STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Monday, 30 September 2013

[Tansy_Gold]

[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Monday, 30 September 2013[font color=black][/font]

SMW for 27 September 2013

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 27 September 2013
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Dow Jones 15,258.24 -70.06 (-0.46%)
S&P 500 1,691.75 -6.92 (-0.41%)
[font color=black]Nasdaq 3,781.59 0.00 (0.00%)


[font color=black]10 Year 2.62% 0.00 (0.00%)
30 Year 3.68% 0.00 (0.00%) [font color=black]


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[font size=2]Market Conditions During Trading Hours[/font]
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[font size=2]Euro, Yen, Loonie, Silver and Gold[center]

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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Market Data and News:[/font][/font]
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Economic Calendar
Marketwatch Data
Bloomberg Economic News
Yahoo Finance
Google Finance
Bank Tracker
Credit Union Tracker
Daily Job Cuts
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Economic Blogs:[/font][/font]
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The Big Picture
Financial Sense
Calculated Risk
Naked Capitalism
Credit Writedowns
Brad DeLong
Bonddad
Atrios
goldmansachs666
The Stand-Up Economist
The Automatic Earth
Wall Street on Parade
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Essential Reading:[/font][/font]
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Matt Taibi: Secret and Lies of the Bailout


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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Government Issues:[/font][/font]
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LegitGov
Open Government
Earmark Database
USA spending.gov
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Videos:[/font][/font]
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Charlie Rose talks with Roubini
Charlie Rose talks with Krugman
William Black: This Economic Disaster
Bill Moyers with Kevin Drum and David Corn
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[font color=red]Partial List of Financial Sector Officials Convicted since 1/20/09 [/font][font color=red]
2/2/12 David Higgs and Salmaan Siddiqui, Credit Suisse, plead guilty to conspiracy involving valuation of MBS
3/6/12 Allen Stanford, former Caribbean billionaire and general schmuck, convicted on 13 of 14 counts in $2.2B Ponzi scheme, faces 20+ years in prison
6/4/12 Matthew Kluger, lawyer, sentenced to 12 years in prison, along with co-conspirator stock trader Garrett Bauer (9 years) and co-conspirator Kenneth Robinson (not yet sentenced) for 17 year insider trading scheme.
6/14/12 Allen Stanford sentenced to 110 years without parole.
6/15/12 Rajat Gupta, former Goldman Sachs director, found guilty of insider trading. Could face a decade in prison when sentenced later this year.
6/22/12 Timothy S. Durham, 49, former CEO of Fair Financial Company, convicted of one count conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, 10 counts of wire fraud, and one count of securities fraud.
6/22/12 James F. Cochran, 56, former chairman of the board of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and six counts of wire fraud.
6/22/12 Rick D. Snow, 48, former CFO of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and three counts of wire fraud.
7/13/12 Russell Wassendorf Sr., CEO of collapsed brokerage firm Peregrine Financial Group Inc. arrested and charged with lying to regulators after admitting to authorities he embezzled "millions of dollars" and forged bank statements for "nearly twenty years."
8/22/12 Doug Whitman, Whitman Capital LLC hedge fund founder, convicted of insider trading following a trial in which he spent more than two days on the stand telling jurors he was innocent
10/26/12 UPDATE: Former Goldman Sachs director Rajat Gupta sentenced to two years in federal prison. He will, of course, appeal. . .
11/20/12 Hedge fund manager Matthew Martoma charged with insider trading at SAC Capital Advisors, and prosecutors are looking at Martoma's boss, Steven Cohen, for possible involvement.
02/14/13 Gilbert Lopez, former chief accounting officer of Stanford Financial Group, and former controller Mark Kuhrt sentenced to 20 yrs in prison for their roles in Allen Sanford's $7.2 billion Ponzi scheme.
03/29/13 Michael Sternberg, portfolio mgr at SAC Capital, arrested in NYC, charged with conspiracy and securities fraud. Pled not guilty and freed on $3m bail.
04/04/13 Matthew Marshall Taylor,fmr Goldman Sachs trader arrested, charged by CFTC w/defrauding his employer on $8BN futures bet "by intentionally concealing the true huge size, as well as the risk and potential profits or losses associated."
04/04/13 Matthew Taylor admits guilt, makes plea bargain. Sentencing set for 26 June; faces up to 20 years in prison but will likely only see 3-4 years. Says, "I am truly sorry."
04/11/13 Ex-KPMG LLP partner Scott London charged by federal prosecutors w/passing inside tips to a friend in exchange for cash, jewelry, and concert tickets; expected to plead guilty in May.
08/01/13 Fabrice Tourré convicted on six counts of security fraud, including "aiding and abetting" his former employer, Goldman Sachs
08/14/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout charged with wire fraud, falsifying records, and conspiracy in connection with JP Morgan's "London Whale" trade.
08/19/13 Phillip A. Falcone, manager of hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners, agrees to admit to "wrongdoing" in market manipulation. Will banned from securities industry for 5 years and pay $18MM in disgorgement and fines.
09/16/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout officially indicted on charges associated with "London Whale" trade.








