Rob the Poor and Give Billions to the Rich
Bush and Cheney While working class people were burying their dead in New York City, GM, GE, IBM, Enron and other Fortune 500 companies who put Bush into power were paying off their lackeys in Congress. The so-called "Economic Stimulus" bill gives tax cuts to the corporate fat cats to the tune of $70 billion a year.
But this soak-the-poor-to-give-to-the-rich scam isn't just for next year to stimulate the economy, it's RETROACTIVE FOR 15 YEARS! So IBM will get $1.4 billion, GM $833 million, GE $671 million, etc. Enron, the Houston energy company and a major Bush supporter, would get $254 million. Guess what ordinary workers get!
Fat Cats get billions while unemployed get pittance (Daily Ration) Bush has already given away $40 billion of our hard-earned tax dollars to war profiteering CEOs. But the Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the recent House-passed bill would provide only $2.3 billion in supplemental unemployment benefits by the end of next September, 2002. The airline industry alone got a $15 billion bailout package, and they have laid off 100,000+ Americans with families to support.
This year CEOs gave themselves, through a board vote (with other CEO's siting on these boards), on average a 22% raise. Executive pay jumped 571% between 1990 and 2000. If the minimum wage, which stood at $3.80 an hour in 1990, had grown at the same rate as CEO pay over the decade, it would now be $25.50 an hour, instead of $5.15 an hour.
Bush Senior In Collusion with the Bin Laden Family
Bin Laden and his advisor/controller Since he left office, ex-President and ex-CIA Director George Bush, working as a consultant, has been using his influence and contacts for the Washington-based Carlyle Group, a $12 billion private equity firm and eleventh largest defense contractor in the U.S. Carlyle's portfolio is heavily invested in defense and telecommunications firms.The Bin Laden family has large investments in Carlyle. The New York Times has reported that former President George Bush met with the bin Laden family in Saudi Arabia in 1998 and 2000.
Bush Bush senior's Carlyle connection means he is on the payroll of corporate interests that receive defense contracts from the U.S. government while his son is president. Charles Lewis of the Washington-based Center for Public Integrity, indicated that "in a really peculiar way, George W. Bush could, some day, benefit financially from his own administration's decisions, through his father's investments."
Former president Bush and Saudi rulers Bush Senior specializes in Saudi Arabia and therefore has a personal interest in the corrupt Saudi regime's survival and continued profitability. The public-interest law firm Judicial Watch earlier this year strongly criticized Bush senior for his ties with the Bin Laden family, pointing out in a March 5 statement that it is a "conflict of interest [which] could cause problems for America's foreign policy in the Middle East and Asia."
In a Sept. 29 statement, Judicial Watch added that, "This conflict of interest has now turned into a scandal. The idea of the president's father, an ex-president himself, doing business with a company under investigation by the FBI in the terror attacks of September 11 is horrible." Judicial Watch demanded that President Bush make his father pull out of the Carlyle Group.
The New York Times on October 26, 2001 reported that, "The Saudi family of Osama bin Laden is severing its financial ties with the Carlyle Group, a private investment firm known for its connections to influential Washington political figures, executives who have been briefed on the decision said today." Some of those influential figures include George H.W. Bush and his son, President Bush.
Bush and advisor
George junior is no slouch when it comes to shady deals with the Bin Laden family and other crooked interests drugs.
"In 1979, Bush’s first business, Arbusto Energy, obtained financing from James Bath, a Houstonian and close family friend. One of many investors, Bath gave Bush $50,000 for a 5 percent stake in Arbusto. At the time, Bath was the sole U.S. business representative for Salem bin Laden, head of the wealthy Saudi Arabian family and a brother (one of 17) to Osama bin Laden. It has long been suspected, but never proven, that the Arbusto money came directly from Salem bin Laden. In a statement issued shortly after the September 11 attacks, the White House vehemently denied the connection, insisting that Bath invested his own money, not Salem bin Laden’s, in Arbusto.
