previous  ...234567891011...  next  · entire list

Revealed: huge increase in executive pay for America's top bosses
2011-12-14, The Guardian (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/dec/14/executive-pay-increase-america...

Chief executive pay has roared back after two years of stagnation and decline. America's top bosses enjoyed pay hikes of between 27 and 40% last year, according to the largest survey of US CEO pay. The dramatic bounceback comes as the latest government figures show wages for the majority of Americans are failing to keep up with inflation. America's highest paid executive took home more than $145.2m, and as stock prices recovered across the board, the median value of bosses' profits on stock options rose 70% in 2010, from $950,400 to $1.3m. The news comes against the backdrop of an Occupy Wall Street movement that has focused Washington's attention on the pay packages of America's highest paid. The survey, the most extensive in the US, covered 2,647 companies, and offers a comprehensive assessment of all the data now available relating to 2010 pay. This year's survey shows CEO pay packages have boomed: the top 10 earners took home more than $770m between them in 2010. As stock prices began to recover last year, the increase in CEO pay outstripped the rise in share value. The Russell 3000 measure of US stock prices was up by 16.93% in 2010, but CEO pay went up by 27.19% overall. For S&P 500 CEOs, the largest companies in the sample, total realised compensation – including perks and pensions and stock awards – increased by a median of 36.47%. Total pay at midcap companies, which are slightly smaller than the top firms, rose 40.2%.

Note: For key reports on income inequality from reliable sources, click here.

Person of the Year Introduction
2011-12-14, Time Magazine
http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2101745_2102139_21...

No one could have known that when a Tunisian fruit vendor set himself on fire in a public square in a town barely on a map, he would spark protests that would bring down dictators in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya and rattle regimes in Syria, Yemen and Bahrain. Or that that spirit of dissent would spur Mexicans to rise up against the terror of drug cartels, Greeks to march against unaccountable leaders, Americans to occupy public spaces to protest income inequality, and Russians to marshal themselves against a corrupt autocracy. Protests have now occurred in countries whose populations total at least 3 billion people, and the word protest has appeared in newspapers and online exponentially more this past year than at any other time in history. Everywhere, it seems, people said they'd had enough. They dissented; they demanded; they did not despair, even when the answers came back in a cloud of tear gas or a hail of bullets. The root of the word democracy is demos, "the people," and the meaning of democracy is "the people rule." And they did, if not at the ballot box, then in the streets. Protest is in some ways the source code for democracy — and evidence of the lack of it. For steering the planet on a more democratic though sometimes more dangerous path for the 21st century, the Protester is TIME's 2011 Person of the Year.

Note: For a treasure trove of reports from major media sources that explain why protestors worldwide have been occupying their cities, click here.

Biggest Nuclear Breach Raises Alarm as France Debates Reactors
2011-12-14, Bloomberg/Businessweek
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-12-14/biggest-nuclear-breach-raises-ala...

Just after 6 a.m. on Dec. 5, under cover of darkness, nine Greenpeace activists cut through a fence at the Nogent-sur-Seine atomic plant 95 kilometers (59 miles) southeast of Paris and headed for a domed reactor building. They scaled the roof and unfurled a “Safe Nuclear Doesn’t Exist” banner before attracting the attention of security guards. Two remained at large for four hours. On the same day, two more campaigners breached the perimeter of the Cruas-Meysse plant on the Rhone, escaping detection for more than 14 hours while posting videos of their sit-in on the Internet. The security lapses ... come at a time when debate has intensified on France’s reliance on atomic power for three-quarters of its energy needs in the run-up to next year’s presidential elections. They also preempt next month’s release of the results of safety checks at France’s 58 reactors, commissioned in the aftermath of the Fukushima tragedy. Greenpeace said its activists exposed the biggest security lapse to date at the reactors that are operated by Electricite de France SA.

Note: For lots more on corporate and government corruption, click here and here.

Thousands of birds make crash landing in Utah
2011-12-14, USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/environment/story/2011-12-14/bird-crash-l...

