As if we didnt know, here it is

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...the-world.html


Revealed – the capitalist network that runs the world


AS PROTESTS against financial power sweep the world this week, science may have confirmed the protesters' worst fears. An analysis of the relationships between 43,000 transnational corporations has identified a relatively small group of companies, mainly banks, with disproportionate power over the global economy.

The study's assumptions have attracted some criticism, but complex systems analysts contacted by New Scientist say it is a unique effort to untangle control in the global economy. Pushing the analysis further, they say, could help to identify ways of making global capitalism more stable.

The idea that a few bankers control a large chunk of the global economy might not seem like news to New York's Occupy Wall Street movement and protesters elsewhere (see photo). But the study, by a trio of complex systems theorists at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, is the first to go beyond ideology to empirically identify such a network of power. It combines the mathematics long used to model natural systems with comprehensive corporate data to map ownership among the world's transnational corporations (TNCs).

"Reality is so complex, we must move away from dogma, whether it's conspiracy theories or free-market," says James Glattfelder. "Our analysis is reality-based."

Previous studies have found that a few TNCs own large chunks of the world's economy, but they included only a limited number of companies and omitted indirect ownerships, so could not say how this affected the global economy - whether it made it more or less stable, for instance.

The Zurich team can. From Orbis 2007, a database listing 37 million companies and investors worldwide, they pulled out all 43,060 TNCs and the share ownerships linking them. Then they constructed a model of which companies controlled others through shareholding networks, coupled with each company's operating revenues, to map the structure of economic power.

The work, to be published in PLoS One, revealed a core of 1318 companies with interlocking ownerships (see image). Each of the 1318 had ties to two or more other companies, and on average they were connected to 20. What's more, although they represented 20 per cent of global operating revenues, the 1318 appeared to collectively own through their shares the majority of the world's large blue chip and manufacturing firms - the "real" economy - representing a further 60 per cent of global revenues.

When the team further untangled the web of ownership, it found much of it tracked back to a "super-entity" of 147 even more tightly knit companies - all of their ownership was held by other members of the super-entity - that controlled 40 per cent of the total wealth in the network. "In effect, less than 1 per cent of the companies were able to control 40 per cent of the entire network," says Glattfelder. Most were financial institutions. The top 20 included Barclays Bank, JPMorgan Chase & Co, and The Goldman Sachs Group.

John Driffill of the University of London, a macroeconomics expert, says the value of the analysis is not just to see if a small number of people controls the global economy, but rather its insights into economic stability.

Concentration of power is not good or bad in itself, says the Zurich team, but the core's tight interconnections could be. As the world learned in 2008, such networks are unstable. "If one [company] suffers distress," says Glattfelder, "this propagates."

"It's disconcerting to see how connected things really are," agrees George Sugihara of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California, a complex systems expert who has advised Deutsche Bank.

Yaneer Bar-Yam, head of the New England Complex Systems Institute (NECSI), warns that the analysis assumes ownership equates to control, which is not always true. Most company shares are held by fund managers who may or may not control what the companies they part-own actually do. The impact of this on the system's behaviour, he says, requires more analysis.

Crucially, by identifying the architecture of global economic power, the analysis could help make it more stable. By finding the vulnerable aspects of the system, economists can suggest measures to prevent future collapses spreading through the entire economy. Glattfelder says we may need global anti-trust rules, which now exist only at national level, to limit over-connection among TNCs. Sugihara says the analysis suggests one possible solution: firms should be taxed for excess interconnectivity to discourage this risk.

One thing won't chime with some of the protesters' claims: the super-entity is unlikely to be the intentional result of a conspiracy to rule the world. "Such structures are common in nature," says Sugihara.

Newcomers to any network connect preferentially to highly connected members. TNCs buy shares in each other for business reasons, not for world domination. If connectedness clusters, so does wealth, says Dan Braha of NECSI: in similar models, money flows towards the most highly connected members. The Zurich study, says Sugihara, "is strong evidence that simple rules governing TNCs give rise spontaneously to highly connected groups". Or as Braha puts it: "The Occupy Wall Street claim that 1 per cent of people have most of the wealth reflects a logical phase of the self-organising economy."

So, the super-entity may not result from conspiracy. The real question, says the Zurich team, is whether it can exert concerted political power. Driffill feels 147 is too many to sustain collusion. Braha suspects they will compete in the market but act together on common interests. Resisting changes to the network structure may be one such common interest.

When this article was first posted, the comment in the final sentence of the paragraph beginning "Crucially, by identifying the architecture of global economic power…" was misattributed.

The top 50 of the 147 superconnected companies
1. Barclays plc
2. Capital Group Companies Inc
3. FMR Corporation
4. AXA
5. State Street Corporation
6. JP Morgan Chase & Co
7. Legal & General Group plc
8. Vanguard Group Inc
9. UBS AG
10. Merrill Lynch & Co Inc
11. Wellington Management Co LLP
12. Deutsche Bank AG
13. Franklin Resources Inc
14. Credit Suisse Group
15. Walton Enterprises LLC
16. Bank of New York Mellon Corp
17. Natixis
18. Goldman Sachs Group Inc
19. T Rowe Price Group Inc
20. Legg Mason Inc
21. Morgan Stanley
22. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc
23. Northern Trust Corporation
24. Société Générale
25. Bank of America Corporation
26. Lloyds TSB Group plc
27. Invesco plc
28. Allianz SE 29. TIAA
30. Old Mutual Public Limited Company
31. Aviva plc
32. Schroders plc
33. Dodge & Cox
34. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc*
35. Sun Life Financial Inc
36. Standard Life plc
37. CNCE
38. Nomura Holdings Inc
39. The Depository Trust Company
40. Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance
41. ING Groep NV
42. Brandes Investment Partners LP
43. Unicredito Italiano SPA
44. Deposit Insurance Corporation of Japan
45. Vereniging Aegon
46. BNP Paribas
47. Affiliated Managers Group Inc
48. Resona Holdings Inc
49. Capital Group International Inc
50. China Petrochemical Group Company

* Lehman still existed in the 2007 dataset used

The article on NPR said that it stopped in 2008. The WP article says between 2004-2008 as well. I don't know for sure, but it is my impression that it stopped in 2008. Probably when someone had to have someone from the Obama administration sign off which wasn't going to happen.

thanks for that correction. :) my sheer disgust overpowered me in my response.

so this was the response i got from the Senator in my home state after signing the petition on the National Defense Authorization Act.....

