Constitution Professor Obama Doesn’t Know the Constitution

This isn't off the cuff. This is the State of the Union Speech. He's reading off a teleprompter. And even if it were off the cuff it would still be frightening. The notion that "all men are created equal" is found in the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution. Hat tip to David Kramer over at LRC Blog.

It's $27Trillion, not $700B

States to Lead Carbon Markets as Federal Plan Stalls

It's turning into a game of whack-a-mole. Having lost their filibuster-proof majority in the Senate (not like you should count on Scott Brown to thwart the globalist agenda), the power elite are now pushing their scheme through the states. They are counting on you running out of energy. They are counting on you throwing your hands at the apparent hopelessness of it all. If they want to bring the fight to the states, we'll take the fight to the states. It's thousands more legislators they have to bribe or threaten. And as you'll read, not every state is going to just take this lying down.

This presents to us the entire rationale behind de-centralized government. The less centralized government is, the more power the people have. Yet many people just don't see what's wrong with the New World Order; what's so bad about a small cabal of elites ruling over 6.7 billion people.

Bloomberg -

State government actions are likely to dominate the emerging U.S. carbon market in 2010 amid doubts that Congress will pass an emissions trading law this year.

While cap-and-trade legislation, which would create carbon dioxide permits that companies could buy and sell, is stalled in the U.S. Senate, a group of Northeastern states already has a carbon market and two more regional programs in the Midwest and West plan to follow suit.

Regional-level carbon trading “is where the action is going to be” this year, Bill Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, which represents state and local environmental regulators, said in an interview.

“The states are juiced to expand their programs,” Becker said. “They don’t like the slow pace that we’re seeing in the federal government, and they’re not confident that anything meaningful is going to necessarily pass.”

Under cap-and-trade, the government issues a limited number of permits, also called allowances, each carrying the right to emit one ton of carbon dioxide.

The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a cap-and-trade program for power plants from Maryland to Maine, enters its second full year with a surplus of permits that pushed their price down 41 percent in 2009.

The Northeastern states decided in 2005 how many permits to issue, leaving some room for emissions to rise. Instead, emissions fell as the economy slowed. Permits for December delivery rose 3 cents, or 1.3 percent, to $2.28 today on the Chicago Climate Futures Exchange.

Watching Demand

Demand for the permits this year will depend on economic growth and the price of natural gas, the cleanest fossil fuel, Peter Shattuck, a research analyst at Rockport, Maine-based advocacy group Environment Northeast, said in an interview.

Permit prices also depend on the minimum bid in the carbon trading program’s quarterly allowance auctions, he said.

While no change to last year’s minimum bid of $1.86 is planned for the next auction in March, the price may yet be increased “so that states can attempt to maintain a revenue stream,” Shattuck said. Past auction results would support a new minimum bid of $2.33, he said.

Two other regional carbon markets, the Western Climate Initiative and the Midwestern Greenhouse Gas Reduction Accord are being designed. They aren’t scheduled to start until 2012.

To meet that deadline, the states involved in the new programs must make “detailed decisions” this year about which companies to regulate, the number of permits to sell at auction and how many should be given away, Shattuck said.

Delayed Action

The U.S. House passed a cap-and-trade bill in June that would suspend state-run carbon markets in 2012 and absorb their carbon dioxide allowances into the new federal program. Senate Democrats delayed action on cap-and-trade until 2010 amid criticism of the plan from Republicans and some Democrats.

The “bruising fight on health care” hasn’t helped the chances for quick action on a cap-and-trade bill, Frank O’Donnell, president of Washington-based environmental group Clean Air Watch, said in an interview. It might “take a little time” before senators “are ready to take another bone-crushing type of vote,” O’Donnell said.

Even if cap-and-trade legislation is approved this year, it’s unlikely the Environmental Protection Agency could complete the regulations needed for the carbon market to function by 2012, Roger Martella, former general counsel at the EPA under President George W. Bush, said in an interview.

The EPA would probably need three to five years of lead time, leaving regional programs as an option for “those who want to play in some kind of trading system,” said Martella, a Washington-based partner at law firm Sidley Austin LLP.

‘On the States’

If Congress doesn’t pass a national carbon trading plan “the initiative to the extent that it still exists is going to be entirely on the states,” Jonathan Cannon, a University of Virginia School of Law professor and former EPA general counsel during the Clinton administration, said in an interview.

Regional carbon trading programs are likely to face legal challenges from industry and states without matching greenhouse gas regulations. Last year, a New York power plant filed a lawsuit challenging the legality of the Northeast carbon market on the grounds it unlawfully interferes with the federal government’s authority to regulate interstate commerce.

North Dakota Sues

While that case was recently settled, North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem is now considering legal action against regulators in neighboring Minnesota, a member of the Midwest’s proposed emissions trading program, over plans to include carbon price estimates in future electricity purchasing decisions.

Power plants in coal-rich North Dakota that sell electricity into Minnesota would be hurt by the proposal, Stenehjem, a Republican, said in an interview.

“If anything is going to be done to regulate carbon and if that needs to be done, it’s only going to work if it’s done on a national basis,” he said.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which filed a friend-of-the- court brief in the New York case, will continue to oppose “a patchwork of state and regional regulations” on greenhouse gases, Robin Conrad, the organization’s chief lawyer, said in an e-mail.

The Federal Underbomber

Kurt would like you to know he's not implying the US government was behind the attack. I would like you to know that if it walks like a duck, sounds like a duck, smells like a duck...it's a duck. Thanks anyway, Kurt and Lori. You're true American heroes.

Kurt Haskell -

THE SHARP DRESSED MAN WHO AIDED MUTALLAB ONTO FLIGHT 253 WAS A U.S. GOVERNMENT AGENT.

Since our flight landed on Christmas Day, Lori and I have been doing everything in our power to uncover the truth about why we were almost blown up in the air over Detroit. The truth is now finally out after the publication of the following Detroit News article:

http://detnews.com/article/20100127/NATION/1270405/Terror-suspect-kept-visa-to-avoid-tipping-off-larger-investigation

Let me quote from the article:


"Patrick F. Kennedy, an undersecretary for management at the State Department, said Abdulmutallab's visa wasn't taken away because intelligence officials asked his agency not to deny a visa to the suspected terrorist over concerns that a denial would've foiled a larger investigation into al-Qaeda threats against the United States.

"Revocation action would've disclosed what they were doing," Kennedy said in testimony before the House Committee on Homeland Security. Allowing Adbulmutallab to keep the visa increased chances federal investigators would be able to get closer to apprehending the terror network he is accused of working with, "rather than simply knocking out one solider in that effort."'


Now it all becomes apparent. Let me detail everything we know about the "Sharp Dressed Man" (SDM).