"In conflicting statements, Bush at first denied ever knowing Bath, then acknowledged his stake in Arbusto and that he was aware Bath represented Saudi interests. In fact, Bath has extensive ties, both to the bin Laden family and major players in the scandal-ridden Bank of Commerce and Credit International (BCCI) who have gone on to fund Osama bin Laden. BCCI defrauded depositors of $10 billion in the ’80s in what has been called the 'largest bank fraud in world financial history' by former Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau. During the ’80s, BCCI also acted as a main conduit for laundering money intended for clandestine CIA activities, ranging from financial support to the Afghan mujahedin to paying intermediaries in the Iran-Contra affair."
I'm a person who has no tolerance for violence and hates the suffering of the people of Iraq.
"We need to make the people of Iraqi feel safe"
America is a friend to the people of Iraq.
civilian deaths 655,000+
THANK YOU BUSH
Support our soldiers to make it home safe. Not the war.
HALLIBURTON MIDDLE EAST CONTRACTS: CHENEY CONNECTION
“… the Pentagon findings on Halliburton overcharges are likely to fuel the allegations of favoritism, especially since it was revealed that the firm had been granted the contract to manage Iraq's oilfields, valued at up to $7 billion, without competition and without any bidding. Cheney's name inevitably surfaces
“Cheney(‘s)… links to Halliburton… have drawn intense scrutiny because he ran the company for five years and was given a $33 million payoff when he left to run for office. Before joining Halliburton he was secretary of defense, and in a position to know about and grant Pentagon contracts. Halliburton's military work has expanded over the past decade...
“During the decade of Halliburton's extraordinary growth, Cheney was the defense secretary for four years, from 1989-93, and then the chief executive of the company for five years, from 1995-2000.
“As vice president, Cheney has maintained his contacts with energy-industry executives and solicited their views in developing US energy policy. The secrecy of those contacts - which the White House refuses to divulge - is the subject of a US Supreme Court lawsuit.” - Halliburton Unscathed by Overcharge Flap
HALLIBURTON MIDDLE EAST CONTRACTS: WHISTLEBLOWER
In October of 2004, Bunnatine Greenhouse called the Halliburton Middle East contracts into question…
“… Greenhouse said that when the Pentagon awarded Halliburton a five-year $7 billion contract, it pressured her to withdraw her objections, actions which she claimed were unprecedented in her experience.
“… the Army gave the no-bid contracts to Halliburton's subsidiary KBR for political reasons. Greenhouse charged that contracts were approved over her reservations, some of which were handwritten on the original contracts, and extensions of contracts were awarded because underlings signed them in collusion with senior officials without her knowledge.
“Greenhouse claimed the Army… violated ‘the integrity of the federal contracting program as it relates to a major defense contractor’. ‘Employees of the U.S. government have taken improper action that favored KBR's interests,’ Greenhouse wrote. ‘This conduct has violated specific regulations and calls into question the independence’ of the contracting process.” - Halliburton Contracts Illegal - But Bush Busts The Whistleblower
HALLIBURTON MIDDLE EAST CONTRACTS: CHENEY LIES
Dick Cheney, of course, denied any involvement in the charges Greenhouse made regarding the Halliburton Middle East contracts. However, it was later proven what we all know: he’s a liar.
“Time quoted an email sent by the Army Corps of Engineers, that said the contract for construction of oil pipelines was approved by Under Secretary of Defense Douglas Feith ‘contingent on informing WH tomorrow. We anticipate no issues since action has been coordinated w VP's [Vice President's] office.’
“…The email was dated March 5, 2003, and Halliburton was awarded the contract three days later without allowing for any bids from other companies.
