'US clamps down on Bitcoin, fears lack of control'
US authorities have frozen the account of the world’s largest Bitcoin exchange, which helps move the customers’ cash online. The booming digital currency has…that is messed up.
And this, children, is what we call a ‘forced monopoly’.
Do you see the oppression of the state now?
More like they the state does not want competition from Bitcoin. The Federal Reserve can’t keep in control if there is competition from other non-central bank currencies. Why the goverment also went after the Liberty Coin a few years back.
(via lifeobservinglife)
The Biggest Price-Fixing Scandal Ever | Matt Taibbi
Conspiracy theorists of the world, believers in the hidden hands of the Rothschilds and the Masons and the Illuminati, we skeptics owe you an apology. You were right. The players may be a little different, but your basic premise is correct: The world is a rigged game. We found this out in recent months, when a series of related corruption stories spilled out of the financial sector, suggesting the world’s largest banks may be fixing the prices of, well, just about everything.“All of these stories collectively pointed to the same thing: These banks, which already possess enormous power just by virtue of their financial holdings – in the United States, the top six banks, many of them the same names you see on the Libor and ISDAfix panels, own assets equivalent to 60 percent of the nation’s GDP – are beginning to realize the awesome possibilities for increased profit and political might that would come with colluding instead of competing. Moreover, it’s increasingly clear that both the criminal justice system and the civil courts may be impotent to stop them, even when they do get caught working together to game the system.
If true, that would leave us living in an era of undisguised, real-world conspiracy, in which the prices of currencies, commodities like gold and silver, even interest rates and the value of money itself, can be and may already have been dictated from above. And those who are doing it can get away with it. Forget the Illuminati – this is the real thing, and it’s no secret. You can stare right at it, anytime you want.”
(via quesodemono)
How Bitcoin undermines government authority
Interest in Bitcoin has surged along with its valuation. Last week saw its exchange rate soar past $100 for the first time ever, landing the virtual currency on the front pages of The Washington Post and the Financial Times. Yet the media frenzy, which has focused on the rapidly rising valuation and its possible causes stemming from the bank crisis in Cyprus, is overlooking Bitcoin’s true radical significance—that it can’t be controlled by government.
In his new book, This Machine Kills Secrets, Andy Greenberg recounts the history of the 1990s cypherpunk movement that paved the way for WikiLeaks and Anonymous. The early Internet’s crypto-anarchists foresaw a future world in which widely available cryptography secured personal anonymity and privacy to such an extent that it threatened the authority of the state. Their key insight, Greenberg explains, is that anything that can be done cryptographically can be done without government oversight.
Before eBay or WikiLeaks, cypherpunks like Tim May imagined online markets for information in which buyers and sellers transacted anonymously using untraceable digital cash. Anything from state secrets to private credit reports would no doubt become available for the right price. These ideas were notoriously taken to the next level by the radical libertarian Jim Bell who proposed a system for anonymously crowdfunding the assassination of corrupt government officials.
While almost all the technology necessary for such black markets was available when the cypherpunks were writing, there was one conspicuous exception: true digital cash.
Until Bitcoin, virtual currencies have in one way or another relied on a third party intermediary, such as a bank or a credit card company, to prevent “double spending.” In the physical world, if I give you a $20 bill, I will no longer have it. You can’t be as sure of that, however, when the cash is a digital file that can be easily copied. The solution has been to have a trusted intermediary keep a ledger of balances and deduct a transaction’s amount from the payer’s account, and add it to the payee’s.
Intermediaries, however, are the regulatory chokepoints at which government can apply pressure. For example, after WikiLeaks released its trove of State Department cables, payment processors such as Visa and MasterCard succumbed to political pressure and refused to transmit donations to the group. PayPal even froze its account so that the group couldn’t access funds it had already collected. As as a result, WikiLeaks has been driven to near bankruptcy.
Much of the discussion around bitcoin today centers on whether it will work as money. Money has three functions: it serves as a medium of exchange, a unit of account, and a store of value. Because Bitcoin is distributed, there is no central banker that can decide to inflate the money supply. Some argue this makes it a good store of value, like gold or Picassos, while others counter that Bitcoin’s historic volatility make it a poor store of value and an unreliable unit of account to boot. Given the public’s fear of currency devaluation in Europe and the U.S., the question of whether you can stash your wealth in bitcoin to avoid capitol controls and inflation is what has been driving much of the media’s coverage of the currency.
Time will tell whether the gold bugs or the skeptics are right, but what’s being overlooked is that it doesn’t matter whether Bitcoin makes it as a store of value or a unit of account for it to work as a medium of exchange. Even if the Bitcoin market remains volatile and never pans out as a good store of value or unit of account, one can imagine users converting their dollars or euros to bitcoins for just long enough to make a transaction; perhaps just minutes. And as long as it works as a medium of exchange, it is the true digital cash that was missing from the cypherpunks’ predictions.