1. While being held in Customs on Christmas Day, I first told the story of the SDM.
2. My story has never changed.
3. The FBI visited my office on December 29, 2009, and showed me a series of approximately 10 photographs. None were of the SDM. I asked the FBI if they brought the Amsterdam security video to help me identify the SDM, but they acted as though my request was ridiculous. The FBI asked me what accent the SDM spoke in and I indicated that he had an American accent similar to my own. I further indicated that he wore a tan suit without a tie, was Indian looking, around age 50, 6'0" tall and 250-260 lbs. I further indicated that I did not believe that he was an airline employee and that he was not on our flight.
4. During the first week of January, 2010, Dutch Military Police and the FBI indicated that over "200 Hours" of Amsterdam airport security video had been reviewed and it "Shows Nothing".
5. The mainstream media picked up the "Shows nothing" story, which slanders my story. After visiting my office twice for a flight 253 special, Dateline NBC and Chris Hanson indicated that my story was "Unsubstantiated rumor dispelled as myth" and our story did not air during the tv special.
6. On January 2, 2010, I receive a call from a flight 253 passenger who indicated to me that it may be in my best interest to stop talking publicly about the SDM because he believes I am "wrong" in what I saw. He did not make any claim that he saw the SDM boarding gate incident at all. This call was made out of the blue after he made a "revelation" of this event on January 1, 2010. I later discover that this caller has ties to the U.S. Government.
7. On January 20, 2010, current Director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), Michael E. Leiter, made a startling admission. Leiter indicated that: "I will tell you, that when people come to the country and they are on the watch list, it is because we have generally made the choice that we want them here in the country for some reason or another."
8. On January 22, 2010, CongressDaily reported that intelligence officials "have acknowledged the government knowingly allows foreigners whose names are on terrorist watch lists to enter the country in order to track their movement and activities."

CongressDaily also reported, citing an unnamed "intelligence official" that Michael E. Leiter's statement on January 20, 2010, reflected government policy and told the publication, "in certain situations it's to our advantage to be able to track individuals who might be on a terrorist watch list because you can learn something from their activities and their contacts."
9. On January 22, 2010, ABC News published an article that showed a change of position in the government's official story. Please see the following blog post for more information:

http://haskellfamily.blogspot.com/2010/01/initially-discounted.html

The U.S. government provided no explanation for the reason my story was initially discounted.
10. The SDM could not be from Al Qaeda. When speaking at the counter in Amsterdam, the SDM said the following "He is from Sudan, we do this all the time". Who is "we"? If it is Al Qaeda, you surely don't make such a statement to an airport security official.
11. The SDM could not be from airport security. The SDM did not dress in any security uniform and did not appear to have any security badge. The SDM did not speak with a Dutch accent. The SDM dressed in a suit coat and pants. If the SDM was a higher up security official, he would not have to convince the ticket agent to let Mutallab on the plane without a valid passport. Instead, he would just order her to do it.
12. Could the SDM have been a U.S. Government official? He dressed in a suit and not a security uniform. Check. He indicated we do this all the time. Could "we" be the U.S. Government? Check. He spoke Enlish with an American accent. Check. Would he need to convince the ticket agent that this was a normal procedure to allow boarding without a passport? Check. Would he have the ability to obtain such clearance? Check. Could he enter this security area even though he wasn't a passenger? Check. Would the ticket agent likely refer this request to a manager? Check. Would the U.S. Government not want this information public and try to hide it? Check.
13. The Amsterdam security video has not been released. A much more minor airport security violation occurred at the Newark New Jersey airport several days after the flight 253 incident. That video was released shortly thereafter.
14. Senators Levin and Stabenow, as well as Congressman Dingle, all refuse to discuss the matter with me.

With the information we already knew and the admission from the above referenced Detroit News article, we have evidence and claims made by government officials that the U.S. Government wanted Mutallab to proceed into the U.S. in order to obtain information on other terrorists involved with him. Once we take this statement and add it to my eyewitness account of a "Sharp Dressed Man" escorting Mutallab through the boarding process and allowing him to board without a valid passport we can make the connection that the "Sharp Dressed Man" was a U.S. Government official/agent.

The reasoning behind the following events now becomes very clear:


1. The reason Mutallab got through security despite the numerous warnings for months before our flight.
2. The reason why there have been so many lies from the U.S. Government attempting to discredit my eyewitness account.
3. The reason why the Amsterdam airport security video is being hidden from the public.
4. The reason why the government is proposing a "Failed to Connect the Dots" account of the failure. The truth is too damning.
5. The reason why Mr. Wolf of the Obama administration indicated on the Keith Olberman Show that the White House was investigating a possible "intentional act" from within the U.S. Government as the reason for the Christmas Day attack.
6. The explanation for the cameraman and why he hasn't been identified (Obviously, he was another U.S. Government agent) whose job was to film Mutallab for some governmental purpose.
7. The reason for the lax security after landing, which can be attributed to foreknowledge of the possible suspects involved.
8. The reason for the failure to search or secure the plane and passengers after landing, which can also be attributed to foreknowledge of the possible suspects involved.
9. The corporate media's attempt to bury my eyewitness account.
10. Carl Levin's, Debbie Stabenow's and John Dingle's intentional avoidance of my story and failure to return my calls/emails.
11. Janet Napolitano's statement that "The System Worked". From her point of view it probably did as this WAS PART OF THE SYSTEM!

This article is the big center piece of the puzzle that has been missing and was needed to finish the entire puzzle.

Amazongate: new evidence of the IPCC's failures

Notice what the media does here. The IPCC is a lying, corrupt, criminal organization, but the media makes them out to be a bunch of bumbling idiots. They're like the prosecution at the OJ Simpson trial - blowing the case despite a "mountain of evidence". No, the evidence was all fabricated, there is no consensus, most of the IPCC scientists don't even operate in the climate field, upwards of 35,000 scientists have signed a petition saying the science isn't settled - the IPCC only consists of 2,500 scientists - and the people running the show are all liars, frauds, and criminals.

The IPCC is beginning to melt as global tempers rise, says Christopher Booker

Christopher Booker
London Telegraph -


The claim in an IPCC report that 40 per cent of the Amazon rainforest could
disappear through global warming turned out to be unfounded

It is now six weeks since I launched an investigation, with my colleague Richard North, into the affairs of Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the hugely influential body which for 20 years has been the central driver of worldwide alarm about global warming. Since then the story has grown almost daily, leading to worldwide calls for Dr Pachauri's resignation. But increasingly this has also widened out to question the authority of the IPCC itself. Contrary to the tendentious claim that its reports represent a "consensus of the world's top 2,500 climate scientists" (most of its contributors are not climate experts at all), it has now emerged, for instance, that one of the more widely quoted scare stories from its 2007 report was drawn from the work of a British "green activist" who occasionally writes as a freelance for The Guardian and The Independent.

Last week I reported on "Glaciergate", the scandal which has forced the IPCC's top officials, led by Dr Pachauri, to disown a claim originating from an Indian glaciologist, Dr Syed Husnain, that the Himalayan glaciers could vanish by 2035. What has made this reckless claim in the IPCC's 2007 report even more embarrassing was the fact that Dr Husnain, as we revealed, was then employed by Dr Pachauri's own Delhi-based Energy and Resources Institute (Teri). His baseless scaremongering about the Himalayas helped to win Teri a share in two lucrative research contracts, one funded by the EU.

The source the IPCC cited as its "scientific" authority for this claim, however (as Dr North first reported on his EU Referendum blog), was a propagandist pamphlet published in 2005 by the WWF, the environmentalist pressure group, citing a magazine interview with Dr Husnain six years earlier.

Dr North next uncovered "Amazongate". The IPCC made a prominent claim in its 2007 report, again citing the WWF as its authority, that climate change could endanger "up to 40 per cent" of the Amazon rainforest – as iconic to warmists as those Himalayan glaciers and polar bears. This WWF report, it turned out, was co-authored by Andy Rowell, an anti-smoking and food safety campaigner who has worked for WWF and Greenpeace, and contributed pieces to Britain's two most committed environmentalist newspapers. Rowell and his co-author claimed their findings were based on an article in Nature. But the focus of that piece, it emerges, was not global warming at all but the effects of logging.

