Michael Krieger

My name is Michael Krieger, and I am the creator and editor of Liberty Blitzkrieg. I'm originally from New York City.

As far as my academic and professional background, I attended college at Duke University where I earned a double major in Economics and Spanish. After completing my studies in 2000, I took a job at Lehman Brothers where I worked with the Oil analyst in the Equity Research Department.  In 2005, I joined Sanford C. Bernstein where I served as the Commodities Analyst on the trading floor. About halfway through my time there, I started to branch out and write opinions on bigger picture "macro" topics that no one else at the firm was covering. These opinion pieces were extremely popular throughout the global investment community, and I traveled around providing advice to some of the largest mutual funds, pension funds and hedge funds in the world.

I loved my job, but as time passed I started to educate myself about how the monetary and financial system functions and what I discovered disgusted me. I no longer felt satisfied working within the industry, and I resigned in January 2010.  At that point, I started a family investment office and continued to write macro pieces on economic, social and geopolitical topics. That summer, I drove cross country for six weeks and ultimately decided to leave the crowded streets of Manhattan for the open spaces of Boulder, Colorado, where I currently reside.

In the years that followed, I gradually recognized that my true passion centers upon writing on issues of significant societal importance given the extremely challenging times we live in. This realization culminated with me losing interest in financial markets and eventually launching this website in early 2012.

If you are interested in a more detailed description, replete with colorful anecdotes, of how I ended up making this bizarre professional transition, take the time to watch the video below.

https//www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/DcqMN-FXCIE?rel=0

In Liberty,
Michael Krieger

The FBI Busts Up Another of its Own Terrorist Plots and Politicians Rush to Blame the First Amendment

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Like other recent sensational “terror plots,” however, the criminal complaint unsealed yesterday demonstrates the key role of an undercover law enforcement informant in both formulating and facilitating the alleged plot. It doesn’t appear that Velentzas or Siddiqui actually planned or attempted to bomb any target, nor is there any evidence of discussions about how to create a bomb before the introduction of the informant into their lives.

While Velentzas appeared to have latent sympathy with the Islamic State, contrary to sensational media reports she is not alleged in the criminal complaint to have had any contact with the group.

Their discussions allegedly progressed, with the informant and Velentzas meeting to talk in greater detail about how to create a bomb, using information gleaned from The Anarchist Cookbook, and discussing whether it would be appropriate to target a gathering of police officers with such a device. At several points in the complaint, Velentzas indicates her reticence about doing anything that might harm “regular people,” even criticizing the Boston Marathon bombers for killing and injuring civilians. During this time, the informant also provided both Velentzas and Siddiqui with printed copies of Inspire, including selected passages about how to create explosives.

– From the Intercept article: Informant Provided Bomb-Making Manual to Alleged “ISIS-Inspired” Plotters

What does a government wanting its population to remain in fear so as to justify a total surveillance state, and a military-intelligence industrial complex hooked on billions in wasteful corporate welfare do in the absence of genuine terrorist plots? Create artificial plots, naturally.

This disturbing trend has been covered here at Liberty Blitzkrieg and elsewhere in recent years. Read the following articles for a couple of recent examples:

Manufactured Terrorism – U.S. Officials Claim Credit for Stopping Another Terror Attack Created by the FBI

FBI Moves to Broaden Hacking Authority – Google Says it Poses “Monumental Constitutional Concern”

Moving along, yesterday it was announced that the Feds had broken up an “ISIS inspired plot” involving two New York women, Noelle Velentzas and Asia Siddiqui. While these ladies certainly appear deranged, what is also clear is that they are incredibly incapable. There seems very little chance that they could ever inflict serious damage to American society without assistance and encouragement from the FBI, which is exactly what the agency provided them.

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Is Greece About to Play its Geopolitical Trump Card and Ignite a Chain Reaction Across Europe?

