Letter to fellow NJ teacher regarding the peril of our state pension funds

Dear __________,

I wanted to share something with you that
I'm very concerned about that affects myself
and every teacher and employee of the state
of NJ. I'm referring to our pension fund.

I don't know if you are aware but as of July
of this year our state pension "funds still
fell $28 billion short of the amount actuaries
projected they need to cover the longterm cost
of benefits promised to current and retired 
workers."


And with the current economy spiraling our of
control the news media reported on Oct. 8th
that "the value of pension funds and retirement
accounts dropped by roughly $1 trillion."

Two days after that the Wall Street Journal
reported that investors have lost $8.4 trillion
in the U.S.
"The market rout in the U.S. is rapidly 
wiping out vast amounts of wealth,
casting a pall over households and 
businesses"

It doesn't look good for our pensions to say
the least. To add insult to injury NJ state
does NOT disclose where our monies are being
invested and we are required by law to
keep our money in it unless we quit the job.

If this concerns you, please spread this
information around to every NJ teacher and
NJ state employee. My fervent hope is that
the the NJ teachers and employees will wake
up to this and demand that our money be
withdrawn from the bad investments that
they are currently invested in.

This is our life savings they and we are
allowing to be stolen!

Thanks for reading.

Solutions to the economic crisis : Catherine Austin Fitts on going local

Former high level government official
and former wall street banker Catherine Austin Fitts
on Flashpoints Radio talks about how banking with the
big banks/investing in the big corporations will further destroy us economically and how banking/investing local can radically change things for the better:

"This [financial crisis] can't happen unless we as a society
allow it to happen."

click here.

then click on Wed. Oct.22 show and go to the 6:00 mark for interview.

then go to the sidebar of this blog and click on "Take Action: Bank Intimate"
and learn how to find a solid local bank.

40 Acres and A Dream

The Plight of Black Farmers In the U.S.

700 Billion Is Nothing!

IAEA chief: Iran not close to developing nuclear weapons
Haaretz and the Associated Press

"The head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog agency said on Monday that Iran remains far from acquiring capabilities to develop nuclear weapons.

'They do not have even the nuclear material, the raw unenriched uranium to develop one nuclear weapon if they decide to do so," ElBaradei said. "Even if you decide to walk out tomorrow from the non-proliferation treaty and you go into a lot of scenarios, we're still not going to see Iran tomorrow having nuclear weapons.' "

Gold's New Records
by: James Turk
goldmoney.com

"From September 30, 2007 to the end of this past fiscal year on September 30, 2008, total federal debt grew by $1.0 trillion, from 9,007,653,372,262.48 to $10,024,724,896,912.49, which is an 11.3% annual rate of growth. The federal debt as of October 16, 2008 is now $10,331,139,000,845.92. So in just 16 days since the end of the last fiscal year, the federal debt has grown by an astounding $331.1 billion, which is a 75.5% annual rate of growth. It has taken just 16 days to borrow one-third of what the government borrowed in all of last year.

The above chart shows T-bills only, and therefore excludes the growth of other federal debt instruments. Also, this $10.3 trillion debt total I refer to above excludes the federal government's unfunded liabilities. When these are added, the total obligations of the federal government are $110 trillion, or at least that's what they were estimated to be last May by Dallas Federal Reserve president Richard Fisher. The federal government's unfunded liabilities, and therefore its total obligations, have obviously grown further since then, and are now some unknown number greater than $110 trillion.

In short, the US federal government is staggering under the world's heaviest debt load. To meet its obligations and promises, the Federal Reserve will continue to create "unlimited" amounts of dollars.

That word - "unlimited" - is getting used frequently in the media these days. Bloomberg reported on October 13th that "policy makers offered banks unlimited dollar funding." The Wall Street Journal reported on October 14th that "The U.S. Federal Reserve agreed to provide unlimited dollars to three major European central banks." Then on October 15th Japan jumped into this dollar creation frenzy too, and according to Bloomberg: "The Bank of Japan said it will offer lenders as many dollars as they want." Bloomberg went on to say that dollars will be provided at fixed interest rates for an "unlimited amount", quoting from the actual BoJ announcement.

Gold cannot "prevent unlimited public spending" like the gold standard, but a rising gold price - like a barking dog - can warn of danger."

Parents protest the NJ mandate requiring child vaccinations

Parents Question Vaccine Mandate
NJ.COM

"Many parents fear that ingredients in some vaccines, particularly mercury and formaldehyde, are responsible for autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and other increasingly common neurological problems in children.

'This is not an anti-vaccine rally -- it's a freedom of choice rally," said Louise Habakus, one of the rally organizers. "This one-size-fits-all approach is really very anti-American.' "

Gary Null Calls Out Corzine On Mandated Vaccinations In NJ - Pt.1
Gary Null Calls Out Corzine On Mandated Vaccinations In NJ - Pt.2

ALAN WATTS THE UNITIVE WORLD

Alan Watts - Man and the Hoax

Can Our Own Communities Serve As Financial Safe Havens in Troubled Times?

by: Catherine Austin Fitts & Carolyn Betts, Esq.

