Truck with dangerous radioactive materials hijacked in Mexico

A truck carrying radioactive material was hijacked in central Mexico, the UN’s nuclear watchdog reported.

Photo from cnsns.gob.mx

The truck was reportedly carrying outdated medical equipment used to perform radiotherapy when it was hijacked at a gas station in Tepojaco, Hidalgo – near Mexico City – on Monday, the National Commission of Nuclear Safety and Safeguards (CNSNS) said.

The white Volkswagen Worker semi-trailer had reportedly stopped en route from a hospital in Tijuana to a radioactive waste storage center.

CNSNS authorities said the cobalt-60 teletherapy source posed no health risk as long as the part of the equipment housing the radioactive source is not cracked.

"At the time the truck was stolen, the source was properly shielded. However, the source could be extremely dangerous to a person if removed from the shielding, or if it was damaged," the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said.

"The Mexican authorities are currently conducting a search for the source and have issued a press release to alert the public," the UN nuclear watchdog said. Local authorities have urged calm, telling the public the threat posed by the stolen equipment is minimal.

According to the IAEA, sealed radioactive sources are widely used in medicine for the treatment of malignant diseases and for blood irradiation. Cobalt-60 sources are often deployed in teletherapy, a form of external beam radiotherapy used to treat cancer, and brachytherapy – also known as internal radiotherapy.



FIG. VI-4. Cobalt-60 unit used for teletherapy (Typical source activity: up to 370 TBq (10 kCi) 60 Co). (Image from iaea.org)

Experts have previously warned that such radioactive sources have long been held by hospitals without sufficient security

Credit to RT

Booms & Shaking reported on in 11 states country wide within past week. Many same day!

White House ‘Prepared’ to Let Iran Keep Enriching Uranium

The White House confirmed late Tuesday that it is “prepared” to let Iran keep a “limited” uranium enrichment program under any final nuclear accord reached with Tehran in the next months.

Iran’s so-called right to enrich uranium has been a key sticking point in ongoing negotiations between the regime and Western nations.

The Iranians insist that they have an inherent “right” to keep enriching uranium, the main fuel for a nuclear weapon, for peaceful purposes. However, many in the West believe that Tehran would use this technology to clandestinely build a bomb.

The White House first told the Washington Free Beacon that it is currently exploring ways to preserve some of Tehran’s enrichment activities and confirmed that position late Tuesday after multiple media outlets requested clarification.

“We are prepared to negotiate a strictly limited enrichment program in the end state, but only because the Iranians have indicated for the first time in a public document that they are prepared to accept rigorous monitoring and limits on level, scope, capacity, and stockpiles,” the White House said in a statement provided to the Free Beacon.

“If we can reach an understanding on all of these strict constraints, then we could have an arrangement that includes a very modest amount of enrichment that is tied to Iran’s practical needs and that eliminates any near-term breakout capability,” the White House said.

This announcement by the White House came on the same day that Iran announced that it is in talks with the Russians to build two new atomic power plants.

Western negotiators known as the P5+1 reached a draft agreement to freeze some of Iran’s nuclear activities two weeks ago in Geneva. However, the final details of this interim deal must still be agreed upon before Iran enacts the temporary halt.

Tehran and the United States have engaged in a diplomatic tug of war in recent days over the precise language included in the draft deal.

Tehran maintains that the deal recognizes its right to enrich uranium, while the White House categorically denies that this is the case.

“The United States does not recognize that Iran has a ‘right’ to enrich, and the Joint Plan of Action did not include Iran’s demand for explicit recognition of a freestanding ‘right to enrichment,’” the White House explained to the Free Beacon in its statement.

Iran’s foreign minister and lead negotiator accused the White House of misleading the public about the details of the plan in pointed comments issued before Iran’s Parliament.

“While we were negotiating (in Geneva), the White House released a text as a fact sheet of the negotiations,” Javad Zarif said during a Wednesday briefing, according to Iran’s state-run Fars News Agency.

“This is while they could release the original text of the negotiations, but they released that fact sheet because they wanted to make their desired changes in it,” Zarif was quoted as saying.

Additionally, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson accused the White House on Tuesday of “attempting to misrepresent” the deal’s details.

The White House has quibbled with Iran’s claim that it has a right to “enrich” but not its ability to potentially maintain control of some portions of the program.

