Following this year’s further revelations on the NSA actively spying on Americans’ communications, along with the president’s promise to “reign in” the powers of US spooks, one would have expected that the government would be engaged in a damage control campaign going forward.
However, this is the criminally insane military industrial complex usurped government we’re referring to, so Instead they’re putting world-eating Octopus logos on the side of spy satellites and tweeting about it.
Here’s a photograph of the launch of NROL-39, the latest government spy satellite being overseen by The National Reconnaissance Office, which provides signals intelligence to the NSA, among other agencies. The NRO is considered one of the “big 5″ spy agencies.
The program is classified, but ‘what the hell, let’s tweet about it’ was presumably the conclusion of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the over-arching agency that the NRO reports to.
And to really rub it in Americans’ faces about how we spy on them and the entire world, lets slap on a logo featuring an octopus enveloping the world with its tentacles, with the words “Nothing is beyond our reach.”
Really subtle. This would be akin to the DoD sticking the grim reaper on it’s unmanned drone program as a logo… oh wait it did do that.
A spokesperson for NRO issued a statement that reads:
“NROL-39 is represented by the octopus, a versatile, adaptable, and highly intelligent creature. Emblematically, enemies of the United States can be reached no matter where they choose to hide.”
“‘Nothing is beyond our reach’ defines this mission and the value it brings to our nation and the warfighters it supports, who serve valiantly all over the globe, protecting our nation.” the statement continues.
The ODNI is headed up by James Clapper, the principle advisor to President Obama on intelligence and national security, and the man who openly LIED to Congress during a March Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on the NSA’s spying programs, then later apologised for doing so.
Indeed, fresh calls were made in Congress this week to prosecute Clapper, a retired Air Force lieutenant general, for committing a federal offense.
“The only way laws are effective is if they’re enforced,” said Rep. James Sensenbrenner Jr., the original author of the Patriot Act. “If it’s a criminal offense — and I believe Mr. Clapper has committed a criminal offense — then the Justice Department ought to do its job.”
So you’d think Clapper would want to be keeping a low profile right about now. But no, like some bad guy out of a James Bond movie, he’s tweeting about engulfing the world like a crazy cephalopod or a crackers kraken. He’s letting the world know that he’s about to become a maniacal mollusc, launching a giant spy telescope into space. He’s proudly announcing that he’s an insane invertebrate collecting and devouring all your metadata and tracking your exact whereabouts under a 30 year old executive order.
If you’re thinking that you’ve seen this logo somewhere before, it may be because you watched the feature-length episode of the original Batman series when The Joker, The Penguin, The Riddler, and Catwoman joined forces as the “United Underworld”. Yes, it was the logo of the most vile villains in all of Gotham city. Very fitting.
“In addition its primary payload, the rocket will also carry a dozen mini satellites funded by the National Reconnaissance Office and @NASA,” the ODNI twitter account also notes.
The only other thing known about the NROL-39 spy satellite launch is its trajectory, which places it into an orbit identical to existing spy satellites used for radar imaging. It is thought by some that the mission is therefore part of a series of launches in an effort to retrieve components from the failed spy satellite program known as Future Imagery Architecture. In 2007, The New York Times labeled the program “perhaps the most spectacular and expensive failure in the 50-year history of American spy satellite projects.”
So much for “nothing is beyond our reach” then.
Credit to infowars
In a note to clients this afternoon, Eric Green, global head of rates, FX, and commodities research at TD Securities, warns that “stocks look more vulnerable than ever,” as prices have outrun improvements in fundamentals.
Green writes:
A prevailing view among many has been that the portfolio substitution effect of QE inflated risk assets such as equities beyond reason. When the Fed began talking about tapering, however, there was no evidence that stocks were overvalued. Narrow profits as a percentage of gross value added were very much consistent with stocks priced in the 1550 range. However, since that time the S&P 500 has risen almost 11% after trading sideways between May and early September. Indeed the leg up from 1650 after the no tapering decision in September has not been supported by underlying growth and earnings fundamentals. Part of this may be attributed to a ‘low for longer’ theme that has gained more traction relative to the lead up to the September meeting.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/stocks-look-more-vulnerable-than-ever-2013-12#ixzz2mglMd1uK
Wall Street: The day of reckoning nears
The wolf really may be coming to Wall Street.
Although Hollywood has a movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio as the “wolf,” the real one may not be the trader but rather a regulator.
Indeed, 2014 could be a very interesting year on the Street.
How interesting? Let’s have a look:
Someone BIG is getting steel braceletsIn 2013 the world of finance was rocked by high-profile cases against JPMorgan Chase and SAC Capital that highlighted a year of aggressive enforcement from regulators. But while the targeted firms paid billions in penalties and suffered public shame, there were precious few high-profile arrests.
If selling gets out of hand—and there’s reason to believe it could, considering the market’s meteoric rise during the current bull run—the tapering will become undone. Remember, the Fed promised with its last round of quantitative easing that the purchases would be “open-ended,” meaning they will be decreased or increased at the Open Markets Committee’s discretion.
In the end, Wall Street will get its way. It always does.
Jim Rogers Cautions “Be Prepared, Be Worried, And Be Careful… This Is Going To End Badly”
“Eventually, the whole world is going to collapse,” Jim Rogers chides a disquieted CBC anchor as he explains the reality that, “we in the West have staggering debts. The United States is the largest debtor nation in the history of the world,” adding that “this is going to end badly.”
However, the co-founder of Soros’ Quantum fund is convinced that the commodity super-cycle is far from over, but driven by supply constraints (and cost increases) as opposed to demand from higher growth. The following interview provides more color on his commodity view as he re-iterates his bullish stance on Ag (with sugar a focus) and Natural Gas (some harsh natural realities coming), warning “don’t get too excited about fracking,” when he talks energy products.
Rogers, in his inimitable way, sums up the state iof euphoria that many markets find themselves in thus, “we are all floating around on a sea of artificial liquidity right now. This is not going to last.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-12-04/jim-rogers-cautions-be-prepared-be-worried-and-be-careful-going-end-badly
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-12-04/jim-rogers-cautions-be-prepared-be-worried-and-be-careful-going-end-badly
Kyle Bass Warns When “Everyone Is ‘Beggaring Thy Neighbor’… There Will Be Consequences”
“There are going to be consequences to central bank balance sheet expansion all over the world,” Kyle Bass tells Steven Drobny in his new book, The New House of Money, adding “It’s a beggar-thy-neighbor policy, but everyone is beggaring thy neighbor.” The Texan remains concerned at QE’s effects on wealth inequality and worries that “at some point this is going toignite and set cost pressures off.” While Gold-in-JPY is his recommended trade for non-clients, his hugely convex trades on Japan’s eventual collapse remain as he explains the endgame for his thesis, “won’t buy back until JPY is at 350,” and fears “the logical conclusion is war.”