statism watch

Probably, because the international central banks want to establish the same sort of consolidation over first world assets as they already have over the third world. Tim Geithner said so in June 2008, right before the first wave of this debt conflagration swept over the US, the UK, and their client states. Could this be any clearer? And Flaherty and his peers are running around on dogsleds and knocking over igloos up in Iqaluit, throwing up this big snowjob about the minor degrees of disagreement between these states as to precisely how they’re going to go about handing full control of the world economic system over to the IMF and World Bank. It’s ridiculous. And we’re all just sitting there watching the Superbowl, watching Idol or some fake reality TV show, thinking we’re in Valhalla. That’ll work for precisely as long as it takes for the stimulus to trigger currency crises, then this whole house of cards comes down and we beg for our money to get pegged to a global standard. How many rude awakenings do we need? Come on, people!

Flashback: The US budget: Barack Obama’s $3.8 trillion red ink blueprint | EU cautions Greece about its deficit | Consumer debt loads are the new concern | No solution in dispute over Iceland deposits | IMF warns against retreat from stimulus spending | Why Did the ‘Stimulus’ Fail to Help the US Economy? | Could Greece drag down Europe? | Record surge in UK inflation | Iceland sets date for Icesave vote | ‘Significant chance’ of second financial crisis, warns World Economic Forum | Iceland says IMF aid likely delayed | Iceland blocks central bank debt repayment deal | Canadians struggling to dig out of debt | Can’t say if federal stimulus is working: watchdog | UAE markets dive on Dubai debt woes | Dubai’s ‘big pyramid scheme’ grounded by debt load | A world awash in debt | U.S. banking troubles far from over | Ottawa on track for largest-ever deficit | U.S. markets fall on Dubai crisis | 1 in 10 Americans delinquent in paying mortgage | Personal bankruptcies still soaring | Credit card debt balloons | US credit shrinks at Great Depression rate prompting fears of double-dip recession | Canada’s $1-trillion debt baby | Credit delinquencies up 24% in June | Bank of Canada declares recession over | Budget officer ‘can’t tell’ if stimulus plan working | More Canadians in arrears on credit payments | Canadian households $1.3-trillion in debt | Credit companies seek to avoid regulation, create global debit system | Canadian credit card delinquencies rising | Iceland’s government collapses | Iceland inflation soars to 17.1% | 5 injured during protest in Iceland over economic meltdown | Now the consumer crunch: falling credit limits, rising interest rates

David Oliver, Toronto Star
February 8, 2010

The inevitable “sovereign debt panic” finally struck last week, causing severe one-day drops in stock markets from New York to London to Toronto on Thursday.

Ostensibly, the epicentre of the crisis is Greece, in danger of defaulting on its debt payments to worldwide holders of its government bonds, or sovereign debt.

But the fear about state defaults quickly spread to Spain, Portugal and Ireland, fiscal train wrecks that together with Greece now go by the unfortunate acronym PIGS.

Even then, the scope of a potential second global financial crisis so soon after the credit crisis of 2008-09 goes far beyond the euro zone, the 16 nations sharing a common currency, the euro.

Last week’s dramatics could have been far worse. And they may yet manifest themselves in an ugly fashion in weeks to come if the euro-zone countries don’t rescue what Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou described last week as “the weakest link in the euro zone.”

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Flashback: Student Mock Parliament to be held in Montreal Parallels Integrationist Aims of SPP

Dana Gabriel, StatismWatch Contributing Writer
February 8, 2010

The North American Forum on Integration (NAFI) was created in 2002, and is one of many think tanks pushing for closer continental ties. In 2005, NAFI organized the Triumvirate, a North American model parliament which meets once a year. The exercise brings together university students from the U.S., Mexico and Canada with participants assigned the roles of legislators, journalists or lobbyists. Over the years, the mock parliament has debated and drafted resolutions on such key issues as trade corridors, immigration, NAFTA’s Chapter 11, along with the creation of a North American investment fund and a customs union. Infowars reported that last year’s Triumvirate gathering was cancelled due to the swine flu pandemic scare.

