NSA bugs Merkel aides instead of chancellor
RT | February 24, 2014
In the wake of President Obama’s promise to stop spying on German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the US intelligence has switched its attention to her top government officials, a German newspaper reported.
Washington’s relations with Germany were strained last year after revelations that the US National Security Agency (NSA) was conducting mass surveillance in Germany and even tapped the mobile phone of Chancellor Merkel.
Facing the German outrage, President Barack Obama pledged that the US would stop spying on the leader of the European country, which is among the closest and most powerful allies of America.
After the promise was made, the NSA has stepped up surveillance of senior German officials, German newspaper Bild am Sonntag (BamS) reported on Sunday.
“We have had the order not to miss out on any information now that we are no longer able to monitor the chancellor’s communication directly,” it quoted a top NSA employee in Germany as saying.
BamS said the NSA had 297 employees stationed in Germany and was surveying 320 key individuals, most of them German decision-makers involved in politics and business.
Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere is of particular interest to the US, the report said, because he is a close aide of Merkel, who seeks his advice on many issues and was rumored to be promoting his candidacy for the post of NATO secretary-general.
A spokesman for the German Interior Ministry told the newspaper it would not comment on the “allegations of unnamed individuals.”
Privacy issues are a very sensitive area in Germany, which holds the memory of invasive state surveillance practices by the Nazi government and later by the Communist government in the former East Germany.
Part of the outrage in Germany was caused by the allegation that US intelligence is using its surveillance capabilities not only to provide national security, but also to gain business advantage for American companies over their foreign competitors.
Berlin has been pushing for a ‘no-spying deal’ with the US for months, but so far with little success. Germany is also advocating the creation of a European computer network which would allow communication traffic not to pass through US-based servers and thus avoid the NSA tapping.
Invasions of the Mind Snatchers
By Nebojsa Malic | Ron Paul Institute | February 19, 2014
Many empires have risen and fallen over the course of recorded history. All were created by force. Yet all have tried to legitimize that force, by passing laws and seeking to establish some sort of order that would outlive their military supremacy. Some have been more successful at this than others. The Atlantic Empire, on the other hand, is the only example in history of an imperial enterprise destroying its own laws, undermining its own legitimacy in pursuit of power.
Atlantist politicians invoke “democracy” almost as a totem, a sacred idea whose veneration magically bestows legitimacy upon governments and peoples. Thus framed, the totem does not bear closer scrutiny, and even defies definition. It is whatever the Empire says it is.
In actuality, democracy is just one political decision-making process. Politics, like chess or football, is a stand-in for war, designed to ritualize conflict so as to prevent bloodshed. As long as everyone abides by the rules, and accepts the restrictions of the system, that is all fine and good. Democracy has been described as “civil war with ballots instead of bullets.” Once someone decides to cheat, or even rewrite the rules to “I win, you lose,” the ballots lose their meaning. And bullets are the only thing left.
Or are they? Though the Atlantic Empire has not hesitated to use brute force to impose its will (e.g. the 1999 “Kosovo War”), such interventions have always been risky, costly and complicated. In 1999, for example, it took 78 days for the combined might of NATO to win a negotiated armistice with the outnumbered and outgunned Yugoslavia, allowing the Empire to occupy the province of Kosovo, but not the country entire. So the Atlantists turned to other means.
A student organization, “Otpor,” was taken over and turned into a revolutionary force. With millions of dollars in US taxpayer funding, promotional materials, “training” by the National Endowment for Democracy and other government instructors in nearby Hungary, these “activists” ran a media campaign against the Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic.
Meanwhile, the U.S. government rounded up some 18 opposition parties, wrote their program, and handpicked the front-man for the presidential elections of September 2000: a mild-mannered translator of the Federalist Papers who was never supposed to have any actual power. That would be reserved for the real leader of the “Democratic Opposition of Serbia” (DOS), whose popular support ran in single digits.
The government was caught between “Otpor” and DOS, appealing to the citizenry not to elect foreign agents. When the results of the election showed that DOS did not win, but may have won enough votes to force a runoff, “Otpor” activists and militia personally loyal to the DOS leader started a riot, burning the ballots at the National Assembly building. When the military and the police refused to intervene, president Milosevic resigned. It later emerged that the head of Yugoslavia’s state security had been a CIA informant for almost a decade, as were several high-ranking generals.
If this scenario sounds familiar, that’s because it is. Having been successfully tested in Serbia, the model was then applied elsewhere: 2003 in Georgia (“Rose Revolution”), 2004 in Ukraine (“Orange Revolution”), 2005 in Kyrgizstan (“Tulip Revolution”) and Lebanon (“Cedar Revolution”). The “Jeans Revolution” in Belarus (2006) failed, as did the “Green Revolution” in Iran (2009) and the “White Revolution” in Russia (2012). In all cases, the supposedly popular revolt followed a pattern straight out of the playbook used in Serbia – even to the clenched-fist symbol used by the “student activists” supposedly organizing the protests.
In early 2011, a series of revolts erupted in North Africa, bearing all the hallmarks of the astroturf “color revolutions”: governments were toppled in Tunisia and Egypt. Fringe protests in Libya and Syria escalated into all-out civil war. Meanwhile, a genuine popular protest in Bahrain was crushed by force; Bahrain is a major U.S. fleet base and a client-state of Saudi Arabia.
In every case, the Western media narrative has been the same: young people everywhere demanding “democracy” and overthrowing the evil regimes oppressing them. And if there is any fault to be found in Washington on EU capitals, it is for “standing idly by” and “not helping enough.”
In mid-2011, some European filmmakers made a documentary called “The Revolution Business”, daring to notice the common thread in the supposedly spontaneous outpourings of street riots demanding democracy throughout the world. They spent a lot of time with Srdja Popovic, former Otpor leader that went on to become a professional revolutionary. Otpor having folded years ago into Serbia’s ruling Democratic Party, Popovic now runs an outfit called CANVAS (Center for Applied NonViolent Action and Strategies), lecturing all over the world and training activists in dozens of countries to replicate the Serbian coup. In that mission he is helped by an instruction booklet written by Gene Sharp, a scholar from Boston.
The tactics and techniques of the revolutionaries have been described in some detail, both in Sharp’s book and by outside observers (such as John Laughland). Suffice to say they are all about exploiting the genuine public sentiment — real discontent where it exists, manufactured where it does not — and using the tricks from their toolbox to nudge it in the desired direction.
They always target the young, known for the excess of zeal and shortage of forethought. Who doesn’t want freedom and democracy – which they envision as the hedonist lifestyle seen on American films and TV. And here are all these “consultants”, teaching them for “free”. Even those who dislike and mistrust the Empire find it hard to argue against such gifts without seeming unduly paranoid.
Between the anvil of internal rebellion and the hammer of the Imperial media and diplomatic assault, the “oppressive regime” usually loses its nerve and folds. The “good democrats” installed in power soon start ruling in the interest of the Empire, and the activists realize the “training and consultation” they received weren’t free after all. The Empire always collects its debts.
Yet the revolutionaries rarely revolt after finding out they’ve been used thus. Even if they somehow overcame the crushingly demoralizing effect of finding out they were the agents of their own subjugation, that very fact destroys their credibility at home. Having supped from the cannibal pot, they are marked forever.
Then there are some who enjoy the taste, and become willing agents of the Empire. Popovic is proud of his revolution-exporting adventures. He gladly points out that the Otpor logo — a stenciled fist — has been used by local franchises from Ukraine to Venezuela. On several occasions, the backdrop to Popovic is an Otpor poster, showing the fist and the motto, “Because I love Serbia.” It is a particularly vicious lie: in the Serbia the Empire had Otpor create, only those who hate it prosper.
Popovic does try to obscure his Imperial connections, claiming that CANVAS is an entirely private organization, funded with Serbian money. Why, then, is its name an English acronym? And where did they get the money, in a country first systematically impoverished by a decade of UN sanctions, then bombed to rubble, and finally looted by the Empire’s “democrats”? So looted, in fact, that rummaging through garbage is close to becoming a major branch of agriculture…
And that is the other thing no one dares mention about the “color revolutions”: the governments they put into power are inevitably lackeys of the Empire, imposing horrifyingly destructive policies at home. Even when the people try to vote them out, the Empire simply bribes the winning politicians into switching sides, as it has done in Serbia in 2008 and 2012. Recent events in Ukraine, following the government’s rejection of an economic suicide offer from the EU, demonstrate that the Empire has become more desperate and less scrupulous about denying reality when doing so suits its interests. The legitimately elected government in Kiev has been demonized as “abolishing democracy,” while the violent protesters – representing fringe leaders micro-managed by U.S. and German diplomats – are extolled as authentic democrats and patriots.
Tracing the pattern of astroturfed “revolutions” over the past decade and a half, one cannot help but notice that they are suffering from diminishing marginal returns. In Serbia, a threat of violence and a lot of smoke and mirrors were sufficient to topple the government that successfully defended against conventional warfare. Eleven years later in Libya, it actually took an open military intervention (“kinetic military action” in Pentagonese) to make the rebels win, while the Syrian rebels are steadily losing the war despite all the aid and propaganda in their favor.