Thousands of migrating birds, apparently mistaking parking lots for ponds, crashed into the ground throughout southern Utah this week. Thousands of the birds were killed [and] officials said they had rescued more than 2,000 as of Tuesday evening. Wildlife officials said the grebes ... were likely migrating toward Mexico and probably mistook the parking lot of a Cedar City Walmart and other areas as far south as Anderson's Junction for bodies of water. Thinking they were landing to rest atop a pond or lake, the grebes plummeted to the ground Monday night. "The storm clouds over the top of the city lights made it look like a nice, flat body of water. All the conditions were right," Griffin said. "So the birds landed to rest, but ended up slamming into the pavement." Griffin said the event was unlike anything she had seen before in her professional career. "I've been here 15 years and this was the worst downing I've seen," she said. "Most of the downings I've seen have been pretty localized, but this was very widespread." Cedar City resident Stephen Gwin was among the volunteers who helped DWR officials gather the surviving birds. "I have never in my life encountered such a thing," he said. "I've heard of fish die-offs and other strange natural phenomenon, but I've never experienced one before. It was very strange."

Note: Do birds really mistake parking lots for ponds? Could a more likely explanation be that someone is messing with HAARP technologies? Perhaps some kind of experiment was conducted to see if they could successfully disorient and kill large numbers of birds, as may have happened in other very strange incidents about a year ago. Other mass wildlife deaths are reported here.

Newburgh Four: poor, black, and jailed under FBI 'entrapment' tactics
2011-12-12, The Guardian (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/12/newburgh-four-fbi-entrapment-terror

Imam Salahuddin Muhammad could hardly miss Shahed Hussain when he first appeared three years ago at his mosque in the dilapidated town of Newburgh, just 60 miles up the Hudson River from New York. Hussain was flash, drove expensive cars and treated people to gifts of cash and food. Hussain would make Newburgh's Muslim community famous when earlier this year four other black Newburgh Muslims were jailed for 25 years for a 2009 plot to fire a Stinger missile at US military planes. All four followed the instructions of Hussain, who meticulously organised the scheme: from getting the missile and bombs, to reconnaissance missions, to teaching the tenets of radical Islam. Hussain was a fake. In fact, Hussain worked for the FBI as an informant trawling mosques in hope of picking up radicals. Yet far from being active militants, the four men he attracted were impoverished individuals struggling with Newburgh's grim epidemic of crack, drug crime and poverty. Hussain offered the men huge financial inducements to carry out the plot – including $250,000 to one man – and free holidays and expensive cars. The Newburgh Four ... represent the most extreme form of a controversial FBI policy to use invented terrorist plots to lure targets. "There has been no case as egregious as this. It is unique in the incentive the government provided. A quarter million dollars?" said Professor Karen Greenberg, a terrorism expert at Fordham University.

Note: For a powerful BBC documentary showing clearly that much of the war on terror is a fabrication to forward a political agenda, watch Power of Nightmares at this link. For many reports from major media sources on the fake terror behind the "global war on terror", click here.

Protests Boost Sales and Fears of Sonic Blaster
2011-12-12, ABC News/Associated Press
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/protests-boost-sales-fears-sonic-blaster-1...

Rather than batons or rubber bullets, some police departments have started using an intense beam of sound to manage protesters, but the annoying tone has drawn criticism from some who say it can cause permanent damage. More U.S. police and emergency-response agencies are using the so-called Long-Range Acoustic Devices ... for crowd control. The leading manufacturer, LRAD Corp. of San Diego, said the product was developed as a nonlethal option for military use. Some people who have been on the receiving end call the devices "sound cannons." A woman is suing the city of Pittsburgh claiming the piercing tone from a police blaster during the 2009 G-20 summit permanently damaged her hearing. There were reports that New York City police used the punishing tone on protesters. The devices were developed for the U.S. Navy. They have also been used to deter pirates from attacking cruise ships. The products range from a 15-pound, battery-operated, hand-held unit to a 320-pound device with a range of nearly 2 miles. Even the smallest unit, the LRAD 100X, emits as much as 137 decibels at 1 meter, which is louder than a jet takeoff at 100 meters.

Note: For key reports from reliable sources on so-called "non-lethal" weapons, click here.

Police employ Predator drone spy planes on home front
2011-12-10, Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-drone-arrest-20111211,0,...

Armed with a search warrant, Nelson County Sheriff Kelly Janke went looking for six missing cows on the Brossart family farm in [eastern North Dakota]. He called in reinforcements from the state Highway Patrol, a regional SWAT team, a bomb squad, ambulances and deputy sheriffs from three other counties. He also called in a Predator B drone. Sophisticated sensors under the nose helped pinpoint the three suspects and showed they were unarmed. Police rushed in and made the first known arrests of U.S. citizens with help from a Predator, the spy drone that has helped revolutionize modern warfare. But that was just the start. Local police say they have used two unarmed Predators based at Grand Forks Air Force Base to fly at least two dozen surveillance flights since June. The FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration have used Predators for other domestic investigations, officials said. The drones belong to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which operates eight Predators on the country's northern and southwestern borders to search for illegal immigrants and smugglers. The previously unreported use of its drones to assist local, state and federal law enforcement has occurred without any public acknowledgment or debate.