The Triumvirate 2010 will be held in Querétaro, Mexico. A description on its website states that, “This 5th edition will gather a hundred university students from Mexico, the United States and Canada to participate, from May 30th to June 4th, 2010, in an international negotiation exercise in which they will simulate a parliamentary meeting.” Some of the main objectives of the Triumvirate event include, “To allow participants to familiarize themselves with the functioning of democratic institutions as well as North American political, economic, environmental and social realities; to develop the participants’ sense of belonging to North America (and) to increase intercultural exchanges and promote the creation of academia networks.” This year’s delegates will address such topics as making smart borders more efficient, managing transboundary water in North America, as well as countering human trafficking and consolidating North American governance. While the model legislature is seen as an opportunity for students to better understand the political process and the challenges facing the continent, in many ways it mirrors actual efforts to further integrate the three countries. This includes the vision of a real functioning North American parliament similar to the European Union (EU) model.

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Glowing articles about ‘elite police’ squads, questioning youth and demanding their ID on the street. Good intentions or not, it’s a dangerous precedent, the thin edge of the wedge that eventually wipes out your right to not have to deal with internal checkpoints and police harrasment. You can bet there’s a lot more to this story on the ground in Malvern and paramilitary squads and random police raids are coming to your door (or apartment building) as well unless you, the privileged, speak out about this. Make everybody see: This is how militarized patrols started in other jurisdictions – now, the police carry submachine guns in London, UK. Now, the police carry submachine guns on the NY subway. Now, your bags are being searched to get on trains. Police around the globe feel empowered now to merely point to the existence of crime in order to swell their own operational mandate and justify treating everyone like criminals. The cameras and drones are on their way as well. This is the intended meaning of ‘the day the world changed‘. So remember, citizens, you do not have to identify yourself to police or submit to a search unless they have a reasonable expectation that a crime has been committed. Yet.

Flashback: Winter Olympics on slippery slope after Vancouver crackdown on homeless | Toronto Star Columnist Fiorito: The cops came and took my gun | UK: Anti-terror stop and search policy ruled illegal by European human rights court | UK: From snapshot to Special Branch: how my camera made me a terror suspect | UK: Photographer questioned under anti-terror laws for taking pictures of Christmas lights | UK: Big fall in police use of stop-and search powers after outcry | UK Police in £9m scheme to log ‘domestic extremists’ | UK anti-terrorism strategy ’spies’ on innocent | UK: Paramilitary police placed on routine foot patrol for first time | Olympic security follows protester’s friend | Toronto police seize 400 guns in ’safety push’ | EU Plans Massive Surveillance Panopticon That Would Monitor “Abnormal Behavior” | Pentagon Caught Subverting Protest Group | UK: Big Brother state wants even more spy powers | Toronto TAVIS special police corps demanding ID on city streets | 50 Toronto high schools to have armed police presence | DoD Training Manual Describes Protest As “Low-Level Terrorism” | Lunchtime lockdown to promote healthier eating: T.O. school plan | UK: Police caught on tape trying to recruit climate activist as informant | UK police maintain databank on thousands of protesters | UK: Government ‘using fear as a weapon to erode civil liberties’ | Schools seek more police as crime drops | Former MI5 chief: UK Ministers ‘using fear of terror’ to restrict civil rights | Police presence in high schools makes the grade | UK: Calling the police to account for anti-photography law | Olympic security boss puts protesters on notice | UK Big Brother police to get ‘war-time’ power to demand ID in the street | Safety report author Falconer on armed police in schools: “Facile” | Activists seen as potential threat to Vancouver Games | Frequent school lockdowns raise questions | 27 Toronto schools to get armed police presence | Two trustees stand opposed to armed police in schools | Toronto Police offer gun owners shiny new camera, home visit to disarm themselves | Armed police officers heading to high schools | Protestors added to database of terror suspects | RCMP conducts random search and seizure on Canada Day | Papers Please: UK cops stopping millions in streets | Armed Police to Roam Toronto High Schools | $4 Million Earmarked for Cameras, “Respect” at Toronto Schools | Machine Gun-Toting Officers To Patrol NYC Subway