“The email totally contradicts Cheney's televised claims that he had no involvement in Halliburton's contracts whatsoever and proves that Cheney and the White House played a key role in boosting Halliburton into the number one war profiteering position in Iraq.” - Halliburton Contracts Illegal - But Bush Busts The Whistleblower
HALLIBURTON MIDDLE EAST CONTRACTS: OVERCHARGING AMERICAN TAXPAYERS
“In December 2003, two Democratic members of Congress, Henry Waxman and John Dingell, issued a report claiming that Halliburton was charging the Army an average of $2.64 per gallon of oil, and sometimes as much as $3.06.
“By comparison, the Defense Department’s Energy Support Center had been doing a similar job for $1.32 per gallon, and SOMO, an Iraqi oil company, was doing the same job for just 96 cents a gallon.
“Between May and late October 2003, Halliburton spent $383 million for 240 million gallons of oil—an amount that should have cost taxpayers as little as $230 million. ‘I have never seen anything like this in my life,’ Phil Verleger, a California oil economist and consultant, told The New York Times. ‘That’s a monopoly premium—the only term to describe it…
HALLIBURTON MIDDLE EAST CONTRACTS: BANKING CABAL IS BIGGER PICTURE
Although the corruption at Halliburton is maddening, it’s important to move beyond this one small issue and get to the heart of why this fraudulent activity is allowed to continue throughout US government policy
The fact is that the international banking cabal is in charge of the corrupt officials in the US government who allow and profit from frauds such as the Halliburton Middle East contracts.
“The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the larger centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson... The country is going through a repetition of Jackson's fight with the Bank of the United States—only on a far bigger and broader basis.” - ex-President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Suppressed Details of Criminal Insider Trading Lead Directly into the CIA’s Highest Ranks
CIA Executive Director “Buzzy” Krongard managed firm that handled “PUT” options on United Airline Stock
by Michael C. Ruppert
FTW - October 9, 2001 – Although uniformly ignored by the mainstream U.S. media, there is abundant and clear evidence that a number of transactions in financial markets indicated specific (criminal) foreknowledge of the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. In the case of at least one of these trades -- which has left a $2.5 million prize unclaimed -- the firm used to place the “put options” on United Airlines stock was, until 1998, managed by the man who is now in the number three Executive Director position at the Central Intelligence Agency.
Until 1997 A.B. “Buzzy” Krongard had been Chairman of the investment bank A.B. Brown. A.B. Brown was acquired by Banker’s Trust in 1997. Krongard then became, as part of the merger, Vice Chairman of Banker’s Trust-AB Brown, one of 20 major U.S. banks named by Senator Carl Levin this year as being connected to money laundering. Krongard’s last position at Banker’s Trust (BT) was to oversee “private client relations.” In this capacity he had direct hands-on relations with some of the wealthiest people in the world in a kind of specialized banking operation that has been identified by the U.S. Senate and other investigators as being closely connected to the laundering of drug money.
Krongard joined the CIA in 1998 as counsel to CIA Director George Tenet. He was promoted to CIA Executive Director by President Bush in March of this year. BT was acquired by Deutsche Bank in 1999. The combined firm is the single largest bank in Europe. And, as we shall see, Deutsche Bank played several key roles in events connected to the September 11 attacks.
THE SCOPE OF KNOWN INSIDER TRADING
Before looking further into these relationships it is necessary to look at the insider trading information that is being ignored by Reuters, The New York Times and other mass media. It is well documented that the CIA has long monitored such trades – in real time – as potential warnings of terrorist attacks and other economic moves contrary to U.S. interests. Previous stories in FTW have specifically highlighted the use of Promis software to monitor such trades.
It is necessary to understand only two key financial terms to understand the significance of these trades, “selling short” and “put options”.
“Selling Short” is the borrowing of stock, selling it at current market prices, but not being required to actually produce the stock for some time. If the stock falls precipitously after the short contract is entered, the seller can then fulfill the contract by buying the stock after the price has fallen and complete the contract at the pre-crash price. These contracts often have a window of as long as four months.