Another pernicious consequence of CANVAS in the governments the Empire decides to dislike is that any legitimate protest against genuinely repressive governments becomes that much less likely. Having seen country after country devastated by “color revolutions”, ruining the future of millions for the sake of a handful of quislings, people around the world are that much more reluctant to take politics into the streets. And with the ballot box increasingly discredited by Empire-backed “democrats” who refused to accept democracy if and when they lose, elections may soon become discredited as well. Leaving what, exactly, as a civilized form of conflict-resolution?
The Empire claims to champion democracy, but the end result of its actions is the exact opposite. There is no world order at work here, new or otherwise. Just chaos.
Protest Coverage in Haiti and Venezuela Reveals U.S. Media Hypocrisy
By Kevin Edmonds | NACLA | February 21, 2014
The media coverage of the events unfolding in Venezuela provides a troubling example of how the imperial ambitions of the United States can magnify crises—especially when contrasted with the current political situation in Haiti.
Both Venezuela and Haiti have been facing anti-government protests, with the respective oppositions citing poor leadership, corruption, electoral fraud, and a deteriorating economy as their primary motivations in calling for change. However, the international media’s escalation of the Venezuelan crisis and their complete silence when it comes to Haiti, raises some important questions about the United States’ inconsistency in upholding the values of human rights and democracy.
Haiti has been enduring a political crisis since the highly controversial election of President Michel Martelly, who received his mandate from only 16.7 percent of registered voters, and has been running the country without a fully functioning government in order to avoid dealing with constitutionally mandated checks and balances. For the third year in a row, Martelly has promised to hold elections to fill legislative and local seats without yet following through.
As evidence of Martelly’s unbridled commitment to democracy, instead of holding elections for mayors whose terms expired in 2012, he personally handpicked the representatives, appointing them as “municipal agents.” As a result of Martelly’s political inaction on the national level, one third of the seats in the Haitian Senate remain empty. This congressional inability to establish quorum on issues of national importance has been particularly convenient for the President. In September 2013, the Senate put forward a resolution to indict President Martelly, Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe, and the Minister of Justice Jean Renel Sanon for high treason, lying to the public, and playing a harmful role in the death of Judge Jean Serge Joseph.
Earlier in 2013, Judge Joseph had been given the task of overseeing a high profile corruption investigation against President Michel Martelly’s wife Sophia and their son Olivier. Judge Joseph had reported receiving threats to dismiss the corruption case during a meeting with Martelly, the Prime Minister, and the Minister of Justice and Public Security. Joseph refused, and two days later he died under suspicious circumstances.
Because the Haitian Senate has only 16 of 30 members currently active, the impeachment vote was not passed on a technicality. This was in spite of the decision, which saw 7 of the 16 members vote in favor of Martelly’s impeachment, with 9 abstentions and 0 voting against the motion. According to the Haitian Constitution, abstentions do not count as votes—with Article 117 stating that “All acts of the Legislature must be approved by a majority of the members present [emphasis added].” Thus, in regular circumstances the decision by the Senate would move forward with the impeachment. Therefore, this purposefully fragmented political system does a great deal to serve the interests of impunity.
This political crisis is especially worrying when the murder of opposition leaders in Haiti has gone largely unreported in the international press. Most recently, on February 8, Daniel Dorsainvil, one of Haiti’s leading human rights activists and his wife Girldy Lareche were gunned down in Port au Prince. While conflicted motives for the shooting have emerged, Haiti’s human rights community fears that the murders were politically motivated. Dorsainvil was the Coordinator of the Platform for Haitian Organizations for the Defense of Human Rights (POHDH). POHDH was established after the coup d’état of Jean Bertrand Aristide in 1991. According to POHDH’s website, “The systematic suppression of the military against the democratic and popular movement, which followed this event, and the mass amount of human rights violations in general, was the motivation for social and community development organizations to regroup with the purpose of initiating actions specifically in the field of human rights.”
A civil engineer by training, Dorsainvil had been a tireless advocate for justice, routinely speaking out against the Martelly government for its disregard of human rights, political scandals, and the consistent delaying of elections. Dorsainvil’s latest initiative was the establishment of the Patriotic People’s Democratic Movement (MPDP), a group of thirty political and social organizations openly standing in opposition to Martelly’s government. While this attack is tragic on its own, it comes after numerous threats against Haitian human rights defenders such as Patrice Florvilus, Mario Joseph, and André Michel.
In May 2013, Patrice Florvilus, the Executive Director of Defenders of the Oppressed, was subjected to numerous death threats. Margaret Satterthwaite, Director of the Global Justice Clinic at New York University School of Law, remarked:
The targeting of Patrice Florvilus and other attorneys demonstrates a troubling pattern of state obstruction of legitimate human rights work in Haiti…The government’s use of state institutions such as law enforcement, and its failure to address judicial and extra-legal threats leave human rights defenders dangerously exposed. All sectors of the government, from the police to the courts, are responsible for safeguarding human rights.
Due to the neglect and failure of the Haitian government to protect Florvilus and his family from attacks, he has had to relocate to Montreal in December 2013.
In October 2013, human rights lawyer Andre Michel was arrested by the Haitian National Police due to his initiation of legal proceedings against Martelly’s wife and son related to charges of corruption, which Judge Joseph oversaw before his death. Haitian human rights organizations condemned the arrest as an arbitrary and politically motivated attempt to intimidate human rights activists and members of the opposition.
Thus, while Martelly was praised by President Obama in early February for his leadership, Haiti has also seen a slew of anti-government protests due to the political crisis, human rights abuses, and economic decline. The lack of media attention regarding Martelly’s consistent attacks on popular organizations and human rights defenders in Haiti, in contrast to Venezuela is a stark reminder of how abuses of power can be marginalized if one has influential friends in the right places.
Nuclear Site Safety Official Fired After Her Repeated Warnings of Safety Problems
By Noel Brinkerhoff | AllGov | February 21, 2014
Yet another official at the nation’s most challenging environmental cleanup project has been fired after raising serious safety concerns.
This time it was Donna Busche, the head of nuclear safety for cleaning up the former nuclear weapons site at Hanford, Washington, which sits atop 53 million gallons of radioactive waste stored in underground tanks.
Busche, a nuclear engineer who oversaw a staff of 140, was fired by her employer, URS Corp., one of the federal contractors hired by the U.S. Department of Energy to resolve the Hanford mess.
“The Energy Department’s overall safety culture is broken and all they are doing now is sitting idly by,” Busche told the Los Angeles Times.
Her termination came after she repeatedly warned company executives that the radioactive-waste solution being used was flawed and posed safety problems.
URS denied that her firing had anything to do with her safety complaints, saying she was let go for “unprofessional conduct.”
Busche was the second senior project official fired at Hanford. A third official resigned, after citing safety-related concerns with the $13.4-billion construction project.
Walter Tamosaitis, who headed research at URS, was fired in 2013 after he questioned whether the company’s decision to mix the waste in large tanks might result in a buildup of hydrogen gas, which can explode.
In addition, Gary Brunson, the Energy Department’s engineering division director at Hanford, quit after warning of nearly three-dozen problems not being addressed by another site contractor, Bechtel.
But the worries don’t stop there. The Energy Department’s inspector general and other federal investigators have also warned of management and safety issues at Hanford. With 150 aging nuclear-waste tanks, many of which are leaking, it’s the largest cleanup project leftover from the Cold War.
To Learn More:
Official Who Raised Safety Concerns at Hanford Nuclear Site is Fired (by Ralph Vartabedian, Los Angeles Times)
Whistle-Blower Fired From Hanford Nuclear Site (by Nicholas K. Geranios, Associated Press)
As Hanford Radioactive Leak Continues, Clean-Up Contractor Pays Fraud Penalty (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)
Six Underground Tanks Leaking Nuclear Waste in Washington State (by Noel Brinkerhoff and Danny Biederman, AllGov)
Meet Jack. Or, What The Government Could Do With That Location Data
ACLU
Law enforcement is taking advantage of outdated privacy laws to track Americans like never before. New technologies can record your every movement, revealing detailed information about how you choose to live your life. Without the right protections in place, the government can gain access to this information — and to your private life — with disturbing ease.
As long as it is turned on, your mobile phone registers its position with cell towers every few minutes, whether the phone is being used or not. Since mobile carriers are retaining location data on their customers, government officials can learn a tremendous amount of detailed personal information about you by accessing your location history from your cell phone company, ranging from which friends you’re seeing to where you go to the doctor to how often you go to church. The Justice Department and most local police forces can get months’ worth of this information, without you ever knowing — and often without a warrant from a judge.
You can do something here:
https://www.aclu.org/GPSAct
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Syria’s Chemical Weapons Destruction
Chaos, Corruption, Grand Theft, and an Experiment
By Felicity Arbuthnot | Dissident Voice | February 19, 2014
On September 12, 2013, Syria’s President al-Assad committed to surrender Syria’s chemical weapons, with the caveats that the United States must stop threatening his country and supplying weapons to the terrorists. He has been as good as his word. The same cannot be said for the US and its boot licking allies.