Moira Welsh, The Toronto Star
February 8, 2010

TAVIS initiative joint effort of province and police

It’s Saturday night in Malvern, and a young black man is leaning over the side of a police cruiser, arms spread wide, crying for a bit of mercy.

“I never did anything wrong,” Dane Brown says as police officers put him in the back of their squad car. “I did nothing! I’m just here to see my baby mother.”

Brown’s indignation grows louder when Sergeant Steve Harrigan arrives to check on his officers, part of the Toronto Anti-Violence Intervention Strategy. Harrigan leads a TAVIS Rapid Response Team of 16 officers who sweep into areas like Malvern or Jane-Finch, stopping people on the street, in parks, driving cars or in apartment stairwells. They are looking for guns, drugs or information that will lead them to gang-related crime.

Called “targeted policing,” TAVIS is the creation of the provincial government and Toronto police in response to 2005’s “year of the gun,” when gang violence erupted across the city.

Its mandate is to cut crime in high-risk communities across Toronto. One of the ways TAVIS does that is by stopping thousands of people in the targeted neighbourhoods, home to many minorities. This leads to arrests and a growing database of personal information that police gather from a practice called “carding.”

Officially called “Field Information Reports,” the collection of names, addresses, acquaintances and skin colour on small, white cards is a long-time investigative practice used by all Toronto police officers. TAVIS, however, was given the mandate of focusing on high-crime areas. As a result, its officers card more people, and are likely to card more blacks, than any other police unit.

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Additionally, A Los Alamos lab study suggested that the frequency at which the radiation is emitted from the scanners could directly damage the integrity of DNA.

Flashback: UK: Airline passengers have ‘no right’ to refuse naked body scanners | Full-body scanner blind to bomb parts | Airport scanner companies queue for business after ‘underpants bomber’ | German ‘Fleshmob’ Protests Airport Scanners | Body scanners capable of storing, sending images, group says | Dutch police develop mobile body scans | Whole-body airport scanners are basically safe—or are they? | Airport security starts in the parking lot | Body scanners coming to Canadian airports | UK: New scanners break child porn laws | US implements travel profiling: Tougher air screening for ’security-risk’ countries | UK: Full-body scanners being ordered for airports, says Gordon Brown | Group slams Chertoff on conflict of interest in scanner promotion | The ‘Israelification’ of airports: High security, little bother | Underwear Bomber Renews Calls for ‘Naked Scanners’ | Federal Privacy Commissioner raises alarm over terror security measures | Privacy watchdog OKs ‘naked’ airport scanners | Security may soon test ‘virtual strip search’ at large Canadian aiports | US Border Guards to Expand Use of X-Ray Body Scanners | Homeland Security seeks Bladerunner-style lie detector | Greyhound introduces security screening of passengers, bans fruit, carry-ons | Germany rejects full-body scans at airports | Interpol wants facial recognition database to catch suspects | ‘Pre-crime’ detector shows promise | Eye scans, fingerprints to control NZ borders | Air passengers to undergo ‘virtual strip search’ | US Homeland Security Keen on ‘Novel’ Israeli Airport Security Technology | Israel startup uses behavioral science to identify terrorists | Airport scanner a ‘virtual strip search’

Paul Joseph Watson, PrisonPlanet.com
February 5, 2010

Children and pregnant women should not be subject to scan says influential body

An influential international radiation safety organization has warned that the naked body scanners currently being rolled out in airports across the world increase the risk of cancer and birth defects and should not be used on pregnant women or children.

