Month: April 2013

New York City Property Owner is Now Accepting Bitcoins

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The news surrounding Bitcoin is now coming in so hard and fast it is virtually (pun intended) impossible to keep track of it all.  It was just this past weekend that I highlighted a website that shows some of the various retail locations around the world where you can spend your BTC.  Just today, I discovered that New York property management company, Alvic Property Management, is accepting Bitcoin for rent and maintenance payments at all of its properties.  From PRWeb:

Alvic Property Management, a property management company specializing in the management of condominiums, cooperatives and multifamily rentals in the New York metro area, has become the first property management company to accept rent and maintenance payments in Bitcoin. Properties on the Alvic Property Management platform are now be able to accept payments with the speed and ease of credit card or eCheck payments without the risk of chargebacks or bounced eChecks.

All properties managed by Alvic Property Management are currently accepting bitcoins. Residents initially need to reach out to their property manager to have their account enabled to accept bitcoin, they will then be able to then make payments to a Bitcoin address exclusive to their account. All bitcoin payments will post to the property bank account in US dollars at the quoted bid price on the Mt.Gox Bitcoin exchange at the time of receipt.

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The New Orwellian Term for Americans that Disagree with Government: “Paper Terrorists”

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I first started writing publicly about how the U.S. government was going to ultimately switch the “war on terror” to an internal focus and demonize American citizens that express dissent back while I still worked on Wall Street, five or six years ago.  While I was mocked and accused of hyperbole at the time, it has become quite clear that this is exactly the direction we are headed in…and fast. Let’s not forget that the FBI classified peaceful Occupy Wall Street protestors as terrorists as that movement was gaining momentum.  Furthermore, why else would the Department of Homeland Security be buying ammo in such enormous quantities unless the U.S. oligarchy saw its real enemy as the American public itself? The 99.99%.  From the LA Times:

Finch teaches police and public officials around the country how to deal with self-described “sovereign citizens” like Wright. Finch and his partner, Det. Kory Flowers, have trained nearly 15,000 police and 5,000 public officials to combat sovereigns, zealots who refuse to recognize government authority in virtually any form.

Violent confrontations are rare, but the FBI says at least six police officers have been killed by sovereigns since 2000. A man tied to the movement shot and killed a California Highway Patrol officer who stopped him in Contra Costa County last year. A responding officer shot and killed the assailant.

The agency calls sovereigns — who number between 100,000 and 300,000 — a “domestic terrorist movement.”

You’ve gotta love the FBI.  They can’t recognize or jail any of the financial terrorists that have already pulled off the greatest heist in American history and continue to plunder, but once an average citizen complains about their government being criminal and corrupt, THEY are somehow the terrorists.

“To them, a police officer is just a man in a Halloween costume,” Finch said.

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Gold and Silver Update: Interview with David Morgan and Amir Adnani

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In this interview, we are fortunate enough to get detailed perspectives on what is going on in the precious metals markets from two experts in the field.  Wearing the analyst’s hat, we have the highly respected David Morgan who fills us in on his latest observations as well as how he thinks investors should split … Read more

MSNBC: Your Kids Don’t Belong to You

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This is such an incredibly creepy video it’s actually hard for me to believe it’s real. Professor of political science at Tulane University and MSNBC host, Melissa Harris-Perry states the following: We have to break through our kind of private idea that kids belong to their parents or kids belong to their families and recognize … Read more

So Where Can You Spend Your Bitcoins?

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When I get excited about something it’s really hard to get me to shut up.  So over the past several days I have spouted excitedly about Bitcoin to anyone and everyone I have come across.  The most common question I have gotten is: “it sounds cool, but where can I spend them?”  Most of us know … Read more

Blockbuster Lawsuit: Whistleblower Alleges Reuters Releases Data Early to HFT Clients

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Very interesting, but unsurprising, allegations have surfaced in a lawsuit brought forth by former Thomson-Reuters employee Mark Rosenblum that alleges the company released sensitive economic data early to HFT (high frequency trading) clients.  Now this should come as no shock to anyone, considering it has become crystal clear that the entire economy is essentially simply one giant oligarch-run fraud that is designed to take the wealth and labor of 99.9% and funnel it all up to them.  This realization is a large drive behind the recent success of Bitcoin, as people are simply desperate to get free of the parasitic banking system at all costs.  From Reuters:

In the lawsuit, filed on Wednesday in Manhattan federal court, Mark Rosenblum said he was terminated after telling U.S. authorities that the Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers was released at different times to different subscribers.

Rosenblum said in his court papers that Thomson Reuters releases the monthly survey to so-called “ultra low-latency” subscribers at two seconds before 9:55 a.m. ET, to “desktop” subscribers at 9:55 a.m., and to the general public at 10 a.m.

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ACLU: Gun Control Bill Threatens Privacy Rights and Civil Liberties

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I have to admit, I have a really hard time understanding the perspective of liberty minded folks that lean toward the “progressive” or “liberal” side of the traditional political spectrum when it comes to gun control.  Here is why.

