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Go to 12752
http://www.roguegovernment.com/news.php?id=6842
Bank of America Asking Congress For Bailout
02-24-2008
NY Times

WASHINGTON — Over the last two decades, few industries have lobbied more ferociously or effectively than banks to get the government out of its business and to obtain freer rein for “financial innovation.”

But as losses from bad mortgages and mortgage-backed securities climb past $200 billion, talk among banking executives for an epic government rescue plan is suddenly coming into fashion.

A confidential proposal that Bank of America circulated to members of Congress this month provides a stunning glimpse of how quickly the industry has reversed its laissez-faire disdain for second-guessing by the government — now that it is in trouble.

The proposal warns that up to $739 billion in mortgages are at “moderate to high risk” of defaulting over the next five years and that millions of families could lose their homes.

To prevent that, Bank of America suggested creating a Federal Homeowner Preservation Corporation that would buy up billions of dollars in troubled mortgages at a deep discount, forgive debt above the current market value of the homes and use federal loan guarantees to refinance the borrowers at lower rates.

“We believe that any intervention by the federal government will be acceptable only if it is not perceived as a bailout of the bond market,” the financial institution noted.

In practice, taxpayers would almost certainly view such a move as a bailout. If lawmakers and the Bush administration agreed to this step, it could be on a scale similar to the government’s $200 billion bailout of the savings and loan industry in the 1990s. The arguments against a bailout are powerful. It would mostly benefit banks and Wall Street firms that earned huge fees by packaging trillions of dollars in risky mortgages, often without documenting the incomes of borrowers and often turning a blind eye to clear fraud by borrowers or mortgage brokers.

A rescue would also create a “moral hazard,” many experts contend, by encouraging banks and home buyers to take outsize risks in the future, in the expectation of another government bailout if things go wrong again.

If the government pays too much for the mortgages or the market declines even more than it has already, Washington — read, taxpayers — could be stuck with hundreds of billions of dollars in defaulted loans.

But a growing number of policy makers and community advocacy activists argue that a government rescue may nonetheless be the most sensible way to avoid a broader disruption of the entire economy.

The House Financial Services Committee is working on various options, including a government buyout. The Bush administration may be softening its hostility to a rescue as well. Top officials at the Treasury Department are hoping to meet with industry executives next week to discuss options, according to two executives.

“There are a lot of ideas out there,” said Scott Stanzel, a spokesman for President Bush, when asked at a White House press briefing on Friday about a possible buyout program. “There are many different ways in which we can address this problem and we continue to look at ways in which we can do that.”

Supporters contend that a government rescue could be the fastest and cleanest way to force banks and investors to book their losses from bad mortgages — a painful but essential first step toward stabilizing the housing market.

The government would buy the mortgages at their true current value, perhaps through an auction, at what would probably be a big discount from the original loan amount. The mortgage lenders, or the investors who bought mortgage-backed securities, would be free of the bad loans but would still have to book their losses.

If the government took control of the bad mortgages, supporters of a rescue contend, it could restructure the loans on terms that borrowers could meet, keep most of them from losing their homes and avoid an even more catastrophic plunge in housing prices.

“Every citizen has a dog in this hunt,” said John Taylor, president of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, a community advocacy group that has developed its own mortgage buyout plan. “The cost of spending our way out of a recession is something that everybody would have to bear for a very long time.”

Mr. Taylor estimated the government might end up buying $80 billion to $100 billion in mortgages. But he said the government could recoup its money if it was able to buy the mortgages at a proper discount, repackage them and sell them on the open market.

Surprisingly, the normally free-market Bush administration has expressed interest. Treasury officials confirmed that several senior officials invited Mr. Taylor to present his ideas to them on Feb. 15. Mr. Taylor said he had also received calls from officials at the Office of Thrift Supervision and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which is part of the Treasury Department.

But even supporters acknowledge that a government rescue poses risks to taxpayers, who could be left holding a very expensive bag.

Ellen Seidman, a former director of the Office of Thrift Supervision and now a senior fellow at the moderate-to-liberal New America Foundation, said the government’s first challenge is to buy mortgages at their true current value. If the government overpaid or became caught by an even further decline in the market value of its mortgages, taxpayers would indeed be bailing out both the industry and imprudent home buyers.

“It’s not easy, but it’s not impossible,” Ms. Seidman said. “There are various auction mechanisms, both inside and outside government.”

A second challenge would be to start a program quickly enough to prevent the housing and credit markets from spiraling further downward. Industry executives and policy analysts said it would take too long to create an entirely new agency, as Bank of America suggested. But they expressed hope that the government could begin a program from inside an existing agency.

But even if the government did buy up millions of mortgages and force mortgage holders to take losses, the biggest problem could still lie ahead: deciding which struggling homeowners should receive breaks on their mortgages.

Administration officials have long insisted that they do not want to rescue speculators who took out no-money-down loans to buy and flip condominiums in Miami or Phoenix. And even Democrats like Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, have said the government should not help those who borrowed more than they could ever hope to repay.

But identifying innocent victims has already proved complicated. The Bush administration’s Hope Now program offers to freeze interest rates for certain borrowers whose subprime mortgages were about to jump to much higher rates. But the eligibility rules are so narrow that some analysts estimate only 3 percent of subprime borrowers will benefit.

Bank executives, meanwhile, warn that the mortgage mess is much broader than people with subprime loans. Problems are mounting almost as rapidly in so-called Alt-A mortgages, made to people with good credit scores who did not document their incomes and borrowed far more than normal underwriting standards would allow.

Borrowers who overstated their incomes are not likely to get much sympathy. But industry executives and consumer advocates warn that foreclosed homes push down prices in surrounding neighborhoods, and a wave of foreclosures could lead to another, deeper plunge in home prices.

Right or wrong, the arguments for rescuing homeowners are likely to be blurred with arguments for rescuing home prices. At that point, industry executives are likely to argue that what is good for Bank of America is good for the rest of America.



Go to 12751
http://www.rense.com/general80/trag.htm
Iraq's Deeply Tragic Future
By Scott Ritter
2-24-8

Any analysis of the current state of the ongoing U.S. occupation of Iraq that relied solely on the U.S. government, the major candidates for president or the major media outlets in the United States for information would be hard pressed to find any bad news. In a State of the Union address which had everything except a "Mission Accomplished" banner flying in the background, President Bush all but declared victory over the insurgency in Iraq. His recertification of the success of the so-called surge has prompted the Republican candidates to assume a cocky swagger when discussing Iraq. They embrace the occupation and speak, without shame or apparent fear of retribution, of an ongoing presence in that war-torn nation. Their Democratic counterparts have been less than enthusiastic in their criticism of the escalation. And the media, for the most part, continue their macabre role as cheerleaders of death, hiding the reality of Iraq deep inside stories that build upon approving headlines derived from nothing more than political rhetoric. The war in Iraq, we're told, is virtually over. We only need "stay the course" for 10 more years.