A Canadian analyst has identified more than 20 passages in the IPCC's report which cite similarly non-peer-reviewed WWF or Greenpeace reports as their authority, and other researchers have been uncovering a host of similarly dubious claims and attributions all through the report. These range from groundless allegations about the increased frequency of "extreme weather events" such as hurricanes, droughts and heatwaves, to a headline claim that global warming would put billions of people at the mercy of water shortages – when the study cited as its authority indicated exactly the opposite, that rising temperatures could increase the supply of water.

Little of this has come as a surprise to those who have studied the workings of the IPCC over the years. As I show in my book The Real Global Warming Disaster, there is no greater misconception about the IPCC than that it was intended to be an impartial body, weighing scientific evidence for and against global warming. It was set up in 1988 by a small group of scientists all firmly committed to the theory of "human-induced climate change", and its chief purpose ever since has been to promote that belief.

The blatant bias of each of its four reports has been pointed out by scientists – notably the rewriting of key passages in its 1995 report after the contributing scientists had approved the final text. This provoked a magisterial blast from Professor Frederick Seitz, a former president of the US National Academy of Sciences, who wrote that in all his 60 years as a scientist he had never seen "a more disturbing corruption" of the scientific process, and that if the IPCC was "incapable of following its most basic procedures", it was best it should be "abandoned".

The centrepiece of the IPCC's 2001 report was Michael Mann's notorious "hockey stick", the graph purporting to show temperatures in the late 20th century soaring at an unprecedented rate – later exposed as a statistical artefact. Another new book, The Hockey Stick Illusion by A W Montford, brilliantly tells the bizarre tale of how Mann's colleagues, calling themselves "the Hockey Team" and now at the heart of the IPCC, managed to resurrect the discredited graph for inclusion in its 2007 report. Montford's book, if inevitably technical, expertly recounts a remarkable scientific detective story. And of course, it was incriminating leaked emails between members of the Hockey Team that were at the centre of the recent "Climategate" scandal at the University of East Anglia.

Most disturbing of all are the glimpses the story gives of the inner workings of the IPCC, an institution now so discredited and scientifically corrupted that only those determined to shut their eyes could possibly defend it. This is now compounded by the recent revelations by Dr North and myself in these pages of how its chairman, Dr Pachauri, has built a worldwide network of business links which provide his Delhi institute with a sizeable income.

It is noticeable how many of those now calling for Dr Pachauri's resignation, led by Professor Andrew Weaver, a senior IPCC insider, are passionate global warming believers. Fearing that Pachauri damages their cause, they want him thrown overboard in the hope of saving the IPCC itself. But it is not just Pachauri who has been holed below the waterline. So has the entire IPCC process. And beyond that – and despite the pleading of Barack Obama, Gordon Brown and the BBC that none of this detracts from the evidence for man-made global warming – so has the warmist cause itself. Bereft of scientific or moral authority, the most expensive show the world has ever seen may soon be nearing its end.

UN climate change panel based claims on student dissertation and magazine article

All I can say at this point is, I hope people are paying attention to this. I hope they're taking stock and keeping tabs. Incidentally, you heard a lot of talk about the peer reviewed process over the last seceral years, but recently in particular. Well here you see their definition of "peer reviewed": a student's dissertation and an article in a mountaineering magazine.

The United Nations' expert panel on climate change based claims about ice disappearing from the world's mountain tops on a student's dissertation and an article in a mountaineering magazine.

London Telegraph -


Officials were forced earlier this month to retract inaccurate claims in the IPCC's
report about the melting of Himalayan glaciers

The revelation will cause fresh embarrassment for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which had to issue a humiliating apology earlier this month over inaccurate statements about global warming.

The IPCC's remit is to provide an authoritative assessment of scientific evidence on climate change.


In its most recent report, it stated that observed reductions in mountain ice in the Andes, Alps and Africa was being caused by global warming, citing two papers as the source of the information.

However, it can be revealed that one of the sources quoted was a feature article published in a popular magazine for climbers which was based on anecdotal evidence from mountaineers about the changes they were witnessing on the mountainsides around them.

The other was a dissertation written by a geography student, studying for the equivalent of a master's degree, at the University of Berne in Switzerland that quoted interviews with mountain guides in the Alps.

The revelations, uncovered by The Sunday Telegraph, have raised fresh questions about the quality of the information contained in the report, which was published in 2007.

It comes after officials for the panel were forced earlier this month to retract inaccurate claims in the IPCC's report about the melting of Himalayan glaciers.

Sceptics have seized upon the mistakes to cast doubt over the validity of the IPCC and have called for the panel to be disbanded.

This week scientists from around the world leapt to the defence of the IPCC, insisting that despite the errors, which they describe as minor, the majority of the science presented in the IPCC report is sound and its conclusions are unaffected.

But some researchers have expressed exasperation at the IPCC's use of unsubstantiated claims and sources outside of the scientific literature.

Professor Richard Tol, one of the report's authors who is based at the Economic and Social Research Institute in Dublin, Ireland, said: "These are essentially a collection of anecdotes.

"Why did they do this? It is quite astounding. Although there have probably been no policy decisions made on the basis of this, it is illustrative of how sloppy Working Group Two (the panel of experts within the IPCC responsible for drawing up this section of the report) has been.

"There is no way current climbers and mountain guides can give anecdotal evidence back to the 1900s, so what they claim is complete nonsense."

The IPCC report, which is published every six years, is used by government's worldwide to inform policy decisions that affect billions of people.

The claims about disappearing mountain ice were contained within a table entitled "Selected observed effects due to changes in the cryosphere produced by warming".

It states that reductions in mountain ice have been observed from the loss of ice climbs in the Andes, Alps and in Africa between 1900 and 2000.

The report also states that the section is intended to "assess studies that have been published since the TAR (Third Assessment Report) of observed changes and their effects".

But neither the dissertation or the magazine article cited as sources for this information were ever subject to the rigorous scientific review process that research published in scientific journals must undergo.

The magazine article, which was written by Mark Bowen, a climber and author of two books on climate change, appeared in Climbing magazine in 2002. It quoted anecdotal evidence from climbers of retreating glaciers and the loss of ice from climbs since the 1970s.

Mr Bowen said: "I am surprised that they have cited an article from a climbing magazine, but there is no reason why anecdotal evidence from climbers should be disregarded as they are spending a great deal of time in places that other people rarely go and so notice the changes."

The dissertation paper, written by professional mountain guide and climate change campaigner Dario-Andri Schworer while he was studying for a geography degree, quotes observations from interviews with around 80 mountain guides in the Bernina region of the Swiss Alps.

Experts claim that loss of ice climbs are a poor indicator of a reduction in mountain ice as climbers can knock ice down and damage ice falls with their axes and crampons.

The IPCC has faced growing criticism over the sources it used in its last report after it emerged the panel had used unsubstantiated figures on glacial melting in the Himalayas that were contained within a World Wildlife Fund (WWF) report.

It can be revealed that the IPCC report made use of 16 non-peer reviewed WWF reports.

One claim, which stated that coral reefs near mangrove forests contained up to 25 times more fish numbers than those without mangroves nearby, quoted a feature article on the WWF website.

In fact the data contained within the WWF article originated from a paper published in 2004 in the respected journal Nature.

In another example a WWF paper on forest fires was used to illustrate the impact of reduced rainfall in the Amazon rainforest, but the data was from another Nature paper published in 1999.

When The Sunday Telegraph contacted the lead scientists behind the two papers in Nature, they expressed surprise that their research was not cited directly but said the IPCC had accurately represented their work.

The chair of the IPCC Rajendra Pachauri has faced mounting pressure and calls for his resignation amid the growing controversy over the error on glacier melting and use of unreliable sources of information.

