FedUpUSA

Archive for November 14th, 2011

Just to make sure everyone understands, diverting funds isn’t just a city and state sport.  Why no, we do it for those who make political donations too — especially those who bundle together really big political donations….

A new book by Hoover Institution fellow Peter Schweizer details the startling extent of the cronyism that has pervaded President Obama’s “green jobs” push. According to Schweizer, 4 out of every 5 renewable energy companies backed by the Energy Department was “run by or primarily owned by Obama financial backers.”

Those companies’ “political largesse is probably the best investment they ever made in alternative energy,” Schweizer explains. “It brought them returns many times over.”

80% eh?  That’s a pretty impressive number.  And while I can argue that renewable energy companies are probably more likely to be run by Democrats than Republicans you can be a Democrat and not give a lot of money to a Presidential campaign, can’t you?

Why yes you can…. but in this case the “yes we can” appears to be directly related to Obama’s political donations — give him a lot of money and the federal spigot will open and shower you with taxpayer funds!

This might be defensible if these companies actually turned out to be good investments.  But then we have Solyndra, which it appears was on the verge of failure just before it was bailed out, and it appears the firm re-wrote loan covenants to effectively pay off prior private party loans with the nice taxpayer milk that came from you and I even as the firm was on the verge of failure!

Only in government, my friends.  No private lender would ever allow such a thing to happen.

In private business when you try to screw someone like this the attempt is almost-certain to draw a lawsuit in response and might draw a criminal charge.

When it comes to government handouts?

Not so much.

Here is your crook in chief, making sure that your hard-earned tax money is siphoned off to his cronies that in turn “donate” money to his re-election campaign….

The young and the broke – 37 percent of young households held zero or a negative net worth in 2009.  The median net worth of those 35 and younger is $3,600.

It is hard to imagine a future generation of Americans were those moving forward are actually poorer than the current generation.  Yet that is precisely the world we are diving into.  Those that purchased homes in the pre-bubble days and also attended college in less inflated times have a massive head start on the current younger generation that is contending with a bursting housing bubble and a financial system that might as well be a roulette wheel.  One startling figure from a recent Pew Research report shows that 37 percent of young households hold zero or a negative net worth.  This is not a good way to build a healthy financial future.  The wealth gap between previous generations is also becoming increasingly large.  This narrative ties into the overall systemic pilfering of the middle class.

How large is the net worth gap?

The gap between younger and older Americans has never been so large:

Source:  CNN, Pew Research

“(CNN Money) In 1984, households headed by people age 65 and older were worth just 10 times the median net worth of households headed by people 35 and younger.

But now that gap has widened to 47-to-one, marking the largest wealth gap ever recorded between the two age groups.”

A large part of this gap has to do with the timing of the housing bubble.  Many younger Americans bought during inflated times while Wall Street banks were pillaging the entire system.  Older Americans purchased homes during a time when Glass-Steagall was still in place and the bulk of loans made in the housing market came from stale fixed rate mortgages.  Yet I would also argue that the cost of college today is sapping out a large portion of future earnings.  We have seen a diminishing return on investment for college graduates:

Source:  BusinessWeek

A college education is becoming more expensive while the return on investment is falling.  A similar trend hit in the housing market.  Yet the gap in just one generation has catapulted into a tragic scenario.  In 1984 households headed by those 65 and older held a 10 time median net worth advantage on households headed by those 35 and younger.  That figure is now up to a stunning 47 today.  A gap is always expected as those who are older have time to save and accumulate but the size of the gap is troubling.

Read the rest at My Budget 360

This is what the lack of a rule of law produces.

Cities and states across the country are using money designated for specific purposes—such as fixing roads or sewers—in order to fill financial holes elsewhere, according to public officials and records. The moves are exposing municipalities to controversy, as federal regulators and local auditors are more heavily scrutinizing their finances to protect bond buyers and taxpayers.

…

Then, in late October, the city’s former auditor sued, alleging in the suit that he lost his job because he flagged problems then “participated, at the request of the Securities and Exchange Commission, in an investigation into whether the City of Miami was engaging in behavior tantamount to stock fraud in the marketing of its municipal bonds.” Both so-called whistleblower cases are filed in a circuit court in Miami-Dade County.