This situation is troublesome in the extreme. The collective refusal of any constituent in this complicated mix of political players to confront Bush on Iraq virtually guarantees that it will be the Bush administration, and not its successor, that will dictate the first year (or more) of policy in Iraq for the next president. It also ensures that the debacle that is the Bush administration's overarching Middle East policy of regional transformation and regime change in not only Iraq but Iran and Syria will continue to go unchallenged. If the president is free to pursue his policies, it could lead to direct military intervention in Iran by the United States prior to President Bush's departure from office or, failing that, place his successor on the path toward military confrontation. At a time when every data point available certifies (and recertifies) the administration's actions in Iraq, Iran and elsewhere (including Afghanistan) as an abject failure, America collectively has fallen into a hypnotic trance, distracted by domestic economic problems and incapable, due to our collective ignorance of the world we live in, of deciphering the reality on the ground in the Middle East.

Rather than offering a word-for-word renouncement of the president's rosy assertions concerning Iraq, I will instead initiate a process of debunking the myth of American success by doing that which no politician, current or aspiring, would dare do: predict the failure of American policy in Iraq. With the ink on the newspapers parroting the president's words barely dry, evidence of his misrepresentation of reality begins to build with the announcement by the Pentagon that troop levels in Iraq will not be dropping, as had been projected in view of the "success" of the "surge," but rather holding at current levels with the possibility of increasing in the future. This reversal of course concerning troop deployments into Iraq highlights the reality that the statistical justification of "surge success," namely the reduction in the level of violence, was illusory, a temporary lull brought about more by smoke and mirrors than any genuine change of fortune on the ground. Even the word surge is inappropriate for what is now undeniably an escalation. Iraq, far from being a nation on the rebound, remains a mortally wounded shell, the equivalent of a human suffering from a sucking chest wound, its lungs collapsed and its life blood spilling unchecked onto the ground. The "surge" never addressed the underlying reasons for Iraq's post-Saddam suffering, and as such never sought to heal that which was killing Iraq. Instead, the "surge" offered little more than a cosmetic gesture, covering the wounds of Iraq with a bandage which shielded the true extent of the damage from outside view while doing nothing to save the victim.

Iraq is dying; soon Iraq will be dead. True, there will be a plot of land in the Middle East which people will refer to as Iraq. But any hope of a resurrected homogeneous Iraqi nation populated by a diverse people capable of coexisting in peace and harmony is soon to be swept away forever. Any hope of a way out for the people of Iraq and their neighbors is about to become a victim of the "successes" of the "surge" and the denial of reality. The destruction of Iraq has already begun. The myth of Kurdish stability-born artificially out of the U.S.-enforced "no-fly zones" of the 1990s, sustained through the largess of the Oil-for-Food program (and U.S.-approved sanctions sidestepped by the various Kurdish groups in Iraq) and given a Frankenstein-like lease on life in the aftermath of the U.S. invasion and occupation-is rapidly unraveling. Like Dr. Frankenstein's monster, present-day Iraqi Kurdistan has been exposed as an amalgam of parts incompatible not only with each other but the region as a whole.

Ongoing Kurdish disdain for the central authority in Baghdad has led to the Kurds declaring their independence from Iraqi law (especially any law pertaining to oil present on lands they control). The reality of the Kurds' quest for independence can be seen in their support of the Kurdish groups, in particular the PKK, that desire independence from Turkey. The sentiment has not been lost on their Turkish neighbors to the north, resulting in an escalation of cross-border military incursions which will only expand over time, further destabilizing Kurdish Iraq. Lying dormant, and unmentioned, is the age-old animosity between the two principle Kurdish factions in Iraq, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP). As recently as 1997, these two factions were engaged in a virtual civil war against one another. The strains brought on by the present unraveling have these two factions once again vying for position inside Iraq, making internecine conflict all but inevitable. The year 2008 will bring with it a major escalation of Turkish military operations against northern Iraq, a strategic break between the Kurdish factions there and with the central government of Baghdad, and the beginnings of an all-out civil war between the KDP and PUK.

The next unraveling of the "surge" myth will be in western Iraq, where the much applauded "awakening" was falling apart even as Bush spoke. I continue to maintain that there is a hidden hand behind the Sunni resistance that operates unseen and uncommented on by the United States and its erstwhile Iraqi allies operating out of the Green Zone in Baghdad. The government of Saddam Hussein never formally capitulated, and indeed had in place plans for ongoing active resistance against any occupation of Iraq. In October 2007 the Iraqi Baath Party held its 13th conference, in which it formally certified one of Saddam's vice presidents, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, as the supreme leader of the Sunni resistance.

The United States' embrace of the "awakening" will go down in the history of the Iraq conflict as one of the gravest strategic errors made in a field of grave errors. The U.S. military in Iraq has never fully understood the complex interplay between the Sunni resistance, al-Qaida in Iraq, and the former government of Saddam Hussein. Saddam may be dead, but not so his plans for resistance. The massive security organizations which held sway over Iraq during his rule were never defeated, and never formally disbanded. The organs of security which once operated as formal ministries now operate as covert cells, functioning along internal lines of communication which are virtually impenetrable by outside forces. These security organs gave birth to al-Qaida in Iraq, fostered its growth as a proxy, and used it as a means of sowing chaos and fear among the Iraqi population.

The violence perpetrated by al-Qaida in Iraq is largely responsible for the inability of the central government in Baghdad to gain any traction in the form of unified governance. The inability of the United States to defeat al-Qaida has destroyed any hope of generating confidence among the Iraqi population in the possibility of stability emerging from an ongoing American occupation. But al-Qaida in Iraq is not a physical entity which the United States can get its hands around, but rather a giant con game being run by Izzat al-Douri and the Sunni resistance. Because al-Qaida in Iraq is derived from the Sunni resistance, it can be defeated only when the Sunni resistance is defeated. And the greatest con game of them all occurred when the Sunni resistance manipulated the United States into arming it, training it and turning it against the forces of al-Qaida, which it controls. Far from subduing the Sunni resistance by Washington's political and military support of the "awakening," the United States has further empowered it. It is almost as if we were arming and training the Viet Cong on the eve of the Tet offensive during the Vietnam War.

Keeping in mind the fact that the Sunni resistance, led by al-Douri, operates from the shadows, and that its influence is exerted more indirectly than directly, there are actual al-Qaida elements in Iraq which operate independently of central Sunni control, just as there are Sunni tribal elements which freely joined the "awakening" in an effort to quash the forces of al-Qaida in Iraq. The diabolical beauty of the Sunni resistance isn't its ability to exert direct control over all aspects of the anti-American activity in Sunni Iraq, but rather to manipulate the overall direction of activity through indirect means in a manner which achieves its overall strategic aims. The Sunni resistance continues to use al-Qaida in Iraq as a useful tool for seizing the strategic focus of the American military occupiers (and their Iraqi proxies in the Green Zone), as well as controlling Sunni tribal elements which stray too far off the strategic course (witness the recent suicide bomb assassination of senior Sunni tribal leaders). 2008 will see the collapse of the Sunni "awakening" movement, and a return to large-scale anti-American insurgency in western Iraq. It will also see the continued viability of al-Qaida in Iraq in terms of being an organization capable of wreaking violence and dictating the pace of American military involvement in directions beneficial to the Sunni resistance and detrimental to the United States.

