Category Archives: politics

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Millionaire Politicians: Trading Influence for Cash – YouTube

 

The poverty rate in the United States has risen by about 33% since the year 2000, while the income gap between the top 1 percent earners and the rest has widened by 17 percent for the same period. How have those socioeconomic changes affected America’s politicians?

As it turns out, for the first time in history, more than 50 percent of U.S. Congress members are millionaires.

Furthermore, the median net worth in 2012 for all 535 members of Congress in office was a little over $1 million. The value of all their combined assets, minus liabilities, was about $4 billion, and many of them are in the nation’s top 1 percent richest people.

The top 25 wealthiest senators and representatives each have an estimated net worth of more than $35 million, with the richest – Darrell Issa (R-Calif) – topping the list with nearly half a billion dollars.

U.S. lawmakers earn a base annual salary of $174,000, not counting benefits, and many of them invest in Wall Street.

In 2012, the 10 most popular stock investments for members of Congress included the technological giant General Electric (1st), the bank Wells Fargo (2nd), Bank of America (6th), and JPMorgan Chase (7th).

Do politicians use their privileged position to engage in insider trading? As University of Chicago Professor Luigi Zingales points out, “Not only can members of Congress legally trade on confidential information; they do, despite the potential cost to their reputations.”

A 2004 study published in the Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis revealed that U.S. senators trading in stocks beat the market by 12 percent a year. “Since even the best hedge-fund managers find it hard to achieve comparable results, we must conclude that these senators either are better than hedge-fund managers, or that they benefit from privileged information,” writes Zingales. U.S. congressmen and their staffers also collect privileged information and sell it to hedge-fund managers for millions of dollars.

Peter Schweizer, the President of the Government Accountability Institute, wrote in his 2011 book Throw Them All Out: “Insider trading is illegal on Wall Street, yet it is routine among members of Congress. Normal individuals cannot get in on IPOs at the asking price, but politicians do so routinely. The Obama administration has been able to funnel hundreds of millions of dollars to its supporters, ensuring yet more campaign donations. An entire class of investors now makes all of its profits based on influence and access in Washington.”

Sources:
https://www.census.gov/hhes/www/pover…
http://topincomes.g-mond.parisschoolo…
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/10/us/…
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01…
https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2014…
http://www.opensecrets.org/pfds../ove…
http://www.opensecrets.org/pfds../ove…
http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.c…
http://www.walkerd.people.cofc.edu/40…
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepav…
http://www.amazon.com/Throw-Them-All-…

Millionaire Politicians: Trading Influence for Cash – YouTube.

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Keiser Report: Fast Food Tax Evasion E647 – YouTube

via Keiser Report: Fast Food Tax Evasion E647 – YouTube.

 

In this episode of the Keiser Report, Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert discuss Burger King, yet another company fleeing America for yet another ‘free’ healthcare nation, Canada. Meanwhile, back in America naked incidents are on the rise and, in Europe, suicide tourism rises four-fold. In the second half, Max interviews Trace Mayer about bitcoin, central banking and geopolitics.

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War or Peace: Damning Eye-Witness Video of MH17 False Flag; Plus, Strange Failures of Russian Rockets | Futurist Trendcast Lada Ray

From Lada Ray: Link to video! Warning – GRAPHIC!This has just been brougth to my attention. I believe it is necessary to post the translation of this very graphic and disturbing, but extremely damning video. Please keep in mind that the site that has posted this video, ‘AnnaNews,’ keeps being deleted by YouTube for their unbending drive to tell the truth. However, it keeps coming back up. Watch the video asap, to avoid missing out in case of deletion.

via War or Peace: Damning Eye-Witness Video of MH17 False Flag; Plus, Strange Failures of Russian Rockets | Futurist Trendcast.

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MH17 FULLY EXPOSED!! You Won’t Believe The SHOCKING TRUTH About the Ukraine FALSE FLAG – Corbett Report

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWlAARb0fN4

When Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 went down on July 17, 2014, we were immediately inundated with base propaganda trying to convince us that the shootdown could be traced back to the Kremlin. But what was this rush to judgement based on? What have we learned about the crash since then? Why has MH17 completely disappeared from the news cycle? And who really stood to benefit from the disaster? Find out the answers to these questions and more in this week’s edition of The Corbett Report.

 

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US Going to Absurd Lengths to Overthrow Cuban Government – Abby Martin

Published on Aug 8, 2014Abby Martin speaks with Eugene Puryear, an organizer with the ANSWER coalition, about a new AP report concerning the recruitment of foreign nationals by USAID to stir dissent in Cuba through HIV prevention programs on college campuses.

 

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The Truth About Israel and Palestine – Stefan Molyneux

Published on Jul 31, 2014

The Israel-Palestine conflict has been raging on for decades and there seems to be no end in sight.

On July 8, 2014, Israel launched operation Protective Edge, carrying out airstrikes on 50 cities in the Palestinian Gaza Strip. The Israeli government claimed this was retaliation against rockets fired from Palestinian territories controlled by the Islamic political movement Hamas.

The July events are the latest of a series of bloody attacks between Israel and Palestine. What is the cause of all this violence and why are both sides so committed to it?

 

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State Dept grilled by press corp offensive over Gaza – YouTube

One sharp lady –  right or wrong.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSDyQN6N5EU

Published on Jul 31, 2014

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf condemned the deadly shelling of a United Nations school in Gaza on Wednesday. She called for a “full and prompt” investigation into the incident, but declined to immediately place the blame on Israel.

Artillery shells hit the UN school crowded with refugees, while Israeli airstrikes hit a group of rescue workers and onlookers who had rushed to the scene of a previous attack in a busy shopping area – READ MORE http://on.rt.com/wbpjap

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Keiser Report: Dumb Money E632 – YouTube

Published on Jul 26, 2014In this episode of the Keiser Report, Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert with a double header discussing the ‘dumb money’ piling into markets just as the Spectator’s cover story reads: “The Next Crash: We could be on the brink of another financial crisis.” Max and Stacy read through the piece in shock at the obvious signs of misallocation of wealth while chasing dumb bubbles – including a P/E ratio now at 25.6 compared to a historic norm of 16.5. In the second half, they examine more misallocation of wealth as the US spends an additional $1 trillion annually on healthcare compared to if they spent the same percentage of GDP as the next most expensive country, the Netherlands. While overspending by $1 trillion, the energy grid has the most blackouts of any developed nation and yet less than half a trillion could replace the dumb, old grid with a smart, new one.

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Scheming Aggressive War – Paul Craig Roberts

Despite the conclusion by US intelligence that there is no evidence of Russian involvement in the destruction of the Malaysian airliner and all lives on board, Washington is escalating the crisis and shepherding it toward war.Twenty-two US senators have introduced into the 113th Congress, Second Session, a bill, S.2277, “To prevent further Russian aggression toward Ukraine and other sovereign states in Europe and Eurasia, and for other purposes.” https://beta.congress.gov/113/bills/s2277/BILLS-113s2277is.pdf The bill is before the Committee on Foreign Relations.Note that prior to any evidence of any Russian aggression, there are already 22 senators lined up in behalf of preventing further Russian aggression.

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via Scheming Aggressive War – LewRockwell.com.