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If the EMU powers persist mechanically with their stale demands – even reverting to terms that the previous pro-EMU government in Athens rejected in December – they risk setting off a political chain-reaction that can only eviscerate the EU Project as a motivating ideology in Europe. 

Forced Grexit would entrench a pervasive suspicion that EU bodies are ultimately agents of creditor enforcement. It would expose the Project’s post-war creed of solidarity as so much humbug.

Greece could not plausibly remain in Nato if ejected from EMU in acrimonious circumstances. It would drift into the Russian orbit, where Hungary’s Viktor Orban already lies. The southeastern flank of Europe’s security system would fall apart.

Mr Tsipras is now playing the Russian card with an icy ruthlessness, more or less threatening to veto fresh EU measures against the Kremlin as the old set expires. “We disagree with sanctions. The new European security architecture must include Russia,” he told the TASS news agency. 

He offered to turn Greece into a strategic bridge, linking the two Orthodox nations. “Russian-Greek relations have very deep roots in history,” he said, hitting all the right notes before his trip to Moscow next week.

– From Ambrose Evans Pritchard’s article in the Telegraph: Greek Defiance Mounts as Alexis Tsipras Turns to Russia and China.

Over the past couple of months, I’ve at times been a strong critic of Greek leadership’s seeming unwillingness to demonstrate the courage necessary to flip the bird to EU bureaucrats and usher in paradigm level change for the long suffering nation. At the core of the problem seems the be the mandate under which Syriza was elected — namely to end austerity, but remain in the euro.

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9 New York Doctors Arrested for Using Homeless People to Defraud Millions from Medicaid

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Mr. Rorie was recruiting homeless people, prosecutors said, and whoever had a valid Medicaid card would be packed into a van and sent to medical clinics around New York City. There, after hours of unnecessary tests and fake diagnoses, the homeless people would be sent off with sneakers — selected from stacks of shoeboxes in the clinics’ basements. The doctors, staff members and billing specialists, meanwhile, would rack up hundreds or thousands of dollars per recruit in false Medicaid claims, prosecutors said.

From a warehouse in Sunset Park, Eric Vainer, 43, oversaw the operation with the help of his mother, Polina, 66, prosecutors said. “We can use the same patients like guinea pigs for anything we want,” Mr. Vainer was recorded saying in a government wiretap.

– From the New York Times article: 9 New York Doctors Are Accused of Defrauding Medicaid Using Homeless People

In America’s fraudulent oligarch economy in which corruption and theft have become the preferred means to earn money, it’s no surprise doctors feel a need to participate. Do no harm indeed.

From the New York Times:

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Peter Thiel on the American Political System – “Not a Democracy or Constitutional Republic”

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The obvious conclusion that the U.S. is neither a democracy nor a constitutional republic has been a key topic of conversation here at Liberty Blitzkrieg over the past several years. One of the most powerful representations of this unfortunate fact came from an academic study highlighted last year: New Report from Princeton and Northwestern Proves It: The U.S. is an Oligarchy.

A couple of days ago, Peter Thiel sat down with Tyler Cower at George Mason University’s Mercatus center for a chat about all sorts of interesting things. The Washington Post picked up on some of his thoughts regarding the American political system, which I think deserve some additional commentary.

On the one hand, he accurately identifies the U.S. as nothing resembling either a democracy or a constitutional republic. He then goes on to point out that the system we have is one in which the power is increasingly concentrated in undemocratic, “technocratic” agencies. Where I think he falls way short is with a failure to ask what interests are driving the decisions of these undemocratic entities. Any unbiased observer can clearly see that it is oligarchs driving the oligarchy, as opposed to independent thinking bureaucratic technocrats driving a technocracy. I have published countless articles proving this to be the case. Naturally, a billionaire might have a harder time recognizing this.

Fortunately, the writer of the Washington Post article picked up on his oversight. Here are some excerpts:

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Inmates at San Francisco Jail Forced Into Gladiatorial Combat as Sheriff’s Deputies Placed Wagers

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At just 150 pounds, it was hardly fair to pit Ricardo Palikiko Garcia against an opponent well over twice his size. But Garcia had to fight him — or else he’d allegedly face torture. 

