Saturday, November 23, 2013

China Announces That It Is Going To Stop Stockpiling U.S. Dollars

By Michael Snyder | The Economic Collapse Blog | November 22, 2013

China just dropped an absolute bombshell, but it was almost entirely ignored by the mainstream media in the United States. 

(Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
(Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

The central bank of China has decided that it is “no longer in China’s favor to accumulate foreign-exchange reserves”.  During the third quarter of 2013, China’s foreign-exchange reserves were valued at approximately $3.66 trillion.  And of course the biggest chunk of that was made up of U.S. dollars.  For years, China has been accumulating dollars and working hard to keep the value of the dollar up and the value of the yuan down.  One of the goals has been to make Chinese products less expensive in the international marketplace.  But now China has announced that the time has come for it to stop stockpiling U.S. dollars.  And if that does indeed turn out to be the case, than many U.S. analysts are suggesting that China could also soon stop buying any more U.S. debt.  Needless to say, all of this would be very bad for the United States.
For years, China has been systematically propping up the value of the U.S. dollar and keeping the value of the yuan artificially low.  This has resulted in a massive flood of super cheap products from across the Pacific that U.S. consumers have been eagerly gobbling up.
For example, have you ever gone into a dollar store and wondered how anyone could possibly make a profit by making those products and selling them for just one dollar?
Well, the truth is that when you flip those products over you will find that almost all of them have been made outside of the United States.  In fact, the words “made in China” are probably the most common words in your entire household if you are anything like the typical American.
Thanks to the massively unbalanced trade that we have had with China, tens of thousands of our businesses, millions of our jobs and trillions of our dollars have left this country and gone over to China.
And now China has apparently decided that there is not much gutting of our economy left to do and that it is time to let the dollar collapse.  As I mentioned above, China has announced that it is going to stop stockpiling foreign-exchange reserves
The People’s Bank of China said the country does not benefit any more from increases in its foreign-currency holdings, adding to signs policy makers will rein in dollar purchases that limit the yuan’s appreciation.
“It’s no longer in China’s favor to accumulate foreign-exchange reserves,” Yi Gang, a deputy governor at the central bank, said in a speech organized by China Economists 50 Forum at Tsinghua University yesterday. The monetary authority will “basically” end normal intervention in the currency market and broaden the yuan’s daily trading range, Governor Zhou Xiaochuan wrote in an article in a guidebook explaining reforms outlined last week following a Communist Party meeting. Neither Yi nor Zhou gave a timeframe for any changes.
It isn’t going to happen overnight, but the value of the U.S. dollar is going to start to go down, and all of that cheap stuff that you are used to buying at Wal-Mart and the dollar store is going to become a lot more expensive.

But of even more importance is what this latest move by China could mean for U.S. government debt.  As most Americans have heard, we are heavily dependent on foreign nations such as China lending us money.  Right now, China owns nearly 1.3 trillion dollars of our debt.  Unfortunately, as CNBC is noting, if China is going to quit stockpiling our dollars than it is likely that they will stop stockpiling our debt as well…
Analysts see this as the PBoC hinting that it will let its currency fluctuate, without intervention, thus negating the need for holding large reserves of the dollar. And if the dollar is no longer needed, then it could look to curb its purchases of dollar-denominated assets like U.S. Treasurys.
“If they are looking to reduce these purchases going forward then, yes, you’d have to look at who the marginal buyer would be,” Richard McGuire, a senior rate strategist at Rabobank told CNBC in an interview.
“Together, with the Federal Reserve tapering its bond purchases, it has the potential to add to the bearish long-term outlook on U.S. Treasurys.”
So who is going to buy all of our debt?
That is a very good question.
If the Federal Reserve starts tapering bond purchases and China quits buying our debt, who is going to fill the void?
If there is significantly less demand for government bonds, that will cause interest rates to rise dramatically.  And if interest rates rise dramatically from where they are now, that will set off the kind of nightmare scenario that I keep talking about.
In a previous article entitled “How China Can Cause The Death Of The Dollar And The Entire U.S. Financial System“, I described how China could single-handedly cause immense devastation to the U.S. economy.
China accounts for more global trade that anyone else does, and they also own more of our debt than any other nation does.  If China starts dumping our dollars and our debt, much of the rest of the planet would likely follow suit and we would be in for a world of hurt.
And just this week there was another major announcement which indicates that China is getting ready to make a major move against the U.S. dollar.  According to Reuters, crude oil futures may soon be pricedin yuan on the Shanghai Futures Exchange…
The Shanghai Futures Exchange (SHFE) may price its crude oil futures contract in yuan and use medium sour crude as its benchmark, its chairman said on Thursday, adding that the bourse is speeding up preparatory work to secure regulatory approvals.
China, which overtook the United States as the world’s top oil importer in September, hopes the contract will become a benchmark in Asia and has said it would allow foreign investors to trade in the contract without setting up a local subsidiary.
If that actually happens, that will be absolutely huge.
China is the number one importer of oil in the world, and it was only a matter of time before they started to openly challenge the petrodollar.
But even I didn’t think that we would see anything like this so quickly.
The world is changing, and most Americans have absolutely no idea what this is going to mean for them.  As demand for the U.S. dollar and U.S. debt goes down, the things that we buy at the store will cost a lot more, our standard of living will go down and it will become a lot more expensive for everyone (including the U.S. government) to borrow money.
Unfortunately, there isn’t much that can be done about any of this at this point.  When it comes to economics, China has been playing chess while the United States has been playing checkers.  And now decades of very, very foolish decisions are starting to catch up with us.
The false prosperity that most Americans are enjoying today will soon start disappearing, and most of them will have no idea why it is happening.
The years ahead are going to be very challenging, and so I hope that you are getting ready for them.
THIS ARTICLE ORIGINALLY APPEARED ON THE ECONOMIC COLLAPSE BLOG
*****