Note: "Looking for six cows," the Sheriff called in "a regional SWAT team, a bomb squad, ambulances and deputy sheriffs from three other counties. He also called in a Predator B drone." Does that sound like a reasonable response to the problem of missing cows? Or could there be an agenda to establish aerial surveillance by drones as the norm in the US?

Three women jointly receive Nobel Peace Prize
2011-12-10, CNN
http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/10/world/europe/norway-nobel-peace-prize/index.html

Women's rights took center stage Saturday at the Nobel ceremonies as three women recognized for their struggles against the backdrops of the Arab Spring and democratic progress in Africa accepted this year's peace prize. Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and Leymah Gbowee, a social worker and peace campaigner from the same country, shared the prize with Tawakkul Karman, an activist and journalist who this year played a key opposition role in Yemen. The three were chosen for their non-violent struggle against injustice, sexual violence and repression. All three women dedicated their remarks to women struggling for equal rights around the world. Crediting women with ending the conflict and challenging the dictatorship of former President Charles Taylor, [Sirleaf] declared a zero-tolerance policy against corruption and made education compulsory and free for all primary-age children. Gbowee, 39, led a women's movement that protested the use of rape and child soldiers in Liberia's civil war. She mobilized hundreds of women to force delegates at 2003 peace talks to sign a treaty -- at one point calling for a "sex strike" until demands were met. Karman, 32, ... founded the rights group Women Journalists without Chains, and emerged as a key figure in protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh's regime.

Does Hollywood face a child-molestation crisis in casting?
2011-12-06, Chicago Tribune
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sns-rt-us-abuse-hollywoodtre7b51l1-201...

A new child-abuse scandal in Hollywood is raising questions over the safety of minors in the entertainment business and sparking calls for new child-labor regulations. Last week Martin Weiss, a longtime manager of young talent, was arrested on suspicion of child molestation after an 18-year-old former client told police he had been abused by Weiss 30 to 40 times from 2005 to 2008. "This problem is more pervasive than people want to believe," said Paula Dorn, co-founder of the BizParentz Foundation, a non-profit organization that supports the families of children working in the entertainment industry. "We have children trying to interact in an adult world." Paul Petersen, a former child actor on "The Donna Reed Show" and founder of A Minor Consideration, a nonprofit that supports former child stars, said the situation is "worse today than it was in the '30s, and there was a lot of dirty stuff going on then." Petersen [said] that his group is pushing for new regulations, including background checks and fingerprinting for talent agents, and a stronger enforcement of the California Talent Agencies Act, which is intended to protect artists from contract exploitation.

Note: For powerful evidence from a suppressed Discovery Channel documentary showing that child sexual abuse scandals reach to the highest levels of government, click here.

L.A. calls for end to 'corporate personhood'
2011-12-06, Los Angeles Times blog
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/12/corporate-personhood-la-constit...

At a packed City Council meeting ... Los Angeles lawmakers Tuesday called for more regulations on how much corporations can spend on political campaigns. The vote in support of state and federal legislation that would end so-called "corporate personhood” is largely symbolic. The council resolution includes support for a constitutional amendment that would assert that corporations are not entitled to constitutional rights, and that spending money is not a form of free speech. City Council President Eric Garcetti, the resolution's sponsor, said such actions are necessary because “big special interest money” is behind much of the gridlock in Washington. He blamed a 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Citizens United vs. the Federal Election Commission, which rolled back legal restrictions on corporate spending on the grounds that political speech by a business entity should receive the same 1st Amendment protections that people do. It allows corporations and other groups to spend unlimited money on behalf of candidates. Councilman Richard Alarcon, who also supported the resolution, said corporations are “trying to take over every aspect of our lives.” “Corporations are at the wheel of America,” Alarcon said. “And they are driving us to destruction.”

Note: Why was this key decision only reported in a blog and hardly covered by the media elsewhere? To understand how the media controls public debate, as reported by top journalists, click here.