Like the gladiators of old, Garcia and others were forced into pugilistic matches, local authorities said. Four sheriff’s deputies then placed bets on their bouts.

“Deputy’s betting against me and forcing me to fight and if I don’t fight, then he’s basically telling me that he was going to beat me up, cuff me, Tase me all at once,” Garcia said in an audio recording.

Investigators fear the fights may have gone on for a while. For Garcia, there was a lead-up. Deputies forced him to do pushups to train for fights.

– From the CNN article: Inmates Forced Like Gladiators to Fight as Deputies Took Bets

You know something’s just not right in your culture when you see a headline about prisoners engaging in gladiatorial combat while incarcerated, and the first thing that comes to your mind is, “this reminds me of a similar story from last year.”

Indeed, all it took was a quick search and I uncovered an article I wrote last March ago titled, FBI Launches Investigation into a Private Prison So Violent it is Called “Gladiator School,” which noted that:

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Jeb Bush Doubles Down on His Love Affair with the NSA in Recent Interview

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Last month, I highlighted Jeb Bush’s passionate and relentless support for the fascist, authoritarian and unconstitutional activities of the NSA in the post, Jeb Bush Exposed Part 2 – He Thinks Unconstitutional NSA Spying is “Hugely Important.” Here’s an excerpt:

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who is seriously considering a run for the White House in 2016, said Wednesday that the National Security Agency’s program that collects bulk telephone records was “hugely important,” throwing his support behind the practice as Congress debates whether to reauthorize or limit it.

At an event on foreign policy hosted by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Mr. Bush, a Republican, said, “For the life of me, I don’t understand the debate” over the metadata program.

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57-Year-Old Michigan Man Beaten to a Bloody Pulp by Police Officer Known as “RoboCop” for Running a Red Light

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Dent opened his door and was dragged out of his Cadillac; almost immediately, Melendez put him in a chokehold. Melendez then proceeded to deliver 16 blows to Dent’s temple. This all took place in about 15 seconds. Another officer arrived moments later and proceeded to use a taser stun gun against Dent, three times. In the video, Dent, with blood dripping from his forehead and cheek, appears not to be resisting Melendez’s efforts to arrest him.

Melendez’s record shows he has faced similar allegations before. At one point, he garnered more citizen complaints than any officer in Detroit, where he started his career in 1993 and served until his resignation in 2009. He entered Inkster’s police force a year later.

Over nearly two decades, Melendez has been named as a defendant in a dozen federal lawsuits, accused of planting evidence, wrongfully killing unarmed civilians, falsifying police reports and conducting illegal arrests. Some suits were settled out of court. Others were dismissed.

In 1996, Melendez, who was known in Detroit as “RoboCop”, and his partner shot and killed Lou Adkins. While Adkins was on the ground, several witnesses said the officers shot him 11 times, according to the Detroit Free Press. The case was settled for $1.05m, court records show.

– From the Guardian article: How a Traffic Stop Left a Michigan Man Beaten, Bloodied and Bitter at Police

Michigan police officer William Melendez has a sordid reputation. Amongst other things, he has come to be known as “Robocop” for his shady and often violent behavior. Additionally, he was “cited as the ringleader of numerous officers indicted by a federal grand jury in 2003 on civil rights violations.”

In contrast, Detroit native Floyd Dent worked at Ford for 37-years, has no criminal record and seems to be a decent and thoughtful citizen. He just happens to be black, driving at night, and had the unfortunate experience of running into William “Robocop” Melendez on the evening of January 28, 2015.

One of these individuals should be behind bars for a very long time, and one of them shouldn’t.