PAS leaders come under fire from delegates

SHAH ALAM (Nov 23): Several delegates at the 59th PAS Muktamar today voiced their concerns and blasted the party leadership over various issues, including failure to step in during the Kedah PAS internal crisis and to raise issues concerning Sabah and Sarawak in Parliament.
Kedah delegate Nasir Zakaria criticised the party's leadership for not stepping in when Kedah PAS faced an internal crisis in the months prior to the 13th General Election and hinted that the crisis was the reason the state was lost.
"We are aware that there are many voices in and out of PAS saying that this defeat must not be repeated. So like the other delegates, we call upon the Electoral Post Mortem Committee to reveal their findings.
"As for our loss of Kedah, there were internal factors leading to it. In a family, children will argue with each other and being kids they can never resolve some of the issues. It's the duty of the parent to step in when things get out of control.
"A father must take quick action to stop things from escalating. Kedah does not want this kind of cancer (internal disputes) to topple another PAS led government. We don't want our constituencies to come under siege (when we are internally weak)," said Nasir.
He also pointed out that to win or regain the rural Malay support, the party must fulfil five criteria, namely integrity, defend the faith, defend the Malay rulers, have local personalities, and show concern for the Malays and protect them.
"PAS only fulfils two criteria while Umno fulfils all five. We are known only for defending the faith and for our integrity. We need to reposition ourselves through greater political education, " said Nasir.
'Sabah, Sarawak important states'
Sabah delegate Datuk Ali Akbar Gulasan also criticised the party's MPs for not taking up East Malaysia issues to Parliament.
"We have requested PAS MPs to speak up on our behalf and take up our issues to Parliament because we (Sabah and Sarawak PAS) don't have any presence there.
"We require their assistance but we have never received any response," he said.
Ali Akbar said PAS divisions in Sabah and Sarawak will receive more support if some of the party vice-presidents include Sabah and Sarawak in their portfolios.
"If you look at our opponent (Umno), they elect a Sabahan as one of their three vice-presidents. And BN has called Sabah and Sarawak as their fixed deposits.
"In this context, Sabah and Sarawak are very important states and PAS needs more strength to seize it from BN. Therefore, Sabah suggests that we divide the vice-presidents portfolios according to region, with Sabah and Sarawak being one region.
"Representatives from Sabah and Sarawak should also be part of the various Dewan and the Central Committee," said Ali Akbar.
Module on party struggle for supporters club
Taman Templer assemblyman Zaidy Abdul Talib urged the PAS central leadership to come up with a module for its supporters club to foster better understanding among members.
While PAS is an Islamist party, its supporters club comprises comprise non-Muslim members.
A "black and white" syllabus, Zaidy said, would not only help explain the party's struggle to non-Muslims but also help them understand the Islamic perspective better.
Currently, non-Muslims learnt about Islam through their experiences and interactions with the Muslim community, he said.
"The module would contain 'dos and don'ts' and list down the sensitivities of the various communities in Malaysia.
"The booklet can be distributed to everyone in the party to give a clearer picture about the brand of Islam practiced by PAS," Zaidy said when met by reporters after debating President Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang's keynote address this morning.
Zaidy also said the party should increase their engagement with NGOs whose cause mirrors the PAS' struggle, such as human rights of which he said was also found in Islam.
He had earlier cited the party's support for electoral reform group Bersih, which saw a multi-racial and religious participation
PAS, Zaidy said, can help increase support for the party if such initiatives were implemented.

Latvians mourn victims of roof disaster, among Europe's deadliest

Latvians were in mourning on Saturday in the wake of one of Europe's deadliest building disasters, with at least 51 killed after a roof caved in on shoppers in a busy Riga supermarket.
The small Baltic EU state began three days of official grieving over Thursday's tragedy -- Europe's third worst roof disaster in the last 30 years -- as rescuers kept combing the rubble for survivors.
Riga mayor Nils Usakovs said five people were still feared trapped inside the Maxima supermarket, whose roof crashed down during peak shopping hours around 6:00 pm (1600 GMT) on Thursday, in the Zolitude district of the Latvian capital.
"This has been a hard day for all of Latvia," Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis said late Friday on public television of the catastrophe that shook the nation of two million.
Three firefighters among the 200 rescuers who rushed to the scene were among those killed, while other rescue workers became themselves trapped inside during a second collapse.
"In Afghanistan you're prepared for death every day, but not when you are here at home," Afghan veteran Maris Utinans told AFP while working on the rescue effort late Friday.
Latvia will also observe a moment of silence on Monday for the catastrophe, its deadliest since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, while police probe what caused the cave-in at the two-year-old supermarket.
It ranks in the top three of Europe's worst roof disasters of the last 30 years.
In 2006, 66 people died when a Moscow market roof collapsed. That same year, 65 people were killed in Chorzow, southern Poland, when a snow-laden roof caved in on an exposition hall.
Mourners at the disaster site late Friday lay heaps flowers and lit candles around the metal police barricades as volunteers handed out hot drinks to them and to rescue workers.
"It is a terrible tragedy for the city and the whole country. My friends and I just wanted to pay our respects by coming here to light a candle and lay flowers," Janis Berzins, 24-year-old Riga resident, told AFP.
Speculation about the possible cause of Thursday's cave-in has centred on plans to build a rooftop garden on the building.
A photograph published by Latvia's Diena daily Friday showed an aerial view of the roof prior to the collapse, covered in a garden with soil, shrubbery and a children's play gym.
Visiting the scene, Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis said police had launched a criminal investigation to find the cause of the disaster.
Run by the Lithuanian-owned Maxima chain -- Latvia's number two retailer after Rimi -- the supermarket was built in 2011 and was named one of the country's top three architecture projects that year.
Local council official Juris Radzevics said that plans had been submitted to the council to turn the roof into a green area.
"The project was submitted in accordance with all regulations but of course we will be looking at whether materials and works were carried out to the proper standards," Radzevics told the LNT television channel.
A police spokesman said emergency sirens had been set off in the store before the cave-in, adding they were probing who sounded the alarm and why.

Sultan declares Friday, Saturday as rest days in Johor from January 1

Johor's Sultan Ibrahim Sultan Iskandar has declared that the state's rest days will be on Friday and Saturday instead of Saturday and Sunday from January 1, a move that would have implications for the fast growing Iskandar economic corridor.
The much-anticipated decision to revert back to the Friday-Saturday weekend was announced during the investiture ceremony in conjunction with Sultan Ibrahim’s 55th birthday.
Prior to 1994, Johor had Friday and Saturday as non-working days.
"The decision was made following feedback from various quarters to allow Muslims to perform their religious obligation on Friday in a more peaceful manner" he said in his speech at the event held at Dewan Jubli Intan Sultan Ibrahim in the royal town, the Star online reported today.
Speculation has been rife about the change after a state government document was leaked on the internet.
Currently, states such as Kedah, Kelantan, and Terengganu have put Friday and Saturday as their off days.
Malaysia's sovereign wealth fund Khazanah Nasional Bhd had poured in billions for the Iskandar zone, which has been fashioned after Shenzhen in mainland China, across from Hong Kong.
Iskandar, which has seen booming property market, has also begun to attract small-and-medium enterprises and industries while other industries mull their investments in the area.
But the new rest days could affect future investments as it is not in sync with neighbouring Singapore or other states in the west coast of the Malay peninsula. Among businesses and services that could be affected include banking and international colleges that cater to students from the island republic.
One business that could see an increase in visitors is the Legoland resort as the new weekend will attract visitors from Johor itself while others turn up on Sundays, say analysts. - November 23, 2013.
MORE TO COME

