Afghanistan

Per the AP, the gunman in Arizona lawmaker's shooting identified as Jared Laughner, and the weapon used was a pistol with an extended magazine. According to Jay Bookman, Laughner is "ex-military and fought in Afghanistan."

Is America starting to wake up?

One of the traditional characteristics of the financial media world in the last few days of any given year is the veritable cornucopia of next year "predictions" from those who believe their opinions are relevant/important/credible. Of course, with this whole process being nothing but an exercise in vanity, and resulting in pervasive ridicule by the rest of the media world 365 days later, unless of course one has immaculate luck, in which case playing the lottery has far better fringe benefits, Zero Hedge has no interest in actually predicting parallel outcomes, when event iterations are serial and just getting the one main thing right usually ends up paying off in droves (as such our one and only very vague prediction for the end of 2011 is that the Fed will be one year closer to completely losing control of its centrally planned schizophrenic reality, and the market will be ever closer to realizing this). That said, the following list of forecasts by Charles Hugh Smith is certainly worth reading. And with gems such as: Markets in precious metals, oil, commodities, stocks and bonds will rise and fall in an unpredictable fashion; The SNAP food stamp program will be expanded to include cable TV
access to a new U.S. government-sponsored channel, "Bread and Circuses, and QE3 will include issuing U.S. Treasury bonds directly to households you know this may well be the only set of predictions that gets the outcome right in our Bizarro world, TheOnion-style centrally planned reality.

There were two things that surprised me this past year. First, was the effectiveness of propaganda and market manipulation. Despite, the obvious lack of any real economic recovery other than phony aggregate demand increases due to inflationary policies many people actually think things are getting better. The Larry Summers’ of the world and other economic magicians like him have one economic policy and that is expectations management, which really means create enough propaganda, push the stock market up, and people will then believe things are getting better and then things will get better in reality. I believe this policy has been half successful so far. It has been successful is kicking the can down the road but it has not been and will not be successful in improving the standards of living for the American people and it is becoming more and more widely understood that this “respite” is merely being used by the small oligarch class in Washington D.C. and Wall Street to steal what little is left and push the middle class into serfdom. When this thing collapses again let’s never lose sight of this and remember who did what during these days of “recovery.”..This is not to say I am bearish on mankind or the world 10-20 years from now. I am not. I think once we finish the next 5-10 years which could be very, very difficult we can emerge into a New Renaissance. We just need to clean out the trash first. That means the current group of political and economic leaders that have infected the global economy. My advice remains the same. You must accept the fact that the current model has failed and will be replaced. - Mike Krieger

To find out, we'll look at a couple comparisons to get an idea of what is going on in the rest of the economy. And then we'll compare the government's efforts in the 1930s to today ...

Snowpocalypse now?

You don't need to be Bill and Melinda Gates to give back to your community...

Two very important articles have come out in the last couple of days that you must take the time to read thoroughly. The first is from the Washington Post and is entitled: “Monitoring America.” It is a lengthy article worth your time since it shows in no uncertain terms how the U.S. government has now officially started to turn war on terror technology and military weaponry on American citizens domestically. Stuff that had formerly only been “used in Iraq or Afghanistan” is now being turned on Americans and this newspaper reports it in a matter of fact manner. It also describes how anyone can just say that they think a fellow citizen is acting suspiciously and then all of a sudden the government’s “fusion centers” start snooping on you and a file remains “open” for five years. For nothing more than someone saying they thought you were acting suspiciously. Welcome to East Germany. This is where tax dollars are going, that and to pay bankster bonuses. - Mike Krieger

One of F. William Engdahl’s latest articles is titled “Wikileaks, a Big Dangerous US Government Con Job”. In this article, Engdahl implies that Wikileaks is a US government-run propaganda operation with an end goal of restricting freedoms on the internet. Here are some of the key excerpts from this article.

Ben Bernanke is a highly educated PhD from Princeton who has never worked a day in the real world since he graduated from college in 1975. His entire life has been spent in the ivory tower of academia surrounded by models and theories that work perfectly in the comfort of his office. After building his reputation as an “expert” on the Great Depression by studying it and reaching the wrong conclusions, he came down from his ivory tower in 2002 to join an organization that has systematically destroyed the value of the US currency, thereby undermining the well being of the once vibrant middle class...If the Grinch had been pimping for a small pack of Grinchsters who impoverished the honest people of Whoville, then the Dr. Seuss poem would have perfectly described Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve and the banksters that run the show here in the USA. The actions taken by Ben Bernanke, Alan Greenspan and their brethren on the Federal Reserve over the last quarter century have destroyed the middle class and left senior citizens impoverished, while enriching its Wall Street masters. Now he is stealing Christmas from the hard working middle class of this country.

A number of readers have asked me to comment on WikiLeaks and the release of "secret" diplomatic/government cables and documents. (How "secret" were they if up to 3 million people had access to them?) I am going to connect a number of issues here by identifying the core contexts of the WikiLeaks controversy. That every nation requires diplomacy and a diplomatic corps is not in question, nor is the need for confidentiality in pursuing diplomacy. The need for Armed Forces to defend the nation against aggression is also not in question. What is in question is whether the American Empire is acting in the best interests of the U.S. and its citizenry. - Charles Hugh Smith

Brilliant plan, Brilliant!

If the shade of Adam Smith were to reappear today, he would be equally disturbed by the failure of the Bowles-Simpson commission to address the issue of war debts dealt.

"WikiLeaks coined a new type of journalism: scientific journalism. We work with other media outlets to bring people the news, but also to prove it is true. Scientific journalism allows you to read a news story, then to click online to see the original document it is based on. That way you can judge for yourself: Is the story true? Did the journalist report it accurately? Democratic societies need a strong media and WikiLeaks is part of that media. The media helps keep government honest. WikiLeaks has revealed some hard truths about the Iraq and Afghan wars, and broken stories about corporate corruption." Julian Assange, The Australian Op-Ed

Earlier today it was announced that in lieu of a physical arrest, Julian Assange is currently undergoing a liquidity one, after earlier today first Swiss NZZ and subsequently the WSJ reported that the Australian's funds in Swiss PostFinance bank have been frozen: "In a statement Monday, WikiLeaks said there was €31,000 in the PostFinance account, belonging to the defense fund and to Mr. Assange personally. WikiLeaks described this money as "frozen." But €31k may be a small price to pay knowing that very soon Assange will most likely succeed Ben Bernanke as the magazine's Person of the Year.