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Tuesday 04.10.2012

Confiscation of Gold and Silver Coins Will Not Happen
By Greg Hunter's USAWatchdog.com
People ask me on a consistent basis if I think the government will confiscate their gold and silver coins if times get rough. I feel there is little chance of this happening, and here's why. Gold and silver coins are predominantly held by the wealthy (especially gold). The wealthy are not going to allow the government they support with campaign money to take their gold. It is just not going to happen. Think about it, poor and moderate income people (and that is at least half the population) do not have a significant holding of gold or silver. Most of the rest of the population have the bulk of their wealth tied up in 401-K's or IRA's. This may come as a surprise, but most rich people do not have 401-K's or IRA's. They have stocks and bonds, but the rich also have the money and smarts to diversify their portfolios.

Gold Bounce Could Be Just That, Not a QE Bet
By Matt Day
Gold is paring earlier gains, a sign that today's early rise could be more the result of bargain-hunting after futures slid to 2-month lows last week–rather than funds placing new bets in expectations of more quantitative easing from the Fed.

Morgan Stanley: 'We still like Gold'
even after the metal fell to an 11-week low
LONDON (Commodity Online): "We still like gold" even after the metal fell last week to an 11-week low, said Morgan Stanley in a weekly commodity research note.
"We believe that the recent weakness in gold is a good entry point as some elements of the recent selling pressure appear to be at odds with the FOMC's still-dovish position," Morgan Stanley added.

Global Reserve Currencies, the Triffin dilemma and gold's role
When the U.S. dollar was set as the globe's reserve currency the world missed the chance to put something in place that could really have worked. If this can be resurrected would there be a place for gold?
Author: Richard (Rick) Mills - Mineweb.com
COQUITLAM, BC - Trade imbalances - deficits and surpluses - between nations are one of the major reasons for financial crises. Countries become trapped in a vicious spiral - they accumulate debt because they are sustaining a trade deficit, the bigger their debt grows year after year, the harder it becomes to generate a trade surplus.
Only the countries with a trade surplus have any room to manipulate policy, there's very little debtor nations can do.

Massive, Catastrophic Spike in Interest Rates Still Not Happening
By Matt Phillips - WSJ.com
In yield on the 10-year note, bond market shows it isn't dead yet.
Like a geek at the keg party, the Treasury bond market is doing its best imitation of "I'm-not-dead-yet" bit from Monty Python's Holy Grail.
Prices for I.O.U.s from Uncle Sam have jumped quite a bit since last Friday's somewhat disappointing jobs report. The weak update on the labor market has some once again wondering whether the Fed is going to launch some sort of bond-buying program aimed at supporting the economy. That's pushed bond prices higher.

An Imperfect Union: Europe's debt crisis
Ten European countries are in recession and three have needed bailouts to avoid default. How could this impact the U.S. economy? Steve Kroft reports.

Cracks in Europe
BY DOUGLAS NOLAND - FinancialSense.com
There were important developments this week on the liquidity analysis front. Tuesday's release of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) minutes (March 13 meeting) threw chilled water on market expectations for near-term additional quantitative easing. In Europe, Wednesday's auction of Spanish 10-year bonds disappointed increasingly nervous markets. Demand for Spain's debt has waned. This is a serious issue for a country suffering from deep recession, a troubled banking sector and ongoing borrowing requirements. Even from a bearish perspective, one would have expected the ECB's massive liquidity operations to have bought Spain more than just a few short months.

A Serious Threat to Western Nations
BY JR NYQUIST - FinancialSense.com
On 21 September 1999 Richard L. Palmer, President of Cachet International, Inc. testified on "the infiltration of the Western financial system by elements of Russian organized crime before the House Committee on Banking and Financial Services…." His full testimony can be read at the Web site for the Committee on Financial Services – Democrats. Palmer's testimony, like that of many experts, has never been placed in proper context.
Palmer warned the House Committee of "serious threats to Western nations." He had worked as an Army intelligence officer in Europe, and served 20 years in the Operations Directorate of the CIA. His final assignment was as Chief of Station in the former Soviet Union from 1992 to 1994. For several years he monitored criminal activities related to the Russian mafia. Palmer told the Committee he had direct experience working with former Soviet security and police services, "as well as members of Russian banking, business, Organized Crime and corrupt officials."

