Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 8:00 PM Eastern) where we hang out, share and talk about news, music, photography and other things of interest to the community.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
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Hey! Good Evening!
This evenings music features New Orleans, Louisiana singer and piano player Clarence "Frogman" Henry. Enjoy!
Clarence "Frogman" Henry - Aint Got No Home
"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes her laws."
-- Mayer Amschel Rothschild
News and Opinion
News of the Economic Overlords
From Detroit to Cyprus, Banksters in Search of Prey
From Nicosia, Cyprus, to Detroit, Michigan, the global financial octopus is squeezing the life out of society, stripping away public and individual assets in a vain attempt to fend off its own, inevitable collapse. The bankers “troika” that effectively rules Europe prepares to reach into the individual accounts of ordinary depositors on the island nation of Cyprus to fund the bailout of their local banking brethren. Across the Atlantic, a corporate henchman makes arrangements to seize the assets and abolish the political rights of a Black metropolis. The local colorations may vary, but the crisis is the same: massed capital is devouring its social and natural environment. Either we liquidate the banksters, or Wall Street will liquidate us.
The proposed seizure of a big chunk of every ordinary Cypriot depositors’ accounts, in the guise of a one-time “tax,” was shocking even by the standards of the Euro Zone’s overlords: the International Monetary Fund, European Central Bank and European Commission. ... The banks are now closed, to prevent people from withdrawing their money. But Europe’s ruling triumvirate at the bankers’ lair in Brussels continues to demand that the public-at-large pay to keep the global criminal financial enterprise humming, or be starved out. “In the absence of this measure, Cyprus would have faced scenarios that would have left deposit-holders significantly worse off,” they said – disaster banksterism.
A rapscallion Black lawyer for the notorious corporate law firm Jones Day delivered the bankers’ ultimatum to Detroit. Emergency financial manager Kevyn Orr, anointed by Michigan’s Republican governor, is a bankruptcy specialist whose mission is to liquidate the assets of the 82 percent Black city, especially the revenue-producing Water and Sewerage Department. Orr’s firm’s clients – which, according to their website, include “more than half of the Fortune 500 companies” – have plenty of experience at liquidating in Detroit. ...
Detroit and the people of Cyprus share the same enemy, a class that is beyond the reach of simple civil rights suits. The Lords of Capital on Wall Street and the City of London and the Federal Reserve in Washington and in the “troika” at Brussels confront their own existential crisis, which compels them to liquidate the public sector so that it can eventually be transferred to their own balance sheets. There are many ways to accomplish this, through privatization of existing public institutions, or by simply blowing a hole in public services and allowing privateers to fill the void, subsidized by public funds. However, nothing can save the banksters from inevitable, and increasingly imminent, collapse. Ever-increasing profit margins must be achieved, somehow, or the system implodes. Hundreds of trillions of notional dollars in derivatives must be serviced and fed by a class that makes nothing and can only survive by chicanery and coercion by governments under their control.
Only Wall Street Wins in Detroit Crisis Reaping $474 Million Fee
The only winners in the financial crisis that brought Detroit (9845MF) to the brink of state takeover are Wall Street bankers who reaped more than $474 million from a city too poor to keep street lights working.
The city started borrowing to plug budget holes in 2005 under former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, who was convicted this week on corruption charges. That year, it issued $1.4 billion in securities to fund pension payments. Last year, it added $129.5 million in debt, 9.3 percent of its general-fund budget, in part to repay loans taken to service other bonds. ...
The city, which peaked at 1.85 million residents in 1950, has lost more than a quarter of its population since 2000. The 700,000 inhabitants who remain endure unreliable buses, inadequate police and fire protection and broken street lights that have darkened entire blocks.
Banks including UBS AG (UBS), Bank of America Corp.’s Merrill Lynch and JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM). have enabled about $3.7 billion of bond issues to cover deficits, pension shortfalls and debt payments since 2005, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Liabilities rose to almost $15 billion, including money owed retirees, according to a state treasurer’s review.
The debt sales cost Detroit $474 million, including underwriting expenses, bond-insurance premiums and fees for wrong-way bets on swaps, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That almost equals the city’s 2013 budget for police and fire protection.