Recent Charges of Sexual Abuse of Children in Hollywood Just Tip of Iceberg, Experts Say
2011-12-05, Fox News
http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2011/12/05/recent-charges-sexual-abuse-c...

If a spate of recent allegations proves true, Hollywood may have a hideous epidemic on its hands. The past two weeks have brought three separate reports of alleged child sexual abuse in the entertainment industry. Martin Weiss, a 47-year-old Hollywood manager who represented child actors, was charged in Los Angeles on Dec. 1 with sexually abusing a former client. His accuser, who was under 12 years old during the time of the alleged abuse, reported to authorities that Weiss told him "what they were doing was common practice in the entertainment industry." Weiss has pleaded not guilty. On Nov. 21, Fernando Rivas, 59, an award-winning composer for “Sesame Street,” was arraigned on charges of coercing a child “to engage in sexually explicit conduct” in South Carolina. The Juilliard-trained composer was also charged with production and distribution of child pornography. Registered sex offender Jason James Murphy, 35, worked as a casting agent in Hollywood for years before his past kidnapping and sexual abuse of a boy was revealed by the Los Angeles Times on Nov. 17. Revelations of this sort come as no surprise to former child star Corey Feldman. Feldman, 40, himself a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, unflinchingly warned of the world of pedophiles who are drawn to the entertainment industry last August. "I can tell you that the No. 1 problem in Hollywood was and is and always will be pedophilia,” Feldman told ABC’s Nightline. “That's the biggest problem for children in this industry... It's the big secret.”

Note: For powerful evidence from a suppressed Discovery Channel documentary showing that child sexual abuse scandals reach to the highest levels of government, click here.

Critics: 'Tough' Sheriff Botched Sex-Crime Cases
2011-12-04, ABC News/Associated Press
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/critics-tough-sheriff-botched-sex-crime-ca...

More than 400 sex-crimes reported to Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's office during a three-year period ending in 2007 — including dozens of alleged child molestations — ... were inadequately investigated and in some instances were not worked at all, according to current and former police officers familiar with the cases. Many of the victims, said a retired El Mirage police official who reviewed the files, were children of illegal immigrants. The botched sex-crimes investigations have served as an embarrassment to a department whose sheriff is the self-described "America's Toughest Sheriff" and a national hero to conservatives on the immigration issue. Bill Louis, then-assistant El Mirage police chief who reviewed the files after the sheriff's contract ended, believes the decision to ignore the cases was made deliberately by supervisors in Arpaio's office — and not by individual investigators. "I know the investigators. I just cannot believe they would wholesale discount these cases. No way," Louis said. "The direction had to come (from) up the food chain." Louis said he believes whoever made the decision knew that illegal immigrants — who are often transient and fear the police — were unlikely to complain about the quality of investigations.

Note: For powerful evidence from a suppressed Discovery Channel documentary showing that child sexual abuse scandals reach to the highest levels of government, click here.

OCC’s Quarterly Report on Bank Trading and Derivatives Activities: Third Quarter 2011
2011-12-01, OCC (U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Administrator of National Banks)
http://www.occ.gov/topics/capital-markets/financial-markets/trading/derivativ...

The OCC’s quarterly report on trading revenues and bank derivatives activities is based on Call Report information provided by all insured U.S. commercial banks and trust companies, reports filed by U.S. financial holding companies, and other published data. The notional amount of derivatives held by insured U.S. commercial banks decreased $1.4 trillion, or 0.6%, from the second quarter of 2011 to $248 trillion. Notional derivatives are 5.7% higher than at the same time last year. Derivatives activity in the U.S. banking system continues to be dominated by a small group of large financial institutions. Five large commercial banks represent 96% of the total banking industry notional amounts. Insured commercial banks have more limited legal authorities than do their holding companies.

Note: Graphs in this report show that the holding companies for the top five banks also control massive amounts of derivates totaling $326 trillion! The holding companies JPMorgan Chase, BofA, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, and Goldman Sachs have over $311 trillion in derivates, 95% of the total U.S. market. So these banks and their holding companies combined own $532 trillion in derivates, equivalent to roughly $75,000 for every person on the planet. What are the bankers doing? If the above link fails, click here.

