As another example of what appears to be a good idea and Constitutional, and yet approached and legislated in the "wrong" manner, the perfect example it now appears is the "legalization" of medical marijuana in quite a few states throughout the nation.
How so?
In an article published by the AP, it appears the State of Colorado is formulating legislation in order to "track" users and purchasers, using high tech gadgetry and video surveillance at the "points of purchase" in the state requiring these rather small businesses and clinics eventually to be mandated to purchsae, I'm sure, these gadgets and the software to hook them up to state databases.
It is being announced and publicized as in the interests of preventing large scale "black market" distribution of medical grade marijuana, although at the prices that most of these clinics are charging for these prescriptions, I'm sure the street variety will still have a much larger share of the market than the "purer" grade.
Until, of course, the companies manufacturing those joints decides to increase their profit margins, and starts using additives in those joints also to perhaps make a "drug" that is questionably addictive even more so.
Instead of merely rescinding and readdressing the laws which have banned the sale of marijuana for recreational or medicinal purposes and left it at that, and focused on increasing the penalties for large scale distribution on the street, this also appears aimed toward eventually another national or global entity cornering the market on distribution "rights" in many of the states, edging out the small businesses once again mostly owned by holistic physicians or solo MDs.
And there is already in place in most states throughout the nation tracking on prescriptions written by doctors for Class III drugs, and medical marijuana does take a prescription and is classified, to my knowledge, as a Class III drug.
So why isn't there a move to put such cameras in all pharmacies also throughout the nation? Or perhaps that is also already in the works, since there does seem to be more illegal activity regarding some of those "advertised" Class III drugs, anti-depressants, pain killers and the like by those large pharma companies and those inhibitors in those three minute ads on mainstream television every night during prime time.
Increasing penalties on pot in sales to juveniles and large scale operations which are moving imported and exported drugs globally and nationally appears again what may be needed here, but then I am only a mere citizen who can see where this all is eventually leading, and soon that marijuana needed for those whom are deriving health benefits will be $100.00 a joint, plus tax.
And consist of street quality pot, with three minute disclosure commercials "disclosing" all the chemical addictives that most likely will result in a major lawsuit for some patient that has an allergic reaction or develops lung cancer due to the additives in the paper or something else less than 20 years down the road.
Colorado is not the only state, it appears, that is jumping on the commercial marijuana bandwagon for the "jobs and the economies" of those that see bucks in the misfortune of others, however.
And as the prices begin to soar into the stratosphere due to such an agenda, the major drug traffickers, street vendors and black market cross borders importers are licking their lips.
Since such an attempt by the states to micromanage and monitor sales, by feeding another industry and the state itself off those whose numerous medical conditions and its symptoms truly are alleviated by medicinal or recreational use, or the small businesses who are now able to operate in many areas of local communities where such clinics are needed, will end up making them a bundle and increase the demand.
Those in poor health may not be working and already collecting social service benefits, and do need to cut costs whereever they can on prescriptions and extraneous expenses, and $100 joint will make the street value all the more attractive once again, unless the Medicaid supplements also will be increasing accordingly.
I'm sure those rolling paper manufacturers are also delighted.
http://enews.earthlink.net/article/us?guid=20100929/539e95cc-2d90-4667-be4a-fcb7f550d820
Showing posts with label regulation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label regulation. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Goldman Sachs Passion Play Misses The True Crime
While the entire even minimally politically aware citizenry of the United States is on overdrive due to the far-reaching events of this past week with respect to the war zone conditions that are more than apparent in the border states and particularly Arizona over the illegal immigration situation, with those on the East Coast per a Saturday Night Live News segment slamming the state, while being totally ignorant of what actually led to the actions taken by the state government to begin with, there has been more afoot on the Eastern Seaboard.
Such is the insulation in this country, and lack of a national identity at this point that those not directly affected by the porous southern borders and drug cartels doing business cross borders almost unimpeded for the past thirty years, have once again attempted to minimize the impact on those victims, rather than putting pressure on the federal government to actually do their jobs and get our southern borders secured FOR ALL.
This week, however, another drama is being played out in the media which also majorly impacted those living mostly in the West and Southwest and Sunbelt states (the states with the continuing foreclosures, which are increasing by the month) and that is the hearings being conducted over the Goldman Sachs securities fraud.
Little connection, however, or reporting has been forthcoming insofar as just who were the actual true victims in the Goldman Sachs fiasco.
And it was not primarily the investors of those CDOs which were pawned off on them by Goldman Sachs knowing full well that those collateralized loans were junk, and that one of their major clients was hedging their bets though derivatives in the process.
After all, Goldman Sachs is the Cadillac of investment houses and most of their clients are not neophytes but savy investors, or at least minimally aware of risk when making some of those investments.
I mean, these investors were playing the market, after all.