The fall in global stock market prices over the last year has had a significant impact on most Americans’ retirement savings. When monthly 401(k) and IRA statements arrived last week, many small investors saw their investments drop in value by significant amounts. On Friday, October 10, a Wall Street Journal headline reported: “After Year of Declines, Investors Lose $8.4 Trillion of Wealth.”

The response of the federal government and the Federal Reserve to this situation is further eroding small investor confidence: while small investors and their pension funds suffer significant losses, Wall Street firms are receiving multi-billion-dollar loans, investments and bailouts and the executives responsible for creating a mortgage securities and derivatives scandal escape with rich golden parachutes.

Continue Reading . . . .

Get You're Police State On

Cobb police add tank to arsenal
Atlanta-Journal Constitution

"Don’t be surprised to see an Army tank rolling down a street near you."

Contributions from Goldman Sachs

Its sizable profits made during the 2007 Subprime mortgage financial crisis led the New York Times to proclaim that Goldman Sachs is without peer in the world of finance.
-On Goldman Sachs from Wikipedia

Source: opensecrets.org

Obama, Barack (D-IL)	Senate	$691,930
Clinton, Hillary (D-NY)	Senate	$468,200
Romney, Mitt (R)	Pres	$229,675
McCain, John (R-AZ)	Senate	$208,395
Himes, Jim (D-CT)	House	$114,748
Giuliani, Rudolph W (R)	Pres	$111,750
Dodd, Christopher J (D-CT)	Senate	$105,400
Edwards, John (D)	Pres	$66,450
Specter, Arlen (R-PA)	Senate	$47,600
Emanuel, Rahm (D-IL)	House	$32,950
Reed, Jack (D-RI)	Senate	$30,100
Sununu, John E (R-NH)	Senate	$29,900
Baucus, Max (D-MT)	Senate	$26,000
Warner, Mark (D-VA)	Senate	$25,900
Harkin, Tom (D-IA)	Senate	$24,580
Lautenberg, Frank R (D-NJ)	Senate	$23,300
Skelly, Michael Peter (D-TX)	House	$22,657
Collins, Susan M (R-ME)	Senate	$21,400
Landrieu, Mary L (D-LA)	Senate	$20,700
Durbin, Dick (D-IL)	Senate	$19,800
McConnell, Mitch (R-KY)	Senate	$17,500
Rangel, Charles B (D-NY)	House	$16,100
Shays, Christopher (R-CT)	House	$15,600
Biden, Joseph R Jr (D-DE)	Senate	$14,800
Gillibrand, Kirsten E (D-NY)	House	$14,500
Cote, Adam (D-ME)	House	$14,000
Rockefeller, Jay (D-WV)	Senate	$13,400
Kirk, Mark (R-IL)	House	$13,200
Pryor, Mark (D-AR)	Senate	$12,600
Hoyer, Steny H (D-MD)	House	$12,500
Cornyn, John (R-TX)	Senate	$12,100
Maloney, Carolyn B (D-NY)	House	$12,100
Boehner, John (R-OH)	House	$12,000
Kanjorski, Paul E (D-PA)	House	$11,500
Coleman, Norm (R-MN)	Senate	$11,300
Chambliss, Saxby (R-GA)	Senate	$11,100
Pelosi, Nancy (D-CA)	House	$11,000
Bachus, Spencer (R-AL)	House	$10,000
Johnson, Tim (D-SD)	Senate	$10,000
Menendez, Robert (D-NJ)	Senate	$10,000
Fitz-Gerald, Joan (D-CO)	House	$9,700
Crapo, Mike (R-ID)	Senate	$9,200
Richardson, Bill (D)	Pres	$9,100
Allen, Tom (D-ME)	House	$8,900
Blunt, Roy (R-MO)	House	$8,000
Castle, Michael N (R-DE)	House	$7,600
Schwartz, Allyson (D-PA)	House	$7,600
Walberg, Tim (R-MI)	House	$7,600
Clyburn, James E (D-SC)	House	$7,500
McCrery, Jim (R-LA)	House	$7,500
Udall, Mark (D-CO)	House	$7,285
Smith, Gordon H (R-OR)	Senate	$7,100
Roskam, Peter (R-IL)	House	$6,600
Sullivan, Sean Patrick (R-CT)	House	$6,600
Miller, George (D-CA)	House	$6,500
Murphy, Patrick J (D-PA)	House	$6,100
Neal, Jim (D-NC)	Senate	$6,100
Johanns, Michael O (R-NE)	Senate	$6,000
Reid, Harry (D-NV)	Senate	$6,000
Becerra, Xavier (D-CA)	House	$5,600
Stender, Linda D (D-NJ)	House	$5,600
Treadwell, Sandy (R-NY)	House	$5,600
Frank, Barney (D-MA)	House	$5,500
Nadler, Jerrold (D-NY)	House	$5,500
Roberts, Pat (R-KS)	Senate	$5,500
Lalor, Kieran Michael (R-NY)	House	$5,400
Minnick, Walter Clifford (D-ID)	House	$5,100
Andrews, Robert E (D-NJ)	House	$5,000
Camp, Dave (R-MI)	House	$5,000
Crowley, Joseph (D-NY)	House	$5,000
Dingell, John D (D-MI)	House	$5,000
Moore, Dennis (D-KS)	House	$5,000
Reynolds, Tom (R-NY)	House	$5,000
Shelby, Richard C (R-AL)	Senate	$5,000
Pallone, Frank Jr (D-NJ)	House	$4,850
Murphy, Chris (D-CT)	House	$4,700
Flake, Jeff (R-AZ)	House	$4,600
Frelinghuysen, Rodney (R-NJ)	House	$4,600
Thompson, Fred (R)	Pres	$4,600
Bean, Melissa (D-IL)	House	$4,500
Capito, Shelley Moore (R-WV)	House	$4,500
Dole, Elizabeth (R-NC)	Senate	$4,500
Klein, Ron (D-FL)	House	$4,500
Wexler, Robert (D-FL)	House	$4,500
Corker, Bob (R-TN)	Senate	$4,200
Baker, Richard (R-LA)	House	$4,000
Kuhl, John R Jr (R-NY)	House	$4,000
Mahoney, Tim (D-FL)	House	$4,000
Neal, Richard E (D-MA)	House	$4,000
Pryce, Deborah (R-OH)	House	$4,000
Ackerman, Gary (D-NY)	House	$3,500
Biggert, Judy (R-IL)	House	$3,500
Boxer, Barbara (D-CA)	Senate	$3,500
Lewis, John (D-GA)	House	$3,500
Lowey, Nita M (D-NY)	House	$3,500
Holt, Rush (D-NJ)	House	$3,300
Huckabee, Mike (R)	Pres	$3,300
Ros-Lehtinen, Ileana (R-FL)	House	$3,300
Udall, Tom (D-NM)	House	$3,300
Wilson, Heather A (R-NM)	House	$3,300

