<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->In the reversal of a nine-year policy preventing the use of tracking cookies on those people who visit federal websites, the White House is now considering changing this policy.
Even the ACLU is concerned about this policy reversal, calling it a "serious threat to Americans' personal information." Their website states:
Since 2000, it has been the policy of the federal government not to use such technology. But the OMB is now seeking to change that policy and is considering the use of cookies for tracking web visitors across multiple sessions and storing their unique preferences and surfing habits. Though this is a major shift in policy, the announcement of this program consists of only a single page from the federal register that contains almost no detail.
âThis is a sea change in government privacy policy,â said Michael Macleod-Ball, Acting Director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office. âWithout explaining this reversal of policy, the OMB is seeking to allow the mass collection of personal information of every user of a federal government website. Until the OMB answers the multitude of questions surrounding this policy shift, we will continue to raise our strenuous objections.â
The use of cookies allows a website to differentiate between users and build a database of each userâs viewing habits and the information they share with the site. Since web surfers frequently share information like their name or email address (if theyâve signed up for a service) or search request terms, the use of cookies frequently allows a userâs identity and web surfing habits to be linked. In addition, websites can allow third parties, such as advertisers, to also place cookies on a userâs computer.
âAmericans rely on the information from the federal government to research politics, medical issues and legal requirements. The OMB is now asking to retain the personal and identifiable information we leave behind,â said Christopher Calabrese, Counsel for the ACLU Technology and Liberty Project. âNo American should have to sacrifice privacy or risk surveillance in order to access free government information. No policy change should be adopted without wide ranging debate including information on the restrictions and uses of cookies as well as impact on privacy.â
This is just the latest McCarthy type move by the Obama administration this week. Earlier in the week I blogged about the White House asking members of the public to report anyone spreading "disinformation" about ObamaCare. Now they want to keep track of who is visiting federal websites. Bush took a lot of flak for the Patriot Act, but Obama's administration isn't looking any better to me right now.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<b>Bankruptcy Expert: 1.4 Million Companies Could Go Under</b><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->WASHINGTON/WILMINGTON, Del. -- U.S. bankruptcy filings rose 38 percent in April-June from a year ago, according to court data released on Thursday, as consumers and business were hit by rising unemployment and a lack of credit.
Overall, 381,073 bankruptcies were filed in the second quarter, up 15 percent from the first three months of the year and up 38 percent from a year ago, according to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.
More than 16,000 businesses filed for bankruptcy in the quarter, the highest in the three-month period since 1993, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute.
The number of business failures rose 64 percent from the same quarter a year ago and Chapter 11 business filings more than doubled in the first half, compared to the first half in 2008. Major second-quarter filings included Chrysler LLC and General Motors Corp, both among the 10 largest filings ever, which sent many of their suppliers into bankruptcy as well.
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<!--emo&:o--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ohmy.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='ohmy.gif' /><!--endemo--> John Barrett said the assailant threatened to use a gun during the altercation Saturday night and then punched the 55-year-old mayor so hard in the stomach that he buckled.
The man then told Barrett to lie face down on the ground.
"This is when Tom thinks 'Yikes, this guy could kill me,'â" John Barrett said.
At that point the mayor came up swinging and the assailant, Anthony J. Peters, opened up an extendable, police-style baton and started beating him, John Barrett said.
Yet, his brother said, the mayor is still cracking jokes.
"He did say he will never play the piano again, but he never played the piano to begin with," said John Barrett, who said he visited his brother twice Monday at the hospital.
<b>The Worst is Yet to Come</b><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The Obama administration continues to subsidize the weak sectors of the economy and punish the healthy sectors to pay for this largess. It is an unsustainable pattern. Furthermore, many of the worst aspects of his policies have not yet kicked in, and when they do, the damage will be severe.
First, we have to realize that the trends of mass layoffs had to end, albeit temporarily. Bankrupt Wall Street firms and General Motors already have shed huge numbers of workers and are having a lull, as the government bailout cash has stabilized these outfits â for the time being. There still are healthy firms out there, but they wonât be healthy for long, as the government is going to punish any company that is profitable with higher taxes, more onerous regulations, and other wealth-stunting.
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[url=http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/article/312114/âIn-the-Tank-Foreverâ-U.S.-Consumers-Retailers-in-a-"Death-Spiral"-Davidowitz-Says;_ylt=ArCsu8ACwxloGJLY3wCb7IK7YWsA;_ylu=X3oDMTE2OHF2NHRpBHBvcwMxMQRzZWMDdG9wU3RvcmllcwRzbGsDaW50aGV0YW5rZm9y?tickers=dltr,fdo,ndn,kss,xrt,WMT,CVS&sec=topStories&pos=9&asset=&ccode=]<b>In the Tank Forever": U.S. Consumers, Retailers in a "Death Spiral,"</b> Davidowitz Says[/url]
I think it must be under EJ thread too.... They are doing ground work for harvest when collapse comes.
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No, in US. They are projecting it in such a way that all this is happening due to lack of spirituality. Most vulnerable group in this crisis will be liberals, who survive on serveral doles from the government.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->A Congo military tribunal has found two Norwegians on trial for alleged murder and espionage guilty on all accounts and has sentenced them both to death. They will also have to pay a total of more than US$ 60 milllion in damages.