In fact, there are quite a number of Goldman Sachs investors who, I'm sure, invest for the tax writeoffs they receive for losses on some of those investments.
Although mere disclosures also of the risks for most of these investments is clearly inadequate for many, due to the legalese with which most prospectuses and other investment documents are written to begin with.
And selling your investors down the river for a favored investment client firm is not good business practice, nor is it legal in the sense the founders intended irrespective as to whether or not there are codified laws allowing mere disclosure as a protection for these huge Wall Street banking firms in order to mitigated their potential losses since Wall Street is pretty much left alone by the SEC and Congress more and more while the investment grades and risks are becoming greater and greater, for the average American individual investor, that is.
In fact, I would simply state that Goldman Sachs had a huge ethical problem, and conflict of interest actually, in order to win favor with one client at the cost of so many others and can not understand for the life of me just how that would not have been in violation of at least several SEC or United States Code provisions.
But the true victims actually are the American homeowners mostly in the West and Southwest who were sold most of those bad loans which Goldman Sachs has admitted full well knew were bad while they were unloading them.
People who were first time homebuyers, or who were forced into refinances in those states due to the rising costs of ownership during that very short boom cycle, many of whom also were owners of homes during a similar scenario involving Charles Keating in the 1980's - who was selling risky investments to elderly retirees in also the West and Southwest and who ended up losing their homes and everything they had when Lincoln Savings & Loan went bust.
Many of these risky and bad CDO's were also guaranteed by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.
We all know what happened then since it is and has been the American people who are also bailing out those two entities, all for Goldman Sachs' investors, since the homeowners whose loans were involved and their interests are far down the list and in which at this point for many actually have no underlying debt, as it were, since they were resold.
AND the American people were billed for cash advanced literally in the millions directly to Goldman Sachs (a part owner of our own Federal Reserve actually, according to several reports), so actually it appears Goldman Sachs was using Congress to write themselves their own checks, while billing then those costs to the American public at large on their investors behalf.
And yet it is and was the American homeowners who are still being threatened by these banks and lenders in bed with thsoe Wall Street wheeler dealers and Washington, and few have been able to refinance under more favorable terms since Congress has yet to address the actual terms of those bogus contracts to begin with.
In fact, most of Congress and Obama's attentions have been in attempting to hawk refinances instead to get more and more Americans, it appears, into some of those bogus loans in order to use to pay back some of these investors, apparently.
Or for those "new" jobs created in the mortgage industry of now "mortgage counselors" to settle those debts with those investors by renegotiating the terms of those loans as the middle man with those homeowners, weighing the cost/benefit against foreclosing on the property and reselling it as to which would get those investors and those banks affiliated with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae more.
Many of those loans, of course, were sold through California lenders which were not even based on the U.S. currency, but on the British LIBOR rates.
In the banking industry, the connections between New York and Wall Street and California and those mortgage bankers is strong.
After this week's bust and play acting by the Senate with respect to any true financial sector/Wall Street reform, I'm wondering when those in Washington will get around to addressing the fallout to the true victims of this passion play.
The American people, and mostly those American homeowners in the West and Southwest which New York and its brash comedians maligned in a roundabout way once again last Saturday night.
Watch Washington give Goldman Sachs a lengthy tongue lashing, as what occurred today by selected Senators needing some face time with the media for the upcoming elections, and then purportedly levy a heavy fine.
While the true victims continue to lose their homes, jobs and even lives in the West and Southwest due to Washington's continued political maneuvering protecting the bankers and appeasing the foreigners while raping the citizenry.
Such is the insulation in this country, and lack of a national identity at this point that those not directly affected by the porous southern borders and drug cartels doing business cross borders almost unimpeded for the past thirty years, have once again attempted to minimize the impact on those victims, rather than putting pressure on the federal government to actually do their jobs and get our southern borders secured FOR ALL.
This week, however, another drama is being played out in the media which also majorly impacted those living mostly in the West and Southwest and Sunbelt states (the states with the continuing foreclosures, which are increasing by the month) and that is the hearings being conducted over the Goldman Sachs securities fraud.
Little connection, however, or reporting has been forthcoming insofar as just who were the actual true victims in the Goldman Sachs fiasco.
And it was not primarily the investors of those CDOs which were pawned off on them by Goldman Sachs knowing full well that those collateralized loans were junk, and that one of their major clients was hedging their bets though derivatives in the process.
After all, Goldman Sachs is the Cadillac of investment houses and most of their clients are not neophytes but savy investors, or at least minimally aware of risk when making some of those investments.
I mean, these investors were playing the market, after all.
In fact, there are quite a number of Goldman Sachs investors who, I'm sure, invest for the tax writeoffs they receive for losses on some of those investments.
Although mere disclosures also of the risks for most of these investments is clearly inadequate for many, due to the legalese with which most prospectuses and other investment documents are written to begin with.
