Mini-Me: Italian Court Confirms Convictions of CIA Personnel for Rendition & Torture – Way Now Clear for Formal Extradition Request

07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Ethics, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Officers Call

Huh?

Italy court upholds American convictions in CIA case

ROME (AP) — Italy's highest criminal court on Wednesday upheld the convictions of 23 Americans in the abduction of an Egyptian terror suspect from a Milan street as part of the CIA's extraordinary rendition program, paving the way to possible extradition requests by Italian authorities.

The ruling by the Court of Cassation marks the final appeal in the first trial anywhere in the world involving the CIA's practice of abducting terror suspects and transferring them to third countries where torture is permitted.

The Americans were convicted in absentia following a three-and-a-half-year trial, and have never been in Italian custody. They risk arrest if they travel to Europe and one of their court-appointed lawyers suggested that the final verdict would open the way for the Italian government to seek their extradition.

“It went badly. It went very badly,” lawyer Alessia Sorgato said after the court announced its decision after a day of deliberations. “Now they will ask for extradition.”victed in absentia following a three-and-a-half-year trial, and have never been in Italian custody. They risk arrest if they travel to Europe and one of their court-appointed lawyers suggested that the final verdict would open the way for the Italian government to seek their extradition.

Milan Prosecutor Armando Spataro, one of Italy's top anti-terrorism magistrates who shaped the prosecution, hailed the top court's decision, saying it was tantamount to a finding that extraordinary rendition “is incompatible with democracy.”

Read full article.

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2012/09/142012/09/14

Owl: Drugs of War – The Imperial Trade, Banks on Top

03 Economy, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Transnational Crime, 11 Society, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Corruption, Director of National Intelligence et al (IC), Economics/True Cost, Government, Knowledge, Law Enforcement, Media, Military, Money, Officers Call, Politics

A Jaw-Dropping Explanation of How Governments Are Complicit in the Illegal Drug Trade

The drug war is far, far more than just simply criminals at work, says scholar Oliver Villar.

Note: The following interview helps us understand the drug war from a dramatically different perspective than the one the corporate media paints. Instead the traditional portrayal of the war on drugs as a fight between law enforcement and illicit drug dealers, scholar Oliver Villar explains that the illegal drug trade is a tool of empire a means of “social control” as much as profit. Villar, a lecturer in politics at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst, Australia's insight is well worth the read.

EXTRACT:

LS: Catherine Austin Fitts, a former investment banker from Wall Street, shared this observation once with me:

Essentially, I would say the governments run the drug trade, but they're not the ultimate power, they're just one part, if you will, of managing the operations. Nobody can run a drug business, unless

the banks will do their transactions and handle their money. If you want to understand who controls the drug trade in a place, you need to ask yourself who is it that has to accept to manage the transactions and to manage the capital, and that will lead you to the answer who's in control. [2]

What are your thoughts on this essential equation?

Read full interview.

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2012/08/312012/08/31

Mini-Me: Marine Officer on 9/11 – The Anomalies Continue to Surface

07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, Commerce, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, Knowledge, Law Enforcement, Media, Military, Politics

Huh?

Phi Beta Iota: As President Barack Obama faces what David Gergen calls one of three “choice” or turning point elections in modern US history, one has to wonder where he stands on the subject of the truth. Below the line is a methodical review with many links from retired Marine Corps officer Jim Fetzer, who focuses on the Cheney-dominated US Government at the time. Equally troubling facts can be asserted on the New York end by focusing on Larry Silverstein and Rudy Guliani. If ever a sitting President had a ready-made opportunity for eradicating an opposing political party by enabling the truth to be told about a major event in modern US history, Barack Obama is that President. We do not favor a traditional justice approach here, but rather a Truth & Reconciliation Commission. If Barack Obama were to sponsor The Smart Nation Act, the Electoral Reform Act of 2012, a Truth & Reconciliation Commission on 9/11, and the immediate decriminalization of marijuana and then of all other drugs [with a jobs program equal to the challenge of existing unemployment and emptied prisons with restored voting rights], it would be game over. Then instead of having to fight for credibility and traction every day, he might actually be able to govern in 2013-2016. On the other hand, if President Barack Obama and the Democratic Party are intent on demonstrating there is no substantive difference between the two parties that control the electoral process and the disbursement of the public treasury, they should continue to do precisely what they are doing now.

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2012/07/192012/07/19

Winslow Wheeler: Hill Hearing on Defense Backs Into the Truth

03 Economy, 09 Justice, 10 Security, Corruption, Government, Military

WinslowWheeler Cropped — Winslow Wheeler

Foreign Policy is running my description of the hearing that Buck McKeon put on yesterday with Lockheed-Martin and a cast of lesser, not entirely cooperative, other characters. Find my analysis at http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/07/19/hard_of_hearing?print=yes&hidecomments=yes&page=full, and below:

Hard of Hearing

Why the House's attempt to save defense spending might flop.