There you go.  Whatever is convenient is just fine, even if it leads people to invest unwisely.

You know, like when we sell someone a bunch of CDOs claiming they’re great investments while we’re passing emails around our desks asking who we’re going to unload our “shit” or “vomit” onto?

Yeah, that behavior.  Behavior that financial institutions have engaged in repeatedly and despite having entered in consent agreements have then done it again, and again, and in some cases again and again and again without meaningful consequence.

Is it any surprise that cities and states are doing the same thing?

Nope.

Historically, the SEC has avoided financially penalizing municipalities, since taxpayers ultimately pay the penalty. So last year the agency tried a new approach—it fined individual officials in San Diego to settle allegations the city had misled bond investors.

In Miami, any new case would be a second offense. In 2003, the SEC ordered Miami to cease and desist from future violations of antifraud provisions after concluding the city had misled bond buyers by moving money among agencies to mask a deficit. The city maintained it did nothing wrong.

How about some handcuffs?  Yeah, I know that the SEC can’t bring criminal charges — but the DOJ and State Attorney General can.  10 years with Bubba ought to be a sufficient disincentive to further cheating.  Obviously “cease and desist” orders aren’t, and fining the people who got hurt isn’t so good either; all that does is screw the public twice.

Marc Sarnoff, a city commissioner, said that he and others weren’t aware that moving the funds was a potential violation of rules.

Is that because raising money under false pretense is so common that it wouldn’t be something that a commissioner would consider improper?

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is taking his show on the road in at attempt to help Americans feel better about the Federal Reserve.  During a visit to the Fort Bliss headquarters of the Army’s 1st Armored Division this week, Bernanke held a town hall meeting during which he took questions from some of the soldiers.  Bernanke tried to sound as compassionate as possible as he assured the soldiers that the Federal Reserve is looking out for the American people and is doing everything that it can to help create jobs.  At one point, Bernanke even made the following statement: “For a lot of people, I know, it doesn’t feel like the recession ever ended.”  That probably helped a lot of people feel better.  A few probably even had a good cry.  But what Bernanke did not explain to the troops is that the Federal Reserve is very much responsible for the fact that unemployment is rampant, for the fact that the U.S. dollar is rapidly being devalued and for the fact that we have accumulated the largest national debt in the history of the world.

Ben Bernanke keeps insisting that the Federal Reserve has two main jobs (fighting inflation and keeping unemployment low) and that it is working incredibly hard to accomplish that dual mandate.  During his visit with the soldiers he told them that the Fed is very determined to create more jobs for the American people….

“We at the Federal Reserve have been focusing intently on supporting job creation.”

Well, if we are to judge the Federal Reserve by how well it has accomplished its “dual mandate”, then the Federal Reserve has been an abysmal failure.

Since the Federal Reserve was created, the U.S. dollar has lost well over 95 percent of its value to inflation.

Is that something Bernanke should be proud of?

Of course not.

Okay, so the Fed has failed when it comes to keeping inflation under control.

What about jobs?

Well, the first decade of this century was the worst decade for job creation that the United States has seen since the Great Depression.

The sad truth is that a total of zero jobs were created last decade.  The following is a quote from a recent article in Washington Monthly….

“If any single number captures the state of the American economy over the last decade, it is zero. That was the net gain in jobs between 1999 and 2009—nada, nil, zip. By painful contrast, from the 1940s through the 1990s, recessions came and went, but no decade ended without at least a 20 percent increase in the number of jobs.”

So what kind of a grade should we give the Federal Reserve for the job that it has done?

How about a big fat F?

The Federal Reserve has been a failure of epic proportions.  It greatly contributed to the Great Depression (even Bernanke admits this), it created the conditions for the financial bubbles that greatly contributed to the financial crisis of 2008, and it has brought us to the verge of yet another gigantic financial crisis.

But Ben Bernanke believes that all of us that are criticizing the Fed are just ignorant.  He thinks that we just don’t understand the Fed properly.  During a recent question and answer session, Bernanke stated the following….

“I think that the concerns about the Fed are based on misconceptions”

Oh, if only the rest of us understood how the Fed works and how they really care about the American people.  Then everything would be okay.

Not.

During that same session, Bernanke insisted that the Federal Reserve only has the purest motives….