And selling your investors down the river for a favored investment client firm is not good business practice, nor is it legal in the sense the founders intended irrespective as to whether or not there are codified laws allowing mere disclosure as a protection for these huge Wall Street banking firms in order to mitigated their potential losses since Wall Street is pretty much left alone by the SEC and Congress more and more while the investment grades and risks are becoming greater and greater, for the average American individual investor, that is.
In fact, I would simply state that Goldman Sachs had a huge ethical problem, and conflict of interest actually, in order to win favor with one client at the cost of so many others and can not understand for the life of me just how that would not have been in violation of at least several SEC or United States Code provisions.
But the true victims actually are the American homeowners mostly in the West and Southwest who were sold most of those bad loans which Goldman Sachs has admitted full well knew were bad while they were unloading them.
People who were first time homebuyers, or who were forced into refinances in those states due to the rising costs of ownership during that very short boom cycle, many of whom also were owners of homes during a similar scenario involving Charles Keating in the 1980's - who was selling risky investments to elderly retirees in also the West and Southwest and who ended up losing their homes and everything they had when Lincoln Savings & Loan went bust.
Many of these risky and bad CDO's were also guaranteed by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.
We all know what happened then since it is and has been the American people who are also bailing out those two entities, all for Goldman Sachs' investors, since the homeowners whose loans were involved and their interests are far down the list and in which at this point for many actually have no underlying debt, as it were, since they were resold.
AND the American people were billed for cash advanced literally in the millions directly to Goldman Sachs (a part owner of our own Federal Reserve actually, according to several reports), so actually it appears Goldman Sachs was using Congress to write themselves their own checks, while billing then those costs to the American public at large on their investors behalf.
And yet it is and was the American homeowners who are still being threatened by these banks and lenders in bed with thsoe Wall Street wheeler dealers and Washington, and few have been able to refinance under more favorable terms since Congress has yet to address the actual terms of those bogus contracts to begin with.
In fact, most of Congress and Obama's attentions have been in attempting to hawk refinances instead to get more and more Americans, it appears, into some of those bogus loans in order to use to pay back some of these investors, apparently.
Or for those "new" jobs created in the mortgage industry of now "mortgage counselors" to settle those debts with those investors by renegotiating the terms of those loans as the middle man with those homeowners, weighing the cost/benefit against foreclosing on the property and reselling it as to which would get those investors and those banks affiliated with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae more.
Many of those loans, of course, were sold through California lenders which were not even based on the U.S. currency, but on the British LIBOR rates.
In the banking industry, the connections between New York and Wall Street and California and those mortgage bankers is strong.
After this week's bust and play acting by the Senate with respect to any true financial sector/Wall Street reform, I'm wondering when those in Washington will get around to addressing the fallout to the true victims of this passion play.
The American people, and mostly those American homeowners in the West and Southwest which New York and its brash comedians maligned in a roundabout way once again last Saturday night.
Watch Washington give Goldman Sachs a lengthy tongue lashing, as what occurred today by selected Senators needing some face time with the media for the upcoming elections, and then purportedly levy a heavy fine.
While the true victims continue to lose their homes, jobs and even lives in the West and Southwest due to Washington's continued political maneuvering protecting the bankers and appeasing the foreigners while raping the citizenry.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Obamacare: Using Corporate Business Models To Determine Health Care
For Any and All American Constitutional "Conserve"atives:
Last night I listened to part of Obama's new "road trip" and public relations spiel regarding the health care reform he and the Democratic Congress (and their Republican also Global Socialist members) are hatching in Washington.
At the end of the spiel all I could think of was that his health care "reform" is nothing more than "reforming" medicine and health care along the lines of any corporate enterprise. On a cost/benefit business model with an actuary in Washington then determining what types of treatment will be "approved."
In other words, Obama is now creating a new position within his administration whoever the new "health czar" will be.
God.
Or at least that is what the job description should read with the power which will be given over human life and death in this country.
Listen up, America. Do you really want some federally trained lackey in Washington determining whether or not your spouse, child or other family member "deserves" or is worthy of treatment for their health care needs?
And just who are you going to sue or bring charges against if that treatment is denied, anyway? It is you who are paying for that coverage, yet the only recourse that would be available to you would be to file a claim with the same entity that denied you the treatment to begin with.
The federal government.
And what if you have religious beliefs that preclude invasive medical treatments, or also rely more on homeopathic remedies rather than running to the doctors at the first sign of a cold or flu?
Should you be forced to pay for medical treatments and costs that will continue to escalate beyond your ability to pay at some point, as I do believe there will also be differences in the costs to citizens included within that bill according to their age?
And just how can the government "fine" you for not purchasing a government issued "product," or "service" which is what it is, because it is the government and not the health care provider or doctor who will be in charge of your treatment plan?