Boeing cargo jet takes off after mistaken Kansas landing

By Alice Mannette
WICHITA, Kansas (Reuters) - A Boeing cargo jet that was stranded overnight at a Kansas airport too small to handle the giant aircraft took off safely Thursday and landed a short time later at what had been its intended destination, officials said.
The Dreamlifter bound for McConnell Air Force Base in Wichita, Kansas, had inadvertently landed instead at the nearby Colonel James Jabara Airport run by the city, according to a statement by Boeing Co spokesman Doug Alder.
The bizarre spectacle made national headlines and drew gawkers to the smaller airport on Thursday, prompting traffic jams, car crashes, and road closures around the area.
The plane took off about 1:15 p.m. CST (2:15 p.m. EST) and landed at McConnell 20 minutes later. Airport officials and spectators applauded and sighed with relief when the massive plane's wheels left the airfield about 16 hours after the erroneous landing.
City officials said the 235-foot (72 meter) Atlas Air 747 Dreamlifter landed at Jabara late Wednesday by mistake, but did not say what led to the error.
The two pilots had taken off from New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, officials said.
"Whoa," Wichita city officials said in a statement posted early Thursday on the city's official Facebook page. "The plane is too large for the runway and will need help departing."
Boeing contracts with Atlas Air to fly the plane and was looking into how the incident happened, Alder said.
The airport is equipped to handle small business planes but nothing as heavy as the Dreamlifter, which can carry about 800,000 pounds on takeoff. No cargo had to be removed from the plane for it to take off, Alder said.
The airport and plane escaped damage.
"I think it's hysterical. I couldn't stop laughing," said Kevin Schwerdtfeger, 33, a commercial pilot from Appleton, Wisconsin, who was in town for training and stopped by the airfield to watch the take-off. "I've heard of this before, but it's fairly rare."
Another pilot expressed sympathy for the crew and said he thought the whole situation was "kind of sad."
"I'm sorry for the pilots that landed there by mistake because their careers are in jeopardy," Steve McNulty, 65, said.
The 600-acre (243 hectare) Jabara Airport, which has one runway, one helipad and no control tower, is about nine miles from McConnell.
The 6,100-foot runway is about 3,000 feet short of what planes of that size and weight typically use to become airborne, according to local media reports.
The Dreamlifter is a modified 747-400-passenger plane that can haul more cargo by volume than any other plane, according to Boeing's website. It is one of four specially enlarged 747s that are used to move pieces of the 787 Dreamliner to factories for assembly into new jets.
(Additional reporting by Karen Brooks and Alwyn Scott; Editing by Scott Malone, Bernadette Baum and Maureen Bavdek)

JPMorgan gave $75K a month to Chinese PM’s kid


JPMorgan Chase has made many headlines recently. There’s a new investigation underway regarding the bank’s practice of giving lots of money to the kids of rich people abroad in order to gain influence illegally. They just topped the Financial Stability Board’s “Too big to fail” list. They just reached an agreement with the Justice Department to pay a record $13 billion for its fraudulent mortgage products. It’s facing an investigation as Bernie Madoff’s primary bank. And an ex-employee stands accused of hiding hundreds of millions of dollars worth of trading losses. The Resident (aka Lori Harfenist) discusses how she is getting a wee tired of this whole, too-big-to-fail thing.

Godfrey Bloom Quotes Murray Rothbard – The State Is An Institution Of Theft


• Debate: Action programme for taxation in the European Union for the period 2014-2020
Published on Nov 21, 2013
• European Parliament, Brussels, 21 November 2013
• Speaker: Godfrey Bloom MEP, Ind. (Yorkshire & Lincolnshire), Europe of Freedom and Democracy (EFD) group -http://www.godfreybloommep.co.uk

