More American Cronyism – U.S. Government Selling Visas to Fund Luxury Apartment Buildings

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Merging, on paper, the affluent midtown neighborhood and the struggling one uptown placed Hudson Yards in a community with an overall high unemployment rate, positioning developer Related Cos. to gain low-cost financing from foreigners seeking green cards.

The program through which that happens, known as EB-5, enables foreign nationals to obtain U.S. permanent-resident status by putting up money for new business ventures that create American jobs. It gives ventures in high-unemployment and rural areas a special status to encourage investment. But as the program’s popularity has soared in recent years, the bulk of immigrant investment is going to projects that are located, like $20 billion Hudson Yards, in prosperous urban neighborhoods.

At least 80% of EB-5 money is going to projects that wouldn’t qualify as being in Targeted Employment Areas without “some form of gerrymandering,” estimates Michael Gibson, managing director of USAdvisors.org, which evaluates projects for foreign investors.

Increasingly, the money appears to be flowing to the flashiest projects, which the investors often see as safest, EB-5 professionals say. Among those getting EB-5 money are an office building set to host Facebook Inc. near Amazon.com Inc.’s Seattle headquarters, a boutique hotel in high-end Miami Beach, and a slim Four Seasons condo-hotel in lower Manhattan that sports a penthouse with an asking price above $60 million. In all of them, geographic districts were crafted to include higher-unemployment areas. 

– From the Wall Street Journal article: How a U.S. Visa-for-Cash Plan Funds Luxury Apartment Buildings

Another day, another story highlighting just how completely corrupt and sleazy the U.S. economy has become.

I’ve covered the issue of EB-5 visas before, and how a program that was initially supposed to help high unemployment neighborhoods attract investment, has become another scheme to further enrich America’s crony capitalist class.

Before we get into the meat of this post, here are a few excerpts from last year’s piece, How NYC’s Biggest Real Estate Project in a Generation is Being Financed by Selling Green Cards to the Chinese:

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Is the Justice Department Finally Ready to Jail Corporate Criminals?

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The single greatest travesty to afflict American society in the 21st century has been the abandonment of the rule of law and accountability. It’s worse than the attacks of 9/11 and the subsequent loss of privacy and civil liberties. It’s even worse than the economic devastation unleashed by the financial crisis.

The reason it’s worse is because dynamic, complex and diverse cultures such as these United States will always be flawed and some of its leaders, both corporate and political, will always fall to the temptation of corruption and criminality. The key to preventing such bad behavior from multiplying and ultimately destroying the entire civilization, is the rule of law.

Edward Snowden leaked the information he did in order to inform the American public of what its government was doing in cahoots with large tech companies. He saw Constitutional violations and he held up his oath to protect the founding document from “enemies foreign and domestic.” Nevertheless, no one in a position of power has been held accountable.

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Welcome to the Recovery – Two Out of Five American Children Experience Poverty

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The last seven years of American history will be remembered for the unprecedented oligarch crime scene that it is. Branding what has occurred during the Obama administration an “economic recovery,” represents little more than a vicious assault on human intelligence.

I’ve spent a lot of time on these pages proving this to be the case, and have even dubbed it the “oligarch recovery” (see links at the end). Here’s the latest proof.

From the Wall Street Journal:

Childhood poverty is far more prevalent than annual figures suggest, a new paper says, with nearly two in every five U.S. children spending at least one year in poverty before they turn 18 years old.

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Video of the Day – Donald Trump is Asked About Libertarianism

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*Note: This post originally maintained Trump was saying “be careful” to Nick Gillespie, when in reality he seems to have been talking to others walking with him in the crowd with equipment. The post has been changed to reflect this realization.

Reason’s editor in chief Nick Gillespie recently caught up with Donald Trump on the campaign trail and asked him about libertarianism. This is what ensued:

This exchange is troubling from several different angles. First off, Trump does his typical dance in which he avoids questions he doesn’t want to answer by giving a simplistic jingoistic response. He is also clearly uncomfortable with the question. Why?

