Insider Trading Is Perfectly Legal – But Only For Members Of The U.S. Congress

Did you know that insider trading is perfectly legal in the United States?  Well, not for 99.9% of the population.  It is actually only a very small percentage of the population that can legally indulge in insider trading - the members of the United States Congress.  In fact, a law that would ban insider trading by members of Congress has been stalled for years on Capitol Hill.  So why wouldn't lawmakers in Washington D.C. want to apply the same rules to themselves that apply to the rest of us?  After all, how are we supposed to respect the integrity of those "serving" in Congress when they are playing by an entirely different set of rules?  The American people aren't stupid.  They can see what is going on.  The truth is that there is a reason why approval ratings for Congress are at an all-time low.

The sad thing is that this issue has gotten very little attention in the mainstream media.  Nobody seems really that upset about it.  But it is a travesty that our lawmakers can legally make trades in the open market based on inside information that they have gained by being in positions of authority. As the Wall Street Journal recently explained, they can generally make all the money they want off of insider information without any fear of prosecution because "insider-trading laws generally do not apply to lawmakers, leaving them free to trade on nonpublic information."

But members of the U.S. Congress are generally in a greater position to influence the fortunes of individual companies than almost anyone else.  For example, certain members of the U.S. Congress may know that certain legislation is going to be introduced that would have a dramatic impact on the economic fortunes of a particular industry or corporation.  What would stop those members of Congress from making very profitable trades in the marketplace based on that information?

Nothing.  Nothing at all.

So, is there any evidence that members of Congress have been involved in this sort of activity?

Well, there is at least one study that seems to indicate that members of the U.S. Congress have been much more successful in the stock market than members of the general public....

A 2004 study of the results of stock trading by United States Senators during the 1990s found that that senators on average beat the market by 12% a year. In sharp contrast, U.S. households on average underperformed the market by 1.4% a year and even corporate insiders on average beat the market by only about 6% a year during that period. A reasonable inference is that some Senators had access to - and were using - material nonpublic information about the companies in whose stock they trade.

Of course Congress could stop all of this by simply passing a law that bans insider trading by our lawmakers.

But they refuse to do it.

Instead, it is likely that our "leaders" will continue to make millions of dollars by betting against the U.S. economy and very few people will even raise an objection.

In the upcoming Wall Street sequel, Gordon Gekko makes a statement that seems very appropriate for the world in which we now live....

"Someone reminded me I once said 'Greed is good' - now it seems it's legal"

Police State: Cops Shut Down 7 Year Old's Lemonade Stand for "No Permits"

Local governments are broke so they are coming for every penny you have...


You're never too young to learn a life lesson - or, rather, a business lesson. As this local news report shows, the aptly named Daniela Earnest of Tulare, California had her lemonade stand shut down by town officials. (It turns out the stand lacked proper business permits.) Daniela, who's just seven years old, had the heartwarming goal to save enough money to send her family to Disney Land.

But, Daniela's lemonade stand ran afoul of local authorities, who said that the fledgling business was located in a dangerous intersection. Daniela eventually pled her case in front of the town council, which vowed to help her family find a safer location.

The story's happy ending? After seeing her story in the paper, a local radio station stepped in and came up with four day passes to Disney.

Children Taunted In Iraq: U.S. Soldier Under Investigation (VIDEO)

Screenshot from a video apparently showing a U.S. soldier taunting children in Iraq


Taunts, "Are you going to grow up to be a terrorist?"

ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- An Alaska-based soldier is under investigation for a video on his Facebook page that taunts smiling Iraqi children by asking if they're gay, if they engage in certain sex acts and if they would grow up to be terrorists.

The two young boys did not appear to understand the questions, which were in English, but smiled at the camera and at times flashed the "thumbs up" gestures during the 30-second clip.

Spc. Robert A. Rodriguez, who is based at Fort Wainwright in Fairbanks, was ordered to remove the video from his site, Army spokesman Maj. Bill Coppernoll said Monday.

"The incident is currently under investigation, and the Army will take appropriate action based on the findings of the investigation," he said.