From the Guardian:

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Four “Too Big to Fail/Jail” Banks Threaten to Hold Back Funds to Democrats Over Elizabeth Warren

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Having already proven that their institutions are above the law in the aftermath of the financial crisis, executives at the “Too Big to Fail and Jail” banks have decided it’s time to teach Senate Democrats a lesson. Not being content with trillions in taxpayer backed bailouts to protect and further consolidate virtually all wealth within their oligarch fiefdoms, these bankers are irate at the notion that a commoner would dare criticize their unassailable crony privilege.

However, the worst part of this story, is that while Warren is harsher than most of her completely bought and paid for colleagues, she is still pretty meek when it comes to the big bank oligopoly. In her most misguided position, she doesn’t even support an audit of the largest organized crime institution operating within these United States, the Federal Reserve. Oh and for those of you who will claim the Fed is already audited, think again. Read: The Fed Impedes GAO Audits by Destroying Source Documents.

Thus it seems even Warren’s meager push for reform is simply too much for the thin skinned bailout baby banks to handle. From The Hill:

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Accusations Emerge That the U.S. Is Aiding ISIS – The Latest “Conspiracy Theory” Circulating in Iraq

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My belief is, we will, in fact be greeted as liberators.

– Dick Cheney on NBC’s Meet the Press, March 16, 2003

But that enmity for the United States circulates beyond the militias that once fought U.S. soldiers, surfacing also in parliamentary debates and Iraqi media reports and even at the highest ranks of the national armed forces that the United States is aiding.

“Everybody knows that the Americans are dropping supplies to Daesh,” said Brig. Gen. Abed al-Maliki, a senior Iraqi army commander based in the city of Samarra, about 80 miles north of Baghdad, using another term for the Islamic State.

What’s more, he said, during some of the fiercest fighting around Samarra last year, U.S. Special Operations forces dropped behind enemy lines to assist Islamic State militants.

“They came in with parachutes, and they were helping to bomb the city,” he said.

U.S. airstrikes against the Islamic State, he contended, are probably just a cover for efforts to support the group.

“It’s just a show,” he said, sitting in the city’s army command headquarters. “If the Americans want to finish something, they will finish it. If they wanted to liberate Iraq, they could.”

– From the Washington Post article, In Fight for Tikrit, U.S. Finds Enemies on Both Sides of the Battle Lines, March 27, 2015

How do you know your foreign policy is a complete and total destructive nightmare? When the country you supposedly “liberated” not only turns into a horrific war zone, but all sides fighting accuse you of helping the enemy. This seems to be precisely what is happening in Iraq at the moment.

Just last week, I was shocked to read in the Wall Street Journal that the U.S. military was preparing to coordinate action against ISIS in Tikrit, alongside Iranian backed militias. I highlighted this in the post, Can’t Make This Up – U.S. Providing Aid in Fight Against ISIS in Iraq Alongside Iranian Troops. Here’s the key excerpt:

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Meet the Overseas Contingency Operations Account – Washington D.C.’s Crony Capitalist War Slush Fund

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Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain has called it a “gimmick,” and Democrats complain that larding up the separate war funding bill with extra spending amounts to an “abusive loophole.” Yet so far, the massive increase is likely to remain in this year’s budget.

Another major criticism of the process has been its common use to fund favored projects and other items not directly tied to the war — a trend that has steadily grown over the years as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan dragged on and the Pentagon loosened the definition of war-related spending.

From 2001 to 2014, nearly $71 billion of nonwar funding was provided through war appropriations, according to the Pentagon’s own definition, the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service reported in December.

– From the Politico article: War Budget Might be Permanent ‘Slush Fund’

Many people will read this post, and posts like it, and shrug their shoulders saying that there’s always going to be corruption. True; however, there are degrees of corruption. When empires such as the U.S. attain a certain level of corruption that reaches the point where it becomes engrained within the fabric of society, and you couple that with zero accountability for the super rich and powerful, you have the ingredients for societal collapse. We are rapidly approaching this point, and I personally don’t think there’s any way to stop it.

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