Some Hope for Illinois Renters

Illinois Sheriff Scolds Banks for Eviction of 'Innocent' Renters
CNN

"An outraged sheriff in Illinois who refuses to evict "innocent" renters from foreclosed homes criticized mortgage companies Thursday and said the law should protect victims of the mortgage meltdown."

Thanks to From the Wilderness Blog

Argentinia & Brazil Dump Dollar

Argentina, Brazil to drop U.S. dollar in bilateral commercial transactions

BUENOS AIRES, March 15 (Xinhua) -- Argentina and Brazil are to scrap bilateral commercial transactions in U.S. dollars and start using their own currencies from August, an official in charge of currency settlement at the Argentine Central Bank said here Saturday.

The new payment system is aimed at reducing costs in commercial transactions and would benefit small and medium-sized enterprises, the official said.

Under the new system, there will be a unified exchange rate between the real and peso, the so-called reference rate, which will be applied by Brazilian and Argentine central banks at the end of each day.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva reached an agreement to establish a new payment system with his Argentine counterpart Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner during his visit to Argentina in February.

Technical preparations are underway for the new system, which the two countries will adopt in several steps due to the large amount of bilateral trade.

Brazil is Argentina's largest trading partner, while Argentina is Brazil's second-biggest trading partner after the United States.

Bilateral trade stood at around 23.6 billion U.S. dollars last year.

Telling It Like It Is!

Its sizable profits made during the 2007 Subprime mortgage financial crisis led the New York Times to proclaim that Goldman Sachs is without peer in the world of finance.
-On Goldman Sachs from Wikipedia

An E-Mail to a Member of the Research Team at Goldman Sachs:

Harry:

Thank you for the opportunity to be on your e-mail list. I appreciate your generosity and hard work.

I am writing to ask you to unsubscribe me from your list. I value your research reports. However, it would be hypocritical of me to accept them.

I believe in death penalties for private corporations and partnerships. My vote for one of the first to be executed is Goldman Sachs.

You and your colleagues have helped to build and manage a machinery that has committed treason and genocide on a breathtaking scale. The history of Goldman Sachs over the last two decades is living proof that it is possible to kill with a financial system and a pen.

The fact that you don’t understand what you and your colleagues are doing is breathtaking. It raises more than a few questions about whether you understand what is really behind the flow of funds you track and publish.

The question before us is who will pay the price of the mess that you and your colleagues have had such a significant hand in creating:

Who will lose their business and who will keep it?
Who will lose their job and who will keep it?
Who will lose their home and who will keep it?
Who will lose their reputation and who will not?
Who will lose their family and who will not?
Who will lose their health and who will not?
Who will lose their future and who will not?
Who will lose their life and who will not?
Who will lose their freedom and who will not?

My plan for bailing out the country would include asserting common law offsets against the assets of the NY Fed member banks and all of their partners and employees who benefited up to an amount sufficient to repay $4 trillion missing from the US government, to fund losses caused by the manipulation of the precious metals markets and to fund claims of fraudulent inducement and fraud on mortgages and mortgage securities. To fund the offsets, I would propose to seize the offshore and onshore assets of those who created the mortgage bubble and derivatives mess in the first place.