With a little bit of effort, today you can purchase bitcoins anonymously with physical cash. You could then do all sorts of things the government doesn’t want you to do. You could buy illegal drugs on the notorious Silk Road, an encrypted website that has been operating with impunity for the past two years facilitating annual sales estimated at almost $15 million. You could gamble at various casinos or prediction markets, buy contraband Cuban cigars, or even give money to WikiLeaks. Dissidents in Iran or China can use Bitcoin to buy premium blogging services from WordPress, which now accepts payment in the currency. Perhaps more importantly, Bitcoin makes the cypherpunks predictions of markets for stolen secret information and even assassinations feasible.
Last month, the Treasury Department issued guidance on how it plans to regulate Bitcoin exchanges. This is good news for the currency since it implies the government is looking to regulate its use rather than prohibit it. Confronted with Bitcoin’s potential, it’s not reasonable to expect that Treasury’s money laundering cops would simply let it be. So it’s a sensible approach for them to take because Bitcoin, much like BitTorrent, can be used for both licit and illicit purposes and would in any event be difficult to shut down.
Today physical cash is anonymous, which helps keep one’s purchases private. Cash is also difficult to control: a $100 bill never gets “declined.” As we move to an all-digital world, we should ensure that we retain some type of digital cash that is not tied to a financial intermediary that can spy on or control transactions—even if, just like physical cash, it is put to nefarious uses. The real question facing Bitcoin today, then, is whether law enforcement and regulators will continue to show as much restraint as they have so far.
Today, online gambling is illegal under federal law and the prohibition is enforced through payment processors, which are not allowed to send money to offshore casinos. The infamous Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) also targeted financial intermediaries and would have banned payments to suspected pirate websites.
Bitcoin is revolutionary because it solves the double-spending problem without employing an intermediary; there is only the payer and the payee. The system accomplishes this by distributing the ledger of transactions across a peer-to-peer network of users, much like BitTorrent. This allows a record to be kept of all transfers so that the same cash can’t be spent twice, but because it’s distributed, there’s no one central authority keeping the ledger. This makes bitcoins true digital cash. Like dollar bills or euro coins, if you hand them over to a payee, you will no longer have them. And because there is no third party running the ledger, there is no one for the government to pressure or regulate.
close the gitmo detention camp now, the majority of the prisoners are turning out to be innocent. and we’ve kept them imprisoned for what now over 11 years? that’s bullshit. and while we’re at it close the whole damn military base too. what a waste of money. for at least 11 years, out of our pockets we paid for these people to be stationed there to sit on their arses all day while picking their noses all day or to hit golf balls at the gitmo bay’s own country club all day. i won’t even talk about all the houses and subdivisions built there, or the shopping malls, and theatres and restaurants or even the private schools complete with all the facilities such as a baseball field, football field, track etc… all on our dime. and they’re wanting to expand it? bullshit.
Joe Biden: the ‘affirmative task’ before us is to “create a new world order”.
Infowars: Pew: 5% of Americans Love Doing Their Taxes
Ryan W. McMaken
lewrockwell.com
April 11, 2013And an additional 29% “like” it. Why do people enjoy doing their taxes? Well, they get a “refund.” That is, they get back some of their money that the government has been holding interest-free while you work to pay them more. And what if you hold “too much” of your own money and then write the feds a check at the end of the year to cover the short fall? In that case, you probably have to pay them penalties. You see how it works.
We can thank the Great “Libertarian” Milton Friedman for helping the federal government develop tax withholding, an ingenious government scam which helps the feds maximize revenues and hold excess funds interest-free for a time, all the while convincing some people that they’re actually getting some kind of gift from the feds.
Obama Blowing Smoke Up Our Butts With Proposed New Cigarette Tax
Donna Anderson
Infowars.com
April 11, 2013President Barack Obama claims his proposed 94-cent-a-pack cigarette tax will significantly reduce consumption, just like it did when he passed his 62-cent-a-pack tax in 2009. But that “significant reduction” is all smoke and mirrors, being used to distract you from the real reasons for this new tax increase: It gives Congress approximately $78 billion worth of breathing room in their budget and further enslaves middle- and low-income Americans who are already suffering under the weight of the new higher payroll taxes.
Obama’s 2014 budget includes $750 million in discretionary Preschool Development Grants to provide all low- and moderate-income four-year-old children with free, high-quality preschool, to be fully financed by a Federal $1.95-per-pack tax on cigarettes. In addition, according to Obama, this new tax increase will have substantial public health benefits because researchers have found that raising taxes on cigarettes significantly reduces consumption, especially for young Americans.
