12/31/10

Happy New Year!

Loved this picture from London. Welcome 2011! Let’s pray it is better than 2010 and that the US will return to her constitutional roots and heritage. And now for survival tunes…

12/31/10

Financial News Update – 12/31/10

FBI Delivers Anti-terror Flyers to Farm Supply Stores (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner/Brian B.)

Missouri Guard to train inmates for emergencies (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Herbal drug crackdown: Europe to ban hundreds of natural remedies next year (Hat Tip: Brian B.)

Obama Administration Pushing ‘Backdoor’ Cap-and-Trade Tax (Hat Tip: Brian B.)

GOP Fuming Over Recess Appointment of Lawyer Who Compared 9/11 to Drug Trade (Hat Tip: Brian B.)

Obama works around Congress on climate change, healthcare (Hat Tip: Brian B.)

Will Ordinary Americans Fight For the Bill of Rights? (Hat Tip: Brian B.)

Matterhorn Closes The Year In Style: “Hyperinflation Will Drive Gold To Unthinkable Heights” (Hat Tip: Brian B.)

Next Year’s Wars: 16 brewing conflicts to watch

Bumpy Climb for Stocks in 2010

Singapore economy grows record 14.7%

Big Health-Care Changes Arrive in 2011

Hu Jintao Visits Poor Beijing Families, Vows to Narrow China’s Wealth Gap

Venezuelans fret over prices after devaluation

Deficit-burdened states to have lavish governor parties

As the Worm Turns – Episode 028

Venezuela Devalues Currency (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Using Regulation Against The Will Of The People (Hat Tip: Brian B.)

Peter Schiff: Here’s Why Home Prices Have To Decline At Least 20% And Probably More

Meet The Hundreds Of NYC Sanitation Workers Who Earn Over $100,000

New York City Workers Delayed Snow Clean-Up To Protest Budget Cuts

Now Get Ready For A 90% Collapse In Canadian Real Estate

Pension “Armageddon” Hits Pittsburgh As State Threatens Takeover Of City’s Plan

This Is The Number In Today’s Chicago PMI Scaring The Bejesus Out Of Investors

Meet Winifred Jiau: The First Woman To Be Arrested In The FBI Insider Trading Probe

Chinese Pro-Democracy Activist Explains How Inflation Will Cause The Collapse Of The Regime

The Next Cities To Hit New Lows For Housing: New York, Detroit, Chicago

17 Statistics That Prove We Have Sold Our Grandchildren Into Perpetual Debt Slavery

Obama to give Manhattan back to Native Americans (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Utilities Seek Fresh Talent for Smart Grids (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

The Midwest Wind Surtax (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Wish you were here? President spends $1.5m on his holiday in Hawaii… while the rest of (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Cooking the Books: The 2010 Deficit Was $2.1 trillion (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Iowahawk: The Constitution Is Very Important (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Evans-Pritchard: Italy Next to Crumble in Europe

Davy Crockett on Welfare

Peru Stocks Top Emerging Markets, Lima Index Gains 64%

Christie Requests U.S. Aid for New Jersey Snowstorm Expenses

Commodities Beat Stocks, Bonds, Dollar in 2010

Treasuries Have Biggest Monthly Drop of 2010 on Economic View

Corn, Soybeans Rise, Cap Best Second-Half Rally in Five Decades

Borders Tumbles After Delaying Payments to Some Publishers

Dollar Weakens as Emerging Stocks, Currencies, Commodities Gain

Estonia’s Entry Expands Euro Into Former Soviet Union

Gold Poised for Tenth Annual Gain as Investors Seek Protection

China to Assess Foreign Property Investment, China Daily Says

Gov’t Property Shopping Spree

OBAMA AND THE 111TH CONGRESS TOP 10 VIOLATIONS OF THE US CONSTITUTION (Hat Tip: Nancy Jacques)

EPA now funding propaganda videos telling kids juiceboxes are destroying the planet (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Planned Parenthood Launches New Sex Ed Program for Kids (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

China slows as tightening start to bite (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Must See: Howard Davidowitz Destroys The Recovery Illusion, Debunks The Consumer Renaissance (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Massachusetts ups fine for skipping insurance (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

With E.P.A. Set to Limit Gases, Political Clashes Loom (Don’t Fund The EPA) (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Ineffectiveness of Banking Accords

Banning Herbs for Health

A New Year and a New Direction for Health Care Reform

Side Effects: Ball Drop Brings Bad News for Consumer-Driven Health Plan Users

Is Iran About to Test a Nuclear Bomb In North Korea? (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

The U.S. National Debt Is The Biggest Subprime ARM Of All Time

Metals from copper to silver hit record highs (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

PRECIOUS METALS: US Recovery Weighs On Gold Prices (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Frances Fox Piven Calls for a new Cloward-Piven Strategy for Today (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