Europe on the Brink -- A WSJ Documentary
In this documentary, Wall Street Journal editors and reporters examine the origins of Europe's debt crisis and why it spread with such ferocity to engulf much of the continent and threaten the entire world.

Bernanke Sees Need for
More Regulatory Curbs on Shadow Banking
Joshua Zumbrun and Steve Matthews - WashPost.Bloomberg.com
April 9 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke called on regulators to stem risks from "shadow banking" operating beyond traditional oversight and favored steps to promote the "resiliency" of money market funds.
"An important lesson learned from the financial crisis is that the growth of what has been termed 'shadow banking' creates additional potential channels for the propagation of shocks through the financial system and the economy," Bernanke said today in a speech in Stone Mountain, Georgia.

Is the Fed Promoting Recovery or Desperation?
BY JOHN HUSSMAN PHD - FinancialSense.com
On Friday, the Department of Labor reported that March non-farm payrolls increased by 120,000, falling well short of consensus expectations in excess of 200,000. For our part, we continue to expect a deterioration in observable economic variables, with weakness that emerges gradually and then accelerates toward mid-year. On the payroll front, our present expectation is that April job creation will deteriorate toward zero or negative levels.
Immediately after the payroll number was released, CNBC shot out a news story titled "Disappointing Jobs Report Revives Talk of Fed Easing." Of course it does, because this remains a market dependent on sugar. And with little doubt the Fed will eventually deliver it - perhaps following a market plunge of 25% or more - but with little doubt nonetheless, because like the indulgent parent of a spoiled toddler, the FOMC can't stand to see Wall Street throw a tantrum without reaching for a lollipop.

Why the US is becoming a nation of renters
Fear of Buying: The Psychology of Renting (Part 5 of 5)By Barry Ritholtz
Way back in 2005, as we were approaching the peak of the Real Estate frenzy, David Leonhardt published an interesting and rather contrarian article, Is It Better to Buy or Rent?. The Pulitzer prize winning business reporter for the New York Times wrote:

"But renting might deserve another look right now. After five years in which rents have barely budged while house prices in New York, Washington, Los Angeles and elsewhere have doubled, renting has become a surprisingly smart option for many people who never would have considered it before."

That was 2005 — since then, the Real Estate market crashed 35% nationally. Rents have risen dramatically. After under building rental units for a decade or longer, Home builders have been increasing the percentage of multi-unit homes and apartments they are constructing. The Architecture Billings Index has risen. Not owning a home has increasingly become the first choice for many new households.
We have become a Nation of Renters

Predicting Recession with U.S. State Co-Incident Indicators
BY DWAINE VAN VUUREN - FinancialSense.com
Common knowledge tells us that to forecast recession with some lead (advance warning) means we need to use leading indicators. However a special characteristic of the 50 state-wide co-incident indicators maintained by the Philadelphia Fed allows us to build an early warning system for recessions.
In our previous research titled "Dating NBER Recessions with Philadelphia Fed State coincident indices" we showed how a specific sub-set of 50 US states were more "sensitive" to recession and allowed us to date recessions in a co-incident fashion with a very high degree of accuracy (an r-squared of 0.96 to NBER which is very high.) You can also download a PDF version of this research we published in 2011 for peer-review at the Social Sciences Research Network (SSRN)..

