I am joined tonight by Jason Dye Financial Consultant from Aardvark Consulting http://www.aardvarkconsulting.net . We go over whats going on in the financial world, small time debt solutions for the little guy, and what we can expect in the future. I also go over the latest headlines and takes your calls.
May, 2010
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The Resistance radio 05/14/2010
Saturday, May 15th, 2010Obama Prepares Delay of Iraq Troop Withdrawal
Thursday, May 13th, 2010Martin Chulov
The Guardian
May 13, 2010
The White House is likely to delay the withdrawal of the first large phase of combat troops from Iraq for at least a month after escalating bloodshed and political instability in the country.
General Ray Odierno, the US commander, had been due to give the order within 60 days of the general election held in Iraq on 7 March, when the cross-sectarian candidate Ayad Allawi edged out the incumbent leader, Nouri al-Maliki.
American officials had been prepared for delays in negotiations to form a government, but now appear to have balked after Maliki’s coalition aligned itself with the theocratic Shia bloc to the exclusion of Allawi, who attracted the bulk of the minority Sunni vote. There is also concern over interference from Iraq’s neighbours, Iran, Turkey and Syria.
The Resistance Radio 05/11/2010
Thursday, May 13th, 2010I go over the latest headlines, the EU bailout, audit the fed, and go into detail on what a national id/real id really is and how it pertains to your personal privacy.
Mayor Bloomberg gives his 25 cents.
Wednesday, May 5th, 2010By Jason Van Gilder
vanversive.net
Time to add New York City Mayor Bloomberg to the list of McCarthyites. In the wake of the failed Times Square bombing which authorities have already arrested a Pakistani man named Faisal Shahzad, however that didn’t stop Mr Bloomberg from giving his 25 cents on who might be behind the attempted bombing.
In this short clip he is quick to label a lone “homegrown terrorist” who is angry about the Obama health bill as a possible suspect to the failed act. Although many mainstream news groups are already reporting that the man they have in custody who was caught in Dubai and shown to be connected to the Taliban is the person at fault. That won’t stop the mainstream media and their endless quest to find racist, violent, and armed lone nuts within tea party groups, libertarians, gun owners, traditional conservatives, and anybody who has a dissenting opinion of the government.
Just like Joe Stack and the Pentagon shooter they will also try to link this to legitimate dissenters. It seems we just can’t get our terrorists straight anymore. We can’t distinguish between radical Muslem fundamentalists and the growing paranoia of possible domestic terrorists on American soil. All thanks to people like our buddy and MSNBC favorite Mark Potok.I guarantee in the coming weeks Marky will be all over the news defending his position that patriot groups and tea parties and the rest of their ilk are dangerous, even though the car bomber is allegedly linked to the Taliban.
Believe me if they could and they probably will, sometime before the November elections something will happen that mainstream media can finally link the tea parties to the Taliban, perhaps that will be the October surprise that everybody has been talking about perhaps not. All I know is the pointing of fingers is getting out of hand, and the constant demonization regardless of what you feel about the tea parties or other organizations that oppose big government is getting ridiculous. Especially since Bill Clinton came out some time ago basically saying that the tea parties better stand down or else we might just see another Oklahoma city bombing, and believe me that’s exactly what they want because that would protect their political careers in Washington and give weight to the paranoia of possible domestic terrorists.
Markey panel to address ‘deniers’ head-on
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010E&E News
By Paul Voosen
Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) will seek to further restore the public credibility of climate science this Thursday by hosting several top American researchers in an explanatory hearing that, his office promises, “will address the claims of deniers head-on.”
The Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming hearing follows news yesterday that the InterAcademy Council, an alliance of many of the world’s science academies, had chosen its panel to review the methods of the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Flaws and typos revealed in the IPCC’s influential 2007 report, particularly an error exaggerating the risk global warming poses to Himalayan glaciers, have damaged the panel’s standing and given ammunition to those critical of science underlying climate change.
