Internet Controls for National Security and China Dumps U.S. Assets

Under the guise of “protecting Americans” and choosing itself in so-called “national security,” the current Obama administration wants to be able to control the ability of people and organizations to access the Internet.

This concept on its face seems very harmless and in the best interest of the country, however, having the ability to “turn the Internet off or shutting down sites that Obama considers “dangerous” including particular political groups, individuals or organizations who espouse differing views has far reaching political, financial, moral and legal implications.

Such a policy imposed under Executive Order to control what enters Internet sites and what is shared daily would stifle free speech in direct violation of the First Amendment rights of all Americans.

During the elections in Iran, its citizens using Facebook and Twitter got out 95% of the news from Iran. In America would our social sites be shut down if enough people using them “dared” to question the current political regime in power at any given time? Sitting ominously in the Senate is the Rockefeller Bill S. 773 to takeover the Internet in emergencies. As we all know, once taken over, we will never get it back the way it was before. This is what elitists have in mind for us.

America’s brightest minds and taxpayers funds made the Internet happen, and now there are indications that the Obama administration is moving quietly to allow control of the web to move from the US to foreign powers. Such a transfer of power and control would change the future of mankind. This would be affected via our Department of Commerce.

America controls the Internet via the Domain name System (DNS), and the servers that serve the Internet. They are managed by IANA, the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, which operates via the Department of Commerce, being responsible for global cooperation and coordination of the DNS, IP addressing, and other Internet protocol sources. Without these elements one would not have access to the Internet. 

Over the years, the UN and others internationally have been pressing the US to give away control and management to an international body.  Those thirsting for this power are the UN and the International Telecommunications Union, which coordinates international telephone communications. Their argument is that the Internet has become a powerful and dependent form of communications, that is dangerous and inequitable for one nation to control and manage.

Our President has agreed to relinquish some control over IANA and its governance. Foreign companies and countries would have a greater say in what goes on in the Internet. This is the foot in the door. Before you know it the UN will have control and censorship will begin. No control should be given to any other country or body. It is not only our Internet; it is a matter of national security, which our government is up too. The world has been allowed to share this miracle free and without censorship or restriction. Do we want to end up like the Chinese, where their communist government recently told Google to censor the Internet? Do we want the UN to use the Internet as a source of funding? Do we want the UN or any participant country to restrict what we can say or do on the net? Do we want limitations on free speech? That is what the UN has planned for us. The Internet will no longer be a vehicle of free speech. Why would we want to give away one of our most precious and greatest assets for nothing to a group that is bent on enslaving us via one-world government? Once our control is gone we will never get it back.

The Council on Foreign Relations, literary house organ that we have subscribed to for 50 years, Foreign Affairs, tells us that many governments feel that, like the telephone network, the Internet should be administered under a multilateral treaty. They view ICANN as an instrument of American hegemony over cyberspace and that its private-sector approach favors the US and gives it oversight authority, and that other nations have no say as to what goes on in the Internet. Then again, we did invent it and do own it. Its private construction was deliberately implemented to keep government out of the net, not for the US or any other government or body to control it. South Africa, Brazil and China as stooges for one-world interests are demanding an international treaty, so the UN can control it. Adding to the demands are the intellectually void countries of Zimbabwe, Cuba and Syria. These three paragons of peace and prosperity want the UN to tell us how to run our Internet.

UN bureaucrats and ministers from under-developed nations in particular say the US has undue influence over how things run on line. They want a treaty under which their regimes cannot be criticized. They want Internet surveillance and the power to tax domain names to pay for universal access and, of course, to fund their regimes. They in their protestations have no intention of stopping spam because much of it emanates from their countries. They want all kinds of censorship. Can you imagine what China or Cuba’s demands would be? China and Cuba are both dictatorships. Why would such one-party states be allowed in the UN, never mind telling us how censorship would work? Both jail people for political decent and sometimes execute them. We can also throw Iran in for good measure. This is a nation with one political party that in 2003 jailed 80 journalists and activists. Then Iran wants UN control so that thousands of immoral websites can be banned. This war by the internationalists to control the Internet is not new. It began in 1999. That is when the UN proposed taxing all e-mail messages to pay for development aid.

You cannot legislate morals. That is reflected in our unsuccessful ventures into legislation of alcohol, drugs, sex and tobacco and now the UN wants to legislate all kinds of content. Are we to allow the curtailment of our First Amendment rights? We do not think so. Are we to tolerate Cyber Patrols or Net Nannies?

In addition we now have cyber crime investigators pushing for the creation of a national web interface linking police computers. 89% of police say they want to look into e-mail accounts in a broad push by law enforcement agencies to alter the ground rules of online investigations. They want laws requiring Internet companies to store data for up to five years and they want instant access to police inquiries instead of waiting hours or days for responses from Internet companies. They want emergency access like the FBI had and terribly abused that privilege to get phone numbers. In the Internet the police want information now not after a review of whether the request is appropriate.