“Put Options,” are contracts giving the buyer the option to sell stocks at a later date. Purchased at nominal prices of, for example, $1.00 per share, they are sold in blocks of 100 shares. If exercised, they give the holder the option of selling selected stocks at a future date at a price set when the contract is issued. Thus, for an investment of $10,000 it might be possible to tie up 10,000 shares of United or American Airlines at $100 per share, and the seller of the option is then obligated to buy them if the option is executed. If the stock has fallen to $50 when the contract matures, the holder of the option can purchase the shares for $50 and immediately sell them for $100 – regardless of where the market then stands. A call option is the reverse of a put option, which is, in effect, a derivatives bet that the stock price will go up.
A September 21 story by the Israeli Herzliyya International Policy Institute for Counterterrorism, entitled “Black Tuesday: The World’s Largest Insider Trading Scam?” documented the following trades connected to the September 11 attacks:
Between September 6 and 7, the Chicago Board Options Exchange saw purchases of 4,744 put options on United Airlines, but only 396 call options… Assuming that 4,000 of the options were bought by people with advance knowledge of the imminent attacks, these “insiders” would have profited by almost $5 million
On September 10, 4,516 put options on American Airlines were bought on the Chicago exchange, compared to only 748 calls. Again, there was no news at that point to justify this imbalance;… Again, assuming that 4,000 of these options trades represent “insiders,” they would represent a gain of about $4 million.
[The levels of put options purchased above were more than six times higher than normal.]
No similar trading in other airlines occurred on the Chicago exchange in the days immediately preceding Black Tuesday.
Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co., which occupied 22 floors of the World Trade Center, saw 2,157 of its October $45 put options bought in the three trading days before Black Tuesday; this compares to an average of 27 contracts per day before September 6. Morgan Stanley’s share price fell from $48.90 to $42.50 in the aftermath of the attacks. Assuming that 2,000 of these options contracts were bought based upon knowledge of the approaching attacks, their purchasers could have profited by at least $1.2 million. Merrill Lynch & Co., with headquarters near the Twin Towers, saw 12,215 October $45 put options bought in the four trading days before the attacks; the previous average volume in those shares had been 252 contracts per day [a 1200% increase!]. When trading resumed, Merrill’s shares fell from $46.88 to $41.50; assuming that 11,000 option contracts were bought by “insiders,” their profit would have been about $5.5 million.
European regulators are examining trades in Germany’s Munich Re, Switzerland’s Swiss Re, and AXA of France, all major reinsurers with exposure to the Black Tuesday disaster. [FTW Note: AXA also owns more than 25% of American Airlines stock making the attacks a “double whammy” for them.]
On September 29, 2001 – in a vital story that has gone unnoticed by the major media – the San Francisco Chronicle reported, “Investors have yet to collect more than $2.5 million in profits they made trading options in the stock of United Airlines before the Sept. 11, terrorist attacks, according to a source familiar with the trades and market data.
“The uncollected money raises suspicions that the investors – whose identities and nationalities have not been made public – had advance knowledge of the strikes.” They don’t dare show up now. The suspension of trading for four days after the attacks made it impossible to cash-out quickly and claim the prize before investigators started looking.
“…The source familiar with the United trades identified Deutsche Bank Alex. Brown, the American investment banking arm of German giant Deutsche Bank, as the investment bank used to purchase at least some of these options…” This was the operation managed by Krongard until as recently as 1998.
As reported in other news stories, Deutsche Bank was also the hub of insider trading activity connected to Munich Re. just before the attacks.
CIA, THE BANKS AND THE BROKERS
Understanding the interrelationships between CIA and the banking and brokerage world is critical to grasping the already frightening implications of the above revelations. Let’s look at the history of CIA, Wall Street and the big banks by looking at some of the key players in CIA’s history.