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[font size=3][font color=red]This thread contains opinions and observations. Individuals may post their experiences, inferences and opinions on this thread. However, it should not be construed as advice. It is unethical (and probably illegal) for financial recommendations to be given here.[/font][/font][/font color=red][font color=black]

[Warpy]

1. Looks like the Nikkei dropped like a rock

Can't wait to see the Dow and S&P tomorrow.

Fucking Clown Congress!

[xchrom]

2. Markets Are Crumbling All Around The World As Government Shutdown Gets Close

http://www.businessinsider.com/morning-markets-september-30-2013-9

Not surprisingly, markets are ugly today. Pretty much everywhere.
In Japan, the Nikkei ended down over 2%.

German stocks are down over 1%. Same with Spain.

Italian stocks are down nearly 2%.

US futures are down a bit less than 1%.



Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/morning-markets-september-30-2013-9#ixzz2gMvToaS2

[xchrom]

3. There's Still An Incredible Lack Of Inflation In The World

http://www.businessinsider.com/theres-still-an-incredible-lack-of-inflation-in-the-world-2013-9

Folks who continue to expect inflation to pop up around every corner continue to be... wrong.
There's basically none. Anywhere.

Here's the latest from Eurostat.

Euro area annual inflation is expected to be 1.1% in September 2013, down from 1.3% in August, according to a flash estimate from Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union. Looking at the main components of euro area inflation, food, alcohol & tobacco is expected to have the highest annual rate in September (2.6%, compared with 3.2% in August), followed by services (1.5%, compared with 1.4% in August), non-energy industrial goods (0.3%, compared with 0.4% in August), and energy (-0.9%, compared with -0.3% in August).



Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/theres-still-an-incredible-lack-of-inflation-in-the-world-2013-9#ixzz2gMw6dqbh

[Demeter]

15. If the 1% doesn't spend, all that inflation doesn't circulate

The smart thing to do would be tax them into the middle class, BEFORE they spread their counterfeit largess beyond the paper assets. And nationalize their corporations, too, so that we don't have prices rising.

[xchrom]

16. i like that! nt

[xchrom]

4. Japanese Manufacturing PMI Hits Highest Level Since February 2011

http://www.businessinsider.com/japanese-pmi-september-30-2013-2013-9

Japanese manufacturing PMI hit 52.5, the highest reading since February 2011.
That's up from 52.2 in August.

The rate of new order growth hit a 40-month high, and backlogs climbed at their fastest pace since April 2006.

Employment was little changed for the second month in a row.



Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/japanese-pmi-september-30-2013-2013-9#ixzz2gMwu7Squ

[xchrom]

5. U.S., Italian political risks spark flight to safety

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/30/us-markets-global-idUSBRE96S00E20130930

(Reuters) - Italian bond yields jumped and European shares fell on Monday as political tension in Italy rattled investors already fearful of a looming U.S. government shutdown.

Ten-year Italian government bond yields rose 31 basis points to 4.73 percent. It was their biggest one-day gain since June, although still far from the level that causes funding problems.

Low risk German bonds yields dropped 3 basis points to 1.69 percent. The euro hit a three-week low against the safer yen at 131.38 yen.

Investors are concerned Italy will be forced into new elections just seven months after the last inconclusive vote, following Silvio Berlusconi's move to pull his ministers out of the ruling coalition on the weekend.

[xchrom]

6. UK finance minister to court voters with 'tough love' welfare rules

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/30/us-britain-politics-osborne-idUSBRE98T07620130930


(Reuters) - British finance minister George Osborne will propose tougher new welfare rules on Monday to try to win over working voters who are grappling with depleted spending power ahead of the 2015 election.