“Our motives are strictly to do what is in the best interest of the broad public and I believe that our efforts to stabilize the financial system, which were ultimately proved successful, were very much in the interest of the broad public”

According to Bernanke, those that work at the Fed are unselfish guardians of our monetary system who are fighting for truth, justice and the American way of life.

Okay, perhaps I am exaggerating just a bit, but you get the point.

Bernanke is trying very hard to convince all of us that the Federal Reserve is just misunderstood and that we should just trust what the “experts” are doing.

So what will the plan be if the financial crisis in Europe blows up?

Well, during his visit to Fort Bliss one of the soldiers actually asked him about that.  The following is his answer….

“Although the Fed would obviously do all that we could to maintain stability and to keep monetary policy as easy as necessary to try to minimize the damage, I don’t think we would be able to escape the consequences of a blow-up in Europe”

Oh, he would keep monetary policy “as easy as necessary”.

Isn’t that lovely – I bet that will be great for the value of the U.S. dollar.

Bernanke also told the soldiers that he believes that happy days are ahead for the U.S. economy….

“I do believe we will return to a healthier growth rate. I don’t see any reason why we couldn’t”

So we should just trust Bernanke, right?

He has never been wrong before, right?

Well, let’s check the record….

In 2005, Bernanke said that we shouldn’t worry because housing prices had never declined on a nationwide basis before and he said that he believed that the U.S. would continue to experience close to “full employment”….

“We’ve never had a decline in house prices on a nationwide basis. So, what I think what is more likely is that house prices will slow, maybe stabilize, might slow consumption spending a bit. I don’t think it’s gonna drive the economy too far from its full employment path, though.”

In 2005, Bernanke also said that he believed that derivatives were perfectly safe and posed no danger to financial markets….

“With respect to their safety, derivatives, for the most part, are traded among very sophisticated financial institutions and individuals who have considerable incentive to understand them and to use them properly.”

In 2006, Bernanke said that housing prices would probably keep rising….

“Housing markets are cooling a bit. Our expectation is that the decline in activity or the slowing in activity will be moderate, that house prices will probably continue to rise.”

In 2007, Bernanke insisted that there was not a problem with subprime mortgages….

“At this juncture, however, the impact on the broader economy and financial markets of the problems in the subprime market seems likely to be contained. In particular, mortgages to prime borrowers and fixed-rate mortgages to all classes of borrowers continue to perform well, with low rates of delinquency.”

In 2008, Bernanke said that a recession was not coming….

“The Federal Reserve is not currently forecasting a recession.”

A few months before Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac collapsed, Bernanke insisted that they were totally secure….

“The GSEs are adequately capitalized. They are in no danger of failing.”

For many more examples that demonstrate the absolutely nightmarish track record of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, please see the following articles….

*”Say What? 30 Ben Bernanke Quotes That Are So Stupid That You Won’t Know Whether To Laugh Or Cry”

*”Is Ben Bernanke A Liar, A Lunatic Or Is He Just Completely And Totally Incompetent?”

But after being wrong over and over and over, Barack Obama still nominated Ben Bernanke for another term as Chairman of the Fed.

It is hard to put how stupid that was into words.

Look, if someone wrecked your car again and again would you keep handing that person your keys?

It just doesn’t make any sense.

Bernanke made another statement during his visit with the troops this week that was really bizarre….

“The Federal Reserve is not perfect … but at this point, if you look around the world, you see no alternative”

He has got to be kidding, right?

Of course there are no other alternatives for us to look at!  Only a handful of nations on earth do not have a central bank at this point.  Iran, North Korea and a handful of others don’t have a central bank dominated by the international banking community but basically everyone else does.

Just because nearly every nation on earth has a central bank does not mean that there are not alternatives to the Federal Reserve system.  I detailed a plan the other day that would transition us away from the Federal Reserve system.

It most certainly can be done.

But right now, most of our politicians are standing up for a system that allows private central bankers to spend trillions of dollars bailing out their friends while the rest of us suffer.

The other day, an article by U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders appeared in the Huffington Post that detailed what was learned during a very limited audit of transactions conducted by the Federal Reserve during the recent financial crisis.

According to Senator Sanders, the Federal Reserve made 16 trillion dollars in secret loans to big corporations, Wall Street banks, foreign nations and wealthy individuals during the financial crisis….

