A Thing of Beauty
A Dragon’s Blood Tree from Socotra Island
“A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
…
Evans-Pritchard on G-20
A single clause in Point 19 of the communiqué issued by the G20 leaders amounts to revolution in the global financial order.
“We have agreed to support a general SDR allocation which will inject …
Don't You Just Love a Good Pump and Dump?
While most investors are worried about the sorry state of the global markets, Soros finds the economic gloom-and-doom “exhilarating,” and reckons a full-blown depression is inevitable. “I have to admi…
WSJ on Treasury's Very Private Asset Fund
The investment community was already suspicious last week when Secretary Timothy Geithner unveiled his plan, announcing that Treasury would select four or five companies as “fund managers” to purcha…
Kauffman Economic Bloggers Survey
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (April 1, 2009) — America’s top economics bloggers—a diverse group of writers with wide-ranging intellectual and political vantage points—largely agree on one important issu…
G20 Communiqué
This is the full version of the communique agreed by the G20 group in London today.
1. We, the Leaders of the Group of Twenty, met in London on 2 April 2009.
2. We face the greatest challenge to the…
The Queen Gives Orwell's 1984 to President of Mexico
At Buckingham Palace, Felipe Calderon was presented with a first edition of George Orwell’s nightmarish book, which tells of a totalitarian regime and coined the concept Big Brother.
The Royal Hou…
G This and G That
The G-20 Meeting in London this week is a reminder that many of us do not know exactly who it is that is getting together to squabble our way to one world government. Here are definitions of G-7, G-…
DOJ Litigation Case Management System
One of the great mysteries is who controls, uses and really has access to the Department of Justice’s information and data systems. The idea of private corporations building and managing such systems…
Vandana Shiva: The Future of Food and Seed
Click Here to View
Max Keiser on Bankers Bonuses Face Off – 27 March 2009
Max Keiser: ….they (Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan et al) are systematically undermining the entire system. They are creating a mechanism to carve out equity and capital for themselves at the expense of …
Geithner's Plan: $1 Trillion for Shredding?
Jim Sinclair of MineSet.com reports that James Galbraith, author of The Geithner Plan Won’t Work, was on Bloomberg TV this morning and noted the mortgage collateral fraud that I have been warning ab…
Health Revolution Petition
“We, the People of these United States of America, hereby call for revolutionary changes in our health care system that encourage health and prosperity instead of disease and corporate profit.”
. …
A Comment on Geithner's Plan
By Carolyn Betts
I am an attorney who was working in Washington with RTC during the S&L crisis, so I know something about “toxic asset” sales. I have been poking around the legal and contractin…
Details on Treasury Public Private Partnership Investment Program
From The U.S. Department of the Treasury Press Room
Treasury Press Release
Fact Sheet (PDF)
White Paper and FAQs
Catherine’s comments on her Community Business segment on Flashpoints on how to …
Happy Birthday, Solari!
Today is Solari’s birthday.
We started operations on March 22, 1998. I was sitting in a beautiful mansion in Washington staring at a blank piece of paper as most everyone I knew told me my life was o…
Attack on Credit Unions?
Credit unions have provided a serious alternative to banking with big banks. Their strength in their communities commands a market share that the big banks want. So this news is ominous. Given what I …
The Goldman Trough
I must say, it sure pays to have the Secretary of Treasury working for you and your partners instead of for the citizens or the good of the whole.
I just finished reading Goldman Sach’s latest Form 1…
How is Your Pension Fund Doing?
With special thanks to one of our favorite sources, Jim Willie at Golden Jackass, here is a roundup of some of articles that indicate the growing challenges faced by pension funds.
Ever wonder why yo…
Flawed Food Safety Bills in Congress
We have received many e-mails about the Food Safety Bills introduced in Congress. We share your concerns. One of our most trusted sources on food issues is the Weston A. Price Foundation. Here is thei…
Is the Baltic Dry Index Rising?
Wikipedia on the Baltic Dry Index
Great Time to Cut Operations at the SEC, Huh?
“Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Mary Schapiro warned yesterday that the agency will “make significant cuts in its current operations” this year unless Congress authorizes it to spend more…
Groundwater Resources of the World
View larger map here.