Frankly, I see no reason why millions of poor people around the world should pay a global tax through the dollar and US treasury and agency securities for which the American people are liable, so you and your colleagues can continue to live in comfort and luxury without concern that you will be held accountable to the same standards of enforcement applied to the people who live in the communities wrecked by the mortgage, money laundering and financial fraud that made you and your clients so powerful.

It seems to me if anyone should lose their business, jobs and home, it is you and your colleagues.

Sincerely Yours,

Catherine Austin Fitts

Message from Ron Paul activist Billie

I compilied a list of the NY representatives who voted Yes and No in the recent Bailout Bill:

Yes:
Gary Ackerman
Micheal Arcuri
Timothy Bishop
Yvette Clarke
Joseph Crowley
Eliot Engel
Vito Fossella
John Hall
Brian Higgins
Steve Israel
Peter King
*John Kuhl
Carolyn Maloney
Carolyn McCarthy
John McHugh
Micheal McNulty
Gregory Meeks
Jerrold Nadler
Charles Rangel
Thomas Reynolds
Louise Slaughter
Edolphus Towns
James Walsh
Anthony Weiner

No:
Kirsten Gillibrand
Maurice Hinchey
Jose Serrano

*Changed vote from No to Yes

We need to send the Yes' a note saying that we are going to do everything in our power to make sure they are NOT re-elected next term.
This isn't about special interests, it's about our country!
The No's need to hear our sincere appreciation for sticking with the guns. I'm sure they received a ton of pressure to change their vote.

Peter Kowald

NYC-Manhattan Condo Coop Price Erosion Begins

Excerpt from NYTimes Article posted on NYCity Housing Bubble Blog

...the average price has fallen from the first quarter, when it reached $1.7 million. And data tracked by the brokerages indicates that the market has slowed: there are fewer sales than in the last five years, there are more apartments for sale now than in the past eight years, and more sales contracts are being canceled. Even the pace of growth for luxury apartments, long the strongest segment of the Manhattan market, has slowed. “I have great concern about 2009,” said Jonathan Miller, chief executive of Miller Samuel Incorporated, the real estate research company tracking these numbers for the brokerage Prudential Douglas Elliman. “At some point, you’re going to see prices erode".... Fewer apartments are selling than in the last five years. Data tracked by the Corcoran Group showed that the number of apartments that closed dropped to 2,982 sales in the third quarter, compared with nearly 4,976 at the same time last year. The number of Manhattan apartments sitting on the market is higher than it has been in the past eight years, according to the Corcoran Group. By last month, the number of listings had grown to 10,761 from 8,444 in September 2007. At the same time, far fewer of those apartments actually sold. Just 727 listings were absorbed in September 2008 compared with 858 in September 2007...

Casualties of Economic Warfare in California: 700 Foreclosures A Day

Thanks to New York City Housing Bubble Blog

Art by Nick Thabit

Skylights

Let's BAIL OUT OF WALL STREET!!

WHAT ACTIONS CAN WE TAKE TO BAIL OUT OF WALL STREET?

The time has come to purge these people from our lives. How do we do it? Since our readers had such great ideas on the bumper stickers brainstorm (yes, we are making some!), we thought we would invite ideas on what to do now that Congress has given Wall Street another trillion dollars and a get out of jail free card.

By Catherine Austin Fitts and Carolyn Betts, Esq.

Here are ten ideas that we wrote up to get us started. Sound off with actions you think we can take!

(1) Vote with your feet and our money in your personal banking affairs. Take all the money you control out of big money-center, tapeworm banks and financial institutions and put it in local credit unions, thrift institutions, savings banks and state chartered banks.

(2) Take control over your retirement savings. Listen to our audio seminar, Positioning Your Assets for Growth in Uncertain Times and use what you learn to protect your assets. Look for more ways to use your investments to increase self-sufficiency for you, your family and your community. Look into the requirements for self-directed IRAs, which will allow you to invest in such things as precious metals, commodities, real estate, local small businesses and offshore investments that are not publicly traded or otherwise on the usual lists available to small investors. If you are limited in your investment options because your retirement funds are in your employer’s 401K, research the list of permitted investments and purge your portfolio as much as possible of tapeworm companies. While you’re at it, talk to the investment folks at your company and urge them to adopt anti-tapeworm investment strategies.

(3) Support state legislative efforts to amend state securities and tax laws to facilitate investing in loans and equity in community businesses by middle-class investors. Remember that safeguards to protect investors from unscrupulous snake-oil, penny stock and chinchilla salesmen are good, but in the name of protecting “unsophisticated” investors without substantial holdings ($200K annual income and $1MM net worth excluding residence), federal and state securities laws have effectively forced the “little guys” to invest in the tapeworm. Why is it easy for people of moderate means to lose money in the lottery, but almost impossible to invest in each other’s businesses? (The answer is Wall Street does not want us to be able to invest in each other – they want us to go through them.)