Speaking to Conservative Party activists at the penultimate conference before the election, Osborne will promise he can sustain a recovery of Britain's $2.5 trillion economy, but caution there can be no complacency.

"What really drives an improvement in living standards is an economic policy that creates jobs, keeps mortgage rates low, helps people keep more of their income tax free," Osborne told the BBC ahead of the speech.

Osborne's pitch is designed to counter the opposition Labour Party's charge that Prime Minister David Cameron has presided over a cost of living crisis. It is meant to appeal to working Britons who, according to polls, feel the country's annual 200 billion pound ($320.7 billion) welfare system is too generous.

[xchrom]

7. Shanghai trade zone publishes restrictions for foreign investment

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/30/us-china-shanghai-idUSBRE98T05U20130930

(Reuters) - The Shanghai government published a list of sectors on Monday where foreign investment will be banned or restricted within its new free trade zone (FTZ), but in a departure from usual practise, no permission will be required to invest in other sectors.

The China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade zone officially opened for business on Sunday, and officials have outlined ambitious plans for bold reforms in the country's currency, interest rates, trade and industry policies in the zone, but without giving details on implementation.

The "negative list," published on the FTZ's website, zbw.sh.gov.cn, closely resembles the central government's current catalogue of nationwide restrictions on foreign investment.

Officials have said the list will be shortened over time as zone liberalizations gain steam and risks are better understood.

[xchrom]

8. French defence minister says export potential of A400M huge

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/30/us-airbus-airlifter-idUSBRE98T07920130930

(Reuters) - France's defence minister said the export potential for EADS's EAD.PAA A400M military transporter was "huge", as the 20 billion euro ($27 billion) project started delivering aircraft to its founding nations after years of delays.

"I can't give you any figures but there is huge capacity for exports, the political and industrial winds are synchronized," France's defence minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told reporters on Monday at the sidelines of a ceremony to celebrate the first delivery of the A400M military transport plane.

The troop carrier was conceived in the 1980s to meet a looming shortfall in military transport capacity among seven European NATO nations: Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Spain and Turkey.

The first A400M, which competes with the Lockheed Martin (LMT.N) C-130 Hercules turboprop and the larger Boeing (BA.N) C-17 cargo jet, flew to France on August 1 after a four-year delivery delay.

[xchrom]

9. After years of crop crises, U.S. harvest beckons new era of plenty...almost

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/30/us-world-grains-stocks-idUSBRE98T03720130930

(Reuters) - For much of the past six years, the global grain markets have lurched from one crop crisis to the next, keeping inventories low and food prices high.

Now, as harvest machines across the U.S. Midwest prepare to reap the nation's biggest corn crop in history, a sea change seems imminent, one that could transform the market. No longer will a constant a fear of scarcity drive prices. Instead, traders be battling for market share instead of scrambling for supplies.

But, warn experts, we are not there yet. At least one more trouble-free global growing cycle is necessary to safely put the past few years of uncomfortably high food prices behind us. Global stockpiles, while recovering, are still far from the 80-or-so days worth of demand that will keep panic at bay.

Chief among their concerns is that demand for cash crops could accelerate now that prices for things like corn and wheat have fallen by as much as half. Meanwhile, still-elevated costs for inputs like fertilizer, seeds and fuel may dampen some farmers' enthusiasm to keep the production throttle at maximum.

[xchrom]

10. Global Economy: Faith in revival put to test

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/29/us-economy-global-weekahead-idUSBRE98S0E420130929


(Reuters) - Yet another budget showdown in Washington and yet another government crisis in Italy herald more turbulence for a global economy growing well below trend.

On top of these recurrent pitfalls, banks and households in Europe are still shedding debt, several big emerging economies are slowing and markets are struggling to decode the Federal Reserve's policy signals.

No wonder that words like 'modest' and 'moderate' pepper many of the latest growth outlooks. Yet there is a guarded confidence at some banks that a recovery, not powerful but worthy of the name, might finally be within reach.

Credit Suisse, for instance, is penciling in 3.8 percent global growth for 2014, up from 3.0 percent this year and surpassing what it sees as the trend rate of 3.5 percent.

