Barker's Newsbites: Friday, May 31, 2013

OK, folks, here's something I don't understand... however, first let me preface via recounting just a few of this morning's Drudge headlines:

Record Unemployment... in Europe

19.4 Million Unemployed... in Eurozone

Nearly 1 Out of Four People Unemployed... in Europe

Frankfort "Blockupy" Protesters Surround European Central Bank

I could go on and on, but you get the idea.

So here's what I don't understand: Why is the Euro worth $1.30 instead of... say... .48 cents U.S.?

Seriously... how could it be that the Euro - which debuted at a high of $1.15 on its launch day of January 5, 1999, but by June of 2001 had sunk to .85 cents U.S. - is now... today... worth $1.30?

Portugal... Italy... Ireland... Greece... Spain...

Think of how fucked up Europe is...?!?!

Seriously... wouldn't you think that rough parity would be the goal of the Oligarchs rather than having a Euro worth basically a third more than the Dollar?

Now if the Canadian dollar were worth $1.30 that would make sense! Canada is in pretty damn good shape compared to both America and the EuroZone! (But, no... one U.S. dollar buys CND 1.03)

Obviously the fix is in... but why...?

Anyway... that's my thought of the day!

Is It Just Me, Folks? (Obama's FBI... the Boston Bombers... Triple Murders... Disconnect After Disconnect After Disconnect...)

From the Washington Post... but written as if deliberately meant to confuse rather than enlighten:

A Chechen man who was fatally shot by an FBI agent last week during an interview about one of the Boston bombing suspects was unarmed, law enforcement officials said Wednesday.

(*PURSED LIPS*)

The FBI has provided few other details, saying that the matter is being investigated by an FBI review team that may not finish its probe for several months.

* WHY IN GOD'S NAME SHOULD IT TAKE "SEVERAL MONTHS...???"

At the time of the shooting, Ibragim Todashev was being interviewed about his possible connection to a triple murder in Waltham, Mass., on Sept. 11, 2011.

* AND THIS WAS AN FBI MATTER... WHY EXACTLY...???

Law enforcement officials said he had acknowledged involvement in the murders and had implicated Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

* OF BOSTON BOMBING INFAMY...

An air of mystery has surrounded the FBI shooting of Ibragim Todashev, 27, since it occurred in Todashev’s apartment early on the morning of May 22. The FBI said in a news release that day that Todashev, a former Boston resident who knew bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev, was killed during an interview with several law enforcement officers.

* FOLKS... EITHER THIS ARTICLE IS SIMPLY HORRIBLY WRITTEN... OR ELSE IT'S BEEN DELIBERATELY HORRIBLY WRITTEN SO AS TO CONFUSE READERS.

* HOW EXACTLY DID TODASHEV COME TO THE FBI's ATTENTION? WHAT CAME FIRST... THIS TRIPLE MURDER ON 9/11/11 OR THE BOSTON BOMBING AND TODASHEV's CONNECTION TO TSARNAEV?

Officials said Todashev was not suspected of involvement in the April 15 Boston bombing.

* SEE WHAT I MEAN, FOLKS...?! COULD BOTH THE REPORTERS AND THEIR EDITOR BE SO FRIGGIN' INCOMPETENT AS TO "ACCIDENTALLY" ALLOW THIS MESS TO BE PUBLISHED AS IS?!

In the statement about Todashev’s shooting issued on the day of the incident, the FBI said that an agent, along with two Massachusetts State Police troopers and other law enforcement personnel, were interviewing “an individual” in connection with the Boston Marathon bombing investigation when a “violent confrontation was initiated by the individual.”

* INTERVIEWING TADASHEV IN HIS APARTMENT... NOT AT THE STATION... NOT AT BOSTON FBI HQ? (WAS TADASHV UNDER ARREST AT THE TIME? WAS HE HANDCUFFED?)

An agent sustained non-life-threatening injuries, later described by one law enforcement official as “some cuts and abrasions.”

* UH-HUH...

Initial reports citing anonymous law-enforcement individuals provided conflicting accounts of what happened. Some law enforcement officials said Todashev wielded a knife and others suggested that he attempted to grab the FBI agent’s gun.