Despite governments claiming that backscatter x-ray systems produce radiation too low to pose a threat, the Inter-Agency Committee on Radiation Safety concluded in their report that governments must justify the use of the scanners and that a more accurate assessment of the health risks is needed.

Pregnant women and children should not be subject to scanning, according to the report, adding that governments should consider “other techniques to achieve the same end without the use of ionizing radiation.”

“The Committee cited the IAEA’s 1996 Basic Safety Standards agreement, drafted over three decades, that protects people from radiation. Frequent exposure to low doses of radiation can lead to cancer and birth defects, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,” reports Bloomberg.

Despite the fact that the level of radiation the passenger is exposed to is relatively low, repeated exposure for frequent flyers would undoubtedly increase cancer risks.

The report issued by the IACRS encompasses the work of the European Commission, International Atomic Energy Agency, Nuclear Energy Agency and the World Health Organization.

As we have highlighted, not only do the body scanners pose health risks but they also violate the fundamental human right of the innocent to be protected against strip-searches.

Despite official denials that the images produced by the devices show details of genitalia, journalists who have investigated trials of the technology have reported that details of sexual organs are “eerily visible”.

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Now, what could possibly go wrong with this idea?

Flashback: Genetically modified monkeys pass traits to offspring | Meet – and eat – the modified Atlantic salmon | Genetically engineered meal close to your table | Are we already dining on clones?

Katie Drummond, Wired.com
February 5, 2010

The Pentagon’s mad science arm may have come up with its most radical project yet. Darpa is looking to re-write the laws of evolution to the military’s advantage, creating “synthetic organisms” that can live forever — or can be killed with the flick of a molecular switch.

As part of its budget for the next year, Darpa is investing $6 million into a project called BioDesign, with the goal of eliminating “the randomness of natural evolutionary advancement.” The plan would assemble the latest bio-tech knowledge to come up with living, breathing creatures that are genetically engineered to “produce the intended biological effect.” Darpa wants the organisms to be fortified with molecules that bolster cell resistance to death, so that the lab-monsters can “ultimately be programmed to live indefinitely.”

Of course, Darpa’s got to prevent the super-species from being swayed to do enemy work — so they’ll encode loyalty right into DNA, by developing genetically programmed locks to create “tamper proof” cells. Plus, the synthetic organism will be traceable, using some kind of DNA manipulation, “similar to a serial number on a handgun.” And if that doesn’t work, don’t worry. In case Darpa’s plan somehow goes horribly awry, they’re also tossing in a last-resort, genetically-coded kill switch:

Develop strategies to create a synthetic organism “self-destruct” option to be implemented upon nefarious removal of organism.

The project comes as Darpa also plans to throw $20 million into a new synthetic biology program, and $7.5 million into “increasing by several decades the speed with which we sequence, analyze and functionally edit cellular genomes.”

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This is going on in Canada as well. The government and the insurance companies love you. Nothing to see here.

Flashback: UK Police routinely arresting people to get DNA, inquiry claims | UK: Police ‘must purge innocent DNA’ | Newborn’s Blood Samples Raise Questions of Privacy | Study finds genetic discrimination by insurance firms | US: Ruling allowing Taser use to get DNA may be nation’s first | UK: Police ‘arrest innocent youths for their DNA’, officer claims | UK: Fury as Commons denied vote on DNA database | Australians refused insurance because of poor genes

Elizabeth Cohen, CNN.com
February 4, 2010

When Annie Brown’s daughter, Isabel, was a month old, her pediatrician asked Brown and her husband to sit down because he had some bad news to tell them: Isabel carried a gene that put her at risk for cystic fibrosis.

While grateful to have the information — Isabel received further testing and she doesn’t have the disease — the Mankato, Minnesota, couple wondered how the doctor knew about Isabel’s genes in the first place. After all, they’d never consented to genetic testing.