Three days earlier US Secretary of State John Kerry – who had been killing Vietnamese in the US onslaught on Vietnam as American ‘planes rained down 388,000 tons of chemical weapons on the Vietnamese people – had threatened Syria with a military strike if the weapons stocks were not surrendered within a week, stating that President Assad “isn’t about to do it and it can’t be done.”
The ever trigger-happy Kerry was right on the second count. It can’t be done for two reasons — extracting dangerous chemicals from a war zone is, to massively understate, a foolhardy and hazardous business. Additionally, it seems having received Syria’s agreement, the “international community” and the Nobel Peace Prize winning Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) had no disposal plan in place and had not a clue what to do with them, whilst at every turn Syria is blamed.
As ever double standards and hypocrisy rule. According to CNN (October 10, 2013): “The United States estimates it will be at least another decade before it completes destruction of the remaining 10% of its chemical weapons, estimated at more than 3,100 tons.” And Syria? “U.S. intelligence and other estimates put its chemical weapons stockpile at about 1,000 tons.” They are believed to be “stored in dozens of sites”, in the circumstances a logistical nightmare and a massive danger to the public and those driving them to be insisting on transporting them anywhere.
CNN also quotes Wade Mathews who had worked on “the U.S. project to destroy its chemical stockpile” who doubted that Syria could meet the deadlines. The US operation, he said, “took billions of dollars, the cooperation of many levels of government – including the military – and a safe environment to make sure the destruction was done safely. We had a coordinated effort, we had a government that insisted that it be done safely and that the community was protected … I don’t think those things are in place in Syria.”
Having received Syria’s compliance, the OPCW started shopping around for a country – any country it seems – to destroy the weapons. Norway, approached by the US, was first choice. They declined, since the country had no experience in dealing with chemical weapons, the Foreign Ministry website stating: “… Norway is not the most suitable location for this destruction.” The second country approached was Albania, a request which the country’s Prime Minister Edi Rama said also came direct from the United States.
According to the Berlin-based Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative, Albania is one of the most corrupt countries in Europe and the most corrupt in the Balkans, plummeting from a woeful 95 out of the 176 countries monitored in 2011, to 113 in 2012 and 116 in 2013, on their Corruption Perception Index.
In their end of year Report, the Initiative quotes Transparency International:
In Albania corruption is registering a new physiognomy in a favorable political environment, with characteristics like a new systems for money laundering, financing of political parties from illegal activities, the capture of the state through the control of procurement and privatization, human and narcotics trafficking and the impunity of high State officials before the justice system and the law.
Protestors against the weapons destruction took to the streets in thousands, some wearing gas masks and protective clothing. Protests also took place in neighbouring Macedonia, with rallying outside the Albanian Embassy.
Albania finally rejected with Rana apologetically grovelling to Washington: “Without the United States, Albanians would never have been free and independent in two countries that they are today”, he said referring to Albania and Kosovo and the massive March 24, 1999 – June 10, 1999 NATO and US assault on the former Yugoslavia with depleted uranium weapons which are, of course, both chemical and radioactive. A Science Applications International Report explains re the residue from the weapons:
Soluble forms present chemical hazards, primarily to the kidneys, while insoluble forms present hazards to the lungs from ionizing radiation … short term effects of high doses can result in death, while long term effects of low doses have been implicated in cancer.
In addition to concerns regarding corruption in Albania – terrorist groups would undoubtedly offer high sums for such weapons – safety might surely have been a consideration. In 2008 an explosion at an ammunition storage depot near Albania’s capitol Tirana, killed 26 people, wounded 300, and damaged or destroyed 5,100 homes. The disaster was said by investigators to be caused by a burning cigarette – in a depository for 1,400 tons of explosives.
Worse, when Albania was pressured to destroy its own chemical weapons stocks, some tons left over from the Cold War.
The U.S. offered to pay for their destruction and later hired some private company which destroyed the weapon capability of the chemicals but otherwise left a horrendous mess.
Hazardous waste was left in containers, on a concrete pad. Inevitably they started to leak.
“In late 2007-early 2008, the US hired an environmental remediation firm, Savant Environmental, who determined the problem was worse than originally thought. Many of the containers were leaking salts of heavy metals, primarily arsenic, lead and mercury.”
Moreover, the conexes – large, steel-reinforced shipping containers – were not waterproof, thus lethally contaminated condensation and water leakage dissolved some of the contaminants which leaked onto the ground.
“Savant Environmental repackaged the waste and placed it in twenty shipping containers. There it sits, visible from space”, on the concrete pad – in the open.
All in all, why was Albania considered?
It is surely coincidence that on October 3, 2013, Tony “dodgy Iraq dossier” Blair, also an enthusiastic backer of Washington and NATO in their Balkans blitz, was appointed as adviser to the Albanian government to advise the impoverished country how to get into the EU. Heaven forbid he might have advised that taking on lethal weapons no one else was prepared to touch, might tick quite a big approval box and made a call to someone somewhere in Washington. This is, of course, entirely speculation.
However, as Pravda TV opined at the time, apart from the sorely needed financial boost: “It will increase the status and prestige of a poor country in Europe, Albania is in Europe’s backyard, in this case it will be going foreground.”
Belgium and France also declined an invitation to dispose of Syria’s weapons, with Ralph Trapp, a consultant in disarming chemical weapons, quoted as saying that “there remain very few candidates” for the task; “the hunt continues” commented The Telegraph (November 18, 2013.)
The trail goes cold as to how many other governments may have been frantically begged to accept cargo loads of poisoned chalices as the US imposed clock ticked, but Italy caved in allowing around sixty containers to be transferred from a Danish cargo ship to a US ship in the Italian port of Giola Tauro, in Calabria, with further consignments also expected to arrive.
The permission caused widespread demonstrations in Southern Italy, the government accused of secrecy and one demonstrator summing up the prevailing mood: “They are telling us that the material carried is not dangerous, but, in fact, nobody knows what is inside those containers.” Not dangerous eh? Does any government, anywhere ever tell the truth?
The Giola Tauro port, which accounts for half the Calabria region’s economy “has been in crisis since 2011”, with 400 workers on temporary redundancies – out of a total workforce of 1300. Not too hard to arm twist, the cynic might think.
The port also suffers from allegations of being a “major hub for cocaine shipments to Europe by the Calabria-based ‘Ndrangheta mafia.” However, Domenico Bagala, head of the Medcenter/Contship terminal where the operation is planned, countered with: “Since Gioia Tauro handles around a third of the containers arriving in Italy, it is normal that it has more containers that are seized”, adding, “We operate in a difficult territory but we have hi-tech security measures in place.”
Calabria is, in fact, plagued by corruption and organized crime. A classfied cable from J. Patrick Truhn, US Consul General in Naples (February 2, 2008) obtained by Wikileaks stated:
If it were not part of Italy, Calabria would be a failed state. The ‘Ndrangheta organized crime syndicate controls vast portions of its territory and economy, and accounts for at least three percent of Italy’s GDP (probably much more) through drug trafficking, extortion and usury.
Further:
During a November 17-20 visit to all five provinces, virtually every interlocutor painted a picture of a region … throttled by the iron grip of Western Europe’s largest and most powerful organized crime syndicate, the ‘Ndrangheta.
Moreover: “The ‘Ndrangheta is the most powerful criminal organization in the world with a revenue that stands at around fifty three billion Euros (seventy two billion U.S. dollars – forty four billion British pounds)” records Wikipedia, noting operations in nine countries, on four continents. Arguably, a less ideal transit point than Calabria for a stockpile of chemical weapons would be hard to find.
Of special concern to Carmelo Cozza of the SUL trade union is the port’s neighbouring village of San Ferdinando which has protested the operation: “The schools are right next door!”
However, when it comes to dodgy dealings, organized crime could seemingly learn a thing or two from the EU. Large amounts of Syria’s financial assets, frozen by the European Union, have simply been spirited from accounts, in what the Syrian Foreign Ministry slams as: “a flagrant violation of law.”
Last week the EU endorsed the raiding of Syria’a financial assets frozen across Europe and the the transfer of funds to “ … the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) … a flagrant violation of the international law and the UN Charter and understandings reached by the executive board of the OPCW”, commented a Foreign Ministry source, adding: “the European step violates the resolution of the OPCW executive board adopted on 15th November 2013 which acknowledged Syria’s stance which was conveyed to the Organization, officially stating the inability to shoulder the financial costs of destroying the chemical weapons.”
The theft of Syria’s monies was condemned as a “swindle policy practiced by some influential countries inside the EU at a time when they reject to release frozen assets to fund purchase of food and medicine which is considered the priority of the Syrian state … (meanwhile) the EU allowed its members to arm the terrorist groups which are responsible for bloodshed in Syria … ” the source added.” It is hard to disagree.
The EU/UN/OPCW has apparently learned well from the UN weapons inspectors and other UN benefits from the Iraq embargo, which bled the country dry from “frozen” assets, to which they helped themselves, as the children died at an average of six thousand a month year after year, from “embargo related causes.” As the UN spent Iraq’s monies, Iraq’s water became a biological weapon, the lights went off and medical and educational facilities largely collapsed. Are UN embargoes the UN’s shameful new money spinner?