* UH-HUH...

One law enforcement official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation, said Wednesday that Todashev lunged at the agent and overturned a table. But the official said Todashev did not have a gun or a knife. A second official also said Todashev was unarmed.

* FOLKS... IS IT JUST ME...?!?!

An official said that according to one account of the shooting, the other law enforcement officials had just stepped out of the room, leaving the FBI agent alone with Todashev, when the confrontation occurred. The shooting followed hours of questioning by the law enforcement officials that had begun the night before.

* SO... HOURS UPON HOURS OF "QUESTIONING"... TAKING PLACE IN TADASHEV's OWN APARTMENT vs. TAKING HIM DOWN TO THE STATION... WHERE THERE ARE CAMERAS...?

* FOLKS... AGAIN... DOES ANY OF THIS RING TRUE TO YOU? AT BEST WE HAVE THE KEYSTONE COPS WITH FBI BADGES! (AT LEAST THAT'S HOW IT LOOKS VIA READING THIS ARTICLE!)

Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, May 30, 2013

"The purpose of taxation is redistribution of wealth."

WRONG...!!! (But we'll get to that in a moment...)

A fellow guest at a party I attended over the long Memorial Day weekend actually came out with the above absurd statement! (A Brit expat! A trained Barrister! An educated man!)

At first I thought he was joking. Indeed, upon the words leaving his lips, all I could visualize was Errol Flynn as Robin Hood!

(*GUFFAW*)

But, no... he was indeed serious.

I proposed to him that the only proper purpose of taxation was to fund necessary governmental activities (obviously the specifics are open to discussion, argument, and disagreement) benefiting one's locality/state/nation which were historically and reasonably the responsibility of government - national defense being the number one example; but he didn't buy it.

Oh, well... what can you do? This guy ain't alone... in fact, his attitude might be more the norm than mine nowadays.

(*SIGH*)

Anyway, folks... just a point to ponder... a philosophical question for each one of my readers to answer for himself or herself.

They Don't Even Attempt to Hide Their Contempt for "We The People"

The oligarchs don't even attempt to hide the fact that the rules don't apply to them...

A 20-year-old Virginia resident had possession of marijuana charges dismissed Wednesday morning following a brief appearance in a Fairfax County courtroom.

* BUT NOT JUST ANY 20-YEAR-OLD VIRGINIA RESIDENT!

Charles Ziller Hagel, a.k.a. “Zilla Thrilla,” the son of Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, appeared before Fairfax County Judge Thomas E. Gallahue during a brief criminal court appearance relating to the drug charge.

Hagel was arrested on May 19, 2012, and charged with possession of marijuana, a misdemeanor charge, according to court records.

Ziller was originally scheduled to appear in court on Aug. 8, 2012, but a continuance was granted.

* WHY...???

Three additional continuances were granted over the next several months...

* WHY...???

Hagel’s case was postponed on Aug. 27, 2012...

* WHY...???

Dec. 3, 1012...

* WHY...???

...and on March 6, 2012...

* WHY...???

...before Hagel finally appeared in court with lawyer on Wednesday.

Hagel, wearing a light blue dress shirt, sat next to his lawyer Nina Ginsberg until Judge Gallahue dismissed the charges...

* WHY...?!?!

...in a proceeding that lasted mere seconds.

* WHY...???

Asked why multiple continuances had been granted in the case, Ginsberg told the Washington Free Beacon that it “happens all the time.”

* THAT'S NOT AN ANSWER.

When pushed for a specific reason, she declined to discuss the matter further.

* AND THIS IS ACCEPTABLE..?!?!

Hagel travelled with his father to Israel in April as the drug charge pended.

* NICE...

Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, May 29, 2013

So... Michele Bachmann is calling it quits after this, her fourth term, is up.

She announced in a video released yesterday that she won't be running for a fifth term.

Well... GOOD RIDDANCE says I!

Yep... after she announced her "surrender" to the RINOs in January via voting to re-elect Boehner (the Brainless and Ballless) to the House Speakership I washed my hands of her.