It wasn't immediately clear if Rodriguez shot the video or just posted it, and discovering that will be part of the Army's investigation, Coppernoll said.

The video is "disgraceful and clearly inconsistent" with standards expected of every soldier, he said.

Raleigh, N.C., television station WRAL first reported the video after another soldier stationed at Fort Wainwright shared it with friends in North Carolina, who took their concerns to the station.

WRAL aired part of the video and quoted from Rodriquez's Facebook page before the site was made private.

Above the Facebook video posting, which was titled, "future gay terrorist!," is written, "i got bored in iraq ... so I kept myself entertained!"

The boys are shown on a dirt road, facing a camera.

A voice is heard asking the boys, "Are you going to grow up to be a terrorist?"

When the boys show two thumbs up, the voice on the video says, "Yeah. All right. Cool. Yeah, terrorist."

There was no phone listing for Rodriguez in the Fairbanks area. Coppernoll said he did not know the soldier's hometown, but the video of the Facebook page shown on WRAL indicated Rodriguez listed Miami.

"For anybody to be so cruel and disrespectful to children of any country but especially a country that we are occupying is really disgraceful and repugnant," said Tim Stallard, a spokesman for Alaskans Together for Equality.

The anti-gay bias is disturbing, also, he said.

"It's ugly, as well, and it's sorry to see anybody expressing such unfortunate and strong bias against gay people," he said.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/25/children-taunted-in-iraq_n_588322.html

Did the CIA Kill Jimi Hendrix?

BY JOHN POTASH / Rock Creek Free Press

Newly released songs by legendary guitarist Jimi Hendrix have led music magazines such as Rolling Stone to feature him in cover stories, despite his death four decades ago. Closer scrutiny of Hendrix’s life suggests that US and British Intelligence targeted Hendrix for developing anti-war and pro-Black Panther politics. Such targeting helps explain why Hendrix failed to release much of his music before his death. It also exemplifies the extreme tactics imperialist governments use to stop anyone who could have more sway over people’s hearts and minds than does the government.

This past March stores started selling a CD of Hendrix’s previously unreleased recordings, titled “Valleys of Neptune”. These dozen songs were some of the hundreds Hendrix failed to release during his brief career. Posthumous releases of the prolific guitarist’s recordings continued for decades after his death. New evidence supports one of the reasons why Jimi Hendrix’s manager, Mike Jeffery, worked to block Hendrix from releasing more of his songs. Leading biographers have said in print that Jeffery stated he “used to” work for MI6—Britain’s CIA. In 2009, James Wright, a road manager for a band that Mike Jeffery also managed, The Animals, made an important claim against Jeffery. In his published book Wright claimed that Jeffery admitted to him that he had Hendrix killed because the rock star wanted to end his management contract with Wright.

US/British Intelligence 1960’s Attack on Political Musicians

Nations Director of Largest Tax Payer Funded Eavesdropper is Concerned About Your Privacy?

monday, may 24, 2010

pentagon's cybercom preps war against the american people

from kurt nimmo: NSA Director Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander told the Senate Armed Services Committee in April that he would work to protect the privacy rights of Americans online. It was an interesting comment from a man who heads up an organization responsible for a massive program of illegal dragnet surveillance of domestic communications and communications records of millions of ordinary Americans since at least 2001.

“NSA is the only place in the U.S. government that has the capabilities we need for defense of the private networks,” James A. Lewis, a senior fellow and cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the CIA’s favorite newspaper last year. “We need to find a way to use those capabilities without putting civil liberties at risk.” CSIS is an insider think tank dominated by the likes of Zbigniew Brzezinski, Brent Scowcroft, Henry Kissinger and other freedom lovers.

Threats against computer networks in the United States are grossly exaggerated. Dire reports issued by the Defense Science Board and the Center for Strategic and International Studies “are usually richer in vivid metaphor — with fears of ‘digital Pearl Harbors’ and ‘cyber-Katrinas’ — than in factual foundation,” writes Evgeny Morozov, a Belarus-born researcher and blogger who writes on the political effects of the internet.