“Since any program is by definition conditional on the P5+1’s determination, it is therefore not a ‘right,’” the White House noted in its Tuesday evening statement. “In other words, the question of enrichment in the end state is still an issue to be negotiated, subject to the explicit condition that nothing is agreed until everything is agreed.”

Iran has promised to address and provide information about several key nuclear sites that remain shrouded in secrecy, according to the White House.

“It is also important to note that Iran has acknowledged that issues raised in the U.N. Security Council Resolutions (UNSCRs) have to be addressed and brought to a satisfactory conclusion before we agree to enrichment in the end state,” the statement read.

“Therefore the UNSCRs continue to provide us with leverage against the Iranian government, and should Iran not agree to our constraints we will revert to the status quo in which Iran remains outside of its international obligations and subject to continuing punitive measures,” it read.

Meanwhile, Iranian officials confirmed that they are in talks with the Russians to build a second and third new nuclear power plant in addition to one announced earlier this week.

The “second and third atomic power plants will be similar to the first one but with higher safety standards,” according to Fars.

Credit to Washington Free Beacon

The cost of extreme weather events has soared by 60% in just 30 years and it's going to get worse

The costs of extreme weather events have risen dramatically, climate scientists have claimed.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recently warned that extreme weather will continue to become more frequent and now a new report by is calling for cohesive action.

The national science academies of EU Member States believe Europe needs to plan for future probabilities of extreme weather, such as heat waves, floods and storms.



The UK has seen extreme weather over the past 30 years, including the Great Storm of 1987, which claimed 22 lives and devastating floods at Cockermouth in 2009. Here, the flooded River Derwent breaks its banks and floods properties in the town in Cumbria
TOP FIVE AREAS REQUIRING ACTION

The EASAC report identifies 5 areas requiring immediate EU-driven action:

Heat-waves - preparation is needed to reduce the deaths experienced in previous years by further studies of the factors affecting health outcomes, according to the report.

Flood defence and early warning - Good practice in flood preparation and zoning for flood defence across Europe should be established, it said.

Climate research - The EASAC report details what we know of current trends and the probabilities of future events but there continue to be many areas of uncertainty which European society needs to reduce to plan for its future.


Adaptation Plans - Individual Member States will need to develop and share information on National Climate Change Adaption Plans, but joint EU action is also essential because these events do not respect national barriers, the research warned.

Highlighting a 60 per cent rise over the last 30 years in the cost of damage from extreme weather events across Europe, the European Academies' Science Advisory Council (EASAC) warned of the grave economic and social consequences if European policy makers do not use the latest estimates of future droughts, floods and storms in their planning while adapting to global warming and the resulting climate disruption.

The UK has seen extreme weather over the past 30 years, including the Great Storm of 1987, which claimed 22 lives, devastating floods at Boscastle in 2004 and Cockermouth in 2009 and October's storms, which killed four.

Parts of Central Europe have suffered vast floods in the Danube and Elbe basins while parts of France, Italy and Spain have been ravaged by bush fires and heat waves.

Sir Brian Heap, the president of the (EASAC), which is based in Germany, said: ‘Given the tragic events this year in the rest of the world and the recent IPCC report, EASAC feels obliged to draw attention to the growing impact of extreme weather in Europe.

The report ‘follows a highly detailed assessment by a group of Europe's leading experts on climate of historic and likely future changes in extreme weather over Europe.

‘From the major loss of lives in heat waves to the economic and human costs of floods and storms, the implications are worrying.



The price of such natural catastrophes as the 'Michael Fish' hurricane of 1987, have soared by over 60 per cent in Europe over the past 30 years, scientists have warned. Here, the clean up begins in Boscastle, Cornwall in 2004

‘They present the European Union and its Member States with significant challenges in preparing Europe for a future with greater frequency of extreme weather.

‘In planning to adapt to such a future, it is critical to use the latest scientific knowledge on how different types of extreme events are expected to develop.

‘This depends not only on the type of event but also where in Europe is being considered since the EU's 28 countries and over 500 million population live in very different climate zones, from the Mediterranean sub-tropical to the Arctic.’

The report urges EU nations to prepare for heat waves and think about how to reduce the number of deaths.

Flood defence is also an area that requires improvement, as rising sea levels will leave coastal areas at serious risk from storm surges.




