Haitian Economy is the Blueprint for Future USA

[Octafish]

A repost from DU2 (note the familiar contempt for those who merely implied 1% would own 99% of USA):



Here's what awaits We the People of the United States:

In Haiti, one percent of the population own 99-percent of the property.

We're not there yet, but close enough to see where things are going.

In 2003, then-Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide planned to tax the elite on their wealth. So, he got bounced by Power -- a coup backed by "Baby Doc" Bush.

Raising taxes. Hah! Like if that could ever happen here.

BTW: The first time Aristide got bounced by Power, he was working to deliver political and economic justice, including getting Haiti's generals out of narcotrafficking business. No wonder Poppy Doc Bush, Jesse Helms and the rest of the ultraright did all they could to help the Haitian generals and the elite they serve. They've devoted their professional careers to bringing the same economic and social conditions to the United States.

[2naSalit]

1. Speaking of the you-know-who

owning 99% of all property, this part needs some wide-spread attention:

Idaho Legislature considers joining interstate compact designed to make the great land grab. UPDATED

Bill on interstate compact on federal lands transfer dies in committee in Senate. Spokesman-Review. By Betsy Z. Russell. ( live link to the text: http://www.spokesman.com/blogs/boise/2015/apr/01/bill-interstate-compact-federal-lands-transfer-dies-committee-senate/ )

Earlier . . . Critical vote in state senate committee probably on April Fool’s-

It has already passed the Idaho House with plenty of room to spare. April Fool’s Day is the likely day the Idaho State Senate committee will vote on H265 . . .”To provide an interstate compact on the transfer of public lands.”

The goal of the bill is “The compact commission, member states, associate member states, and the compact administrator shall cooperate and offer mutual assistance with each other in enforcing the terms of the compact for securing the transfer of title to federally controlled public lands to willing western states.”

The idea is that Utah will convince Idaho, Arizona, Wyoming, and other states with a lot of national forest, BLM lands, national wildlife refuges, etc. to cooperate in taking the U.S. public lands. This is the attempt by Utah to grab hold of Idaho and form what opponents call “the land grab compact.”

Opponents worry (beyond the loss of the 62% of Idaho that is public land) that this compact will make Idaho share the $12-million expenses that Utah has already authorized for action to take the public lands for the states. The compact rules in the bill say that if any state leaves the compact, its resignation will not take effect for 6 months.

SNIP------

Much more on that here:

http://www.thewildlifenews.com/2015/03/31/idaho-legislature-considers-joining-interstate-compact-designed-to-make-the-great-land-grab/

I know, by serious e-mail from people I don't normally hear much from, telling me that the sport hunting orgs are getting pretty flustered about it as are many other special topic orgs right now.

[Octafish]

3. Thank you for the heads up on the latest bunch of Sooners.

Grab all you can, as quick as you can. Now, greed's gone mega.

Likewise, under the land: Extraction industries. Have the taxpayers pick up the protection tab, and deduct any investment needed, such as bribes and equipment, hide the loot offshore.

Greg Palast explains how Barrick Gold became one of Poppy Bush's favorite charities. Of course, for pointing it out, Poppy wold make certain to give the big shaft to The Guardian and Greg Palast.

Poppy Strikes Gold

Sunday, April 27, 2008
Originally Posted July 9, 2003
By Greg Palast

EXCERPT...

And while the Bush family steadfastly believes that ex-felons should not have the right to vote for president, they have no objection to ex-cons putting presidents on their payroll. In 1996, despite pleas by U.S. church leaders, Poppy Bush gave several speeches (he charges $100,000 per talk) sponsored by organizations run by Rev. Sun Myung Moon, cult leader, tax cheat—and formerly the guest of the U.S. federal prison system. Some of the loot for the Republican effort in the 1997–2000 election cycles came from an outfit called Barrick Corporation.

The sum, while over $100,000, is comparatively small change for the GOP, yet it seemed quite a gesture for a corporation based in Canada. Technically, the funds came from those associated with the Canadian's U.S. unit, Barrick Gold Strike.

They could well afford it. [font color="green"]In the final days of the Bush (Senior) administration, the Interior Department made an extraordinary but little noticed change in procedures under the 1872 Mining Law, the gold rush–era act that permitted those whiskered small-time prospectors with their tin pans and mules to stake claims on their tiny plots. The department initiated an expedited procedure for mining companies that allowed Barrick to swiftly lay claim to the largest gold find in America. In the terminology of the law, Barrick could "perfect its patent" on the estimated $10 billion in ore—for which Barrick paid the U.S. Treasury a little under $10,000. Eureka![/font color]

Barrick, of course, had to put up cash for the initial property rights and the cost of digging out the booty (and the cost of donations, in smaller amounts, to support Nevada's Democratic senator, Harry Reid). Still, the shift in rules paid off big time: According to experts at the Mineral Policy Center of Washington, DC, Barrick saved—and the U.S. taxpayer lost—a cool billion or so. Upon taking office, Bill Clinton's new interior secretary, Bruce Babbitt, called Barrick's claim the "biggest gold heist since the days of Butch Cassidy." Nevertheless, because the company followed the fast-track process laid out for them under Bush, this corporate Goldfinger had Babbitt by the legal nuggets. Clinton had no choice but to give them the gold mine while the public got the shaft.