Do "business models" work for a vital service that all Americans most likely will need at some time or another in their lives? And what about the state plans, will citizens still be paying taxes for those state social service agencies on top of the expansion of DHHS that will be required in order to administer this massive plan?
Or will those state plans be "merged" with the states ceding more of their duties and functions to federal control, with then more state revenue to spend indiscriminantly in not having to come up with those matching sums? Just when will we phase out state government altogether, because that would be a huge tax savings to all Americans at this point since this does appear to be the plan from all appearances?
How much of those health care taxes will then be going into administrative costs for more federal government workers and THEIR salaries and benefits?
Is this the type of "jobs stimulus" Obama was referring to, expanding government to the degree that pretty soon everyone in this country will be somehow working for the U.S. government with Uncle Sam then doling out the spoils?
Isn't that the definition of pure communism?
The health care industry is licking its lips over this one, because it will be "bare bones" coverage and they will then get the opportunity to market those "supplemental" plans that they most likely will never have to pay off on.
Just why DO you think the AARP is involved in these talks? Who do you think has a huge share of the market with respect to their "supplemental" medicare plans at the present time?
And just why is it that this is being tailored to meet the needs of the industries which are raping the American people for their health care costs now as it is?
Obama and this Congress and Administration are getting scarier by the moment.
This is Soylent Green & Hitler wrapped into one, yet being marketed as a "solution," to a government created situation to begin with in not performing its governmental function in regulating some of those industries sufficiently but rather getting into bed with them for politicians personal political careers.
Warren Buffett must be making plans to buy Africa as a real estate investment in order to shelter some of that windfall profit he will be making, since included within the bill are measures which require the public to use "approved" health care providers for the cut rate plans.
Maybe that is also part of the plan, installing owner/CEOs in the various third world countries funded by their corporate holdings (of course funded also by the public in their public offerings, which market is then manipulated by the European bankster/owners) in the industrialized West and Far East so that the G-20 conferences are in truth of fact nothing more than corporate Board of Directors' meetings for Earth, Inc. of the principal owners with the world's population at that point nothing more than disinterested shareholder/members working for the planet's "corporate" greater good. Robot workers, in other words, at the mercy of the planet/state.
Did L. Ron Hubbard or Orwell write this script?
After all, Obama and this Congress and Administration are big believers in "science" based technology. Even predicting the planet's demise thousands of years down the road is within their grasp (although not tomorrow's ice storm or path of the next hurricane).
Maybe they left a word out. "Science fiction" based technology, perhaps?
And the little workers bees worth in the event of downtime then determined according to actuarial tables configured according to job position and risk/benefit losses at time of injury or their life expectancy.
At this point, all those on the Hill need to have a mental health check and/or check in to the nearest psychiatric ward.
After all, WE'VE paid for their coverage for years.
Last night I listened to part of Obama's new "road trip" and public relations spiel regarding the health care reform he and the Democratic Congress (and their Republican also Global Socialist members) are hatching in Washington.
At the end of the spiel all I could think of was that his health care "reform" is nothing more than "reforming" medicine and health care along the lines of any corporate enterprise. On a cost/benefit business model with an actuary in Washington then determining what types of treatment will be "approved."
In other words, Obama is now creating a new position within his administration whoever the new "health czar" will be.
God.
Or at least that is what the job description should read with the power which will be given over human life and death in this country.
Listen up, America. Do you really want some federally trained lackey in Washington determining whether or not your spouse, child or other family member "deserves" or is worthy of treatment for their health care needs?
And just who are you going to sue or bring charges against if that treatment is denied, anyway? It is you who are paying for that coverage, yet the only recourse that would be available to you would be to file a claim with the same entity that denied you the treatment to begin with.
The federal government.
And what if you have religious beliefs that preclude invasive medical treatments, or also rely more on homeopathic remedies rather than running to the doctors at the first sign of a cold or flu?
Should you be forced to pay for medical treatments and costs that will continue to escalate beyond your ability to pay at some point, as I do believe there will also be differences in the costs to citizens included within that bill according to their age?
And just how can the government "fine" you for not purchasing a government issued "product," or "service" which is what it is, because it is the government and not the health care provider or doctor who will be in charge of your treatment plan?
Do "business models" work for a vital service that all Americans most likely will need at some time or another in their lives? And what about the state plans, will citizens still be paying taxes for those state social service agencies on top of the expansion of DHHS that will be required in order to administer this massive plan?
Or will those state plans be "merged" with the states ceding more of their duties and functions to federal control, with then more state revenue to spend indiscriminantly in not having to come up with those matching sums? Just when will we phase out state government altogether, because that would be a huge tax savings to all Americans at this point since this does appear to be the plan from all appearances?
How much of those health care taxes will then be going into administrative costs for more federal government workers and THEIR salaries and benefits?
