Kill Assad

Barry, My Liege :

It is time for Assad to go.

Deaths have reached between 10,000 and 15,000, depending on who is counting [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-18093967].

Helicopter gunships and tanks are attacking suburbs.

It is a moral outrage and not acceptable. We cannot continue to do nothing.

My Liege, I cannot imagine that even the Russians and Chinese will object to an action to change the government. But, it does not matter what they say or do.

Assad must go.

The only question is this : Who will restore order in the country after his death?

Without a credible, international force in place, Syria will degenerate into a spasm of tribal and terrorist violence that has the potential to destabilize the entire region.

Here's a proposal :

Install a No-Fly zone immediately so Assad grounds his helicopters and planes.

Send in a limited force to secure the WMD.

Establish connections with a rebel organization so that there is a governmental framework in place to take over when the regime falls. Let them understand that as a condition of support they will accept members of the current government who have the necessary skills and are willing to swear a loyalty oath.

Assemble the largest possible coalition of countries willing to participate and station troops on the borders. It does not matter what organization they belong to.

KILL ASSAD. Use drones, SEALS, whatever is available.

After his death is confirmed, send in the international force to restore order. They will stay until the country is able to keep order by itself.

Your faithful servant,

The Speech

Barry, My Liege :

I have been thinking about the speech we would like you to give at the next campaign appearance. Of course, some of this speech MAY be a little harsh.

It's about taking it directly to Mitt Romney.

The speech :

'Howdy folks.

How y'all doin tonight.

You're in for a treat today, because I am going to let my hair down - figuratively speaking - just a little, and tell it like it is.

That's right, folks, this is the rarest of nights.

You are gonna get the truth.

Let's start with the claim that I am a Muslim and was not born in the United States and am therefore unqualified to be President.

That is just the biggest piece of crap I have ever heard in my life. I have refuted it time and again but it keeps coming back, sort of like black mold in the bathroom.

Seems that there are a lotta folks who want to believe something bad about me regardless of facts. So, I suppose that it will never go away.

My guess is that there are a lot of folks who just don't like black people. When they can't find anything wrong with a person they don't like, they just go ahead and make up something.

I'd like to assume they are well intentioned, but I can't do that. They are just bigots, plain and simple.

So here's the deal:

I AM BLACK.

I AM PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

GET OVER IT.

For God's sake, please get over it so we can work together on our real problems.

Here's another thing about bigots : thanks to George W. Bush, I have some far reaching powers as President. These are powers I did not create and don't really want, but I have them.

For example, I can put a terrorist on a list and kill him with a drone or a night raid with Navy Seals just on my say so.

I am a patient man, but for Christ's sake, maybe it is time to put some of these dingbats on the terror list.

About this Muslim business, that probably came from the fact that my middle name is Hussein. I am proud of that name. It reminds me of my father. He was a Muslim, I am not.

I am a Protestant and go to church with my family regularly. You remember that flapdoodle over Reverend Wright and his motor mouth. Obviously not one of my better moments, but HE IS A PROTESTANT MINISTER, not a Muslim. Get a grip.

I have lived in countries where the predominant religion is Islam and I attended a Muslim school as a child. It was a good school and they did not require that I swear allegiance to Allah to attend.

How many folks do you know with Irish names that are not remotely Irish? Probably a lot. It's one of the fun things in our country to watch an NFL football game and try to guess how a 300 pound black lineman from Detroit got the name Sean McDougal. By the way, that is a totally made up name - I mean no offense to any real Sean McDougals out there.

The point is this : just because I have a Muslim sounding name does NOT make me a Muslim any more than an Irish name makes a black man Irish.

Of course you all know that I really am Irish on my mother's side. This is America. We are PROUD of that.

As far as citizenship and religion go, take a look at Romney's background. Romney's family was polygamous; his father had three wives and his grandfather even more. The family fled to Mexico because they could not practice their religion in the USA. It is possible that Mitt Romney entered the country illegally and is an illegal alien.

Check THAT out and get back to me.

Let's take a look at the question of jobs.

Romney says he is a better candidate because he understands how to create jobs better than I do.

The only thing correct about that statement is the idea that job creation is important. The rest is pure BS.

Under my administration the country has created more than 3.3 million jobs since I took office. We need more, but, hey, 3.3 million new jobs ain't exactly petunias.

So, I know how to create jobs. My understanding of economics and job creation is way better than Mitt's. I'll match him line by line any day of the week.

What does Mitt Know? He knows how to take over companies and cut jobs or outsource them so he can sell the company for a profit. He makes a lot of money that way while a lot of hard working Americans who work in those companies lose jobs, savings, pride and healthcare.

It is legal under our system, but it aint right. It just is not right for America.

What is Mitt's plan for the economy and job creation? Well, according to his repeated statements, Mitt's plan is to do exactly what George W. Bush did.

That means he will reduce taxes on rich people, raise taxes on poor and middle class people, reduce or do away with regulation, encourage out sourcing of American jobs, reduce or eliminate Social Security and Medicare and basically do the opposite of what I have done.

All that means that we will get the same economic results as we did under Bush: namely, the worst financial crisis since the 1930's and a net job LOSS of 1.8 million jobs in eight years. [Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jobs_created_during_U.S._presidential_terms]

That's right, Mitt wants to KILL 2 MILLION jobs and create another recession.

My only question is this - why would any sane person vote for him?

Take the Tea Party, they seem like a group of sincere folks who want to help the country. But, for some reason, they want to adopt economic policies that will directly hurt them by taking away their Social Security, their Medicare and their jobs.