An EASAC report has urged EU nations to prepare for heat waves and think about how to reduce the number of deaths. Parts of Central Europe have suffered vast floods in the Danube and Elbe basins while parts of France, Italy and Spain (pictured) have been ravaged by bush fires and heatwaves

Researchers also believe climate research and adaptation plans should be given more priority.

‘Looking at the science, global climate model outputs have proved of immense value in providing the basis for understanding climate and its future,’ Sir Brian added.

‘However, there is an urgent need to improve regional climate models to reduce uncertainties and improve projections, for example extreme precipitations or hail storms and other local climatic phenomena such as tornadoes remain imperfectly understood.

‘The EU has a critical role in strengthening European climate-research communities and building networks across borders and disciplines to provide the data required for informed future policy-making.’


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2517528/The-cost-extreme-weather-events-soared-60-just-30-years--going-worse-claim-climate-scientists.html#ixzz2mWGYoDyQ

The Unfolding Healthcare Holocaust

This article is not just about Obamacare costs and quality of treatment, it is about the  healthcare holocaust which commenced on October 1, 2013. Obamacare, or dare I say, Obamacide, represents the biggest threat to the well-being and longevity for you and your loved ones.

Rule for Thee but Not for Me

One of the most incredulous aspects of Obamacare enforced, mandatory compliance is that the mandatory provision does not include the legislators who imposed this monstrosity upon us, namely, the Congress. Obamacare is going to prove so substandard that even Obama and his family want nothing to do with it. Are you mad yet? Well, we are just getting started.

The corporate friends of the President, such as the employees at General Electric, McDonalds, several labor unions, SEIU, the thugs at ACORN and over 1,300 big contributors to the Democratic party will not be forced to participate. The agency which will enforce the penalty phase of Obamacare, the IRS, was recently issued an exemption from participating as well. In short, if your corporation donated heavily to Obama’s re-election campaign, an exemption to the mandatory phase of Obamacare has been issued. For everyone else, tough luck, you will be participating in a system which will no doubt hasten the demise of yourself as well as tens of millions of other Americans.

Obamacare mandates the imposition of 19 new taxes which have never existed before including the tax on a home sale which really has nothing to do with healthcare. And if you use an indoor tanning booth, expect to pay a 10% tax.

Obama Said “You Can Keep Your Plan”

Obama told America that we could keep our present medical plan. That was a lie.

There have already been over five million policy cancellations because employers will not conform to the excessive dictates of Obamacare. The estimates are that at least 16 million American will lose their healthcare because of the excessive demands placed upon employers and their health care coverage regulations.

Obama Said “You Will Save Money On My Plan”

Under Department of Health and Human Services poverty level guidelines. If you’re a single earning worker making $44,680, or a couple earning a mere $60,520, or a family of four earning a modest income of $92,200, Obama eliminates your subsidy from the government for lower health costs. I do not mean to speak down to anyone, but do you realize that a couple making $60,520 per year is the equivalent of two fast food jobs? These are very modest incomes and the cost aspect of Obamacare should be raising red flags for all middle class income families.

The Kaiser Foundation published an ObamaCare Cost Calculator for you and your family after subsidies. Please be aware this is a basic estimate for the cost of a “Silver plan” (the second tier plan, as opposed to the basic “Bronze plan” on the Exchange). Also note, the total cost is greatly affected by “regional cost factor” (increasing or decreasing the premium by as much as 20%). There are indeed separate plans, consisting of Bronze, Silver, Gold and something called the Cadillac plan. However, there is an absence of information about what each level of the Obamacare plan entails in terms of cost and treatment. One thing is clear, when the health plan is divided up into differing levels of care and cost, there is indeed a problem because it is apparent that people will not be treated equally under Obamacare.

For a family of four with two dependent children and a $100,000 income, Obamacare insurance costs are nearly $10,000 per year. Such a family could have expected to pay about $500 per month under existing plans such as United Health Care. Under Obamacare, the cost more than doubled.

For the same family listed above making $150,000 per year, they will pay almost $14,000 per year or 350% more than they would expect to pay in today’s health insurance market. This is obviously why the corporate friends of Obama are seeking exemptions from participation. And for those who seek their own exemption through non-participation, they will be fined 2.5% of gross adjusted income and the amount will increase with each successive year that they refuse to participate.