Overall, the above exchange is kind of unnecessary anyway since it’s abundantly clear Trump is anti-liberty and anti-freedom. Let’s recall what he said should be done with Edward Snowden. From a Washington Times story in 2013:

Edward Snowden, the man at the heart of the NSA information leaks, is nothing but a “traitor” — and America ought to recreate history in dealing with him, real estate mogul Donald Trump said on a “Fox & Friends” interview.

In other words, execute him, Mr. Trump implied.

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Guardian Op-Ed – The City of London Has Turned Britain Into a “Civilized Mafia State”

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Liberty Blitzkrieg has seen an uncharacteristically strong focus on London-centric posts today. Go figure.

While the earlier post related to the likely bursting of the London real estate bubble, this one highlights a blistering critique of the role the City of London has played in transforming Great Britain into what George Monbiot calls a “civilized mafia state.” But that’s just an appetizer. This extremely well written and informative article is a must read for anyone still in the dark regarding London’s central role within the global financial crime syndicate.

Here are a few excerpts from the Guardian:

To an extent unknown since before the first world war, economic relations in this country are becoming set in stone. It is not just that the very rich no longer fall while the very poor no longer rise. It’s that the system itself is protected from risk. Through bailouts, quantitative easing and delays in interest-rate rises, speculative investment has been so well cushioned that – as the Guardian economics editor, Larry Elliott, puts it – financial markets are “one of the last bastions of socialism left on Earth”.

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Luxury London Home Sales Plunge 26% – Has this Mega Real Estate Bubble Finally Burst?

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It appears the music may have finally stopped for one of the world’s largest luxury real estate bubbles: London.

It’s well known that foreign oligarchs love London real estate as a means to launder funds, typically “earned” by soaking their host countries dry via corruption and fraud. This has caused absurd and irrational spikes in high-end residential real estate in the English capital, as well as a flood of new construction.

With emerging markets now completely collapsing, the seemingly endless flood of foreign money is drying up, and with it, London real estate.

So has the London real estate bubble popped? Probably.

From Bloomberg:

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The UN’s “Sustainable Development Agenda” is Basically a Giant Corporatist Fraud

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This Agenda is a plan of action for people, planet and prosperity. It also seeks to strengthen universal peace in larger freedom. We recognize that eradicating poverty in all its forms and dimensions, including extreme poverty, is the greatest global challenge and an indispensable requirement for sustainable development. All countries and all stakeholders, acting in collaborative partnership, will implement this plan. We are resolved to free the human race from the tyranny of poverty and want and to heal and secure our planet. We are determined to take the bold and transformative steps which are urgently needed to shift the world onto a sustainable and resilient path. As we embark on this collective journey, we pledge that no one will be left behind. The 17 Sustainable Development Goals and 169 targets which we are announcing today demonstrate the scale and ambition of this new universal Agenda. They seek to build on the Millennium Development Goals and complete what these did not achieve. They seek to realize the human rights of all and to achieve gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls. They are integrated and indivisible and balance the three dimensions of sustainable development: the economic, social and environmental.

– From the Preamble to the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development 

UN records reveal that the intergovernmental body has already marginalised the very groups it claims to be rescuing from poverty, hunger and climate disaster.

Records from the SDG process reveal that insiders at the heart of the UN’s intergovernment engagement negotiations have criticised the international body for pandering to the interests of big business and ignoring recommendations from grassroots stakeholders representing the world’s poor.

Formal statements issued earlier this year as part of the UN’s Post-2015 Intergovernmental Negotiations on the SDGs, and published by the UN Sustainable Development Division, show that UN ‘Major Groups’ representing indigenous people, civil society, workers, young people and women remain deeply concerned by the general direction of the SDG process — whereas corporate interests from the rich, industrialised world have viewed the process favourably.

This allegation is borne out by UN records, which show that its own Major Groups representing the very people the global institution professes to be empowering — poor people in developing countries — are increasingly sceptical of the SDG agenda.