It's a puzzlement.

So, listen up Tea Party, the election is about the ECONOMY. It is NOT about gay marriage, gun rights or any other distraction.

The rich oligarchs who fund your movement want you to be distracted by side issues so they can lower their taxes and raid your social security.

They are running a shell game.

You gotta keep your eye on the prize folks, or the oligarchs are gonna take away your children's future.

Here's another thing about Mitt : He is a liar. Plain and simple, he lies. He is the worst type of politician. He will say anything to get elected and then do whetever he wants after winning the election. We have seen this with some Republican governors who ran on one platform, then pretty much did the opposite when they were elected.

Governor Walker in Wisconsin ran on a fiscally conservative platform. Then after he was elected, he reduced taxes on corporations thereby lowering tax revenues for the state. Then he claimed a budget crisis since revenues had declined. His solution was to cut public employee pensions and take away collective bargaining for public employees.

Listen up Tea Party, this is what Mitt will do to you. He will cut taxes on rich folks like himself, claim a budget crisis and demand that we eliminate or reduce Social Security and Medicare to balance the budget

It is just plain old greed folks; plain old greed.

And another thing, what is up with the 'retroactive retirement' from Bain? That's double talk, plain and simple.

Mitt was running Bain during the time the company outsourced jobs. Lying does not make it so, Mitt. You gotta get your facts right.

If you want my job, and it sure seems like you do, you have to be better than I am. And, Mitt, you are not looking so good right now.

Americans can smell a con job, and we are smelling one right now.

Well that's all for now. Thanks for listening folks.

Good night and may God bless America.'

Your faithful servant,

Tax havens: Super-rich 'hiding' at least $21 trillion

Barry, My Liege :

While I do not normally reproduce news articles, the following is significant enough to change practice.

Just in case you were wondering why we cannot get any growth or jobs in the economy, here's the answer : Super Rich squirrel away cash and hide it from the rest of us, according to the following article in the BBC [Seen here : http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18944097]

" Tax havens: Super-rich 'hiding' at least $21 trillion

A global super-rich elite had at least $21 trillion (£13tn) hidden in secret tax havens by the end of 2010, according to a major study.

The figure is equivalent to the size of the US and Japanese economies combined.

The Price of Offshore Revisited was written by James Henry, a former chief economist at the consultancy McKinsey, for the Tax Justice Network.

Tax expert and UK government adviser John Whiting said he was sceptical that the amount hidden was so large.

Mr Whiting, tax policy director at the Chartered Institute of Taxation, said: "There clearly are some significant amounts hidden away, but if it really is that size what is being done with it all?"

Mr Henry said his $21tn is actually a conservative figure and the true scale could be $32tn. A trillion is 1,000 billion.

Mr Henry used data from the Bank of International Settlements, International Monetary Fund, World Bank, and national governments.

His study deals only with financial wealth deposited in bank and investment accounts, and not other assets such as property and yachts.

The report comes amid growing public and political concern about tax avoidance and evasion. Some authorities, including in Germany, have even paid for information on alleged tax evaders stolen from banks.

The group that commissioned the report, Tax Justice Network, campaigns against tax havens.

Mr Henry said that the super-rich move money around the globe through an "industrious bevy of professional enablers in private banking, legal, accounting and investment industries.

"The lost tax revenues implied by our estimates is huge. It is large enough to make a significant difference to the finances of many countries.

"From another angle, this study is really good news. The world has just located a huge pile of financial wealth that might be called upon to contribute to the solution of our most pressing global problems," he said.

James Henry says his $21tn figure is a conservative estimate

The report highlights the impact on the balance sheets of 139 developing countries of money held in tax havens that is put beyond the reach of local tax authorities.

Mr Henry estimates that since the 1970s, the richest citizens of these 139 countries had amassed $7.3tn to $9.3tn of "unrecorded offshore wealth" by 2010.

Private wealth held offshore represents "a huge black hole in the world economy," Mr Henry said.

Mr Whiting, though, urged caution. "I cannot disprove the figures at all, but they do seem staggering. If the suggestion is that such amounts are actively hidden and never accessed, that seems odd - not least in terms of what the tax authorities are doing. In fact, the US, UK and German authorities are doing a lot."

He also pointed out that if tax havens were stuffed with such sizeable amounts, "you would expect the havens to be more conspicuously wealthy than they are".

Other findings in Mr Henry's report include:

· At the end of 2010, the 50 leading private banks alone collectively managed more than $12.1tn in cross-border invested assets for private clients

· The three private banks handling the most assets offshore are UBS, Credit Suisse and Goldman Sachs

· Less than 100,000 people worldwide own about $9.8tn of the wealth held offshore.

Mr Henry told the BBC that it was difficult to detail hidden assets in some individual countries, including the UK, because of restrictions on getting access to data.

A spokesman for the Treasury said great strides were being made in cracking down on people hiding assets.

He said that in 2011-12 HM Revenue & Customs' High Net Worth Unit secured £200m in additional tax through its compliance work with the very wealthy.

He said that agreements reached with Liechtenstein and Switzerland will bring in £3bn and between £4bn and £7bn respectively."

Your faithful servant,

TEPCO Incompetent Liar

Barry, My Liege :

We cannot trust neclear energy.

We cannot trust it because we cannot manage it.

TEPCO stands accused of misstating the extent of damages and acknowledges its inability to fix it.

Read it here : http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Gov-t-panel-Nuke-plant-operator-still-stumbling-3726856.php

It WILL happen here, My Liege.

We are warned.

Your faithful servant,