(4) Use your influence to urge institutions and governments you deal with to vote with their feet and the money they control. Urge others to do the same. Make a list of these institutions and governmental and quasi-governmental units and write letters, go to meetings and otherwise get involved in the processes by which they make decisions about where they deposit and invest their cash. Here’s a list to get your creativity flowing:

a. Everyone who asks you to contribute money: charities, college and private school endowments and churches
b. State, local and union pension funds
c. City and county governments and government-related entities (e.g., water company, school board, county general fund, bond reserves)

For more ideas on pools of capital in your community, see http://solari.com/blog/?p=1214.

Another thing to keep in mind is that big pools of money like huge charities or charitable pools (e.g., United Way, Red Cross, etc.) and college endowments (e.g., Harvard, with its $30 billion endowment) are usually controlled by members of the tapeworm. This money generally is deposited and invested in the tapeworm. Boards of directors of these institutions are loaded with the good ole boys who may be put in their places to bolster the prestige of their employers and garner social acceptance for institutions whose activities you and I might not approve of (e.g., consider the motives of Archer Daniels Midland in sponsoring public television shows). Reconsider your options so that you invest in causes where you know your contributions are not used this way.

(4) Spend money locally and reduce dependence on big box stores. Make a list of family expenditures over the last year and categorize them in terms of whether they are local or “tapeworm” oriented and whether they are discretionary or non-discretionary. Look at the discretionary category and the money you spent at “tapeworm” restaurants, big box stores, chain stores and similar outfits. Then identify a local alternative for each one, keeping in mind that some big names are franchises owned by local small businesspeople who need our support. If you don’t know, go to your local stores and ask who owns them. Also remember that while local grocery stores may be preferable to chains, even at chains you may have the option to choose locally-grown and organic foodstuffs, which both support local and regional farmers and contribute to your family’s health and well-being.

When you make out your Christmas list or school shopping list, see how many items you can identify that can be purchased through non-tapeworm sources. Of course, while you’re at it, remember that you’ll get a “two-fer” in heaven, or more bang for your buck, if your spending decisions favor goods that are produced (a) in this country or at least a country that supports fair labor standards, (b) using green technologies or packaged in recyclable materials, (c) by companies whose employment policies, community contributions, garbage, trash and toxic waste disposition policies, business dealings, production methods and other policies are “net energy plus” and have a positive return on investment to the community.

(4) Prepare for more power outages, cash shortfalls and other emergency situations. More central controls leads to more unstable systems. We need to protect ourselves from the risk of relying on unstable systems. Since inflation in the costs of real goods are here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future, and who knows what kind of shortages we may be subject to for whatever reason (market manipulations, weather-related catastrophes, break-downs in neglected infrastructure, etc.), investment in the following makes both economic and strategic sense:

(a) household systems that contribute to lower energy costs and better health (geothermal, solar and wind systems, water storage tanks and wells, electronic air and water cleaners and filters),

(b) staples like toilet paper, non-perishable ingredients and foodstuffs,

(c) canned goods and bottled water,

(c) propane generators and other back-up systems,

(d) community or personal vegetable and herb gardens or local CSAs

(e) locally-slaughtered and packed sides of beef, port and lamb (preferably combine with back-up generating capacity, although homeowners’ policy riders for food spoilage are available for as little as $10/year).

(5) Find or Establish a Local Barter Network. Maybe you can’t get the credit you need to operate your small business, or take out an equity line of credit to make improvements to your home. But remember, you aren’t in this alone. Your neighbors are in the same position. Maybe your local home improvement contractor or lumber yard owner or small business supplier would like to find a way to afford piano lessons or math tutoring for his child, a professionally drafted contract or will or a new website that you could provide. Take a stand in proving that Wall Street cannot bring down our local economy and local businesses if we do not channel our money through Wall Street and the Fed and if we support each other. Used in conjunction with the local currency (see below), this is a powerful way to (a) reduce your exposure to losses from the falling dollar and the forces of inflation, (b) get new customers for your small business, (c) earn extra value in addition to your stagnating salary to help make ends meet and (d) support the local economy so that your customers and neighbors can pay their mortgages and other bills.

(6) Consider a Local Currency. Local currencies aren’t subject to devaluation when the Fed makes bad monetary decisions or Treasury invests taxpayer dollars in useless derivatives, and you don’t have to worry about FDIC insurance coverage. One way to start is to use precious metals within trusted networks. To help you get started, see our silver and gold exchange calculator, www.silverandgoldaremoney.com.

(7) Start a local version of Kiva or Solari Circle for group education, action and investing in local small businesses. Get together with friends and family to decide on what the actions are that can best serve you and take them together. Turn off your TVs, simplify, start a food purchasing club, study options for sustainability and help each other with money management and savings. Many established and stable local businesses are having trouble maintaining their working capital lines of credit to keep their operations going. At the same time, there are many local people who want to take their money out of the control of Wall Street, but don’t know where to put it. Look for local leaders who are knowledgeable at angel, venture and local investment. Perhaps there is a way for you to participate with them.

(8) Let your congressperson know you won’t take this any more. Find out how your congressman/senators voted on the bail-out legislation. If they voted “no,” thank them and send a campaign contribution. For those who voted ”yes,” check out the opponent and let them know why you are doing that (see 10 Reasons Not to Bail Out Wall Street).

