Category Archives: Homeland Security

DHS Preparing for Massive Civil Unrest?

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That’s the theory that many are operating under on the more paranoid side of the web, though in this case they may not be far off. I personally wasn’t concerned by rrecent reports of the DHS ammunition binge though it does seem that they are buying an eyebrow raising amount of .40 HST hollowpoints. It was strange since ICE is under orders to use less lethal rounds in all but the most extreme circumstance but the feds would have to be blind to not see that the border will be a war zone in a few years so I didn’t really give it much thought.

Likewise FEMA purchasing emergency food doesn’t seem particularly out of the ordinary because their job is to basically distribute food and provide other logistical support to states during disasters. Even the most suspicious bloggers pointed out that much of the government procurement of late was likely in preparation for large earthquakes which seem to be on everyone’s mind of late.

Yet their newest acquisition seems to suggest that the Department of Homeland security is expecting to have its agents come under heavy fire. They are putting in orders for what are essentially bulletproof, toll both style checkpoints that can withstand anything up to sustained 7.62 rifle fire.

These checkpoints are very similar to the kind you see in front of government buildings now, so these must be upgrades. But what exactly is the government expecting to happen within our borders that would require armed guards in pre-fab bunkers to guard start and federal buildings?

Taken together rational people can only come to one conclusion. The government is taking economic collapse and radical movements like OWS much more seriously than they are letting on. They seem to be preparing for large-scale disaster and violence, should you be doing the same?

h/t SHTFPlan

Why Are Big Banks Interested in Bitcoin?

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I was reading a Reuters piece on Bitcoin (which for the record I think is a combination of sci-fi fueled fantasy and scam ponzi scheme) when I saw this interesting revelation:

Workers at Morgan Stanley (MS.N) and Goldman Sachs (GS.N) in London and New York have been visiting online Bitcoin exchanges as often as 30 times a day, according to documents seen by Reuters. Neither bank wanted to comment.

Employees at almost all the major international banks and numerous trading and investment firms have shown interest.

Bitcoin has become the Wild West of finance, with a proliferation of websites offering loosely regulated replicas of the services familiar to those in the financial industry.

There is a Bitcoin stock exchange, where companies can make initial public offerings and pay dividends in Bitcoin.

One website offering Bitcoin options trading was ‘listed’ this month for an implied valuation of half a million dollars.

Perhaps the most notorious is Bitcoinica, a platform offering margin trading, short selling and stop orders run by 17-year-old Chinese high school student Zhou Tong.

Users can leverage their bets up to a ratio of 10:1 on Bitcoinica, meaning they can lose more than their initial investment.

Zhou Tong, who is professionally advised by a forex trader and the head of a Singapore-based algorithmic trading firm, now lends his name to international slang.

To be “Zhou Tonged” is to be wiped out financially.

The chorus of a YouTube rap laments a Bitcoin day trader rash enough to hold a position with no stop loss protection: “It’s so silly, how come you just lost funds? You got Zhou Tonged!”

Sounds like Bitcoin is seen as yet another way banks can keep themselves afloat using
“exotic financial instruments” to separate suckers from hard earned cash. I guarantee you people who got “Zhou Tonged” have to cover their losses in non-bitcoin.

Let’s be honest, Bitcoins are just another attempt by people to create “creds” they can trade on the “Matrix” ala 90s cult phenomenon Shadowrun. That franchise, (now devolved into an Earth First! inspired morality tale) still influences transhumanism, neo-primativism and the remnants of the cyberpunk culture today and with Bitcoin and other online currency movements you can see the influence just as clearly. It’s interesting to note that Bitcoins are often used on sites to make illegal purchases – like drugs and illegal firearms. This is a fad based on late 90s cyberpunk pretensions not a sound investment.

Which makes Morgan Stanly and Goldman Sachs looking into this troubling. Either they see the potential to rob more people in an effort to prop up institutions that should have been bankrupt long ago or they are even less astute with money than we assume. Either way if you deal with them or Bitcoin you should be worried.

Fed Buying 61% of U.S. Treasuries

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This is the cheap gimmickry the left is using to avoid facing the obvious – we’re broke. This will only make the inevitable collapse more painful than it has to be:

The Federal Reserve is propping up the entire U.S. economy by buying 61 percent of the government debt issued by the Treasury Department, a trend that cannot last, Lawrence Goodman, a former Treasury official and current president of the Center for Financial Stability, writes in a Wall Street Journal opinion article published Wednesday.

