Euro-Priced-Oil WAS the ACTUAL "WMD"

Purple Cheese: "A Financial Times article dated June 5, 2003 - shortly after the war officially ended - announced that Iraqi oil sales had returned to the international markets - once again denominated in US dollars, not euros. Not surprisingly, this detail was never mentioned in the five US major media conglomerates."

Beware the Ides of March...
The most recent news reports indicate the Iranian oil bourse will start trading on March 20, 2006, coinciding with the Iranian New Year.

In "Doomsday for the Greenback," Mike Whitney explains, "At present, the greenback serves as the world's reserve currency, the main medium of exchange. This allows the US to pile up enormous debt while avoiding the pitfalls of skyrocketing interest rates or hyper-inflation. The $2 billion of borrowed wealth that props up the faltering empire every day comes primarily from the exporting powerhouses Japan and China."

Coincidentally on March 23, 2006 the Federal Reserve System plans to stop reporting on the M3 in contrast to continuing detailed reporting on the other three indicators of the United States money supply:

• M0: The total of all coins and banknotes in circulation. (i.e. currency)
• M1: M0 + the amount in demand accounts (also called "checking account" or "current account")
• M2: M1 + other various savings account types, money market accounts, and certificate of deposit accounts (CDs) of under $100,000.
• M3: M2 + all other CDs, deposits of euro dollars and repurchase agreements.

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Monday, January 02, 2006

Viva Hugo Citgo

Chicago is refusing Venezuelan discounted oil to low-income neighborhoods...
The Chicago Transit Authority is refusing an opportunity to alleviate commuting costs for hundreds of thousands in the Windy City's low-income neighborhoods. Instead of accepting deeply discounted fuel from the Venezuela-owned CITGO Petroleum Corporation, the city is instead raising fares to solve budget shortfalls.
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Sunday, January 01, 2006

Naughty artists in Austria

Eine Sex-Szene in Staatschefmasken, eine Frau mit EU-Slip, ein Aufruf zum Terror-Voten, EU-Galgen: Sind die Bilder der Kunstaktion "25Peaces" zu Europa gute Werbung für die EU? EU-Kampagne schlägt Wellen.


In case you don't listen to the BBC or missed hearing about this "scandal" elsewhere, Austria has experienced artshock at the hands of euroPART, an independent artists' group. Very independent indeed with a million euros grant, they embarrassed the government by covering Vienna with thought-provoking posters just days before Austria assumed the EU's rotating presidency on Sunday.

Three of the 150 works by over 70 artists from all 25 EU countries were deemed porn and have been removed, two for showing nude models wearing masks of President George W. Bush, the Queen and French President Jacques Chirac and the other a pelvic shot of a woman in a suggestive spread who wears nothing but EU-blue panties emblazoned with the stars symbol of the 25-country European Union.

"Not a single poster portrays Europe in a good light," Karl Doutlik, the head of the European Commission representation in Austria, was quoted as saying by the Kurier.

"Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys," says P.J. O'Rourke.

"Giving money and power to artists is like giving water baloons to teenage boys in the closed balcony section of a movie theater," says me.