It’s simple, the pediatrician answered: Newborn babies in the United States are routinely screened for a panel of genetic diseases. Since the testing is mandated by the government, it’s often done without the parents’ consent, according to Brad Therrell, director of the National Newborn Screening & Genetics Resource Center.

In many states, such as Florida, where Isabel was born, babies’ DNA is stored indefinitely, according to the resource center.

Many parents don’t realize their baby’s DNA is being stored in a government lab, but sometimes when they find out, as the Browns did, they take action. Parents in Texas, and Minnesota have filed lawsuits, and these parents’ concerns are sparking a new debate about whether it’s appropriate for a baby’s genetic blueprint to be in the government’s possession.

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Canadian law makers are being pressured into this policy as well. It’s a nascent global policy. Do you agree with ‘global policy’? We all need to think long and hard about this, since, historically, the boundaries between nation states have acted as firewalls to tyranny.

Flashback: EU urged to adopt bank supertax | Prepare to be boarded! Pirate Party wins entry to European Parliament | Sweden approves wiretapping law | Stockholm Court: Pirate Bay Judge ‘Unbiased’ | Pirate Bay lawyer calls for retrial after judge confirms ties to copyright groups | Jail terms for Pirate Bay founders, appeal in works | Sweden approves wiretapping law | Opposition to proposed Swedish surveillance law mounts | Sweden sets sights on new ‘catch and release’ wiretap law

Peter Vinthagen Simpson, TheLocal.se
February 4, 2010

The European Court of Justice has told Sweden that it must implement a 2006 measure requiring telecom operators to store information about their customers’ phone calls and emails.

• Sweden has Europe’s 2nd fastest broadband: report (15 Jan 10)
• EU closes in on banking oversight deal: Borg (2 Dec 09)
• Swedish intelligence agency hit by IT-attack (4 Nov 09)

The European Union directive, known as the Data Retention Directive, was approved by Brussels in March 2006, but Sweden has yet to implement the measure more than three years after its passage.

The Swedish government conceded to the court that it had not fulfilled its obligations and assured the court that the EU directive 2006/24 can be expected to pass into Swedish law on April 1st 2010.

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Want to fix the economy? Try restricting fractional reserve banking to a 1:1 multiplier, for starters. Doesn’t it seem inherently fraudulent to lend out more money – even illusory fiat money – than you have? Think of how Air Canada overbooks its flights as an analogous situation. Bankers oversell a commodity and have zero accountability to their customers. The Keynesian fraud has to stop. But you won’t see anyone discussing real alternatives to the international system at the G7, G8, or G20. That is control of the dialogue. All of this collegial ‘disagreement’ between finance ministers is a sham, a shadowplay, and serves only to reinforce their fundamental consensus. And if you need to have this any more in your face / this rap smackdown puts Keynes in his place.

Update (2010/02/07): The outcome of the meeting? The ministers agreed to agree upon something at some point in the future. Photo-ops were had by all.

Flashback: Global Bank Insurance Levy Wins Support over Transaction Tax at Davos | Harper urges G20 to follow economic accords | Bankers unite against Barack Obama and Gordon Brown in call for world regulation | IMF warns against retreat from stimulus spending | Banks find gaping loophole in Obama financial reforms | Obama talking tough with banks | EU urged to adopt bank supertax | Obama ponders bank transaction levy to recoup bailout shortfalls | Explosive Leaked Emails Expose Treasury Secretary Geithner’s Deception in ‘Backdoor Bailout’ | Final Copenhagen Text Includes Global Transaction Tax | EU calls for tax on bank transactions | UK: Brown takes campaign for Tobin tax to Commonwealth | UK: Brown proposes global fund to kick-start Copenhagen climate change process | Flaherty, USA say no to global financial tax, yes to continued ’stimulus’ at G20 | Bernanke continues pressing for sweeping new powers for Fed | IMF chief wants global bank tax | G20 nations meet as protests flare on issue of international banking regulation | IMF approves $13bn gold sale to boost lending fund | China Set to Buy $50 Billion in IMF Notes | China calls anew for super-sovereign currency | No one talking about dumping dollar: China minister | China explores buying $50bn in IMF bonds | Chinese economists deem huge holding of US bonds “risky” as Geithner visits | A Bigger, Bolder Role Is Imagined For the IMF | UK PM reveals G20 plan to boost IMF by $1 trillion, hails new world order (again) | UN & IMF Back Agenda For Global Financial Dictatorship | IMF poised to print billions of dollars in ‘global quantitative easing’ | Gordon Brown seeks sweeping reforms to give IMF global ’surveillance role’ | IMF may need to “print money”, act as “world’s central bank” as crisis spreads | Globalists Exploit Financial Meltdown In Move Towards One World Currency | World needs new Bretton Woods, says Brown | IMF prescribes state regulation of ‘global financial order’ | Bilderberg Seeks Bank Centralization Agenda | Banks face “new world order,” consolidation: report