How to Invest in a U.S. Manufacturing Boom
Trends suggest America's manufacturing renaissance is just getting started. Here's what investors need to know.
By JACK HOUGH - SmartMoney.com
Investors who have favored emerging markets like China in recent years should pay attention to another growing manufacturing center. It boasts plenty of skilled workers; cheap and abundant energy; stable institutions; and a large middle class that likes to shop.
It is the U.S., where a long industrial decline might be in reverse.
In March, manufacturing expanded for the 32nd straight month, and contributed 37,000 of the 120,000 U.S. jobs added, the government reported. That's partly because of the ongoing recovery from the Great Recession. But the economy is also changing.

Microsoft to build new data center in Wyoming
The company received $10 million in incentives
from the state to locate the facility there
By Nancy Gohring - Computerworld.com
IDG News Service - Microsoft plans to build a new data center, this time in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
It won't be considered a "mega data center," but it will cost US$112 million to build. Microsoft said initially it will employ 17 people to work there but ultimately it will need 40 people. The facility is expected to open in the spring of 2013.
Microsoft didn't say specifically which of its services it will operate from the data center, which will serve the Mountain West region for the company.

Caterpillar's big bet on the U.S. economy
By John D. Stoll
(Reuters) - It hasn't been long since Caterpillar Inc (CAT.N) looked like the typical resident of the Rust Belt. Having misjudged how deep the U.S. economy would decline, the world's largest maker of construction machinery reduced its workforce by 33,000 people worldwide in 2009, closed plants and posted lower profits.
But the Peoria, Illinois-based company has mounted a quick recovery and is emerging as the poster child for America's manufacturing renaissance.
In 24 months, 15 Caterpillar facilities have been built or updated in the United States, tens of thousands of workers have been added to the payroll and $2 billion is committed for capital investments on its home soil this year.

Sony to Eliminate 10,000 Jobs, 6% of Workforce, Nikkei Says
By Shunichi Ozasa and Naoko Fujimura - Bloomberg.com
Sony Corp. (6758), the Japanese electronics maker that has forecast a fourth straight annual loss, will slash about 10,000 jobs, or 6 percent of its workforce, the Nikkei newspaper reported on its website.
As many as 5,000 job cuts will come from reorganizing businesses making chemicals and small-and medium-sized panels, the Nikkei reported. George Boyd, a spokesman for the Tokyo- based company, declined to comment when contacted by phone.

GOP lawmaker calls for change
to how government measures unemployment
By Molly K. Hooper - TheHill.com
A Republican lawmaker is intensifying his push for legislation that would change how the government measures the unemployment rate.
Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) intends to press GOP leaders to move his bill to include the number of individuals who gave up looking for work in the percentage of jobless claims.
Should the government measure unemployment with Hunter's figure, the unemployment rate would be higher than the current rate of approximately 8 percent — a potentially devastating assessment for the White House, especially in an election year.

U.S. stocks fall on disappointing jobs report
By Kate Gibson, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — U.S. stocks fell sharply Monday as investors got their first chance to react to the March nonfarm payrolls report, which showed companies adding fewer jobs than expected.
The Labor Department last Friday said U.S. employers added 120,000 jobs last month, with the number under 200,000 for the first time since November.
"The start of this week will largely be devoted to deciphering the message from Friday's jobs report. The numbers themselves were clearly disappointing," David Kelly, chief market strategist at J.P. Morgan Funds, said in emailed research.

Dow closes below 13,000 for first time in a month
APNews - Townhall.com
Investors had a three-day weekend to brood over disappointing job growth in March. When they got back to work Monday and delivered their verdict, it wasn't good.
Stocks closed sharply lower, sending the Dow Jones industrial average and the Standard & Poor's 500 index to only their second four-day losing streak this year.
The Dow finished down 130.55 points at 12,929.59, its first close below 13,000 since March 12. The S&P ended the day off 15.88 points at 1,382.20. The Nasdaq composite closed down 33.42 at 3,047.08.