Is this the type of "jobs stimulus" Obama was referring to, expanding government to the degree that pretty soon everyone in this country will be somehow working for the U.S. government with Uncle Sam then doling out the spoils?
Isn't that the definition of pure communism?
The health care industry is licking its lips over this one, because it will be "bare bones" coverage and they will then get the opportunity to market those "supplemental" plans that they most likely will never have to pay off on.
Just why DO you think the AARP is involved in these talks? Who do you think has a huge share of the market with respect to their "supplemental" medicare plans at the present time?
And just why is it that this is being tailored to meet the needs of the industries which are raping the American people for their health care costs now as it is?
Obama and this Congress and Administration are getting scarier by the moment.
This is Soylent Green & Hitler wrapped into one, yet being marketed as a "solution," to a government created situation to begin with in not performing its governmental function in regulating some of those industries sufficiently but rather getting into bed with them for politicians personal political careers.
Warren Buffett must be making plans to buy Africa as a real estate investment in order to shelter some of that windfall profit he will be making, since included within the bill are measures which require the public to use "approved" health care providers for the cut rate plans.
Maybe that is also part of the plan, installing owner/CEOs in the various third world countries funded by their corporate holdings (of course funded also by the public in their public offerings, which market is then manipulated by the European bankster/owners) in the industrialized West and Far East so that the G-20 conferences are in truth of fact nothing more than corporate Board of Directors' meetings for Earth, Inc. of the principal owners with the world's population at that point nothing more than disinterested shareholder/members working for the planet's "corporate" greater good. Robot workers, in other words, at the mercy of the planet/state.
Did L. Ron Hubbard or Orwell write this script?
After all, Obama and this Congress and Administration are big believers in "science" based technology. Even predicting the planet's demise thousands of years down the road is within their grasp (although not tomorrow's ice storm or path of the next hurricane).
Maybe they left a word out. "Science fiction" based technology, perhaps?
And the little workers bees worth in the event of downtime then determined according to actuarial tables configured according to job position and risk/benefit losses at time of injury or their life expectancy.
At this point, all those on the Hill need to have a mental health check and/or check in to the nearest psychiatric ward.
After all, WE'VE paid for their coverage for years.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Food Safety Legislation Threatens Small Farmers, Citizen Consumers
“Control oil and you control nations; control food and you control the people” - Henry Kissinger
In wake of the recent health "threats" due to the peanut/salmonella scare, Mexican tomato/salmonella scare and swine flu scares, Congress has been gearing up in order to supposedly "protect" the American citizens and consumers with two bills now in committee.
The first, HR 875 or The Food Safety Modernization Act, is an attempt by Congress to appoint an agri-business connected "Food Czar" over the enforcement of regulatory standards mainly directed toward America's small business farmers, placing complicated governmental hoops for small farmers to jump through that in its provisions basically strips them of their rights to farm their own land.
The penalties for non-compliance of this Food Safety Czar's edicts or any of the provisions of this Act can result in forfeiture of their lands and property.
One provision of this Act, the National Animal ID System, requires small farmers to immediately tag and identify all animals born on their farms with expensive identifying equipment within a mere 48 hours of birth. The penalty for non-compliance is a fine in the amount of $500,000, ten years imprisonment and/or forfeiture of their property.
Interestingly, for large corporate agri-businesses the same provisions only require identification of one number in every 800,00 animals.
Another provision requires small farmers to create easements on their lands for warrantless governmental inspection and entry at will. It would also eliminate allowance of "seed banking" by small farmers for future crops.
This bill was introduced by Rosa Deloro whose husband has Monsanto as a client, and who herself has received over $180,000 in agri-business donations.
In its provisions, it is a blatant attempt by the large agri-businesses and Congress to seize control of our food supply, and force us to consume their products rather than those of less expensive and locally grown produce from small area farmers.
Michael Taylor, a former Monsanto employee, is lobbying now for a position in the Obama Administration as the Food Safety Czar in furtherance of the large agri-business communities agendas of total control of our food production and delivery.
Since large agri-businesses rarely simply sell in local markets, it actually will eventually more than likely result in greater contamination and diseases which now occur during transportation and processing to large industrialized out state processing plants, and will place significant barriers on also organically grown food supplies.
The second bill, HR-759 or FDA Globalization Act of 2009 will vastly expand the FDA's authority over our food supply by granting full authority to define and enforce science based standards for the production and harvesting of plant sources in the global market place.
Our economy wasn't enough, now our food sources and supplies are going under global control and dominion through our own FDA.
The definition of "science based" of course is left totally open so that it can be defined in any manner this regulatory body determines is in the interest of "science," and again as with many federal regulatory bodies including and especially our IRS, without direct Congressional oversight in any manner whatsoever.
Most likely those in charge of these regulatory standards will have agri-business backgrounds, and who's to say that certain organically based food sources would not meet their definitions of "science based."