This is where the President wants to take us and we do not like it. Be sure to contract your house and Senate representatives and let them know how you feel about this abridgment of your privacy and your rights. If you do not act now, it may be too late later.

  US banks have $176 billion in exposure to Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain, with risks concentrated among the 10 largest U.S. banks, Barclays Capital said on Tuesday.

    Looks like more socialism and debt is on the way.  A jobs-creation bill that could pass the Senate this week would delay a scheduled 20 percent reduction in doctor payments under the Medicare health-insurance program… 

           The bill also extends soon-to-expire jobless payments, healthcare subsidies for the unemployed and highway-funding programs, according to the text of the bill, which has not yet been introduced.

  Senior Chinese military officers have proposed that their country boost defense spending, adjust PLA deployments, and possibly sell some US bonds to punish Washington for its latest round of arms sales to Taiwan. 

  Here’s a more troubling story.  The Asia Times: China Dumps US Asset Backeds and Corporates Dollar-denominated risk assets, including asset-backed securities and corporates, are no longer wanted at the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE), nor at China’s large commercial banks. The Chinese government has ordered its reserve managers to divest itself of riskier securities and hold only 

Treasuries and US agency debt with an implicit or explicit government guarantee. This already has been communicated to American securities dealers, according to market participants with direct knowledge of the events. 

           It is not clear whether China’s motive is simple risk aversion in the wake of a sharp widening of corporate and mortgage spreads during the past two weeks, or whether there also is a political dimension.   blog.atimes.net/?p=1352

  Another significant story that was ignored -  Der Spiegel: How Goldman Sachs Helped Greece to Mask its True Debt   Goldman Sachs helped the Greek government to mask the true extent of its deficit with the help of a derivatives deal that legally circumvented the EU Maastricht deficit rules. At some point the so-called cross currency swaps will mature, and swell the country’s already bloated deficit. 

          “Around 2002 in particular, various investment banks offered complex financial products with which governments could push part of their liabilities into the future,” one insider recalled, adding that Mediterranean countries had snapped up such products. 

          Greece’s debt managers agreed a huge deal with the savvy bankers of US investment bank Goldman Sachs at the start of 2002. The deal involved so-called cross-currency swaps in which government debt issued in dollars and yen was swapped for euro debt for a certain period — to be exchanged back into the original currencies at a later date.  

          At some point Greece will have to pay up for its swap transactions, and that will impact its deficit. The bond maturities range between 10 and 15 years. Goldman Sachs charged a hefty commission for the deal and sold the swaps on to a Greek bank in 2005.

www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,676634,00.html

The outlook of small business owners remained bleak at the start of the new year, according to a survey released on Tuesday by the National Federation of Independent Business. 

           “Small business owners entered 2010 the same way they left 2009 — depressed,” the group said, noting its Small Business Optimism Index reading for January was still below the 90 mark, the dividing line between positive and negative outlooks. 

          But the group also said that seven of the index’s 10 components rose, indicating conditions could soon improve. Better outlooks on jobs, inventories and capital spending have helped push the index up 1.3 points since December, the group said. 

          In January, small businesses had to cut prices despite tangling with inflation while profits remained weak, according to the survey of the federation’s 2,114 members.

The Morgan Stanley Monthly Buy-side Survey shows managers are over-the-top bullish on stocks. 

1.) Are you bullish or bearish on the following asset prices? 

S&P 500 – 79% Bullish, 21% Bearish 

Emerging Markets – 78% Bullish, 22% Bearish 

Crude Oil – 63% Bullish, 37% Bearish 

Dollar – 60% Bullish, 40% Bearish 

Gold – 50% Bullish, 50% Bearish 

10yr Treasuries – 15% Bullish, 85% Bearish  

Capital One customers face rate hike  – Credit card provider dramatically increases the interest rate on outstanding balances because of the “economic environment” 

The rate charged on outstanding balances will jump from 8.01% to 15.31%.

We don’t know if it’s arrogance or stupidity, but banks are asking for the pitchfork & torch treatment. 

Federal Reserve Charmain Ben Bernanke has indicated that the FED will not make any immediate hawkish moves regarding its fiscal policies.

“At present the U.S. economy continues to require the support of highly accommodative monetary policies,” Bernanke said in statement before the US House of Representatives Committee on Financial Services regarding the FED’s exit strategy from its measures implemented to booster the economy during the recession.

Even so, Bernanke added that “at some point the Federal Reserve will need to tighten financial conditions by raising short-term interest rates and reducing the quantity of bank reserves outstanding.”

The state controller’s office found that California taxpayers are on the hook for more state government retiree health benefits than previously thought.