Dollar’s 30 Year Slide May Be Gold’s New Life: 2014 Outlook

Today’s AM fix was USD 1,241.75, EUR 918.59 and GBP 766.75 per ounce.
Yesterday’s AM fix was USD 1,248.50, EUR 929.64 and GBP 775.76 per ounce.
Gold fell $1.50 or 0.12% yesterday, closing at $1,243.20/oz. Silver climbed $0.14 or 0.71% closing at $19.99/oz. Platinum rose $4.60 or 033% to $1,389.50/oz, while palladium climbed $3.78 or 0.53% to $714.75/oz.
Many traders and investors are still scratching their heads at the peculiar gold trading Wednesday which pushed gold below the important technical level of $1,250/oz. Support at $1,250/oz has been breached and gold is vulnerable of a fall to test support at $1,200/oz and the June 28th low of $1,180/oz (see charts below).
US Dollar Index – 1983 to Today (Bloomberg Industries)
And yet gold still seems to be stuck in a downtrend. This week’s sell off may have been due to trading shenanigans on the COMEX and many, including the UK Financial Regulator are asking questions as to whether gold price rigging is taking place.
Gold’s falls come despite there being many compelling reasons for gold to rally. These include uber dove Yellen at the Fed’s helm, the near certainty that the Eurozone debt crisis will erupt early in the New Year, signs ETF outflows are stabilizing and China picking up the slack with regard to physical demand, after India’s demand fell from near record levels.
Gold in U.S. Dollars, 5 Days – (Bloomberg)
THE U.S. DOLLAR has been on a 30 year slide versus other competing paper currencies, in particular the Chinese yuan. If the dollar’s decline, as measured by the DXY Index continues, gold may be the main beneficiary.
The dollar may be printed in unlimited quantities, though the global stock of gold increases by just 2% to 2.5% annually. Irrespective, of the huge increase in money supplies globally today. Indeed, should gold prices fall more, gold production is likely to begin falling.
This is seemingly lost on Janet Yellen and central banks, who continue to print money at record rates.
The smart money who understand gold’s importance as a diversification continue to accumulate gold.
The very poor state of the U.S. economy bodes badly for the U.S. dollar in 2014 which should help gold resume its multi year bull market.
Gold in U.S. Dollars, 1 Year – (Bloomberg)
DATA FROM THE INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND today shows that central banks continued to diversify into gold in October.
Turkey’s holdings rose the most, with the central bank adding a large 12.994 tonnes – 16.18 million oz vs. 15.762 million oz.  Kazakhstan’s gold reserves rose 2.4 tons and Azerbaijan’s gold reserves increased 2 tonnes last month.
Germany, the world’s second biggest holder of gold reserves, cut its bullion holdings by a tiny amount in October for the second time in five months.  Germany’s gold holdings dropped to 108.9 million ounces from 109.01 million ounces in September. The reduction was likely for domestic gold coin sales.
Gold in U.S. Dollars  and Suspensions Of COMEX Gold Trading – 3 Month (Bloomberg)
GOLDMAN SACHS Inc. has come out with another of their widely covered market predictions.
Gold, iron ore, soybeans and copper will probably drop at least 15% next year as commodities face increased downside risks even as economic growth in the U.S. accelerates, according to Goldman.
As we noted before, Goldman’s gold calls and crystal gazing have been poor at best. Indeed, some suspect that while Goldman is advising clients to sell, they may be on the other side of the the trade going long.
News This Week
* China to Start Interbank Gold Swap Trading November 25China, on track to overtake India as the world’s largest gold consumer this year, will start interbank swaps trading next week in a move to further open up the domestic precious metals market. China gold swaps to trade on China Foreign Exchange Trade System, according to a statement on CFETS website yesterday. Gold swaps to settle and deliver via Shanghai Gold Exchange.
(Bloomberg)
* China’s planned crude oil futures may be priced in yuan The Shanghai Futures Exchange (SHFE) may price its crude oil futures contract in yuan and use medium sour crude as its benchmark, its chairman said on Thursday, adding that the bourse is speeding up preparatory work to secure regulatory approvals.
China, which overtook the United States as the world’s top oil importer in September, hopes the contract will become a benchmark in Asia and has said it would allow foreign investors to trade in the contract without setting up a local subsidiary.
(Reuters)
* Germany Lowers Gold Reserves in October, IMF Data ShowHoldings drop to 108.9 Million ounces vs. 109.01 Million ounces in September., data on IMF website show. (Note: Likely for domestic gold coin sales)
(Bloomberg)
* Gold-Put Options Surge as Futures Slump to Lowest in Four MonthsPut options on gold, giving the owners the right to sell Dec. futures at $1,200/oz and $1,250/oz, more than tripled on the Comex in New York after the metal slumped to a four-month low.
Puts giving the owner the right to sell at $1,200 rose to $2.30 from 70c on estimated volume of 1,259 contracts, the third most-active option.
Puts giving the owner the right to sell at $1,250 jumped to $15.10, the highest in a month, on estimated volume of 2,206 contracts, the most-active option
Futures for Dec. delivery fell as much as 2.6% to $1,240.20/oz, the lowest since July 9
(Bloomberg)
* China Oct. Silver Imports 230.8 Tons, Customs SaysSilver imports by China were 230.8 tons in Oct., compared with 243 tons in Sept., according to data released by customs agency today
(Bloomberg)
* UBS Estimates 36% of South Africa Gold Industry is Losing MoneyEstimate based on spot price of $1,260/oz, UBS says in report dated yday.
In 3Q, 28% of SA gold industry was loss-making, based on gold price of $1,330/oz
Sector lowered 3Q all-in costs by 20% q/q to $1,138/oz
“Further unit cost reductions will be challenging to deliver”
(Bloomberg)
CME Lowers Gold and Silver MarginsCME lowers Comex 100 Gold futures (GC) initial margins for specs by 9.4 percent to $7,975 per contract from $8,800
CME lowers Comex 5000 Silver futures (SI) initial margins for specs by 11.1 percent to $11,000 per contract from $12,375
(Reuters)
ConclusionThere is likely a floor under gold prices at the $1,200 level and that should again provide strong support. There are no guarantees regarding price ever – particularly in the short term. However, gold production may fall at prices below $1,200 as it becomes uneconomical for many gold mines to operate profitably.
In South Africa, no longer the world’s largest producer, (which is now China) but still a major producer, there are estimates that 36% of the South African gold industry are loss making even at today’s spot prices – $1,250/oz. In 3Q, 28% of the South African gold industry was loss making, based on a gold price of $1,330/oz.
The short term technicals remain poor and the trend remains lower so we remain bearish for next week despite the strong seasonals. November, December and January are traditionally strong months for gold due to year end fund allocation and in recent years Chinese New Year demand.
It remains prudent to ignore short term noise and day to day price movements. Instead focus on physical gold’s importance, either in your possession or inallocated gold accounts, as financial insurance and as a vital diversification for investors and savers today.
Click Gold News For This Week’s Breaking Gold And Silver News
Click Gold and Silver Commentary For This Week’s Leading Gold, Silver Opinion
Like Our Facebook Page For Interesting Insights, Blogs, Prizes and Special Offers

Which Side on Your On? Anti-Austerity Cops Face Off Against Riot Police in Portugal

An on-duty police officer stand guard outside the Portuguese parliament during a demonstration by national security forces unions in Lisbon on Thursday. (AP)Defending their pensions from the threat of ever-deepening austerity cuts, as many as ten thousand off-duty police officers and state security agents in Portugal found themselves on the other side of the barricades Thursday night as they faced down their on-duty colleagues in riot control gear.
With a march through Lisbon that ended at the steps of parliament, the anger police and security union members broke through security fences, and even briefly occupying the entrance to Parliament before the night was over.
The proposed cuts in public pensions are being demanded by the nation’s creditors in exchange for a government bailout package received in 2011.
As Agence France-Presse reports:
Thousands of Portuguese police officers, paramilitary police and other security officers took to the streets of the capital to protest the government’s latest austerity measures.
Police in plain clothes massed outside parliament, where they broke through a security cordon to briefly occupy the steps leading up to the building.
During an earlier march, they had called for the government to resign, carrying a banner that read “For professional dignity and people’s security.”
Unions said the rally was the biggest ever organised by the country’s police, and warned that budget cuts planned for next year would “destabilise the work of the police” and “deteriorate public security.”
Media reports estimated the number of demonstrators at between 8,000 and 10,000.
“I’ve been with the police for eight years and never got promoted or a pay rise, even though I have a family now and more responsibilities,” complained protester Manuel Ribas, 32.
“Next year, they will take another 100 euros [$135] out of my gross salary, which will leave me with 900 euros a month, just as if I had just left the police academy.”
Following the raucous protest, the police superintendent of the nation’s police Paulo Gomes tendered his resignation
Portuguese police officers gather outside parliament during a protest in Lisbon on November 21, 2013.People march towards the Portuguese parliament during a protest in Lisbon on November 21, 2013. (Press TV)An off-duty office is detained on the steps of parliament. (AP)A demonstrator waves the flag of the Association of Professional Police Officers during a protest against the government’s austerity measures outside Parliament in Lisbon. (Photo: AFP/Francisco Leong)
____________________________________________
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.
Source: Common Dreams
Distributed by RINF Alternative News