Oh, looky! The rationale for robbing Americans blind debt-mania-induced austerity, prepared by academic economists in the employ of the 1%, is full of holes:
Economists See No Crisis With U.S. Debt as Economy Gains
Representative Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, declared this month that the U.S. national debt “is hurting our economy today.” It’s an idea embraced by almost every Republican and even some Democrats. [Including a certain (allegedly) Democratic President who keeps screaming about deficits and the need for a grand betrayal] ...
Three years after a government spending surge in response to the recession drove the U.S. past that red line -- the nation’s $16.7 trillion total debt is now 106 percent of the $15.8 trillion economy -- key indicators reflect gathering strength. Businesses have increased spending by 27 percent since the end of 2009. The annual rate of new home construction jumped about 60 percent. Employers have created almost 6 million jobs.
And with borrowing costs near record lows, the cost of paying off the debt is lower now than in the year Ronald Reagan left the White House, as a percentage of the economy.
“The argument that heavy debt loads slow economic growth doesn’t hold a lot of water,” says Guy LeBas, chief fixed- income strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott LLC in Philadelphia who oversees $12 billion. “It suffers from a mix-up of cause and effect: When weak economic conditions arise, it tends to encourage deficit spending, which is what has led to more U.S. debt being issued, and not the other way around.”
Chicago Public Schools Expected to Announce 'Largest Number of Schools Ever Closed in One Place at One Time'
The Chicago Public Schools is set to announce the closure of around 50 public schools on Thursday, what the Chicago Sun-Times has described as "the largest number ever closed in one place at one time in the country."
While the full list and names are expected to be announced by CPS at 5 PM, media outlets report that adminstrators of the schools slated for closure were told earlier in the day to notify their staffs.
A recent Sun-Times analysis of the 129 schools on the list for possible closure disproportionately affected black students. ...
The Tribune reports that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is not in town for the announcement of the closures this week as he is on a family skiing vacation in Utah.
Forget Cyprus, Nobody Is Stealing from Depositors More than Bernanke
After the Federal Reserve reaffirmed its easy money policy Wednesday, Chairman Ben Bernanke was asked whether the U.S. would ever think of taxing bank depositors as Cyprus has done. He said that was very unlikely but Jim Rickards, senior managing director of Tangent Capital Partners, says the Fed already has its hands in depositors’ pockets.
“Nobody is stealing more money from bank depositors than Ben Bernanke,” Rickards tells The Daily Ticker. Bernanke's doing that, Rickards says, by maintaining interest rates near zero.
“At this stage of a recovery normalized interest rates should be around 2-3%,” says Rickards. “Apply that 2-3%…to the entire multi-trillion-dollar deposit base of the United States of America and that’s a $400-billion per year wealth transfer from savers to bankers so they can pay themselves bigger bonuses or make crazy bets.” Over time, Rickards says, that wealth transfer could reach $1 trillion.
Cyprus bailout plan ignites citizens' anger
Little politicians, big power grabs department:
EU commission prepares ground for far-reaching economic powers
BRUSSELS - The European Commission has started preparing the ground for legislation that would prevent member states from undertaking major tax, labour or financial reforms without running it by the commission and other governments first.
In an ideas paper published Wednesday (20 March), the commission said this ex-ante co-ordination should concern "major national economic reform plans and should take place at an early stage before the measures are adopted."
The suggested scope of covered policies would implicate virtually all national government legislation - including competitiveness and employment laws, reforms that cover product and services markets, as well as those affecting tax systems and network industries. ...
The proposals - to eventually take shape as a draft legislation later this year - are part of a general attempt to induce the interdependent 17-country eurozone to behave more as one political and economic entity.
This plan doesn't sound any better than the Troika's demands; it looks like Mr. Anastasiades, having been rebuffed by the parliament and the people over stealing from depositors, has found another pot of people's money to steal for the banksters:
Under Pressure, Cyprus Lawmakers to Vote on Bailout
With anger and anxiety growing across Cyprus, Mr. Anastasiades’s new plan would scrap a tax on bank deposits. Experts warned, however, that the deposit-tax plan might need to be revisited unless the government found other means to reach the goal of raising €5.8 billion to satisfy Cyprus’s creditors and unlock the full bailout funds.