On April 1, 2009, Obama increased the Federal tax on a pack of cigarettes by 62 cents and according to his “researchers” there were tremendous benefits for everyone in the country. A report by Tobacco Free Kids, showed that every 10 percent increase in cigarette prices reduces youth smoking by about seven percent and total consumption by about four percent. Every state that has significantly increased cigarette taxes has enjoyed substantial increases in revenue, while still reducing consumption. And politicians win because polls show that voters overwhelmingly prefer raising cigarette taxes to other tax increases or cutting funding for crucial programs.
However, in 2012 the CDC issued a press release that painted a slightly different picture. Between 2000 and 2010, total consumption of all smoked tobacco products declined by 27.5 percent. But from 2010 to 2011 the decline was minimal, only 0.8 percent. And despite the overall decline, the consumption of non-cigarette smoked tobacco products actually increased by 123 percent.
From 2000 to 2011, the largest increases were in consumption of pipe tobacco (482 percent) and large cigars (233 percent), both items that are taxed at a significantly lower rate than cigarettes. From 2008 to 2011, sales of large cigars more than doubled, and in 2011 there was a sixfold increase in loose pipe tobacco sales – enough to make 17.5 billion cigarettes.
“While consumption patterns of traditional cigarettes have continued to decline, when we take into account these alternative cigarette-like products, we’re seeing a lack of change in the overall consumption of burned tobacco that is being inhaled,” said Terry Pechacek, associate director for science with the C.D.C. Office on Smoking and Health in Atlanta and one of the report’s authors.
These lower-priced tobacco products are particularly appealing to the youth market, the very market Obama says he’s helping to shield by increasing the cigarette tax. Because they’re not labeled as cigarettes, manufacturers are free to add fruit and other flavorings that are banned in cigarettes, and they’re substantially cheaper than cigarettes, which makes them especially attractive to young kids whose only income is the lunch money they get from their parents every week.
According to Reynolds American, a cigarette manufacturer opposing the new tax increase, the median household income for nearly half of all smokers in 2011 was $27,700 compared to $45,761 for nonsmokers, so Obama is planning to fund his free preschool initiative on the backs of the very people he’s proposing to help.
“The idea of increasing taxes on low- to middle-income Americans at this time is ludicrous,” Bryan Hatchell, a spokesman for Reynolds American, said in a statement. “The effect of the payroll tax increase this year, along with higher gas and food prices, have hit hard millions of Americans who are simply trying to keep their heads above water financially.”
And economists question whether it’s economically wise to fund a long-term project – early childhood education – with revenue that, if “research” is right, will decrease over time. Some suggest that Obama could raise much more long-term money if he’d focus on budget cuts instead of tax increases, but we all know that’s just a pipe dream.
Bitcoin crashes after on the same day it reaches its highest value
The digital currency Bitcoin had a topsy turvy day yesterday; having risen to a high of $260 in value, the exchange rate fell to $160. Reports indicate the crash was caused by a redditor under the name of “Bitcoinbillionaire” giving away $12,000 worth of the digital currency.
Alameda County Administrator Susan Muranishi will receive $423,664 a year for the rest of her life
According to county pay records, in addition to her $301,000 base salary, Muranishi receives:
– $24,000, plus change, in “equity pay’’ to guarantee that she makes at least 10 percent more than anyone else in the county.
– About $54,000 a year in “longevity” pay for having stayed with the county for more than 30 years.
– An annual performance bonus of $24,000.
– And another $9,000 a year for serving on the county’s three-member Surplus Property Authority, an ad hoc committee of the Board of Supervisors that oversees the sale of excess land.
Like other county executives, Muranishi also gets an $8,292-a-year car allowance.
Muranishi has been with the county for 38 years, and she’s 63. When retirement day comes, she’ll be getting a lot more than a gold watch.
That’s because, according to the county auditor’s office, Muranishi’s annual pension will be equal to the dollar total of her entire yearly package — $413,000. She also has a separate executive private pension plan, for which the county chips in $46,500 a year.
Wait, who was the 1% again?
Lew Rockwell: ‘Your Money Is Safer Under The Mattress Than In A Bank’ - http://bit.ly/WWjvdm
sorry for not updating lately. quite busy!
Don’t Watch TV Sports? You’re Still Paying For It (by TheYoungTurks)
Published on Feb 1, 2013
“Time Warner Cable Chief Executive Glenn Britt, who has been very public about his concerns over rising programming costs, Thursday defended the company’s expensive TV deals for the Lakers and Dodgers.
“They were going to be expensive no matter what happened; we think we’ve done the best of the alternatives,” Britt said when asked about the contracts during a fourth-quarter earnings call with analysts.”*
Cable is essentially a rip-off if you’re not watching sports. All cable customers, whether they watch sports or not, are paying to subsidize the ever-increasing cost of sports channels. Is this fair? Davis Sirota breaks it down.
*Read more from Joe Flint/ LA Times:
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/cotown/la-et-ct-time-warner-cab..