Doug Saunders, the Globe and Mail
February 4, 2010

Finance ministers agree on urgency of regulating economy, but head into Iqaluit summit with contradictory proposals on how to do it

Britain’s Chancellor of The Exchequer Alistair Darling, left, gestures as he talks with French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde during the G20 meeting on Sept. 5, 2009 in London.

A year after the world’s governments agreed to tackle the global financial collapse with a co-ordinated program of big-budget stimulus spending, their top ministers are arriving in the Canadian Arctic Friday in a desperate bid to keep that unity from falling apart.

But detailed interviews with the British and French finance ministers in Paris and London this week reveal that they and their Canadian, U.S., and German colleagues are headed into Iqaluit for a G7 finance ministers’ summit with different and often contradictory proposals to regulate finance and prevent another downturn.

“We’re all people of good will, but we need to be very careful … because what works with one set of banks or one country does not necessarily work with another set of banks or another country,” Christine Lagarde, the French Finance Minister, said in an interview at her Paris office.

Alistair Darling, the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, warned that this could be the last chance to come up with a new bank-regulation system before the G8 and G20 summits of world leaders this summer, also in Canada, and that there is a wide distance between nations on how to proceed. [Ed. Note: G20: Toronto ought to be interesting. This journal would encourage some planning around G20 resistance take place here.]

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You will, of course, excuse our initial skepticism Mr. Elliot.

Flashback: New RCMP watchdog is toothless | RCMP watchdog won’t be reappointed | Bill would end RCMP self-investigations | Video shows violent B.C. police takedown | RCMP actions ‘gratuitous, ‘violent,’ BC needs own police lawyer tells inquiry | RCMP reject watchdog report on internal investigations | Mounties discussed Tasing Dziekanski prior to altercation | Mounties want to bar Taser inquiry from finding misconduct | RCMP credibility battered by TASER inquiry | Ottawa cuts funding for RCMP watchdog in wake of TASER inquiry | Head of RCMP unit that framed Arar promoted to Assistant Commissioner | RCMP Investigates, Clears Self of Wrongdoing in Case of TASERed Inuvik Girl | Perjury: Is it different for cops?

CBC News
February 4, 2010

The RCMP will bring in independent agencies to investigate, whenever possible, if a member of its own force has been accused of serious offences, the RCMP commissioner said.

“I believe that the RCMP has in the past conducted impartial and thorough investigations of our members. This has been validated time and time again by the commission for public complaints against the RCMP, ” William Elliott said on Thursday as he announced the new policy.

“However, I’m convinced that we collectively need to raise the bar in terms of how we respond to situations where life is lost, serious injuries sustained, or sensitive matters of public confidence and trust are raised.”

Elliott acknowledged that the policy does not eliminate the possibility that the RCMP could investigate itself or address the broader subject of the police investigating the police.

“But it does incorporate in policy what we have been saying, what I have been saying is the RCMP is in favour of independent investigations,” he said. “And wherever possible that is what we will look to.”

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