It also places the small farmer under the same requirements as it does the large industrial agri-businesses, and would require all farms to register with the FDA (of course for an annual fee), create extensive written food safety plans, keep copious electronic records and MANDATE certification in so-called "good agricultural practices."
This bill also seems intended to feed the "science" and "technology" fields Mr. Obama and the globalists in the federal govenment are so enmored with, and who also make rather large campaign contributions to federal legislators' campaign chests.
Local small farmers are already metriculous in their practices due to the very fact that they depend on word of mouth and a strong reputation in order to stay in business.
The USDA already has unilateral authority to shut down any farm that is not in compliance with existing standards and seize any and all contaminated products.
What is missing is better screening of those products that enter this country from the global markets at the point of entry, and also the large agri-businesses and their transport methods to large national or foreign processing plants which can contaminate bulk food sources on a more massive and national scale.
The bulk of small business farmers' products are sold locally, as opposed to the larger agri-businesses, so it appears the attacks on the small business farmers are an attempt to seize total control of our food sources and market, and expand their farms and fields through forefeitures, and not simply in order to insure the safety of the quality of food sold at your local grocery.
Below are the bills, and they are now in Committee most likely to be heard prior to Memorial Day.
Please contact your Senators and House members in order to preserve freedom over our own food sources in this country, and protect those small farmers who are the backbone of this nation:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-759
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h759/show
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/officials/congress
In wake of the recent health "threats" due to the peanut/salmonella scare, Mexican tomato/salmonella scare and swine flu scares, Congress has been gearing up in order to supposedly "protect" the American citizens and consumers with two bills now in committee.
The first, HR 875 or The Food Safety Modernization Act, is an attempt by Congress to appoint an agri-business connected "Food Czar" over the enforcement of regulatory standards mainly directed toward America's small business farmers, placing complicated governmental hoops for small farmers to jump through that in its provisions basically strips them of their rights to farm their own land.
The penalties for non-compliance of this Food Safety Czar's edicts or any of the provisions of this Act can result in forfeiture of their lands and property.
One provision of this Act, the National Animal ID System, requires small farmers to immediately tag and identify all animals born on their farms with expensive identifying equipment within a mere 48 hours of birth. The penalty for non-compliance is a fine in the amount of $500,000, ten years imprisonment and/or forfeiture of their property.
Interestingly, for large corporate agri-businesses the same provisions only require identification of one number in every 800,00 animals.
Another provision requires small farmers to create easements on their lands for warrantless governmental inspection and entry at will. It would also eliminate allowance of "seed banking" by small farmers for future crops.
This bill was introduced by Rosa Deloro whose husband has Monsanto as a client, and who herself has received over $180,000 in agri-business donations.
In its provisions, it is a blatant attempt by the large agri-businesses and Congress to seize control of our food supply, and force us to consume their products rather than those of less expensive and locally grown produce from small area farmers.
Michael Taylor, a former Monsanto employee, is lobbying now for a position in the Obama Administration as the Food Safety Czar in furtherance of the large agri-business communities agendas of total control of our food production and delivery.
Since large agri-businesses rarely simply sell in local markets, it actually will eventually more than likely result in greater contamination and diseases which now occur during transportation and processing to large industrialized out state processing plants, and will place significant barriers on also organically grown food supplies.
The second bill, HR-759 or FDA Globalization Act of 2009 will vastly expand the FDA's authority over our food supply by granting full authority to define and enforce science based standards for the production and harvesting of plant sources in the global market place.
Our economy wasn't enough, now our food sources and supplies are going under global control and dominion through our own FDA.
The definition of "science based" of course is left totally open so that it can be defined in any manner this regulatory body determines is in the interest of "science," and again as with many federal regulatory bodies including and especially our IRS, without direct Congressional oversight in any manner whatsoever.
Most likely those in charge of these regulatory standards will have agri-business backgrounds, and who's to say that certain organically based food sources would not meet their definitions of "science based."
It also places the small farmer under the same requirements as it does the large industrial agri-businesses, and would require all farms to register with the FDA (of course for an annual fee), create extensive written food safety plans, keep copious electronic records and MANDATE certification in so-called "good agricultural practices."
This bill also seems intended to feed the "science" and "technology" fields Mr. Obama and the globalists in the federal govenment are so enmored with, and who also make rather large campaign contributions to federal legislators' campaign chests.
Local small farmers are already metriculous in their practices due to the very fact that they depend on word of mouth and a strong reputation in order to stay in business.
The USDA already has unilateral authority to shut down any farm that is not in compliance with existing standards and seize any and all contaminated products.
What is missing is better screening of those products that enter this country from the global markets at the point of entry, and also the large agri-businesses and their transport methods to large national or foreign processing plants which can contaminate bulk food sources on a more massive and national scale.