Remember, folks... Bachmann was the one who after having the courage to run for GOP nomination for president then showed even more courage by trying to "out" the corrupt forces within the Clinton State Department prior to the debacle in Benghazi... but after being shut down by Boehner and McCain(iac) that was the apparent end of her standing on principle.

I can't explain how today's GOP came to be today's GOP, but I will tell you this, folks - it's a disaster for the country.

For all intents and purposes we have a one-party progressive corporatist (fascist) oligarchy running American - and the world - off the road of liberty, progress, and prosperity. Indeed, just speaking financially, the oligarchs are robbing us blind. The Fed/Wall Street Dempublicans and Republicrats steer low interest due direct federal loans to the "private" banks who then turn around and "invest" them at slightly higher interest in Treasury bonds... and so it goes and so it goes as the debt pile up and the taxpayer who ends up paying via inflation also ends up holding the bag when eventually the whole mess blows up.

Liberty? The Constitution? A mere handful of Republican elected officials give a damn about the American Creed... American Ideals... Republican (as in "Republic") Ideals...

Those of you who read my newsbites and have the courage and intellect to face the truth know that I do not exaggerate! We've got some state governors who are worth a damn... four, five, maybe six U.S. senators... perhaps a couple... maybe three dozen (tops!) members of the House...

(*SHRUG*)

See, folks, the Democrats were smart! Back in the 19th and early 20th century the Republicans were known as the "Party of the Rich." (Fairly? Unfairly? It doesn't matter!) The problem with such a bedrock is that it's small. There are relatively few truly rich individuals and at the higher levels the richest of the rich get to have oversized influence over "their" party regardless of whether we're talking the Democrat or Republican Party! What the Democrats realized is that with their base of the poor and the unions along with their "share" of the truly wealthy, the way to lock in control was to become the party of the upper middle class... the professional managerial class... those who run government on a day to day basis, who run the educational and healthcare infrastructure...

(*SHRUG*)

Anyway, folks, my point - to wrap up from whence we started - is simply this: It doesn't matter that Bachmann is gone... she's been gone... she "left" in January - five months ago!

What does matter is that there aren't enough Ted Cruz and Rand Paul Republicans and thus when it comes right down to it...

(*SIGH*)

...for all intents and purposes your choices at the ballot box come down to Democrat vs. Democrat Lite - aka: RINO.

Woodrow Wilson Obama...

 If reading the second to last paragraph doesn't give you pause...

(*SHRUG*)

There is one problem with the entirely justified if self-interested media squawking about the Justice Department’s snooping into the phone records of multiple Associated Press reporters and Fox News’s James Rosen.

The problem is that what the AP reporters and Rosen did arguably violates the letter of the law.

The search warrant in the Rosen case cites Section 793(d) of Title 18 of the U.S. Code.

Section 793(d) says that a person lawfully in possession of information that the government has classified as secret who turns it over to someone not lawfully entitled to posses it has committed a crime.

That might cover Rosen’s source.

Section 793(g) is a conspiracy count that says that anyone who conspires to help the source do that has committed the same crime.

That would be the reporter.

It sounds as though this law criminalizes a lot of journalism. You might wonder how such a law ever got passed and why, for the last 90 years, it has very seldom produced prosecutions and investigations of journalists.

The answer: This is the Espionage Act of 1917, passed two months after the United States entered World War I.

* AND DEMOCRAT WOODROW WILSON WAS A PROGRESSIVE FASCIST... AND RACIST... AND ANTI-SEMITE...

* DON'T BELIEVE ME...? DO A BIT OF RESEARCH. YES... I UNDERSTAND MANY OF YOU DIDN'T LEARN THIS IN SCHOOL. THAT WAS DELIBERATE.

(*SHRUG*)

In his 1998 book Secrecy, the late senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan tells the story of how it came into being: Congress was responding to incidents of German espionage before the declaration of war. In July 1916, German agents blew up the Black Tom munitions dump in New York Harbor. The explosion was loud enough to be heard in Connecticut and Maryland. The Espionage Act was passed with bipartisan support in a Democratic Congress and strongly supported by President Woodrow Wilson, also a Democrat.