Find this map at: WhyMap.org
Stewart vs Cramer
“You knew what the banks were doing and yet were touting it for months and months – the entire network was. And so now to pretend that this was some sort of crazy once in a lifetime tsunami that nobod…
The Fed Did Indeed Cause the Housing Bubble
To: The Wall Street Journal
Re: “The Fed Didn’t Cause the Housing Bubble”
By: Alan Greenspan, former Chairman of the Federal Reserve
Dated: Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Ladies and Gentlemen:
In hi…
Hersh on Government Assassinations
Investigative Reporter Seymour Hersh Describes ‘Executive Assassination Ring’
Minnesota Post (11 March 09)
Catherine Austin Fitts at GoldRush 21 (August 2005)
Catherine Austin Fitts speaking at the GoldRush 21 conference held in Dawson City, Yukon Canada on August 7-9 2005 – predicts current crisis and the importance of Main Street to real solutions.
Dirty, Dirty…
Congress Saves on Online Contracts: Senate Makes Major Concession in Stripping Internet Posting Provision from Stimulus
Internet junkies and wonks alike may have jumped the gun in looking forward to …
The Illustrations the New York Times Paid Money Not To Print
This Kissinger image (by David Levine) is one of 320 illustrations—by 142 of the world’s most acclaimed contemporary artists – that The New York Times itself originally commissioned for its Op-Ed …
Confiscation = Government Run
If the Administration wants to provide bailout relief, here is a simple solution. Waive taxes on 401ks and IRAs and allow Americans to withdraw all monies tax free so they can reinvest in real asset…
Bailout Mo’ Money
We thought we would dig out the data to update Bloomberg’s calculation of November 2008 that totaled the bank bailouts at $8.5 trillion.
Here is our list of additional commitments:
I. $750 Billi…
Cash On The Sidelines
Click here to view larger charts.
A New Beginning
Tom Fox Photography
Most Foreclosures Pack Into a Few Counties
STATE-BY-STATE GRAPHIC: Foreclosures in 2008
WASHINGTON — More than half of the nation’s foreclosures last year took place in 35 counties, a sign that the financial crisis devastating the nationa…
Sound Advice From Don Coxe
“Believing that you could put together bad stuff with good stuff, mix it up, and make it great stuff, is the debauched, debased, phony belief system that brought down Wall Street.
Believing that you…
The Race to Zero
“I was standing there, about to put a dollar bill into a vending machine, and it hit me: I could use my dollar to buy a pack of gum or a package of mints, or else I could use my dollar to buy a shar…
Brother, Can You Spare a Trillion?
The full page ad in Ruppert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal for its “Future of Finance Initiative” starts off by saying that the financial system has stopped working.
I completely disagree.
The fina…
Beware the Privatization of State and Local Assets
At its beginning, the ruling powers in Great Britain embarked on one of the most sustained efforts to destroy community life ever undertaken.
From 1770 to 1830 some 3,280 enclosure bills were passed …
Proposed U.S. Budget
The new budget tells the story. The U.S. government collects taxes from Americans and debt tithes globally and then gives the money to the banks and funds the military.
Proposed US Budget
Global Re…
Sam Smith Moves To Maine
The Progressive Review is one of the finest news sources around. It’s esteemed publisher is proof positive that not everyone who graduates from Harvard goes along with the game. Sam’s comments on le…
Help Keep GATA Going
A Challenge From a Tennessee Hillbilly to Help GATA
By Chris Powell – GATA (3 Mar 09)
“Thanks to some of you, GATA has met the two $300 matching contribution challenges we were given during the Phoe…
Numbers in the News
Mathematicians Discover the Largest Number
Consent of the Governed Blog (11 Feb 2009)
PALO ALTO, CA – An international mathematics research team announced today that they had discovered a new integ…
Charles Walters: 1926 ~ 2009
“It’s with great sadness that we pass along the news that Acres U.S.A. founder/executive editor Charles Walters passed away on January 14, 2009…”
. . . view the rest of the Acres, USA article
Paul Harvey: 1918 ~ 2009
Paul Harvey at Wikipedia
Paul Harvey Tribute – ABC
Broadcasting Pioneer Paul Harvey Dies at Age 90 – Yahoo.com
The China Question
There is a Internet rumor that the U.S. has granted the Chinese the power of eminent domain if the U.S. defaults on its debt. This does indeed raise the question: “What is the U.S. giving the Chine…
Water Wonders
Simple elixir called a ‘miracle liquid’
Los Angeles Times – By Marla Dickerson (23 Feb 2009)
Sales of "Atlas Shrugged" Soar
Sales of “Atlas Shrugged” Soar in the Face of Economic Crisis
Washington, D.C., February 23, 2009—Sales of Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged” have almost tripled over the first seven weeks of …
Letter to the Editor
Editor, The Nation
Ladies and Gentlemen:
On February 13th, you published “The Peterson Foundation Responds” by David Walker, CEO of The Peterson Foundation (See Peterson Foundation Tax Return, Pet…
Financial Coup d'Etat & Your 401k: Uh-oh
Now that social security is being looted, the time has come to replenish it with the remaining balances in our 401k’s.