December 9, 2011





Ms. ********
730 ******* RD
******, NV *****-0325


Dear Ms. ******:


Thank you for contacting me about detainee provisions in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012. I appreciate hearing from you.


On January 22, 2009, President Obama signed a series of executive orders regarding national security policy. As you know, these directives ordered the eventual closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention center, which had become a potent recruiting symbol for anti-American militant extremists; established a process for determining which detainees can be brought to justice in other countries and which detainees can begin to be prosecuted for terrorist acts; and renewed America's commitment to prohibiting torture. These are tough and complex issues, but, like you, I believe very strongly that strengthening our fight against terrorists required these changes. Our military leaders, officials from our intelligence and diplomatic corps, and bipartisan members of Congress all believe that revising our detention and interrogation methods of suspected terrorists will lead more effectively to a strategic defeat of Al Qaeda and other global terrorist groups, and ultimately, a safer America.


In order to effectively combat terrorism within the complex legal and strategic landscape in which we operate, the Administration must also maintain maximum flexibility to apply each of the different tools in our counterterrorism toolbox for each different case in order to ensure intelligence is not lost, the public is not harmed, and terrorists are not set free. While this practical approach has been adopted by the current Administration, some in Congress continue to seek to tie the Administration's hands. As you noted, the Fiscal Year 2012 National Defense Authorization Act, as reported by the Senate Armed Services Committee, includes provisions that would, among other things, mandate the use of military custody for individuals suspected of terrorism-related offenses, even if arrested in the United States. In an important recent speech, Deputy National Security Advisor John Brennan expressed the Administration's concerns about these provisions and other proposals in Congress to limit the Administration's flexibility in its approach to counterterrorism. He stated that under the approach advocated by some in Congress:


"[W]e would never be able to turn the page on Guantanamo. Our counterterrorism professionals would be compelled to hold all captured terrorists in military custody, casting aside our most effective and time-tested tool for bringing suspected terrorists to justice - our federal courts. .In sum, this approach would impose unprecedented restrictions on the ability of experienced professionals to combat terrorism, injecting legal and operational uncertainty into what is already enormously complicated work."


I have been working diligently to improve the detainee-related provisions in the legislation. After the Armed Services Committee first completed their work on the bill, I wrote to the Chair and Ranking Member of the Committee to express my concerns with the provisions and urge further changes. The Committee ultimately reported out a new version of the bill with significant improvements to the detainee provisions. Nevertheless, some important concerns remained.


During consideration of the bill on the Senate floor, I worked with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and others to secure passage of an amendment preventing application of the detention provisions in the bill to United States citizens, lawful resident aliens, or any other persons who are captured or arrested in the United States (S.AMDT.1456). This amendment maintains the constitutional protections of due process and fair judicial proceedings for individuals arrested within the United States, and is an important addition to the bill.


Nevertheless, I am not satisfied that all of the concerns with the detainee provisions have been adequately addressed. As the bill proceeds to a House-Senate conference committee, you can be sure that I will continue to seek additional improvements. It is critical that we maintain a detention policy that gives our counterterrorism professionals the flexibility, capability, and resources they need to effectively apply all of our national security tools toward bringing terrorists to justice.


Again, thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts with me. I look forward to hearing from you in the near future.


My best wishes to you.


Sincerely,
A
HARRY REID
United States Senator
Nevada


this feels like smoke up my ass.

What a dick wad. Oops, did I just say that out loud?

P.S. "Regardless of all my, and another other reasonable person's efforts, you're screwed."

Bumped- sign and circulate. A constitutional amendment is the only way to change Citizens United decision- this is a process that can take years (even without the present polarized Congress we now have) and we need to get going!

Two ways to amend the Constitution

The founders offered two mechanisms for changing the Constitution. The first is for the proposed bill to pass both halves of the U.S. Congress (House and Senate) by a two-thirds majority in each. Once the bill has passed both houses, it then goes to the states. While the Constitution does not impose a time limit on states for which to consider the amendment, Congress frequently includes one (typically seven years). In order to become an amendment, the bill must receive the approval of three-fourths of the states (38 states). This approval can be generated through either a state convention or a vote of the state legislature. In either case, a majority vote is necessary for passage. Often, the proposed amendment specifies the route which is necessary.

The second method prescribed is for a Constitutional Convention to be called by two-thirds of the state legislatures (34 states), and for that Convention to propose one or more amendments. These amendments are then sent to the states to be approved by three-fourths of the legislatures or conventions. As of July 2006, this method has never been used.

Very interesting article. It touches on something I worry about especially with the increase of a privatized military presence - how the military is becoming the enforcement arm of the 1%.

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/1754...%25_wars/#more

Fighting 1% Wars
Why Our Wars of Choice May Prove Fatal
By William J. Astore

America’s wars are remote. They’re remote from us geographically, remote from us emotionally (unless you’re serving in the military or have a close relative or friend who serves), and remote from our major media outlets, which have given us no compelling narrative about them, except that they’re being fought by “America’s heroes” against foreign terrorists and evil-doers. They’re even being fought, in significant part, by remote control -- by robotic drones “piloted” by ground-based operators from a secret network of bases located hundreds, if not thousands, of miles from the danger of the battlefield.