(9) Educate yourself and your children about what you really need to know in the future. Urge local public and private schools, community colleges, technical schools and sources of adult education (e.g., community centers, churches and retirement homes and centers) to adopt curricula to teach both children and adults about:

(a) Community self sufficiency and community organizing.
(b) Economics and how the money REALLY works,
(c) What the US Constitution stands for and civic values,
(d) How to fix things: cars, washing machines, plumbing systems, etc. and
(e) The history of our currency (the Federal Reserve, fiat currency, abandoning the gold standard, etc.), NAFTA, the Great Depression and American stock market crashes, financial scandals and crises and what were the causes and solutions.

(10) Start a local solar energy panel franchise, geothermal drilling company or other green business. Retire from your tapeworm job or take the opportunity after a job loss or cut-back to get off the tapeworm job grid. Do business with people you know you can trust. Contribute to a positive return on investment in your community.

Fed Loans to Banks, Dealers, AIG Soar to $410 Billion
Bloomberg News

Jim Rogers Calls Paulson Plan "Welfare for the Rich",
Calls Both Presidential Candidates "an Embarrasment",
Says We Are In A Global Recession
Bloomberg News

Manhattan Won't Avoid Property Crunch
Wall Street Journal
Thanks to New York City Housing Bubble Blog
for this one.

Ten Reasons Not To Bail Out Wall Street

by Catherine Austin Fitts and Carolyn Betts, Esq.

(1) Crime that pays, is crime that stays.

There is reason to believe that Wall Street and those they represent are holding loans without collateral, multiple loans secured by the same properties, and other fraudulent instruments among the “troubled assets.” Based on the secret “Treasury Conference Call” with 800 Wall Street insiders, we know the deal proposed to be passed by Congress isn’t the real deal promised to Wall Street.

(2) This smells like obstruction of justice.

Bail-out without due diligence of so called “troubled assets” is a perfect way to hide documentation of financial crimes. It is also a perfect means to launder both the past ill-gotten gains and new federal money spent recklessly and without necessary safeguards and oversight mechanisms. Be very suspicious when they tell you “we just can’t tell what’s in these troubled assets.” We can assure you the federal government has field offices all across the country that deal with significant amounts of real estate and mortgage assets. If Treasury refuses for more than a decade to comply with the laws, with approximately $4 trillion missing (and counting), it is not competent to manage $700 billion of taxpayer money while its arm is twisted by Wall Street.

(3) Wall Street owes the federal government money.

We need to get stolen money back from the banks that served as depositories for the US government (including trillions for which the Pentagon and HUD could not account) and punish them, not create another opportunity for them to game the system and engage in criminal enterprises to rob consumers. To the extent there has been regulatory wrong-doing, let’s not let the miscreants leave town with the evidence.

(4) Good guys are shut out.

A bail-out provides no way for honest leaders to come to the fore and use their creativity and expertise to restore balance and integrity to the system or for unproductive and poorly-managed banks that contribute to current over-capacity to die a dignified death.

(5) More investment in the “bubble economy.”

Spending massive amounts on non-productive uses (“buying” worthless credit default swaps, mortgages with no collateral, other derivatives) as opposed to productive uses (repairing infrastructure, creating alternative energy systems, supporting inventing and production of “green” products) is inflationary.

This bail-out will drive prices of food, water and energy up for the people who can least afford it.

(6) Does not result in capital circulating in healthy ways.

The bail-out of Wall Street and too-big-to-fail banks and insurance companies that are getting bigger by the minute by swallowing up other failing financial institutions (and creating more institutions that are “too big to fail”) does not result in trickle-down to those whose money was stolen in recent swindles (S&L, dot.com, current housing crisis), i.e., the taxpayers/middle class and working poor.

(7) Arrangements that result in more corruption.

Centralized “fixes” are sure to result in black holes, no-bid contracts and other scandals.

(8) Drains the real economy, rather than invests in the real economy.

The US economy can’t be productive or grow if consumers don’t have jobs and can’t afford to purchase goods and services. Real stimulation of Main Street is accomplished through investment in productive investment, not bail-outs that shift money to unproductive sectors. We should use all of our precious resources to reinvest in our people in the real economy.

(9) It props up sectors which need to downsize and consolidate.

There is significant overcapacity in the financial and banking sectors. Brainpower and talent needs to stop blowing financial bubbles and shift to economic activities that create real value.

(10) It is a temporary “fix” to keep Wall Street afloat until after the election.

These resources are better invested in permanent, long-term solutions. This bail-out will not fix anything. Rather, it will help the perpetrators get away and ensure that the ultimate day of reckoning is worse.

The Administration wants to drain the real economy to bail out Wall Street. Seems to us that the more appropriate plan would be to require Wall Street to return $4 trillion plus that is missing and use that to rebuild the real economy.

We think the time has come to reverse the flow. Go to any business school in the country. That is what they teach. Money should move out of unproductive sectors into productive sectors. The bail-out does just the opposite.

“Just say NO!”