BY WINSLOW T. WHEELER | JULY 19, 2012

It was probably the most ballyhooed congressional hearing on defense for the year. As the monthly economic news continues to show poor job growth, and as the elections heat up, the Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Buck McKeon, and defense contractor Lockheed-Martin saw a major opportunity to protect the Pentagon budget and their bottom line. On Wednesday, just as the House of Representatives was about to debate the 2013 Department of Defense Appropriations bill, McKeon held a big hearing with Lockheed and other industry representatives to explain why the American economy could not possibly stomach the $55 billion in defense cuts set to occur in January, as required by last summer's Budget Control Act and the failure of the congressional “Super Committee” to cut a broad budget deal.

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2012/06/052012/06/05

Paul Craig Roberts: Collapse at Hand – and ONE THING an Honest Government Could Do To Make It All Right

03 Economy, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Transnational Crime, 11 Society, Blog Wisdom, Budgets & Funding, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, General Accountability Office, Government, Law Enforcement, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth, Office of Management and Budget

Collapse At Hand

Ever since the beginning of the financial crisis and quantitative easing, the question has been before us: How can the Federal Reserve maintain zero interest rates for banks and negative real interest rates for savers and bond holders when the US government is adding $1.5 trillion to the national debt every year via its budget deficits? Not long ago the Fed announced that it was going to continue this policy for another 2 or 3 years. Indeed, the Fed is locked into the policy. Without the artificially low interest rates, the debt service on the national debt would be so large that it would raise questions about the US Treasury’s credit rating and the viability of the dollar, and the trillions of dollars in Interest Rate Swaps and other derivatives would come unglued.

In other words, financial deregulation leading to Wall Street’s gambles, the US government’s decision to bail out the banks and to keep them afloat, and the Federal Reserve’s zero interest rate policy have put the economic future of the US and its currency in an untenable and dangerous position. It will not be possible to continue to flood the bond markets with $1.5 trillion in new issues each year when the interest rate on the bonds is less than the rate of inflation. Everyone who purchases a Treasury bond is purchasing a depreciating asset. Moreover, the capital risk of investing in Treasuries is very high. The low interest rate means that the price paid for the bond is very high. A rise in interest rates, which must come sooner or later, will collapse the price of the bonds and inflict capital losses on bond holders, both domestic and foreign.

The question is: when is sooner or later? The purpose of this article is to examine that question.

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2012/06/04

Mini-Me: Slavery By A Different Name – The Convict Lease System

07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 11 Society, Corruption, Government, Law Enforcement

Slavery By A Different Name: The Convict Lease System

by Devon DB

GlobalResearch, 1 June 2012

After the Civil War, the 13^th, 14^th, and 15^th Constitutional amendments were passed which aided newly freed slaves in being equally treated under the law, or so the story goes. The fact of the matter is that slavery was- and still is- completely legal in the United States and not only that, but it took on a much different form. The institution of slavery changed as instead of having the direct enslavement of blacks with an entire apparatus that had to be created to keep slaves in their condition, elements of the state apparatus were used to enslave blacks, namely the legal and prison systems. Yet, the enslavement itself was changed as black convicts were no longer slaves to individual masters, but rather they were enslaved to the companies which they were leased out to. To create this system there not only had to be the involvement of the Southern judicial system and individual Northern and Southern elites, but also the involvement of the corporation and reinstitution of slavery within a corporate context.

The 13^th Amendment

To attain a full understanding of the convict lease system, there must first be a reexamination of the 13^th amendment. It has been stated in history books and in classrooms across America that this amendment ended slavery, yet this is quite false. The 13^th Amendment states “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” [1] (emphasis added) Thus, slavery is completely and totally legal if it is part (or the whole) of a punishment for someone who was convicted of a crime.

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2012/06/02

Mini-Me: The Biggest Fraudster of All is US Department of “Justice”

07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 11 Society, Corruption, Government, Law Enforcement

Huh?

Op-Ed Columnist

The Mortgage Fraud Fraud

By JOE NOCERA

EXTRACT

Charlie has always insisted that he never filled out the loan document — his mortgage broker did it, and he was actually a victim of mortgage fraud. (The broker later pleaded guilty to another mortgage fraud.) Indeed, according to a recent court filing by Charlie’s lawyer, the government failed to turn over exculpatory evidence that could have helped Charlie prove his innocence. For whatever inexplicable reason, prosecutors really wanted to nail Charlie Engle. And they did.

Second, though, it seemed incredible to me that with all the fraud that took place during the housing bubble, the Justice Department was focusing not on the banks that had issued the fraudulent loans, but rather on those who had taken out the loans, which invariably went sour when housing prices fell.

As I would later learn, Charlie Engle was no aberration. The current meme — argued most recently by Charles Ferguson, in his new book “Predator Nation” — is that not a single top executive at any of the firms that nearly brought down the financial system has spent so much as a day in jail. And that is true enough.

But what is also true, and which is every bit as corrosive to our belief in the rule of law, is that the Justice Department has instead taken after the smallest of small fry — and then trumpeted those prosecutions as proof of how tough it is on mortgage fraud. It is a shameful way for the government to act.

Read full article.

Phi Beta Iota: We have learned that the technical term for an out of control government in league with white collar criminals at the top of Wall Street and Main Street is “control fraud.” The Department of Justice has always been lax on white collar criminals, but under the Obama Administration it has become their de facto protector to the point of treason against the public interest.