The Dying Dollar — Paul Craig Roberts

Since 2006, the US dollar has experienced a one-quarter to one-third drop in value to the Chinese yuan, depending on the choice of base.
Now China is going to let the dollar decline further in value.  China also says it is considering undermining the petrodollar by pricing oil futures on the Shanghai Futures Exchange in yuan. This on top of the growing avoidance of the dollar to settle trade imbalances means that the dollar’s role as reserve currency is coming to an end, which means the termination of the US as financial bully and financial imperialist.  This blow to the dollar in addition to the blows delivered by jobs offshoring and the uncovered bets in the gambling casino created by financial deregulation means that the US economy as we knew it is coming to an end.
The US economy is already in shambles, with bond and stock markets propped up by massive and historically unprecedented Fed money printing pouring liquidity into financial asset prices.  This month at the IMF annual conference, former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers said that to achieve full employment in the US economy would require negative real interest rates.  Negative real interest rates could only be achieved by eliminating cash, moving to digital money that can only be kept in banks, and penalizing people for saving.
The future is developing precisely as I have been predicting.
As the dollar enters its death throes, the lawless Federal Reserve and the Wall Street criminals will increase their shorting of gold in the paper futures market, thereby driving the remnants of the West’s gold into Asian hands.
PBOC Says No Longer in China’s Interest to Increase Reserves
By Bloomberg News – Nov 20, 2013
The People’s Bank of China said the country does not benefit any more from increases in its foreign-currency holdings, adding to signs policymakers will rein in dollar purchases that limit the yuan’s appreciation.
“It’s no longer in China’s favor to accumulate foreign-exchange reserves,” Yi Gang, a deputy governor at the central bank, said in a speech organized by China Economists 50 Forum at Tsinghua University yesterday. The monetary authority will “basically” end normal intervention in the currency market and broaden the yuan’s daily trading range, Governor Zhou Xiaochuan wrote in an article in a guidebook explaining reforms outlined last week following a Communist Party meeting.
About Dr. Paul Craig Roberts Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. He was columnist for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and Creators Syndicate. He has had many university appointments. His internet columns have attracted a worldwide following. His latest book, The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic Dissolution of the West is now available.
The post The Dying Dollar — Paul Craig Roberts appeared first on PaulCraigRoberts.org.
The official blog can be found here.
Distributed by RINF Alternative News

Fed Minutes Reveal a Dangerous Power Grab by New York Fed

By Pam Martens: November 21, 2013
Simon Potter, Markets Group Head at the New York Fed
Just when it seemed one could no longer be shocked by the corruption, hubris and lack of accountability in the American financial system, along comes yesterday’s release of the Federal Reserve’s minutes for the October 29-30 meeting of its Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC).
While mainstream media focuses on what the minutes revealed about when the Fed might begin to reduce its monthly $85 billion in bond purchases, receiving scant attention is a brazen power grab boldly stated on page two of the eleven pages of minutes.
Back on October 31, wire services reported that the temporary dollar and foreign currency swap lines that had been put in place between central banks on a temporary basis during the financial crisis had been turned into standing arrangements.
The Associated Press explained the action as follows: “Six of the world’s leading central banks, including the U.S. Federal Reserve, say they will provide each other with ready supplies of their currencies on a standing basis, extending arrangements set up to steady the global financial system during post-2007 turbulence.”
In other words, without public deliberations, an action that was adopted as a temporary, emergency operation, now had become a permanent part of world finance – on the basis of minutes and details yet to be seen by Congress or the general public.
When those minutes were released yesterday, alarm bells should have rang out from the business press. Not only did this temporary emergency measure become permanent, but the full FOMC committee is reduced to voting on its continuance but once a year and the conduct of the program has been effectively delegated to the Chairman of the Federal Reserve and a man the American people have never heard of, Simon Potter, the Manager of the System Open Market Account and Markets Group at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
According to the minutes, ten members of the FOMC Committee, including Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and his likely replacement, Vice Chairman, Janet Yellen, unanimously voted in favor of the plan. The comments of those opposing the plan are opaquely described in the minutes as follows:  “The Committee considered a proposal to convert the existing temporary central bank liquidity swap arrangements to standing arrangements with no preset expiration dates.  The Manager [Potter] described the proposed arrangements, noting that the Committee would still be asked to review participation in the arrangements annually.  A couple of participants expressed reservations about the proposal, citing opposition to swap lines with foreign central banks in general or questioning the governance implications of these standing arrangements in particular.”
Instead of the full FOMC committee, which includes Federal Reserve Board Commissioners and Presidents of the regional Federal Reserve banks, approving these interventions in foreign currencies, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve will simply now consult with a subcommittee. But more troubling, the New York Fed has gained enormous power in the process. The minutes state: “authority to approve subsequent drawings of a more routine character for either the dollar or foreign currency liquidity swap lines may be delegated to the Manager [Potter], in consultation with the Chairman.”
Simon Potter already wields enormous and nontransparent power in financial markets. Potter is head of the Markets Group which oversees a sprawling trading operation at the New York Fed. Of the 12 regional Federal Reserve Banks, only the New York Fed has a trading floor rivaling that of Goldman Sachs. Potter is also Manager of the System Open Market Account (SOMA) at the New York Fed. According to the Fed’s web site, SOMA operations are designed to influence bank reserves, money market conditions, and monetary aggregates.
The New York Fed has come under withering criticism for allowing CEOs of the serially prosecuted Wall Street banks to serve on its Board of Directors while it purports to function as a primary regulator of Wall Street. Despite having failed to detect and prevent the frauds that led to the financial collapse of Wall Street in 2008, it has received expanded regulatory powers under the Dodd-Frank “reform” legislation.
On July 16 of last year, the former New York State Attorney General and later Governor who attempted to drag Wall Street corruption into the light of day before it imploded the system, Eliot Spitzer, penned an article for Slate on the insidious doings of the New York Fed.
Under the headline, “Why the New York Fed Must Be Investigated,” Spitzer explained the history of the New York Fed’s role in turning a blind eye to the rigging of the global interest rate benchmark known as Libor, a benchmark impacting everything from student loans to mortgage rates to municipal borrowing costs across America. Spitzer wrote: “The New York Federal Reserve knew about Libor games being played by the banks years ago and seems to have done precious little about it—except perhaps send a memo parroting the so-called reform ideas proposed by the banks themselves. Then nothing more. No prosecutions, no inquiries of the banks to see if the illegal behavior had stopped—just a live-and-let-live attitude.”
Spitzer called for an independent special prosecutor to investigate the New York Fed, citing the deep conflicts of interests on its Board over the years:
“Well, look who was on the board: Dick Fuld of Lehman fame; Sandy Weill of Citibank; Jeff Immelt of GE—the largest beneficiary of the Fed’s commercial paper guarantees; and, of course, Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase, whose bank’s London derivative trades and Libor involvement make his role on the board even more absurd.”
Dimon’s two-terms totaling six years on the Board of the New York Fed ended this past December. He continued to serve even as his bank, JPMorgan Chase, was being investigated for losing $6.2 billion trading exotic derivatives with its bank depositors’ money.
And the hits just keep on coming. Last month we learned that Carmen Segarra, a former bank examiner at the New York Fed is charging in a lawsuit that she was told to change her negative review of Goldman Sachs over its inadequate conflict of interest policy. When she refused to do so, she was terminated in retaliation and escorted from the Fed premises, according to her lawsuit.
Just how long will it take Congress — that body in Washington with a 9 percent approval rating from the American people — to figure out that “just trust us” has been a killer policy when it comes to Wall Street and other people’s money.