England’s NHS System Is Obamacare’s Model

In England, Granny must die to save the state money.These words ring true as Dr. Patrick Pullicino discovered that there are approximately 450,000 deaths in Britain each year of people who are in hospital or under NHS care. Around 29% of that number, or about 130,000, were euthanized patients who were on the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP).

The Pullicino findings are bolstered by the newly discovered heinous compensation practices from the NHS with regard to the LCP. The majority of NHS hospitals in England are being given financial rewards for placing terminally-ill patients on a controversial “pathway” to death, as this fact has not been publicly disclosed.

The undeniable fact is that the British NHS doctors are prematurely ending the lives of thousands of elderly hospital patients because they are difficult to manage and they wish to free up beds. However, the main motivation for this attack upon humanity is that they are making money by eliminating the lives of the elderly in Britain.

Pullicino states that NHS doctors have turned the use of a controversial death pathway into the equivalent of euthanasia of the elderly. Pullicino has extensively researched the issue and asserts that  elderly patients, who could live longer, are prematurely placed on the LCP and it has now become an assisted death pathway rather than a care pathway. On average, patients submitting to LCP die within 33 hours.

For the Seventy-two trusts to receive compensation for euthanizing the elderly, the trust must respond to such questions as how many people had died on the LCP over the past three years and how much money received in that period was attached to goals involving the premature deaths of the elderly.

A staggering 62% of the trusts admitted that they had received, or will receive, cash rewards for meeting targets (i.e., killing old people) associated with the implementation of the LCP. The other 38% seem to enjoy killing for just for the sport of it, as they admitted that they had adopted the LCP without receiving any payments from NHS. This is hell on earth.

 Obamacare Death Panels

One would think that the Globalists would be ecstatic with the murder of over 50 million fetuses in the last 40 years in the United States. There seems to be a Planned Parenthood abortion factory on every corner attempting to murder every baby that they can get their hands on, but the Eugenics crowd at the United Nations are not satisfied. They want more even more death and destruction as they are demanding an even greater reduction in population from an increasing number of segments in our population.

A top Democrat strategist, Steven Rattner, who served as President Obama’s lead auto-industry adviser, wrote an opinion piece in the New York Times entitled “Beyond Obamacare” in which he calls for death panels and that the implementation of these panel are inevitable. Of course, Rattner’s comments have been totally ignored by the corporate-controlled media. As was the case with the LPC of the NHC, Rattner supports the rationing of health care for elderly patients, while unequivocally stating that  “We need death panels.” Rattner also serves on the board the New America Foundation, a George Soros-funded think tank that was instrumental in supporting rationed healthcare. Clearly, this is an Agenda 21 population reduction program. Similar systems exist in many countries, including Australia and New Zealand, where their governments have decided to ration care to the elderly.

The President’s position on denial of care is abundantly clear as his health care reform encourages rationing healthcare by levying a tax on “Cadillac” insurance plans in an attempt to push as many Americans as possible into Obamacare. Additionally, Obamacare calls for the appointment of a small contingent to make decisions on elderly care following the full implementation.

Obamacare is modeled after England’s NHC, only with even more denials of care through age-related treatment exclusions. The NHC is the unquestionable blueprint for Obamacare. However, we do not yet have a complete picture because Obamacare is still holding back many of the details of age-related exclusion.

We passed it Nancy and we are still waiting to see what all is in this healthcare plan. 

Ezekiel Emanuel (MD) President Obama’s Special Adviser for Health Policy, coincidentally, the brother of Rahm Emanuel), wrote an article in The Lancet (January 2009) entitled, Principles for allocation of scarce medical interventions. Emanuel proposes an ethical basis for rationing healthcare resources based upon age. He calls it the “complete lives system.”

In the article, Emanuel expresses the notion that all lives do not have a fundamentally equal value. Dr. Emanuel states that the state has the right and the mandated obligation which espouses the Eugenics belief that certain members of society are more valuable and should be saved at the expense of less valuable individuals. The obvious implication is that the state will decide which people will be condemned to death. Emanuel proposes that the very young and people 75 years of age and over should not be given life-saving treatments, only comfort care. These statements speak to the likely implementation of post-birth abortion (murder) and physician assisted suicide. Emanuel is one of the front men for Obamacare and his words are to be taken seriously.

