Department of Justice

Spy 1: You can ask about ETF. . . . E-T-F. E, exchange.
Spy 2: Yes, got it.
Spy 1: How they are used, the mechanisms of use for destabilization of the markets.
Spy 2: Aha.
Spy 1: Then you can ask them what they think about limiting the use of trading robots. . . .

Just as people enjoy the presumption of innocence in a criminal trial, property owners never convicted or even charged with a crime should not be presumed guilty in civil asset forfeiture proceedings. The Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000 has proven inadequate for curbing abuses, as countless Americans across the nation, having done nothing wrong, continue to lose their homes, businesses, and, sometimes, their very lives to the aggressive, acquisitive policing that this law encourages. Civil asset forfeiture is a big challenge. While the Justice Department has recently stepped up to limit the scope of this problem, it is time for Congress to act.

In Related News: Western Politicians and Media Rush To Issue Tributes To King That Led The World In BEHEADINGS, FLOGGED Bloggers For Criticism & BANNED Women From Driving

Do you know what an “extremist” is? In the wake of the horrible terror attacks on the offices of Charlie Hebdo in France, Barack Obama is speaking very boldly about the need to win the war against “extremists”, and he has announced plans to host a major global summit on “extremism” next month. And on the surface that sounds great. But precisely how are we supposed to determine whether someone is an “extremist” or not? What criteria should we use?

Governments from Around the World ADMIT They Do It

As investors and market participants become increasingly aware of the regulatory failures that allowed for manipulation of LIBOR, FOREX, municipal bond bidding and certain commodities markets, regulatory sources are increasingly expressing concern that they have paid too little attention to potential manipulations of an arguably larger, more systemically important and less regulated market – the CDS market as self-governed, through ‘regulatory license’, by the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA).

• Christmas rally enters sixth day in Europe (Reuters)
• Downing North Korea's Internet not much of a scalp (Reuters)
• North Korean Internet Access Restored After Hours-Long Outage (BBG)
• At U.N. council, U.S. calls life in North Korea 'living nightmare' (Reuters)
• Ukraine Cuts Gold Reserve to Nine-Year Low as Russia Buys (BBG)
• De Blasio Seeks to Heal Rifts With Police After Officers Slain (BBG)
• Oil steady around $60 on hopes of strong U.S. data (Reuters) - so it fell below $60 because...
• Australian Dollar Hits Four and a Half Year Low on Chine Growth Worries (Reuters)

For many, if not most, companies and especially retailers, the great wildcard that is the "massive" Chinese market with the potential of hundreds of millions of buyers in the country's nascent middle class, has been a slam dunk when it comes to boosting stock prices. After all, what can go wrong? America's largest retailer was one of those hoping to capitalize on just this shareholder euphoria for Chinese exposure, and just like everyone else, it milked its Chinese exposure for many years. And then, unexpected everything did go wrong: as Bloomberg explains, "After years of heralding China as one of its best markets, Wal-Mart in August said its performance there was among the worst in its major countries." How is that possible? Read on to find out how Wal-Mart fabricated, lied and misled investors for years using every single trick in the book and then some.

Justice out of a job...

.Gov Tortured and Killed Innocent People for the Specific Purpose of Producing False Propaganda (U.S. Used C-O-M-M-U-N-I-S-T Techniques Specifically Designed to Produce F-A-L-S-E Confessions)

Also In the News:   Releasing the Torture Report Will Actually SAVE American Lives ... And Must-Know Facts about the Chokehold Killing of Eric Garner

Over a year ago we reported that one of Twitter early and most aggressive self-promoters, Anthony Davian, was busted for what was at the time financial Twitters' the first Ponzi Scheme.  Today, we can close the case on Athony Davian. As SIRF reports, "Anthony Davian, a once-prolific presence on social media who held himself out as a iconoclastic hedge fund manager prior to his August 2013 indictment on a series of fraud charges, was sentenced several hours ago in a Cleveland courtroom to four years and nine months in federal prison."

All of this mighty, tragic effort to prop up a matrix of lies might have gone into a set of activities aimed at preserving the project of remaining civilized. But that would have required the dismantling of rackets such as agri-business, big-box commerce, the medical-hostage game, the Happy Motoring channel-stuffing scam, the suburban sprawl “industry,” and the higher ed loan swindle. All of these evil systems have to go and must be replaced by more straightforward and honest endeavors aimed at growing food, doing trade, healing people, traveling, building places worth living in, and learning useful things.

Halliburton’s takeover of Baker Hughes is setting out to be the oil and gas merger of the year. One of the largest such deals in years, it has not, however, met with unanimous approval. From antitrust concerns to management frictions and negative market forces, this has not been a smooth ride. And with a $3.5 billion break-up fee promised to Baker Hughes by Halliburton should the merger fall through, failure would come at a hefty price. Here are five reasons why the deal might still capsize.

“There is a danger to democracy,” a Supreme Court spokesman said, “in having police infiltrate protests when there isn’t a reasonable basis to suspect criminality.” "It is impossible to tell how effective the government’s operations are or evaluate whether the benefits outweigh the costs, since little information about them is publicly disclosed." Just another day in the American oligarchy.