So, can things get worse in the black farce which is the chaotic, dangerous, disorganised disposal attempts of Syria’s chemical materials? You bet they can. The companies selected to destroy the chemicals are Finland’s Ekokem and the US subsiduary of the French giant Veolia.
“The most dangerous materials are to be neutralized at sea by the Cape Ray, an American naval vessel specially outfitted for that purpose, which departed its Norfolk, Va., home port on Jan. 27 for the Mediterranean.” (New York Times, February 14, 2014.) A method which has never been tried before, an experiment seemingly to take place in the Mediterranean, not in US territorial waters. “It’s Not Just a Job, It’s An Adventure”, was a US Navy recruiting slogan. Doubt the population of the countries bordering the near enclosed Mediterranean feel quite the same, from Europe to Anatolia, North Africa to the Levant.
Additionally, the inclusion of Veolia as a suitable partner in the whole dodgy venture is in a class of its own. The company has long been involved in waste management and vast transport projects in the illegal settlements in Israel.
In November 2012 Professor Richard Falk, wrote, on UN notepaper, to the (UK) North London Waste Authority who were considering awarding £4.7 billion worth of contracts to Veolia. His letter quoted in part below, detailing his concerns regarding the company’s compliance with international legal norms, speaks for itself:
I am writing to you in my capacity as the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967 to urge you not to select Veolia for public contracts due to its active involvement in Israel’s grave violations of international law.
Due to its deep and ongoing complicity with Israeli violations of international law and the strength of concern of Palestinian, European and Israeli civil society about the role played by Veolia, I decided to select Veolia as one of the case studies to include in my report. I have attached the report for your consideration.
Veolia is a signatory to the UN Global Compact, a set of principles regarding business conduct. Yet its wide ranging and active involvement in Israel’s settlement regime and persistent failure to exercise due diligence show utter disregard for the human rights related principles of the Global Compact.
It is my view that Veolia’s violations of the UN Global Compact principles and its deep and protracted complicity with grave breaches of international law make it an inappropriate partner for any public institution, especially as a provider of public services.
Professor Falk concludes:
I urge you to follow the example set by public authorities and European banks that have chosen to disassociate themselves from Veolia and take the just and principled decision not to award Veolia any public service contracts. Such a measure would contribute to upholding the rule of law and advancing peace based on justice.
So a company in breach of international law is being awarded a contract to a UN body (the OPCW) in spite of being condemned by a distinguished UN legal expert and Special Rapporteur.
The final anomaly, for now, as Bob Rigg – former UN weapons inspector in Iraq, and former senior editor for the OCPW and former Chair of the New Zealand National Consultative Committee on Disarmament – points out:
At present, Israel has a monopoly on nuclear weapons in the middle east. Once the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons is complete, Israel will enjoy a near regional monopoly over a second weapon of mass destruction -chemical weapons. In addition to Israel, Egypt is the only regional power with a chemical-weapons capability.
At all levels, lawbreakers rule supreme.
Colombia: Who Is Really In Charge?
By John I. Laun | Colombia Support Network | February 18, 2014
In the last several days a number of stunning disclosures have surfaced concerning the role of the Colombia military. First, the Colombian news magazine Semana revealed that military intelligence had conducted wire-tapping and surveillance for an operation called Andromeda from a listening post set up in a site disguised as a small restaurant named “Buggly Hacker” located in Galerias, a Bogota commercial district. Among the phone calls tapped and overheard it appears there may have been calls of members of the Colombian Government’s delegation involved in peace talks with the FARC guerrillas, whose delegation’s conversations may likewise have been tapped and overheard. When news broke of this activity, President Juan Manuel Santos declared publicly that these wiretaps (chuzadas, as they are referred to in Colombia) were illegal and had to be investigated at once. The President said publicly that he did not authorize and knew nothing about this activity. But the next day, President Santos declared that the chuzadas had been done legally!
Two things are very clear. First, that the President of Colombia is not aware of what a significant part of his government is doing, and that’s all right with him. And second, that the military are (quite literally) calling the shots in Colombia. It appears obvious that Mr. Santos changed his opinion overnight on the legality of the secret wire-tapping activity by military intelligence because military officers told him he could not call the activity illegal. In other words, they’re in ultimate control of the government in Colombia!
How could Mr. Santos determine that this activity was legal? There are laws which have provided great leeway to military intelligence. But they certainly do not extend to overhearing conversations between Colombian Government representatives and FARC representatives meeting in Havana supposedly aimed at arriving at a broad peace agreement through which the guerrilla war would be ended. Who would speak freely his or her ideas on what a peace agreement should consist of—a necessary part of peace conversations if they are to be productive— if he or she knew a third party was overhearing what was being said? No one. Particularly if the party overhearing the conversations is the Colombian military, which has a long record of abusive conduct, and even has a representative at the peace talks, General Mora. The chuzadas are a serious impediment to frank and open dialogue between the Colombian Government and the FARC. One suspects that former President Alvaro Uribe Velez is likely the recipient of the information gained from the chuzadas, as he utilizes his close relationship with military officers to obtain information with which to undercut the peace talks, which he has publicly opposed. He earlier obtained the coordinates for movement of two FARC leaders as they came out of their bases to go to Havana—secret information he could only have gotten through a leak from a military or governmental source. Of course, President Santos has not moved seriously to investigate this leak. Why? Because he is not in control of the Colombian government.
This has been made clear by events in the last couple of days. Semana, much to their credit, has carried out and now published the results of an extensive investigation of corruption in the Colombian military. The investigation found military officers discussing how to skim off funds for their personal benefit from monies received by the military, the likely source of which was the United States Government. One of the persons involved in the recorded conversations is the current Commander of the Colombian Armed Forces, General Leonardo Barrero. Another article reported how supposedly disgraced General Rito Alejo del Rio, confined to a military installation in Bogota for his support of illegal paramilitary forces during his time as Commander of the Seventeenth Brigade in Carepa, near Apartado, essentially commands the installation, freely making supposedly-prohibited cell phone calls. And other military personnel who misbehaved had been involved in the “false positives” scandal in which military officers ordered the kidnapping of young men, had them killed, and then falsely presented them as guerrillas killed in combat.
The reports by Semana show an astonishing level of corruption in the Colombian military. President Santos has promised an investigation of these activities, of which he says he had no knowledge. Again, we see Mr. Santos as being out of the loop, heading a government he does not control. The conclusion is inescapable that the military controls the government and Mr. Santos is an uninformed bystander. He seems to believe that his job is to hob-nob with representatives of multinational corporations, as he did on a recent visit to Spain, inviting them to invest in Colombia and remove its valuable mineral resources for a pittance. The Colombian people deserve much better than this!
There is another aspect of the military’s current “dance of the millions” which is very troubling. The funds that are being stolen by military personnel are almost certainly provided by the United States government (i.e., U.S. taxpayers) as a part of the bloated budget of funds the U. S. government provides to the Colombian military. An obvious question is: Did the U.S. government personnel, such as the country’s military attache and Ambassador in Colombia, know what has been going on? And, if not, why not? This scandal calls for a full review of the U.S. aid program to Colombia and an immediate freezing of any funds in the aid pipeline. We in the human rights community have long known of the pervasive corruption in the Colombian military, though we did not know of the brazen theft of funds which Semana uncovered. It is high time that President Obama, Secretary of State Kerry and Secretary of Defense Hagel give their undivided attention to the Colombia situation. And the members of Congress should insist upon a thorough investigation, dismissal of those government personnel who overlooked these very serious problems, and prosecution of those who may have collaborated with the Colombian military to their own advantage.
Obama Admin’s TPP Trade Officials Received Hefty Bonuses From Big Banks
By Lee Fang | Republic Report | February 18, 2014
Officials tapped by the Obama administration to lead the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade negotiations have received multimillion dollar bonuses from CitiGroup and Bank of America, financial disclosures obtained by Republic Report show.
Stefan Selig, a Bank of America investment banker nominated to become the Under Secretary for International Trade at the Department of Commerce, received more than $9 million in bonus pay as he was nominated to join the administration in November. The bonus pay came in addition to the $5.1 million in incentive pay awarded to Selig last year.
Michael Froman, the current U.S. Trade Representative, received over $4 million as part of multiple exit payments when he left CitiGroup to join the Obama administration. Froman told Senate Finance Committee members last summer that he donated approximately 75 percent of the $2.25 million bonus he received for his work in 2008 to charity. CitiGroup also gave Froman a $2 million payment in connection to his holdings in two investment funds, which was awarded “in recognition of [Froman’s] service to Citi in various capacities since 1999.”
Many large corporations with a strong incentive to influence public policy award bonuses and other incentive pay to executives if they take jobs within the government. CitiGroup, for instance, provides an executive contract that awards additional retirement pay upon leaving to take a “full time high level position with the U.S. government or regulatory body.” Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase, the Blackstone Group, Fannie Mae, Northern Trust, and Northrop Grumman are among the other firms that offer financial rewards upon retirement for government service.
Froman joined the administration in 2009. Selig is currently awaiting Senate confirmation before he can take his post, which collaborates with the trade officials to support the TPP.