One of the spinoffs of the continued success of the Sunni resistance is the focus it places on the inability of the Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad to actually govern. The U.S. decision to arm, train and facilitate the various Sunni militias in Iraq is a de facto acknowledgement that the American occupiers have lost confidence in the high-profile byproduct of the "purple finger revolution" of January 2005. The sham that was that election has produced a government trusted by no one, even the Shiites. The ongoing unilateral cease-fire imposed by the Muqtada al-Sadr on his Mahdi Army prevented the outbreak of civil war between his movement and that of the Iranian-backed Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), and its militia, the Badr Brigade.

When Saddam's security forces dissolved on the eve of the fall of Baghdad in March 2003, the security organs which had been tasked with infiltrating the Shiite community for the purpose of spying on Shiites were instead instructed to embed themselves deep within the structures of that community. Both the Mahdi Army and the Badr Brigade are heavily infiltrated with such sleeper elements, which conspire to create and exploit fractures between these two organizations under the age-old adage of divide and conquer. A strategic pause in the conflict between the Mahdi Army and the U.S. military on the one hand and the Mahdi Army and the Badr Brigade on the other has served to strengthen the hand of the Mahdi Army by allowing time for it to rearm and reorganize, increasing its efficiency as a military organization all the while its political opposite, the SCIRI-dominated central Iraqi government, continues to falter.

Further exacerbating the situation for the American occupiers of Iraq is the ongoing tension created by the war of wills between the United States and Iran. The Sunni resistance has no love for the Shiite theocracy in Tehran, or its proxies in Iraq, and views creating a rift between the Mahdi Army and the Badr Brigade as a strategic imperative on the road to a Sunni resurgence. Any U.S. military strike against Iran will bring with it the inevitable Shiite backlash in Iraq. The Shiite forces that emerge as the most independent of the American occupier will be, in the minds of the Sunni resistance, the most capable of winning the support of the Shiites of Iraq. Given the past record of cooperation between the Mahdi Army and the Sunni resistance, and the ongoing antipathy between Sunnis and SCIRI, there can be little doubt which Shiite entity the Sunnis will side with when it comes time for a decisive conflict between the Mahdi Army and the Badr Brigade, and 2008 will be the year which witnesses such a conflict.

The big loser in all of this, besides the people of Iraq, is of course the men and women of the armed forces of the United States. Betrayed by the Bush administration, abandoned by Congress and all but forgotten by a complacent American population and those who are positioning themselves for national leadership in the next administration, the soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines who so proudly wear the uniform of the United States continue to fight and die, kill and be maimed in a war which was never justified and long ago lost its luster. Played as pawns in a giant game of three-dimensional chess, these brave Americans find themselves being needlessly sacrificed in a game where there can be no winner, only losers.

The continued ambivalence of the American population as a whole toward the war in Iraq, perhaps best manifested by the superficiality of the slogan "Support the Troops," all the while remaining ignorant of what the troops are actually doing, has led to a similar amnesia among politicians all too willing to allow themselves to seek political advantage at the expense of American life and treasure. January 2008 cost the United States nearly 40 lives in Iraq. The current military budget is unprecedented in its size, and doesn't even come close to paying for ongoing military operations in Iraq. The war in Iraq has bankrupted Americans morally and fiscally, and yet the American public continues to shake the hands of aspiring politicians who ignore Iraq, pretending that the blood which soaks the hands of these political aspirants hasn't stained their own. In the sick kabuki dance that is American politics, this refusal to call a spade a spade is deserving of little more than disdain and sorrow.

While the American people, politicians and media may remain mute on the reality of Iraq, I won't. There is no such thing as a crystal ball which enables one to see clearly into the future, and I am normally averse to making sweeping long-term predictions involving a topic as fluid as the ongoing situation in Iraq. At the risk of being wrong (and, indeed, I hope very much that I am), I will contradict the rosy statements of the president in his State of the Union address and will throw down a gauntlet in the face of ongoing public and media ambivalence by predicting that 2008 will be the year the "surge" in Iraq is exposed as a grand debacle. The cosmetic bandage placed over the gravely wounded Iraq will fall off, and the damaged body that is Iraq will continue its painful decline toward death.

If there is any winner in all of this it will be the Sunni resistance, or at least its leadership hiding in the shadow of the American occupation, as it continues to exploit the chaotic death spiral of post-Saddam Iraq for its own long-term plan of a Sunni resurgence in Iraq. That the Sunni resistance will continue to fight an American occupation is a guarantee. That it will continue to persevere is highly probable. That the United States will be able to stop it is unlikely. And so, the reality that the only policy direction worthy of consideration here in the United States concerning Iraq is the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of American forces continues to hold true. And the fact that this option is given short shrift by all capable of making or influencing such a decision guarantees that this bloody war will go on, inconclusively and incomprehensibly, for many more years. That is the one image in my crystal ball that emerges in full focus, and which will serve as the basis of defining a national nightmare for generations to come.

Scott Ritter was a Marine Corps intelligence officer from 1984 to 1991 and a United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq from 1991 to 1998. He is the author of numerous books, including "Iraq Confidential" (Nation Books, 2005) , "Target Iran" (Nation Books, 2006) and his latest, "Waging Peace: The Art of War for the Antiwar Movement" (Nation Books, April 2007).

© 2008 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/76318/



Go to 12750
http://www.rense.com/general80/sieccze.htm
US Self-Employment
Plummeting - Massive Downturn
2-24-8

All forms of self-employment in the U.S. are in virtual free fall now. Small businesses are failing in vast numbers creating even more jobless Americans thrust into the quest for the security of wage- based employment with benefits for themselves and their families.

Always a difficult field to compete in because of the growing avalanche of massive imports via cheap foreign labor ('free trade') and distributed through big box chain outlets with King Wal-Mart ruling the roost, and the deep loss of disposable capital in the public sector, U.S. self-employment is headed toward its worst level ever. All forms are being impacted, from stand alone small business retail and service storefronts to home-based product or service outlets to internet based independent sales ventures and multi-level marketing. All are in their steepest decline in 16 years and are expected to plumb new depths in the coming months and the foreseeable future.

US Self-Employment in a Steep Downturn - Source Bureau of Labor Statistics / Merril Lynch (shaded region represents period of US recession)



Go to 12749
http://www.rense.com/general60/ovoe.htm
Overthrow Of The American
Republic - Part 67
LA SALLE NATIONAL BANK - REPUTED BRIBERY CENTER
By Sherman H. Skolnick
12-7-4

It could eventually become a many-volumed textbook study of high level criminality perpetrated by lowlifes.

Illicit gold transactions and smuggling. Bribery of high-level state and federal officials. Laundering the funds of international criminal gangs. This, and much more.

The proposed title might simply be "La Salle National Bank---Reputed Bribery Center".

To get a handle on this subject, you would have to be quite familiar with and have uncensored access to the following, among other things:
.
RECORDS OF THE HOUSE BANKING COMMITTEE under Texas populist Congressman Wright Patman. as Chairman. For government printing office publication in 1964, he ordered every National Bank in the U.S. to divulge their twenty leading stockholders of record. Two reputed criminal enterprises, known to Patman, refused. One was La Salle National Bank of Chicago and the other was a similar money laundry in Indianapolis, Indiana.