“…we learned that the Federal Reserve provided a jaw-dropping $16 trillion in total financial assistance to every major financial institution in the country as well as a number of corporations, wealthy individuals and central banks throughout the world.”

Senator Sanders also says that the audit revealed that many of those running the Fed are from the same institutions that the Fed has been bailing out….

“The GAO also revealed that many of the people who serve as directors of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks come from the exact same financial institutions that the Fed is in charge of regulating. Further, the GAO found that at least 18 current and former Fed board members were affiliated with banks and companies that received emergency loans from the Federal Reserve during the financial crisis.”

Wait – isn’t there a huge conflict of interest problem there?

Of course there is.

But neither major political party is making a stink about it.

Sadly, Senator Sanders says that the audit found that there was “instance after instance” where individuals used their positions at the Fed to benefit their own firms….

“The GAO has detailed instance after instance of top executives of corporations and financial institutions using their influence as Federal Reserve directors to financially benefit their firms, and, in at least one instance, themselves.”

Wow – you would think that this scandal would have been reported on the front page of every major newspaper from coast to coast.

But that didn’t happen.

In fact, both major political parties continue to insist that there is nothing wrong with the Federal Reserve and that the Fed is doing a wonderful job.

It really is sickening.

Look, we need to educate the American people about the Federal Reserve and we need to make control over our currency a major issue in the 2012 campaign.

The American people should demand that the issuing of all United States currency be immediately returned to Congress as the U.S. Constitution requires.

The American people should demand that no more debt-based Federal Reserve Notes be issued and that from now on only debt-free United States money be issued.

The Federal Reserve has a track record of nearly 100 years of failure.

It is time for it to be shut down.

The choice, America, is up to you.

The Economic Collapse

There are times that one has to lament the state of American “journalism” and how badly it has become infested with magical thinking.  Unfortunately, Mr. Moyers is one of those who has fallen to this disease.

The government is paralyzed. Our government is just not working. If the election continues the status quo, we are in trouble. Our political system has gotten us into such a mess that we can’t solve our problems. This happened once before when the political system broke down and could not work to bridge differences, and the result was a disastrous civil war. The system is failing now. It isn’t solving the debt problem or the foreclosure problem or anything. We have been able to use military to kill our enemies, but that’s about it. This election is one more chance to make good choices. If the Republicans send people to do what they have been doing – just keep saying “no” – we will reap the harvest of history. If the Democrats continue to wring their hands and settle for photo ops and rhetoric, we will get nowhere. They (political parties) are going to be finished unless we can settle the deep and divisive issues that are taking us down. This election should be opportunity for the people to take the bridge of the ship and say to the captain, “That’s an iceberg out there, turn the ship.”

So how does the election not continue the “status quo” when The Press refuses to speak to truth?

How would Bill define “good choices”?  And what “deep and divisive issues” are we talking about here?

Look, I know where Bill is going….. and then he serves it right up:

I know a lot of tea partiers. I was out listening to them and talking to them. They had a half-truth. Why do I want to put more of my taxes into a government that was serving special interests? They understood that. The other side says we have to have a safety net. The two sides can’t get together. The populist movement (of the tea party) was taken over and co-opted by corporate interests. It’s hard to retain fiery indignation and independence when that happens. I don’t think Occupy Wall Street will have the influence they want unless they do what the tea party did and take over the nominating process. Unless they do, they will never have the satisfaction that they want and that the civil rights movement, say, had back in the 1950s and ’60s. These people are not going to have long-ranging effect unless they have a party to act on their interests. They need to become a political movement instead of a grievance committee.

What “safety net” Bill?  This is what you don’t want to face: The so-called “safety net” you’re looking for is not a “safety net.”  A safety net is a soup kitchen and a charity ward at the hospital, along with a shelter — in short, “three hots and a cot, plus a doc.”  That’s all it is.

But somewhere along the way “a safety net” got defined as a $500 iPhone and the $100 in monthly service charges that go with it, a $2,000 plasma TV, $100+ in cable or satellite TV service, air conditioning blasting at 72F when it’s 95F outside and 75F inside when it’s -20F in the winter, lobster and T-bone steaks on “food stamps”, “disability” for adults who choose to act like babies and waddle around in diapers (literally!) and similar abuses.  That which everyone believes we can provide for those who truly need it got turned into an entitlement to a lifestyle that defined a tycoon’s life just 20 or 30 years ago!

