US joins misguided pursuit of austerity

FT

When viewing the US fiscal stand-off from Europe, it all looks eerily familiar. The US has become very European. But for me the main problem is not an inability to deal with the structural deficit, as the Economist argued in its latest cover story, but rather the contrary.

I fear that the US is blindly rushing into semi-automated austerity, which is exactly the mistake we have made in Europe. The problem is not the size of the national debt as such, which is manageable in both cases, but our policies in dealing with it.

Click to read more...

Social Security: It’s Worse Than You Think

NY TIMES

CONGRESS and President Obama have pushed through a relatively modest stopgap measure to avoid the “fiscal cliff,” but over the coming years, the United States will confront another huge cliff: Social Security.

In the first presidential debate, Mr. Obama described Social Security as “structurally sound,” and Mitt Romney said that “neither the president nor I are proposing any changes” to the program. It was a rare issue on which both men agreed — and both were utterly wrong.

Click to read more...

FHA Bailout Is Inevitable, But Taxpayer Pain Is Not

The Federal Housing Administration (FHA)'s 2012 audit confirmed what has been obvious for some time: FHA is deeply underwater, with a negative economic value of $34 billion.

With over $1 trillion in mortgages backed by FHA, even minor changes in the housing market could add tens of billions to that total. A taxpayer bailout is inevitable.

What isn't inevitable is the size of that bailout. FHA has been sunk not by a housing bust, but by policy choices. Better choices can reduce the size of the hole.

Click to read more...

Obama supporters shocked, angry at new tax increases

Sometimes, watching a Democrat learn something is wonderful, like seeing the family dog finally sit and stay at your command.

With President Obama back in office and his life-saving “fiscal cliff” bill jammed through Congress, the new year has brought a surprising turn of events for his sycophantic supporters.

“What happened that my Social Security withholding’s in my paycheck just went up?” a poster wrote on the liberal site DemocraticUnderground.com.

Click to read more...

Russian naval force gathers off Syria in warning to West

Sunday Times

FIVE Russian landing ships carrying hundreds of marines and military vehicles are gathering in the eastern Mediterranean in a show of force said by one Russian diplomat to be aimed at deterring western intervention in Syria’s civil war.

Accompanied by combat vessels from the Black Sea and Baltic fleets, the ships are converging on the Syrian port of Tartus, where Russia maintains a military base regarded as an evacuation route for its nationals in Syria.

Click to read more...

IMF Says U.S. Must Reduce Government Benefits By A Third And Raise Taxes By A Third

On PBS New Hour last night David Brooks, New York Times columnist, blasted the “fiscal cliff” deal for doing “nothing to address our long term debt and nothing to reform entitlements.” The White House and the Congress “failed on every single front,leaving us worse off.”

The solution, Brooks emphasized, is to adopt the IMF proposal to cut benefits by a third and raise taxes by a third… If we don’t (take on) Medicare, we will have to choose between “the rich elderly or the poor young.”

Click to read more...

Government: A Cycle of Violence

Trends forecaster Gerald Celente joins Alex Jones to break down the looming financial crisis and how to prepare for what's to come.

http://www.trendsresearch.com

Ex-Burglars: Newspaper’s Gun Map Would’ve Made the Job Easier

Reformed crooks say the New York newspaper that published a map of names and addresses of gun owners did a great service – to their old cronies in the burglary trade.

The information published online by the Journal-News, a daily paper serving the New York suburbs of Westchester, Rockland and Putnam counties, could be highly useful to thieves in two ways, former burglars told FoxNews.com. Crooks looking to avoid getting shot now know which targets are soft and those who need weapons know where they can steal them.

Click to read more...

Docs Indicate FBI Knew Terrorist Anwar al-Aulaqi Purchased Airline Tickets for 9/11 Hijackers

Judicial Watch announced on 1-3-13 that it has received documents from the U.S. State Department indicating that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was aware on September 27, 2001, that Anwar al-Aulaqi, the U.S. born terrorist assassinated by a U.S. drone in Yemen on September 30, 2011, had purchased airplane tickets for three of the 9/11 terrorist hijackers, including mastermind Mohammed Atta. Subsequent to the FBI’s discovery, al-Aulaqi was detained and released by authorities at least twice and had been invited to dine at the Pentagon.

Click to read more...

UPDATED: NDAA Prevents Closing Guantanamo, Could Lead to Claims of a Right to Discriminate

WASHINGTON – President Obama has signed the National Defense Authorization Act, which jeopardizes his ability to meet his promise to close the military prison at Guantanamo Bay during his presidency. The law also contains a troubling provision compelling the military to accommodate the conscience, moral principles, or religious beliefs of all members of the armed forces without accounting for the effect an accommodation would have.

Click to read more...