Controller John Chiang’s office issued a report Tuesday showing the growing divide between what the state owes retirees for health and dental benefits and what it has saved so far.

The gap has grown to nearly $52 billion, about $3.6 billion over last year’s estimate.

Chiang, a Democrat, suggested the state can reduce its obligation by switching from a pay-as-you-go formula to a full-funding approach, which involves setting aside more money now so the state can use investment income to pay for future benefits.

The report comes as the state is struggling to pay for core services such as public schools and universities.

“Even as we try to claw our way out of the recession and provide needed cash to the state’s coffers, we cannot ignore the promise that we made to pay health and dental benefits for current state employees,” Chiang said in a statement. “I urge lawmakers to reduce the impact on future generations by putting additional dollars into the annual payments so that we can invest those funds.”

According to the controller’s office, California should have set aside $3.9 billion this year to cover its annual obligation. But the current budget only provides $1.3 billion for retirees’ health and dental benefits.

Chiang estimated that switching to a full-funding approach would mean the state would only have to contribute $2.8 billion to meet its obligations for the year.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has advocated changing retirement benefits for new state workers to help reduce the cost to taxpayers. Under his latest budget, the Republican governor wants state workers to contribute 5 percent more to their pension plans.

Republican state lawmakers would like to take a step further by moving from public pensions to defined contribution plans, such as 401k plans widely used in the private sector. In the meantime, they recommended increasing contributions.

“It’s prudent that we look for ways to bump current contributions by $1 billion if possible,” said Assemblyman Roger Niello, R-Fair Oaks, who serves as vice chair of the Assembly Banking and Finance Committee. “But it’s obviously extremely difficult because of all the other pressing calls on money that isn’t there.”

The US trade deficit grew beyond forecasts to $40.2 billion in December from $36.4 billion in November while market forecasts had called for the trade gap to widen to just $36.8 billion.

Mortgage applications in the U.S. fell last week, reflecting a drop in purchases.

The Mortgage Bankers Association’s index fell 1.2 percent in the week ended Feb. 5. The group’s purchase gauge decreased 7 percent, while the refinancing gauge rose 1.4 percent.

Home sales slumped following the expiration of a first-time buyers’ tax credit originally set for November, signaling the market’s stabilization was dependent on government assistance. Demand may be slow to advance further as the benefits of an extension of the tax credit through June are offset by the risk of higher mortgage rates after the Federal Reserve stops housing debt purchases next month.

“There is no evidence yet of a housing recovery, only of growing stability in the market,” Ryan Sweet, a senior economist at Moody’s Economy.com in West Chester, Pennsylvania, said before the report. “There is a rush to refinance before mortgage rates begin to move higher.”

The average rate on a 30-year fixed loan fell to 4.94 percent from 5.01 percent the prior week, the group said. The rate reached 4.61 percent at the end of March, the lowest since the group’s records began in 1990.

At the current 30-year rate, monthly borrowing costs for each $100,000 of a loan would be $533.16, or about $15 less than a year ago, when the rate was 5.19 percent.

Homeowners may be trying to get a jump on a possible increase in mortgage rates after Fed policy makers last month reiterated a pledge to stop supporting the market by March 31.

More than a fifth of U.S. homeowners owed more than their properties were worth in the fourth quarter as the number of houses and condominiums lost to foreclosure climbed to a record, according to Zillow.com.

In the fourth quarter, 21.4 percent of owners of mortgaged homes were underwater, up from 21 percent in the previous three months and down from 23 percent in the second quarter, the Seattle-based real estate data provider said today in a report. More than one in 1,000 homes were repossessed by lenders in December, the highest rate in Zillow data dating back to 2000.

Underwater homes are more likely lost to foreclosure because their owners have a harder time refinancing or selling when they get behind on loan payments. U.S. home values dropped 5 percent in the fourth quarter from a year earlier, the 12th straight quarter of year-over-year declines, Zillow said.

“While the next few months are likely to bring further home value declines in most markets, we do expect to see a national bottom in home prices by the middle of this year,” Zillow Chief Economist Stan Humphries said in a statement. “Thereafter, home values are likely to bounce along the bottom with real appreciation remaining negligible for some time.”

There were 2.82 million foreclosures in the U.S. last year, according to RealtyTrac Inc., the most since the data provider began compiling figures in 2005. The number may rise to 3 million in 2010, the Irvine, California-based company said last month.

Bank sales of foreclosed properties accounted for a fifth of all U.S. home sales in December, Zillow said. Such transactions made up 68 percent of sales in Merced, California; 64 percent in the Las Vegas area; and 62 percent in Modesto, California, the company said.

Almost 29 percent of homes sold in the U.S. went for less than their sellers originally paid for them, Zillow said.

The closely held company uses data from public records going back to 1996. Its mortgage figures come from information filed with individual counties.