Bookmark the permalink.

How Wall Street is Bleeding Detroit Dry

Shady Wall Street dealings and massive corporate subsidies are responsible for Detroit’s financial nosedive, not worker and retiree pensions, a report published Wednesday reveals.
Released by Wallace Turbeville, a former Goldman Sachs investment banker who now works for the think tank Demos, the study takes aim at Detroit emergency manager Kevyn Orr’s claims that workers and retirees are to blame for Detroit’s shortfall.
“To say the pension fund killed the city, it’s like if you were stabbed, strangled and blown up, did you die from the strangling?” Turbeville said, according to The Huffington Post. “That’s why I find this whole thing illogical, except for the fact somebody didn’t like pensions.”
Turbeville singles out Detroit’s risky financial dealings with big banks as “a great threat to the city.” In 2005 and 2006, the city financed its $1.6 billion in debt through a series of complex swap deals with “hidden risks.” The report explains,
The deals included provisions that would allow the banks to terminate the swaps under specified conditions and collect termination payments, which would entitle the banks to immediate payment of all projected future value of the swaps to the bank counterparties. Such conditions included a credit rating downgrade of the city to a level below “investment grade,” appointment of an emergency manager to run the city and failure of the city to make timely payments.
Turbeville states, “These swap deals were particularly ill-suited for a city like Detroit, which had been hovering on the edge of a credit rating downgrade for years… A strong case can be made that the banks that sold these swaps may have breached their ethical, and possibly legal, obligations to the city in executing these deals.”
Furthermore, massive tax subsidies to corporations—which climbed as high as $20 million annually—were a “burden on city revenues at a time when it was particularly damaging,” the report finds. These revenues were further depleted by unemployment and depopulation connected the Great Recession. This coincided with a reduction of Michigan state sharing of revenue.
Contrary to widespread belief, Detroit’s overall spending is not the culprit behind the city’s shortfall and in fact decreased 38 percent since the Great Recession. Rather, it was declining revenue, “exacerbated by complicated Wall Street deals,” that threatened Detroit’s ability to pay its expenses, the study finds.
The report accuses Orr of grossly inflating Detroit’s alleged $18 billion in debt to accelerate the push for bankruptcy filings. “While emergency manager Kevyn Orr has focused on cutting retiree benefits and reducing the city’s long-term liabilities to address the crisis, an analysis of the city’s finances reveals that his efforts are inappropriate and, in important ways, not rooted in fact,” the report concludes.
The study comes as Detroit’s bankruptcy case makes its way through the courts. Orr has been slammed by unions for forcing through bankruptcy proceedings with the support of Michigan Governor Rick Snyder in a bid to subvert local democratic process and state law. Orr has been blasted for gutting public services and diverting public dollars to pay off the big banks largely responsible for the city’s financial spiral while threatening workers’ hard-earned pensions.
_____________________
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.
Source: Common Dreams
Distributed by RINF Alternative News

China Announces That It Is Going To Stop Stockpiling U.S. Dollars

China just dropped an absolute bombshell, but it was almost entirely ignored by the mainstream media in the United States. The central bank of China has decided that it is “no longer in China’s favor to accumulate foreign-exchange reserves”. During the third quarter of 2013, China’s foreign-exchange reserves were valued at approximately $3.66 trillion. And of course the biggest chunk of that was made up of U.S. dollars. For years, China has been accumulating dollars and working hard to keep the value of the dollar up and the value of the yuan down. One of the goals has been to make Chinese products less expensive in the international marketplace. But now China has announced that the time has come for it to stop stockpiling U.S. dollars. And if that does indeed turn out to be the case, than many U.S. analysts are suggesting that China could also soon stop buying any more U.S. debt. Needless to say, all of this would be very bad for the United States.
For years, China has been systematically propping up the value of the U.S. dollar and keeping the value of the yuan artificially low. This has resulted in a massive flood of super cheap products from across the Pacific that U.S. consumers have been eagerly gobbling up.
For example, have you ever gone into a dollar store and wondered how anyone could possibly make a profit by making those products and selling them for just one dollar?
Well, the truth is that when you flip those products over you will find that almost all of them have been made outside of the United States. In fact, the words “made in China” are probably the most common words in your entire household if you are anything like the typical American.
Thanks to the massively unbalanced trade that we have had with China, tens of thousands of our businesses, millions of our jobs and trillions of our dollars have left this country and gone over to China.
And now China has apparently decided that there is not much gutting of our economy left to do and that it is time to let the dollar collapse. As I mentioned above, China has announced that it is going to stop stockpiling foreign-exchange reserves
The People’s Bank of China said the country does not benefit any more from increases in its foreign-currency holdings, adding to signs policy makers will rein in dollar purchases that limit the yuan’s appreciation.
“It’s no longer in China’s favor to accumulate foreign-exchange reserves,” Yi Gang, a deputy governor at the central bank, said in a speech organized by China Economists 50 Forum at Tsinghua University yesterday. The monetary authority will “basically” end normal intervention in the currency market and broaden the yuan’s daily trading range, Governor Zhou Xiaochuan wrote in an article in a guidebook explaining reforms outlined last week following a Communist Party meeting. Neither Yi nor Zhou gave a timeframe for any changes.
It isn’t going to happen overnight, but the value of the U.S. dollar is going to start to go down, and all of that cheap stuff that you are used to buying at Wal-Mart and the dollar store is going to become a lot more expensive.
But of even more importance is what this latest move by China could mean for U.S. government debt. As most Americans have heard, we are heavily dependent on foreign nations such as China lending us money. Right now, China owns nearly 1.3 trillion dollars of our debt. Unfortunately, as CNBC is noting, if China is going to quit stockpiling our dollars than it is likely that they will stop stockpiling our debt as well…
Analysts see this as the PBoC hinting that it will let its currency fluctuate, without intervention, thus negating the need for holding large reserves of the dollar. And if the dollar is no longer needed, then it could look to curb its purchases of dollar-denominated assets like U.S. Treasurys.
“If they are looking to reduce these purchases going forward then, yes, you’d have to look at who the marginal buyer would be,” Richard McGuire, a senior rate strategist at Rabobank told CNBC in an interview.
“Together, with the Federal Reserve tapering its bond purchases, it has the potential to add to the bearish long-term outlook on U.S. Treasurys.”
So who is going to buy all of our debt?
That is a very good question.
If the Federal Reserve starts tapering bond purchases and China quits buying our debt, who is going to fill the void?
If there is significantly less demand for government bonds, that will cause interest rates to rise dramatically. And if interest rates rise dramatically from where they are now, that will set off the kind of nightmare scenario that I keep talking about.
In a previous article entitled “How China Can Cause The Death Of The Dollar And The Entire U.S. Financial System“, I described how China could single-handedly cause immense devastation to the U.S. economy.
China accounts for more global trade that anyone else does, and they also own more of our debt than any other nation does. If China starts dumping our dollars and our debt, much of the rest of the planet would likely follow suit and we would be in for a world of hurt.
And just this week there was another major announcement which indicates that China is getting ready to make a major move against the U.S. dollar. According to Reuters, crude oil futures may soon be pricedin yuan on the Shanghai Futures Exchange…
The Shanghai Futures Exchange (SHFE) may price its crude oil futures contract in yuan and use medium sour crude as its benchmark, its chairman said on Thursday, adding that the bourse is speeding up preparatory work to secure regulatory approvals.
China, which overtook the United States as the world’s top oil importer in September, hopes the contract will become a benchmark in Asia and has said it would allow foreign investors to trade in the contract without setting up a local subsidiary.
If that actually happens, that will be absolutely huge.
China is the number one importer of oil in the world, and it was only a matter of time before they started to openly challenge the petrodollar.
But even I didn’t think that we would see anything like this so quickly.
The world is changing, and most Americans have absolutely no idea what this is going to mean for them. As demand for the U.S. dollar and U.S. debt goes down, the things that we buy at the store will cost a lot more, our standard of living will go down and it will become a lot more expensive for everyone (including the U.S. government) to borrow money.
Unfortunately, there isn’t much that can be done about any of this at this point. When it comes to economics, China has been playing chess while the United States has been playing checkers. And now decades of very, very foolish decisions are starting to catch up with us.
The false prosperity that most Americans are enjoying today will soon start disappearing, and most of them will have no idea why it is happening.
The years ahead are going to be very challenging, and so I hope that you are getting ready for them.
Distributed by RINF Alternative News