Barrick says it had no contact whatsoever with the president at the time of the rules change.(1) There was always a place in Barrick's heart for the older Bush—and a place on its payroll. In 1995, Barrick hired the former president as Honorary Senior Advisor to the Toronto company's International Advisory Board. Bush joined at the suggestion of former Canadian prime minister Brian Mulroney, who, like Bush, had been ignominiously booted from office. I was a bit surprised that the president had signed on. When Bush was voted out of the White House, he vowed never to lobby or join a corporate board. The chairman of Barrick openly boasts that granting the title "Senior Advisor" was a sly maneuver to help Bush tiptoe around this promise.

CONTINUED...

http://www.gregpalast.com/poppy-strikes-gold/

The guy really gave rise to compassionate conservative, as in helping the rich and their corporations.

The story continues, in which Mr. Palast details how said gold mining company employed pure fascist tactics to take over the mine, a plan which involved bulldozing the miners' homes and mines, some with the miners and their families still inside.

Let that, uh, sink in for a moment. For his trouble in reporting the story, Barrick threatened to sue.

The Truth Buried Alive

—By Greg Palast, From The Best Democracy Money Can Buy (Penguin/Plume, 2003)

Source: UTNE Reader
April 2003 Issue

EXCERPT...

Bad news. In July 2001, in the middle of trying to get out the word of the theft of the election in Florida, [font color="red"]I was about to become the guinea pig, the test case, for an attempt by a multinational corporation to suppress free speech in the USA using British libel law. I have a U.S.-based Web site for Americans who can’t otherwise read my columns or view my BBC television reports. The gold-mining company held my English newspaper liable for aggravated damages for my publishing the story in the USA. If I did not pull the Bush-Barrick story off my U.S. Web site, my paper would face a ruinously costly fight.(1)[/font color]

Panicked, the Guardian legal department begged me to delete not just the English versions of the story but also my Spanish translation, printed in Bolivia. (Caramba!)

The Goldfingers didn’t stop there. [font color="green"]Barrick’s lawyers told our papers that I personally would be sued in the United Kingdom over Web publications of my story in America, because the Web could be accessed in Britain. The success of this legal strategy would effectively annul the U.S. Bill of Rights.[/font color] Speak freely in the USA, but if your words are carried on a U.S. Web site, you may be sued in Britain. The Declaration of Independence would be null and void, at least for libel law. Suddenly, instead of the Internet becoming a means of spreading press freedom, the means to break through censorship, it would become the electronic highway for delivering repression.

And repression was winning. InterPress Services (IPS) of Washington, DC, sent a reporter to Tanzania with Lissu. They received a note from Barrick that said if the wire service ran a story that repeated the allegations, the company would sue. IPS did not run the story.

I was worried about Lissu. On July 19, 2001, a group of Tanzanian police interest lawyers wrote the nation’s president asking for an investigation–instead, Lissu’s law partner in Dar es Salaam was arrested. The police were hunting for Lissu. They broke into his home and office and turned them upside down looking for the names of Lissu’s sources, his whereabouts and the evidence he gathered on the mine site clearance. This was more than a legal skirmish. Over the next months, demonstrations by vicims’ families were broken up by police thugs. A member of Parliament joining protesters was beaten and hospitalized. I had to raise cash quick to get Lissu out, and with him, his copies of police files with more evidence of the killings. I called Maude Barlow, the “Ralph Nader of Canada”, head of the Council of Canadians. Without hesitation, she teamed up with Friends of the Earth in Holland, raised funds and prepared a press conference–and in August tipped the story to the Globe & Mail, Canada’s national paper.

CONTINUED...

http://www.mapcruzin.com/palast-2.htm

Greg Palast did something very, very bad from the insider's perspective: He told the truth, including the bits about the buried alive gold miners, as it happens. So, the Big Corporation sued and sued and sued. With their deep pockets, they can buy justice, judges, prime ministers and whoever and whatever else they need to turn a buck, even presidents and their dim sons and rich cronies. Haiti, Detroit, Idaho.

[2naSalit]

6. Thanks for the additional info

I live in Montana where we have lots of extractive industry control over the public and public lands. Palast is an awesome and fearless journalist and activist. I first heard of him in 2001 regarding a stolen election issue, he's never failed to provide important info. Palast and Ms. Klein would make a formidable pair if they ever chose to work together, but I'm thankful that both of them do what they do.

I heard something, at least a couple weeks ago, that there was interest in the gov't for updating the mining laws and address problems in this century... I'll believe that when I see it.

As for you, please keep informing us, I still read all these posts even if I don't comment - I don't always log in.

[Wilms]

2. Minus the warmer temperatures.

Freezing elderly works in their schema. No?

[Octafish]

4. And Now the Richest .01 Percent

by Robert Reich
Tuesday, November 18, 2014

The richest Americans hold more of the nation’s wealth than they have in almost a century. What do they spend it on? As you might expect, personal jets, giant yachts, works of art, and luxury penthouses.

And also on politics. In fact, their political spending has been growing faster than their spending on anything else. It’s been growing even faster than their wealth.

According to new research by Emmanuel Saez of the University of California at Berkeley and Gabriel Zucman of the London School of Economics, the richest one-hundredth of one percent of Americans now hold over 11 percent of the nation’s total wealth. That’s a higher share than the top .01 percent held in 1929, before the Great Crash.

We’re talking about 16,000 people, each worth at least $110 million.

One way to get your mind around this is to compare their wealth to that of the average family. In 1978, the typical wealth holder in the top .01 percent was 220 times richer than the average American. By 2012, he or she was 1,120 times richer.

CONTINUED, despite promises to the contrary...

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2014/11/18/and-now-richest-01-percent

The cold adds to our misery they so enjoy.

[JEB]

5. K&R for the original post and subsequent informative posts and links.