The bulk of small business farmers' products are sold locally, as opposed to the larger agri-businesses, so it appears the attacks on the small business farmers are an attempt to seize total control of our food sources and market, and expand their farms and fields through forefeitures, and not simply in order to insure the safety of the quality of food sold at your local grocery.
Below are the bills, and they are now in Committee most likely to be heard prior to Memorial Day.
Please contact your Senators and House members in order to preserve freedom over our own food sources in this country, and protect those small farmers who are the backbone of this nation:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-759
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h759/show
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/officials/congress
Saturday, April 4, 2009
How To Cure The "Golden Parachutes" (And Stop The Corporate Thieves)
Recently I received a plea from a liberal left wing group and organization asking me if I would join in their fight to protest the fact that over 18 billion dollars from the last Congressional bailout of the banking industry went to the major executives of these questionably failed banking institutions for their own severance packages and group therapy sessions at top resorts throughout the country, and getting regulating requiring Congressional determination in any future bailouts.
I signed the petition but with a caveat, their proposed solution in my opinion was actually worse than allowing those executives to determine and fund their own future retirement lifestyles.
What is needed, of course, is a Constitutional solution that would protect the American people from such criminal activity again. Since most of the members of Congress, due to their own upper echelon incomes, have no real concept of "reasonableness" when it comes to financial matters (as with the ballooning amounts of this now pending spending package exhibit), their solution of having Congress institute legislation with respect to Congress then determining the amount of these severance packages was actually quite ludicrous.
Imagine if Speaker Pelosi or the Executive Office was to determine how much they are going to give to their corporate backers the next time some corporation seeks bankruptcy protection not through the Constitutional process, but by crying wolf on the steps of Capitol Hill? The mind boggles.
Better would be to institute legislation that calls for executive compensation, bonuses and severance packages for these publicly held corporations to be determined or affirmed by the actual owners of these corporate entities, the uninvolved citizen shareholders and stockholders themselves, not major corporate shareholders.
If I owned stock in any of those financial institutions or those automakers you can be darn sure that if they ran my investment into the ground so far as to have bankrupted the company itself, they should go away as empty handed as I potentially would under an actual federal bankruptcy action.
Actually, those executives should have to divest themselves of their own property in order to refund partially the losses and damages they have inflicted. There is no guarantee in the stock market, that is true, and everyone takes a risk for such an investment in the first place.
But if it is determined that it is blatant misuse of corporate assets and golden parachutes that have partially led to the crisis, than those responsible should also be held accountable for taking undue risks and profiting personally while the company's economic viability was in question or faltering. The owners and employees should be paid, and what is left over in such reorganizations or bankruptcies then be distributed for any salaries or benefits due and owing the executives at the time of any federal bankruptcy proceeding, or Congressional bailout.
Otherwise, it is becoming more profitable to rape company assets and take the money and run. This used to be called grand theft. But now in our politically correct society it is merely termed "bad business judgement," or "poor risk/loss assessment."
Taken in light of the S&L bailouts of the 80's and Big Oil bailouts, this is now becoming standard operating procedure for Congress to shift those costs now to the general public to assume those risks and losses, even those who were their customers and clientele and whose money was used for those corporate soirees.
Again, this has been the case in Congress betraying the Constitution and checks and balances included within it, as the founding fathers would never entertain using public sums to reward such breaches of the public trust for private commercial concerns especially public "institutions," instead every single one of those perpetrators would have been sent off to the local jail under criminal charges of "theft."
This would not have even occurred if Congress actually had been obeying the Constitution to begin with, as the banks in this country would never have been privatized in the first place, since one of the enumerated powers of Congress is to print, value and regulate U.S. coin and currency.
The dumbing down of America has simply been incredible, as there are screams now from the far right wing of "communism" if Congress (not the Executive Office) were to begin actually following the Constitution and nationalize the banking concerns once again (but without regulation also of the Fed, that action would be an exercise in futility also).
I am not nor was a shareholder or stockholder in AIG, yet it is I and my posterity and yours who will be assuming those risks. The new Rule of Law with these bailouts is now that every U.S. citizen, whether willingly or not, is an investor in all banks and major corporate industries in this nation and not as a matter of choice, but as a matter of Congressional and Executive unlawful directive. The President and Congress are now acting with a CEO mentality, rather than a Constitutional one.
It is the innocent Americans who are suffering with this mindset, which is nothing more than communism, pure and simple. Rather than the Communism as defined by some citizens and politicians on Capitol Hill with respect to nationalizing our banks, those Congressional members merely made the "community" of America suffer those losses while they were also losing their homes to these entities. If that isn't communism, I don't know what is. They even left Americans with a global communistic move as included in the September bailout was a London based insurer, AIG. The AIG bailout is the East India Tea Company all over again.
Corporations are "property" not citizens, and the owners of that property legally are the only ones who should determine just how much their administrator's are worth, while employed and thereafter. Period.