Dr. Suzanne Allen is the present head of emergency services at the Johnson City Medical Center in Tennessee. Allen told Snopes that ”Oh, yes. We are seeing cutbacks throughout the services we provide. For example, we are now having to deal with patients who would normally receive dialysis that can no longer be accepted. In the past, there was always automatic approval under Medicare for anyone who needed dialysis, not anymore.” So, what will be their outcome? “They will die soon without dialysis,” she stated. In the no one over 75 will be given major medical procedures unless approved by locally administered Ethics Panels. In the Snopes interview Dr. Allen added that “These Panels will determine whether a patient receives medical treatment or not.”  Most Americans are in a great deal of trouble.

Conclusion

It turns out that Sarah Palin was correct, there are death panels in Obamacare. We are in the midst of the implementation of these heinous practices across the nation.

In short, the elderly have a duty to die and to die inexpensively. As the Agenda 21 watchdogs have repeatedly reported, Obama represents global interests that want 90% of us dead. Through the use of abortion, contraception and elderly genocide, can there be any question that our population is being targeted for a British style elderly genocide? I propose that we oppose Obamacare with every means available. Much of the foundations of representative government has been destroyed. However, in this instance we may wish to pursue making our Congress feel the extreme heat of our wrath, for it is not hyperbole to state that Obamacare is genocidal and we have entered a period of an extreme healthcare holocaust.

Credit to The common Sense Show

Holding the Dollar Could be Riskier Than Stocks

Loud Booms Caused By Microearthquakes, Seismologist Says

The U.S. Geological Survey says it recorded a 2.1 magnitude earthquake in Connecticut last Friday. According to Groton's Office of Emergency Management, that explains the mysterious loud booms that perplexed several residents over the weekend.

Joe Sastre is the Emergency Management Director for Groton. He says the town fielded a number of 911 calls on Friday with people reporting booming noises. "We were getting, 'I heard an explosion. Something blew up. But I don't see any smoke. I don't see any fires. I don't see any flames,'" Sastre said. "[Emergency] Services, when they were driving through the neighborhood trying to locate something, found a lot of people standing in their front yards asking, 'What's going on?' But nobody actually saw anything."

The mystery remained throughout the holiday weekend, but as seismologists returned to work on Monday the answer became clear -- two microearthquakes centered about two kilometers below the surface at the intersection of Route 184 and 117 (fairly close to the Bess Eaton Donut Shop) were to blame.

Sastre said there were no injuries and no reports of property damage from the quake. He said these types of quakes are fairly common in Connecticut.

But that still leaves the question -- why do earthquakes make sound? For that, I called up Justin Starr, a research assistant at Weston Observatory at Boston College, which monitored the quake. Starr said seismic energy from earthquakes produces "P Waves," which move by compressing whatever medium they travel through. "When a P Wave hits the earth's surface it causes the earth's surface to fluctuate rapidly up and down. Very, very quickly," Starr said.

Basically, the ground mimics the diaphragm of a speaker, amplifying the frequency of the seismic energy, which is low, but high enough for humans to hear as a low-frequency booming noise.

And the quakes raise one more question -- with no tectonic plate boundaries near Connecticut, why does the state get these earthquakes at all? Starr said there's a few theories about this, but one explanation lies in the distinction between inter-and-intra plate earthquakes. Interplate quakes are what they get out in California. Here in New England, we get intraplate, which are quakes that happen within a plate, far removed from any major tectonic fault lines.


Credit to Wnpr.org

Too Big To Fail Banks Are Taking Over As Number Of U.S. Banks Falls To All-Time Record Low

 

The too big to fail banks have a larger share of the U.S. banking industry than they have ever had before. So if having banks that were too big to fail was a "problem" back in 2008, what is it today? As you will read about below, the total number of banks in the United States has fallen to a brand new all-time record low and that means that the health of the too big to fail banks is now more critical to our economy than ever. In 1985, there were more than 18,000 banks in the United States. Today, there are only 6,891 left, and that number continues to drop every single year. That means that more than 10,000 U.S. banks have gone out of existence since 1985.

Meanwhile, the too big to fail banks just keep on getting even bigger. In fact, the six largest banks in the United States (JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley) have collectively gotten 37 percent larger over the past five years. If even one of those banks collapses, it would be absolutely crippling to the U.S. economy. If several of them were to collapse at the same time, it could potentially plunge us into an economic depression unlike anything that this nation has ever seen before.