[xchrom]

11. Analysis: Default or not, Asia a hostage to U.S. debt

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/29/us-usa-debt-asia-analysis-idUSBRE98S0GY20130929


(Reuters) - Unless the U.S. Congress settles a political showdown to raise the country's debt ceiling in coming weeks, it will be left on the edge of an unprecedented default. But America's main creditors in Asia may be the least of its worries.

The creditors - China, Japan and other Asian governments - have a hoard of U.S. Treasuries in their $5 trillion cache of foreign exchange reserves, the equivalent of almost a third of U.S. gross domestic product.

Despite having so much at stake as bond prices lurch violently, they are not about to do anything more than minor tweaking of their portfolios.

Sovereign reserve managers and advisers cite conventional reasons for the thinking.

[xchrom]

12. Europe’s Record Jobless Rate Seen Resisting Recovery

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-29/europe-s-record-jobless-rate-seen-resisting-recovery.html

Europe’s nascent economic recovery is too green to make any impact on the region’s jobs market yet, according to economists.

Unemployment in the 17-nation euro area remained at a record high of 12.1 percent in August, according to the median estimate of 30 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. The European Union’s statistics office is due to publish the jobless numbers at 11 a.m. tomorrow in Luxembourg.

“Europe is faced with a high level of structural unemployment and this is not going to change any time soon,” said Annamaria Grimaldi, an economist at Intesa Sanpaolo SpA in Milan. “The recovery is happening painfully slowly and that’s another reason why we’ll see jobless rates far above 11 percent well into 2015.”

Even after the currency bloc emerged from its longest-ever recession, economists predict unemployment to keep rising and peak at 12.3 percent in the final quarter of this year. The job market’s resistance to an improving economy has been the subject of political debate across the region, with European Central Bank President Mario Draghi urging governments to implement “decisive structural reforms” to fight unemployment.

[xchrom]

13. Volcker Rule Costs Tallied as U.S. Regulators Press Deadline

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-30/volcker-rule-costs-tallied-as-u-s-regulators-press-deadline.html

The fate of the Dodd-Frank Act’s ban on banks trading for their own accounts -- one of the final pieces of the U.S. effort to prevent a repeat of the 2008 financial crisis -- may rest with a cluster of economists at the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The agency’s 50 economists are attempting to calculate the costs and benefits of the so-called Volcker rule, a linchpin of the financial overhaul that would curb the kind of high-stakes proprietary trading that could lead to crippling losses or bailouts at banks like JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) or Citigroup Inc. (C)

Court challenges that overturned other Dodd-Frank regulations because of faulty cost-benefit analysis have increased pressure on the SEC economists, led by Craig M. Lewis, a veteran finance professor on leave from Vanderbilt University. Their work may determine whether the rule could withstand a similar lawsuit -- an option banks and trade groups say is under consideration.

The economists are racing the clock: Regulators are under pressure from President Barack Obama and Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew to finish the rule in the next three months. At a recent meeting, Lew gave the heads of the five agencies drafting the rule a series of deadlines designed to make sure the government meets the year-end target, according to a person briefed on the meeting who asked not to be identified because it wasn’t public.

[xchrom]

14. Fed Too Familiar With Lost Labor Seeking New Message for Policy

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-29/fed-too-familiar-with-lost-labor-seeking-new-message-for-policy.html

It’s becoming increasingly clear why Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke should have avoided linking the central bank’s policy decisions to specific unemployment rates.

Bernanke said in June he expected the Fed would complete its bond buying when the jobless level was around 7 percent, and policy makers have pledged since December they won’t consider raising interest rates as long as it exceeds 6.5 percent. With a decline in August to 7.3 percent for the wrong reason -- Americans giving up on finding work -- Fed officials are being forced to shift their guideposts.

The flawed measure has contributed to the market’s confusion over the direction of monetary policy, and Fed officials now are struggling with how to minimize it as a policy benchmark without damaging their credibility, according to Ethan Harris, co-head of global economics research at Bank of America Corp. in New York. The Federal Open Market Committee’s Sept. 18 decision not to taper its $85 billion in monthly bond buying surprised investors across the globe.

“Picking the unemployment rate as the key growth-side indicator was a huge mistake for the Fed,” said Harris, one of the few economists to correctly predict the Fed wouldn’t taper in September. “It was supposed to be a marker that the average Joe could look at and say, ‘Ah! OK, now we’ve hit a broad-based recovery.’ Now, they’ve almost immediately abandoned it.”