Their remoteness, which breeds detachment if not complacency at home, is no accident. Indeed, it’s a product of the fact that Afghanistan and Iraq were wars of choice, not wars of necessity. It’s a product of the fact that we’ve chosen to create a “warrior” or “war fighter” caste in this country, which we send with few concerns and fewer qualms to prosecute Washington’s foreign wars of choice.

The results have been predictable, as in predictably bad. The troops suffer. Iraqi and Afghan innocents suffer even more. And yet we don’t suffer, at least not in ways that are easily noticeable, because of that very remoteness. We’ve chosen -- or let others do the choosing -- to remove ourselves from all the pain and horror of the wars being waged in our name. And that’s a choice we’ve made at our peril, since a state of permanent remote war has weakened our military, drained our treasury, and eroded our rights and freedoms.

Wars of Necessity vs. Wars of Choice

World War II was a war of necessity. In such a war, all Americans had a stake. Adolf Hitler and Nazism had to be defeated; so too did Japanese militarism. Indeed, war goals were that clear, that simple, to state. For that war, we relied uncontroversially on an equitable draft of citizen-soldiers to share the burdens of defense.

Contrast this with our current 1% wars. In them, 99% of Americans have no stake. The 1% who do are largely ID-card-carrying members of what President Dwight D. Eisenhower so memorably called the “military-industrial complex” in 1961. In the half-century since, that web of crony corporations, lobbyists, politicians, and retired military types who have passed through Washington’s revolving door has grown ever more gargantuan and tangled, engorged by untold trillions devoted to a national security and intelligence complex that seemingly dominates Washington. They are the ones who, in turn, have dispatched another 1% -- the lone percent of Americans in our All-Volunteer Military -- to repetitive tours of duty fighting endless wars abroad.

Unlike previous wars of necessity, the mission behind our wars of choice is nebulous, confusing, and seems in constant flux. Is it a fight against terror (which, as so many have pointed out, is in any case a method, not an enemy)? A fight for oil and other strategic resources? A fight to spread freedom and democracy? A fight to build nations? A fight to show American resolve or make the world safe from al-Qaeda? Who really knows anymore, now that Washington seldom bothers to bring up the “why” question at all, preferring simply to fight on without surcease?

In wars of choice, of course, the mission is whatever our leaders choose it to be, which gives the citizenry (assuming we’re watching closely, which we’re not) no criteria with which to measure success, let alone determine an endpoint.

How do we know these are wars of choice? It’s simple: because we could elect to leave whenever we wanted or whenever the heat got too high, as is currently the case in Iraq (even if we are leaving behind a fortress embassy the size of the Vatican with a private army of 5,000 rent-a-guns to defend it), and as we are likely to do in Afghanistan sometime in the years after the 2012 presidential election. The choice is ours. The people without a choice are of course the Iraqis and Afghans whom we’ll leave to pick up the pieces.

Even our vaunted Global War on Terror is a war of choice. Think about it: Who has control over our own terror: us or our enemies? We can only be terrorized in the first place if we choose to give in to fear.

Think here of the “shoe bomber” in 2001 and the “underwear bomber” in 2009. Why did the criminally inept actions of these two losers garner so much attention (and fear-mongering) in the American media? As the self-confessed greatest and most powerful nation on Earth, shouldn’t we have shared a collective belly laugh at the absurdity and incompetence of those “attacks” and gone about our business?

Instead of laughing, of course, we allowed yet more American treasure to be poured into technology and screening systems that may never even have caught a terrorist. We consented to be surveilled ever more and consulted ever less. We chose to reaffirm our terrors every time we doffed our shoes or submitted supinely to being scoped or groped at our nation’s airports.

Our distant permanent wars, our 1% wars of choice, will remain remote from our emotions and our thinking, requiring few sacrifices except from our troops, who grow ever more remote from our polity. This is especially true of America’s young adults, between 18 and 29 years of age, who are the least likely to have family members in the military, according to a recent Pew Research Center study.

The result? An already emergent warrior-caste might grow ever more estranged from the 99%, creating tensions and encouraging grievances that quite possibly could be manipulated by that other 1%: the powerbrokers, money-makers, and string-pullers, already so eager to call out the police to bully and arrest occupy movements in numerous cities across this once-great land.

Our Military or Their Military?

As we fight wars of choice in distant lands for ever-shifting goals, what if “our troops” simply continue to grow ever more remote from us? What if they become “their” troops? Is this not the true terror we should be mobilizing as a nation to prevent? The terror of separating our military almost totally from our nation -- and ourselves.

As Admiral Mike Mullen, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, put it recently to Time: “Long term, if the military drifts away from its people in this country, that is a catastrophic outcome we as a country can't tolerate.”

Behold a horrifying fate: a people that allows its wars of choice to compromise the very core of its self-image as a freedom-loving society, while letting itself be estranged from the young men and women who served in the frontlines of these wars.

Here’s an American fact: the 99% are far too remote from our wars of choice and those who fight them. To reclaim the latter, we must end the former. And that’s a war of necessity that has to be fought -- and won.

NPR Tries to Track Down Those Millionaire Job Creators
Friday 9 December 2011
by: Peter Hart, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting | Report

Dean Baker (12/9/11) flagged this NPR Morning Edition report today (12/9/11), and it's well worth a positivity.

In the debate over the payroll tax cut, Democrats want to pay for extending the tax break with a surtax on the wealthy. Republicans claim--usually without being challenged by reporters--that a surtax on millionaires would be an attack on job-creating small-business owners.

So NPR decided to go to GOP officials and ask to speak with these small-business-owning, millionaire job-creators. Turned out there was trouble finding any:

We wanted to talk to business owners who would be affected. So NPR requested help from numerous Republican congressional offices, including House and Senate leadership. They were unable to produce a single millionaire job creator for us to interview.

So we went to the business groups that have been lobbying against the surtax. Again, three days after putting in a request, none of them was able to find someone for us to talk to.