Incredibly, there were actually more banks in existence back during the days of the Great Depression than there are today. According to the Wall Street Journal, the federal government has been keeping track of the number of banks since 1934 and this year is the very first time that the number has fallen below 7,000...

The number of federally insured institutions nationwide shrank to 6,891 in the third quarter after this summer falling below 7,000 for the first time since federal regulators began keeping track in 1934, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

And the number of active bank branches all across America is falling too. In fact, according to the FDIC the total number of bank branches in the United States fell by 3.2 percent between the end of 2009 and June 30th of this year.

Unfortunately, the closing of bank branches appears to be accelerating. The number of bank branches in the U.S. declined by 390 during the third quarter of 2013 alone, and it is being projected that the number of bank branches in the U.S. could fall by as much as 40 percent over the next decade.

Can you guess where most of the bank branches are being closed?

If you guessed "poor neighborhoods" you would be correct.
According to Bloomberg, an astounding 93 percent of all bank branch closings since late 2008 have been in neighborhoods where incomes are below the national median household income...

Banks have shut 1,826 branches since late 2008, and 93 percent of closings were in postal codes where the household income is below the national median, according to census and federal banking data compiled by Bloomberg.It turns out that opening up checking accounts and running ATM machines for poor people just isn't that profitable. The executives at these big banks are very open about the fact that they "love affluent customers", and there is never a shortage of bank branches in wealthy neighborhoods. But in many poor neighborhoods it is a very different story...

About 10 million U.S. households lack bank accounts, according to a study released in September by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. An additional 24 million are “underbanked,” using check-cashing services and other storefront businesses for financial transactions. The Bronx in New York City is the nation’s second most underbanked large county—behind Hidalgo County in Texas—with 48 percent of households either not having an account or relying on alternative financial providers, according to a report by the Corporation for Enterprise Development, an advocacy organization for lower-​income Americans.And if you are waiting for a whole bunch of new banks to start up to serve these poor neighborhoods, you can just forget about it. Because of a whole host of new rules and regulations that have been put on the backs of small banks over the past several years, it has become nearly impossible to start up a new bank in the United States. In fact, only one new bank has been started in the United States in the last three years.

So the number of banks is going to continue to decline. 1,400 smaller banks have quietly disappeared from the U.S. banking industry over the past five years alone. We are witnessing a consolidation of the banking industry in America that is absolutely unprecedented.

Just consider the following statistics. These numbers come from a recent CNN article...

The assets of the six largest banks in the United States have grown by 37 percent over the past five years.

The U.S. banking system has 14.4 trillion dollars in total assets. The six largest banks now account for 67 percent of those assets and all of the other banks account for only 33 percent of those assets.

Approximately 1,400 smaller banks have disappeared over the past five years.

JPMorgan Chase is roughly the size of the entire British economy.

The four largest banks have more than a million employees combined.

The five largest banks account for 42 percent of all loans in the United States.

Bank of America accounts for about a third of all business loans all by itself.

Wells Fargo accounts for about one quarter of all mortgage loans all by itself.

About 12 percent of all cash in the United States is held in the vaults of 

JPMorgan Chase.As you can see, without those banks we do not have a financial system.

Our entire economy is based on debt, and if those banks were to disappear the flow of credit would dry up almost completely. Without those banks, we would rapidly enter an economic depression unlike anything that the United States has seen before.

It is kind of like a patient that has such an advanced case of cancer that if you try to kill the cancer you will inevitably also kill the patient. That is essentially what our relationship with these big banks is like at this point.

Unfortunately, since the last financial crisis the too big to fail banks have become even more reckless. Right now, four of the too big to fail banks each have total exposure to derivatives that is well in excess of 40 TRILLION dollars.

Keep in mind that U.S. GDP for the entire year of 2012 was just 15.7 trillion dollars and the U.S. national debt is just 17 trillion dollars.

So when you are talking about four banks that each have more than 40 trillion dollars of exposure to derivatives you are talking about an amount of money that is almost incomprehensible.

Posted below are the figures for the four banks that I am talking about. I have written about this in the past, but in this article I have included the very latest updated numbers from the U.S. government.