Clark Clifford – The National Security Act of 1947 was written by Clark Clifford, a Democratic Party powerhouse, former Secretary of Defense, and one-time advisor to President Harry Truman. In the 1980s, as Chairman of First American Bancshares, Clifford was instrumental in getting the corrupt CIA drug bank BCCI a license to operate on American shores. His profession: Wall Street lawyer and banker.
John Foster and Allen Dulles – These two brothers “designed” the CIA for Clifford. Both were active in intelligence operations during WW II. Allen Dulles was the U.S. Ambassador to Switzerland where he met frequently with Nazi leaders and looked after U.S. investments in Germany. John Foster went on to become Secretary of State under Dwight Eisenhower and Allen went on to serve as CIA Director under Eisenhower and was later fired by JFK. Their professions: partners in the most powerful - to this day - Wall Street law firm of Sullivan, Cromwell.
Bill Casey – Ronald Reagan’s CIA Director and OSS veteran who served as chief wrangler during the Iran-Contra years was, under President Richard Nixon, Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. His profession: Wall Street lawyer and stockbroker.
David Doherty - The current Vice President of the New York Stock Exchange for enforcement is the retired General Counsel of the Central Intelligence Agency.
George Herbert Walker Bush – President from 1989 to January 1993, also served as CIA Director for 13 months from 1976-7. He is now a paid consultant to the Carlyle Group, the 11th largest defense contractor in the nation, which also shares joint investments with the bin Laden family.
A.B. “Buzzy” Krongard – The current Executive Director of the Central Intelligence Agency is the former Chairman of the investment bank A.B. Brown and former Vice Chairman of Banker’s Trust.
John Deutch - This retired CIA Director from the Clinton Administration currently sits on the board at Citigroup, the nation’s second largest bank, which has been repeatedly and overtly involved in the documented laundering of drug money. This includes Citigroup’s 2001 purchase of a Mexican bank known to launder drug money, Banamex
Nora Slatkin – This retired CIA Executive Director also sits on Citibank’s board.
Maurice “Hank” Greenburg – The CEO of AIG insurance, manager of the third largest capital investment pool in the world, was floated as a possible CIA Director in 1995. FTW exposed Greenberg’s and AIG’s long connection to CIA drug trafficking and covert operations in a two-part series that was interrupted just prior to the attacks of September 11. AIG’s stock has bounced back remarkably well since the attacks. To read that story, please go to http://www.copvcia.com/stories/part_2.html.
One wonders how much damning evidence is necessary to respond to what is now irrefutable proof that CIA knew about the attacks and did not stop them. Whatever our government is doing, whatever the CIA is doing, it is clearly NOT in the interests of the American people, especially those who died on September 11.
An Inside Job?
US officials are compiling what one called "growing" evidence that other hijackings may have been planned for September 11. Officials from both the government and the airline industry tell TIME Magazine that a knife-like weapon was found on each of two separate Delta Airlines aircraft later that day, although neither plane took off due to the nationwide grounding after the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks on hijacked United and American airlines planes.
Investigators are not yet certain how these weapons came to be on board the aircraft. But they increasingly believe that the weapons may have been prepositioned by accomplices for use by others. As one US official told TIME, "These look like inside jobs."
Marvin P. Bush, the president’s younger brother, was a principal in a company called Securacom that provided security for the World Trade Center, United Airlines, and Dulles International Airport.
Numbers suggest terrorists targeted flights
The numbers appear out-of-whack, thankfully. And so, a lingering question is why the passenger loads on the four planes hijacked in U.S. skies are being described by industry officials as "very, very low."
"You have to think it was by design, that they didn't want to go on a flight with the chance of the passengers working against them,'' said Dave Esser, head of the aeronautical science department at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. "If you've got the threat of a bomb or a gun you can hold people at bay. These guys were strong-arming people with box cutters and knives.
"They wanted the numbers to be on their side.''
And they were, staggeringly so.
Three of the transcontinental flights departed for the West Coast with at least two-thirds of the seats empty. Only 37 of the 182 seats were occupied -- including four by hijackers, at least two in first class -- as United Airlines' Flight 93 left Newark for San Francisco.