“Education” is the same thing.  It used to be cinder-block dorms with a common bathroom down the hall and slop-house cafeteria-style food.  It could also be paid for flipping burgers or delivering pizzas when you weren’t in class.  Now it looks (and costs) more like a luxury condo complex.  We have outrageous for-profit edifices to football driving our “colleges” while 10 year old boys allegedly get buggered in the shower but boy oh boy those schools are great, and when the coach gets sacked the students riot to protest his firing, not the fact that a bunch of at-risk kids were allegedly sexually assaulted right under their noses on their university grounds for two decades!

“Medical care” used to mean, in the context of the safety net, the aforementioned charity ward.  Now it means Juanita the illegal Mexican coming into the US at 8 months pregnant with zero prenatal care in her nation and then going into premature labor, sticking the American taxpayer with a $1 million labor, delivery, and NICU bill. Instead of charging here with felony theft (which it is) from our nation she gets coddled, fed, housed, doctored and allowed to stay as a reward for her unlawful conduct.  Then when she, with no skills, goes on the dole we call it a “safety net” keeping her in subsidized housing and food instead of buying her and her kid a plane ticket back to her nation of residence. 

Jose comes to pick strawberries and gets hurt on the job; he steals $20,000 in medical care from us all since he can’t pay either and has no right to be here.  Rather than charge him with both the illegal entry and theft for ripping us off we treat him, allow him to stay and cover his subsidized housing and food all so we can pay 25 cents less for a quart of strawberries instead of having the millions of unemployed Americans pick them at a living US-style wage!

It also means approving for Prostate Cancer (a deadly disease) a $100,000 treatment for anyone who wants it and fits the profile, irrespective of ability to pay and the fact that this $100 large buys, on average, four months of additional life, $200,000+ open heart surgery for people who have lived their entire life with a BMI of 30+ and refuse to lose the weight, hip replacements on demand for those who destroyed them through a lifetime of bad habits and similar abuses.  This is not to say that people don’t have the right to eat themselves to death — they do.  But where does the “safety net” end when consequences are divorced from choices?

The answer is simple: It never ends.  We made promises we can’t keep and The Press, including Bill Moyers, cheered those promises on as “compassion”, never once asking “uh, excuse me, but how much is the bill going to be for this fancy meal you’re serving up?” and refusing to recommend that people eat before they get an answer to the question.

Since 1979, 40 percent of the increase of wealth has gone to 1 percent of the population. I don’t know if the destruction of the middle class was by design, but that’s been the effect of it. Our economy favors the relative few at the top, and everything else is left barely hanging on, if that. That’s the story of the last 30 years. This is similar to what happened between the Civil War and 1912. The industrial revolution created incredible wealth at the top and great misery everywhere else. There was a feeling by political leaders that the wealthy deserved their riches because they are virtuous. And then the people rose up and in bloody soil planted the seeds that the 20th century used as markers to lay down a civilized society: the right of women to vote, the end of child labor, the creation of Social Security and rights for unions to organize and so on. Unless we can resurrect a vigorous fair government that works on behalf of everyday people, we are going to become a plutocracy like Mexico where wealth is concentrated at the top and everybody else is left with scraps.

Ah, but here’s the problem Bill.  You want $50 DVD players and a DOW in the 12,000s but the way we got both was by exporting our blue collar labor to places that abuse employees to the point that they have to net the buildings to prevent them from committing suicide!

We also used to pollute the hell out of the air and water; I grew up with a chemical plant a few miles from my home that would make your eyes water every time you drove by it.  We cut that crap out and doing so was expensive.  But our manufacturing, in addition to being exported to places where labor is exploited, also exploits damaging the environment!

In addition you want “protection” of housing prices but there’s no way to do that other than screwing everyone as the price appreciation was due to false economic demand that in fact did not exist.  Never mind that for the person without a house they want low prices, not high ones, just like the buyer of a stereo or DVD player wants low prices.