– From Nafeez Ahmed’s recent article: UN Plan to Save Earth is “Fig Leaf” for Big Business

On September 25th, Pope Francis will address the United Nations General Assembly in New York City. To much fanfare, the Pope will celebrate the unveiling of the UN’s Sustainable Development Agenda 2030.

A key plank of this agenda relates to the UN’s “Sustainable Development Goals,” or SGDs. While this sounds all warm and fuzzy, several well meaning participants have become horrified by the extent to which multi-national corporations have influenced the entire process. So much so, that insiders are claiming the UN is actually marginalizing the very people it claims to be saving. The poor, the weak, and the voiceless.

In an invaluable piece of investigative reporting, Nafeez Ahmed writes the following:

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“Liars Loans” are Back…but with a Twist

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Most of you will be intimately familiar with the roll “liars loans” played in last decade’s financial crisis. In a nutshell, these were loans in which the borrower was encouraged to lie about his or her income in order to qualify for a mortgage they couldn’t actually handle. In the aftermath of the crisis, regulations have been put in place to ensure lenders verify income and the ability of the borrower to service the mortgage. As is always the case, there’s a loophole, and Wall Street is already exploiting it.

The loophole pertains to loans for homes that will be used for business purposes. Unsurprisingly, people are lying about the true use of their homes to avoid regulations. Some of these are then being packaged in AAA rated bond issuances.

From Bloomberg:

The pitch arrived with an iconic image of the American Dream: a neat house with a white picket fence.

But behind that picture of a $2.95 million home in Manhattan Beach, California, were hints of something darker: liar loans, those toxic mortgages of the subprime era.

Years after the great American housing bust, mortgages akin to the so-called liar loans — which were made without verifying people’s finances — are creeping back into the market. And, like last time, they’re spreading risks far and wide via Wall Street.

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IRS Employee Arrested After Sexually Molesting Woman Being Audited in Tennessee

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What’s the deal with government employees thinking they have the liberty to sexually molest the citizens they are supposed to be working for?

It was barely over a week ago that I published the following post: TSA Agent Arrested for Sexually Molesting South Korean Woman at NYC’s LaGuardia Airport. Here’s an excerpt:

A TSA screener is accused of sexually assaulting a woman at LaGuardia Airport in New York City after telling her she needed to be searched in the bathroom.

Maxie Oquendo allegedly sexually assaulted a 21-year-old student from South Korea after her Salt Lake City flight landed Tuesday afternoon.

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U.S. Aerial Surveillance is Being Impaired Off the East Coast Until October 1st Due to “Military Activities”

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A notam issued Sept. 1 announced that, beginning Sept. 2, both ADS-B surveillance and TCAS may be unreliable in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, as well as in airspace extending approximately 200 nautical miles off shore. The situation is expected to last through Oct. 1 as a result of military exercises in the area.

But similar military exercises in the past have caused no interference with civilian ADS-B or TCAS, and AOPA is asking the FAA to explain both why the notam was issued so late and what has changed to raise these new concerns. 

“We are working to get answers for our members,” said Rune Duke, AOPA director of air traffic and airspace. “This notam has caused considerable alarm and much confusion, while giving pilots little time to prepare. The long duration, ambiguous language, and short notice of this notam are all cause for serious concern. We have spoken with representatives of the FAA and the Department of Defense and will continue to pursue this until we get the answers pilots need.”

– From the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association release: AOPA Seeks Answers About ADS-B Notam 

This is not my area of expertise, so I encourage readers to do their own research and decide for themselves whether or not this concerning. Given the fact so many people are extremely skittish about “something happening” this month, I thought it was curious enough to share.

In a nutshell, it appears that aerial surveillance across much of the East Coast will be impaired until October 1 due to “military activities.” We learn from the NBAA (National Business Aviation Association) that:

TCAS, ADS-B Unreliable in Southeast U.S. Beginning Sept. 2

Sept. 1, 2015

Due to military activities, the TCAS and ADS-B surveillance may be unreliable in the airspace over Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, and extending approximately 200 nautical miles offshore, from 1 a.m. EDT (0500z) Sept. 2 until midnight EDT (0459z) on Oct. 1.

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