The controversial TPP trade deal has rankled activists for containing provisions that would newly empower corporations to sue governments in ad hoc arbitration tribunals to demand compensation from governments for laws and regulations they claim undermine their business interests. Leaked TPP negotiation documents show the Obama administration is seeking to prevent foreign governments from issuing a broad variety of financial rules designed to stem another bank crisis.
A leaked text of the TPP’s investment chapter shows that the pact would include the controversial investor-state dispute resolution system. A fact-sheet provided by Public Citizen explains how multi-national corporations may use the TPP deal to skirt domestic courts and local laws. The arrangement would allows corporations to go after governments before foreign tribunals to demand compensations for tobacco, prescription drug and environment protections that they claim would undermine their expected future profits. Last year, Senator Elizabeth Warren warned that trade agreements such as the TPP provide “a chance for these banks to get something done quietly out of sight that they could not accomplish in a public place with the cameras rolling and the lights on.”
Others have raised similar alarm.
“Not only do US treaties mandate that all forms of finance move across borders freely and without delay, but deals such as the TPP would allow private investors to directly file claims against governments that regulate them, as opposed to a WTO-like system where nation states (ie the regulators) decide whether claims are brought,” notes Boston University associate professor Kevin Gallagher.
Rights concerns in Colombia over leaked recording
Press TV – February 18, 2014
Human rights concerns have risen again in Colombia after an online recording of a military chief revealed his solidarity with a colonel jailed for alleged extrajudicial killings.
In the recording, published by leading news magazine Semana on Sunday, Colombia armed forces chief General Leonardo Barrero is heard telling colonel Robinson Gonzalez del Rio that prosecutors’ investigations into the extrajudicial killings is a “bunch of crap.”
The army chief also suggests that Gonzalez, who is facing criminal charges over the killing of two men in 2007, mount a counterattack to discredit prosecutors.
According to local reports, deputy joint chief General Javier Rey, resigned on Monday following the revelation by Semana’s weekend report. Barrero is also reported to have expressed regret over his remarks in the audio recording.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos said the serious allegations made in the Semana report need to be investigated. The government, however, said it was taking no immediate action against Barrero as he was not directly accused of corruption.
An earlier scandal on extrajudicial killings by Colombia military dubbed the “false positives scandal” broke in 2008.
According to media reports, hundreds of innocent civilians were slain and presented as guerrillas killed in battle by the country’s army in an effort to inflate body counts and receive promotions or other benefits.
Earlier this month, Semana reported that a military spy ring had eavesdropped for 15 months on emails and text messages of government negotiators involved in peace talks with leftist rebels.
Canada grants new identity, passport to Mossad assassin
Press TV – February 16, 2014
The Canadian government has granted a new identity and passport to an agent of the Israeli spying service Mossad who had been involved in an assassination plot in 2010.
The Mossad agent, whose identity was not revealed, received the new identity and passport after his participation in the assassination of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai in 2010, Canadian news agency QMI quoted Arian Azarbar, a businessman, as saying.
“The girl who was in charge of that file at Passport Canada… told me about it,” Azarbar said.
Al-Mabhouh was killed in his hotel room by a team of ten assassins carrying European passports.
“The Canadian government has said we had nothing to do with this, but it is a lie,” Azarbar added.
Azarbar has also provided the QMI agency with the name of the Israeli spy and the location of his residence in Canada. The agency, however, has declined to disclose the information, saying it would “endanger the safety and security” of the Mossad agent.
Alexis Pavelich, the spokesman for Canada’s Immigration Ministry, has refused to talk about the passport issue.
Back in 1997, Jordan arrested two Mossad agents carrying fake Canadian passports following a life attempt on Hamas leader Khaled Mashal.
Canada is closely allied to the Israeli regime.
Canada was one of the few countries that opposed the successful Palestinian bid in November 2012 to upgrade its status at the United Nations from “non-member observer entity” to “non-member observer state.”
In October 2011, Canada also opposed the Palestinian effort to win membership within the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Obamacare: the Final Payment
By Paul Craig Roberts | CounterPunch | February 12, 2014
The anonymous Obamacare expert, who provided us a year ago with the most complete account of Obamacare available, has returned with an explanation of estate recovery. Obamacare herds the poor into Medicaid which requires some enrollees to forfeit homes and other assets they might have to the state to cover the cost of their medical care. The research article below is meticulous and demonstrates that Obamacare was not enacted to serve the people.– Paul Craig Roberts
Raiding the Assets of Low-Income and Poor Americans
Since writing “Obamacare: Devils in the Details” posted on this site on February 3, 2013, I have investigated in detail other aspects of the insurance industry’s program to bring health care to Americans. In this article I explain estate recovery to which poorer Americans herded by Obamacare into Medicaid are subject. In violation of moral philosopher John Rawls’ second principle of justice, some of the poorest Americans will pay the highest cost of health care as they, and they alone, are subject to having the family home and any other assets they might possess confiscated by the state in order to reimburse Obamacare for the cost of their medical expenses. The compassionate rhetoric aside, Obamacare makes the poor pay the most.
Under what was deceptively named the Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly known as Obamacare, which is unaffordable for the patient in more ways than one, beginning January 1, 2014, citizens without health insurance must pay a tax penalty to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Qualified individuals and families with incomes between 138 and 400 percent of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL) can shop for commercial insurance policies at a Health Insurance Marketplace (an exchange) and may be eligible for a subsidy from the government to help pay for a plan. Those with incomes at or below 138 percent of the Federal Poverty Level will be tossed into Medicaid unless there are specific reasons why they would not be eligible.
The Federal Poverty Level incomes for different family sizes for 2014 established by the Department of Health and Human Services can be found here: http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/14poverty.cfm [2] To determine whether you will be put into Medicaid, find the Federal Poverty Level annual income that applies to your family size for 2014 from the HHS tables and multiply the amount by 1.38. If your annual income is not larger than this amount, into Medicaid you go. For example, to avoid being put into Medicaid by Obamacare, a single individual in the 48 states and D.C. needs an income that is more than 138 percent of $11,670 (more than $16,105). A family of four needs an income that is more than 138 percent of $23,850 (more than $32,913). Poverty level incomes in Alaska and Hawaii are higher due to the higher cost of living in those states.
You won’t find estate recovery in the ACA. It’s in the Omnibus Reconciliation Act of 1993 (OBRA 1993)–a federal statute which applies to Medicaid, and, if you are enrolled in Medicaid, it will apply to you.
Estate Recovery
OBRA 1993 requires all states that receive Medicaid funding to seek recovery from the estates of deceased Medicaid patients for medical services received in a nursing home or other long-term care institution, home- and community-based services and related hospital and prescription drug services regardless of age. It also allows, at state option, recovery for all services used in the Medicaid state plan at age 55 or older. At minimum, states must pursue recovery from the probate estate which includes property that passes to heirs under state probate law, but states can expand the definition of estate to allow recovery from property that bypasses probate. This means states can use procedures for direct recovery from bank accounts and other funds. The state keeps a running tally, and even if you have a will, your heirs are chopped liver. Estate recovery can be exempted or deferred in certain situations after your death, but the regulations for this are limited and complicated with multitudes of conditions.
Your estate is what you own when you die–your home, other real estate in which you have a legal interest, personal property, bank accounts, annuities and so on. For cash-strapped states, recovery provides an income stream, and with the expansion of Medicaid states will be in dire need of money, particularly in the current economy.
You must first understand that if an exchange determines you are eligible for Medicaid, you have no other choice. Code for exchanges specifies that an applicant is not eligible for a subsidized plan to the extent that he or she is eligible for coverage under Medicaid. Therefore, when you apply, if you are found eligible, you will be tossed into Medicaid. You can also be auto-enrolled in Medicaid if you are presumed eligible through a database such as SNAP (food stamps). If you are enrolled in a subsidized private plan through an exchange and your circumstances change making you eligible for Medicaid, in you go.
Obamacare revises Medicaid regulations in order to make more Americans eligible for Medicaid. Revised regulations include an increase in age and income limitations, and the asset test no longer applies. Prior to these revisions, applicants were not eligible for Medicaid if they had more than a specific dollar amount in assets. But, under Obamacare, those who likely own a home or have savings set aside–for example, early retirees or people who have lost their jobs and, as a result, are in a low income bracket–will find themselves in Medicaid, and their assets will be looted by the government when they die for medical services used at age 55 and up.
Estate recovery can have a damaging impact on low-income and poor Americans. It is a pernicious death tax on those who have the least and are the most vulnerable. Often, the only asset they have is the family home and what’s in it, and, for some, this has been the family home for several generations. The threat of losing the home causes people to forego health care.
Home equity is part of a deceased Medicaid recipient’s estate and except under certain circumstances is subject to estate recovery. Surviving family members may either sell the home and use the proceeds to satisfy the Medicaid claim or, if they wish to keep the home in the family, they can satisfy the claim with their own personal funds. This Medicaid clawback not only confiscates family property but also robs people of their dignity as Medicaid allows only an amount it considers reasonable for services provided by a funeral home and burial costs. In some states, funeral homes are responsible for notifying Medicaid if there is excess money in a burial trust fund so it can also be pillaged.