You can’t have this both ways and pretending to “fix it” with borrowing (which is what we’ve done serially since 1980) isn’t a fix — it’s a lie.  Bill’s lament may be nice at heart, but the truth requires more than “a good heart.”  If requires facing certain facts, such as:

• A “safety net” isn’t equality of result.  It’s an emergency intervention mechanism for those who (a) truly need it, and (b) exists at a literal subsistence level so that people who have the ability to be productive will not willingly choose to stay within it.   Three hots, a cot and a doc but no iPhones, no plasma TVs and no luxury goods of any sort.  If you have $2,000 worth of rims on that ghetto-mobile we sell ‘em and use ‘em to pay your “benefits” with.  Food coupons are for reasonable and non-prepared foodstuffs — the outside “ring” of the grocery store ex luxury items (define it as anything that’s less than 150% of the per-serving cost for hamburger or chicken breast and that seems reasonable.)  Those who say that we must be “nicer” because some people don’t have full kitchens have obviously never been in these stores of late; they all sell $20 skillets and crock pots that are perfectly-sufficient to prepare real food and work anywhere there’s an electrical outlet.  For under $100 in hard goods I can equip a family of four with the ability to make and eat (including tableware) anything from omelettes, eggs and bacon to pot roasts.  Cut the crap Bill or even better, stop being a damned limousine liberal and go shopping for your own food for once — in a real store (you know, a Winn-Dixie, Publix or WalMart — NOT “Whole Paycheck.”)
• Debt is nothing more than pulling forward tomorrow’s demand into today.  That assumes, incidentally, that you actually pay down the debt.  When you do what we’ve done, serially adding to it at a rate exceeding growth in GDP for a literal 30 straight years, it is known as a scam and the mainstream media is and has been a prime enabler of that scam.
• The economic demand presented by debt that is never paid down is false.  This is obvious to anyone who has a hint of intelligence and honesty in their analysis, yet it seems to escape virtually everyone who comments on these matters.  How can that be, other than through malevolent intent?  It’s impossible to argue that this is a “mistake” or “difference of opinion” since the arithmetic is neither difficult or advanced; it is in fact fifth grade material.  Since one must assume that the mainstream media and economics professions are in fact professionals who have no less than an honest high-school education (with nearly all being degreed college graduates) it is simply impossible to accept that the willful and intentional failure to point this out and honestly present it is an accident.

There’s a real problem here and we cannot solve it without honest brokers in both the political sphere and the media.  The former is hard enough to obtain but when the media glad-handles the politicians it is literally impossible since the media becomes the enablers of those who steal from the public.

We can have an honest debate about the virtue of liberal versus conservative policies, what an appropriate and fair tax system looks like and what government services we should have in this nation and elsewhere.

But none of this can happen until we connect the services we demand from government with the means to pay for them in the present tense and stop lying across the board about what we’ve done over the last 30 years along with the mathematically-certain outcome of that behavior.

In order for a society to function, there has to be a certain level of trust.  Each day when we leave our homes, we take for granted that most people are not going to attack us for no reason, that there will only be isolated incidents of theft in our community and that rioting and violence are not going to erupt in the streets.   Whether we realize it or not, we depend on the fact that the vast majority of the people around us are going to act in a civilized manner.  Unfortunately, the thin veneer of civilization that we all take for granted is starting to disappear.  When I was growing up, I was taught that challenging times reveal our true character.  There are many that believe that the declining economy is causing a lot of the chaos that we are now witnessing, but perhaps what is going on is that these challenging economic times are simply revealing the character that has been there all along.  For decades, a “false prosperity” that was fueled by unprecedented amounts of debt has masked a lot of the internal rot that has taken hold in America.  But now that our prosperity is crumbling, our lack of values is becoming startlingly clear.

Greed, corruption and extreme self-centeredness have deeply infected our society.  We see this on Wall Street and in Congress, and we see this among those that are trying to survive on the mean streets of our largest cities.

Our nation is breaking down on every level.  If by some miracle we were able to fix our economy, that would mask our problems for a while, but it would not solve them.

Unfortunately, as I write about nearly every day, there are a whole host of indications that our economy is about to get even worse.  When it does, millions of Americans will become even more desperate, and as we are now seeing all over this country, desperate people do desperate things.

The following are 22 signs that the thin veneer of civilization that we all take for granted is starting to disappear….