All the years of its operation, La Salle was known as handling offshore escrow accounts for the reputed bribery of high-level state and federal public officials including judges. If the Judge proceeded to issue his or her poisonous, corrupt ruling, as ordered, then the escrowed bribery funds went forward to another offshore account, that of the Judge. That is, the Judge did not get the reputed bribe until the Judge delivered and the corrupted decision became "bounce-proof", not subject to being reversed by a yet higher court.

RECORDS OF JAMES R. VASSILOS, super-bagman, attorney for some top officials of the American CIA. He was once the husband of the heiress to the Holland-based banking fortune, Algemene Bank Nederland, ABN took over La Salle National Bank, as their U.S. flagship and then merged, and became ABN-AMRO.

Using gold stolen from the Soviet gold treasury upon the downfall of the Soviet Empire, 1990-91, ABN bought up shaky banks, WITH GOLD, in fifteen major American cities.[Some of this gold was offered to John F. Kerry;s wife of convenience, Teresa Heinz, for him to concede the 2004 Presidential Election. Yet, Kerry knew that by the Ohio vote, becoming what was necessary to get the White House by the Electoral College vote, Kerry was actually the President-Elect. He delayed conceding while the unholy deal was arranged.. Overthrow series, part 64, "Buying & Selling the U.S. Presidency". 11/5/4]

RECORDS OF REPUBLIC NATIONAL BANK OF NEW YORK,, owned principally by Edmond Safra, worldwide gold smuggler. He was murdered in Monaco, 1999, in the midst of his bank being taken over by the British Hong Kong opium fortune center, Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank and their parent firm, headquartered in London, HSBC. [see 1999 gold story about Safra, www.skolnicksreport.com ] Republic National Bank specialized in reputed illicit dealings for the Russian mafiya, made up of former cut-throats of the Soviet Secret Political Police, the KGB. .The Russian gangsters operate with complete immunity and impunity, among other places, in Chicago, Cleveland, Brooklyn, and Miami. The American Secret political Police, FBI and Homeland Security, are afraid to tangle with the assassination experts of the Russian mafiya. In Russia, Bankers that refuse to assist the mafiya, are routinely murdered, several such events each month. Americans who dare complain to FBI or Homeland Security about La Salle, ABN-AMRO, are routinely stalked, harassed, and have their computers, websites, and phones sabotaged.

A big secret in Chicago, is that La Salle reserves to themself the arbitrary and lawless right to defy court summonses and subpoenas served on them. Chicago-area judges, knowing what La Salle is into, routinely refuse to enforce summonses and subpoenas. as against La Salle, and ABN-AMRO.

Over the last forty years, as head of our court reform group, I on occasion agreed to be the subpoena server, to serve on La Salle National Bank's highly secretive Trust Department. I tested out the subpoena service, handing the subpoena to manager of La Salle's Trust Department. He looked at it, gave a smirk, and threw it away into the garbage can. "Now get out of my office, Mr. Skolnick". As is their custom, practice, and usage, in respect to La Salle, the Judge in the litigation, naturally, refused to enforce the subpoena.

[The term "custom, practice, and usage", is a ;long-time habit or routine of public officials that has the same apparent force as if actually a statute passed by the state Legislature or Congress.]

RECORDS OF LA SALLE AND ABN-AMRO, showing the transactions of various fronts operating for and on behalf of Osama bin Laden and several Saudi Banks tied to him and his family that is not actually estranged from him. On our website, and by radio talk show commentaries, after the U.S. Treasury announced they were freezing up accounts related to Osama, I challenged the U.S. Treasury to freeze up known Osama accounts with La Salle and ABN-AMRO. The U.S. Treasury refused to do so for six months after my public statements.

TRANSCRIPTS OF SKOLNICK'S COMMENTARIES ABOUT LA SALLE NATIONAL BANK, from 1971 to 2003. Played as a recorded phone message, at times on a chain-linked group of as many as thirty phones, called HOTLINE NEWS. The phones were arranged to take the calls as "roll-over", meaning jumping automatically to the next open line of the group.

The commentaries repeatedly referred to La Salle and later years, ABN-AMRO. Mentioned was the reputed criminality cover up of Theo Bark, Director of ABN-AMRO, brother-in-law of super-bagman James R. Vassilos. For the purposes of bribing top officials, Vassilos ran the annual National Prayer Breakfast at a major hotel in Chicago. A packed Grand Ballroom of top local, state, and federal officials attended.Later, under disguise of deliviering a copy of the Bible, to for example, the IRS District Director, Vassilos found ways to work a corrupt and malign influence on top IRS Officials, such as in Chicago. [Some of the details are in my series, "Bankruptcy Bordello" on, for example, rense.com Also see my website series, www.skolnicksreport.com on IRS Corruption, including the IRS top officials and their clandestine ocean-going ship uised to launder criminal funds. By Registered Mail, we sent the details to the U.S. Treasury Inspector General who ignored it all. We later discovered that Inspector General, mentioned in a secret government report, was the highest ranking U.S. Government Official as being a member of the traditional Sicilian and Italian Mafia. A Chixago Federal Judge, James Alesia, about 1991, received the Anti-Mafia Medal from the Northern League of Italy. He had survived three assassination attempts in opposing the criminal enterprises linked to La Salle and ABN-AMRO. The picture of a Northern Italy official giving the medal to the Judge appeared only in the lawyer's newspaper, the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin. Corrupt top officials of the U.S. Treasury and U.S. Justice Department were greatly concerned about whispers that Judge Alesia, somehow through intermediaries, was possibly assisting some loudmouth court reformers in investigating La Salle and ABN-AMRO.]

Amongst our research and investigation group is over one million court documents, secret notebooks, audio/vido tapes, and related material, a great deal of it relating to the corruption of La Salle National Bank and ABN-AMRO.

At the behest and urging of a foreign government, several Federal Grand Juries are reportedly investigating the International Trust records and secret Federal Reserve wire transfer records and such of La Salle and ABN-AMRO, housed on the 29th floor of the bank building, at 135 So. La Salle St., Chicago, Illinois.

This posed a situation highly detrimental to the Carlyle Group and the Bush Crime Family, using the La Salle ABN-AMRO facilities for worldwide dirty business, taking over with muscle, weapons and other related businesses and then strong-arming contracts out of the highly corrupt Pentagon. Also implicated in these records is the up-to-the-minute records of the American CIA using Osama bin Laden, to give a false image of "terrorists" endangering the U.S. through the high-level plot of the Aristocracy that came to be known simply as 9-11. The Moslems were NOT actual participants, just patsies, in the internal explosives that brought down the twin towers of the World Trade Center, and later that same day, WTC Building 7.

So here was a situation where La Salle and ABN-AMRO, could not accomplish as they do locally, that is throw away and ignore subpoenas, such as for Trust Department records. What could be done? Simple. Burn down the records, with the international passwords of the highly secret .records on the 29th Floor. By mirror image, the secret passwords are beyond U.S. jurisdiction, not available by subpoena, in the money laundry/tax havens of the Channel Islands, Luxembourg, and Liectenstein.

So in a dramatic disaster, with hundreds of pieces of fire equipment gathered at the 135 So. La Salle St. bank building, the 29th floor was burned down on December 7, 2004. Strange, all the bigshots from Chicago of La Salle ABN-AMRO were in Amsterdam and had to hurry back to Chicago.