Obama renews call for 'Buffett rule' tax on millionaires
By Dave Boyer - The Washington Times
The White House and President Obama's re-election team launched a simultaneous offensive Monday to pressure Republican senators to approve the so-called "Buffett rule," a tax increase on income over $1 million.
"The president supports that legislation and there's going to be a vote in the Senate," presidential spokesman Jay Carney said of a procedural vote scheduled for April 16. He added that the measure "has broad support across the country."

The Shocking Truth
About Unemployment In America In One Chart
By Michael Snyder - TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
The mainstream media is not telling you the truth about unemployment in the United States. The percentage of working age Americans that are employed is not increasing. In March 2010, 58.5 percent of all working age Americans had a job. In March 2012, 58.5 percent of all working age Americans had a job. So if the employment rate is exactly the same as it was two years ago, then how in the world can the Obama administration claim that things have gotten significantly better since then? According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the official unemployment rate in the United States was 9.8 percent in March 2010 and it declined to 8.2 percent in March 2012. So how is this possible if the percentage of working age Americans that have jobs hasn't moved? Well, what they do is they claim that there are millions upon millions of Americans that have "left the labor force". In other words, they claim that there are millions upon millions of unemployed Americans that don't want jobs anymore. Of course that is a total farce, but the mainstream media and most Americans are buying it. They actually believe that the unemployment rate is going down. But the truth is that the unemployment crisis in America has not subsided. In fact, we are pretty much exactly where we were two years ago, and things are about to get a whole lot worse.

A Disappointing Jobs Report
Doom at the end of the tunnel?
BY IRWIN M. STELZER - WeeklyStandard.com
It is no easy thing to peer through the fog of recent economic data. Confidence that the economic recovery would accelerate ran into a not-so-good job report Friday. To the chagrin of the president's reelection campaign team, only 121,000 workers were added to private sector payrolls in March, far below expectations, and only about half the previous month's total. The unemployment rate ticked down from 8.3 percent to 8.2 percent, but only because fewer people were seeking work. The Federal Reserve Board's monetary policy gurus are confirmed in their view that it is too soon to tighten policy, and those who have been calling for even looser policy, a QE3, will once again raise their voices.

Webster Tarpley on Rense - Apr 4, 2012

This Is Not FDR's Social Security
By Robert Samuelson - RealClearMarkets.com
Would Franklin Roosevelt approve of Social Security? The question seems absurd. After all, Social Security is considered the New Deal's signature achievement. It distributes nearly $800 billion a year to 56 million retirees, survivors and disabled beneficiaries. On average, retired workers and spouses receive $1,839 a month - money vital to the well-being of millions. Roosevelt would surely be proud of this, and yet he might also have reservations. Social Security has evolved into something he never intended and actively opposed.
It has become what was then called "the dole" and is now known as "welfare." This forgotten history clarifies why America's budget problems are so intractable.

Utah breach 10X worse than originally thought
SSNs on 280K exposed; names, birth dates
of another 500K compromised
By Jaikumar Vijayan - Computerworld.com
Computerworld - The scope of a data breach involving a Medicaid server at the Utah Department of Health is much worse than originally thought. State officials now say that close to 280,000 Social Security Numbers may have been exposed in the incident instead of 25,000, as originally believed.
Less sensitive personal data such as names, birth dates and addresses of another 500,000 people may have also been compromised in the breach, state officials said today.
Today's announcement marks the second time in three days that Utah state officials have upped their estimates of a March 30 intrusion into a server containing Medicaid claims data on Utah residents.

Poll: Support for Supreme Court Up Since Obamacare Arguments
BY MICHAEL WARREN - WeeklyStandard.com
A new poll from Rasmussen shows approval for the Supreme Court among Americans has risen since the Court held its high-profile hearings on Obamacare two weeks ago. According to the poll, which was taken on April 6 and 7, 41 percent of likely voters rate the Court's work as "good" or "excellent," compared with just 28 percent saying the same thing in mid-March, shortly before the oral arguments. Disapproval of the Court's performance remains steady at 19 percent.