#1 In Detroit, 100 bus drivers recently refused to drive their routes out of fear for their own personal safety.  An article posted on the website of the CBS affiliate in Detroit is quoting the head of the bus drivers union, Henry Gaffney, as saying that the drivers are “scared for their lives”….

“Our drivers are scared, they’re scared for their lives. This has been an ongoing situation about security. I think yesterday kind of just topped it off, when one of my drivers was beat up by some teenagers down in the middle of Rosa Parks and it took the police almost 30 minutes to get there, in downtown Detroit,” said Gaffney.

#2 In Wilmington, Delaware recently, a man offered to help someone carry a television down the street, but quickly realized that it was his own television which had just been stolen out of his house….

A Wilmington resident who stopped home for lunch about noon today saw a man carrying a flat screen TV down the street and asked the man if he needed help.

He then recognized the television as his own, looked up and saw the door to his home ajar, said Master Sgt. Adam Ringle.

#3 Shocking video has surfaced of a young thug walking up to a defenseless elderly man in a Chicago subway station and knocking him out cold.  In the video, the friends of the young man are cheering him on and laughing at how easy it was to knock the old man out cold.

#4 Beating up old people for no reason seems to be catching on all over the country.  Just check out the following report from a recent article posted on philly.com….

AN 84-YEAR-OLD ex-university official savagely attacked by four young punks during a walk in Wissahickon Valley Park earlier this week theorizes that the beating he endured was a cruel game of “get the old geezer.”

Jim Shea, a former vice president of university relations for Temple, from 1968 to 1983, walks up to five miles on Forbidden Drive, in Fairmount Park, three times a week, but that type of stamina wasn’t enough to stave off the lowlifes who not only beat him bloody, but dealt a blow to one of the things he holds most dear – his pride.

#5 All over the United States, police are wailing on Occupy Wall Street protesters with clubs and liberally using pepper spray on them.  Whatever you may think of the Occupy Wall Street protests, the reality is that this is not a sign that things are becoming “more stable” in America.  You can see video of one very disturbing confrontation right here.

#6 Clashes between police and protesters in Oakland, California recently became so violent that at one point the streets of Oakland resembled a war zone.

#7 Unfortunately, as the American people become increasingly frustrated with out system many of them are actually starting to consider violence as a solution.  According to one recent survey, 31 percent of all Occupy Wall Street protesters “would support violence to advance their agenda”.

#8 In New York recently, a confrontation between two female customers and a frustrated cashier ended with the cashier beating the living daylights out of them with a metal rod.  The following is how a local CBS affiliate in New York described this incident….

It appeared to have started when two female customers argued and yelled obscenities at the cashier when he questioned a $50 bill they gave him.

One of the female customers then slapped the cashier. A woman is then seen jumping over the counter while the other woman goes behind the register.

That’s when the cashier can be seen on the video disappearing into the back of the fast-food restaurant. He comes back with a metal rod and begins hitting the women.

You can see video of this violent confrontation right here.

#9 These days, many Americans are so “on edge” that just about anything will make them snap.  For example, a 60-year-old woman in New Mexico recently repeatedly stabbed her boyfriend because she thought that he was cheating during a game of Monopoly.

#10 If you thought that the above example was crazy, just check out what one man down in Georgia did recently.  He actually firebombed a Taco Bell because they did not put enough meat in his Chalupa.

#11 In Cleveland last week, a 49-year-old man was sent to the hospital after a poll monitor working for the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections tried to bite his nose off.

#12 Not only do TSA agents make us feel like dehumanized cattle as we go through airport security, some of them are evening making fun of us at the same time.  For example, one TSA agent recently scribbled “GET YOUR FREAK ON GIRL” on a TSA inspection notice after discovering a sex toy in the luggage of one female traveler.

#13 Identity theft is rising to very alarming levels all over the United States.  For example, a recent article in the Palm Beach Post described what has been going on down in Florida this year….

In the first half of this year, the Federal Trade Commission received more than 20,000 complaints from Floridians whose identities had been stolen — nearly as many as in all of 2010. More than half of those reporting their Social Security numbers or other personal information had been ripped off and used to commit fraud or theft were in South Florida, with heavy concentrations in parts of Fort Lauderdale, Hollywood and Hallandale Beach.