A survey of 400 authors and contributors to the IPCC report showed, however, that the majority still support Mr Pachauri and the panel's vice chairs. They also insisted the overall findings of the report are robust despite the minor errors.

But many expressed concern at the use of non-peer reviewed information in the reports and called for a tightening of the guidelines on how information can be used.

The Met Office, which has seven researchers who contributed to the report including Professor Martin Parry who was co-chair of the working group responsible for the part of the report that contained the glacier errors, said: "The IPCC should continue to ensure that its review process is as robust and transparent as possible, that it draws only from the peer-reviewed literature, and that uncertainties in the science and projections are clearly expressed."

Roger Sedjo, a senior research fellow at the US research organisation Resources for the Future who also contributed to the IPCC's latest report, added: "The IPCC is, unfortunately, a highly political organisation with most of the secretariat bordering on climate advocacy.

"It needs to develop a more balanced and indeed scientifically sceptical behaviour pattern. The organisation tend to select the most negative studies ignoring more positive alternatives."

The IPCC failed to respond to questions about the inclusion of unreliable sources in its report but it has insisted over the past week that despite minor errors, the findings of the report are still robust and consistent with the underlying science.

Report: TARP benefits have fallen far short

It hasn't increased lending, because the money was never meant to be lent. On the one hand, even if a particular bank wasn't simply robbing your money and throwing a massive party with it or buying up smaller, solvent banks to consolidate their power, they needed the money to fix their crippled balance sheets. On the other hand, it was simple highway robbery.

The Hill -

The $700 billion bailout program for the financial industry has so far done little to boost bank lending, aid small businesses or reduce home foreclosures, a top government watchdog said in a report.

Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general over the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), said in a report that while the bailout has helped stabilize the financial system, many of the program's original goals have not been met.

"Lending continues to decrease, month after month, and the TARP program designed specifically to address small-business lending — announced in March 2009 — has still not been implemented by Treasury," Barofsky wrote in the report. "The TARP foreclosure prevention program has only permanently modified a small fraction of eligible mortgages, and unemployment is the highest it has been in a generation."

The Obama administration is urging Congress to pass an additional fiscal stimulus measure, or "jobs bill," early this year to help bolster the economy. Lawmakers are anxious about the economy weighed down from 10 percent unemployment and ongoing weakness in the housing market.

Senate Democrats are split about whether they should use TARP money that has been repaid from some of the largest banks to help support new programs to boost lending to small businesses. Republicans want the repaid money to go toward paying down the $1.35 trillion deficit.

Barofsky questioned if the government has started to lose its leverage over the nation's largest banks now that they have repaid more than a combined $100 billion. The banks have seen their financial health improve significantly and they have continued to pay lavish bonuses to employees.

Meanwhile, Congress is debating new regulations on the financial industry, including beefed up consumer protections, new limits on the multi-trillion dollar derivatives market and a new mechanism to disolve large failing firms so that taxpayers are not on the hook for future bailout money. The House passed legislation in December, but the Senate has yet to act and the Senate Banking Committee continues to draft legislation behind the scenes.

Without major changes, Barofsky said it's unclear if the TARP program could ever be deemed a success.

"It is hard to see how any of the fundamental problems in the system have been addressed to date," Barofsky wrote.

The report argues that the financial industry believes now more than ever that the government will bail out systemically important firms. And the government efforts to support the housing market risk reinflating a market bubble.

"Stated another way, even if TARP saved our financial system from driving off a cliff back in 2008, absent meaningful reform, we are still driving on the same winding mountain road, but this time in a faster car," the report says.

Barofsky's office has repeatedly called for changes to one program under TARP that created public-private partnerships to purchase toxic loans and securities. In his report, Barofsky noted the possibility of "suspect trades" in the partnerships that already exist. Barofsky has pushed for stronger conflict-of-interest walls in the Public Private Investment Program.

"We believe that a requirement for a separate investment team for the Public Private Investment Program is not necessary and would be detrimental to the program," said Meg Reilly, Treasury spokeswoman. "As detailed in earlier reports, we believe that the PPIP compliance rules we have implemented to monitor trading activity are a rigorous and effective method of protecting taxpayers."

Forbes an open shill for criminal Monsanto

If you're up on your Monsanto, you see this as blatant irresponsible corporate propaganda disguised as journalism. You absolutely cannot believe anything the media tells you. And if you're not up on your Monsanto and GMO foods, please be sure to read the entire article. Dr Mercola breaks it down completely.

Are they psychotic or have they taken the blue pill?

Mercola.com -

Forbes has declared Monsanto “Company of the Year,” calling criticism of the notorious company “vicious” attacks against a company that “has been working to make humanity better fed.”

What’s more, Forbes claims that the attacks come because Monsanto has close to a monopoly in some seed markets, which Forbes argues is because they are making “seeds that are too good.”

You read that right. Apparently, Monsanto’s decades-long attempt to control the seed market -- which has led it lawsuits against small farmers and genetically modified plants that never regerminate, forcing farmers to buy seeds year after year -- is apparently just a result of their being “too good.”

I encourage you all to BOYCOTT Forbes and cancel any subscription you may have.

Sources:

Forbes January 18, 2010


Dr. Mercola's Comments:


For anyone who knows anything about the business of Monsanto, the news that this ominous company has been named “Company of the Year” by renowned Forbes magazine is simply shocking.

This follows on the heels of other oxymoronic honors, such as

• President Obama accepting the Nobel Peace Prize while firmly entrenched in a seemingly never-ending war spread across two countries, and

• Time magazine naming Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke “Man of the Year,” supposedly for “saving” the US from “an even worse” financial collapse than what Bernanke himself helped create.

• Even more ironic are the media efforts to convince you that the unsustainable situation created by printing of billions of dollars to bail out failing banks and companies can be sustained indefinitely.

So, who is responsible for these strange decisions? And perhaps more importantly, why?

Through the lens of these examples, a rather bizarre picture is taking shape. I can’t say exactly what the message is, but I believe I can say this: Beware, because deception is taking place through coordinated media manipulation.

If you know anything about how conventional media is being used on a mass scale, you realize that typically someone is trying to sell you on something – an idea, an ideology, a certain mindset, in order to eventually produce a certain behavior.

The question is, what are they trying to convince you of now?

Are We Living in Some Alternative Reality?

When reading the news these days, I often feel like I’m getting information from some alternate Universe where up is down, and left is right. Because they surely aren’t reporting reality on this planet. It’s gotten so blatantly bizarre lately, it’s as though they don’t even bother to come up with a decent cover story to shroud their attempts at manipulating your mind.

That’s the good news.

The bad news is that there are still many who have not figured this game out yet, who will swallow just about anything that magazines like Time and Forbes put in print – like the story that Monsanto is a world class do-gooder.

Unfortunately, there are still those who are unaware of the many improprieties and outright crimes committed by Monsanto, such as:

• Suing small farmers for patent infringement after Monsanto’s GM seeds spread wildly into surrounding farmers’ fields, contaminating their conventional crops

• Secretly discharging PCB-laden toxic waste into an Alabama creek, and dumping millions of pounds of PCBs into open-pit landfills for decades after PCBs were banned in the US for being a possible carcinogen.

• Being found guilty of bribery to bypass Indonesian law requiring an environmental assessment review for its genetically engineered cotton.

• Last year, the supreme court of France found Monsanto guilty of falsely advertising its herbicide Roundup as "biodegradable" and “environmentally friendly.” Scientific evaluation discovered that glyphosate, the active ingredient in RoundUp, is acutely toxic to fish and birds and can kill beneficial insects and soil organisms that maintain ecological balance. Additionally, the surfactant ingredient in Roundup is more acutely toxic than glyphosate itself, and the combination of the two is even more toxic.