The only flight that was even half full proved to be American Airlines' Flight 11, a wide-body Boeing 767 that left Boston bound for Los Angeles with 81 passengers.
All 9/11 airports serviced by one Israeli company
ICTS is [...] an Israeli owned company, and [...] it sells services to every airport from which the hijacked planes operated, including security, sometimes through wholly owned subsidiaries like Huntleigh USA Corporation.
It has been suggested that the incredible feat of hijacking four aircraft without a single arrest at the gate would require the resources of a nation-state. This is even more true with the revelation that at least one gun had managed to be aboard a hijacked plane. One company had automatic inside access to all of the airports from which hijacked planes departed on 9-11, and to the airports used by Richard Reid, the shoe bomber. An Israeli company. One that Mossad agents could easily find employment with without the management knowing who they were or what their purpose really was.
But one thing is clear. By virtue of the Odigo warning, someone knew enough about the planned attacks to warn Odigo before the planes had even departed the airport gates, yet they did not call the Israeli security company at the airports which could have stopped the flights from leaving.
Bush Senior Met With Bin Laden's Brother on 9/11
On 11 September, while Al-Qaeda's planes slammed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the Carlyle Group hosted a conference at a Washington hotel. Among the guests of honour was a valued investor: Shafig bin Laden, brother to Osama.
In October 2000, Government Simulates Exercises of a Boeing 757 hitting the Pentagon.
The pilot of flight 77 which supposedly hit the Pentagon, was an ex-navy F4 pilot who, less than one year prior, participated in an exercise in the Pentagon, in which it gets attacked by a commercial airliner. The project is documented by the government.
No, we aren't making this stuff up!
Even Fox 'news' talks about how an ex-navy man was the pilot, but they fail to tell you about the real story...
1) In October 2000, Government Simulates Exercises of a Boeing 757 hitting the Pentagon.
2) Charles Birlingame, Navy F4 pilot participates in this exercise.
3) Birlingame retires, gets a job flying commercial jet-liners.
4) Less than 12 months later, its' HIS flight allegedly crashes into the Pentagon!
In October 2000, before the 9/11 attacks, the government simulated a Boeing 757 attacking the Pentagon. It appears as if they are interested in how the airliner will look in the aftermath. As though they are considering what 'scenes' to stage, for maximum pictorial effect.
Actual Photos from government project MASCAL
If you look up PROJECT MASCAL on WickiPedia, you will find the same pictures, and a link to their source, the Dept. of Defense. But guess what, the page has been removed form the Dept of Defense.
http://www.mdw.army.mil/news/news_photos/Contingency_Planning_Photos.html (PAGE NOW REMOVED)
Condoleezza Rice said, 'No one ever imagined a domestic airplane could be used as a weapon'
...Whoops!? ....Is she sure about that!? She obviously missed the memo.
It seems someone in the government had not only thought about it, but created a mock exercise complete with little model buildings, planes, and even rescue vehicles on the scene.
So, yes, that is a blatant lie, gone unchecked by the news media & public.
You can look up the official flight data from any source.
One would assume the goal of the exercise was about the logistics of a plane strike, but oddly, you see models of little EMT trucks with flashing lights, as if the focus of the exercise, was how the scene would look in the aftermath.
FOX 'News' talks about 'how ironic' it is that an ex-navy fighter pilot was at the helm of flight 77! However, they fail to tell you about project MASCAL.
Don't you find that odd? Wouldn't the EXTREME IRONY alone be newsworthy? Yet, this is probably the first you have heard about this.
The similarities and odds of MASCAL, as related to the events of 911 are beyond equation, yet they don't even mention it on FOX, CNN, MSNBC or any network news
The major news media's are already under 'Martial Law' based on the patriot act, it has superseded our Bill of Rights, and our Constitution.
