‘Welcome to Police Industrial Complex’ – former Philly commissioner

‘Welcome to Police Industrial Complex’ – former Philly commissionerDangerous, alienating, and sociopathic: the policy of arming police to the teeth with military-grade gear shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how crime is solved and what it means for a cop to walk the beat, former Captain Ray Lewis told RT. Nine-foot tall, 55,000 pound, Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) armored-fighting vehicles rolling through the streets of America.

Embedly Powered

via Rt

Judge allows US Marshals’ seizure of stingray records, dimisses lawsuit

Judge allows US Marshals’ seizure of stingray records, dimisses lawsuitFurther Reading After an ordinary stingray records request, the feds drive the files 320 miles. The American Civil Liberties Union has lost in its attempt to get the city of Sarasota, Florida, to hand over city records pertaining to the use of stingrays, or fake cell tower surveillance devices.

Embedly Powered

The Constitution Impaired; the Bill of Rights Annulled

The Constitution Impaired; the Bill of Rights AnnulledTruthout is serializing Beatrice Edwards’ book, The Rise of the American Corporate Security State. To read more excerpts from this book, click here. Reason to be afraid #3: The separation of powers established by the Constitution is eroding. Rights guaranteed by constitutional amendments are becoming irrelevant.

Embedly Powered

Anat Admati on Seeing Through ‘The Banker’s New Clothes’

Anat Admati on Seeing Through ‘The Banker’s New Clothes’This week, Bill speaks with Anat Admati, an economist at Stanford University, about how our banks are actually larger now than they were before the 2008 crash – and still living dangerously. In this TEDx Stanford talk she delivered earlier this year, Admati explains how she fell into a “rabbit hole” when she started studying banking around the time of the financial crisis.

Embedly Powered

The Velocity Of Money In The U.S. Falls To An All-Time Record Low

The Velocity Of Money In The U.S. Falls To An All-Time Record LowPreface by Washington’s Blog: Read this for background on why the velocity of money has crashed. By Michael Snyder: When an economy is healthy, there is lots of buying and selling and money tends to move around quite rapidly. Unfortunately, the U.S. economy is the exact opposite of that right now.

Embedly Powered

The Size Of The Derivatives Bubble Hanging Over The Global Economy Hits A Record High

The Size Of The Derivatives Bubble Hanging Over The Global Economy Hits A Record HighBy Michael Snyder. The global derivatives bubble is now 20 percent bigger than it was just before the last great financial crisis struck in 2008. It is a financial bubble far larger than anything the world has ever seen, and when it finally bursts it is going to be a complete and utter nightmare for the financial system of the planet.

Embedly Powered

The Neofeudal-Neoliberal Arrangement: Since We Own What You Need, We Own You

The Neofeudal-Neoliberal Arrangement: Since We Own What You Need, We Own YouNeofeudalism depends on the cultural supremacy of Neoliberalism, the belief that the social order is defined and created by markets. I’ve been discussing the essence of Neofeudalism this week: those with access to the low-interest unlimited credit spigot of the Federal Reserve become more equal than others-the perfect Orwellian description of a Neofeudal arrangement in which financial leverage buys not just rentier assets but political power and control.

Embedly Powered

Pentagon preparing for mass civil breakdown

Pentagon preparing for mass civil breakdownA US Department of Defense (DoD) research programme is funding universities to model the dynamics, risks and tipping points for large-scale civil unrest across the world, under the supervision of various US military agencies. The multi-million dollar programme is designed to develop immediate and long-term “warfighter-relevant insights” for senior officials and decision makers in “the defense policy community,” and to inform policy implemented by “combatant commands.”

Embedly Powered

The fault in our starry-eyed ‘recovery’: 2014 looks like we’re going bust again

The fault in our starry-eyed ‘recovery’: 2014 looks like we’re going bust againForget the cheerleading from the White House. Nevermind the latest job numbers. Look at your wallets. Despite the persistent happy talk about a recovery, and the hundreds of charts that come along with it, the US economy is not getting better – it may actually be getting worse.

Embedly Powered