• In 2007, the South African Advertising Standards Authority also found Monsanto guilty of lying when advertising that “no negative reactions to Genetically Modified food have been reported.”

• According to one EPA scientist, Monsanto doctored studies and covered-up dioxin contamination of a wide range of its products. She concluded that the company’s behaviour constituted “a long pattern of fraud.”

• In 1999, the New York Times exposed that Monsanto’s PR firm, Burson Marsteller, had paid fake "pro-GMO" food demonstrators to counteract a group of anti-biotech protesters outside a Washington, DC FDA meeting.

This is but a short list of examples, but it should give you a clue as to why I question the rationale behind giving them this honor.

Monsanto – Company of the Year?

Anyone who has studied the devastating effects of the unrestrained release of genetically modified crops into the environment will see the insanity in declaring Monsanto “Company of the Year.”

What the world needs is a return to saner, more sustainable farming practices, not mass cultivation of crops infused with “suicide genes” that prevent regermination the year after, or food crops that have been contaminated with GM seeds used for pharmaceutical production.

I truly believe that letting Monsanto lead us down the garden path is nothing short of suicidal.

It’s time for people to realize that while the declared motive behind GM food is an altruistic one -- to alleviate hunger, poverty and malnutrition worldwide – in reality, the ruthless propagation of GM crops are intended to create previously unimaginable profits above anything else.

Despite their assurances, we’re already beginning to see the real price of all that tinkering with Mother Nature: unnatural crop combinations that can harm your health and potentially cause generational DNA changes, for example.

Not only that, but contrary to promises, GM crops are FAILING MISERABLY all across the world. The reality simply isn’t living up to the hype of increased yields of healthy crops.

After 30 years of GMO experimentation, we have the data to show:

• No increase in yields; on the contrary GM soya has decreased yields by up to 20 percent compared with non-GM soya. Up to 100 percent failures of Bt cotton have been recorded in India. And recent studies by scientists from the USDA and the University of Georgia found that growing GM cotton in the U.S. can result in a drop in income by up to 40 percent.

• No reduction in pesticides use; on the contrary, USDA data shows that GM crops has increased pesticide use by 50 million pounds from 1996 to 2003 in the U.S., and the use of glyphosate went up more than 15-fold between 1994 and 2005, along with increases in other herbicides to cope with rising glyphosate resistant superweeds.

• Roundup herbicide is lethal to frogs and toxic to human placental and embryonic cells. Roundup is used in more than 80 percent of all GM crops planted in the world.

• GM crops harm wildlife, as revealed by UK and U.S. studies.

• Bt resistant pests and Roundup tolerant superweeds render the two major GM crop traits useless. The evolution of Bt resistant bollworms worldwide have now been confirmed and documented.

• Vast areas of forests, pampas and cerrados lost to GM soya in Latin America.

• Epidemic of suicides in the cotton belt of India. 100,000 farmers between 1993-2003, and an estimated 16,000 farmers a year since, have committed suicide since Bt cotton was introduced.

• Transgene contamination is completely unavoidable, as science has recently revealed that the genome (whether plant, animal or human) is NOT constant and static, which is the scientific base for genetic engineering of plants and animals. Instead, geneticists have discovered that the genome is remarkably dynamic and changeable, and constantly ‘conversing’ and adapting to the environment. This interaction determines which genes are turned on, when, where, by what and how much, and for how long. They’ve also found that the genetic material itself has the ability to be changed according to experience, passing it on to subsequent generations.

• GM food and feed linked to deaths and sicknesses both in the fields in India and in lab tests around the world. For example, in April 2006, more than 70 Indian shepherds reported that 25 percent of their herds died within 5-7 days of continuous grazing on Bt cotton plants.

Forbes on a Roll – But Where?

But Forbes doesn’t just throw your intelligence for a loop by hailing the success of a destroyer like Monsanto. Oh, no. There’s more.

Tellingly, in the same issue, Forbes also lashes out against chelation therapy, and derides anyone who thinks there may be a connection between vaccines and autism.

So what is this all about, really?

I have to seriously wonder why we are being urged to imagine we live in a world where no bad deed goes unrewarded; a place where what’s bad for you is somehow beneficial, and where lack of integrity, reason and logic is applauded.

What is this type of media coverage saying to you? What is this saying to your children?

This is not what America used to stand for, if I remember correctly. And it’s not what America should stand for now, or in the future.

Quite frankly, it’s all wrong. It’s all upside-down and backwards.

The only good thing about these blatantly bizarre media displays is the fact that they are just that – blatantly bizarre. And hopefully that will shake more people from their slumber and cause them to ask some basic questions about what’s really going on in this world.

Important Questions Only You Have the Answer to

• Who taught you what you know?

• Who do you listen to? What messages are you receiving from conventional media? How do you determine what’s real and what’s not?

• When was the last time you turned OFF the television and really pondered some issue at length, on your own, looking at it from all sides, including the sides you’ve been told to ignore? Heck, when was the last time you asked WHY you are being told to ignore it in the first place!

Other questions may be even more important than the preceding ones, as they involve really tuning into yourself:

• Where do you fall within the scheme of nature?

• Do natural laws apply to you?

• Where does science fit in? How far can science take you? Are you willing to gamble the future of your children on the assurances of mega-companies like Monsanto, who have tremendous responsibility to their shareholders to turn a profit in a crumbling market?

• To what degree do you think man-made chemicals can improve your health? What IS health, really? What does your body really need in order for all those trillions of cells to thrive in harmony?

Folks, I encourage you to open your mind; think deeply and clearly, and avoid jumping to preconceived conclusions based on what you think you “know,” without first challenging yourself to discern who fed you that “knowledge” in the first place.

Personally, I’m fed up with the brainwashing that conventional media dishes out, and if you too have had enough, I suggest you boycott Forbes and cancel any subscription you may have to their magazine. Unless you simply don’t want to live in a right-side-up world, that is.

Congressman Ron Paul said the following in one of his speeches before Congress earlier this year, and it sums up my sentiments exactly:

"Is this a dream or a nightmare? Is it my imagination or have we lost our minds? It is surreal. It is just not believable. A grand absurdity. A great deception. A delusion of momentous proportions based on preposterous notions and ideas whose time should never have come.

Insanity passed off as logic. Evil described as virtue. Ignorance pawned off as wisdom. Slavery sold as liberty. The philosophy that destroys us is not even defined. We have broken from reality, a psychotic nation. Ignorance with a pretense of knowledge replacing wisdom."

Normal children's toothpaste not strong enough to reduce IQ and quell spirit of resistance prevent tooth decay, study finds

People are responding to the New World Order a tad bit too angrily, so perhaps a stronger chemical lobotomy will do the trick. There are few more grotesque crimes committed against humanity by the scientific dictatorship than fluoride. Fluoride is poison. If you don't believe me, go suck on a tube of toothpaste and come back and tell us what happened to you. Just don't sue me when you die.

Daily Mail -

Parents should use toothpaste with stronger concentrations of fluoride to prevent tooth decay in their children, a new report says.

Researchers found that toothpaste that contained fluoride concentrations less than 1,000 parts per million were only as effective at preventing tooth decay as non-fluoride products.

The study, carried out by the Cochrane Oral Health Group, based at the University of Manchester, has previously shown that fluoride toothpastes reduce dental decay by 24 per cent.