Here's more from Rasmussen:
It is impossible to know if the improved perceptions of the court came from the hearings themselves, President Obama's comments cautioning the court about overturning a law passed by Congress, or from other factors. Approval of the court had fallen in three consecutive quarterly surveys prior to the health care hearings.

Health-care law will add $340 billion to deficit, new study finds
By Lori Montgomery - WashingtonPost.com
President Obama's landmark health-care initiative, long touted as a means to control costs, will actually add more than $340 billion to the nation's budget woes over the next decade, according to a new study by a member of the board that oversees Medicare financing.
The study is set to be released Tuesday by Charles Blahous, a conservative policy analyst whom Obama appointed in 2010 as one of two public trustees for Medicare and Social Security. His analysis challenges the conventional wisdom that the health-care law, which calls for an expensive expansion of coverage for the uninsured beginning in 2014, will nonetheless reduce deficits by raising taxes and cutting payments to Medicare providers.

Obama administration diverts $500M to IRS
to implement healthcare reform law
By Sam Baker - TheHill.com
The Obama administration is quietly diverting roughly $500 million to the IRS to help implement the president's healthcare law.
The money is only part of the IRS's total implementation spending, and it is being provided outside the normal appropriations process. The tax agency is responsible for several key provisions of the new law, including the unpopular individual mandate.
Republican lawmakers have tried to cut off funding to implement the healthcare law, at least until after the Supreme Court decides whether to strike it down. That ruling is expected by June, and oral arguments last week indicated the justices might well overturn at least the individual mandate, if not the whole law.

The Real Health Care Debate
By Chris Hedges - Truthdig.com
The debate surrounding the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act illustrates the impoverishment of our political life. Here is a law that had its origin in the right-wing Heritage Foundation, was first put into practice in 2006 in Massachusetts by then-Gov. Mitt Romney and was solidified into federal law after corporate lobbyists wrote legislation with more than 2,000 pages. It is a law that forces American citizens to buy a deeply defective product from private insurance companies. It is a law that is the equivalent of the bank bailout bill—some $447 billion in subsidies for insurance interests alone—for the pharmaceutical and insurance industries. It is a law that is unconstitutional. And it is a law by which President Barack Obama, and his corporate backers, extinguished the possibilities of both the public option and Medicare for all Americans. There is no substantial difference between Obamacare and Romneycare. There is no substantial difference between Obama and Romney. They are abject servants of the corporate state. And if you vote for one you vote for the other.

David Walker - America at a Crossroads - Jan 2012
America is at a critical crossroads. The choices that U.S. elected officials make in connection with the role of government and its finances over the next 5 years will largely determine whether America's collective future will be better than its past.

Financial Scammers Prey on Seniors
By ANNE TERGESEN - WSJ.com
As the population ages, legal actions taken in response to the financial abuse of older adults are proliferating. But family members can take steps to protect an elder's nest egg.
According to the North American Securities Administrators Association, state securities regulators issued 1,241 enforcement actions — including criminal complaints and cease-and-desist orders — involving investments sold to those ages 50 or older in 2010, the latest year for which data are available. That number was more than double the 506 actions taken in 2009.
Jack Herstein, president of the association and assistant director of the Nebraska Department of Banking and Finance, says state regulators expect the number of enforcement actions to continue to climb, in part because "complaints are rising."

Lose a Smartphone, And You Lose a Lot
By JEANETTE PAVINI - WSJ.com
Say you just lost your wallet with $40 cash in it. You'd feel bad, right? There's the inconvenience of canceling cards, getting a new driver's license, etc. But what if you lost your wallet with $900 in cash in it, plus your address book and your bank passwords? That's what it's like when you lose your smartphone.
Now that really hurts.
How much does it cost to lose a smartphone? One of our readers found out the hard way. Her iPhone was stolen while she was on public transit. She didn't have phone insurance, her renter's insurance didn't cover the loss, and she was told if she canceled her phone contract, she would be liable for a hefty early termination fee. In the end, she paid a small fortune and learned a big lesson.
Some 60 million smartphones and cellphones are lost, stolen or damaged each year, according to Asurion, a provider of cellphone insurance.