The plan sent to Parliament would nationalize pension funds from state-run companies and conduct an emergency bond sale to help raise the €5.8 billion. Gone was any reference to a deposit tax, which Parliament roundly rejected in a vote Tuesday.
Before concrete details emerged, German leaders made it clear they would not back a deal that involved nationalizing the state-owned companies’ pensions, a measure that is rejected in Berlin as more socially dangerous than even the original plan to tax smaller savings.
In a closed-door meeting with members of her junior coalition partner, the Free Democrats, Chancellor Angela Merkel made clear her impatience with the government in Cyprus, stating that “under no circumstances can we give up our principles,” the public television network ARD reported.
Cyprus Should Let the Banks Go Bankrupt
Texas takes step toward secession with Rick Perry’s plan to hoard gold
Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) and freshman state Rep. Giovanni Capriglione have a plan to create a “Fort Knox of Texas” so that the state can start hoarding gold.
Giovanni has filed a bill to establish a Texas Bullion Depository to store the $1 billion worth of gold bars that are owned by University of Texas Investment Management Co. (UTIMCO), which are currently being housed by the U.S. Federal Reserve.
Speaking to conservative radio host Glenn Beck on Tuesday, Perry said that lawmakers were in the process of “bringing gold that belongs to the state of Texas back into the state.” ... Tangent Capital Partners senior managing director Jim Rickards speculated to Yahoo Finance on Thursday that creating a “Fort Knox of Texas” could be a step in Texas creating its own currency and eventually moving to secede.
“This bill contains a provision that says to the federal government that you, the federal government, purport to confiscate this Texas gold, we, the state of Texas, consider that to be null and void,” Rickards pointed out. “And under the 10th Amendment of the United States Constitution, they have that power.”
Earlier this year, more than 100,000 people signed a petition on the White House website calling on President Barack Obama’s administration to allow the state to secede.
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Iraq, Afghan Wars to Cost US Over Next 100 Years
If history is any judge, the U.S. government will be paying for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars for the next century as service members and their families grapple with the sacrifices of combat.
An Associated Press analysis of federal payment records found that the government is still making monthly payments to relatives of Civil War veterans - 148 years after the conflict ended.
At the 10 year anniversary of the start of the Iraq war, more than $40 billion a year are going to compensate veterans and survivors from the Spanish-American War from 1898, World War I and II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the two Iraq campaigns and the Afghanistan conflict. And those costs are rising rapidly. ...
So far, the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and the first Persian Gulf conflict in the early 1990s are costing about $12 billion a year to compensate those who have left military service or family members of those who have died.
Those post-service compensation costs have totaled more than $50 billion since 2003, not including expenses of medical care and other benefits provided to veterans, and are poised to grow for many years to come.
The new veterans are filing for disabilities at historic rates, with about 45 percent of those from Iraq and Afghanistan seeking compensation for injuries. Many are seeking compensation for a variety of ailments at once.
Real liars go to Tehran
Title: The Case for Toppling Saddam. Author: Benjamin "Bibi" Netanyahu - then out of the Israeli government.
It's all here: a "dictator who is rapidly expanding his arsenal of biological and chemical weapons" and "who is feverishly trying to acquire nuclear weapons"; the Saddam equals Hitler parallel; the portrayal of (de facto nuclear power) Israel as helpless victims of Palestinian "terror"; the claim that Saddam could produce nuclear fuel "in centrifuges the size of washing machines that can be hidden throughout the country - and Iraq is a very big country"; the cheerleading of a unilateral pre-emptive strike; and the inevitable conclusion that "nothing less than dismantling his regime will do''.
Fast-forward over 10 years to this week in Israel. The scene: press conference of Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu and visiting US President Barack Obama. Anyone watching it live on al-Jazeera, from the Middle East to East Asia, must have thought they were watching a geopolitical Back to the Future - and frankly, Michael J Fox at least oozed charm.