The George Orwell award to Dean Baker, who thinks the solution is to give the go…
Bubba Goes Green; Fox is Miffed
This first video is a documentary which describes a Southern Christian community exploring the creation of an ethanol business for energy independence and other businesses to build local self-sufficie…
The Data Beast – Part VI
In Stanley Kubrick’s thriller, Eyes Wide Shut, we watch as Dr. Bill Harford (played by Tom Cruise) attends a private party given by a secret society whose members have the power, among other things,…
Understanding Financial Terminology
Step one to understanding the economy and finance is simply understanding the accounting and financial terms that are new to you or which you do not understand. I usually start with a good dictionary …
Looting Social Security
William Greider of The Nation has written a excellent description of the coming assault on the social safety net.
Trillions have been stolen, yet rather than recapture it and hold people accountab…
Bank Nationalization
A question in from a network member:
So I would like your take on the situation: Is the movement to nationalize banks:
a way to increase productivity and predictability – by eliminating a
whole la…
Rigorous Intuition
In 1997, a strategic planning group at the CIA made a visit to my company in Washington. They brought with them a woman whose job and title were classified. I was not allowed to know them. She com…
John Taylor Gatto
I just heard a recording of an outstanding speech by John Taylor Gatto called “A Short, Angry History of Modern Schooling.” Check out his website. If you feel like you are only one person, check out…
Seed Monopolists
From “Planting Seeds” in The Guardian in January:
“Bill and Melinda Gates hate controversy, but the world’s top philanthropists do seem to be moving ever deeper into political lobbying. They’ve jus…
Kiss an Entreprenuer Today!
Did you know that from 1980-2005, firms less than five years old accounted for all net job growth in the United States? This statistic is one of many from a great new Research Roundup from the Kauff…
State & Local Tax Receipts
Weakness Unmatched in 35 Years
Investor’s Insight (16 Feb 2009)
In From a Reader – An Experience with Bank of America
Catherine,
I’ve been visiting Solari for about a year, and I want to thank you for the information you provide.
I want to relate an experience I had with Bank of America lately. I’ve banked there fo…
States vs. Feds
There is a war going on but it is not one we are reading about in the news.
As tax revenues decline, the federal government can operate with deficits. By law, states and counties must balance their…
Nassim Taleb & the Black Swan
Nassim Taleb, author of The Black Swan, talks straight about bailouts and makes sound suggestions about solutions. For example, how can you fix anything if you leave in charge the people who created t…
The Stimulus Wiki
Here is a great idea – using wiki technology to bring transparency to government spending, starting with the stimulus package.
The Stimulus Wiki
OK, anyone want to wikify the bailout?
From the Netherlands
View this slide show from a network member:
Understanding and Navigating the Economic Crisis update
Lots of suggestions to help you take action.
Happy Valentine's Day!
My favorite man came over this afternoon with a pink rose and a card. The cover read: ” Please, please, please, please be my Valentine!” I opened it and the inside said: “What? You will? How cool is…
Highlights of The Stimulus Bill
The Associated Press breakdown of approximately $700 billion of the $789 billion economic stimulus bill agreed to by the Senate and House:
Aid To Poor And Unemployed
$40 billion to provide extende…
The Data Beast – Part V
Aaron Russo was a fearless, talented, capable man. He loved life and people. He could not fathom why millions of Americans were adapting to fascism. I got to know Aaron while he was filming “America: …
The Data Beast – Part IV
From Sam Smith
The Progressive Review – 11 Feb 2009
Washington Monthly – The National Coordinator for Health Information Technology isn’t “new”; it was created by George W. Bush five years ago. More …
The Data Beast – Part III
I grew up next to a University campus. My parents loved to learn. Our home was filled with books and people from diverse backgrounds.