“Last year the Fed purchased a stunning 61 percent of the total net Treasury issuance, up from negligible amounts prior to the 2008 financial crisis,” Goodman writes.

Goodman also warns that U.S. economy and markets are “at risk for a sharp correction” if conditions aren’t “normalized.”

“This not only creates the false appearance of limitless demand for U.S. debt but also blunts any sense of urgency to reduce supersized budget deficits.”

What’s the point of this? As MoneyNews explains it’s all about the illusion of stability:

Fed intervention in the government debt market makes demand for Treasury bonds appear higher than it really is, as foreign creditors and other investors have fled U.S. government debt instruments and are looking elsewhere until the government makes serious attempts to curb spending and narrow its gaping deficits.

Goodman notes that foreign investors like Japan and China that once scooped up U.S. debt are shunning it. In 2009, such foreign purchases of U.S. debt amounted to 6 percent of GDP and has since falled by over eighty percent to a paltry 0.9 percent.

Without foreign buyers and a shrinking base of U.S. corporate and bank buyers, the Treasury has had to resort to the Federal Reserve itself to make the purchases. The Fed purchasing not only makes up the shortfall, but can keep long term interest rates artificially low.

“The Fed is in effect subsidizing U.S. government spending and borrowing via expansion of its balance sheet and massive purchases of Treasury bonds. This keeps Treasury interest rates abnormally low, camouflaging the true size of the budget deficit,” Goodman writes.

“Similarly, the Fed is providing preferential credit to the U.S. government and covering a rapidly widening gap between Treasury’s need to borrow and a more limited willingness among market participants to supply Treasury with credit.”

 

As stated this trend cannot last. At some point the government will not have money to pay its bills and will be forced to take austerity measures like Europe has. You can see how well that turned out.

Get prepared.

Americans Facing Higher Canadian Oil Prices Thanks to Obama

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Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper is showing a lot of backbone and common sense in his reaction to the Obama administration giving the green hell for wanting to build an oil pipeline that would have created thousands of jobs and made us much less dependent on oil imports from our enemies. I wish we had leaders like this here:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Even if President Barack Obama approved the controversial Keystone XL pipeline tomorrow, at least some Canadian oil would still flow to Asia, according to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

In a public one-on-one interview here with Jane Harman, head of the Wilson Centre think-tank, Harper said Obama’s rejection of the controversial pipeline — even temporarily — stressed Canada’s need to find other buyers for oilsands crude.

And that wouldn’t change even if the president’s mind did.

“Look, the very fact that a ‘no’ could even be said underscores to our country that we must diversify our energy export markets,” Harper told Harman in front of a live audience of businesspeople, scholars, diplomats, and journalists.

“We cannot be, as a country, in a situation where our one and, in many cases, only energy partner could say no to our energy products. We just cannot be in that position.”

His wide-ranging question-and-answer at the influential non-partisan think-tank — which also touched on border security, trade, the Arctic and Syria among other topics — followed a meeting with Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon at the White House for the sixth North American Leaders’ Summit.

Harper also told Harman that Canada has been selling its oil to the United States at a discounted price.

So not only will America be able to buy less Canadian oil even if Keystone is eventually approved, the U.S. will also have to pay more for it because the market for oilsands crude will be more competitive.

“We have taken a significant price hit by virtue of the fact that we are a captive supplier and that just does not make sense in terms of the broader interests of the Canadian economy,” Harper said. “We’re still going to be a major supplier of the United States. It will be a long time, if ever, before the United States isn’t our number one export market, but for us the United States cannot be our only export market.

“That is not in our interest, either commercially or in terms of pricing.”

Obama is of course claiming that this is the fault of Republicans but the reality is he thought Canada would knuckle under and sit on billions of dollars of oil as a favor to Obama. Now China, an increasingly belligerent threat that is already a match for America in terms of military manpower and might, will have even more cheap oil to build their force projection capabilities. The liberals and greens in Hawaii and on the West Coast will get bombed first so i don’t really care.

But more expensive Canadian oil means food price will start climbing even faster in the future so factor that into your plans now. Store food.

h/t Hot Air