* HMM... I WONDER WHAT SPECIFICS I'D FIND IF I WERE TAKE THE TIME TO LOOK? I WONDER HOW MANY DEMOCRATS JOINED HOW MANY REPUBLICANS IN UNSUCCESSFULLY OPPOSING THE LEGISLATION...

Wilson wanted even more.

“Authority to exercise censorship over the press,” he wrote a senator, “is absolutely necessary.”

Wilson got that authority in May 1918 when Congress passed the Sedition Act, criminalizing, among other things, “abusive language” about the government.

* AGAIN, FOLKS... IF YOU'VE NEVER HEARD OF THIS... TIME TO PONDER WHY NOT.

(*SHRUG*)

[Democrat] Wilson’s Justice Department successfully prosecuted Eugene Debs, the Socialist candidate who received 900,000 votes for president in 1912, for making statements opposing the war. The Wilson administration barred Socialist newspapers from the mails, jailed a filmmaker for making a movie about the Revolutionary War (don’t rile our British allies), and prosecuted a minister who claimed Jesus was a pacifist. German-language books were removed from libraries, German-language newspapers were forced out of business, and one state banned speaking German outdoors.

It was an ugly period in our history. It’s also a reminder that big-government liberals can be as much inclined to suppress civil liberties as small-government conservatives can — or more so.

* EVEN MORE SO...

(*NOD*)

* INDEED... FAR MORE SO! SMALL GOVERNMENT CONSERVATIVES ARE PEOPLE LIKE ME... BIG GOVERNMENT RINOs ARE PEOPLE LIKE GEORGE W. BUSH AND JOHN S. MCCAIN!

* MY FRIENDS... UNDERSTAND... THERE ARE MAYBE 6 GOP SENATORS YOU CAN REALLY TRUST... PERHAPS 25 GOP HOUSE MEMBERS; THE OLIGARCHY IS BIPARTISAN!

Fortunately, things changed after Wilson left office. A Republican Congress allowed the Sedition Act to expire in 1921.

* A REPUBLICAN CONGRESS...

Debs received 915,000 votes for president in 1920 while in Atlanta federal prison, but President Warren Harding, a former journalist and a Republican, commuted Debs’s sentence to time served, effective Christmas day 1921, and invited him to the White House.

* HARDING... REPUBLICAN...

The Espionage Act of 1917 remained on the books and was amended to cover news media. But it was used sparingly. Franklin Roosevelt, who served in the Wilson administration, didn’t use it in World War II. When his attorney general urged him to prosecute the Chicago Tribune for a story three days before Pearl Harbor that detailed military plans for a possible world war, he brushed the recommendation aside. That despite the fact that New Deal Democrats were as paranoid about the Republican and isolationist Tribune as conservatives have been in recent times about the New York Times.

Roosevelt did order the internment of West Coast Japanese Americans in 1942.

* WHILE LARGELY REFUSING TO ALLOW FEDERAL POWER TO BE USED TO PREVENT AND PUNISH LYNCHINGS IN THE THEN-SOLID DEMOCRAT SOUTH...

(*SHRUG*)

* HISTORY... IT'S A BITCH, AIN'T IT?

But an act apologizing for that and providing restitution was passed with bipartisan majorities and signed by Ronald Reagan in 1988.

* PRESIDENT RONALD REAGAN...

Presidents and attorneys general of both parties have been reluctant to use the Espionage Act when secret information has been leaked to the press because they have recognized that it is overbroad. They have understood, as Moynihan argues in "Secrecy", that government classifies far too many things as secrets, even as it has often failed to protect information that truly needs to stay secret.

(*NOD*)

Barack Obama and his Justice Department seem to be of a different mind. They have used the Espionage Act of 1917 six times to bring cases against government officials for leaks to the media — twice as many as all their predecessors combined.

* TWICE AS MANY AS ALL THEIR PREDECESSORS COMBINED...

* FOLKS... JUST THINK ABOUT THAT...

“Gradually, over time,” Moynihan writes, “American government became careful about liberties.” Now, suddenly, it seems to be moving in the other direction.