They did find a few wealthy business owners willing to talk--and they said their personal tax rate wasn't a factor in their hiring decisions.

It's interesting to me that I do business directly with 2 of the companies in the top 10. I can't imagine that it would make an iota worth of difference to them if I pull my business away from them - they are controlling millions (billions) of other people's money, and they would probably still have indirect influence over my money anyway.

Here is the link per request:
http://www.truth-out.org/npr-tries-t...ors/1323463415
There ya go.

I didn't post it originally because the story was really just that short.

Interesting read...
 

The Atlantic
Saturday, December 10, 2011


Mr. Washington Goes to Anonymous
By Alexis Madrigal

Dec 9 2011, 5:37 PM ET 20

Welcome to one of the inner rings of The Establishment. We're near Dupont Circle, a short distance to the various centers of power in Washington, DC. The Capitol Building is not so far. The White House, too. The myriad National Associations dot the streets, and the K Street lobbyists and big law firms are a few blocks away. Here we find The Brookings Institution, one of DC's oldest think tanks. When you think of people in suits coming up with policies that become laws, this is one of the places you're thinking about.

Today's order of business was a panel about Anonymous, about hacktivism, about... the lulz. "Radical online activism is a new public-policy challenge, with groups such as Anonymous being described as everything from terrorist organizations to freedom fighters," the Institution billed it.

http://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt...okings_615.jpg

The speaker charged with explaining Anonymous' idiosyncrasies was Biella Coleman, an anthropologist who has been studying the group and its affiliates for months and months. An hour before she went on stage, she asked her Twitter followers, "The question for today: do I dare say 'Ultra-Coordinated Motherfuckeray' to the D.C. establishment in one hour?" (She didn't, sadly.)

This is the challenge Anonymous poses to the establishment. For those who think it is risky to wear a skinny tie, the group's argot and traditions are so alien that it's difficult to parse what the the group is. I have long imagined some DC lawyers gathered around 4chan.org with looks of horror and disgust on their faces. Even Coleman, who has spent massive amounts of time embedded among Anonymous and 4chan users, noted that the latter site was "teeming with pornography" and that many of its members communicate "in a language that seems to reduce English to a string of epithets." Which would, of course, be the point. Outsiders aren't supposed to understand.

So, when Coleman came to the microphone before the Brookings-blue logos of the stage, I was curious to see how her presentation of the social dynamics of Anonymous might be perceived. She described the group's birth on 4chan and the turn that some groups within the larger mass took to engage in activist politics in 2008, changes that came in the process of griefing the Church of Scientology in Project Chanology. Through that experience, various Anons developed the digital and physical moves that they'd later use on other organizations. She covered several other notable Anonymous and AnonOps (separate group) exploits. What was fascinating about her talk was the way that it gave the impression that -- much as people would like to -- it is very difficult to separate out the different kinds of activities that define Anonymous' do-ocracy. Anonymous, a bit like Occupy Wall Street, is as much a platform for action as anything else, and individual efforts are largely separate from any other effort. This massive decentralization of power makes it difficult for Anonymous to stand for any one thing or even to ask that question of itself as an institution. It wouldn't make sense to say, "What are Anonymous' politics?" even if it seems clear that, in inchoate, intuitive form, there are some.

Coleman also highlighted the way Anons follow a strictly enforced "no fame" policy in which those members who seek celebrity are shunned. But inside the group, individuality is encouraged. The whole enterprise is "evasive, shifty, and nomadic," but not necessarily in a bad way. That style is also a strategy. As Richard Forno, the graduate program director of University of Maryland, Baltimore County's cybersecurity program, explained, for those trying to defend their organizations an Anonymous attack, the very fact that no one controls the operation makes it difficult to strike back. Beyond any technical resilience the hackers build into an operation, the anonymity and decentralization create a social resilience. There's no one person to apprehend, no organization to strike, nothing to hit.

The last speaker was Paul Rosenzweig. Rosenzweig has a classic Washington resume: University of Chicago JD, lecturer at George Washington Law School, visiting fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, various posts at the Department of Homeland Security, and a bow tie. I have to admit that he did not strike me as likely to understand or feel much sympathy for Anonymous. But Rosenszweig did a fantastic job of framing the group's activities for the policy crowd. "I offer the comments with a great degree of uncertainty and trepidation," he began, and then used the nominal title of the panel, "Hacktivism, Vigilantism and Collective Action in a Digital Age," as a way of illuminating different aspects of Anonymous and how policymakers might respond to it. Far from the befuddled establishment lawyer that I expected, Rosenszweig's sensitivity to the multivalence of Anonymous impressed me. We can only hope that other people whispering into lawmakers' ears are as intellectually curious as he is.

"In some instances, [Anonymous' action] is hacktivism of a vicious sort or vigilantism of an even more vicious sort," Rosenszweig said. "And in some instances, it embodies collective action that has been a tradition and core part of what we in America think of as free speech and political activity."

These distinctions matter. If policymakers think of Anonymous as hacktivism, they may see it as a kind of insurgency that they would battle not solely with policing but also with a battle to win hearts-and-minds and rob the group of its moral standing. If they see the group as vigilantes, they might take a more crime-fighting approach. And if they see the group as embodying collective action, "that's a whole different kettle of fish." "If it's a First Amendment sort of activity, the only thing that's legitimate is to police the margins and enforce the traditional First Amendment rules like preventing a heckler's veto, so one part of speech doesn't drown out another part," he said. Rosenzweig tipped his hand a little as to how he sees the group, but with the utmost (and seemingly honest) humility.