Some somehow felt assured, that night that the owners and operators of La Salle and ABN-AMRO, doing their reputed dirty business in more than fifteen U.S. cities, including Chicago, slept well, their secrets supposedly not even being hinted at by the oil-soaked, spy-riddled American monopoly press.

To get an even more complete picture of this reputed criminality, you would have to undertake to read, one by one, most every story on www.skolnicksreport.com and linked other websites.



Go to 12748
http://rense.com/general61/voer.htm
Overthrow Of The American
Republic - Part 68
COWARD AMERICA
By Sherman H. Skolnick
1-11-5

It was a time of throwing stones. It was an era of an eye for an eye. Treason, long tolerated, will not much longer be endured, was, however, an idle pass word.

Experts on upheaval were studying the fault lines. People-quake students tried to get a handle on the early warning systems. Secret societies and their aristocracies examined their options.

Could those in the high windows, ready to piss down on peons, get away with more deception? Blame more on the Moslems? Stage another supposed "terrorist" horror? Set loose another private army of alarmists and neurotics to scrape away the last of the insulation between raw nerves and arrogant power publicly flaunted?

Through digital rants, amateurs as bloggers, circulate their Internet visions of insurrection. Do Americans really know how to carry off a successful Revolution? Who persuaded narrow-brains that the American mercantile class, rising up against the Crown in London, constituted a genuine "Revolution"? How many professors, with or without tenure, dare write that President Franklin D. Roosevelt was one of the greatest counter-revolutionaries in History?

Passing out bags of flour amidst "Fireside Chats" and such, FDR cooled down the rage of the foreclosed and the unemployed. A barrage of alphabet-soup Federal Agencies, kept idle hands from picking up the bomb and the gun.

With FDR's control, the Red Flag of Hope interwoven with Despair, never became the Black Flag, of "Kill the Rich Bastards!" Nevertheless, the Ultra Rich fortified some of their mansions, some building machine gun emplacements. The Injustice Department in Washington was equipped with machine gun nests.

The unpaid teachers and other local county and city employees, sent home with near worthless scrip, vented their anger against "The Jews!" The belly bombast was certainly well fed in places like Chicago, where the City Hall toilet paper money was redeemed with dented cans of beans peddled by a Department Store chain with a Jewish name, Goldblatts Brothers. Actually, the stores offered bargains through low-cost slightly damaged merchandise and were generally sympathetic to the plight of the poor and the jobless. Plainly, hate needed an easy target.

Among the industrialized nations, the U.S. is the most heavily armed populace. Americans go beyond mere hunting deer with a rifle. They don military-like garments and with their friends, go off into the woods to shoot at each other with paint-balls. Yet, when the Ultra Rich, the Establishment, "the powers that be"---that is THEM---the Ruling Class as labeled by some, mutter "To Hell With The Middle Class!", few if any American gun owners reach under their bed for their weapons.

Overseas, non-Ammericans in their own cynical tone and lingo, snort "American fools are All Mouth!" Realists realize that without a Second Amendment, no Bill of Rights exists as against a Bill of Wrongs.

Fatalists, in a moment of extreme anguish, may well cry out, TABERNACLES OF TRAITORS PROSPER, AND THOSE THAT BRIBE HIGH COURT JUDGES ARE SECURE.



Go to 12747
http://www.rense.com/general80/bz.htm
Brzezinski Seizing Control
Over US Policy In
Slow-Motion Coup
By Webster G. Tarpley
2-23-8

WASHINGTON DC -- Events of the past few days indicate that the Zbigniew Brzezinski faction of lunatic Russia haters have now won the upper hand inside the secret councils of the Anglo-American finance oligarchy, displacing the hitherto dominant George Shultz-neocon faction. Although George Bush and his cronies still occupy the White House, the policies that are being carried out are coming from the Brzezinski left CIA machine. Brzezinski has returned to public prominence in recent months due to his role as top establishment controller for the Obama campaign. But Brzezinski is not waiting for the outcome of the November elections to take over key parts of the US government. Brzezinski and his left CIA allies are already moving to assert their strategy, even as the neocons and their characteristic obsessions are moved to the back burner. The probability of an attack on Iran or Syria is declining, even as the danger of confrontation with Russia, China, and Pakistan ­ all much more dangerous targets to trifle with ­ increases exponentially.


1. KOSOVO - The independence of Kosovo has opened a new crisis front in Eastern Europe, with the potential for very nasty complications in regard to Russia. This is the essence of the Brzezinski anti-Russian policy. Kosovo independence is of course a flagrant violation of all existing norms of international law, most notably the Helsinki CSCE treaty of 1975 which finally put an end to World War II by declaring that all borders in Europe were to be considered final unless and until any changes had been agreed through mutual consultation of the interested parties. Since the Serbian government in Belgrade is vehemently opposed to Kosovo independence, the unilateral actions of the US, British, and NATO are the very essence of international anarchy. The new regime in Kosovo goes far beyond the usual kleptocracy of NATO puppets favored by Brzezinski and his circles. The new regime in Kosovo is essentially the terrorist KLA, an organization devoted to gun-running, drug-running, and trafficking in human slaves. The KLA is a Balkan version of Al Qaeda, and both are wholly owned creations of the CIA and British intelligence. With Kosovo independence, the US, British, and NATO stand ready to use armed force to defend the right of a terrorist gang to assert sovereignty over a segment of modern Europe. The criminal obscenity of this policy could hardly be greater, but for Brzezinski all methods are legitimate provided that they increase tension with Moscow, and in that respect Kosovo independence is already a glowing success.


2. US EMBASSY, BELGRADE - The attack on the US embassy in Belgrade, Serbia by gangs of drunken students is a classic Brzezinski operation. The tactic of having an incensed rent-a-mob of swarming adolescent patsies attack the US Embassy in order to gin up a crisis is one of Zbigniew's signature specialties. During the time that Brzezinski was running the foreign policy of Trilateral puppet Jimmy Carter, there were bloody attacks on the US embassies in Pakistan and in Afghanistan, both countries that featured prominently in Brzezinski's arc of crisis theory. Most famous of all was of course the attack on the US embassy in Teheran, Iran, which led to the taking of hostages and the huge international crisis which helped to doom the Carter administration to extinction at the polls. If US diplomats or State Department personnel are taken hostage anywhere in the world in the weeks and months to come, this must be attributed to Brzezinski.


3. SPACE WARFARE - The shooting down by the Pentagon of a US satellite over the Pacific is a very provocative military stunt designed to intimidate both Moscow and Beijing, who happened to be Brzezinski's immediate targets. This reckless and irresponsible action has raised the specter of an uncontrolled arms race reaching into outer space.


4. SYRIA - Zbigniew Brzezinski himself, fresh from addressing a retreat of House Democrats in Williamsburg Virginia, is now in Syria at the head of a RAND Corporation delegation. The purpose of this mission should not be construed as peace in the Middle East, although some foolish observers may read it in that way. Brzezinski's goal is immediately to lessen Russian influence in Syria, including the closing of certain naval facilities that the Russian navy has maintained in that country. In the longer run, Brzezinski would like to turn both Syria and Iran into components of the ring he means to forge around Russia for the purpose of the strategic encirclement of that rival superpower. Zbigniew's argument against the neocons is, why attack Iran and Syria, when you can turn them into kamikaze stooges, play them against Russia, and get rid of all of them that way? Europe and China are destined to play similar anti-Russian roles in Brzezinski's playbook.