But with respect to those financial institutions and Congresss' fraud upon the public (since a good 2/3 of them accepted campaign donations from them for the 2008 elections), once those banks and the printing of our currency was privatized and given to the Federal Reserve and it's subsidiary private banks which it funds, Congress had the duty to be strictly overseeing their policies and practices and regulating them, not as co-conspirators in their fraud against the public and this now "secret" reorganization under the Executive Office, and out of public view and scrutiny.
I signed the petition but with a caveat, their proposed solution in my opinion was actually worse than allowing those executives to determine and fund their own future retirement lifestyles.
What is needed, of course, is a Constitutional solution that would protect the American people from such criminal activity again. Since most of the members of Congress, due to their own upper echelon incomes, have no real concept of "reasonableness" when it comes to financial matters (as with the ballooning amounts of this now pending spending package exhibit), their solution of having Congress institute legislation with respect to Congress then determining the amount of these severance packages was actually quite ludicrous.
Imagine if Speaker Pelosi or the Executive Office was to determine how much they are going to give to their corporate backers the next time some corporation seeks bankruptcy protection not through the Constitutional process, but by crying wolf on the steps of Capitol Hill? The mind boggles.
Better would be to institute legislation that calls for executive compensation, bonuses and severance packages for these publicly held corporations to be determined or affirmed by the actual owners of these corporate entities, the uninvolved citizen shareholders and stockholders themselves, not major corporate shareholders.
If I owned stock in any of those financial institutions or those automakers you can be darn sure that if they ran my investment into the ground so far as to have bankrupted the company itself, they should go away as empty handed as I potentially would under an actual federal bankruptcy action.
Actually, those executives should have to divest themselves of their own property in order to refund partially the losses and damages they have inflicted. There is no guarantee in the stock market, that is true, and everyone takes a risk for such an investment in the first place.
But if it is determined that it is blatant misuse of corporate assets and golden parachutes that have partially led to the crisis, than those responsible should also be held accountable for taking undue risks and profiting personally while the company's economic viability was in question or faltering. The owners and employees should be paid, and what is left over in such reorganizations or bankruptcies then be distributed for any salaries or benefits due and owing the executives at the time of any federal bankruptcy proceeding, or Congressional bailout.
Otherwise, it is becoming more profitable to rape company assets and take the money and run. This used to be called grand theft. But now in our politically correct society it is merely termed "bad business judgement," or "poor risk/loss assessment."
Taken in light of the S&L bailouts of the 80's and Big Oil bailouts, this is now becoming standard operating procedure for Congress to shift those costs now to the general public to assume those risks and losses, even those who were their customers and clientele and whose money was used for those corporate soirees.
Again, this has been the case in Congress betraying the Constitution and checks and balances included within it, as the founding fathers would never entertain using public sums to reward such breaches of the public trust for private commercial concerns especially public "institutions," instead every single one of those perpetrators would have been sent off to the local jail under criminal charges of "theft."
This would not have even occurred if Congress actually had been obeying the Constitution to begin with, as the banks in this country would never have been privatized in the first place, since one of the enumerated powers of Congress is to print, value and regulate U.S. coin and currency.
The dumbing down of America has simply been incredible, as there are screams now from the far right wing of "communism" if Congress (not the Executive Office) were to begin actually following the Constitution and nationalize the banking concerns once again (but without regulation also of the Fed, that action would be an exercise in futility also).
I am not nor was a shareholder or stockholder in AIG, yet it is I and my posterity and yours who will be assuming those risks. The new Rule of Law with these bailouts is now that every U.S. citizen, whether willingly or not, is an investor in all banks and major corporate industries in this nation and not as a matter of choice, but as a matter of Congressional and Executive unlawful directive. The President and Congress are now acting with a CEO mentality, rather than a Constitutional one.
It is the innocent Americans who are suffering with this mindset, which is nothing more than communism, pure and simple. Rather than the Communism as defined by some citizens and politicians on Capitol Hill with respect to nationalizing our banks, those Congressional members merely made the "community" of America suffer those losses while they were also losing their homes to these entities. If that isn't communism, I don't know what is. They even left Americans with a global communistic move as included in the September bailout was a London based insurer, AIG. The AIG bailout is the East India Tea Company all over again.
Corporations are "property" not citizens, and the owners of that property legally are the only ones who should determine just how much their administrator's are worth, while employed and thereafter. Period.
But with respect to those financial institutions and Congresss' fraud upon the public (since a good 2/3 of them accepted campaign donations from them for the 2008 elections), once those banks and the printing of our currency was privatized and given to the Federal Reserve and it's subsidiary private banks which it funds, Congress had the duty to be strictly overseeing their policies and practices and regulating them, not as co-conspirators in their fraud against the public and this now "secret" reorganization under the Executive Office, and out of public view and scrutiny.
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