The IPCC review, requested by the United Nations, will be led by Harold Shapiro, an economist and former president of Princeton University. The peer-review report will examine, among other topics, the literature that may be cited in IPCC reports — several errors stemmed from NGO or government reports that were not peer-reviewed — and data quality control. The panel expects to deliver its findings by the end of August. (See related story in today’s ClimateWire.)
Markey, the committee’s chairman and sponsor of the House-passed climate bill (H.R. 2454), will hear from three past and future American contributors to the IPCC, who will be tasked with laying out the fundamental science behind climate change.
The panel will also hear from Lisa Graumlich, the director of the School of Natural Resources and the Environment at the University of Arizona, who served on a British panel investigating the conduct of scientists at the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia. Intemperate e-mails leaked from the unit last winter gave rise to allegations that climate scientists sought to squash dissent and manipulate temperature data (ClimateWire, April 15).
Last month, the panel cleared the unit and its researchers of any malpractice.
“We saw no evidence of any deliberate scientific malpractice in any of the work of the Climatic Research Unit and had it been there we believe that it is likely that we would have detected it,” the reviewers said. “Rather we found a small group of dedicated if slightly disorganized researchers who were ill-prepared for being the focus of public attention.”
Also testifying to the panel will be another Briton, Lord Christopher Monckton, a hereditary peer in the House of Lords and prominent critic of the scientific consensus supporting anthropogenic climate change.
More than 80% of school districts to cut jobs
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — More than 80% of U.S. school districts are expected to eliminate jobs and more than half will likely freeze hiring during the upcoming school year, an education organization said Tuesday.
Based on a survey of school administrators from 49 states, a total of 275,000 education jobs are expected to be cut in 2011, according to the American Association of School Administrators.
“Faced with continued budgetary constraints, school leaders across the nation are forced to consider an unprecedented level of layoffs that would negatively impact economic recovery and deal a devastating blow to public education,” said AASA Executive Director Dan Domenech.
While the jobs picture begins to stabilize across the broader economy, in its previous survey, the AASA projected job cuts in the education field between 2009 and 2011 to exceed the jobs created by the government in that same period.
In the survey released Tuesday, AASA said job cuts in the 2010 to 2011 school year alone would nearly negate the estimated 300,000 jobs saved or created by the government.
“This survey complements the results of our latest economic impact survey to truly illustrate that schools have yet to feel the economic relief and stability that is appearing in other sectors,” said Domenech.
Of the projected job cuts, about 54% are teacher positions, 9% are support personnel, such as nurses and guidance counselors, 5% are administrative and 31% are classified, a category including maintenance employees and cafeteria workers.
Read full article
Christian preacher on hooligan charge after saying he believes that homosexuality is a sin
Monday, May 3rd, 2010A Christian street preacher has been arrested and charged with a public-order offence after saying that homosexuality was sinful.
Dale Mcalpine was handing out leaflets to shoppers when he told a passer-by and a gay police community support officer that, as a Christian, he believed homosexuality was one of a number of sins that go against the word of God.
Mr Mcalpine said that he did not repeat his remarks on homosexuality when he preached from the top of a stepladder after his leafleting.
But he has been told that police officers are alleging they heard him making his remarks to a member of the public in a loud voice that could be overheard by others.
Mr Mcalpine, 42, who earns about £40,000 a year in the energy industry, was arrested and taken to the local police station in the back of a police van after preaching in the Cumbrian town of Workington on April 20.
After seven hours locked up in a cell, he was charged with using abusive or insulting words or behaviour contrary to the Public Order Act 1986.
Mr Mcalpine – who has delivered open-air sermons and handed out leaflets in Workington for years, and has never been in trouble with the police – said the incident was one of the worst moments of his life.
‘I felt deeply shocked and humiliated that I had been arrested in my own town and treated like a common criminal in front of people I know,’ he said.