5. BUSH IN AFRICA - President Bush may not know what he is doing on his current visit to five African countries, but Zbigniew Brzezinski knows exactly what the mission is. The Brzezinski policy is to foment destabilization and chaos in Africa under the auspices of the new United States African command (US-AFRICOM), all for the purpose of driving the Chinese out of Africa. As Zbigniew announced on November 30, 2007 in the Washington Post, he intends to cut off Chinese access to oil, other energy sources, and strategic raw materials on the African continent. Since the Anglo-Americans control the Persian Gulf by direct military occupation, this is tantamount to a policy of driving the Chinese in on Eastern Siberia. Brzezinski believes that if the Chinese cannot get their oil from Africa, they will be forced to attempt the military seizure of Russia's oil wells in the Far East, where there is much oil and very few Russians. Both Moscow and Beijing know exactly what Brzezinski is doing in this regard. This is the kind of harebrained scheming by Lord Astor, Lady Astor and Sir Neville Chamberlain which helped to bring about World War II. The idea then was to play Hitler against Stalin and get rid of both of them that way. When that blew up in the faces of the British, the result was World War II. This time, it may well be thermonuclear World War III.


6. CIA UNILATERAL KILLINGS IN PAKISTAN - Back in July 2007, Obama attracted much unfavorable attention when he announced his plan to bomb targets inside Pakistan without reference to the government of that country. He was vigorously criticized by Bush, McCain, and Mrs. Clinton. Obama turned out to be a bigger warmonger than Bush himself, since the tenant of the White House said that it was absolutely essential to work with the government of Pakistan against terrorism, and not humiliate them unnecessarily. Now it turns out that Obama's puppet master Zbigniew Brzezinski is more powerful than Bush on this issue. The Washington Post of Tuesday, February 19 revealed that a CIA Predator drone aircraft had attacked the Pakistani town of Mir Ali, killing a certain Abu Laith al-Libi, supposedly a leading figure of the al Qaeda patsy organization. The big news was that this time around, the CIA had not sought approval from the government of Pakistan. President Musharraf, weakened by the CIA destabilization of his country that is now ongoing, was only notified of the operation once it was underway, meaning that he was not even consulted in advance. Thus, the aggressive policy put into Obama's mouth by Zbigniew Brzezinski has become operational US policy, regardless of what the lame-duck Bush had to say about this issue last summer. Pakistan is now being targeted because of President Musharraf's strategic understanding with China. Brzezinski intends to strip the Chinese of all their traditional allies as part of his campaign to smash the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and any other foci of resistance inside Eurasia against Anglo-American imperialism.


7. FALL OF ITALIAN GOVERNMENT - The European government most friendly to Russia and most reluctant to follow Brzezinski's lead into confrontation was the Italian regime of Romano Prodi. Italy had launched a program of large-scale economic cooperation with Moscow, much of it mediated through the Italian oil company ENI, a perennial outsider and rival of the Anglo-American cartel. Underpinning the cooperation between Italy and Russia was a far-reaching rapprochement between the Vatican and the Russian Orthodox Church aiming at forms of ecumenical dialogue with obvious overtones of political and economic cooperation. This dialogue between the Roman Pope and the Russian Orthodox Patriarch is something Brzezinski abhors. A few weeks ago, Prodi was overthrown through the actions of a Quisling political faction centered on the Bank of Italy. The other European governments, most notably Mrs. Merkel in Germany, and Sarkozy in France, are currently in the pocket of the Anglo-Americans. The British regime of Gordon Brown has of course taken the lead in fomenting confrontation with Russia through such transparent provocations as the Litvinenko-Berezovsky affair and the recent flap about UK subversive activities in Russia conduited through the British Council, supposedly a cultural exchange organization, but in reality a very aggressive arm of MI-6, which is now being expelled from Russia. The policy being imposed by Brzezinski is by its origins a London policy.


POLICE STATE MOVES TO ELIMINATE OBAMA'S COMPETITION


The campaign of scandal revelations against Senator John McCain in the New York Times suggest that the banking establishment is determined to remove all obstacles that might impede the March of Brzezinski's puppet Obama to the White House. In addition, Arizona Republican Congressman Rick Renzi, a McCain ally, has just been indicted on charges of extortion, wire fraud and money laundering in an alleged scheme to profit from a land deal. Renzi is an honorary co-chairman of McCain's presidential campaign. At the same time, the controled corporate media continue to cover up the explosive revelations of Larry Sinclair, which have now been covered on numerous web sites and in the supermarket tabloid, The Globe. Since Karl Rove already knows all about these scandals, Democratic primary voters need to know about them too ­ otherwise they risk choosing a candidate so thoroughly compromised as to be unelectable.


Obama is an intrinsically weak candidate, who might well be defeated even by McCain in a normal election, especially given the overwhelming suspicion about Obama among Latino, Asian, and Catholic voters. The motivation of the New York Times smear campaign against McCain by his former admirers and backers is to eliminate any serious contenders who might hinder the new Messiah between now and November.


This is not the first time that the intelligence community-police state apparatus has had to intervene decisively to provide assistance to the faltering ambitions of their puppet, Obama. During his quest for a seat in the United States Senate from Illinois in 2004, Obama received a scandal boost not once but twice. Obama's opponent in the Illinois Democratic senatorial primary of March 2004 was Marson Blair Hull, a wealthy securities broker who spent $28 million on television advertising and was heavily favored to defeat Obama in that primary. But Hull's campaign was torpedoed by a barrage of well timed media charges that he had abused his former wife. Hull was therefore obliged to drop out of the race.


After Hull had been eliminated, Obama still had to face his Republican opponent in the November general election. Here his adversary was Jack Ryan, an investment banker from Goldman Sachs. Ryan had divorced his wife Jeri in 1999, and the case was sealed at their mutual request. Suddenly the Chicago Tribune and WLS television began undertaking mighty exertions to get these divorce records made public, even though they involved a dispute about child custody. On June 22, 2004, Los Angeles Superior Court judge Robert Schneider released the court documents in question. They revealed an accusation by Jeri Ryan against her husband, now Obama's political competitor, to the effect that Jack Ryan had induced her to frequent sex clubs in a number of locations, and had attempted to coerce her into sexual intercourse in the presence of third parties. Judge Schnider's decision was all the more extraordinary because it was made in the face of the direct opposition by both parties to the divorce, and bore on a Family Court matter that is normally kept vigorously secret. It was as if some totalitarian invisible hand were intervening in favor of the beleaguered Obama candidacy. At this point Jack Ryan was compelled to abandon his candidacy at the urging of Dennis Hastert, then Speaker of the House. By now the Illinois Democratic Party appeared to have gotten the message that Obama enjoyed divine protection, since they did not nominate a serious candidate to oppose him in the November election. Instead, they brought in a carpetbagger and well known windbag in the person of Allan Keyes of Maryland, who predictably went on to lose to Obama by the most lopsided margin in Illinois political history.


This process also recalls the 1988 elimination of top Democratic contender Gary Hart through a sex scandal. Hart's prospective opponent was Bush the Elder, another intrinsically weak candidate favored by the CIA who needed police state assistance top make it to the White House. Gary Hart was knocked out of contention by a scandal involving Donna Rice, with whom Hart had been embroiled with the help of underworld figure Don Aronow, an ally of the Bush family.


With US missiles about to be installed in Poland under the direct supervision of Ian Brzezinski, the Pentagon's top man for Eastern Europe, the world is demonstrably moving towards a US ­ Russian superpower confrontation with unmistakable thermonuclear overtones. The one missing ingredient in this pattern is a suitable demagogue in the White House who can make an appeal for national mobilization in this crisis, including quite possibly a restoration of the military draft, planeloads of body bags, and a dimension of economic sacrifice and tax increases which Bush never proposed. This is the role of Zbigniew Brzezinski's puppet and Manchurian candidate, Obama. The anointed one can still be prevented from carrying out the Brzezinski-Soros plan to seize the Democratic presidential nomination through the domestic equivalent of a color revolution or people power coup.


The dynasty we need to worry about at this point is neither the Clintons nor the Bushes. The main concern today is an extension of the Brzezinski dynasty. Zbigniew Brzezinski, founder of the Trilateral Commission, member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and RAND Corporation operative, personally selected Carter as president of the United States in the mid-1970s. The resulting 1977-1981 Brzezinski Trilateral administration was an unmitigated catastrophe, leading to two decades of severe political reaction from which this country has not recovered. Given the ongoing breakdown crisis of the Anglo-American banking and currency systems, another Brzezinski administration would pose the threat of thermonuclear war with Russia in an infinitely more acute form than in the 1970s. After a few months of Zbigniew Brzezinski running the show, the era of Bush and the neocons might begin to look like the good old days. It is still possible to avoid this nightmare by timely action.



Go to 12746
http://www.rense.com/general80/meats.htm
More Examples Of How
Unsafe The Meet Supply Is
From Patricia Doyle, PhD
2-24-8

USDA Inspectors - Meat Safety Is Threatened
By Gillian Flaccus
2-23-8

(AP) -- Sometimes, government inspectors responsible for examining slaughterhouse cattle for mad cow disease and other ills are so short-staffed that they find themselves peering down from catwalks at hundreds of animals at once, looking for such telltale signs as droopy ears, stumbling gait, and facial paralysis. The ranks of inspectors are so thin that slaughterhouse workers often figure out when "surprise" visits are about to take place, and make sure they are on their best behavior.

These allegations were raised by former and current US Department of Agriculture (USDA) inspectors in the wake of the biggest beef recall in history -- 143 million pounds [about 65 000 tons) from a California meatpacker accused of sending lame "downer" cows to slaughter.

The inspectors told The Associated Press that they fear chronic staff shortages in their ranks are allowing sick cows to get into the nation's food supply, endangering the public. According to USDA's own figures, the inspector ranks nationwide had vacancy rates of 10 percent or more in 2006-07. "They're not covering all their bases. There's a possibility that something could go through because you don't have the manpower to check everything," said Lester Friedlander, a former USDA veterinary inspector at a plant in Wyalusing, Pennsylvania.

Amanda Eamich, a spokeswoman for the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), acknowledged that the department has been struggling to fill vacancies but denied the food supply is at risk. "Every single animal must past antemortem inspection before it's presented for slaughter, so only healthy animals are going to pass," she said. "We do have continuous inspection at slaughter facilities." ... Wayne Pacelle, the Humane Society's president and chief executive, said the video was filmed over a 6-week period last fall [2007] and all the abuse happened when USDA inspectors were not present. "The inspection system obviously has enormous gaps if these routine abuses could happen," he said. "The inspector would show up and if there were downed animals, the workers would try to get them up before the inspectors got there."

Generally, downer cows -- those too sickly to stand, even with coaxing -- are banned from the food supply under federal regulations. Downer cows carry a higher risk of mad cow disease. And because sickly animals typically wallow in feces and have weakened immune systems, downer cows are more likely to carry _E. coli_ and _Salmonella_, too. Veterinary inspector looks for such symptoms as an unsteady gait, swollen lymph nodes, sores, and poor muscle tone. ... Inspectors whose job is to make sure that the cattle are treated humanely said staff shortages mean they are forced to adopt routine hours for their checks, removing the element of surprise. USDA numbers show anywhere between 10 and 12 percent of inspector and veterinarian positions at poultry, beef, and pork slaughterhouses nationwide were vacant between October 2006 and September 2007. In some regions, including Colorado and Texas, a major beef-producing state, the rate hovered around 15 percent. In New York, vacancy rates hit nearly 22 percent last July [2007]. ... At 2 packing houses in Nebraska, veterinarians monitor up to 700 head of cattle at a time for signs of illness -- just enough to make sure all the cows are standing, said one veteran inspector who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of losing his job. The inspector has worked for 15 years as an inspector at 2 plants in Lexington and Grand Island, Nebraska One-quarter of the inspection positions at one of his plants have been vacant now for 2 years, he said. "There are so many vet shortages out in the field right now, they can't keep it properly staffed," the inspector said. "When they come into these big slaughter facilities, they'll put 200 head in a pen. All you can tell is they're moving."

Friedlander, who left the USDA in 1995, said he recalled checking up to 220 cows an hour by standing on a catwalk above a pen of hundreds of animals. He would also check to see if cows could walk by having workers drive them from one pen to another, 6 or 7 cows abreast. "If you're a vet, you see the 1st cow, you might see the 2nd cow, but the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th cow you might not see," he said. "How can we tell if there's any facial paralysis or droopy ears? You can't tell."

Go to 12745
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5ib5V7z9A-ocCTOvoaRCq9Ohbl9SAD8UV0AL81



Go to 12744
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/world/story.html?id=327919
Russia threatens to use force over Kosovo
Steven Edwards, Canwest News Service
Published: Friday, February 22, 2008
UNITED NATIONS -- The international split over Kosovo grew more ominous Friday as Russia raised the spectre of using force to back its Serb ally's bid to retain the territory.

Russia's envoy to NATO warned both the Western military alliance, which has a 16,000-strong peacekeeping force in Kosovo, and the European Union against formally backing the ethnic-Albanian leadership's declaration of independence from Serbia.

"If the European Union works out a common position, or if NATO breaches its mandate in Kosovo, these organizations will be in conflict with the United Nations," said Dmitry Rogozin, alluding to Russia's position that a UN Security Council resolution on Kosovo does not authorize a unilateral move to independence.

"We too would then have to proceed from the view that in order to be respected, we must use brute force -- in other words armed force."

Mr. Rogozin spoke a day after a mob in the Serbian capital of Belgrade ransacked and torched the U.S. embassy during a 250,000-strong rally protesting the independence move and Washington's recognition of the breakaway state.

The EU has not collectively ruled on Kosovo's proclamation, but has pledged to deploy a 2,000-strong administrative-support mission to take over from the UN, which has run the territory since NATO's 1999 bombing campaign forced the Serb army to withdraw.

Russian Foreign Ministry Mikhail Kamynin said the United States and "other forces that supported Kosovo's proclamation should have been aware of the consequences of such a step."

While no one expects Russia would pit its forces against NATO's in the region, experts say such talk could encourage other violence on the ground.

"Bellicose language from the Russians is not helpful," said retired U.S. major gen. William Nash, who served as UN regional administrator in northern Kosovo in 2000.

"One fear is that acts of provocation can lead to retaliation that in turn escalates the whole circumstance."

Up to 10,000 of the two million ethnic-Albanians in Kosovo died when Serb forces under then-Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic swept through the province almost a decade ago. Since NATO tipped the balance of power to the ethnic Albanians, it's Kosovo's minority Serbs who've faced pressure to leave. Mr. Nash said that missing today is a "compensation package for both Serbia, as an entity that has lost a portion of its country, and the Serb citizens in Kosovo."

In Washington, the State Department demanded Moscow repudiate Mr. Rogozin's words, characterizing what he said as "cynical and ahistorical."

"We strongly advise Russia to be more responsible in its public comments toward Kosovo," said Nicholas Burns, the third-ranking State Department official.

"Russia is isolated this week . . . very few countries are supporting its position."

In fact, the world is almost evenly split over the issue, with countries' positions appearing to reflect their internal concerns.

Against a backdrop of sensitivity over Quebec, Canada is among more than 25 countries that have not said one way or the other whether they support Kosovo's move. Argentina, which seeks to end British rule in the Falklands, and Cyprus and Spain, which are faced with their own separatist movements, are among almost 20 countries that have ruled against recognition. They say the unilateral declaration sets a bad precedent.

Major emerging powers such as India and South Africa are among almost 10 countries that have expressed concern over Kosovo's move.

Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica Friday called Thursday's violence a "great misfortune" that was "directly damaging to our fight to preserve (the) state."

But the Serb government also pressed ahead with a bid to reclaim control over at least northern Kosovo, which borders Serbia, and is where Serbs form a regional majority.

The government announced Friday, for example, that Serb judges and other judicial employees would abandon UN-run Kosovo institutions and return to Serb ones in the north -- an apparent effort to create parallel Serb institutions in the breakaway state.

At border crossings Friday, Kosovar police and NATO troops from France kept students from Serbia from entering Kosovo, saying they were "not citizens" and that they would be banned "pending further orders."

Inside Kosovo, members of the Serb minority have shown their anger by destroying UN and NATO property, detonating small bombs and taunting NATO and UN officials.

Russia said NATO needs to remember it is supposed to be neutral in the standoff.

The EU told Serbia it must protect the embassies in Belgrade.

The Canadian embassy in Belgrade was open Friday after being hit by stones amid Thursday's riot.

The Department of Foreign Affairs said the building, which is not far from the U.S. embassy, had not been a direct target of the violence.

Family of U.S. diplomats in Belgrade, meanwhile, prepared to leave the country until the security situation improves.

The United States also closed its diplomatic mission Friday in Banja Luka, an ethnic-Serb stronghold in Serbia's neighbour Bosnia, after Serb protesters, attempting to attack it the day before, clashed with police.

Kosovo's independence proclamation has raised concerns over the future of Bosnia which, since the 1992-95 civil war, has been split between the Muslim-Croat Federation and Republika Srpska, an ethnic-Serb region. The parliament in the Serb area this week claimed the right to also secede and join the Republic of Serbia.

Britain, France, Germany and Turkey joined the United States in quickly recognizing Kosovo's independence, declared last Sunday. The Belgrade embassies of all those countries were also targeted in Thursday's riots. The charred remains of a body, believed to be that of a protester, were found inside the U.S. embassy.



Go to 12743
http://www.rense.com/general80/siege.htm
Polish-American Talks On
Missile Shield Close to Collapse
Putin Warns Against Missile Siege Of Russia
From Patricia Doyle, PhD
2-24-8

MOSCOW (Prensa Latina) -- President of Russia Vladimir Putin warned on Saturday in the Kremlin that Russia will respond accordingly to any attempt to place military infrastructure near its borders. Speaking in a defense meeting, Putin said Moscow will not let itself be dragged into an arms race, but will respond accordingly to attempts to militarize its environment.

Previously, he visited Zhukovski, a city in the province of Moscow, turned by a presidential decree into the capital of the national aeronautics industry, to attend the presentation of the Complex of Science and Innovation in Aeronautics.

"We need to review the national re-armament program of the Armed Forces and increase the purchase of state-of-the-art air equipment," he said.

Go to 12742
http://www.plenglish.com/article.asp?ID=%7BD5BC622B-E67B-40
69-9474-EEBAB4BF6FBF%7D)&language=EN



Polish-American Talks On Bush 'Missile Shield' Close To Collapse
Gazeta Wyborcza
2-22-8

Talks on Missile Shield Close to Collapse - Just two weeks before the planned visit of Prime Minister Donald Tusk to Washington, DC, negotiations on the possible deployment of elements of the U.S. missile shield in Poland are on the verge of collapse, sources say. The matter is in deadlock, with negotiators waiting for a political impulse from the highest level.


Polish politicians are disappointed with the latest round of talks with the U.S.. Source say Poland cancelled the final consultations, planned for Friday, ahead of Tusk's visit to the White House scheduled for March 10. In a recent interview, PM Tusk said Poland would not accept a situation "in which Americans treat us from a business standpoint and we give them treatment based on ideology."


Poland expects a military aid package of USD 20 bln from the United States in exchange for the consent for American missile-shield bases on its soil.
Go to 12741
http://www.interfax-news.com/5/367758/news.aspx



Go to 12740
http://www.realjewnews.com/?p=47
Three DANGEROUS JEWS are destroying America.

Three DANGEROUS JEWS are dictating to Bush their Jewish Agenda:

1. Richard Perle - Director of Pentagon’s Defense Policy

2. Paul Wolfowitz - Deputy Defense Secretary

3. Charles Krauthammer - Writer-Propagangist: Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Etc.

These 3 dangerous Jews are telling Bush that he must wage war against the enemies of Israel at the cost of the lives of young Americans. So far over 4000 young American boys and girls been killed in the Iraq War.
See a List of War Dead

Ask Perle, and Wolfowitz, and Krauthammer why they don’t send their own Jewish children over to Iraq to fight their Jewish War!

Why aren’t Congressmen and Senators speaking out against the Jewish influence on US Foreign Policy? — But U.S. Senator Hollings recently censured his colleagues: “The U.S. invaded Iraq to secure Israel and everybody knows it. But due to the pressures we get politically nobody is willing to stand up and say what’s going on.”

We were told back in 2002 by Bush that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. Bush told us that we must attack Iraq in self defense. It has come to light that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. But why aren’t our leaders saying anything? I will tell you why: Jews Are Contributing To Re-Election Campaigns, that’s why!

This insanity of this Jewish control of our Government must stop. Jews care about themselves and not about others. I grew up in Judaism. I know their game. Jews are not patriotic to their host nations!

UNLESS AMERICA BECOMES a Christian nation once again, the Jewish control will get stronger and stronger. Let us all make a commitment to Christ and Church attendance. This is the only way that we can break the Jewish Stranglehood on our nation!

+Brother Nathanael…Street Evangelist!
admin @ October 16, 2007



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