The group's latest research, which involved 79 trials on 73,000 children worldwide, also suggested that brushing a child's teeth with a fluoride toothpaste before the age of 12 months could lead to an increased risk of developing mild fluorosis.

Children's toothpastes currently range from 100 parts per million to 1,400 parts per million.

Swallowing large amounts of toothpaste can still cause fluorosis in children up to the age of six, when the permanent teeth are still developing, but using a small amount can reduce these risks, according to the report.

Dr Anne-Marie Glenny, one of the report's authors, said: 'It is very confusing for parents to know how to strike the right balance, which isn't helped by the fact that different companies use different concentrations of fluoride in their toothpastes aimed at children.

'From a public health point of view, the risk of tooth decay and its consequences such as pain and extractions is greater than the small risk of fluorosis.

'Children would have to swallow a lot of toothpaste over a long period of time to get the severe brown mottling on the teeth, as opposed to the more typical mild white patches.

'For children that are considered to be at a high risk of tooth decay by their dentist, the benefit to health of preventing decay is likely to outweigh the risk of fluorosis.


'In such cases, careful brushing of their children's teeth by parents with a small amount of toothpaste containing higher levels of fluoride would be beneficial.'

UK: Chief climate scientist says science isn't settled, sceptics 'should not be dismissed'

First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win. - Mohandas Gandhi

London Telegraph -



Prof John Beddington admitted the impact of global warming had been exaggerated by some scientists and condemned climate researchers who refused to publish data which formed the basis of their reports into global warming.

In an interview, Prof Beddington, called for a new era of honesty and responsibility from the environmental community and said scientists should be less hostile to sceptics who questioned man-made global warming.


His words were refected in a New Scientist editorial that also argued that climate scientists should "welcome in the outside world" for more scrutiny.

Prof Beddington also said public confidence in climate science would be boosted by greater honesty about its uncertainties.

''I don't think it's healthy to dismiss proper scepticism,” he said.

“Science grows and improves in the light of criticism.

“There is a fundamental uncertainty about climate change prediction that can't be changed.”

His comments come after the United Nations’ climate science panel admitted last week that it made a mistake by claiming that the Himalayan glaciers could melt by 2035.

The IPCC was forced to apologise after the prediction in its benchmark 2007 report – that Himalayan glaciers would disappear by 2035 – was revealed to have been based on unsubstantiated claims.

It followed another row surrounding the science behind climate change, dubbed “Climategate”, when leaked e-mails appeared to suggest that scientists at the University of East Anglia had manipulated climate change data.

As a result Prof Phil Jones, the director of the University’s Climatic Research Unit and a contributor to IPCC reports, has been forced to stand down while he is investigated.

Urging scientists to release their data to their critics, Prof Beddington added: ''I think, wherever possible, we should try to ensure there is openness and that source material is available for the whole scientific community.

“There is a danger that people can manipulate the data, but the benefits from being open far outweigh that danger.”

The New Scientist editorial said that the IPCC has done 'Herculean' work in assessing the risk of climate change and the recent revelations do not undermine the conclustion that man made global warming is happening.

But the process needs to be reviewed so that the public had more access to research and reports come out more frequently.

Lord Stern of Brentford, has previously said that climate change sceptics that pedal “muddled and unscientific” thinking could stop the world from tackling global warming.

Prof Beddington insisted that uncertainty about some aspects of climate science should not be used as an excuse for inaction:

But he said the false claim in the IPCC's 2007 report revealed a wider problem with the way that some evidence was presented.

“Certain unqualified statements have been unfortunate,” he said.

“We have a problem in communicating uncertainty. There's definitely an issue there.

“If there wasn't, there wouldn't be the level of scepticism. All of these predictions have to be caveated by saying, 'there's a level of uncertainty about that'.”

Prof Beddington also said that large-scale climate modelling using computers resulted in ''quite substantial uncertainties'' that should be communicated.

''It's unchallengeable that CO2 traps heat and warms the Earth and that burning fossil fuels shoves billions of tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere,” he told The Times.

“But where you can get challenges is on the speed of change.”

Fed Vows Low Rates for "Extended Period"

Let me help you understand this, and if you do already, indulge me. When the Fed lowers interest rates, it essentially means that it is loaning money it created out of thin air, to be spent by the government. So low interest rates = SPENDING. And isn't spending what got us into this mess in the first place? Seriously folks, you have got to be seriously brain damaged to believe the government when it tells you spending recklessly got us into this calamity, but the best way to get us out of it is to spend recklessly. THEY'RE DOING IT ON PURPOSE. This is how we know the economy is going to completely tank, that the currency is going to be destroyed utterly. It's their intention, and if you understand economics even just a little, this is glaringly obvious. Prepare for economic apocalypse. END THE FED.

CBS News -

The Federal Reserve has decided to hold interest rates at a record low and pledged to keep them there for an "extended period" to nurture the economic recovery and lower unemployment.

One member - Thomas Hoenig, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City - dissented from the Fed's decision to retain the pledge to hold rates at record lows. He believes the economy has improved sufficiently to drop the pledge, which has been in place for nearly a year.

The Fed made no changes to a $1.25 trillion economic support program aimed at driving down mortgage rates and bolster housing. Reports on home sales this week pointed to a fragile housing market.

Fed policymakers said economic activity has continued to "strengthen," the deterioration in the job market is easing and consumers are spending moderately. But they warned that high unemployment, lackluster income growth and tight credit could crimp that spending.

Against that backdrop, the Fed kept its target range for its bank lending rate at zero to 0.25 percent, where it's stood since last December.

In response, commercial banks' prime lending rate, used to peg rates on home equity loans, certain credit cards and other consumer loans, will remain about 3.25 percent. That's its lowest point in decades.

Super-low interest rates are good for borrowers who can get a loan and are willing to take on more debt. But those same low rates hurt savers. They're especially hard on people living on fixed incomes who are earning measly returns on savings accounts and certificates of deposit.

Investors were skittish leading up to the announcement, sending the Dow Jones industrial average fell 50 points in afternoon trading - the sixth drop for stocks in the past eight days.

Meanwhile, a 7.6 percent drop in sales of new homes in December brought concerns about how fast the economy is recovering.

The drop also followed hearings on Capitol Hill where Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner answered questions about the government's rescue of insurance giant American International Group Inc. last year. Geithner oversaw the bailout as head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson also testified.

The hearing was the latest event in Washington to occupy investors. The U.S. market has been spooked by President Barack Obama's push to restrict trading by major financial institutions as well as concerns that Fed chairman Ben Bernanke might not get confirmed in the Senate for a second term.

Paul Volcker, a former Fed chairman and the head of the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board, will testify before Congress next week about Mr. Obama's plans to overhaul of banking regulations. Traders will also be glued to President Obama's prime-time State of the Union speech for more clues about his plans to clamp down on the nation's banks.

Carbon Currency: A New Beginning for Technocracy?

Patrick Wood
Canadian Free Press -

Critics who think that the U.S. dollar will be replaced by some new global currency are perhaps thinking too small.

On the world horizon looms a new global currency that could replace all paper currencies and the economic system upon which they are based.

The new currency, simply called Carbon Currency, is designed to support a revolutionary new economic system based on energy (production, and consumption), instead of price. Our current price-based economic system and its related currencies that have supported capitalism, socialism, fascism and communism, is being herded to the slaughterhouse in order to make way for a new carbon-based world.

It is plainly evident that the world is laboring under a dying system of price-based economics as evidenced by the rapid decline of paper currencies. The era of fiat (irredeemable paper currency) was introduced in 1971 when President Richard Nixon decoupled the U.S. dollar from gold. Because the dollar-turned-fiat was the world’s primary reserve asset, all other currencies eventually followed suit, leaving us today with a global sea of paper that is increasingly undesired, unstable, unusable.