‘My freedom was taken away on the hearsay of someone who disliked what I said, and I was charged under a law that doesn’t apply.’
He said he was not homophobic and has gay friends, but he feels compelled by his faith to urge people to abandon all types of sins so they can seek salvation.
‘If you are preaching hate and calling on people to harm others, it is right that is against the law,’ he said. ‘But I would never do that. If we have a free society, I should be allowed to preach the Gospel as generations have before me.’
Christian campaigners said last night they were alarmed that the police seemed to be using legislation originally introduced to deal with violent and abusive rioters and football hooligans to curb free speech.
Neil Addison, a barrister and expert on religious law, said: ‘People should be able to express their opinions freely as long as their conduct is reasonable. In fact, it is part of the duty of the police to protect free speech.’
Mike Judge, a spokesman for the Christian Institute, which is supporting Mr Mcalpine, said: ‘Dale is an ordinary, everyday Christian with traditional views about sexual ethics.
‘Some people will agree with him, others will disagree. But it’s not for the police to arrest someone just because others may disagree with what is said.’
Mr Mcalpine’s ordeal began when he and two other Christians went to the pedestrianised shopping precinct in the centre of Workington.
He took a small stepladder and a rucksack of Christian leaflets and met full-time preacher Keith Bullock from Carlisle and a friend from his evangelical church in Workington.
Mr Bullock began speaking from the stepladder outside a mobile phone shop close to
a number of stores and coffee bars.
Read full article
Draft of Secretive International Copyright Treaty Leaked — Confirms Fears About Internet Freedom
Monday, May 3rd, 2010Michael Geist
Alternet
On the table: losing internet access due to infringement allegations, and widespread data sharing across national borders.
Negotiations on the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) resumed last week in Wellington, New Zealand, with Canada, the United States, the European Union, and a handful of other countries launching the eighth round of talks. While even the most optimistic ACTA supporters do not expect to conclude an agreement before the end of the year, the next five days may prove to be a pivotal point in the negotiations since over the past several weeks, there have been two major leaks that could dramatically alter the still-secret discussions.
The first leak was an internal Dutch government document chronicling the positions of each ACTA participant on treaty transparency. The level of ACTA secrecy is highly unusual for an agreement focused on intellectual property issues, leading to a steady stream of parliamentary resolutions and political demands for transparency coming from around the globe.
US insists on keeping treaty secret
The standard response to transparency criticisms from many governments (including Canada) was to claim that they favored releasing the ACTA text to the public, but that other unnamed countries did not. Since there was no consensus, the text could not be released.
The Dutch leak succeeded in blowing the issue wide open by identifying precisely which countries posed barriers to transparency. The document identified the U.S., Singapore, South Korea, and a trio of European countries as the remaining holdouts. Once publicly identified, the European countries quickly reversed their positions. The E.U. now unanimously supports the releasing of the text alongside Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and Switzerland. With the outing of the transparency issue, it will fall to the U.S., which is widely viewed as the critical stumbling block, to justify its insistence on keeping the treaty secret.
Maintaining support for secrecy also faces a second pressure point — the second major leak was a copy of the draft agreement itself. In other words, while countries maintain official positions of treaty secrecy, a draft is readily available for anyone with Internet access. Because the text has not been officially released, however, government officials have refused to comment on substantive provisions revealed by the leaked document.
Identifying the opposition to transparency may have been welcome news, but the availability of the leaked text was more bittersweet. On the one hand, ACTA watchers were grateful for the opportunity to see first-hand what has been discussed behind closed doors for the past three years.
Dodd reform bill
Monday, May 3rd, 2010“This is an email that I received from the CFL and felt people should know about it because not everyone is subscribed to them, so enjoy.”
Despite all the limited government rhetoric you’re hearing from the Republican Party these days, it appears that Senate Republican leaders, including Richard Shelby, are more than ready and willing to work with Chris Dodd to empower the Fed, add more layers of federal bureaucracy to our economy, and set the stage for future crises.