How to Influence Your Congressperson

By Carolyn Betts, Esq.

WHAT CONGRESS IS GOOD FOR THESE DAYS

Not much, it seems, given that we have what essentially amounts to a single-party system (i.e., the corporatist party). However, the Bush Administration needs Congress’s imprimatur in order to carry out the proposed highway robbery in the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (better known as the “$700 billion bail-out”). Yesterday, Congress voted the wishes of the American people for a change. My suggestion is that each of us finds out how our congressional representative voted (see the vote count, which we will be posting elsewhere on the blog from time to time as available) and acts accordingly. I called my congresswoman this morning with a “thank you, hang in there and I’m sending a contribution because I believe in voting with my money” message. Catherine reports she is sending a $100 campaign contribution to her congresswoman. If your congressional representative was a sell-out to the corporadoes, perhaps an “I’m sending a campaign contribution to your opponent” message would be a good idea. Money talks.

Having lived and worked in Washington, DC for over 16 years, I can assure you that if the lines to the Capitol are flooded with calls from furious constituents (or, on the other hand, praise and campaign contributions), somebody notices. Do you believe the media when they tell you the Republicans who voted against bail-out bill were just teaching Nancy Pelosi a lesson because she was mean to them?

CONTACTING YOUR CONGRESSPERSON

In every Congressional office there is at least one “staffer” who tracks constituent mail and telephone calls and keeps a tally of the pro and con reactions of constituents to pending legislation. At any one time, at least the staffer whose subject matter area is covered, and probably the congressman or senator, knows this number. If you are lucky, your representative is a sponsor of legislation or chairman or ranking member of a committee that will report out legislation. The “ranking” member of a committee is the top member in the minority party and the chairman, of course, is the top member of the majority party. Ordinarily, every member of the committee, however, will get to vote on the terms of the legislation and may have some control over the drafting. Majority party members have more power, of course. Members of other committees generally will only get to vote “yes” or “no” on the legislation in the form in which it is voted out of committee (although the legislation is still subject to change until the final bill is passed by both houses). There may be another chance for changes if, as is usually the case, differences between the versions passed by the Senate and House must be resolved in the Conference Committee. But who knows how the House and Senate will be short-circuiting the usual process in an attempt to cram down the bail-out before anyone has a chance read it, digest it and fully comprehend the potential costs and other consequences.

You want to use your time and energy wisely. To that end, I’ve put together a ranking, based on my experience around Capitol Hill, setting forth my best guess as to the order of importance of a single communication received by a congressional, from most effective to least effective in getting your point across. But remember, when time is of the essence, quicker is better than perfect. Excellence is the enemy of the good.

(1) Anything from a significant campaign donor, whether or not a constituent
(2) Anything from a constituent campaign donor or campaign worker
(3) Personalized, handwritten letter (not a rant and rave by an apparent lunatic) from a constituent, particularly a constituent identified as a member of a big group (e.g., union member)
(4) Telephone call to the local office from a constituent (or anyone from the correct telephone area code or exchange)
(5) Telephone call to the Washington office from a constituent
(6) Personalized email from a constituent (i.e., anyone who provides a name and address with the correct zip code)
(7) Form letter from a constituent
(8) Email campaign communication (i.e., form email or online petition) from a constituent
(9) Any communication from a non-constituent, non-donor

The reason your communication is so important is that Members of Congress pay good money to marketing firms who tell them that every constituent who calls in or writes represents X% of the representative’s constituency. The more trouble you go to in taking action (i.e., writing a personal letter versus signing a pre-printed form letter or petition), the higher is the “X” factor. Beware, however, that the most you can expect is that your communication will be a check mark in the “yes” or “no” column on a pending vote—so make sure it’s clear which column the staffer who reads/hears your communication should check. If you must engage in a more complex analysis involving shades of gray, do it up front, with brevity, as in “I favor this part of the bill” and “Please vote against that part of the bill.”

HOW DO YOU SEND AN EMAIL TO YOUR REPRESENTATIVES?

Go to www.house.gov or www.senate.gov, find your state, select the representative you want to contact, go to the contact page and enter your name, address and zip code. If you do not enter a zip code that is in the member’s district, you cannot send an email through this facility. This takes less than five minutes unless you write a very thoughtful email. Do it now. The rest of this article is most useful if you want to go beyond that.

IMPORTANCE OF SPONSORING COMMITTEE

The benefit of having a representative on the sponsoring committee of legislation is that that person will have staffers who know the subject matter and likely are involved in bill drafting. The member also will have a direct line to the staffers on the committee itself, usually attorneys, who do the drafting (or cut and paste the words given them from lobbyists). If you have some clout or represent a constituent group of importance to the member, you might get a meeting with a staffer in the local office. Given that the bail-out bill is being ram-rodded through Congress, however, I think it’s safe to assume that it is unlikely that anyone other than representatives of huge special interest groups will get face time with staffers. These subject matter committees, however, do not have control over the purse, which is a matter for the appropriations committees and, thus, do not report out the bail-out portion of the bail-out bill. They would be responsible for other non-monetary statutory provisions. Keep in mind that there as been a lot of talk about including other matters in the bail-out legislation, for example, taxation of securities market trades, amending the bankruptcy laws to allow bankruptcy judges to “jam down” the loans and increasing oversight. All these matters implicate many committees in addition to those working on the funding portion of the bail-out bill.

