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Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Please read the following. Bloomberg brought this on by a suit for freedom for information for which we are all grateful, but their reporting on it takes the award for the least words about anything.
Reuters is somewhat more forthcoming.
Please keep in mind any agency or bank fighting to hide figures has something really awful to hide.
According to early definitions, the Fed had the legal right to lend to financial institutions, individuals and partnerships with these funds. They had full and legal rights to make these determinations themselves without oversight.
Judge Sets Sept. 30 Deadline for Fed to Appeal Disclosure Order
By Mark Pittman
Aug. 28 (Bloomberg) — The Federal Reserve has until Sept. 30 to appeal a federal judge’s order requiring the central bank to identify financial institutions that benefited from its emergency loans.
The Fed’s Board of Governors asked Manhattan Chief U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska to delay enforcement of her Aug. 24 decision that the identities of borrowers in 11 lending programs be made public by Aug. 31. The central bank wanted Preska to stay her order until the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York can hear the case.
The Fed’s “ability to effectively manage the current, and any future, financial crisis” would be impaired, according to the Fed’s motion for a stay. It said “significant harms” could befall the U.S. economy as well.
Bloomberg LP, the New York-based company majority-owned by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, sued on Nov. 7 under the Freedom of Information Act on behalf of its Bloomberg News unit.
Fed lawyer Kit Wheatley told Preska in a conference call yesterday that it could take 30 days for the Fed to get permission for an appeal from Solicitor General Elena Kagan, the administration’s top courtroom lawyer.
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
While the Fed is in court appealing the release of data, Ron Paul’s bill gains strength.
There is a huge battle taking place to pull any teeth left out of the mouth of the Fed.
After this, monetary policy will be totally resident in political expediency. Put emphasis on the word TOTALLY.
Barney Frank says Ron Paul bill will pass
By Amanda Carpenter on Aug. 28, 2009
House Financial Services Chairman Rep. Barney Frank, Massachusetts Democrat, said he expects former GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul’s legislation to audit the Fed to pass out of his committee in October as part of a larger regulatory package.
Rep. Paul’s, Texas Republican, bill if added to Mr. Frank’s other proposed reforms could give a boost to a financial regulation package the Obama Administration wanted to pass last spring. The Fed bill has 282 co-sponsors, including every Republican member of the House and a considerable number of Democrats. The Senate’s lead sponsor of the bill is Sen. Bernard Sanders, a Vermont independent and self-described socialist.
Today, the Government Accountability Office has no power to audit the Federal Reserve. Mr. Paul’s bill would empower the government watchdog to do so and make their findings available to the public.
Mr. Frank was asked at a town hall meeting when he would put the bill up for a vote in committee and after giving a lengthy explanation of current problems with the Federal Reserve Mr. Frank said he was working with Mr. Paul and that, "This will probably pass in October."
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Look at how short term this issue is so it can be reported as an outstanding success indicating a return to great economic times.
Freddie Mac to sell $3 billion bills on Monday
28-AUG-2009 15:54
NEW YORK, Aug 28 (Reuters) – Freddie Mac said Friday it plans to sell $3 billion of reference bills on Monday, Aug. 31.
The scheduled offerings include $1 billion of one-month bills due Sept. 28, 2009, $1 billion of three-month bills due Nov. 30, 2009, and $1 billion of six-month bills due March 1, 2010.
Settlement is Tuesday, Sept. 1.
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
So far this is the reported score for this Friday.
Bank failure tally tops 83
The number of bank closures this year continues to grow as the fallout from the housing crisis and unemployment take a toll on local financial institutions.
By Ben Rooney, CNNMoney.com staff reporter
Last Updated: August 28, 2009: 7:40 PM ET
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Regional banks in Maryland and Minnesota were closed by regulators Friday, bringing the total number of failed banks this year to 83, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation said.
Baltimore, Md.-based Bradford Bank, which operated nine branches, will reopen Monday as part of Manufacturers and Traders Trust Company.
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Control, information and influence is all growing even on top of the huge powers that have moved into the White House since 9/11. It seems as if this is a trend not only in our daily lives but also in finance.