"I tend to see predominant within Anonymous, the more adverse parts and more the criminality and the theft of private information," he concluded. "But I'm certainly willing to acknowledge that I might be wrong. And that kind of indeterminacy of the threat, if it is a threat at all, makes it very difficult, possibly impossible [to create] a coherent policy or a coherent legal approach." All this to say that, given the yawning gulf between Anonymous and the DC establishment, I was shocked to discover that there are some among the elites that can be eminently reasonable about the kind of things that Anonymous does. Perhaps given the byzantine and bizarre ways that power flows in Washington, DC, it's easier to understand a strange group that has its own language and plays by its own rules.

From -
http://www.theatlantic.com/technolog...nymous/249791/

Jay-Z on paying more taxes and the Occupy movement

http://money.cnn.com/video/news/2011...cupy.cnnmoney/

Do you think a lot of people feel the same way Jay-Z does? Wouldn't it be nice to know what the tax money goes towards?
As Obama asks those that make more money to pay more taxes, congress debates and fights this thought. Their debate is that those that make more money will have the jobs and they deserve a break.
What do you think?

Occupy Wall Street, Re-energized: A Leaderless Movement Plots a Comeback
 

LINK:http://www.time.com/time/nation/arti...101802,00.html

Go, Tammy, Go....
 

From the latest Boldprogressives.org email -

We recently told you about Rep. Tammy Baldwin's (D-Wisconsin) bill opposing the proposed deal that would give Wall Street banks immunity for crimes that haven't been investigated yet. 1,000 phone calls and 55,000 signatures from people like you helped catapult Baldwin's co-sponsors from 27 to 48 members of Congress! This is huge momentum, and we're not done yet.

Our Capitol Hill outreach program, P Street (the progressive alternative to K Street), will continue updating members of Congress about grassroots support while asking them to sign on as co-sponsors. Add your voice today.
Thanks for being a bold progressive.

P.S. More good news: The Massachusetts Attorney General recently announced a lawsuit against 5 big Wall Street banks for illegally foreclosing on homeowners. Progressive activism against Wall Street immunity, coupled with the Occupy Wall Street momentum, has undoubtedly empowered investigations like these. And it's been announced that more are coming in California and Nevada. But a deal with Wall Street banks would make these lawsuits go away, so please add your name as a citizen signer of Baldwin's resolution today

http://act.boldprogressives.org/sign...non/?source=bp

It's tomorrow!!
 

12/12 West Coast port shutdown.. from CA to WA.

Protesting “Wall Street on the Waterfront.”

Organizers say the shutdown will focus public attention on how the 1% use the ports, international trade, and even the spirit of Christmas to profit off the 99%.

“One way that the 1% amasses wealth is through the ports.
“Shut Down Wall Street on the Waterfront is a coordinated effort from the occupy movement to target the corporations that contribute to the vast inequality of wealth and power in our economic system.”

“The rank and file of the labor movement not only supports the occupy movement, but are a part of the occupy movement. Organized and unorganized working people are struggling to keep their homes and their jobs, while the 1% reaps record profits,” says Kathryn Cates, one of the organizers, “Because the holiday season has been exploited by the 1% to make money off working people, December is a peak business time for the ports and the wealthiest corporations. On December 12 we will show that the holidays are about family & community not profits and exploitation.”

The longshoreman’s union, representing many port workers, has historically not crossed picket lines, community or otherwise.

As of December 5th, nine West Coast occupations have responded to the call to shut down Wall Street on the Waterfront, including Occupy LA/Long Beach, Occupy San Diego, Occupy Tacoma, Occupy Seattle, Occupy Anchorage and Occupy Oakland.

West Coast Shutdown info can be found at shutdowntheport.com.

This action was approved by the Occupy Portland General Assembly on November 26, 2011

looks like progress in FL..

ORLANDO -- Hundreds of people, from 16 different cities, were in Orlando this weekend for the first state-wide Occupy Wall Street event.

For months they've occupied city parks across the state.

However, protesters with the Occupy movement have grown tired of just sitting around.

"It resolves nothing to just protest,” says protester, Valerie Cepero. “If you don't have a goal, then how do you know you've made any progress?"

This weekend, protesters worked to develop a list of objectives they hope can pass as legislation. They divided up into small groups and made a list of issues that are important to them.

"We demand our state legislator to pass a non-binding resolution to support the overturning of Citizens United VIPC,” said the moderator of one of the groups.

The issues ranged from insurance, to foreclosures, to elections. One proposal asks that elections be held during the weekend.

"I don't think there's any good reason why an election needs to be on a week day when the people that are most affected by this legislation are not going to be able to take off of work," Cepero said.

Once the groups finished listing their proposals, they presented them to the general assembly. By a show of hands, the group voted for or against each item.

"About five or six items will go on our final list of objectives," Cepero said.

That final list will be delivered to state legislators in Tallahassee January 10.

Members of Occupy Orlando said the gathering would also help to pull the attention away from recent incidents involving law enforcement at Beth Johnson Park near lake Ivanhoe.

Earlier this week, five protesters were arrested charged for trespassing and resisting arrest after code enforcement officers handed out warnings asking demonstrators to take their belongings out of the park and sidewalk. In total at least 45 demonstrators have been arrested since the Occupy Orlando movement began.

Sunday afternoon, protesters told News 13 they would be evicted from the park at midnight. Orlando Police denied the allegations.

http://www.cfnews13.com/

Sure and how many people risk their boss's ire, to ask for that time off? In these times when you can easily lose your job ? How easy is it to vote before or after work when you work a long day and live someplace where the lines are long to vote? Election Day use to be a day off or a half day off, now it isn't. I think the point is to encourage people to vote not to make it harder... Personally I wouldn't mind if we had Australia's system, where you are required to vote, or you get fined.... And there already are places you can vote early.. which Florida did away with, so you cna vote the weekend before, why isn't that a great idea? Cuts down on lines the actual day and..whats wrong with it ? Whats the down side of more people voting? Well except for the Republicans, who win less elections, when more people vote...

