How Hugo Chavez pissed off the United States

Fascinating article by Greg Palast. Basically, he stood up to the one percent:

Elected presidents who annoy Big Oil have ended up in exile - or coffins: Mossadegh of Iran after he nationalized BP's fields (1953), Elchibey, president of Azerbaijan, after he refused demands of BP for his Caspian fields (1993), President Alfredo Palacio of Ecuador after he terminated Occidental's drilling concession (2005). "It's a chess game, Mr. Palast," Chavez told me. He was showing me a very long and very sharp sword once owned by Simon Bolivar, the Great Liberator. "And I am," Chavez said, "a very good chess player."
For a limited time, the Palast Investigative Fund is offering the film, "The Assassination of Hugo Chavez," as a free download here.

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Flags

There are many people out there who want to believe that the American flag is being honored no matter how it is displayed at government sanctioned Fourth of July celebrations. I'm not one of them. IMG_2797 My problem is that only a couple hundred feet from this above huge flag hoisted on by use of firetruck ladders, one sees many smaller American flags waving side by side with the corporate flags of businesses who essentially own Congress and who often call the shots contrary to the wishes of the People of the United States. American Flagf If I had my way, corporate influence would be eradicated and thus invisible at Fourth of July festivities. If it means giving up air shows and big fireworks displays, so be it. The number one priority for the People of the United States should be to take back their country. It needs to be actually run by the People. Kicking the corporations out of Fourth of July celebrations would be a powerful first step.

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Unequal access to secret information shows us who is doing real journalism

Chris Hayes nails it on MSNBC. The U.S. government and its many cronies in the mass media love to disburse secret information when it bolsters the position of the government. They take the opposite position when information embarrasses the U.S. government.

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Love his conclusion: The conduct of the vast and growing surveillance web is "on all of us what the government does in our name."

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Lee Camp unleashes ridicule toward big banks who censor chalk protester

Lee Camp says things that I think, but I also filter them. More and more, I'm feeling that being civil to the forces crushing democracy is not getting us anywhere. Therefore, Camp's bursts of ridicule toward the rich and abusive are feeling cathartic. This episode takes a look at more abuses by big banks, especially a huge penalty levied toward a man who wrote his bank protests in chalk.

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Matt Taibbi puts the spotlight on the rating agencies

The financial meltdown could never have happened if the ratings agencies hadn't rated crap loans as excellent. It would have brought the entire corrupt system to a halt. Matt Taibbi is whipping these culprits with some stunning evidence that has recently come to light.

Thanks to a mountain of evidence gathered for a pair of major lawsuits, documents that for the most part have never been seen by the general public, we now know that the nation's two top ratings companies, Moody's and S&P, have for many years been shameless tools for the banks, willing to give just about anything a high rating in exchange for cash. In incriminating e-mail after incriminating e-mail, executives and analysts from these companies are caught admitting their entire business model is crooked. "Lord help our fucking scam . . . this has to be the stupidest place I have worked at," writes one Standard & Poor's executive. "As you know, I had difficulties explaining 'HOW' we got to those numbers since there is no science behind it," confesses a high-ranking S&P analyst. "If we are just going to make it up in order to rate deals, then quants [quantitative analysts] are of precious little value," complains another senior S&P man. "Let's hope we are all wealthy and retired by the time this house of card[s] falters," ruminates one more.
Here's Taibbi's conclusion:
What's amazing about this is that even without a mass of ugly documentary evidence proving their incompetence and corruption, these firms ought to be out of business. Even if they just accidentally sucked this badly, that should be enough to persuade the markets to look to a different model, different companies, different ratings methodologies. But we know now that it was no accident. What happened to the ratings agencies during the financial crisis, and what is likely still happening within their walls, is a phenomenon as old as business itself. Given a choice between money and integrity, they took the money. Which wouldn't be quite so bad if they weren't in the integrity business.
This is an engaging and detailed article that will leave you frustrated that it's business as usual for the ratings agencies. Excellent reporting and phenomenal writing by Taibbi.

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