The deathly economic state of today’s world is a direct reflection of the sum of its sick and dying currencies, but this could soon change.

Forces are already at work to position a new Carbon Currency as the ultimate solution to global calls for poverty reduction, population control, environmental control, global warming, energy allocation and blanket distribution of economic wealth.

Unfortunately for individual people living in this new system, it will also require authoritarian and centralized control over all aspects of life, from cradle to grave.

What is Carbon Currency and how does it work? In a nutshell, Carbon Currency will be based on the regular allocation of available energy to the people of the world. If not used within a period of time, the Currency will expire (like monthly minutes on your cell phone plan) so that the same people can receive a new allocation based on new energy production quotas for the next period.

Because the energy supply chain is already dominated by the global elite, setting energy production quotas will limit the amount of Carbon Currency in circulation at any one time. It will also naturally limit manufacturing, food production and people movement.

Local currencies could remain in play for a time, but they would eventually wither and be fully replaced by the Carbon Currency, much the same way that the Euro displaced individual European currencies over a period of time.

Sounds very modern in concept, doesn’t it? In fact, these ideas date back to the 1930’s when hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens were embracing a new political ideology called Technocracy and the promise it held for a better life. Even now-classic literature was heavily influenced by Technocracy: George Orwell’s 1984, H.G. Well’s The Shape of Things to Come and Huxley’s “scientific dictatorship” in Brave New World.

This paper investigates the rebirth of Technocracy and its potential to recast the New World Order into something truly “new” and also totally unexpected by the vast majority of modern critics.

Background

Philosophically, Technocracy found it roots in the scientific autocracy of Henri de Saint-Simon (1760-1825) and in the positivism of Auguste Comte (1798- 1857), the father of the social sciences. Positivism elevated science and the scientific method above metaphysical revelation. Technocrats embraced positivism because they believed that social progress was possible only through science and technology. [Schunk, Learning Theories: An Educational Perspective, 5th, 315]

The social movement of Technocracy, with its energy-based accounting system, can be traced back to the 1930’s when an obscure group of engineers and scientists offered it as a solution to the Great Depression.

The principal scientist behind Technocracy was M. King Hubbert, a young geoscientist who would later (in 1948-1956) invent the now-famous Peak Oil Theory, also known as the Hubbert Peak Theory. Hubbert stated that the discovery of new energy reserves and their production would be outstripped by usage, thereby eventually causing economic and social havoc. Many modern followers of Peak Oil Theory believe that the 2007-2009 global recession was exacerbated in part by record oil prices that reflected validity of the theory.

Hubbert received all of his higher education at the University of Chicago, graduating with a PhD in 1937, and later taught geophysics at Columbia University. He was highly acclaimed throughout his career, receiving many honors such as the Rockefeller Public Service Award in 1977.

In 1933, Hubbert and Howard Scott formed an organization called Technocracy, Inc. Technocracy is derived from the Greek words “techne” meaning skill and “kratos”, meaning rule. Thus, it is government by skilled engineers, scientists and technicians as opposed to elected officials. It was opposed to all other forms of government, including communism, socialism and fascism, all of which function with a price-based economy.

As founders of the organization and political movement called Technocracy, Inc., Hubbert and Scott also co-authored Technocracy Study Course in 1934. This book serves as the “bible” of Technocracy and is the root document to which most all modern technocratic thinking can be traced.

Technocracy postulated that only scientists and engineers were capable of running a complex, technology-based society. Because technology, they reasoned, changed the social nature of societies, previous methods of government and economy were made obsolete. They disdained politicians and bureaucrats, who they viewed as incompetent. By utilizing the scientific method and scientific management techniques, Technocrats hoped to squeeze the massive inefficiencies out of running a society, thereby providing more benefits for all members of society while consuming less resources.

The other integral part of Technocracy was to implement an economic system based on energy allocation rather than price. They proposed to replace traditional money with Energy Credits.

Their keen focus on the efficient use of energy is likely the first hint of a sustained ecological/environmental movement in the United States. Technocracy Study Course stated, for instance,

Although it (the earth) is not an isolated system the changes in the configuration of matter on the earth, such as the erosion of soil, the making of mountains, the burning of coal and oil, and the mining of metals are all typical and characteristic examples of irreversible processes, involving in each case an increase of entropy. (Technocracy Study Course, Hubbert & Scott, p. 49)

Modern emphasis on curtailing carbon fuel consumption that causes global warming and CO2 emissions is essentially a product of early Technocratic thinking.

As scientists, Hubbert and Scott tried to explain (or justify) their arguments in terms of physics and the law of thermodynamics, which is the study of energy conversion between heat and mechanical work.

Entropy is a concept within thermodynamics that represents the amount of energy in a system that is no longer available for doing mechanical work. Entropy thus increases as matter and energy in the system degrade toward the ultimate state of inert uniformity.

In layman’s terms, entropy means once you use it, you lose it for good. Furthermore, the end state of entropy is “inert uniformity” where nothing takes place. Thus, if man uses up all the available energy and/or destroys the ecology, it cannot be repeated or restored ever again.

The Technocrat’s avoidance of social entropy is to increase the efficiency of society by the careful allocation of available energy and measuring subsequent output in order to find a state of “equilibrium,” or balance. Hubbert’s focus on entropy is evidenced by Technocracy, Inc.’s logo, the well-known Yin Yang symbol that depicts balance.

To facilitate this equilibrium between man and nature, Technocracy proposed that citizens would receive Energy Certificates in order to operate the economy:

“Energy Certificates are issued individually to every adult of the entire population… The record of one’s income and its rate of expenditure is kept by the Distribution Sequence, so that it is a simple matter at any time for the Distribution Sequence to ascertain the state of a given customer’s balance… When making purchases of either goods or services an individual surrenders the Energy Certificates properly identified and signed.

“The significance of this, from the point of view of knowledge of what is going on in the social system, and of social control, can best be appreciated when one surveys the whole system in perspective. First, one single organization is manning and operating the whole social mechanism. The same organization not only produces but also distributes all goods and services.

“With this information clearing continuously to a central headquarters we have a case exactly analogous to the control panel of a power plant, or the bridge of an ocean liner…” [Technocracy Study Course, Hubbert & Scott,p. 238-239]

Two key differences between price-based money and Energy Certificates are that a) money is generic to the holder while Certificates are individually registered to each citizen and b) money persists while Certificates expire. The latter facet would greatly hinder, if not altogether prevent, the accumulation of wealth and property.

Transition

At the start of WWII, Technocracy’s popularity dwindled as economic prosperity returned, however both the organization and its philosophy survived.

Today, there are two principal websites representing Technocracy in North America: Technocracy, Inc., located in Ferndale, Washington, is represented at www.technocracy.org. A sister organization in Vancouver, British Columbia is Technocracy Vancouver, can be found at www.technocracyvan.ca.

While Technocracy’s original focus was exclusively on the North American continent, it is now growing rapidly in Europe and other industrialized nations.

For instance, the Network of European Technocrats was formed in 2005 as “an autonomous research and social movement that aims to explore and develop both the theory and design of technocracy.” The NET website claims to have members around the world.

Of course, a few minor league organizations and their websites cannot hope to create or implement a global energy policy, but it’s not because the ideas aren’t still alive and well.