I can understand where their visceral dislike of guns comes from.  Many of them are urbanities and cannot possible conceive the reason anyone would need or want a gun, let alone an “assault rifle.”  I grew up in Manhattan, believe me I get the mentality.  It is very much a cultural phenomenon more than anything else.   That said, many of these people fully understand how criminal our corporate government has become and how these oligarchs are systematically attempting to remove the civil rights of the citizenry.  While this may not be a “right” you agree with, it is a right nonetheless.  I think at a time when we are dealing with such fascist tendencies at the top, we should not advocate for the removal of any rights whatsoever from the citizenry.  This has been my position all along and continues to be.

Yet there is more.  As we see from the ACLU, Harry Reid’s gun control bill is about far more than gun control.  It is about government databases, as well as various other blatant threats to privacy and civil liberties.  From the Daily Caller:

As Senate Democrats struggle to build support for new gun control legislation, the American Civil Liberties Union now says it’s among those who have “serious concerns” about the bill.

In an exclusive interview with The Daily Caller, a top lobbyist for the ACLU announced that the group thinks Reid’s current gun bill could threaten both privacy rights and civil liberties.

The inclusion of universal background checks — the poll-tested lynchpin of most Democratic proposals — “raises two significant concerns,” the ACLU’s Chris Calabrese told TheDC Wednesday.

Calabrese — a privacy lobbyist — was first careful to note that the ACLU doesn’t strictly oppose universal background checks for gun purchases. “If you’re going to require a background check, we think it should be effective,” Calabrese explained.

Calabrese wouldn’t characterize the current legislation’s record-keeping provision as a “national gun registry” — which the White House has denied pursuing — but he did say that such a registry could be “a second step.”

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Foreign Cash is Now Bidding for “Rat Infested” Homes in America’s Latest Housing Bubble

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I’ve been following closely the recent attempts by the domestic oligarchy in charge of the corporatist-facist state we call America to create a new housing bubble for several years now.  For a little while, I was merely confused as to how prices were starting to rise when college graduates have no jobs and are six figures in debt, while at the same time real incomes are dropping for the rest of the populace.  Rather quickly, the pieces starting falling into place.  It became clear that the primary demand in the market was not from new families or recent college grads.  Nope, it was pretty much all financial oligarchs with private equity firms buying up properties in bulk as “investments.”  An entire asset class of “buy to rent” was born.  I tweeted the following a few days ago:

I can sum up the housing market like this. Rich baby boomers with PE firms outbidding each other as they enter the dementia phase of their lives.

I firmly believe that the above statement sums up what is now the primary backbone of the latest housing bubble.  Alas, there is more.  On top of these boomers that know nothing other than real estate and financial speculation, there is a flood of foreign money, in many cases criminal money, being laundered into U.S. real estate.  We discover that this foreign cash is now preventing regular citizens from buying or even renting in the San Francisco Bay Area.  From Mercury News:

Many homes that would be purchased in a normal market by average buyers are ending up in the hands of cash-paying absentee owners, typically investors, according to the real estate information company DataQuick. That’s especially true of foreclosures and lower-priced homes and condos.

David Yang, 36, who works in solar power, is moving into a home in South San Jose — the 10th one he bid on in five months of looking. “Every house in a good neighborhood probably will receive 20 to 30 offers,” he said. “It’s really crazy.”

His agent, Sharmila Banerjee, said that “cash is coming from China, India, Russia, but there can be difficulties transferring money from outside the country.” When one such deal fell through, another one of her clients had his offer accepted, she said.

In February, 1,044 houses and condos — 28 percent of the sales — in the counties of Santa Clara, San Mateo, Alameda and Contra Costa were bought by absentee buyers. That is the highest percentage since DataQuick began tracking them in 2000. In Contra Costa County, absentee buyers were 35 percent of the sales.

Real estate agent Melissa Haugh said everyone in her office was stunned at the price, paid in cash, for a Santa Clara fixer-upper.

“The house had a rat infestation, there were holes in the walls, windows that leaked, mold around windows, water damage to floors. It needed $100,000 in work,” she said.

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In His Own Words: Why Chris Hedges Resigned from a “Human Rights” Organization

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Chris Hedges, is in my opinion, one of the most admirable, patriotic and courageous Americans alive today.  The Pulitzer Prize winning journalist for the New York Times could have just quietly faded into the night after a career most of us can only fathom, but not him.  Rather, he is right here on the front … Read more

Great News: Introducing the “Whistleblowers Defense League”

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The U.S. government has a particular disdain for activists with computer chops, folks often times referred to as “hacktivists.”  This was put on full display for the entire world earlier this year when an overzealous and vindictive federal prosecutor’s witch hunt against prodigy Aaron Swartz drove him to suicide.  This same contemptuousness has also resulted … Read more