No charm here; this was more like an eerie, suit-and-tie Return of the Living Dead. Bibi and Obama were at pains to stress the US-Israel bond was "eternal". Actually Bibi preferred to stress that Iran's (non-existent) nuclear weapons posed an existential threat to Israel. He repeated, over and over again, that Obama was adamant; Israel was entitled to do anything to defend itself, and its security would not be anyone's responsibility, even Washington's.
US General Downplays Scope and Significance of Guantánamo Hunger Strike
The general overseeing the Guantánamo military prison is reportedly downplaying the scope and significance of an ongoing hunger strike undertaken by detainees at the infamous detention center in an effort to highlight the "desperation and hopelessness of indefinite detention" and draw attention to the "normalization of Guantánamo."
Despite the fact that a number of the detainees have not eaten since February, "threatening the lives of many," General John Kelly testified before the House Armed Services committee on Wednesday that some prisoners "were eating a bit, but not a lot," and that it was "difficult to confirm how many of the inmates were on hunger strike, because the prisoners eat communally." ...
Omar Farah, an attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) representing a number of the detainees, said in an email that the strike is about these violations as well as the "normalization of Guantanamo," which he explains as the lack of plan or political will on the part of the President "to live up to his promise to close the prison."
Since its onset, there have been conflicting reports on the number of detainees participating in the hunger strike. Farah said that according to his clients, as of March 14, nearly 130 prisoners in Camp 6 and roughly 20 in Camp 5 were participating in the strike.
As New Drone Policy Is Weighed, Few Practical Effects Are Seen
In recent months, the criticism from human rights activists, United Nations officials and some friendly foreign governments has been joined by a number of former senior American military and intelligence officials who argue that the costs of the drone program might exceed its benefits. In the latest example, Gen. James E. Cartwright, the former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a favored adviser during Mr. Obama’s first term, expressed concern in a speech here on Thursday that America’s aggressive campaign of drone strikes could be undermining long-term efforts to battle extremism.
“We’re seeing that blowback,” General Cartwright, who is retired from the military, said at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. “If you’re trying to kill your way to a solution, no matter how precise you are, you’re going to upset people even if they’re not targeted.”
General Cartwright also expressed skepticism about the draft proposal to transfer some drone operations to the military, saying that he worried about a “blurring of the line” between soldiers and spies if the Pentagon was put in charge of drone operations in sovereign countries “outside a declared area of hostility.” He said that if there are problems with the drone program, moving it “from one part of the government to another” would not necessarily solve them.
Irony department:
Rachel Maddow mocks Republicans for repeatedly forgetting their own beliefs
On her show Thursday night, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow lampooned Republicans for having a flip-flopping problem, saying it appeared they did not seem to believe what they were actually supposed to believe.
“Why does this happen so much in Republican politics?” she wondered. “And how does the other party, or the country at large, argue policy with a party that so often does not even seem to know what their policy positions are, let alone actually believe in them?”
Maddow began by recounting House Speaker John Boehner’s latest flip-flop. The Republican from Ohio said Wednesday on CNN that a background check should be required for everyone who purchases a gun, but after the interview his office clarified he was actually opposed to universal background checks.
Assault weapons ban won't be in Democrats' Senate bill
WASHINGTON -- An assault weapons ban won't be in the gun-control legislation that Democrats bring to the Senate floor next month, a decision that means the ban's chances of survival now are all but hopeless.
The ban is the most controversial firearms restriction that President Barack Obama and other Democrats have pressed for since an assault-type weapon was used in the December massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn. Rejection by Congress would be a major victory for the National Rifle Association and its supporters and a setback for Obama and the provision's sponsor, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein.
In a tactical decision, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., concluded that including the prohibition in the gun bill would jeopardize the chances for passage of any firearms legislation at all, taking away votes that would be needed to overcome Republican attempts to block the Senate from even taking up the issue.
State Dept. Hid Contractor's Ties to Keystone XL Pipeline Company
Late on a Friday afternoon in early March, the State Department released a 2,000-page draft report downplaying the environmental risks of the northern portion of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, which would ferry oil from Canada's tar sands to refineries in Texas, passing through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma. But when it released the report, State hid an important fact from the public: Experts who helped draft the report had previously worked for TransCanada, the company looking to build the Keystone pipeline, and other energy companies poised to benefit from Keystone's construction. ...