SUBJECT MATTER JURISDICTION OVER MAJOR NON-FUNDING PROVISIONS

In the case of the bail-out bill, the House Financial Services Committee, chaired by Barney Frank, and specifically its Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government Sponsored Enterprises and/or Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit appear to have subject matter jurisdiction over the bail-out bill. One could only hope that the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations and Subcommittee on Domestic and International Monetary Policy, Trade, and Technology are also involved. This legislation appears to be at the committee rather than subcommittee level at this point, however. You can see the committee’s latest statements and drafts of the House version of the bill (H.R. 3997) and summaries and section-by-section summaries at http://financialservices.house.gov/. A word to the wise: watch out for summaries. The current bail-out summary, for example, doesn’t define what “troubled assets” are. Go here to send an email message to this committee: The current version at this writing is the House amendment to the “amendment of the Senate to the amendment of the House to the amendment of the Senate” of the original bill, and this is only the beginning. Go here http://financialservices.house.gov/who.html to see a list of the many members of this committee.

In the Senate, the name of the analogous committee is the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, chaired by Chris Dodd of Connecticut. The committee home page with current Senate version of the bill, a summary and a section-by-section summary can be accessed here: http://banking.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?fuseaction=Home.Home. Go here to contact the committee: http://banking.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.Form. Go here to see a list of members of this committee: http://banking.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Information.Membership.

FINER POINTS ON APPROPRIATIONS

In theory, Congress can only appropriate funds within the federal debt limit. The bill would raise the debt limit to $11.315 trillion. There is also a law affectionately referred to on the Hill as “PAYGO” [click here for Wikipedia’s explanation of PAYGO], which provides that Congress cannot pass a law involving US credit unless it can “find” funds to cover the potential liability. The Congressional Budget Office will “score” the bail-out bill and determine what is the potential liability under agreed assumptions. Reading CBO’s explanation of the costs of a given version of the bill is most informative [see CBO’s letter to Barney Frank , for example, in which we are told that $700 billion is the amount that may be outstanding at any one time]. So, if you are into that sort of thing, you may be interested to see how CBO scores different versions of the bill and what assumptions are used. The devil is in the details, as they say. Sometimes making absurd assumptions is the only way the guys on the Hill can make the numbers work for PAYGO. CBO can be expected to be a real thorn in the side of the Administration in getting this bill passed. Much to the consternation of Paulson and his tribe, who fought for off-balance-sheet treatment, CBO has already declared this to be an on-balance-sheet item.

The Senate Appropriations Committee is chaired by Robert Byrd of West Virginia. Go here to see this committee’s web page. Go here to see its members. The House Appropriations Committee is chaired by Dave Obey of Wisconsin. Go here to see this committee’s web page and go here to see its members. At this writing, there is no draft of a bail-out bill on the Appropriations Committee site, so we are left to assume that the substantive committee (Financial Services) is taking the lead and that the appropriations bill would follow if the House and Senate pass the substantive bill.

The Financial Services Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations in the House has jurisdiction over funding of the US Treasury. In the Senate, the Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee (chaired by Dick Durban of Illinois) would have jurisdiction. Whether subcommittee membership is relevant in this highly visible, highly political piece of legislation is anybody’s guess.

HOW CAN YOU GET A COPY OF PENDING LEGISLATION?

The Library of Congress’s “THOMAS” webpage for tracking of pending legislation is at http://thomas.loc.gov/. Frankly, I find this page difficult to use if I don’t know the exact name or number of a bill. However, this is the definitive source and is where I would look for the language of the conference committee bills and the final legislation when it is enacted. There will be side-by-side comparisons of the House and Senate versions of the bill, assuming they are different. In the meantime, an easier way to find the current version(s) of the bail-out bill is to go on the web pages of the appropriate committees. Remember, there should be both a House version and a Senate version of at least two bills: the appropriations bill and the bill with the substantive authorizations.

HOW I KNOW THESE THINGS

I worked and lived in the DC area for about 16 years. I lived on Capitol Hill for six years and belonged to a church six blocks from the US Capitol, where I got to know a lot of Congressional staffers and lobbyists. I’m probably one of the few people who has lived next door to two Members of Congress (they were married to each other). I lobbied and testified before committees of the House and Senate in connection with an age discrimination bill that arose out of a seminal US Supreme Court case in which my mother was the plaintiff. The bill ultimately was adopted as the Older Workers Benefit Act of 1990. A subsidiary of the law firm at which I was an associate and then partner lobbied Congress on housing-related issues. I also worked a lead financial advisor to the Federal Housing Administration at the Department of Housing and Urban Development and in that capacity, have worked with the financial and budgetary ramifications of a various budget, appropriation and legislative proposals. What I know only scratches the surface, but I offer it in hopes that you will use this as a jumping-off place.