Reactor Core Melted Fully, Japan Says
2011-12-01, Wall Street Journal
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204262304577069302835999204.html

Japan's tsunami-stricken nuclear-power complex came closer to a catastrophic meltdown than previously indicated by its operator [which on November 30] described how one reactor's molten nuclear core likely burned through its primary containment chamber and then ate as far as three-quarters of the way through the concrete in a secondary vessel. The [new] assessment—offered by Japan's government and Tokyo Electric Power Co., ... marked Japan's most sobering reckoning to date of the nuclear disaster sparked by the country's March 11 earthquake and tsunami. But it came nearly six months after U.S. and international nuclear experts and regulators had reached similar conclusions. For the first time, Tokyo Electric ... said that nuclear-fuel rods in the complex's No. 1 reactor had likely melted completely, burning through their so-called pressure vessel and then boring through concrete at the bottom of a second containment vessel. That brought the fuel closer than previously believed to breaching the containment vessel and foundation and continuing to burn through the ground below — a scenario sometimes described as the "China Syndrome." The findings are the latest reminder of how much remains unknown about the extent of the mid-March Fukushima Daiichi accident.

Note: For further information on the developing understanding of the severity of the meltdowns at Fukushima, see these reports at The Guardian and The New York Times. For key reports from major media sources on corporate and government corruption, click here and here.

Arrest Bush during Africa trip: human rights group
2011-12-01, Reuters News
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/12/01/us-usa-amnesty-bush-idUSTRE7B02IQ20...

Amnesty International on [December 1] called on Ethiopia, Tanzania and Zambia to arrest former U.S. President George W. Bush for human rights abuse when he visits the region this month. During his time as President from 2001 to 2009, Bush authorized the use of waterboarding and other interrogation techniques that Amnesty and other human rights groups consider torture. "International law requires that there be no safe haven for those responsible for torture; Ethiopia, Tanzania and Zambia must seize this opportunity to fulfill their obligations and end the impunity George W. Bush has so far enjoyed," Matt Pollard, senior legal adviser, said in a statement. Bush has defended the use of waterboarding -- which simulates the sensation of drowning -- as key to preventing a repeat of the September 11 attacks on the United States. Bush is expected to visit the region this week to raise awareness about cancer in Africa, Amnesty said.

Note: For the full text of Amnesty's call for the arrest of George W. Bush, click here. For lots more from major media sources on the crimes of the Bush administration during the "global war on terror," click here.

New Sex Abuse Suit Claims Sandusky Threatened Boy’s Family If He Told
2011-11-30, ABC News
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2011/11/new-sex-abuse-suit-claims-sandu...

The latest person to accuse former Penn State coach Jerry Sandusky of sexual abuse also claims that Sandusky threatened to hurt the boy’s family if he ever told anyone about the abuse. Sandusky’s newest accuser, who is now 29, had not told anyone about the abuse until he read about the grand jury presentment charging Sandusky with 40 counts of child molestation over 15 years, his lawyer Jeff Anderson said today. Until that time, he had thought he was the only victim. Anderson said the boy met Sandusky through the Second Mile foundation when the alleged victim was 10, and was abused by Sandusky from 1992 to 1994. He said that Sandusky threatened to harm the boy’s family if the boy told anyone about the abuse. Sandusky also paid for sports camps, plied the boy with gifts, and took him on trips, Anderson said. The lawyer said during a press conference today that they had filed suit against Sandusky, Penn State and the Second Mile charity seeking reparations for over 100 acts of sexual abuse. Anderson alleged that Sandusky had abused the boy at Penn State University, at Second Mile events, at his home, at a Penn State bowl game out of state, and in Philadelphia.

Note: For powerful evidence from a suppressed Discovery Channel documentary showing that child sexual abuse scandals reach to the highest levels of government, click here.

U.S. Settles Suit Over Anthrax Attacks
2011-11-30, New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/30/us/anthrax-victims-family-to-receive-2-5-mi...

The federal government has agreed to pay $2.5 million to the widow and children of the first person killed in the anthrax letter attacks of 2001, settling a lawsuit claiming that the Army did not adequately secure its supply of the deadly pathogen. The settlement with the family of Robert Stevens, a tabloid photo editor in Florida, follows an eight-year legal battle that exposed slack rules and sloppy recordkeeping at the Armys biodefense laboratory at Fort Detrick, in Frederick, Md. As part of the agreement, Justice Department lawyers are seeking to have many documents that were uncovered in the litigation kept under court seal or destroyed. Mr. Stevenss widow, Maureen, filed suit against the government in 2003, as evidence accumulated that the anthrax powder in the lethal letters had come from an Army laboratory. Mr. Stevens, 62, died on Oct. 5, 2001, days after inhaling anthrax powder at work.