Some might think it fair that those who are enrolled in Medicaid pay back the benefits they received. However, under a mandate that requires all Americans to be covered by health insurance or pay a tax penalty to the IRS, estate recovery is unconscionable since Obamacare offers no other viable option for this income-segment of the population. It also discriminates by age since only Medicaid enrollees who use benefits in the state plan at age 55 and up are subject to estate recovery, but those who use benefits at age 54 or less are home free unless they receive long-term care. Under federal law, discrimination is not permitted on the basis of age, but, obviously, the U.S. government turns a blind eye to to its own law. Perhaps, when states need more money due to the Obamacare expansion of Medicaid, and as the jobless economy continues causing more people to be eligible, age discrimination will be broadened to 45 and up.
You may be eligible for an exemption from having to pay a penalty for being uninsured if you meet specific requirements–for example, if you are in jail, if you have a sincerely-held religious belief that prevents you from seeking and obtaining medical care, if you are eligible for Medicaid under its expansion but live in a state that opted not to expand Medicaid, if you are a member of an Indian tribe, and several other situations. But there is no exemption for people who refuse to sign up for Obamacare because of the Medicaid estate recovery program.
Since the plans at the Obamacare exchanges are income-based, you may be put into Medicaid when you apply for insurance. Or, you may start off enrolled in a subsidized plan, confident that estate recovery won’t apply to you, but several months or a year later, due to a change in your circumstances, find you have been tossed into Medicaid. You can increase your income in order to avoid Medicaid, but it would have to remain over 138 percent of the Federal Poverty Level throughout the taxable year. If paying for insurance will deprive you of food or shelter, you can try filing for a hardship exemption, that is, if the government site is working smoothly, and if you can find the form. It is important to understand how this income-based scheme works so you can figure out how best to survive the many caveats of Obamacare. To learn more and what to watch out for, read my lesson on how Obamacare works.
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2013/02/03/obamacare-a-primer/ [3]
Estate recovery was not an unintended consequence of Obamacare. The House Ways & Means Committee and The House Energy & Commerce Committee share jurisdiction over health care, including Medicare and Medicaid, and both worked extensively on Obamacare. So, don’t bother thinking that the members of these committees didn’t know that estate recovery would impact millions of Americans who would be tossed into Medicaid. The asset test was dropped and the age limit was increased explicitly in order to expand Medicaid. Yet, did We the People hear any concern about estate recovery? Certainly not in the many floor speeches given by Democrats as well as Republicans or from the media.
Obama stated during his 2008 presidential campaign that transparency would be the leverage needed to ensure that people stay involved in the national health care reform process. The expansion of Medicaid was part of the process. Did Obama or your representatives tell you that Medicaid, depending on your age, is a loan subject to deferred payment by your estate? Did they tell you the government subsidy for a private plan at an exchange is a loan, that must be repaid if your income increases? Transparency was highly selective. The bait was shown but not the hook.
Obama also often made the point that the public should receive the same level of coverage and care as members of Congress. Medicaid is hardly the same level of coverage and care, but, aside from that, tell us, Mr. Obama, because your health care is funded by taxpayers, will your estate be subject to recovery?
The fact that Obamacare did not revise existing federal statute–in other words, it retained estate recovery–most certainly undermines the compassionate rhetoric about helping low-income and poor Americans.
Official Response To Estate Recovery Inquiry
In October 2009 during the national health care reform debacle, eight public-spirited citizens, dismayed as they watched Obamacare morph into deception, signed and faxed a letter to 28 members of Congress, Democrats and Republicans alike, including chairs and ranking members of the various health care policy committees working on Obamacare. The letter addressed “Discrimination, Estate Recovery & Exploitation in National Mandated Health Insurance.” Other recipients included President Barack Obama; Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services; and Nancy Ann Deparle, Director of White House Office of Health Reform.
The letter pointed out that absence of choice for Medicaid-eligible citizens other than a costly penalty is discrimination based on economic status. It also stated that the Medicaid estate recovery program discriminates by age and against those who own a home and have other assets versus those who do not. The letter asked if OBRA 1993 had been amended so states would not be allowed to recover assets or place liens on property under national mandated health insurance, and, if there was no amendment, why not?
The citizens who sent the letter received no response from Congress or the Obama administration. The government that comprises ObamaNation, Inc. serves only its money masters.
Depending on their state of residency, Americans can sign up for Obamacare coverage with a federal or with a state exchange. The US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is the federal office that established the federal exchange at healthcare.gov at which residents of the 36 states that chose not to use a state exchange can sign up for Obamacare. (New Mexico and Idaho have state exchanges but are currently using the federal one.) Fourteen states and the District of Columbia submitted proposals, which were approved by CMS, to run their own exchanges.
In June 2013 a letter was sent to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services by a well-informed citizen pointing out that the Medicaid Manual prepared by CMS to provide guidance for states contains procedural rules intended to ensure that individuals are informed about estate recovery before they complete the application process.
There are variations in the ways in which states implement estate recovery, depending upon their Medicaid program and state laws. However, Federal law requires all states to incorporate the following protections for Medicaid recipients into the design of their estate recovery program:
— The State should notify Medicaid recipients about the estate recovery program during their initial application for Medicaid eligibility and annual re-determination process.
— The State must notify affected survivors about the initiation of estate recovery and give them an opportunity to claim an exemption based on hardship.
— The State must establish procedures and criteria to waive recovery if it would cause undue hardship.
The letter went on to say that the final CMS Health Insurance Marketplace application (healthcare.gov) notifies applicants about Medicaid’s right to pursue and recover any money from other health insurance, legal settlements or other third parties but does not disclose estate recovery. Since estate recovery is one of the terms of the Medicaid contract, it is deceptive to omit disclosure of this practice. CMS was asked to provide the reasons for this omission.
CMS responded evasively to the concerned citizen’s question. CMS claimed that the Health Insurance Marketplace application at healthcare.gov does not disclose Medicaid’s right to claim against the estate, because CMS wanted to provide flexibility to state Medicaid agencies as to how each one notifies applicants about estate recovery. Some states have developed pamphlets to address common estate recovery questions or devote a portion of a general Medicaid pamphlet to the subject. Some states also post their state plans, perhaps with additional explanatory text, on their web sites.
Even if we take this claim at face value, it reflects a cavalier attitude. As health insurance is mandated with low-income earners and the very poor having no alternative to Medicaid, certainly those subject to estate recovery have a right to be notified in advance of being herded into this insurance plan.
It is well worth knowing about estate recovery before you sign up at an Obamacare exchange so you can make an informed choice as to whether or not you want to get trapped in this Byzantine sinkhole or steer clear, particularly if you think your income may relegate you to coverage under Medicaid now or in the future. Unfortunately, it appears that CMS as well as some of the state-based exchanges, such as Covered California, decided you don’t deserve to know about this particular term of the Medicaid contract when you apply and sign on the dotted line. So, as of this writing, there is no mention of estate recovery on the Obamacare application at healthcare.gov that services residents of the 36 states which use the federal exchange nor for Californians, residents of a state with a robust estate recovery program! Some states disclose estate recovery on their state exchange applications for Obamacare, and others do not.
Non-disclosure of estate recovery on an Obamacare application does not mean that the state in which you reside will not bill your estate for the cost of your medical treatment under Medicaid. It merely means that a conscious choice was made not to let you know that one consequence of signing up for Obamacare could be the loss of your home.
There are a few states that recover for long-term care only. It would be in your best interest to find out your state’s recovery policy so you know where you stand. You should also remain alert to changes.
Here is what you need to know:
When you complete the application at healthcare.gov, it is assumed that when you submit it, you are fully informed and agree to all terms. Submission of the application is akin to signing a contract. Your signature not only means you have provided true answers to all the questions under penalty of perjury, but also that you understand and agree to all the rules and conditions. However, by not disclosing estate recovery CMS expunged your right to make an informed decision. Therefore, you may not realize that your estate can become government property because Obamacare forces you into Medicaid if your income is less than the threshold for a subsidized premium.
When you sign a loan note at a bank, you are agreeing to the terms and conditions of the contract between you and the bank, and these are disclosed in the note. The banker doesn’t say to you, “Just sign here and we’ll let you know the terms later. You can pick up a pamphlet at our local office or request that one be mailed to you. Or, you can visit our website and see if you can find the page that tells you what you just signed yourself into. Thank you. We appreciate your business.”
Even if your circumstances change such that you are no longer eligible for Medicaid and you are shifted into a subsidized Obamacare plan, any Medicaid expenditures you incurred remain as claims on your estate.
According to the federal procedural rules, the state should notify Medicaid recipients about the estate recovery program during their initial application for Medicaid eligibility. Initial is the operative word. It does not mean after an individual has been put into Medicaid. Since healthcare.gov is the initial point of contact for applicants who reside in one of the 36 states using the federal exchange, there is no legitimate excuse for nondisclosure of estate recovery. Healthcare.gov is where the buck stops. The application should contain notification of estate recovery. The same is true for state-based exchanges that omitted this disclosure on their Obamacare applications.