Yes, investigations need to proceed! But, under the actual laws/regulations governing Wall Street and the banks during the mega-rip off most of what was done was not illegal. That is why it is so important to get the agencies created and the new regulations they are to enforce going. And the GOP in Congress has done everything including blocking confirmation of directors of consummer agencies that will make those kinds of actions illegal and subject to prosecution in order to protect Wall Street and banking further.

Not one damn thing is going to get done that helps the 98% without changing the composition of both the Senate & House and elect Democrats and Independents that are left of center. This general election is so critical and we need to focus on all of the GOP backed voter suppression activity going on.

Portland Port is CLOSED
Oakland Port is CLOSED
Long Beach partly CLOSED
Longview Port is CLOSED

CNN reports some disruption to ports, but not closings:


(CNN) -- Protesters chanting, "Whose port? Our port!" protested at West Coast ports on Monday, temporarily shutting down some of the facilities in a protest against what they called corporate greed.

The protesters, affiliated with the nationwide "Occupy" movement, set out in the pre-dawn hours in Oakland, California; Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon, to shut down ports in an effort to "disrupt the economic machine that benefits the wealthiest individuals and corporations," according to organizers.

Long Beach police arrested two people during the demonstration there, police Chief Jim McDonnell said. Port operations were not significantly impacted beyond some traffic delays, he said.

A spokesman for the port in Portland, Oregon, said the protests had partially shut down the port there. In Oakland, the port said in a statement that operations were continuing "with sporadic disruptions for truckers trying to enter and exit marine terminal gates."

About 80 protesters demonstrated outside the gate of San Diego's port, but caused no disruption because, port spokesman Ron Powell said.

"They were there at a time when we really didn't have a lot of truck traffic coming in and out," he said.

Four people who sat down in the road were arrested he said. San Diego police did not immediately return a telephone call seeking information on the arrests.

Protesters were planning a second occupation of the Oakland port Monday afternoon. Protesters in Seattle also were preparing to protest at the port there, according to organizing websites and posts on Twitter.

In addition to the West Coast port blockades, protesters also were planning to demonstrate at the port in Houston, while demonstrators in Salt Lake City and Denver were planning to disrupt operations of Walmart distribution facilities. About 40 to 50 people protested at the Denver facility, CNN affiliate KCNC reported.

The demonstrations were part of a nationwide day of protest called in the aftermath of efforts by cities across the country, including New York, Boston and Oakland, to clear demonstrators from encampments they had set up in public parks and other locations.

"We are occupying the ports as part of a day of action, boycott and march for full legalization and good jobs for all to draw attention to and protest the criminal system of concentrated wealth that depends on local and global exploitation of working people, and the denial of workers' rights to organize for decent pay, working conditions and benefits, in disregard for the environment and the health and safety of surrounding communities," organizers said on their website.

The port protesters are focusing on terminals owned by SSA Marine, saying it is owed by the Goldman Sachs investment firm, which they argue exemplifies corporate greed and is anti-union.

SSA Senior Vice President Bob Watters disputed the protesters' claims, saying Goldman Sachs owns less than 3% of an investment fund that has a minority stake in the company. He also said the company is the largest employer of International Longshore and Warehouse Union members on the West Coast.

That union, which represents 15,000 dock workers, has distanced itself from the effort.

In a letter to members sent last month, union president Robert McEllrath said the organization shares Occupy protesters concerns about what they consider corporate abuses, but he said the union was not sanctioning any shutdown.

Protest organizers said on their website that they were acting independent of organized labor only because the unions are "constrained under reactionary, anti-union federal legislation."

Some port workers are also against the planned blockade.

"I'm just barely getting on my feet again after two years, and now I gotta go a day without pay while somebody else has something to say that I'm not really sure is relevant to the cause," trucker Chuck Baca told CNN affiliate KGO.

Port officials say shutting down their facilities will only cost workers and their communities wages and tax revenue.

"Protesters wanted to send a message to the 1% but they are impacting the 99%," said Portland port spokesman Josh Thomas. The stoppage is resulting in "lost shifts, lost wages and delays," he said.

Port of San Diego board chairman Scott Peters issued an open letter to the community on Sunday asking that protesters not disrupt work.

"The Port of San Diego is made up of working people with families who serve the public each day by helping to bring in goods that are important to the people of the San Diego region," Peters wrote.

"They are the 99 percent, the gardeners, the maintenance workers, the dock workers, the Harbor Police officers, the office workers, the environmental workers -- all working to improve the quality of life in San Diego Bay and on its surrounding lands," he said. "It is these people who would be hurt by a blockade of our Port."

This is from an FB post from Occupy St. Louis. Meant to cite it, sorry.

Watch the port shut down live on UStream today:

http://occupywallst.org/article/watc...-port-shutown/

Proof Obama will sign NDAA 1031 Citizen Imprisonment Law in a few days
 

This is seriously shocking. Call, email the white house now!!

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/write-or-call#write

Robert Fisk: Bankers are the dictators of the West

Writing from the very region that produces more clichés per square foot than any other "story" – the Middle East – I should perhaps pause before I say I have never read so much garbage, so much utter drivel, as I have about the world financial crisis.

But I will not hold my fire. It seems to me that the reporting of the collapse of capitalism has reached a new low which even the Middle East cannot surpass for sheer unadulterated obedience to the very institutions and Harvard "experts" who have helped to bring about the whole criminal disaster.

Let's kick off with the "Arab Spring" – in itself a grotesque verbal distortion of the great Arab/Muslim awakening which is shaking the Middle East – and the trashy parallels with the social protests in Western capitals. We've been deluged with reports of how the poor or the disadvantaged in the West have "taken a leaf" out of the "Arab spring" book, how demonstrators in America, Canada, Britain, Spain and Greece have been "inspired" by the huge demonstrations that brought down the regimes in Egypt, Tunisia and – up to a point – Libya. But this is nonsense.