Bill would give president emergency control of Internet
by Declan McCullagh
August 28, 2009 12:34 AM PDT
Internet companies and civil liberties groups were alarmed this spring when a U.S. Senate bill proposed handing the White House the power to disconnect private-sector computers from the Internet.
They’re not much happier about a revised version that aides to Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat, have spent months drafting behind closed doors. CNET News has obtained a copy of the 55-page draft of S.773 (excerpt), which still appears to permit the president to seize temporary control of private-sector networks during a so-called cybersecurity emergency.
The new version would allow the president to "declare a cybersecurity emergency" relating to "non-governmental" computer networks and do what’s necessary to respond to the threat. Other sections of the proposal include a federal certification program for "cybersecurity professionals," and a requirement that certain computer systems and networks in the private sector be managed by people who have been awarded that license.
"I think the redraft, while improved, remains troubling due to its vagueness," said Larry Clinton, president of the Internet Security Alliance, which counts representatives of Verizon, Verisign, Nortel, and Carnegie Mellon University on its board. "It is unclear what authority Sen. Rockefeller thinks is necessary over the private sector. Unless this is clarified, we cannot properly analyze, let alone support the bill."
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Pakistan remains the most dangerous geopolitical situation on the globe.
Pakistan’s Noncampaign Against the Taliban
By BOBBY GHOSH / WASHINGTON Friday, Aug. 28, 2009
Despite strenuous entreaties by top U.S. officials, Pakistan has abandoned plans to mount a military offensive against the terrorist group responsible for a two-year campaign of suicide bombings across the country. Although the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has been in disarray since an Aug. 5 missile strike from a CIA-operated drone killed its leader, Baitullah Mehsud, the Pakistani military has concluded that a ground attack on its strongholds in South Waziristan would be too difficult.
The Pakistani military has choked off main roads leading out of South Waziristan, and the country’s fighter jets have been pounding targets from the air (an operation Islamabad insists it will continue). But that falls short of the military campaign the U.S. desires. Instead, Pakistani authorities are hoping to exploit divisions within the TTP to prize away some factions, while counting on the CIA’s drones to take out Baitullah’s successors.
U.S. counterterrorism officials worry that a failure to capitalize on the post-Baitullah confusion within the TTP will allow its new leader, Hakimullah Mehsud, to consolidate his position and reorganize the group. Officials in Washington say special envoy Richard Holbrooke and NATO commander General Stanley McChrystal have pressed the Pakistanis to strike while the iron is hot. But after initial promises to launch a ground offensive in South Waziristan, the Pakistanis have backed off.
A top Pakistani general, Nadeem Ahmed, recently said preparation for such an operation could take up to two months. Now there will be no ground assault at all, according to a senior Pakistani politician known to have strong military ties. Instead, the politician tells TIME, the military will try to buy off some TTP factions through peace deals.
This alarms U.S. officials, who point out that terrorist leaders have previously used peace deals to expand their influence. Such deals have been "abject failures that at the end of the day have made the security situation in parts of Pakistan worse," says a U.S. counterterrorism official. "Why the Pakistani government keeps returning to this strategy is a mystery."
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Wars cost lives and dollars. This place is a world class s**thole where the people have been at war as far back as their written history.
Those in power that the West supports are dopers and hate the West.
What are we doing there?
NATO chief: mission to last ‘as long as it takes’
By SUZAN FRASER
The Associated Press
Friday, August 28, 2009; 10:29 AM
ANKARA, Turkey — NATO’s mission in Afghanistan will last "as long as it takes" to ensure that the country is secure, the alliance’s new leader said Friday during a visit to the Turkish capital.
Thanks in part to an increase in the number of troops, the mission is making a difference in the war-ravaged and poverty stricken country, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said.
But allies still must contribute more, Fogh Rasmussen said, adding that he had asked NATO members including Turkey to help train Afghan soldiers and police.
"The situation is not satisfactory right now, but we have made progress," Fogh Rasmussen told a small group of reporters at the end of his two-day visit to Ankara.
"We will stay as long as it takes to secure the country. We will stay committed, we will assist the Afghan people in securing their own country, and therefore we will stay as long as it takes."
