Cost of the Bailout =$23 Trillion Dollars! For perspective:

The country has not existed for a trillion seconds, Western civilization has not been around a trillion seconds. One trillion seconds ago – 31,688 years – Neanderthals stalked the plains of Europe. If you spent  $1every single second it would take 728,824 YEARS to spend the whole $23 trillon.

“U.S. taxpayers may be on the hook for as much as $23.7 trillion to bolster the economy and bail out financial companies, said Neil Barofsky, special inspector general for the Treasury’s Troubled Asset Relief Program.

The Treasury’s $700 billion bank-investment program represents a fraction of all federal support to resuscitate the U.S. financial system, including $6.8 trillion in aid offered by the Federal Reserve, Barofsky said in a report released today.

“TARP has evolved into a program of unprecedented scope, scale and complexity,” Barofsky said in testimony prepared for a hearing tomorrow before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

Costs include $2.3 trillion in programs offered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., $7.4 trillion in TARP and other aid from the Treasury and $7.2 trillion in federal money for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, credit unions, Veterans Affairs and other federal programs, he said.

Wow . . .

…from Barry Ritholtz in his Website The Big Picture

We already know how little regard Jennifer Lynch has for the truth. She put it in her grostesque, unsolicited memo to Parliament last month when she suggested that truth be removed from the Criminal Code as a defence to the charge of hate propaganda.

What human being — not what politician, not what lawyer, but what human being — would propose that telling the truth should be a crime in Canada? What an execrable woman; what an embarrassment to Stephen Harper’s Conservative government; what an embarrassment to anyone who actually cares about real human rights; what a shame for all Canadians.

…..more HERE.

The mustangs are almost too apt a symbol of where we’re all headed.

On Friday July 17, the House of Representatives met to debate . . . Go on, take a guess: Health care? The cap-and-tax racket? Stimulus Two? No, none of the above. Don’t worry, they’re still spending your money. Wild horses couldn’t stop them doing that.

And, as a matter of fact, that’s the correct answer: wild horses. On Friday, the House voted on the Restore Our American Mustangs Act — or ROAM.  Like all acronymically cute legislation, its name bears little relation to what it actually does: It’s not about “restoring” mustangs. The federal Bureau of Land Management aims for a manageable population of 27,000 wild mustangs. Currently, there are 36,000, and the population doubles every four or five years. To prevent things getting even more out of hand, the BLM keeps another 30,000 mustangs in holding pens — or, if you prefer, managed-care facilities. That’s to say, under federal management, one in every two “wild” horses now lives in government housing. The American mustang population is road-testing the impending demographic profile of Japan and Germany: one worker for every retiree.

….read full article HERE.

This week the controversy about Obama’s birthplace resurfaced dramatically. A US Army Reserve, Major Stefan Frederick Cook, scheduled for deployment to Afghanistan, refused to serve claiming that the order was illegal because the American President was not legitimate. He argued that he should not be required to serve under a President who has not proven his eligibility for office.

“As an officer in the armed forces of the United States, it is my duty to gain clarification on any order we may believe illegal. With that said, if President Obama is found not to be a ‘natural-born citizen,’ he is not eligible to be commander-in-chief,” Major Cook said. “Then any order coming out of the presidency or his chain of command is illegal. Should I deploy, I would essentially be following an illegal order. If I happened to be captured by the enemy in a foreign land, I would not be privy to the Geneva Convention protections.”

The military created shock waves by revoking the deployment order without giving any reasons. Thereby it evaded a reply to Major Cook’s objection and implicitly acknowledged that it could offer no proof of President Obama’s birth in the USA. If the military cannot vouch for President Obama’s legitimacy the implications can be very far-reaching. Major Cook’s case is being heard in the court of US District Judge David O Carter. The judge told the plaintiffs to fix their paperwork and that he would listen to “the merits” of their case. The date of the hearing was fixed for 16 July.

It is unlikely that the US mainstream media will highlight the event. But regardless of the judge’s verdict, will the issue die? If it snowballs into a crisis America could face a cruel choice. While it battles a severe economic meltdown it may have to either remove a most popular President or violate its Constitution.

Even while US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pursues her five-day visit to India, an event has occurred in the USA that could conceivably snowball into a major controversy to cut short President Obama’s tenure.
Article 2, Section 1 of the US Constitution states: “No person except a US born citizen… shall be eligible to the office of President.”

During the last US campaign a controversy arose about Obama’s birthplace. Critics were unsure if he was born in the USA or Kenya. Obama’s campaign committee released a Hawaiian birth certificate on 13 June, 2008. Sceptics alleged that it had signs of forgery.

Obama maintained he was born in Hawaii. One hospital, Honolulu ‘s Kapi’olani Medical Center for Women and Children, claims it received a letter from the President declaring his birth there. But White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs refused to authenticate the letter. For nearly six months the hospital proudly declared Obama was born at its facility to create poll hype. Later it covered up and refused to confirm if the letter actually existed. The letter was purportedly signed by Barak Obama. If the signature was forged it was a most serious offence. Was any action taken against the Hospital?

Canada’s top court tossed out a drug conviction linked to the seizure of 35 kilograms of cocaine Friday, saying evidence obtained with “willful and flagrant” disregard for the Charter of Rights and Freedoms can’t be used in trial.

The ruling was one of four handed down by the Supreme Court aimed at clarifying when tainted evidence can be included at trial and when a person is considered detained by police.

While the ruling did turf out the drug conviction, it did allow the submission of evidence in three other cases. The rulings underscore that any breach of rights must be carefully balanced against the value of the evidence and the facts of each case.

In the cocaine trafficking case, Bradley Harrison and a friend were driving a rental sport utility vehicle to Toronto from Vancouver in October 2004 when they were pulled over by an Ontario Provincial Police officer near Kirkland Lake, Ont. The officer thought it was suspicious the SUV was driving at exactly the speed limit and didn’t have a front licence plate.

….crooks rule. Read more  HERE.