Another Senate Charade – Matt Taibbi

(RollingStone) – This note comes courtesy of my friend David Sirota out in Colorado. This is a classic example of how the Senate works. If the public understood better how rigged this game is, and how few issues are actually left to an honest vote in the legislature, I’m pretty sure the pitchfork factor would be twice even what it is now.

The short version of this story: Bernie Sanders had put forth a proposal in the Senate to put a 15 percent cap on credit-card interest. Who isn’t in favor of this kind of legislation? The only difference between credit card companies and loan sharks at this point is that you can choose to not patronize a loan shark. As an adult professional in this country one has to have a credit card – it’s impossible to rent a car, buy a hotel room, shop online or do countless other things without one.

But all the credit card companies use the same insane formulae based on FICO scores to charge exorbitant interest rates for anyone who slips up – and they don’t exactly make it easy to not slip up. (I’m doing research on this subject so anyone who has a particularly egregious story about being ripped off by credit card companies, please write in). Almost everyone has horror stories about consumer credit and my guess is that if put to a national referendum, something like the Sanders 15% cap would pass pretty easily.

Video: Oliver Stone, Jesse Ventura Spar With Republican Congressman On Larry King

See Also: Film: The War On Democracy – John Pilger – View Film Here

Part 1 of 2

Hutaree Leader’s Brother Says David Stone was Overgrown Child Who Liked to Play War

(DetroitNews) – David Stone Sr. loved to hunt, loved to play games — and loved his toy soldiers long after the age when most teenagers have moved on to cars and girls.

“All he ever wanted to do was play with his G.I. Joes,” said his older brother Randall Stone, 48, of Texas. “It was like, ‘Dude, it’s time to grow up.’ ”

Video: Biden Conspires With Israel To Bomb Iran Back To The Stone Age

(KurtNimmo) – Joe Biden went to Israel not for the sake of peace or even to admonish the country for its plan to build 1,600 illegal settlement homes in East Jerusalem. Biden went there to talk about bombing Iran back to the Stone Age.

MSM: Oscar-winning US filmmaker Oliver Stone says Adolf Hitler was ‘enabled by Western bankers’

(CanadianPress) – Adolf Hitler was a psychopath and a monster but rose to power thanks to big business leaders and other supporters who appreciated his vow to destroy communism and control workers, Hollywood filmmaker Oliver Stone said Monday.

Video: Oliver Stone Says Banksters “Enabled” Hitler and the Nazis

(KurtNimmo) – Filmmaker Oliver Stone has told The Canadian Press that international bankers “enabled” Hitler and the Nazis. “Adolf Hitler was a psychopath and a monster but rose to power thanks to big business leaders and other supporters who appreciated his vow to destroy communism and control workers, Hollywood filmmaker Oliver Stone said Monday,” in Bangkok, Thailand, writes Michael Casey. –

Wall Street’s Naked Swindle – Rolling Stone

A scheme to flood the market with counterfeit stocks helped kill Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers — and the feds have yet to bust the culprits

MSM: How Washington is screwing up health care reform – and why it may take a revolt to fix it

(RollingStone) – Let’s start with the obvious: America has not only the worst but the dumbest health care system in the developed world. It’s become a black leprosy eating away at the American experiment — a bureaucracy so insipid and mean and illogical that even our darkest criminal minds wouldn’t be equal to dreaming it up on purpose.

Do you deserve to die?

Scenario 1: You’ve just been diagnosed with a cancer of the lymphatic system. You’re told that it requires a procedure within the next two weeks. Unfortunately, you were laid off from your corporate job 11 months, 30 days ago. You are on your last day of COBRA. Your company retirement and savings are all gone. You can’t afford the $1,200 a month premium needed to continue your coverage. Without the operation, you will die. Do you deserve to die?

Vaccinations: Deadly Immunity – Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Global Research Editor’s note

We bring to the attention of our readers this 2005 article by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. published by Rollingstone.com.

MSM: As Goldman Sachs posts huge profits from the economic crisis, the question is – Did it cause the problems in the first place?

(DailyMail) – No name is more ubiquitous in the pantheon of global finance than that of Goldman Sachs. At a time when world commerce and banking has been brought to a shuddering halt by greed, excess and foolishness, this investment bank provoked astonishment and disgust this week by handing out record bonuses.

Rolling Stone writer called ‘anti-Semitic’ for simply following the money

Popular Rolling Stone contributor, writer and blogger Matt Taibbi claims that he was sent e-mails which attacked him and accused him of anti-Semitism for exposing the investment bank giant Goldman’s Sachs and their shady financial dealings over the years.

Video: Matt Taibbi – Has Goldman Sachs taken over the economy of the U.S.?

Matt Taibbi on the Thom Hartmann program. Matt wrote the piece in Rolling Stone, “The Great American Bubble Machine”.

MSM: Israelis ‘firing live rounds’ at West Bank protesters

Israeli armed forces and border police used the cover of the war against Hamas in Gaza to reintroduce the firing of .22 rifle bullets – as well as the extensive use of a new model of tear-gas canister – against unarmed demonstrators in the Occupied West Bank protesting at the building of Israel‘s “separation wall”.