The FCC’s new Web power grab deserves a vote under the Congressional Review Act. (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Government Gobbles the Web – The FCC makes a naked lunge to collect political power unto itself. (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Net Neutrality Order Adds More Confusion (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

The Constitution is only confusing to liberals

As frustration grows, airports consider ditching TSA (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Move to Curb Transactions for Iranian Oil Leaves Indian Companies Scrambling (India cuts Iran) (Hat Tip: Jean Stoner)

Calling a Pig a Pig… RNC Candidate Ann Wagner Slams Dems on Their Creeping Socialism

Sore Loser Dem Warns Against Creeping Fascism; Blames Corporate Dollars in Politics For Dem’s Historic Defeat Please have your office cleaned out by Monday, Mr. Hall. Thank you.

Everyone Must Sacrifice… Obama’s Vacation Will Cost Taxpayers $1,474,200

Good Grief… Leading RNC Candidate’s Law Firm Supports Obamacare – Says It’s Constitutional

Slow the plow: Big Labor’s death grip

The Shadow Banking System: A Third Of All The Wealth In The World Is Held In Offshore Banks

Frances Fox Piven Rings in The New Year By Calling for Violent Revolution

SurvivalBlog:

The U.S. Dollar’s Prospects in the New Year Read it all – he’s right on the money (no real pun intended). Dark days are ahead and if you ever listen to anyone, make it Rawles and SurvivalBlog.

Bailed-Out Banks Slip Toward Failure

Brownian Schism–Ellen Brown Restoring Credit with a Publicly-owned Bank: The Model of the Bank of North Dakota.

The Price of Silver is Soaring.

Silver Will Be Worth More Than Gold

If You Haven’t Bought Silver Yet, Read This

Energy, Agriculture, Gold And Silver Bullion–Protectors From The Coming Crisis

Baby Boomers Retirements In Jeopardy

The UK inflation genie is out of the bottle

Grain Prices Heading Higher In 2011 On Tight Supplies, Rabobank Says

Inflation Heard Round the World

Ex Shell president sees $5 gas in 2012

Gulf CEO: Oil May Near $150 a Barrel by Summer

Ashton Kutcher Predicts Worthless Currency And Mass Panic, Recommends Getting As Buff As Possible.

“It is not these well-fed long-haired men that I fear, but the pale and the hungry-looking.” – Julius Caesar, as quoted in Plutarch’s Lives

12/31/10

Obama Moves to Strengthen Labor Unions – Communists Approve

By: Trevor Loudon
New Zeal

The best way to keep abreast of the Obama Administration’s latest moves is to read the Communist Party USA newszine People’s World.

People’s World labor editor John Wojcik, has kindly informed us of new Administration moves to strengthen labor unions.

Private employers will be required to post large signs informing workers about their right to form unions under a new rule the Obama administration plans to institute by executive order.

The plan received less than the amount of publicity that might have been expected because it was announced the week before Christmas when the main focus of the news was on the legislative battles in Congress.

The National Labor Relations Board plans to issue a rule requiring almost all employers to post notices in employee break rooms or other prominent spots that explain workers’ rights to bargain collectively, distribute union literature or engage in other union activity without reprisal.

In the past the NLRB usually made policy on a case-by-case basis during labor-management disputes.

The decision to issue the new order steps up even further the more aggressively pro-labor role the board has played during the Obama administration.

The President first signaled his determination to strengthen the board’s role in protecting organizing rights when he made several recess appointments to give the NLRB its first Democratic majority in ten years.

The recess appointments were made because the President’s candidates were held up for months over GOP claims that a former AFL-CIO lawyer, Craig Becker, would be too pro-union.

The administration’s new rule is opposed by big business which sees it as an attempt to achieve, by executive order, some of what labor and its allies have not been able to achieve on the legislative front. Republican filibusters have blocked passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, which would make it easier to form unions. The EFCA would allow workers to form a union as soon as a majority sign cards expressing their desire to be in a union.

Others who oppose the rule see it as a step in the direction of reversing a long-term decline in union membership. Only 7.2 percent of the nation’s work force is now unionized. Anti-union forces fear that widespread knowledge of union organizing rights will begin to reverse that trend.

The rule will not take effect until late February. From now until then, the NLRB is taking comments.

I am reminded of a famous quote from V.I. Lenin’s Role and Functions of the Trade Unions:

Just as the very best factory, with the very best motors and first-class machines, will be forced to remain idle if the transmission belts from the motors to the machines are damaged, so our work of socialist construction must meet with inevitable disaster if the trade unions—the transmission belts from the Communist Party to the masses—are badly fitted or function badly.

Strengthening unions strengthens socialism. The good Leninists of the Communist Party USA and their friends in the Obama Administration are no doubt acutely aware of this.