One of my mother’s best friends had narrowly escaped the German…
Credit Freeze
I froze my credit recently.
Forty-seven states and the District of Columbia have enacted laws requiring the credit bureaus to enable consumers to protect their credit files with a security freeze.
…
The Data Beast – Part II
In assessing the advisability of a national health database, it is valuable to understand that a national health database will be:
one of many databases containing data about you that will feed p…
The Financial Stability Plan
Here is the fact sheet and the new website for the Administration’s Financial Stability Plan.
Lord Acton once said, “The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought soo…
US Government Debt Grows
“The net supply of Treasurys in 2009 and 2010 combined seems likely to total more than $3 trillion and could climb as high as $4 trillion. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates the 2009 Fe…
The Data Beast – Part I
When I served as Assistant Secretary of Housing at the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) in the first Bush Administration, I discovered that the government was paying billions of dol…
Financial Permaculture: What Is It?
Financial Permaculture on Vimeo.
Watch the video from the first-ever Financial Permaculture Summit in Hohenwald, Tennessee.
New Hampshire Explains the Law to the Federal Government
Here is a copy of House Resolution 6 being discussed by the New Hampshire Legislature. It certainly sets some limitations on the Presidency and the Congress …
Continue reading on Jesse’s Café Am…
Executive Order on Health Information Technology
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (popularly referred to as the President’s economic stimulus plan) as engrossed in the House of Representatives (as HR 1), Section 9202 “Investment …
Produce the Note
Here is an excellent idea from one of our finest Congressional Representatives: Ohio Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur.
View the Mortgage Squatting video on YouTube
By Catherine | Economy-&-Financial-Markets | library.solari.com | Mortgage Markets | News & Commentary | Precious Metals & Currencies
If Goldman Did Not Need the Money, Why Did They Take It?
Bloomberg News: Goldman Sachs Group Inc. wants to repay the $10 billion it got from the U.S. Treasury last year to signal the firm is healthy and to escape limitations that were imposed with the mon…
Derivatives R' Us
Rob Kirby of Kirby Analytics is the Sherlock Holmes on the tail of the derivatives cabal. Here is the product of his latest sleuthing.
Rethinking Diversification
[Originally Posted on Feb 2, 2009]
For our entire lives, most of us have depended on highly centralized systems. Our food comes from a thousand or more miles away. Our savings is shipped in…
Look at the Time
Occasionally I have someone tell me that they have to subscribe to corporate media because they need to know what “they” are saying. I understand how these people feel. I broke down two years ago an…
Wall Street Bailout Exceeds Cost of All U.S. Wars Combined
The following appeared in the Rock Creek Free Press
Casey Research, of Vermont, has analyzed the costs of the government bailouts of the housing crisis, the credit crisis and others and has conclud…
The Dow: 2009 vs. 1929
Mark Lundeen each week sends me his comparison of the Dow Jones Industrial Average decline since October 2007 relative to declines after September 1929. Given the dependency of large cap stocks on ear…
US State & Local Government Pension Funds
According to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, in The Funding Status of Locally Administered Pension Plans by Alicia H. Munnell, Jean-Pierre Aubry, and Kelly Haverstick, US state a…
More on NAIS
The Department of Agriculture continues its efforts to implement the National Animal Identification System. Here are proposed new rules published on January 13, 2009.
What Companies Are Actually Doing Well?
According to a NY Times article, the following industries have experienced significant sales growth in the last 12 months (privately owned companies only):
View a complete list in the NY Times arti…
SEC Eliminates Paper Certificates for Withdrawals-by-Transfer
Well, we have swapped real assets for paper. Now we cannot even get the paper:
SEC Approves Eliminating Paper Certificates for Withdrawals-by-Transfer
IRA Rollovers:Tax Laws Affecting Investors
Leaving your current place of employment? Here are frequently asked questions about IRA rollovers from employee sponsored plans.
Read the complete article …
The Fed’s Blueprint for Market Intervention
by James Turk
Read the full article on gata.org
An important document buried in the Federal Reserve’s archives has been discovered by writer and researcher Elaine Supkis. This document is posted on…
Money R' Us: We Break It, We Fix It
Larry Summers, engineer of the housing bubble and gold price suppression, is returning to power on Monday. Ditto, the folks who lost $3.3 trillion at the Pentagon.
Now Paul Volcker, former Fed Chai…