Like terms of a contract, laws are supposed to be known. In Western civilization people are not supposed to be accountable to secret laws or to secret clauses in contracts that they sign. Clearly, if Western legal practice holds, estate recovery is impermissible due to the lack of notice. Only the corrupt architects of Obamacare believe that it is fair to confiscate the assets of an individual or a family without notification that the health care they receive can be charged to their estate.
Liens
Some state-based exchanges requested permission from CMS to add information to their application and chose to include disclosure of estate recovery. The Massachusetts Health Connector application not only includes disclosure of estate recovery, but also goes above and beyond, notifying applicants of liens. “To the extent permitted by law, MassHealth (Medicaid) may place a lien against any real estate owned by eligible persons or in which eligible persons have a legal interest. If MassHealth puts a lien against that property and it is sold, money from the sale of that property may be used to repay MassHealth for medical services provided.”
There are pre-death liens and post-death liens, and whether or not placement of a lien is disclosed on an Obamacare application, this practice is permitted in all states. For more on liens, you should consult an attorney–if you can afford one–or seek information online. It’s not pretty.
Renewal Of Coverage and Auto-enrollment
Note that Obamacare applications contain a section titled Renewal of Coverage in Future Years. An applicant can agree to allow an exchange to use income data, including information from tax returns to automatically renew eligibility for 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 years, or applicants can check “Do not use information from tax returns to renew my coverage.” Exchanges have access to the federal data hub which keeps track of your income and other personal data. If you gave unfettered access to your data by choosing auto-renewal, they have all the information needed to determine whether you are still eligible for your subsidized policy or should be moved into Medicaid.
The letter sent to CMS in June 2013 also asked about estate recovery disclosure in cases where coverage is auto-renewed during the annual redetermination process, when people are shifted from a subsidized plan to Medicaid due to a decrease in income or other change in circumstance, and when people are auto-enrolled on the presumption that they are eligible according to a database such as SNAP (food stamps) or by a hospital or health care center. A similar letter was sent to the Massachusetts Office of Medicaid.
The federal procedural rules on estate recovery say the state should notify Medicaid recipients about the estate recovery program during the annual redetermination process, but according to the Massachusetts Office of Medicaid, you don’t need to be informed about estate recovery during the redetermination process because you presumably read about this on the original application you filled out and submitted.
If you submitted an application that did not disclose estate recovery, it cannot be presumed that you are aware of estate recovery, because notification was not on the application. Thus, the redetermination procedure is one more example of the failure to disclose.
If you are bumped into Medicaid from a subsidized plan due to a change in your circumstances, the Massachusetts Office of Medicaid believes that you don’t need to be informed about estate recovery because you presumably read about this however many years ago when you filled out the original application. You will simply be sent a notice that you are now in Medicaid, and the notice will refer you to the Medicaid Member Booklet for information on the rules. If you obtain and read the booklet, you can learn that you may be subject to estate recovery. But don’t expect to receive a Medicaid Member Booklet with your notice, because “It would be cost prohibitive to include a Member Booklet with every notice. Instead, every notice includes information on how to contact Customer Service with any questions, including to request a copy of the Member Booklet.”
Hope you know what questions to ask and that you do request a copy of the booklet immediately, pray that it arrives before you use any Medicaid services if you are age 55 to 64 and go over it with a fine tooth comb. If you don’t want to be in Medicaid, you can contact your state Medicaid agency to unenroll, but you’ll probably have to pay a penalty for being uninsured unless you can earn more money and get into a subsidized plan.
If you submitted an application that does not disclose estate recovery and you are bumped into Medicaid due to a change in your circumstances, you won’t know about this detrimental practice, but you can learn that your assets may be confiscated if you contact Customer Service and request a Member Booklet.
If you are auto-enrolled into Medicaid because you were presumed eligible through a SNAP (food stamp) database or by a hospital or health care center, you may still need to fill out a full application which may or may not disclose estate recovery.
Now let’s look at how the federal exchange at healthcare.gov will handle these situations.
The federal exchange will not be renewing coverage for Medicaid recipients. Your state Medicaid agency will handle your annual Medicaid eligibility redetermination (renewal). CMS responded to the citizen’s inquiry as follows: “State Medicaid agencies are developing their own renewal forms which may include a notice regarding estate recovery. CMS is in the process of finalizing a model renewal form to assist states, and we appreciate that you highlighted this requirement.”
Why did CMS need to be reminded about notification of estate recovery when the federal procedural rules that CMS is supposed to implement specify that notification is required?
You may receive a renewal form if your state Medicaid agency doesn’t employ the same “streamlined Obamacare procedures” that Massachusetts is using or if you did not choose auto-renewal. Your state Medicaid agency might come up with its own procedure for redetermination regardless of which option you checked on your original application. In any case, the renewal form might not include disclosure of estate recovery although your state Medicaid agency is familiar with the estate recovery notification requirement outlined in the federal procedural rules.
According to CMS, if you are bumped into Medicaid due to a change in your circumstances, your state Medicaid agency may notify you that you are now in Medicaid and “may include Medicaid-specific information as appropriate.”
If the state Medicaid agency sends a notice that you have been bumped into Medicaid, you might also receive Medicaid-specific information–or you might not. The notice will refer you to a pamphlet and provide you with a website address so you can learn that your heirs can be dispossessed in exchange for your being provided with minimal medical care.
If you are auto-enrolled because you were presumed eligible through a SNAP (food stamp) database or by a hospital or health care center, your state Medicaid agency will most likely send you a full application which might or might not disclose estate recovery.
Oregon fast-tracked residents into Medicaid in October 2013 by sending approximately 240,000 letters to those on food stamps. The Oregon Health Authority already had people’s information on file since they were participants in an income-based state program, and, thus, presumed eligible for Medicaid. The letter explained that all they had to do was let the Oregon Health Authority know they wanted to be enrolled in Medicaid by checking the “I-am-interested” box, provide some basic information on the enclosed one-page form and return it to the Authority in the enclosed stamped and addressed envelope. The Oregon Health Authority then worked on enrolling the 75,000 respondents and proceeded to send 177,000 reminder notices.
Did the one-page form contain notification of all rights and responsibilities including estate recovery?
State Policy Changes
Oregon and Washington disclosed estate recovery on their applications and experienced low sign-ups. People are reluctant to accept having their families dispossessed of what little they have. Officials in both states said that state policy would be changed in order to apply estate recovery only to Medicaid patients in long-term care, and Cover Oregon (the state exchange) decided to remove estate recovery disclosure from its application in order to avoid alarming applicants. The Seattle Times reported that Washington’s Health Care Authority has filed an emergency rule to amend Medicaid’s estate recovery policy.
http://blogs.seattletimes.com/healthcarecheckup/topic/estate-recovery/ [6]
Privacy Violations
There is no pretending that your information is private or that Obamacare is concerned with protecting your privacy. California’s state exchange, Covered California, provided insurance agents with names and contact information for tens of thousands of people who either logged onto Covered California’s website to check out plans or who had partially filled out an application but did not finish, and did not ask to be contacted. Exectutive Director, Peter Lee, excused this breach of privacy on the grounds that the exchange’s legal counsel approved it and the state wanted to offer more assistance to Californians.
http://articles.latimes.com/2013/dec/06/business/la-fi-exchange-names-disclosed-20131207 [7]
The privacy statement in the application of Colorado’s exchange, Connect for Health Colorado, states: “You release Connect for Health Colorado and the Department of Health Care Policy and Financing from all liability for sharing this information with other agencies.” Some of the sharing agencies include the United States Customs and Immigration Services, Department of Homeland Security and financial institutions (banks, savings and loans, credit unions, etc.).
In the event that your data has been compromised, states must notify you, but the federal government is not required to do the same, and is, therefore, more likely to hide its security flaws and privacy breaches. According to the Washington Post, administration officials knew when the federal site was launched that the privacy of user data would be at risk. An internal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) memo warned that sufficient testing of data security had not been performed.
http://freebeacon.com/expert-healthcare-gov-security-risks-even-worse-after-fix/ [10]
Subsidized Premiums And Cost-sharing Reductions Are Also Subject To Recovery
CMS and many of the state-based exchanges also left out notification that the tax credit you receive for a subsidized plan and the reduction in cost-sharing and deductibles are advance loans and could leave you with an unexpected debt to the IRS. Most likely, the lack of this disclosure as well as estate recovery was intentional so people would not be deterred from signing up for health insurance. Thus, CMS and other exchanges unilaterally surrendered your right to know important rules that can adversely impact you and your family. Non-disclosure of all rules, rights and responsibilities is not a standard and acceptable business practice and could be deemed fraudulent in a court of law.
Connect for Health Colorado states your acceptance in the fine print on its application: “I understand that if I am eligible for the Advance Premium Tax Credit (APTC) and/or Reduced Co-pays and Deductibles these payments will be made directly to my selected insurance carrier(s). Acceptance of (APTC) and/or Reduced Co-pays and Deductibles may impact my coverage year tax liability. I will be given the option to apply all, some, or none of any APTC amount I may be eligible for to my monthly premium.”
Do you know what this means? It is notification that you may have to pay back part or all of your Obamacare health premium subsidy and reduced co-pays and deductibles if your income rises during the year.