The real comparison, needless to say, has been dodged by Western reporters, so keen to extol the anti-dictator rebellions of the Arabs, so anxious to ignore protests against "democratic" Western governments, so desperate to disparage these demonstrations, to suggest that they are merely picking up on the latest fad in the Arab world. The truth is somewhat different. What drove the Arabs in their tens of thousands and then their millions on to the streets of Middle East capitals was a demand for dignity and a refusal to accept that the local family-ruled dictators actually owned their countries. The Mubaraks and the Ben Alis and the Gaddafis and the kings and emirs of the Gulf (and Jordan) and the Assads all believed that they had property rights to their entire nations. Egypt belonged to Mubarak Inc, Tunisia to Ben Ali Inc (and the Traboulsi family), Libya to Gaddafi Inc. And so on. The Arab martyrs against dictatorship died to prove that their countries belonged to their own people.

And that is the true parallel in the West. The protest movements are indeed against Big Business – a perfectly justified cause – and against "governments". What they have really divined, however, albeit a bit late in the day, is that they have for decades bought into a fraudulent democracy: they dutifully vote for political parties – which then hand their democratic mandate and people's power to the banks and the derivative traders and the rating agencies, all three backed up by the slovenly and dishonest coterie of "experts" from America's top universities and "think tanks", who maintain the fiction that this is a crisis of globalisation rather than a massive financial con trick foisted on the voters.

The banks and the rating agencies have become the dictators of the West. Like the Mubaraks and Ben Alis, the banks believed – and still believe – they are owners of their countries. The elections which give them power have – through the gutlessness and collusion of governments – become as false as the polls to which the Arabs were forced to troop decade after decade to anoint their own national property owners. Goldman Sachs and the Royal Bank of Scotland became the Mubaraks and Ben Alis of the US and the UK, each gobbling up the people's wealth in bogus rewards and bonuses for their vicious bosses on a scale infinitely more rapacious than their greedy Arab dictator-brothers could imagine.

I didn't need Charles Ferguson's Inside Job on BBC2 this week – though it helped – to teach me that the ratings agencies and the US banks are interchangeable, that their personnel move seamlessly between agency, bank and US government. The ratings lads (almost always lads, of course) who AAA-rated sub-prime loans and derivatives in America are now – via their poisonous influence on the markets – clawing down the people of Europe by threatening to lower or withdraw the very same ratings from European nations which they lavished upon criminals before the financial crash in the US. I believe that understatement tends to win arguments. But, forgive me, who are these creatures whose ratings agencies now put more fear into the French than Rommel did in 1940?

Why don't my journalist mates in Wall Street tell me? How come the BBC and CNN and – oh, dear, even al-Jazeera – treat these criminal communities as unquestionable institutions of power? Why no investigations

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion...t-6275084.html

In case you think laws like NDAA 1031 Citizen Imprisonment Law can't or won't be used against you by the government because, well, because you actually aren't a terrorist, think again. These are laws that give the government unprecedented, in the U.S. anyway, control over it's citizens. And removes a great deal of your rights and possible recourse should you be picked up and dragged off to a detention center for a round of torture and questioning.

10 Ridiculous Things That Make You a Terror Suspect

"I'm not anti-America, America is anti-me"

You thought you weren't doing anything wrong, so why should you care about who they call a terrorist? Well, you may not believe it, but you're likely a terror suspect in America's new paradigm of the Land of the Fear.

The government is casting a wide net over its citizens in its search for potential threats. Now, you don't need to actually commit a crime to be hauled away to a detention center and held without charges while you are tortured; you just need to appear suspicious by sympathizing with anti-government views to be labeled a domestic terrorist.

First, it's important to understand the official definition of domestic terrorism in the United States. The ACLU reports that a person is a domestic terrorist if they engage in any "act dangerous to human life" that "appears to be intended to (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping."

Although recent White House action plans claim to be targeting "violent extremism in all its forms," the government itself is clearly guilty of countless "acts dangerous to human life intended to coerce the civilian population, to influence the policy, and to affect the conduct of a government." But that's for another article.

What's more disturbing, is the government's expansion of guilty parties to "terrorist sympathizers." This is where the net gets really large. What exactly constitutes sympathizing with a terrorist? Is questioning the imperial foreign policy and the destruction of civil liberties, sympathizing with the enemy? In the U.S., it seems that if you don't agree with the violence and coercion America commits, then you're an anti-American terrorist sympathizer, as evidenced by peace organizations being added to terror watch lists.

So, what makes you a terror suspect in America? Here are 10 ridiculous things that make you a terrorist according to "officials" running the U.S. government:

1. Tea Party Activists: The political Left demonized peaceful Tea Party activists as right-wing extremists, leading to the second most powerful official in the U.S. government, VP Joe Biden, to liken them to terrorists. Do you sympathize with those who are angry about bank bailouts on the backs of taxpayers? Well, you're likely a terrorist in the eyes of the State.

2. Occupy Activists: Now, the "Occupy" movement, said to be made up of left-wing extremists, is enjoying the same treatment as the Tea Party's right-wing extremists. The United Kingdom has officially labeled "Occupy" demonstrators as domestic terrorists. The U.S. hasn't gone quite that far, but the violent Police State did spy them in search of "domestic terrorists." Watch out, you may be a terror suspect if you sympathize with the 99%.

3. 7 Days of Food: The Department of Justice and FBI considers you a terrorist threat if you have more than 7 days of food stored, as explained by Rand Paul on the Senate floor:

Paul was referring to an official FBI/DOJ flyer given out to business owners to help them identify potential threats. And recently, Federal agents went to food storage facilities demanding customers lists, while citizens were harassed by the government with door-to-door "assessments" of their preparedness.

4. Missing Fingers: The document referred to by Rand Paul above, also claims that if someone is missing a finger or has burn marks, they're more likely to be a terror suspect.

5. Buying Flashlights: Also from the same official source, if you're buying night-vision devices including flashlights, you should be considered a terror suspect.