Filthy Rich CEOs Are Lobbying to Cut Medicare, Social Security and Push the Retirement Age Back

The loudest calls for Social Security cuts are coming from CEOs who will never have to worry about their own retirement security.
The following originally appeared on OtherWords, and is cross-posted here with permission.
David Cote, the CEO of Honeywell, has more than $134 million in his personal retirement fund. If I were sitting on a nest egg that big, I might feel a bit sheepish about telling ordinary grandmas and grandpas to take a cut in their Social Security payments.
But Cote — and leaders of many other large corporations — don’t see it that way. In fact, as Congress prepares for yet another budget showdown at the end of the year, the loudest calls for Social Security cuts are coming from CEOs who will never have to worry about their own retirement security.
Two lobby groups have organized CEOs into an austerity army. One is the Fix the Debt campaign, which is spending tens of millions of dollars on slick PR tactics to garner public support for cutting popular programs like Social Security and Medicare. More than 135 chief executives have signed up as Fix the Debt spokespeople.
The other is the Business Roundtable, a 40-year-old club for about 200 of America‘s most powerful CEOs. The Roundtable doesn’t sugarcoat. They want everybody to work until age 70 before they can get Social Security.
Like Cote, these are people who are sitting on massive nest eggs of their own. According to a new report by my organization, the Institute for Policy Studies, and the Center for Effective Government, Business Roundtable CEOs have retirement accounts worth $14.5 million on average. That’s enough to generate a monthly retirement check of $86,043 starting at age 65. By contrast, the average monthly Social Security check is only $1,237.
Many of these CEOs are also shortchanging their own workers’ pension funds. General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt, for example, has made his employees’ future less secure by building up a nearly $22.6 billion deficit in the company’s retirement fund.
Why do CEOs with platinum pensions care so much about cutting Social Security? The CEOs claim it’s all about patriotism. “As an American,” Cote says, “I couldn’t know about this problem and not try to do something about it.” As the Baby Boom generation ages, Cote says, we’re facing a “demographic time bomb.”
There’s a raging debate among economists about whether we’re really facing a bomb or if this is just another phony crisis. What’s clear is there are far more effective ways to ensure Social Security’s sustainability than cutting benefits.
One of the most effective ways would be to lift the cap on wages subject to Social Security taxes. Right now, just the first $113,700 of an American worker’s wage income is subject to this 12.4 percent payroll tax. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that if this cap were eliminated, it would do reduce Social Security’s projected shortfall by three times as much as raising the retirement age to 70.
It’s not hard to figure out why these powerful CEOs aren’t supporting that change. They’d have to pay way more into the system. For example, Cote received an unusually large cash payout in 2011 of $25.1 million. If the cap didn’t exist, he would’ve paid $2.6 million in Social Security taxes instead of the maximum for that year of $11,107.
If these CEOs were truly patriotic, they’d work to ensure a dignified retirement for all their fellow Americans.
Source: Alternet
Distributed by RINF Alternative News