[Demeter]

17. Say goodbye to a glorious September

It has been lovely weather, and the politics so entertaining, one didn't need cable.

And say Hello to an ENTIRE MONTH OF HALLOWEEN--will it be TRICKS, OR TREATS?

And who will be pulling off the tricks and gathering the treats? All this and so much more in store for October....

[Demeter]

18. A Congressman Seeks Clarification from the Leadership

http://assets.amuniversal.com/5784c0800b900131248e001dd8b71c47

Lessons of and in Adversity from Peanuts:

http://assets.amuniversal.com/5a2eb0c0f984013015ef001dd8b71c47

[Demeter]

19. Without Privacy There Can Be No Democracy

http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/19039-without-privacy-there-can-be-no-democracy

By The Daily Take, The Thom Hartmann Program

The president of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, spoke this morning at the United Nations and delivered a powerful indictment of spying by the NSA on behalf of the United States. She said, "Without respect for a nation's sovereignty, there is no basis for proper relations among nations," adding that "Brazil knows how to protect itself. Brazil ... does not provide shelter to terrorist groups. We are a democratic country."

The Brazilian president is so outraged at American spying, both on her country and on her personal emails and her personal life, that she canceled a state dinner with President Obama.

While most Americans see this as a rift between Brazil in the United States over the issue of our spying on them, President Rousseff highlighted the most important point of all elsewhere in her speech this morning.

She said, "Without the right of privacy, there is no real freedom of speech or freedom of opinion, and so there is no actual democracy."

This is not just true of international relations. It's also true here within the United States.

Back before the Kennedy administration largely put an end to it, J Edgar Hoover was infamous in political circles in Washington DC for his spying on and blackmailing of both American politicians and activists like Martin Luther King. He even sent King tapes of an extramarital affair and suggested that King should consider committing suicide.

That was a shameful period in American history, and most Americans think it is behind us. But the NSA, other intelligence agencies, and even local police departments have put the practice of spying on average citizens in America on steroids.

As Brazil's President points out, without privacy there can be no democracy.

Democracy requires opposing voices; it requires a certain level of reasonable political conflict. And it requires that government misdeeds be exposed. That can only be done when whistleblowers and people committing acts of journalism can do so without being spied upon.

Perhaps a larger problem is that well over half – some estimates run as high as 70% – of the NSA's budget has been outsourced to private corporations. These private corporations maintain an army of lobbyists in Washington DC who constantly push for more spying and, thus, more money for their clients.

With the privatization of intelligence operations, the normal system of checks and balances that would keep government snooping under control has broken down.

We need a new Church Commission to investigate the nature and scope of our government spying both on our citizens and on our allies.

But even more than that we need to go back to the advice that President Dwight Eisenhower gave us as he left the presidency in 1961. Eisenhower warned about the rise of a military-industrial complex, suggesting that private forces might, in their search for profits, override the protective mechanisms that keep government answerable to its people.

That military-industrial complex has become the military-industrial-spying-private-prison complex, and it is far greater a threat to democracy then probably was envisioned by Eisenhower.

Government is the protector of the commons. Government is of by and for we the people. Government must be answerable to the people.

When the functions of government are privatized, all of that breaks down and Government becomes answerable to profit.

It's time to reestablish the clear dividing lines between government functions and corporate functions, between the public space and the private space.

A critically important place to start that is by ending the privatization within our national investigative and spying agencies.

This article was first published on Truthout and any reprint or reproduction on any other website must acknowledge Truthout as the original site of publication.

[xchrom]

20. CHINA MANUFACTURING GROWTH SLOWER THAN EXPECTED

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_CHINA_MANUFACTURING?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-09-30-06-23-38

HONG KONG (AP) -- Chinese manufacturing activity ticked up more slowly than expected in September.

A survey by HSBC Corp. released Monday showed that manufacturing activity in the world's No. 2 economy expanded slightly this month, rising to 50.2 from August's 50.1. The index uses a 100-point scale on which numbers below 50 indicate contraction.

The reading was lower than the expected number of 51.2 from a preliminary version of the survey earlier this month. It's a sign China's gradual recovery from an extended slowdown could be more fragile than thought.

But HSBC economists said the reading was still positive because it showed further improvement.

[xchrom]

21. ITALIAN MARKETS SLUMP AMID POLITICAL UNCERTAINTY

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_ITALY_POLITICS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-09-30-05-26-05

ROME (AP) -- Investors are reacting with concern over the increasing precariousness of Italy's coalition government.

Milan's stock exchange was down 1.6 percent at 17,368.52 on Monday, the first day of trading since Silvio Berlusconi demanded that his five ministers quit Premier Enrico Letta's government. Italy's 10-year government bond yield - a measure of investor wariness - was up 0.08 percentage points at 4.50 percent.

Berlusconi had demanded the resignations in a show of solidarity ahead of a Senate vote to strip him of his seat because of his tax-fraud conviction. But at least three ministers said they would only reluctantly comply in a rare challenge to Berlusconi's leadership.

Letta has called a confidence vote in Parliament this week to determine if his 5-month-old government can survive.

[xchrom]

22. HOW BUDGET SHOWDOWNS COULD SQUEEZE THE US ECONOMY

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_BUDGET_BATTLE_ECONOMIC_IMPACT_QA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-09-29-13-52-34

***SNIP

Here are questions and answers about how the two standoffs, now intertwined, could affect the economy and financial markets:

Q. What exactly will happen within the next days and weeks?

A. The most urgent deadline is for Congress and the White House to agree to keep funding the government after the current budget year ends Monday. Otherwise, some of the government would have to shut down. The House and Senate are considering bills to fund the government past the deadline. But House Republicans want to cut off funding for President Barack Obama's health care law as a condition of passing the spending measure. Senate Democrats and the White House have balked. Unless one side essentially blinks, a partial shutdown of the government will occur.

Q. What would be the effect on the economy if the two sides miss the deadline for passing the spending measure?

A. About one-third of the government will shut down. About 800,000 of about 2.1 million federal employees will be sent home without pay. National parks will close.

[Demeter]

23. America Waking Up to Effects of 'Disaster Capitalism' --Better Life Possible Kevin Zeese, Margaret

By Kevin Zeese, Margaret Flowers

http://www.alternet.org/activism/people-across-america-are-waking-effects-disaster-capitalism-much-better-way-life-possible?akid=10986.227380.bLwvlZ&rd=1&src=newsletter902738&t=17&paging=off&current_page=1#bookmark




In her book Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, Naomi Klein explains how crises are used by governments to distract and frighten people so that unpopular and exploitative policies can be pushed through. It seems that now there is a different reaction to disaster capitalism. Rather than disasters providing cover for the implementation of dangerous capitalist policies that lower wages and increase the wealth divide, the disasters being caused by these dangerous policies have woken the public and are leading to a more active and empowered people.

We face a triple threat of the “e”crises - in the economy, environment and energy - which are all connected, says journalist and academic Nafeez Ahmed, but rather than allowing them to overwhelm and weaken us, people are rising to the challenge of solving these crises through direct confrontation with the forces that created them and by building alternative solutions. People are taking initiative rather than waiting for leaders. Ahmed states, “People are really hungry actually for answers, hungry for solutions, hungry for alternatives, so really this is actually an unprecedented opportunity. It’s an unprecedented crisis but it’s also an opportunity to dream-weave and say ‘well actually everything is going to go to pot over the next 20-30 years if we don’t change, so here’s an opportunity to think outside the box.’”

Enough people appear to recognize that the political system is dysfunctional and does not serve the public’s needs or interests. We saw this recently with the President’s call for an attack on Syria. Instead of falling for the media propaganda telling us that we must intervene to save Syrians from more chemical attacks, the public demanded that the President go to Congress, that there be an investigation into the facts and that the rule of law be followed. The attack was averted. US foreign policy is rarely attacked but stopping the war on Syria shows that something may be changing. There were numerous critical reviews of President Obama’s speech to the United Nations. One of the most important was Jeremy Scahill’s analysis of a portion of the president’s speech where he openly talked about the US using military force to protect our “core interests,” a virtual admission of imperialism. Another was David Swanson’s review of the speech were he listed the top 45 lies in Obama's speech at the UN. But the article that was most relevant to the building of the resistance movement was by David Lindorff who focused on the president telling the world that the US opposes violence to suppress dissent. Lindroff pointed to the coordinated attack on the Occupy Movement, where Homeland Security and other federal agencies worked with local police to arrest more than 8,000 protesters, use pepper spray, flashbangs, clubs and fists as well as infiltration and creating internal dissension in an attempt to destroy the movement. The hypocrisy of President Obama in making this statement to the world was astounding.

Speaking of extreme reactions to protest, we continue to see examples in the US.

Last week a Modesto Junior College student was prevented from handing out free copies of the Constitution. And in Maryland a parent who tried to ask a question about the Common Core curriculum was arrested. He tried to speak because the authorities were only taking questions from index cards and had not asked any questions about the curriculum that many parents were concerned about. These types of actions show the power structure is very insecure about Americans speaking up and taking action.

General David Petraeus has been a target of people opposed to war. On the way to his first class the retired General and former CIA director was chased down the street by people calling him a war criminal and threatening to protest at every class he taught at CUNY. Then he was protested at a fundraiser. The protests keep growing. This week, when veterans announced they would protest a luncheon in Los Angeles, Petraeus cancelled his appearance. This is a major change as it is rare to see a former general called a war criminal in the United States.

This week, we are being told that there is a budget crisis and that we must accept more cuts, more austerity measures. But many Americans understand that austerity actually causes more economic decline rather than recovery. In response, nurses and health care workers in 13 countries had a global day of action against austerity, cuts to healthcare and for a tax on stock transactions. And there have been some victories. This week in New York City, nurses won a series of battles in the courts and electoral arena that will keep community hospitals open.

We know that the economy is rigged so that the working class is subsidizing the richest, that our wealth is trickling up. An analysis published this week found the average U.S. family subsidizes Big Business by $6,000 annually. This is outrageous at a time when most Americans are struggling to survive.

Instead of accepting cuts and declining wages, workers are fighting back. We’ve been reporting on the striking Walmart and fast food workers. Now people are realizing that they are fighting for all of us. And, in North Carolina where teachers are not allowed to unionize or strike, there is talk of a teacher walk-out.

Labor unrest is building and big labor needs to change to catch-up to American workers anger. There is lots of criticism of big labor for its ties to the Democratic Party and cautious lack of activism, but there are some good signs in labor as well. United Students Against Sweatshops which has been winning victories, is allying with the AFL-CIO. Our hope is the students pull the AFL-CIO toward more activism.

People are seeing that the Democratic Party is behind the neo-liberal economic agenda. Democrats are joining the GOP to privatize and log national forests and cut education funding. And the husband of Senator Feinstein is selling our commons, in this case publicly-owned Post Office buildings, to his friends cheap in order to line his family’s pockets with our commonwealth.

On the bright side, as people speak-up, mobilize and take action not only is there a growing movement but the power structure is being divided. Divisions are occurring in the Democratic Party where some are being pulled away from Obama’s pro-Wall Street, market-based policies that undermine the social infrastructure. We hope that trend will continue, especially with regard to the mother of all neo-liberal policies, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) that has been negotiated in secret for more than three years. This is a rigged corporate trade agreement (falsely called “free trade” for marketing purposes) that will do very little to get the economy going but will add to many of the mistaken market policies that hinder the economy and make it unfair. A study published by the Center for Economic and Policy Research made some amazing findings about the TPP: (1) the impact on economic growth will be almost nothing, only a .1% increase in the GDP, but (2) the impact on most Americans will be negative with 90% of workers seeing their wages decline. The TPP will add to the decline of the middle class, race to the bottom in wages and continue the expansion of the wealth divide. As it comes down to the wire – we expect a push by the President for Congress to grant him Fast Track (Trade Promotion Authority) so that he can sign it before Congressional review – resistance to the TPP is growing. In Maine, where the state House of Representatives unanimously passed a resolution opposing “Fast Track,” Rep. Sharon Anglin Treat sees the a broad, bi-partisan opposition developing. The OWS made the TPP a focus of its anniversary protest with Adam Weissman of Occupy Trade Justice describing it as the “anti-Occupy” agreement, “a 1% power grab.” In Washington, DC, a coalition of unions, environmentalists and Public Citizen organized a protest against the TPP on Friday, while lead negotiators were inside discussing the agreement. Over the weekend as part of a TPP Training organized by Flush The TPP (which includes both authors), activists produced light projections on a federal building. And, then on Monday, protests escalated as activists scaled the US Trade Rep’s building and covered it with four massive banners in order to expose their secret negotiations, as captured in this video. The Washington Post said the “guerrilla theater . . . demonstration could rank among the best ever.” On Tuesday the activists celebrated with a “Don’t Fast Track a Train Wreck” March that began at the White House went to the US Trade Rep, World Bank, US Chamber of Commerce, through the business district, and ended at Congress. You can see a video of the Fast Track train march at the end of this article summarizing the spectacle protests Opposition to the TPP is going to continue to grow as more of the secret agreement becomes public knowledge. This week information about the impact of the TPP on two of the hottest environmental issues – hydro-fracking and tar sands – came out. The TPP could allow an end run by the oil and gas industry around local opposition to fracking and gas exports. And, the US Trade Rep, Mike Froman, is pushing less regulation of the already inadequately regulated tar sands industry. As environmental justice activists realize the TPP could undo all of their good work to stop extreme energy extraction, they will join the effort to stop the TPP. Already 75,000 have threatened civil disobedience if Obama approves the KXL pipeline, and they reiterated that threat in letters to President Obama this week.

MORE

This article is produced by PopularResistance.org in conjunction with AlterNet. It is based on PopularResistance.org’s weekly newsletter reviewing the activities of the resistance movement.



Kevin Zeese, JD and Margaret Flowers, MD are participants in PopularResistance.org; they co-direct It’s Our Economy and co-host Clearing the FOG shown on UStream TV and heard on radio. Their twitters are @KBZeese and MFlowers8.

[Demeter]

24. This is what comes of pissing off and kissing off your base

and it's happening on BOTH sides simultaneously. Great theater, lots of special effects....

[Demeter]

25. All this activism is making me hungry

or maybe it's the turn to winter...or maybe it's just time for breakfast!

Have a good week, everyone! It will be a crazy one. Be sure to fasten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy ride!

[xchrom]

26. 'Last Opportunity': ECB and Politicians at Odds Over Stress Tests

http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/ecb-at-loggerheads-with-policymakers-over-banking-stress-tests-a-925256.html

Jörg Asmussen is introduced as someone who "was in the eye of the storm." After five years of the financial crisis, Asmussen, who is bald and walks with a slight stoop, is taking stock before the attendees of a conference at a Frankfurt hotel.

But Asmussen, a former state secretary in the German Finance Ministry, doesn't spend much time dwelling on the past. Today he is a member of the executive board of the European Central Bank (ECB), which is currently launching a large-scale project to finally clear away the toxic assets left over from the crisis and build a new firewall, the European banking union. The first part consists of a balance sheet test. The ECB plans to put 130 major banks to the acid test before it assumes regulatory supervision of the institutions in the fall of 2014.

"This test is not a threat," Asmussen tells his audience. "But after two failed stress tests, this is the last opportunity to reestablish confidence in the European banking system."

A comparison with the United States shows what bad shape the industry is in. US financial groups are reporting record profits, while banks in the euro zone have lost more than €80 billion ($108 billion) in the last two years. The Europeans failed to adequately address their banking crisis. In the United States, 10 times as many ailing banks were closed and balance sheets were more consistently relieved of bad debt than in the euro zone. The ECB stress test is intended to introduce a long-overdue spring cleaning in Europe.

[xchrom]

27. Populists Gain Ground: Austrian Voters Shift to the Right

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/government-reelected-in-austria-despite-voters-shifting-to-righ-a-925272.html

Austria's governing parties were voted back into office in national elections on Sunday, despite losses and an unmistakable shift to the right in the country.

Preliminary official results show Chancellor Werner Faymann's center-left Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) as the strongest in parliament, with 27.1 percent of votes. Its coalition partner, the center-right Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) scored 23.8 percent of the vote.

The right-wing populist Freedom Party (FPÖ) has once again secured its slot as the third biggest party in the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament, with 21.4 percent of the vote. The party also registered a 3.9 percent increase in votes compared to 2008 elections. The Green Party will be fourth largest, with 11.5 percent of the votes.

For the first time, Team Stronach -- a euroskeptic party founded by outspoken billionaire Frank Stronach -- will enter into parliament, with 5.8 percent of total votes. With 4.8 percent, the newly founded business-friendly NEOS also cleared the 4 percent hurdle for entering the Austrian parliament.

[Demeter]

28. -160 at open. That looks like a big vote of No Confidence

It's so much fun, to watch from the sidelines.


Can you imagine what Tuesday will bring?

I'm betting -300.