6. Paying Cash at Hotels: Watch out if you want to pay with cash for hotel rooms. This DHS commercial indicates that you're a terror suspect if you do:

The DHS has also launched their citizen spy program for hotels and has sent them hotel protection guidelines which lists suspicious activities like persons carrying observation equipment or standing around in the same area.

7. Texting Privately in a Public Place: According to this DHS commercial for their citizen spy program, if you're texting while sitting in a public park, but trying to keep it concealed from people who pass by, you should be reported for suspicious terrorist activity:

8. Ron Paul Stickers: A 2009 law enforcement report from the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC) labeled Ron Paul supporters, Libertarians, and people sharing movies about the Federal Reserve as "domestic terrorists." When supporters of a political candidate who stands for peace and freedom become terror suspects, America is in big trouble.

9. Belief in Conspiracies -- Obama's Information Czar, Cass Sunstein, has identified those who hold conspiracy theories as targets for online "cognitive infiltration." Do you question the motives for war? Question the motives of the private Federal Reserve bank? Question any government policies? Chances are you already have been marked as a suspect.

10. Own Precious Metals -- Despite the fact that the Federal Reserve paper note (a.k.a. the dollar) is only sustained by faith, you could now be a suspected terrorist if you would like to preserve your wealth with something that holds real value like precious metals. And forget about establishing an alternative currency made from silver or gold like Bernard von NotHaus as you may be lumped into a "unique form of terrorism."

And now the bonus round for being registered as a potential terrorist -- #11-- Owning guns and ammo. Let's face it: you disagree with the American government colluding with international banks to rob you blind AND you've armed yourself? This also why returning veterans have also been labeled potential terrorists -- they have guns, know how to use them, and may be angry about the lies that sent them to war.

As the Fast and Furious scandal has now revealed, it was done with a premeditated strategy to vilify the Second Amendment to the nation's Constitution. Wait -- actively planning to undermine the founding document of the country and plot criminal activity against citizens to spread fear and increase political power? Should that be considered under the definition of terrorism. . . .?

Yes, many of the unethical and damaging acts of Wall Street were not illegal thanks to the orgy of de-regulation we have seen over the years. But much of what was done by Wall Street was outright fraud. Misrepresenting debt instruments to the public as sound and top-grade while scorning them privately as toxic junk is still very much illegal, criminal acts under existing statutes.

This really burns my ass:

http://www.truth-out.org/under-indus...ops/1323453319

EXCLUSIVE: Under Industry Pressure, USDA Works to Speed Approval of Monsanto's Genetically Engineered Crops

It seems like control is just accelerated but I sit back and wonder who is really pulling all the strings. I see protest, I even see positive change, however there are agencies fighting and even lying to get shit approved/passed. I do understand the weight of our financial scenario and it is beyond our control.

But I can't help but fantasize about 1000's of protesters heading out to farms, empty lots, anywhere there is soil and start protesting with shovels and seeds. What better way to slam so much of this then to take back our local food systems? The magnitude of corps effected by this would be huge and so many banks would come tumbling down. Are we going to continue to allow the UDSA and FDA control what goes into our bodies?

So there are a few occupy farm groups but they are setting up camps to protest. I hope by spring everyone is out digging, growing and preserving. Penetrating local markets and teaching people to become independent and sustainable.

I agree but worry that time is running out to do anything about the acts of fraud leading to what happened. There was such a confusing wall built (of these securities) to protect Wall Street and the banks and housing financial services industries- they wanted this to be a nightmare to even figure out who the hell really owns properties! All of the lobbying paid off for nearly 30 years to get to this place. Those that profited simply put the cash offshore.

I don't think there will ever be trials against those at the core of all of this. I think that each and every mortgage held in this manner should be declared null and void with re-negotiation at todays market values and that any negative financial "marks" on mortgagees since the collapse of the housing market not be allowed to count in the new mortgage.

That is the other side of this- so many people that had good credit now do not due to job loss and the whole damn mess.

But on the bright side, if there ever could be one, private companies are writing low interest loans for people with bad credit, even foreclosures. I've been catching wind of a few people who said "what the hell", applied and found all kinds of options. I was lucky because the crooks that hold my mortgage seriously screwed up and recorded all conversations. they defaulted me on the governments home loan modification and almost forced me into foreclosure because of it. I ready to sue the crap out of them and would have won... maybe 10 years later. Anyhow they came in, took 20K off my principal and dropped my rate to 5%. It happened just in time because there is no way over the past year that would have been possible. But now people are fed up, builders and modular home companies are taking risk. I admit that I would rather see the already existing surplus of homes being lived in but it may take some time for this.

The other positive thing I'm seeing in the home market is people downsizing and moving to smaller homes. I would have loved to have seen this movement happen 20 years ago. That and the government putting a cap on auto makers to not make cars that used more then 25 MPG, forcing them to change unless businesses wanted to apply for a special permit. It would force more local change which is something we do desperately need,.

Once again I forgot to put a link to an article. Sorry. My brain is all christmasy and can't be counted on for much outside of dancing sugar plum fairies.
http://irritatethestate.net/2011/12/...error-suspect/

I'm shocked, saddened and ultimately informed by your articles and posts, folks. Thank you for them. I am deep in the final weeks and the semester and frankly unmoved by even coffee lately. The exhaustion is in my bones this week. I'm overdue a marathon sleep and will be posting anything with gravitas after that....

Thank you again. I am reading your posts and appreciate them.

There's a lot of laws regarding employer/employee but a lot of people still do not want to speak up about their rights and what is the law at work for fear of being reprimanded and/or fired. People get fired for shit all the time that employers shouldn't fire people for and they say it's something else for the reason. This is what some Occupy protestors are trying to change with this law on voting, so it's not directed around or by work and they have the freedom to vote when they want to at their leisure and at peace.