“Ten Most Wanted Corrupt Politicians” for 2012

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, today released its 2012 list of Washington’s “Ten Most Wanted Corrupt Politicians.” The list, in alphabetical order, includes:

• Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-FL)
• Secretary of Energy Steven Chu
• Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and UN Ambassador Susan Rice
• Attorney General Eric Holder
• Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-IL)
• Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ)
• President Barack Obama
• Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV)
• Rep. David Rivera (R-FL)
• Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius

Click to read more...

Bush-Era Wiretapping Case Killed Before Reaching Supreme Court

A federal appeals court’s August ruling in which it said the federal government may spy on Americans’ communications without warrants and without fear of being sued won’t be appealed to the Supreme Court, attorneys in the case said Thursday.

The decision by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals this summer reversed the first and only case that successfully challenged then-President George W. Bush’s once-secret Terrorist Surveillance Program. In December, the San Francisco-based appeals court — the nation’s largest — declined to revisit its decision — making the case ripe for an appeal to the Supreme Court.

Click to read more...

Fiscal cliff agreement puts U.S. on austerity path akin to Europe's

WAPO

For years now, economists like Paul Krugman have been criticizing countries in Europe for engaging in too much austerity during the downturn — that is, enacting tax increases and spending cuts while their economies were still weak.

But after this week’s fiscal cliff deal, the United States is now on pace to engage in about as much fiscal consolidation in 2013 as many European nations have been doing in recent years — and more than countries like Britain and Spain.

Click to read more...

The IMF was wrong about Greece

WAPO

Consider it a mea culpa submerged in a deep pool of calculus and regression analysis: The International Monetary Fund’s top economist today acknowledged that the fund blew its forecasts for Greece and other European economies because it did not fully understand how government austerity efforts would undermine economic growth.

The new and highly technical paper looks again at the issue of fiscal multipliers – the impact that a rise or fall in government spending or tax collection has on a country’s economic output.

Click to read more...

FAU prof stirs controversy by disputing Newtown massacre

A communication professor known for conspiracy theories has stirred controversary at Florida Atlantic University with claims that last month's Newtown, Conn., school shootings did not happen as reported — or may not have happened at all.

Moreover, James Tracy asserts in radio interviews and on his memoryholeblog.com. that trained "crisis actors" may have been employed by the Obama administration in an effort to shape public opinion in favor of the event's true purpose: gun control.

Click to read more...

Workers making $30,000 will take a bigger hit on their pay than those earning $500,000 under new fiscal deal

Middle-class workers will take a bigger hit to their income proportionately than those earning between $200,000 and $500,000 under the new fiscal cliff deal, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.

Earners in the latter group will pay an average 1.3 percent more - or an additional $2,711 - in taxes this year, while workers making between $30,000 and $200,000 will see their paychecks shrink by as much as 1.7 percent - or up to $1,784 - the D.C.-based think tank reported.

Click to read more...

NDAA Signed Into Law By Obama Despite Guantanamo Veto Threat, Indefinite Detention Provisions

President Barack Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act of 2013 on Wednesday, despite his own threat to veto it over prohibitions on closing the Guantanamo Bay prison camp.

Civil liberties advocates had roundly criticized the bill over Guantanamo and a separate section that could allow the military to indefinitely detain American citizens on suspicions of supporting terrorism.

Click to read more...

Court backs Obama on secrecy

The Obama administration acted lawfully in refusing to disclose information about its targeted killings of terrorism suspects, including the 2011 drone strikes that killed three U.S. citizens in Yemen, a federal judge ruled Wednesday.

But the judge also described a “veritable Catch-22” of security rules that allow the executive branch to declare legal “actions that seem on their face incompatible with our Constitution and laws, while keeping the reasons for their conclusion a secret.”

Click to read more...

The Administration Really Doesn't Want to Talk About the Drone That Killed an American Citizen

In the latest sign that President Obama's targeted killing program may be forever shrouded in secrecy, U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon has denied a Freedom of Information Request from the American Civil Liberties Union and The New York Times over the death of Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, the 16-year-old American-born son of former Al-Queda heavy Anwar al-Awlaki who was killed by a drone strike.

But, in this case, the administration withheld answering any of the ACLU's questions through a series of exemptions that lets the Executive bench protect confidential information. McMahon's decision seems pretty disappointed by the administration's actions:

Click to read more...

France's censorship demands to Twitter are more dangerous than 'hate speech'

Writing in the Guardian today, Jason Farago praises France's women's rights minister, Najat Vallaud-Belkacem, for demanding that Twitter help the French government criminalize ideas it dislikes. Decreeing that "hateful tweets are illegal", Farago excitingly explains how the French minister is going beyond mere prosecution for those who post such tweets and now "wants Twitter to take steps to help prosecute hate speech" by "reform[ing] the whole system by which Twitter operates", including her demand that the company "put in place alerts and security measures" to prevent tweets which French officials deem hateful.

Click to read more...