A more likely influence on modern thinking is due to Hubbert’s Peak Oil Theory introduced in 1954. It has figured prominently in the ecological/environmental movement. In fact, the entire global warming movement indirectly sits on top of the Hubbert Peak Theory.

As the Canadian Association for the Club of Rome recently stated, “The issue of peak oil impinges directly on the climate change question.” (see John H. Walsh, “The Impending Twin Crisis – One Set of Solutions?, p.5.)

The Modern Proposal

Because of the connection between the environmental movement, global warming and the Technocratic concept of Energy Certificates, one would expect that a Carbon Currency would be suggested from that particular community, and in fact, this is the case.

In 1995, Judith Hanna wrote in New Scientist, “Toward a single carbon currency”, “My proposal is to set a global quota for fossil fuel combustion every year, and to share it equally between all the adults in the world.”

In 2004, the prestigious Harvard International Review published “A New Currency” and stated,

“For those keen to slow global warming, the most effective actions are in the creation of strong national carbon currencies… For scholars and policymakers, the key task is to mine history for guides that are more useful. Global warming is considered an environmental issue, but its best solutions are not to be found in the canon of environmental law. Carbon’s ubiquity in the world economy demands that cost be a consideration in any regime to limit emissions. Indeed, emissions trading has been anointed king because it is the most responsive to cost. And since trading emissions for carbon is more akin to trading currency than eliminating a pollutant, policymakers should be looking at trade and finance with an eye to how carbon markets should be governed. We must anticipate the policy challenges that will arise as this bottom-up system emerges, including the governance of seams between each of the nascent trading systems, liability rules for bogus permits, and judicial cooperation. [Emphasis added]

HIR concludes that “after seven years of spinning wheels and wrong analogies, the international regime to control carbon is headed, albeit tentatively, down a productive path.”

In 2006, UK Environment Secretary David Miliband spoke to the Audit Commission Annual Lecture and flatly stated,

"Imagine a country where carbon becomes a new currency. We carry bankcards that store both pounds and carbon points. When we buy electricity, gas and fuel, we use our carbon points, as well as pounds. To help reduce carbon emissions, the Government would set limits on the amount of carbon that could be used." [Emphasis added]

In 2007, New York Times published “When Carbon Is Currency” by Hannah Fairfield. She pointedly stated “To build a carbon market, its originators must create a currency of carbon credits that participants can trade.”

PointCarbon, a leading global consultancy, is partnered with Bank of New York Mellon to assess rapidly growing carbon markets. In 2008 they published “Towards a Common Carbon Currency: Exploring the prospects for integrated global carbon markets.” This report discusses both environmental and economic efficiency in a similar context as originally seen with Hubbert in 1933.

Finally, on November 9 2009, the Telegraph (UK) presented an article “Everyone in Britain could be given a personal ‘carbon allowance.’”

“… implementing individual carbon allowances for every person will be the most effective way of meeting the targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. It would involve people being issued with a unique number which they would hand over when purchasing products that contribute to their carbon footprint, such as fuel, airline tickets and electricity. Like with a bank account, a statement would be sent out each month to help people keep track of what they are using. If their "carbon account" hits zero, they would have to pay to get more credits”. [Emphasis added]

As you can see, these references are hardly minor league in terms of either authorship or content. The undercurrent of early Technocratic thought has finally reached the shore where the waves are lapping at the beach.

Technocracy’s Energy Card Prototype

In July 1937 an article by Howard Scott in Technocracy Magazine described an Energy Distribution Card in great detail. It declared that using such an instrument as a “means of accounting is a part of Technocracy’s proposed change in the course of how our socioeconomic system can be organized.”

Scott further wrote,

“The certificate will be issued directly to the individual. It is nontransferable and nonnegotiable; therefore, it cannot be stolen, lost, loaned, borrowed, or given away. It is noncumulative; therefore, it cannot be saved, and it does not accrue or bear interest. It need not be spent but loses its validity after a designated time period.”

This may have seemed like science fiction in 1937, but today it is wholly achievable. In 2010 Technocracy, Inc. offers an updated idea of what such an Energy Distribution Card might look like. Their website states,

“It is now possible to use a plastic card similar to today’s credit card embedded with a microchip. This chip could contain all the information needed to create an energy distribution card as described in this booklet. Since the same information would be provided in whatever forms best suits the latest technology, however, the concept of an ‘Energy Distribution Card’ is what is explained here.”

If you study the card above, you will also note that is serves as a universal identity card and contains a microchip. This reflects Technocracy’s philosophy that each person in society must be meticulously monitored and accounted for in order to track what they consume in terms of energy, and also what they contribute to the manufacturing process.

Carbon Market Players

The modern system of carbon credits was an invention of the Kyoto Protocol and started to gain momentum in 2002 with the establishment of the first domestic economy-wide trading scheme in the U.K. After becoming international law in 2005, the trading market is now predicted to reach $3 trillion by 2020 or earlier.

Graciela Chichilnisky, director of the Columbia Consortium for Risk Management and a designer of the carbon credit text of the Kyoto Protocol, states that the carbon market “is therefore all about cash and trading – but it is also a way to a profitable and greener future.” (See Who Needs a Carbon Market?)

Who are the “traders” that provide the open door to all this profit? Currently leading the pack are JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

Bloomberg noted in Carbon Capitalists on December 4, 2009 that

“The banks are preparing to do with carbon what they’ve done before: design and market derivatives contracts that will help client companies hedge their price risk over the long term. They’re also ready to sell carbon-related financial products to outside investors.”

At JP Morgan, the woman who originally invented Credit Default Swaps, Blythe Masters, is now head of the department that will trade carbon credits for the bank.

Considering the sheer force of global banking giants behind carbon trading, it’s no wonder analysts are already predicting that the carbon market will soon dwarf all other commodities trading.

Conclusion

Where there is smoke, there is fire. Where there is talk, there is action.

If M. King Hubbert and other early architects of Technocracy were alive today, they would be very pleased to see the seeds of their ideas on energy allocation grow to bear fruit on such a large scale. In 1933, the technology didn’t exist to implement a system of Energy Certificates. However, with today’s ever-advancing computer technology, the entire world could easily be managed on a single computer.

This article intended to show that

• Carbon Currency is not a new idea, but has deep roots in Technocracy
• Carbon Currency has grown from a continental proposal to a global proposal
• It has been consistently discussed over a long period of time
• The participants include many prominent global leaders, banks and think-tanks
• The context of these discussions have been very consistent
• Today’s goals for implementing Carbon Currency are virtually identical to Technocracy’s original Energy Certificates goals.

Of course, a currency is merely a means to an end. Whoever controls the currency also controls the economy and the political structure that goes with it. Inquiry into what such a system might look like will be a future topic.

Technocracy and energy-based accounting are not idle or theoretical issues. If the global elite intends for Carbon Currency to supplant national currencies, then the world economic and political systems will also be fundamentally changed forever.

What Technocracy could not achieve during the Great Depression appears to have finally found traction in the Great Recession.

Bibliography & Resources

Scott & Hubbert, Technocracy Study Course, Technocracy, Inc., 1934

Hanna, Toward a single carbon currency, New Scientist, 1995

Victor & House, A New Currency, Harvard International Review, Summer 2004

Hannah Fairfield, When Carbon Is Currency, New York Times, May 6, 2007

M. King Hubbert & The Technocracy Technate Design – Historical blog

Everyone in Britain could be given a personal ‘carbon allowance’, Telegraph (UK)

Network of European Technocrats – website for Europe

Technocracy, Inc. – website for U.S.

Technocracy Vancouver – website for Canada

Association for the study of Peak Oil & Gas – website for Peak Oil