regarding Julian Assange and Wikileaks

At Occasional Planet, Madonna Gauding explains that the U.S. campaign to imprison Julian Assange and put him to death, has nothing to do with national security:

Unfortunately, prosecuting leakers is not really about upholding the law or maintaining national security. It is about making sure the government or corporations can continue to hide information they do not want citizens to know, such as the video of the horrific gunning down of Baghdad civilians by U.S. forces in Iraq that Private Bradley Manning exposed. In this example, this secret brings the lie to the official story of the so called humanitarian mission in Iraq. Exposing military wrongdoing undermines the power of the government and the corporations it supports who make their fortunes off war. Prosecuting Assange to the fullest extent, which could mean prison or even execution for espionage, is not about bringing a criminal to “justice,” or protecting the citizens of the United States. It is about instilling fear and intimidation in any one else (including mainstream journalists) who might want to expose information about government or corporate malfeasance. The purpose of Assange’s prosecution is to send a strong message that whistle blowing will not be tolerated.
Mauding's account is bolstered by the unrelenting and precise writings of Glenn Greenwald, who points out that the Wikileak's release of materials apparently provided by Bradley Manning have done the opposite of threatening U.S. security. [More . . . ]

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Making banks pay for their secret $7 trillion free ride

Eliot Spitzer offers "5 Ways to Make Banks Pay for Their Secret $7 Trillion Free Ride." Here's the problem:

During the deepest, darkest period of the financial cataclysm, the CEOs of major banks maintained in statements to the public, to the market at large, and to their own shareholders that the banks were in good financial shape, didn’t want to take TARP funds, and that the regulatory framework governing our banking system should not be altered. Trust us, they said. Yet, unknown to the public and the Congress, these same banks had been borrowing massive amounts from the government to remain afloat. The total numbers are staggering: $7.7 trillion of credit—one-half of the GDP of the entire nation. $460 billion was lent to J.P. Morgan, Bank of America, Citibank, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley alone—without anybody other than a few select officials at the Fed and the Treasury knowing. This was perhaps the single most massive allocation of capital from public to private hands in our history, and nobody was told. This was not TARP: This was secret Fed lending.

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How to create money out of nothing

Dennis Kucinich explains how the Federal Reserve created 7.7 TRILLION out of nothing, allowing many big banks to profit while starving ordinary Americans of capital. This is a dramatic illustration of why there are Occupy protests. Kucinich is promoting the "Need Act "to reign in the Fed: "to restore the authority of Congress to create and regulate money, modernize and provide stability for the monetary system of the United States, retire public debt and reduce the cost of public investment, and for other public purposes." Here's a more detailed description of the proposed "Need Act." It attempts to accomplish the following: 􀂾 Puts the Federal Reserve (Fed) into the Department of Treasury (Treasury) to make our monetary policy truly accountable to Congress and the American people. 􀂾 Ends the banks’ special privilege by no longer allowing them to create our money supply when they make loans, through a simple and non-disruptive accounting change. 􀂾 Invests money to renew our crumbling infrastructure, making it fit for the 21st Century; creating real wealth and millions of good jobs at the same time.

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The dangers of “Protect-IP” in a nutshell

Protect-IP is an abysmal idea. No one likes it except for well-monied content providers. It would, if construed broadly by the courts, hinder the ability of ordinary folks to organize in order to promote higher profits for the entertainment industry, which already has plenty of ways to protect its IP. This is too high a price to pay.

PROTECT IP Act Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

How flawed are the approaches now being considered by Congress? Consider these reasons.

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How to destroy a perfectly good real estate recording system.

What would you think if an outside enemy systematically attacked hundreds of U.S. county real estate recording offices, making it impossible for most of us to know who owns what legal rights regarding real estate anymore.   Imagine that our courts, from coast to coast, have slowed to a crawl because the enemy had nefariously dismantled a system that had worked quite well for centuries. Imagine that, also for centuries, the filing fees paid for recording real estate interests had funded numerous important local government functions, but that the outside enemy destroyed this source of income, causing many government functions to flounder. Image that this enemy then set up its own real estate "information" offices that gave lots of incomplete information, often refusing to provide any information at all, and did so with reprehensible customer service. Imagine one more thing:  This has all really happened, but it was not caused by an outside enemy. Rather, all of this has happened regarding 60% of all home mortgages, and the entities doing the damage are America's banks, who have conspired to create an entity called MERS, designed to circumvent government real estate recording offices, at a high cost to everyone who relies on the integrity of our real estate recording system. If you want to know the specifics, here is a terrific article by law professor Chris Peterson: "Two Faces: Demystifying the Mortgage Electronic Registry System's Land Title Theory." This damage to our recording system is relatively new--it's been happening for a bit more than ten years, but the theme is now familiar to many of us: Corporate players taking over government functions and, in the process, rigging the playing field against the interests of ordinary Americans. The challenge now is to see whether the courts across America can recognize MERS for what it is, a despicable scam that has clouded the real estate titles of millions of people in an effort to rev up private corporate profits.   The courts are now clogged with many cases attempting to deal with the problems caused by MERS; you'll want to keep your eye on this story to see whether the courts will slap down the banks.

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