The Advance Premium Tax Credit is the subsidized part of your Obamacare premium. The subsidy and cost-sharing reductions are based on an estimate of your total income for the year in which you apply for insurance at an exchange. If your income at the end of the year is higher than the estimate, you may have a tax liability for part or all of these two items because they were based on a lower income. To avoid this risk, you can choose to negotiate a smaller subsidy and pay more of your premium to reduce your exposure to possible tax liability for overpayment of the subsidy. Alternatively, you can refuse the tax credit, pay full freight and collect your tax credit based on your actual year-end income when you file your federal tax return. You can’t negotiate cost-sharing reductions, but, you can opt not to apply for these unless you don’t mind shouldering a possible payback.
For details see section 4:
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2013/02/03/obamacare-a-primer/ [3]
For current payback amounts:
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/PLAW-112publ9/html/PLAW-112publ9.htm [11]
For payback of the entire subsidy:
Medicaid Managed Care Plans
Some states use private insurers to manage health care for their Medicaid population through Medicaid Managed Care Plans, and the Obamacare expansion of Medicaid is a huge money-maker for these private insurers as well as a huge cost booster for U.S. health care. For giants UnitedHealthcare and WellPoint, as well as for smaller publicly-traded companies such as Molina Healthcare, a Fortune 500, multi-state health care organization, an expanded customer base brings revenue growth. Medicaid Managed Care Plans are hoping to enroll the majority of the expanded Medicaid population.
“This is several hundreds of billions of dollars of new market opportunity for these plans over the next couple of years,” says Jason Gurda, managing director of healthcare with investment bank Leerink Swann in New York.”
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/MONEY/usaedition/2013-03-08-Text-03062013-0212-PM_ST_U.htm [13]
Many states are choosing to move all or portions of their Medicaid populations to managed care plans. Thirty-five are expected to make changes to their managed care programs in 2014, up from 28 in 2013 and 20 in 2012. States jumping on the privatized-Medicaid bandwagon will mean more profit for corporations and less money allocated to patient care.
http://www.hms.com/popularity-medicaid-managed-care-expected-grow/ [14]
A Managed Care Plan is a system of health insurance which includes a network of contracted providers that are paid a fixed amount to provide health benefits to a defined population. Needless to say, this model relies on restriction and denial of care putting Medicaid patients at risk.
A Medicaid Managed Care Plan adds more charges subject to estate recovery for those who are tossed into Medicaid. The Medicaid Manual says that when an individual age 55 and older is enrolled either voluntarily or mandatorily in a managed care plan, the state must seek recovery from the individual’s estate for the premium payments. If the state plan recovers for all Medicaid services, the state must recover from the individual’s estate the total capitation rate for the period the beneficiary was enrolled in the managed care plan. If the state plan recovers for only some services covered under the state plan, the state must recover from the individual’s estate that portion of the capitation payment that is attributable to the recoverable services, based on the most appropriate actuarial analysis determined by the state.
The manual also states that when the individual enrolls or is enrolled in the managed care plan, the state must provide a separate notice to the individual that explains that the premium payments made to the managed care plan are included either in whole or in part in the claim against the estate.
States that use private insurers to manage their Medicaid population will most likely have capitation payments but might not have reinsurance or fee-for-service programs which can also be recovered from an estate. Therefore, it is prudent to find out what your state has and who is affected. Here are the fees that can be recovered from estates:
Capitation Payments–a fixed monthly fee paid by the state to the Medicaid Managed Care Plan for each month you are enrolled in one of these plans, regardless of whether or not you use any medical services. If you do seek care, capitation payments can exceed the actual costs of services provided during the month.
According to the Massachusetts EOHHS Privacy Office: The estimated average capitation payment for October 1, 2013 through December 31, 2013 was $449.59 per month– an average annual total of $5,395.08. In other words, a person from age 55 through, let’s say, 62, accumulates $43,160.64 on his or her tally against assets including the home. There goes a chunk of your estate even if you didn’t use any medical care.
Reinsurance Payments–An amount reimbursed to program contractors for certain contract service costs incurred by a Medicaid patient that are beyond a contractual dollar threshold. These payments are in addition to the monthly capitation payment.
Fee-for-Service Payments–A direct payment of some or all of a Medicaid member’s medical bills not covered by other available insurance.
According to the Massachusetts Office of Medicaid, with certain exceptions, persons who are eligible for the Obamacare Medicaid expansion (age 21 to 64) must enroll in one of the state’s Medicaid Managed Care Plans.
The hard sell is on for states to privatize Medicaid, and many who are forced into Medicaid by Obamacare will also be forced into managed care plans as is the case in Massachusetts. This represents yet another noose around the necks of low-income and poor people since the three payments described above are recoverable from estates.
Once the limited estates of poor and low-income Americans have been taken to reimburse Medicaid, the U.S. will be left with a permanently poorer and more desperate population and will be faced with higher Medicaid costs as there will no longer be any private property to confiscate.
Pursuant to the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA) and clarified in the Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006, states were given greater authority to impose and increase premium and cost-sharing charges on certain Medicaid enrollees, but despite these charges their estates are still subject to recovery. Under Obamacare, the government has a right to recover reimbursement from estates of those with lower incomes who are enrolled in Medicaid. Yet, individuals with higher incomes who qualify for a subsidized plan are also paying premiums subsidized by the government but are not subject to estate recovery.
http://kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/deficit-reduction-act-of-2005-implications-for/ [15]
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/27/us/27medicaid.html?_r=0 [16]
Is it fair to impose estate recovery on Medicaid enrollees but not on other subsidy recipients? Is it fair if recovery adheres to the basic requirements in federal statute, but, thereafter, is based on state policy which differs from state to state and, thus, is not applied equally across the nation to all Medicaid enrollees at age 55 and up? Is targeting a specific age group fair? Or legal?
Equal protection is in the Constitution, but ever since the Supreme Court surrendered in the 1930s to President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal legislation, equal protection has been curtailed in the economic arena. The Supreme Court, unwilling to face down a President asserting previously unknown executive power, accepted the violation of the 14th Amendment in economic legislation in order to avoid being packed with FDR yes-men.
Obamacare was not written for the benefit of the poor and uninsured. It was written for the profits of the insurance companies giving them millions of new customers subsidized by U.S. taxpayers. The business of America is business. Private insurance company CEOs receive multi-million dollar pay packages, while under Obamacare low-income earners and the poor have to give up their homes and other assets in order to receive medical care.
Brazil-Europe Internet cable to cost $185 million
BRICS Post | February 13, 2014
Brazil is pushing ahead with plans to boost its Internet security by developing an undersea fibre-optics communications cable that would reroute its online traffic directly to Europe, bypassing the United States.
State-owned telecom provider Telebras recently announced that it was entering into a joint venture with Spain’s IslaLink Submarine Cables to build a link between the northeastern city of Fortaleza and the Iberian Peninsula.
The undersea cable is budgeted at $185 million and construction is scheduled to begin in July.
Brazil, along with most Central and South American countries, traditionally routes its Internet traffic through the Network Access Point, which is hosted in Miami, Florida.
Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa currently use hubs in Europe and the US to connect to one another, which translates into higher costs and leaves open the opportunity for data interception and theft.
Telebras project coordinator Ronald Valladão says the cable will boost Brazil’s Internet security and cut online costs for the consumer.
“This new submarine cable provides a direct connection to the European continent, decreasing latency. It is expected that this will result in cost reductions,” he recently told the media.
Since Edward Snowden, the National Security Agency contractor who leaked vital intelligence to the media on US domestic and overseas surveillance, published information that Washington was aggressively spying on Brazilian officials, including the president, Brasilia has made Internet security and communications a priority.
Brazil and its fellow BRICS partners are also moving ahead with building a massive undersea cable that would connect all members.
By the time it is completed, the BRICS Cable will be the third longest undersea telecommunications cable in the world, covering a distance of 34,000km.
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has also pushed a new Internet bill that would compel Google, Facebook and other networks to store locally gathered data in the country, and not on overseas servers.
The new legislation would force foreign-based Internet companies to maintain data centres inside Brazil that would then be governed by Brazilian privacy laws, officials said.
Rousseff has repeatedly said that the US spying regimen is unacceptable, and postponed an official visit to the US originally scheduled for October 23 in protest.
“The illegal practices of intercepting the communications and data of citizens, companies and members of the Brazilian government constitute a serious act against national sovereignty and individual rights, and incompatible with the democratic coexistence of friendly countries,” a presidential statement said when revelations of espionage in Brazil were made public.
On November 24, Brazil and Argentina urged other South American countries to discuss a bilateral treaty on cyber-security.
On November 27, the UN Rights Committee passed a “right to privacy” resolution, drafted by Brazil and Germany.
The Third Committee of the UN General Assembly, which deals with social, humanitarian and cultural affairs, unanimously adopted the resolution, saying surveillance and data interception by governments and companies “may violate or abuse human rights.”
In late January, talks between Brazil and the US failed to satisfactorily answer the spying charges or eke out a “permanent solution” to restore bilateral ties damaged by the Snowden revelations.
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