I think that you will agree that these numbers are absolutely staggering…

JPMorgan Chase
Total Assets: $1,947,794,000,000 (nearly 1.95 trillion dollars)
Total Exposure To Derivatives: $71,289,673,000,000 (more than 71 trillion dollars)

Citibank
Total Assets: $1,319,359,000,000 (a bit more than 1.3 trillion dollars)
Total Exposure To Derivatives: $60,398,289,000,000 (more than 60 trillion dollars)

Bank Of America
Total Assets: $1,429,737,000,000 (a bit more than 1.4 trillion dollars)
Total Exposure To Derivatives: $42,670,269,000,000 (more than 42 trillion dollars)

Goldman Sachs
Total Assets: $113,064,000,000 (just a shade over 113 billion dollars – yes, you read that correctly)
Total Exposure To Derivatives: $43,135,021,000,000 (more than 43 trillion dollars)

Please don't just gloss over those huge numbers.

Let them sink in for a moment.

Goldman Sachs has total assets worth approximately 113 billion dollars (billion with a little "b"), but they have more than 43 TRILLON dollars of total exposure to derivatives.

That means that the total exposure that Goldman Sachs has to derivatives contracts is more than381 times greater than their total assets.

Most Americans do not understand that Wall Street has been transformed into the largest casino in the history of the world. The big banks are being incredibly reckless with our money, and if they fail it will bring down the entire economy.

The biggest chunk of these derivatives contracts that Wall Street banks are gambling on is made up of interest rate derivatives. According to the Bank for International Settlements, the global financial system has a total of 441 TRILLION dollars worth of exposure to interest rate derivatives.

When that Ponzi scheme finally comes crumbling down, there won't be enough money on the entire planet to fix it.

We had our warning back in 2008.

The too big to fail banks were in the headlines every single day and our politicians promised to fix the problem.

But instead of fixing it, the too big to fail banks are now 37 percent larger and our economy is more dependent on them than ever before.

And in their endless greed for even larger paychecks, they have become insanely reckless with all of our money.

Mark my words - there is going to be a derivatives crisis.

When it happens, we are going to see some of these too big to fail banks actually fail.

At that point, there will be absolutely no hope for the U.S. economy.

We willingly allowed the too big to fail banks to become the core of our economic system, and now we are all going to pay the price.


Credit to The Activist Post

Fed Printing 29 Cents of Every Dollar Uncle Sam Spends

Earth’s Gravity Altered By 2011 Japanese Earthquake

Japan’s devastating earthquake in 2011 left its mark on more than the town of Fukushima. The European Space Agency (ESA) says that it had an impact on Earth’s gravity as well.

Scientists used data from ESA’s GOCE satellite to show the effects of the 9.0 earthquake that struck east of Japan’s Honshu Island on March 11, 2011.

The strength of gravity varies from place to place on Earth, and earthquakes can deform our planet’s crust and cause tiny changes in local gravity. GOCE spent four years mapping out Earth’s gravity with unrivaled precision.

One reason values of gravity differ on Earth is because the materials within Earth are inhomogenous and are unevenly distributed. Since earthquakes shift around rock and other material tens of miles below the surface, they cause small changes in the local gravity. Earthquakes under oceans can also change the shape of the sea bed, displacing water and changing the sea level.

GOCE data is helping scientists understand how oceans transport huge quantities of heat around the planet and develop a global height reference system. Earlier this year, the satellite’s accelerometer and ion thrusters revealed GOCE had “felt” sound waves in space from the Japanese quake.

Scientists from the German Geodetic Research Institute (DGFI) and from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands analyzed the high-resolution vertical gravity gradients measured over Japan by GOCE. The team found the quake had clearly ruptured the gravity field in the area.

The latest research marks the first example that GOCE was able to find changes over time. The gravity change measured by GOCE differs in size and location, compared to those predicted by standard models.

The results, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research, are consistent with coarser observations using NASA’s Grace satellite, which measures changes over time. This suggests GOCE data will be important in improving models and it will help contribute to understanding earthquakes.

“Thus, we see that GOCE gravity gradients complement other types of data such as seismic, GPS and GRACE satellite gravimetry,” Martin Fuchs, from DGFI and lead author of the study, said in a statement. “We are now working in an interdisciplinary team to combine GOCE data with other information to obtain a better picture of the actual rupture in the gravity field than is currently available.”

GOCE ran out of fuel earlier this year and reentered Earth’s atmosphere, largely disintegrating in the process. The satellite more than doubled its planned life in orbit, and its data will continue to be used by scientists for years to come to help understand our planet a little better.

Credit to Red Orbit