Note: Why would the government want these documents destroyed? Remember that these attacks, which happened within weeks of the 9/11 attacks, were at first attributed to terrorists. Now it is fully acknowledged they were the responsibility of someone in government. Hmmmmm.

Homeless man's decision to return $3,300 changed his life
2011-11-30, USA Today
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/ondeadline/post/2011/11/life-turns-ar...

About a year ago, a homeless man in Arizona found a bag full of cash and made a fateful decision: He returned it. 49-year-old Dave Tally of Tempe ... was in debt, unemployed and had lost his driver's license for DUI violations. Homeless, he was sleeping on a mat in a church-based homeless shelter when he found $3,300 in a backpack at a local light-rail station. That could have gotten Tally out of his hole, but he decided that was the wrong thing to do. Instead, he tracked down the owner of the cash, a college kid named Bryan Berlanger who had planned to use the money to buy a car to replace one he'd lost in an accident. When word got out that Tally had turned in the cash instead of keeping it, the national media came looking for him. Donations poured in, and Tally suddenly found himself with $10,000. But he was determined not to fritter it away. He began paying off his bills, clearing up his driving record, and taking the long road back. He even moved into a no-frills apartment across from the shelter as "a reminder of where I've been and where I'm not going back again." One year later, Tally has landed his "dream job," managing a community garden. Recently ... Tally started overseeing an internship program that allows people who are homeless to volunteer in the garden. But he doesn't preach to anyone. "I let them know that when they're ready to make changes, it's possible," he says.

India Eye Care Center Finds Middle Way To Capitalism
2011-11-29, NPR
http://www.npr.org/2011/11/29/142526263/india-eye-care-center-finds-middle-wa...

[Aravind Eye Care System] began modestly in 1976 with an 11-bed hospital. [It] now has 4,000 beds in seven hospitals, most in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It was late founder Dr. G. Venkataswamy's goal to eliminate needless blindness. About 45 million people in the world are blind. About 80 percent of them could be cured through surgery. Dr. "V," as he is known, founded the organization on a deep belief in the spirituality of service. R.D. Thulasiraj, a top Aravind official, says that early on the organization embraced the simple idea that if it wanted to have a real impact in reducing blindness, its surgeons needed to work as efficiently as possible. That attention to process has made Aravind surgeons quite possibly the most productive in the world. In total, the number of sight-restoring eye surgeries that Aravind Eye Care System conducts each year is 300,000 — and about half, or nearly half, are free. The push for more efficiency forces down the average cost of a surgery for Aravind. But that doesn't mean quality is sacrificed. Aravind surgeons have just half the number of complications that the British health system has for the same procedure. That high quality allows Aravind to attract patients who are willing to pay market rates. Then it takes the large profit made on those surgeries to fund free and subsidized surgeries for poor people.

Note: For the inspiring review of an excellent book written on this amazing service to humankind, click here.

How Paulson Gave Hedge Funds Advance Word of Fannie Rescue
2011-11-29, Bloomberg/Businessweek
http://news.businessweek.com/article.asp?documentKey=1376-LVDZC507SXKX01-21E0...

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson stepped off the elevator into the Third Avenue offices of hedge fund Eton Park Capital Management LP in Manhattan. It was July 21, 2008, and market fears were mounting. Amid tumbling home prices and near-record foreclosures, attention was focused on a new source of contagion: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which together had more than $5 trillion in mortgage-backed securities and other debt outstanding. Around the conference room table were a dozen or so hedge-fund managers and other Wall Street executives -- at least five of them alumni of Goldman Sachs Group Inc., of which Paulson was chief executive officer and chairman from 1999 to 2006. After a perfunctory discussion of the market turmoil ... the discussion turned to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The secretary [desribed] a possible scenario for placing Fannie and Freddie into “conservatorship” -- a government seizure designed to allow the firms to continue operations despite heavy losses in the mortgage markets. Paulson explained that under this scenario, the common stock of the two government-sponsored enterprises, or GSEs, would be effectively wiped out. So too would the various classes of preferred stock, he said ... leaving little doubt that the Treasury Department would carry out the plan. The managers attending the meeting were thus given a choice opportunity to trade on that information.

Note: For a treasure trove of reports from reliable sources on corruption and collusion between government officials and the largest financial firms, click here.

previous

...234567891011...

next

· entire list