“That kind of increase is really shocking,” said Vance Luce, deputy special agent in charge of the U.S. Secret Service in South Florida, which investigates identity theft and financial crimes. “The fact that it’s on the upturn doesn’t surprise me at all, but that’s pretty alarming.”

#14 In the Seattle area, an elderly couple in their eighties was recently brutally attacked by a 31-year-old man armed with a crossbow and a hatchet.  The following description of this brutal crime comes from King 5 News….

Prosecutors say 31-year-old John Chase was walking down the highway when he saw Ralph Aldrich, 88, in his back yard. Detectives say Chase shot and killed Aldrich with a crossbow and then went inside the home and repeatedly hit 83-year-old June Aldrich with a hatchet.

#15 As America falls apart, more of us than ever are taking medication for depression.  At this point, more than 1 out of every 10 Americans over the age of 12 is taking prescription antidepressants.

#16 In some areas of the country, people have been literally tearing apart their own cities in an attempt to find things to sell.  I recently discussed this phenomenon on The American Dream Blog….

In Fresno, California the damage caused by thieves stealing copper wire from city street lights is costing the city about $50,000 a month.  So far, about 2,500 street lights have been stripped of their wiring.

#17 As people become more desperate, we are starting to see some truly bizarre crimes in many parts of the nation.  In northern Alabama, one team of crooks has been using a forklift to pull entire ATM machines out of the ground.

#18 Most Americans don’t realize this, but all over the U.S. livestock is being stolen from ranchers in unprecedented numbers.  The following is from a recent Associated Press article….

While the brazenness may be unusual, the theft isn’t. High beef prices have made cattle attractive as a quick score for people struggling in the sluggish economy, and other livestock are being taken too. Six thousand lambs were stolen from a feedlot in Texas, and nearly 1,000 hogs have been stolen in recent weeks from farms in Iowa and Minnesota. The thefts add up to millions of dollars in losses for U.S. ranches.

Authorities say today’s thieves are sophisticated compared to the horseback bandits of the rugged Old West. They pull up livestock trailers in the middle of the night and know how to coax the animals inside. Investigators suspect it’s then a quick trip across state lines to sell the animals at auction barns.

#19 At this point, thieves are becoming so bold that they will steal literally anything that they are able to cart away.  For example, in the San Francisco area a while back thieves actually stole a copper bell that weighs 2.7 tons.

#20 According to the FBI, the number of gang members in the United States has increased by a staggering 40 percent since 2009.  Right now, there are 1.4 million gang members terrorizing citizens on the streets of America.

#21 Down in Miami, thieves have become so bold that they have actually been breaking into parked police cruisers and stealing guns and ammo out of them.  Many of those guns undoubtedly are ending up in the hands of gangs members.

#22 Be careful who you befriend online.  They might just hold you captive and use you as part of a Satanic sex ritual.  The following description of an incident that recently happened in Milwaukee comes from thesmokinggun.com….

Two young Milwaukee women were arrested this week after an 18-year-old Arizona man–who traveled to Wisconsin by bus after meeting one of the suspects online–told cops that he was held captive in the duo’s apartment for two days and slashed and stabbed more than 300 times as part of an apparent satanic sex ritual.

Anger and frustration are growing to unprecedented levels in this country, and all of this anger and frustration is manifesting in thousands of different ways.

As I have written about previously, the rioting, the crime and the violence that we are seeing now is only just the beginning of what is coming.

Unless a miracle happens, our country is going to keep heading down the road toward societal collapse.  For even more examples that show that our country is starting to come apart at the seams, please see the following articles that I have authored previously….

-”18 Signs The Collapse Of Society Is Accelerating”

-”12 More Signs That Society Is Collapsing”

It won’t happen all at once, but unless our nation changes direction dramatically, we will see things get progressively worse and worse.

Instead of teaching our children to love and care for one another, we have taught them to be incredibly self-involved.  Today, way too many Americans deeply love themselves, deeply love money and are deeply addicted to entertainment.  Each new generation seems to be even more prideful, even more arrogant and even more violent.  As a nation, we are losing our empathy for others, our compassion for the needy and our respect for the elderly.  Our family units are breaking down and thousands of our communities are being transformed into hellholes.

What in the world is happening to America?

The Economic Collapse