The two, Tjostolv Moland (28) and Joshua French (27), were detained and jailed in DR Congo earlier this summer, charged with killing their driver/translator on May 5th.
Later they were also charged with espionage for Norway, and for arms smuggling. The two have denied all charges.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
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Joshua Olav Daniel Hodne French, sometimes called John Hunt (born April 7, 1982), and Tjostolv Moland, sometimes called Mike Callan (born 1981), are two Norwegian former-soldiers who later worked in the security industry.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Its is eight years since 9/11 attacks on continental US. In the following years a lot has changed and affected the US in many ways.We examine the changes and impacts in various areas.
External aspects
The prompt intervention in Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban as a direct consequence of the 9/11 attack on continental US. However the area was not pacified and the Taliban allowed to seek shelter in Pakistan. The aftermath showed that the terrorists were trained by Pakistan and funded by Saudi Arabia. The Iraq war against Saddam Hussein was launched without completing the task in Afghanistan. This led to the Taliban retreating and settling in lawless border areas of Pakistan and radicalizing the latterâs already challenged society. This has the direct effect of destabilizing the fragile Pakistani state.. The entire war on terror turned out to be wasteful farce as it ignored the real origins of terror and funding : Pakistan and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
The Iraq intervention succeeded in dislodging Saddam Hussein and his Baath regime but it led to the great instability in Iraq among the various factions in the country> There is constant tension among the various groups and general break down of law and order. The US war in Iraq also drained the US economy and most of it was recycled back to US contractors. Frustrated with the insurgency the US adopted brutal methods and subjected the prisoners to well documented practices at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The Taliban prisoners were subjected to similar methods at Guantanamo Bay prison.
In addition the US designated as Axis of Evil those countries that were not toeing their line. Of these Syria, Libya, Iran all are in the Middle East and the fourth North Korea is in East Asia. All pursued nuclear programs and of them North Korea has tested nuclear weapons twice in this period. All these showed the diminishing goodwill and moral compass of the US and the erosion of US political power.
Internal Aspects
The US internal response to the 9/11 attack was a total overhaul of the internal security apparatus. A new Department of Homeland Security was created merging the various diverse agencies already in existence. Airline travel restrictions on passengers were imposed to prevent future airplane hijacks and are accepted without protests by the populations a necessary security measures. A whole range of new legislation was passed which overturns the traditional notions of individual liberty that were the founding ethos of the nation. The DHA smacks of similar institutions in totalitarian states. The local police reacts with excessive zeal on suspicious acts and a low level of paranoia has been allowed to express itself. There were many instances of âoldâ ladies giving vent to their xenophobic fears of the immigrants in planes. Coupled with the economic meltdown and the consequent employment losses this factor will be more overt in the future unless the economy recovers.
Financial crisis
The financial markets meltdown in 2008 was attributed to the sub-prime mortgage market souring due to borrowers being unable to pay. The real roots of the problem were the boom in real estate market after the tech market collapse in 2000 which drove the players to invest in real estate. This led to the real estate boom particularly in the very states that are suffering from the housing market doldrums: California, Nevada, Florida. The boom caused the house prices to rise above the affordability index of the people. The Federal Reserve lowered the interest rates to cushion the stock markets down turn and this move was used to finance the boom in real estate. New mortgage instruments like sub-prime mortgages were created to enable more people to participate in the real estate sector and increased the housing demand. Fears of market heating up led to the feds under Ben Bernanke raise interest rate from 2006 onwards and these fuelled the sub-prime mortgage crisis as people were unable to pay the rising mortgages. All these came to a head in the liquidity crisis of the Lehman Bros the primary market creator of the mortgage based securities. Instead of bailing out Lehman Bros., the govt. chose to ignore the fallout and ended up with a domino effect. This led to banks and auto finance companies all failing. The irony of the crisis is that it took the entire Western banking system down as Europe was affected by the crisis in US. And the moral authority to preach fiscal discipline to third world countries is also gone. On the domestic political front the crisis was triggered during the Republican administrations which are supposed to be more fiscal conservatives. And the bailout packages in the aftermath that were presented were more like Democratic proposals. The international impact of this crisis was the emergence of G-2 that is US and Peoples Republic of China as the two largest economies and conjoined together as debtor-debtee nations. This will have foreign policy implications in future as PRC determines how they will recover their investments. The large economic stimulus packages in the European nations have enabled them to recover already.
Obama Election
In November 2008 the US elected Barak Obama as President for change. In fact he got better international cheer than in his own country. He has already taken steps to correct the battered image of US in the world. He has taken active measures to rein in the excesses of the business community but they are still not adequate. One of the active measures has been to have a direct role in foreign policy with the State Department taking a secondary role. He has shut down the prisons and is working to recover the moral authority for the government apparatus by shutting down the Gâ Bay prison and prosecuting prisoner abuses excesses. The danger here is that the US zeal to escape culpability will reduce the ascendency of the West and damage the very idea of the West as child of Enlightenment. The one tool that is still in US control is spread of religion under the guise of freedom of religion. All other tools have been blunted or weakened.
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