According to Talking Points Memo, Shelby has stated, “We’re very close to a deal and there will be a substantial number of Republicans that go along with it.”
The White House is doing everything it can in the media to cram yet another powergrab down the American people’s throats. A vote could come at any time, so it’s crucial that liberty activists make their voices heard immediately.
Keep reading for more information on how to contact your senators.
Chris Dodd’s legislation, which should be called the “Fed Empowerment Act,” ignores the true cause of the recent financial downturn: interference in our economy and manipulation of our currency by Congress, the Treasury, and the Federal Reserve.
For all the talk of “change” in D.C., our elected officials are following the same tired old script: if the federal government created the problem, the only solution must be to give it even more power.
Now Senate leaders want to create a new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which will be housed in and funded by the Fed.
And the Dodd bill would create a “Financial Stability Oversight Council” that would have the ability to require nonbank financial companies to be under the Federal Reserve’s supervision based not on their current status, but on what effect they may potentially have on the economy!
Who knows how many businesses will soon be targeted and broken up, under the guise of “reform,” solely for standing up to the federal government.
Recently, Washington Examiner journalist Tim Carney has done some terrific work exposing the corporatism behind the White House’s rhetoric.
To see how Obama’s “reform” plan will actually benefit the big banks and Wall Street firms, especially Goldman Sachs, at the expense of smaller companies and the rest of us, click here to read his piece entitled “Goldman rallies for Obama in Wall Street ‘reform’.”
Don’t let Chris Dodd strengthen the federal government and further entangle the Federal Reserve in our economy without a fight.
Remind your elected officials that any serious effort at true financial reform should start with thoroughly auditing the Federal Reserve.
Click here to get contact information for your senators. Tell them to reject Chris Dodd’s Fed Empowerment Act and to stand up for transparency by working for a standalone vote on Audit the Fed, S. 604!
The American people have already suffered too much because of Washington’s previous interference in our economy.
Together, let’s take a stand for freedom and true reform by opposing the Dodd Fed Empowerment Act and pushing for a long overdue standalone vote on Audit the Fed.
Dems spark alarm with call for national ID card
Saturday, May 1st, 2010By Alexander Bolton
The Hill
A plan by Senate Democratic leaders to reform the nation’s immigration laws ran into strong opposition from civil liberties defenders before lawmakers even unveiled it Thursday.
Democratic leaders have proposed requiring every worker in the nation to carry a national identification card with biometric information, such as a fingerprint, within the next six years, according to a draft of the measure.
The proposal is one of the biggest differences between the newest immigration reform proposal and legislation crafted by late Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).
The national ID program would be titled the Believe System, an acronym for Biometric Enrollment, Locally stored Information and Electronic Verification of Employment.
It would require all workers across the nation to carry a card with a digital encryption key that would have to match work authorization databases.
“The cardholder’s identity will be verified by matching the biometric identifier stored within the microprocessing chip on the card to the identifier provided by the cardholder that shall be read by the scanner used by the employer,” states the Democratic legislative proposal.
The American Civil Liberties Union, a civil liberties defender often aligned with the Democratic Party, wasted no time in blasting the plan.
“Creating a biometric national ID will not only be astronomically expensive, it will usher government into the very center of our lives. Every worker in America will need a government permission slip in order to work. And all of this will come with a new federal bureaucracy — one that combines the worst elements of the DMV and the TSA,” said Christopher Calabrese, ACLU legislative counsel.
“America’s broken immigration system needs real, workable reform, but it cannot come at the expense of privacy and individual freedoms,” Calabrese added.
The ACLU said “if the biometric national ID card provision of the draft bill becomes law, every worker in America would have to be fingerprinted.”
A source at one pro-immigration reform group described the proposal as “Orwellian.”
But Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (Ill.), who has worked on the proposal and helped unveil it at a press conference Thursday, predicted the public has become more comfortable with the idea of a national identification card.