Is someone spying on your phone?
Christina DesMarais, Techlicious - MSNBC.MSN.com
You probably know there are plenty of apps you can install on your smartphone to track its location in case it gets lost or stolen. Apple's "Find My iPhone" is one good one and many security apps, such as AVG Mobilation, can track down a phone in seconds.
But what if someone else is tracking you? Is there any chance your boss or spouse could be spying on everything you do on your phone?
It's easy to do. Spy apps are plentiful and can imperceptibly track text and e-mail messages, location, Web sites you visit, who you call and what photos and videos you shoot. The problem is these apps are difficult to detect and run invisibly in the background.

The Weirdest Thing About the Instagram Deal
Why did Instagram's founders dilute their own stake in the company just four days before finalizing its acquisition?
By Matthew O'Brien - TheAtlantic.com
A million dollars isn't cool. You know what's cool? Instagram.
A mere 551 days after its founding, the photo-sharing startup sold itself to Facebook for a very cool billion dollars. Even Sean Parker would be impressed. But one part of the sale has confused rather than impressed people. Why did Instagram close a second funding round just four days before it finalized its acquisition?

Cops can request a copy of your complete Facebook activity
By Rosa Golijan - MSNBC.MSN.com
If police officers were to file a subpoena for your Facebook information, they would receive a printout of the data from the social network. This printout would be so detailed, complete and creepy that you should strive to be a good law-abiding citizen, just to prevent it from ever existing.
We have just learned about the true nature of Facebook's responses to subpoenas thanks to documents uncovered by the Boston Phoenix, an alternative weekly.

Secret Plan Underway
To Revive Internet Censorship Bill SOPA
Motion Picture Association of America CEO
"confident" similar legislation will become law
By Steve Watson - Infowars.com
Motion Picture Association of America CEO and former Senator Chris Dodd has revealed perhaps more than he intended to in an interview with theHollywood Reporter with regards to the much maligned Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).
Despite the fact that the legislation was indefinitely shelved in January, Dodd said he was "confident" that there are conversations going on between Hollywood and Silicon Valley to help revive SOPA.
"Between now and sometime next year [after the presidential election], the two industries need to come to an understanding," Dodd told the magazine.

Hackers strike over cybersecurity bill
By Andrew Feinberg and Brendan Sasso - TheHill.com
The hacker group Anonymous on Monday crashed the websites of two trade associations that support a House cybersecurity bill.
The self-proclaimed "hacktivist" group claimed credit in a YouTube post after the websites for telephone association USTelecom and technology group TechAmerica were brought down by denial-of-service attacks. Such attacks typically flood networks with excessive requests, often by using remotely hijacked networks known as "botnets."
USTelecom CEO Walter McCormick Jr. blasted Anonymous for trying to "coerce, intimidate and stifle speech."

The New Mastermind of Jihad
A recently freed Islamist thinker has long advocated small-scale, independent acts of anti-Western terror
By DAVID SAMUELS - WSJ.com
Mohamed Merah, the 23-year-old Islamist gunman who hunted down three Jewish children and a rabbi after murdering three French paratroopers in Toulouse last month, didn't act alone. In his journey from the slums of Toulouse, to the local mosques, to the terrorist training camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan that he described to French police, to filming his murder of the terrified children in order to post video clips on the web, Mr. Merah was following a path marked out years earlier by the coldblooded jihadist theoretician Abu Musab al-Suri.
What is perhaps more disturbing, Mr. al-Suri was recently set free from prison in Damascus, Syria, and his current whereabouts are unknown. Turned over to Syria after his capture by the CIA in late 2005, Mr. al-Suri was released sometime in December (according to intelligence sources and jihadist websites) by the regime of President Bashar al-Assad—a move apparently intended to warn the West of the consequences for opposing his rule.