The contractor that produced the bulk of the report was Environmental Resources Management (ERM), an international consulting firm. On the day the State Department published the Keystone impact report, the agency also released a cache of documents that ERM submitted in 2012 to win the contract to produce the Keystone environmental report. ... But there was something strange about ERM's conflict-of-interest filing: The bios for the ERM's experts were redacted.
Here's what those redactions kept secret: ERM's second-in-command on the Keystone report, Andrew Bielakowski, had worked on three previous pipeline projects for TransCanada over seven years as an outside consultant. He also consulted on projects for ExxonMobil, BP, and ConocoPhillips, three of the Big Five oil companies that could benefit from the Keystone XL project and increased extraction of heavy crude oil taken from the Canadian tar sands.
Another ERM employee who contributed to State's Keystone report—and whose prior work history was also redacted—previously worked for Shell Oil; a third worked as a consultant for Koch Gateway Pipeline Company, a subsidiary of Koch Industries. Shell and Koch* have a significant financial interest in the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. ERM itself has worked for Chevron, which has invested in Canadian tar sands extraction, according to its website.
Beekeepers and Public Interest Groups Sue EPA Over Bee-Toxic Pesticides
Today, a year after groups formally petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), four beekeepers and five environmental and consumer groups filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court against the agency for its failure to protect pollinators from dangerous pesticides. The coalition, represented by attorneys for the Center for Food Safety (CFS), seeks suspension of the registrations of insecticides that have repeatedly been identified as highly toxic to honey bees, clear causes of major bee kills and significant contributors to the devastating ongoing mortality of bees known as colony collapse disorder (CCD). The suit challenges EPA’s ongoing handling of the pesticides as well as the agency’s practice of “conditional registration” and labeling deficiencies.
“America’s beekeepers cannot survive for long with the toxic environment EPA has supported. Bee-toxic pesticides in dozens of widely used products, on top of many other stresses our industry faces, are killing our bees and threatening our livelihoods,” said plaintiff Steve Ellis, a Minnesota and California beekeeper. “Our country depends on bees for crop pollination and honey production. It’s time for EPA to recognize the value of bees to our food system and agricultural economy.”
The suit comes on the heels of a challenging season for California’s almond farmers, who produce 80% of the world’s almonds. Almond growers rely on beekeepers to bring literally billions of bees from across the country to pollinate their orchards. However, many beekeepers are reporting losses of over 50% this year and the shortages have left many California almond growers without enough bees to effectively pollinate their trees. This is a vivid demonstration of why the Plaintiffs are demanding EPA to classify these bee-toxic pesticides as an “imminent hazard” and move swiftly to restrict their use.
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin'
Cyprus bailout crisis: 'the next few hours will determine our fate' - live
Congress Never Fixed the Financial System … And Is About to Make It Even WORSE
Intentional Community Events: AZ CA IN MA MI MO NH ON OR PA TN VA WA
Robert Reich: Democrats Don't Do This, Do They?
Contrasts in Equality
A Little Night Music
Clarence Frogman Henry - This Time
Clarence Frogman Henry - Little Green Frog
Clarence "Frogman" Henry - I Don't Know Why I Love You
Clarence Frogman Henry - Lonely Street
Clarence Henry "Frog Man" - Troubles, Troubles
Clarence "Frogman" Henry - It Won't Be Long
Clarence Frogman Henry - I Found A Home
Clarence Frogman Henry - Come On And Dance
Clarence "Frogman" Henry - Teardrops From My Eyes
Clarence "Frogman" Henry - A Little Too Much
Clarence Frogman Henry - Socka-Diddley Alabama
Clarence "Frogman" Henry - Mohair Sam
Clarence 'Frogman' Henry - Lady With The Hat Box
Clarence "Frog Man" Henry - I'm a Country Boy
Clarence Frogman Henry - Ain't Got No Home (live)
It's National Pie Day!
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