Morozov notes that much of the data on the supposed cyber threat “are gathered by ultra-secretive government agencies — which need to justify their own existence — and cyber-security companies — which derive commercial benefits from popular anxiety.”

On Friday Alexander was appointed to head up the newly activated Cyber Command, a subordinate unified command under United States Strategic Command “designed to conduct virtual combat across the world’s computer networks,” according to The Guardian. The ceremony held at Fort Meade, Maryland, was “low-key” in order to not draw media attention.

Early last week the Air Force assigned approximately 30,000 “digital troops” to “the front lines of cyber warfare,” a number that represents a third of the troops in Afghanistan. “The transformation is part of the service’s larger emphasis on cyberspace operations and merging most computer system operations and network warfare functions under Space Command’s 24th Air Force, based at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas,” reported the Air Force Times on May 19.

flashback: military response to cyber attack 'possible'

Facebook founder called trusting users dumb f*cks

Facebook founder called trusting users dumb fucks

By Andrew Orlowski • Get more from this authorPeace Prize for Mr Zuckerberg?

Posted in Music and Media, 14th May 2010 11:33 GMT

Free whitepaper – The Register Guide to Enterprise Virtualization

Loveable Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg called his first few thousand users "dumb fucks" for trusting him with their data, published IM transcripts show. Facebook hasn't disputed the authenticity of the transcript.

Zuckerberg was chatting with an unnamed friend, apparently in early 2004. Business Insider, which has a series of quite juicy anecdotes about Facebook's early days, takes the credit for this one.

The exchange apparently ran like this:

Zuck: Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard
Zuck: Just ask.
Zuck: I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS
[Redacted Friend's Name]: What? How'd you manage that one?
Zuck: People just submitted it.
Zuck: I don't know why.
Zuck: They "trust me"
Zuck: Dumb fucks


The founder was then 19, and he may have been joking. But humour tells you a lot. Some might say that this exchange shows Zuckerberg was not particularly aware of the trust issue in all its depth and complexity.

Facebook is currently in the spotlight for its relentlessly increasing exposure of data its users assumed was private. This is nicely illustrated in the interactive graphic you can find here or by clicking the piccie to the right.
In turn, its fall from grace has made backers of the 'social media' bubble quite nervous. Many new white collar nonjobs created since the mid-Noughties depend on the commercial value of your output, and persona;l information. (Both are invariably donated for free).

But there's a problem.

Much of the data created by Web2.0rrhea is turning out to be quite useless for advertisers - or anyone else. Marketeers are having a harder time justifying the expenditure in sifting through the Web 2.0 septic tank for the odd useful nugget of information.

Facebook's data stash is regarded as something quite special. It's authenticated against a real person, and the users tend to be over 35 and middle class - the ideal demographic for selling high value goods and services. In addition, users have so far been 'sticky' to Facebook, something quite exceptional since social networks fall out of fashion (Friends Reunited, Friendster) as quickly as they attract users.

Facebook also has something else going for it - ordinary users regard it as the natural upgrade to Hotmail. In fact, once the crap has been peeled away, there may not be much more to Facebook than the Yahoo! or Hotmail Address Book with knobs on: the contact book is nicely integrated, uploading photos to share easier, while everything else is gravy. Unlike tech-savvy users, many people remain loyal to these for years.

Related

thursday, may 20, 2010

defcon 5/20: dumb f*cks, spy planes & bar codes

facebook alternatives: a look at 9 social networks you could switch to* facebook scrambles to close hole exposing private data* most browsers leave fingerprint that can identify users* students to be given access to laptop spy photos* will machines take over the world? the scientific turning point* report: secret space plane likely an orbiting spy* 1st wedding performed by a robot* where's jimmy? just google his bar code* obama's regulatory czar pushes creepy plan for legally controlling internet info* 3,000 officers switch to cyberspace specialty* hack attacks mounted on car control systems* pakistan extends facebook ban to youtube*