DHS Preparing for Civil War In US?

For This Old Socialist, Maxine Waters,
Socialism Starts at Home
By John Ransom - TownHall.com
If you thought nation's financial services were battered under Barney Frank and Chris Dodd, wait until you see who's batting cleanup for the Democrats in the House.
Maxine Waters, the ranking Democrat on the Capital Markets and Government
Sponsored Enterprises Subcommittee of the House Financial Services Committee and who serves as the deputy whip for the Democrats in the House- and who will take over for Frank now that he is retiring - is embroiled in another scandal involving money and nepotism.

Can Non-Belief Become Mainstream?
The Weaponization of Atheism
by JEFF SPARROW - CounterPunch.org
In a few days time, the Global Atheist Convention meets in the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, a huge building sprawling out next to the Yarra River, just south of the central business district of Australia's second biggest city.
But walk north for fifteen minutes or so to Victoria Street, Fitzroy, and you'll find a much less imposing structure with a much older connection to atheism.
From the outside, there's little to show that what's now called Brenan Hall, a brick building in the St Vincent's Hospital site, was once known, rather grandly, as the Hall of Science. Few Melbournians realise that their city boasts one of the second oldest purpose-built Freethought halls in the world, a meeting place constructed by the Australasian Secular Association in 1889.

Reviving Faith by 'Taking Up Serpents'
For a new generation of Internet-savvy Pentecostals,
a century-old practice provides 'anointing'
By JULIA DUIN - WSJ.com
This year's Easter service at the Tabernacle Church of God in La Follette, Tenn., will include many of the holiday's traditional rituals, like Holy Communion and footwashing. There will also be some startling novelties.
"It will be filled with shouting, dancing, speaking in tongues, serpent handling and fire handling," said its 21-year-old pastor, Andrew Hamblin. "We'll celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ with a good old time."
Since he opened its doors last fall, Mr. Hamblin's small Pentecostal church, 39 miles north of Knoxville, has grown to almost 50 members, most of them in their 20s. Part of his strategy for expansion has been to use Facebook to publicize the daredevil spiritual exploits of his congregation.

Boeing, Brazil's Embraer sign collaboration pact
Puget Sound Business Journal by Steve Wilhelm
Boeing and Brazilian aircraft maker Embraer S.A. signed a collaboration agreement Monday that codifies what has become a de facto market split between the two.
In the agreement, the two companies committed to collaborate on "aircraft efficiency and safety, productivity and research," in an identical release both sent out. The agreement was signed in Washington, D.C.
Interestingly, the Boeing-Embraer pact comes just a month after aircraft builder Bombardier (which is Canadian) and Comac (which is Chinese) signed another collaboration agreement.

Lindsey Williams: 2012 -
The Beginning of The End
(Full Length Documentary - Nov 2011)

Focused on presidential bid,
Ron Paul has missed 92 percent of votes in 2012
By Eryn Dion - TheHill.com
Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) has missed nearly 92 percent of House votes this year while campaigning for president.
Paul's bid for the White House has lost steam in recent weeks, but he has given little indication he will drop out of the race. The congressman has announced he will not seek a 10th term.
The libertarian lawmaker has called for slashing congressional pay and perks. If elected commander in chief, Paul — who now makes $174,000 a year — has pledged to take a salary of $39,336, "approximately equal to the median income of the American worker," according to his campaign website.

Pakistani president makes rare trip to India
India's prime minister accepts invitation
to visit Pakistan, reports say
By Kate Gibson, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — The leaders of India and Pakistan met Sunday, with both vowing to pursue better relations between the nuclear-armed nations, according to media reports.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh spoke for nearly an hour in New Delhi, with Singh saying he would accept Zardari's invitation to visit Pakistan by the end of the year.
Billed as private yet still important diplomatically, the meeting marked their first face-to-face meeting since 2009 and the first visit by a Pakistani head of state to India in seven years.

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