Bloomberg Kills Article Exposing Chinese Regime, Suspends Reporter

First, the controversial “media” outlet Bloomberg News, widely regarded by critics as a propaganda megaphone for the radical views of billionaire New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, reportedly censored one of its reporters by blocking publication of an article exposing cronyism and corruption among Communist China’s ruling class. Insider sources quoted in news reports said the decision to kill the story was made for “political reasons” — namely, to appease Beijing. Then, last week, award-winning investigative journalist Michael Forsythe, based in Hong Kong, was finally suspended by Bloomberg’s media empire, shattering its credibility among analysts.
The explosive story that Bloomberg refused to run reportedly detailed the myriad hidden links between one of China’s wealthiest crony capitalists and the families of ruthless Communist Party autocrats, who rule the nation with terror and an iron fist. Less than a week after killing Forsythe’s investigative article, Bloomberg bosses also declared another major China story to be off-limits. The second blocked piece, the New York Times reported in a front-page story citing four unnamed Bloomberg employees, focused on the children of senior Communist Chinese tyrants employed by foreign banks.
While most of the public exposure surrounding the Bloomberg scandal has been based on anonymous sources so far, a clearer picture of what happened behind the scenes is slowly starting to emerge. According to media reports, Editor-in-chief Matthew Winkler announced the decision late last month on a conference call, comparing it to self-censorship by news agencies inside National Socialist (Nazi) Germany decades ago. “He said, ‘If we run the story, we’ll be kicked out of China,’ ” one of the Bloomberg employees with knowledge of the scandal was quoted as saying by the Times.
The brutal Communist Party-run regime in Beijing has already retaliated against foreign media organizations in the past, including Bloomberg News, in response to coverage that offended or exposed the autocrats. Of course, Chinese “journalists,” who often double as spies for the autocracy in addition to their regular role as propagandists, are already strictly controlled, too. As reported recently by William F. Jasper for The New American, China’s so-called “journalists” were recently ordered to take new propaganda training as the regime seeks to clamp down even harder on access to information.
A few analysts have suggested that Bloomberg’s decision not to publish the story may have been linked to the company’s lucrative financial-terminal business interests, fearing that angering the regime too much could kill its extremely profitable Chinese operations entirely. When he leaves office in the near future, “Nanny” Bloomberg himself announced plans to visit Chinese rulers in Beijing. The upcoming trip has been highlighted by multiple critics of the media empire’s decision to kill the articles — especially because the Forsythe piece was reportedly set to run around the same time.
However, the primary explanation offered by inside sources, essentially that the firm did not want to have its journalists expelled from China, has also been described as plausible by analysts. The third potential option is that the story was killed to protect the reputation of the barbaric regime. Even though Bloomberg News has exposed several key China stories in the past — including articles highlighting the corrupt enrichment of well-connected Communist Party leaders and cronies — the man behind the media outlet has repeatedly shown affection for oppressive government schemes. At this point, the facts remain unclear.
Apparently under the impression that Forsythe may have revealed the Bloomberg decision to the media, the New York Post reported late last week that the journalist had been placed on unpaid leave. According to the newspaper, the investigative reporter, whose work exposing the Communist Chinese regime’s machinations has earned him several awards, was even escorted out of Bloomberg’s Hong Kong offices on November 14. He reportedly worked on the latest story for almost a year.
The company has refused to comment on Forsythe’s employment status, but sources quoted in the press said he is ultimately expected to be dismissed. Perhaps in response to the devastating news coverage surrounding the scandal, Winkler and other Bloomberg executives have claimed that the Forsythe story was not really “spiked” — claims that have largely been dismissed as misleading at best. Considering the huge amount of attention the saga has attracted, though, analysts say it is certainly possible that Bloomberg may have decided to run the story anyway. “What you have is untrue,” Winkler was quoted as saying in response to the media coverage about the scandal.
Some commentators expect Forsythe’s article to come out no matter what — and that now, it will garner even more interest. “With this story blowing up in the way it has, it seems like only a matter of time before the content of the investigative piece Forsythe was working on gets out anyway, either through Bloomberg growing a spine and just running it, or other outlets following up on the reporting,” wrote Joshua Keating at Slate. “Only now, as a certified ‘story Beijing doesn’t want you to read,’ it’s likely to get a lot more attention than it would have otherwise.”
Analysts and media commentators, of course, lambasted the decision to kill the stories, saying the ham-handed move also killed “all” of the media outlet’s remaining credibility along with the articles. However, while the scandal certainly reflects poorly on Bloomberg and its “journalism,” it also illustrates several important points. Among the key takeaways: establishment “news” coming out of Communist China should generally be regarded as propaganda until proven otherwise. Indeed, the regime in Beijing has developed a reputation as one of the worst autocracies on Earth when it comes to just about everything — but especially free speech, free thought, and a free press.
Critics of the Bloomberg decision also said the scandal showed that media company’s reports should be taken with a grain of salt, too. “As it stands now, any reporting from Bloomberg should be automatically seen as suspect, as the editor-in-chief has admitted that he will appease local governments to keep them happy, and the reporting is expected to reflect that sort of propaganda-happy posture,” noted Techdirt editor Mike Masnick, saying the scandal showed that “yet another major news organization has decided that it no longer needs credibility.” Masnick also blasted the Bloomberg editor’s alleged motivation: Not angering the Chinese regime, which he reportedly compared to appeasing the Nazis.
Of course, the latest scandal is hardly the only reason to be skeptical of Bloomberg “news.” New York City Mayor Bloomberg, the billionaire behind the media machine that shares his name, has a reputation as one of the most autocratic politicians in America. Among other extreme statist activities that contributed to his being ridiculed as “Nanny” Bloomberg and America‘s “most dangerous mayor”: Banning large sodas in New York, bankrolling totalitarian-minded politicians, squandering huge sums out of his fortune to assault gun rights across America, and more. He is also regularly criticized as a hypocrite for his fiendish efforts to disarm law-abiding Americans even as he cowers behind legions of heavily armed bodyguards. The Chinese regime, which disarmed the population amid its mass-murder and enslavement programs, also openly loathes the U.S. Second Amendment.
Separately, and perhaps even more alarming, Bloomberg is one of the billionaires at the center of the so-called “Good Club.” Participants in the radical outfit, extremist billionaires, include population-control zealots Bill Gates and Ted Turner, both of whom have either directly or indirectly contributed to and supported the Chinese dictatorship’s gruesome one-child policy, and the resulting forced abortions. CNN founder Turner even said he wants to take the schemes global, while Gates finances organizations that work with the regime to enforce it. Radical statist financier George Soros, who claimed the Communist Chinese regime should lead the “New World Order,” is a “Good Club” participant, too.
Also part of the exclusive club, which reportedly has as its mission reducing the number of humans on the planet, is none other than establishment ringleader David Rockefeller. The founder of multiple infamous organizations dedicated to advancing a deeply controversial agenda, Rockefeller has openly praised Communist Chinese dictator Mao, widely considered the greatest mass-murderer in human history. “The social experiment in China under Chairman Mao’s leadership is one of the most important and successful in history,” he opined in a 1973 piece for the New York Times. Tens of millions had already been murdered by then.
Virtually everyone outside of China and North Korea — and probably many of the people in both nations — already understands that the Communist Chinese regime is ruthless in its zeal to suppress the truth. That was no surprise; though with the autocracy’s recent appointment to the dictator-packed United Nations “Human Rights” Council, it appears that most UN member governments do not see a problem with the tyranny and vicious human rights abuses.
Whether the Bloomberg stories exposing China’s communist rulers and the crony-capitalists they enrich will eventually see the light of day remains unclear. What has become even more obvious with the latest scandal, though, is that, despite its occasional hard-hitting investigative pieces, Bloomberg News’ credibility has plunged even further. The only reason Chinese regime’s credibility did not sink along with Bloomberg’s is because it was already at rock bottom.
Photo of the Bloomberg LP Tower, which houses Bloomberg News: AP Images
Alex Newman, a foreign correspondent for The New American, is normally based in Europe. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .