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Talking About Being Broke "city of Stockton ca city hall repossed"

Wells Fargo repossesses Stockton’s new city hall plus three other city buildings

Posted by Robert Morley: www.thetrumpet.com at 8:54 pm on June 5, 2012

 

America’s slow-motion debt default is picking up steam. Stockton, California, population 300,000, is threatening bankruptcy due to overly generous union benefits and incredibly poor management by city officials. abc News10 reports in “New Stockton City Hall building seized by Wells Fargo; city preps bankruptcy contingency plan”:

The Stockton City Council announced Wednesday that they will look at bankruptcy contingency plans after Wells Fargo seized the new city hall building.

The city paid $35 million to buy the eight-story building, but was not able to move in because of its money problems, and recently stopped making debt payments altogether. This is the fourth building that was repossessed by Wells Fargo; the bank seized three city parking garages for the same reason. …

“This city has been in business for over 160 years and we will continue to be in business,” Mayor Ann Johnston said. “We will come through the … process or Chapter 9 with a financially sustainable future. Even though we have inherited this mess, we are committed to doing everything in our power to leave this city better, stronger and healthier.”

Note that the new city hall is the fourth city building to be repossessed by Wells Fargo. The city was in such poor financial shape that it only had the money to move its it department into its new city hall before it ran out of cash.

On top of the $35 million wasted on the new city hall and the millions lost on the other four buildings, city officials reportedly wasted $33 million settling a lawsuit for illegally using taxpayer money. It lost millions more paying fines for illegal sewage spills. It even reportedly spent $25,000 cleaning up elephant dung at the Stockton Arena.

However, the biggest financial impediment to the city is its ridiculous unfunded union agreements. For example, the city has a $417 million liability just for employee health-care costs. Then there are all the pension costs.

According to economic analyst Mike Shedlock, “If Stockton files bankruptcy it will be the largest city in the U.S. to seek Chapter 9 bankruptcy protection.”

“Don’t worry,” he says. “[T]hat record will fall soon enough. L.A. and Oakland cannot be that far behind.”

The reality is that bankruptcy is the only way forward for many cities. Debts and agreements made by bribed politicians need to be wiped clean. Unfortunately, there are so many special interest groups with their fingers in the pie that taxpayers are sure to lose out.

The Merced Sun-Star just reported that Democrats bow to labor on bankruptcy:

Despite objections from the mayors of California’s 10 largest cities, the Assembly last week approved Assembly Bill 1692 by Fremont Assemblyman Bob Wieckowski. The bill will make it harder for cities to seek bankruptcy protection.

It reneges on a carefully crafted compromise measure approved just six months ago that requires financially beleaguered cities to enter into good-faith negotiations with their creditors—including, most significantly, public employee unions—before filing for bankruptcy protection.

So as Stockton moves through difficult negotiations, Assembly Democrats, pushed by their public employee union allies, have approved the Wieckowski bill.

Taxpayers in Stockton, California, will continue to pay through the nose. Many of their city employees are incompetent, and worse, their politicians are corrupt and owned by the unions.

As America’s Great Recession rolls on, expect the fighting over money to intensify. The climax is still yet ahead. •

The Babylonian Brotherhood

A closer look at the evidence appears to date the foundation of Babylon far earlier than previously believed and it was one of the first cities of the post-flood era. It was here that the mystery schools and secret societies were formed which were to span the globe in the thousands of years that followed.

  

The Brotherhood which controls the world today is the modern expression of the Babylonian Brotherhood of reptile-Aryan priests and ‘royalty’ which came together there after the flood. It was in Babylon in this post-flood period from around 6,000 years ago that the foundation beliefs - manipulated beliefs - of today’s world religions were established to control and rule the people.

The founder of Babylon according to ancient texts and legend was Nimrod who reigned with his wife, Queen Semiramis. Nimrod was described as a ‘mighty tyrant’ and one of the ‘giants’. The Arabs believed that after the flood it was Nimrod who built or rebuilt the amazing structure at Baalbek in the Lebanon  with its three stones weighing 800 tons each. It was said that he ruled the region that is now Lebanon and, according to Genesis, the first centres of Nimrod’s kingdom were Babylon, Akkad and others in the land of Shinar (Sumer).

 

Later he expanded further into Assyria to build cities like Nineveh where many of the Sumerian Tablets were found. Nimrod and Semiramis (or the beings those names symbolized) were from the reptile bloodlines which also became known as Titans, the genetic streams of the reptile-possessed humans and the full blood reptilians. This race of ‘giants’ or ‘Titans’ was said to have been descendants of Noah, the baby described in the Book of Enoch (previously the Book of Noah) as being a Watcher-human hybrid with extremely white skin.

 

The father of Nimrod in the text of Genesis was Cush, also known as Bel or Belus, who was the grandson of Noah and son of Ham. Cush became known as the deity, Hermes, which means Son of Ham.¹ Ham or Khem means the ‘burnt one’ and may have been connected to Sun worship.² A great network of deities emerged from Babylon and its connections with Egypt.

Nimrod and Semiramis have remained the key deities of the Brotherhood to this day under many different names and symbols. Nimrod was symbolized as a fish and Queen Semiramis as a fish and a dove. Semiramis is likely to be symbolic of Ninkharsag, the creator of the reptile-human crossbreeds. Nimrod was the fish-god Dagon who was depicted as half man, half fish.³ It is possible that this was symbolic of him being half human, half scaled reptile.

 

Queen Semiramis was also symbolized as a fish because the Babylonians believed fish to be an aphrodisiac and it became the symbol for the Goddess of Love.⁴ Hence the use of the fish in Christian symbolism and architecture. In her role as the ‘Holy Spirit’, Semiramis was pictured as a dove holding an olive branch and Semiramis means ‘branch bearer’ as in ‘Ze’ (the) ‘emir’ (branch) and ‘amit’ (bearer).⁵ Note also the symbolism of this in the story of Noah and the Great Flood, when the dove came back bearing an olive branch. The return of the reptilians after the flood?

 

The name, Semiramis, was evolved from the earlier Indian deity, Sami-Rama-isi or Semi-ramis.⁶ A fish and a dove are two symbols still widely used in religious ritual and national ceremony, although most of the people involved have no idea of the true meaning. Sinn Fein, the political wing of the Northern Ireland terrorist group the IRA, has a dove as its symbol and you find the dove on many of the sceptres held by the British monarch (see picture section).

 

Both organizations are modern fronts for the Babylonian Brotherhood and the doves symbolize Queen Semiramis. The dove to them is not a symbol of peace, but of death and destruction because of the reverse symbolism the Brotherhood employs. If it is positive to the masses, it is negative to the Brotherhood, and this allows their negative symbols to be placed throughout the public arena. No-one complains because they have no idea what these symbols, like the dove, really represent.

Semiramis was called the Queen of Heaven (also Rhea), the Virgin Mother of the Gods, and sometimes known as the Great Earth Mother (Ninkharsag). She was also worshipped under the name Astarte ‘the woman who made towers’ and this could refer to the Tower of Babel (Babylon) which Nimrod is said to have built. The bloodlines of European royalty came from the reptile-Aryan bloodlines of Babylon and the crown evolved from the horned headgear worn by Nimrod.

 

The horns symbolized the monarch’s authority and later became a metal headband with three horns symbolizing royal power with divine authority⁷ This is represented by the symbol of the fleur-de-lis which you find throughout the regalia of modern royalty (see Figure 6 below). As I have mentioned already, the Draco ‘royal’ hierarchy, the winged albino whites, are said to have horns and I’m sure this is the true origin of the horned headgear of ancient royalty.

Figure 6:

The Fleur-de-lis, symbol
of the Babylonian trinity of Nimrod,
Queen Semiramis and Tammuz,
among other things.

 

The classic depiction of the Devil also has Draco-like horns. Nimrod was given the title Baal (the Lord) and Semiramis was Baalti (My Lady). The Latin term for my lady is Mea Domina which in its corrupted Italian form became Madonna.8 Nimrod was represented in a dual role of God the Father and Ninus, the son of Semiramis, and her olive branch was symbolic of this offspring produced through a ‘virgin birth’. Ninus was also known as Tammuz who was said to have been crucified with a lamb at his feet and placed in a cave.

 

When a rock was rolled away from the cave’s entrance three days later, his body had disappeared. Heard that somewhere before? This husband-wife-son theme of Nimrod-Semiramis-and Ninus/Tammuz became the Osiris-Isis-Horus mythology of the Egyptians with its equivalent in India, Asia, China and elsewhere. Much later it would be Joseph, Mary and Jesus. When the Babylonians held their Spring rites to mark the death and resurrection after three days of Tammuz-Ninus, they offered buns inscribed with a solar cross. Yes, even the hot cross buns of British Easter tradition come from Babylon.

 

Easter comes from another face of Queen Semiramis - Ishtar -and it is from this, and possibly another Brotherhood deity, Ashtaroth, that we get the name of ‘Ashtar’ as in ‘Ashtar Command ’, a completely manipulated New Age belief in an extraterrestrial ‘hero’ who has come to save us. The Babylonian myths and symbolism provided the foundations for all the major religions, especially Christianity. The Roman Church was the creation of the Babylonian Brotherhood and the Pope still wears a mitre shaped like a fish head to symbolize Nimrod. This is also the significance of his Fisherman’s Ring.

 

The Chair of St Peter in the Vatican was claimed to be a holy relic, but in 1968 it was exposed by a scientific commission as being no older than the 9th century More significantly, according to the Catholic Encyclopaedia, is that it is decorated by twelve plates portraying the twelve labours of Hercules. This same work claims that Hercules was another name for Nimrod before becoming a deity of the Greeks.⁹ In 1825, Pope Leo XII authorized the production of a jubilee medal and it depicted a woman in a pose that was blatant symbolism of Queen Semiramis.

 

She had a crucifix in her left hand, a cup in her right and on her head was a seven rayed crown like the one on the Statue of Liberty, another depiction of Semiramis which was given to New York by French Freemasons. A contact who has relatives working in high positions in the Vatican told me how, during the reign of Pope John Paul II, he was given a guided tour of the place which blew his mind. He was shown the Pope’s solid gold bath which is decorated with all the astrological symbols and he saw inside the vacuum-sealed vaults which contain thousands of ancient esoteric books which have been stolen and hoarded over hundreds of years of religious dictatorship and so taken out of public circulation. The Roman Church and the Babylonian Brotherhood are one and the same.

Nimrod was also Eannus, the god with two faces, who was later known to the Romans as Janus. One of the Anunnaki brothers, Enki the ‘serpent god’, was also known as Ea. The Freemasonic eagle with two heads looking left and right, east and west, is symbolic of Nimrod in the role of Eannus, and I would suggest that the eagle is symbolic of the winged Draco. Eannus, it was said, held the keys to the doors of heaven and he was the sole intermediary between God and humanity, therefore any belief not supported by him was false and should be condemned.

 

This was a wonderful tool for the Babylonian priesthood to impose their will on the populous and exactly the same scam has been played by their successors, the Christian priests, the Rabbis and the priesthoods of Islam, Hinduism and all the rest. The Roman Catholic title of cardinal comes from the word ‘cardo’ meaning hinge and relates to Nimrod’s role as guardian of the door to heaven.10 The Babylonian priests even established a governing body they called the Grand Council of Pontiffs, a name later transferred to the Church of Rome.11

 

The Babylonian High Priest, who instructed the inner circle initiates, was known as... Peter, meaning the ‘Great Interpreter’. The feast day of the Christian St Peter was traditionally celebrated on the day the Sun entered the astrological house of Aquarius, the very day that Eannus and Janus were honoured!¹² The Babylonian religion, like all the look-alikes that were to follow, consisted of two levels. The masses were manipulated into believing superstitions and into taking symbolic stories literally, while the chosen initiates were given the real knowledge on penalty of death if they ever revealed it. In this way the truth about life, human potential, history and the reptilian Agenda, were lost to the population and kept only for the few.

Human sacrifice was fundamental to the religion of Babylon and wherever the Babylonian Brotherhood and their reptilian bloodlines have traveled, human sacrifice has always gone with them because the reptilians demand these rituals. The malevolent ones seem to be addicted to blood and this has been passed on to their crossbreeds as the evidence I shall present will show. The Babylonian priests were required to eat some of their sacrificial offerings and so the word for priest, Cahna-Bal, became the term for eating human flesh, cannibal.¹³ Moloch, the name of that flying lizard I mentioned earlier, was another name for Nimrod-Tammuz.

 

Tam means ‘to perfect’ and muz means ‘to burn’. You can see the symbolism of Tammuz-Moloch, therefore, in the rituals of burning children alive in honor of this deity which, staggeringly, still go on today. The Beltane ritual later performed in Britain by the Druids on May 1st, May Day, involved the burning of children in the belly of a huge wicker effigy of a man. This was inherited from the Babylonians when the Brotherhood expanded across Europe. Indeed it may well be that the reptilians had once based themselves in what is now the United Kingdom and Ireland before they moved their main focus to the Near East and Africa.

The Feast of Tammuz was on June 23rd and celebrated his ascension from the underworld. When he was resurrected, Tammuz was known as Oannes, the fish god, and Oannes is a version of the name, John.¹⁴ For this reason, John has been used as a symbol for Tammuz-Nimrod in symbolic characters like John the Baptist. June 23rd, the Feast of Tammuz, became the Christian day called St John’s Eve! The Nimrod-Semiramis combination has been depicted under countless names in the civilizations and cultures which have followed.

 

These deities throughout the world may seem to be an unfathomable tidal wave of names, but they are overwhelmingly different names for the same two figures. Another deity widely used in Satanism for the sacrifice of children today is Kronos, the king of the Cyclops in Greek legend. He was known as the tower builder and is almost certainly another version of Nimrod, the builder of the biblical Tower of Babel.¹⁵

The reason the reptile bloodlines are involved in such unspeakable ritual and practice today, is quite simply because they always have been. When you follow these bloodlines across history, you find they use the same rituals and sacrifice to the same deities, right to the present day. Another passage in the Book of Enoch tells of the Watchers breeding with human women and the behaviour of the offspring they produced:

“And they became pregnant, and they bore great giants... who consumed all the acquisitions of men. And when men could no longer sustain them, the giants turned against them and devoured mankind. And they began to sin against birds and beasts, and reptiles, and fish, and to devour one another’s flesh and drink blood. The Earth laid accusation against the lawless ones.”¹⁶

That passage describes the bloodlines I am highlighting and they came together in the Babylonian Brotherhood which has since expanded across the planet. While we look out of our eyes and feel part of this physical world, the reptiles look into this third dimension, much like someone looking through a window. In this case, the eyes of the physical body. We are consciously in the third dimension, they are consciously in the fourth looking into the third. When you know what you are looking for it is the eyes that give them away.

 

They are dark, piercing and cold. The reptile full-bloods are not attached to their bodies like humans. They are knowingly using them as ‘space suits’ to operate in this world, and when one wears out they simply occupy another. It is from this process of ‘possession’ by the reptilians and other low vibrational entities that we have the ancient tales, indeed modern ones too, of demons, devils and evil spirits taking over a human mind and body. It is the reptilians and other consciousness of the lower fourth dimension, the cesspit vibration as I call it, which are summoned during Satanic, black magic rituals and it is during these rituals that many unsuspecting puppets are ‘plugged in’ to the reptilian consciousness and taken over. So it was in Babylon and so it is today.

 

Britain’s Already Dead, It Just Hasn’t Been Buried Yet

PJ Media June  2 2012

Don’t be fooled by the pomp and dazzle of the Queen’s royal Diamond Jubilee flotilla easing past the tourists, celebrity-spotters, and pickpockets on the Thames. Britain is a country rotting from the inside, the first nation on earth that elected to destroy its culture with political correctness.
Asks British columnist Rod Liddle, “Who are the people who have made Britain what it is today, the ones who ensured that we became a limp-wristed and decrepit, post-imperial satrapy of incompetence, sanctimony, self-obsession and self-loathing?”
Who indeed? (By limp-wristed, Liddle means lacking in conviction, not gay). The short answer is the new aristocracy, the bien pensant, well-shod, culturally aloof types who watch the BBC, read The Guardian, and vote to nudge the country ever farther along its current trajectory, which has not even slightly been altered by the return of a Conservative to the premiership. Against the wishes of the average citizen, Britain has a government that is simultaneously abdicating its core functions and pretending to take responsibility for other duties for which it is spectacularly ill-suited. It has abandoned a proud, concrete culture in pursuit of a hazy dream of a transnational ideal. The people’s response has been to fume lightly and do nothing, because they’re British and expect things to be bad and get worse.

A few days in London will quickly cure you of any notion that, for instance, New York is a chaotic city. It only barely rated notice in most of the media the other day when five of London’s 11 subway lines went down simultaneously at rush hour due to signal failures and train breakdowns. It was about 80 degrees at the time and most trains have no air conditioning. Subway unions are threatening a strike. And yet a glance at the national news sources, which are obsessed with the massacres in Syria, the Jubilee, the Olympics, and the never-ending Leveson Inquiry that vaguely promises a sinister new truth czar will be empowered to decide in advance which media stories can be published, turns up almost zero outrage at all of this.
The “respectable” media outlets don’t much bother with the latest outrages on the crime front, such as the fatal convenience-store stabbing that resulted in only a ten-year sentence for the assailant, who is expected to be free in four. Unleash a nutty racist tirade on the subway, though, and you stand in contempt of that BBC-transnational ideal of a multiculti wonderland. Judges will express no leniency whatsoever, handing out five month sentences for the crime of… speaking.
So the government can’t make the trains run on time or make people feel safe on the streets. (a friend who lived in New York for many years tells me of how, after moving to London, he witnessed a stabbing, called the police, and waited a number of minutes for them to arrive, by which time the perpetrators were long gone. The nearest police station was about 300 yards away, but the constabulary decided to send representatives from a farther one instead, lest they risk crossing paths with any violent criminals.)
Never let it be said the government is satisfied with this state of affairs; no, instead, it is advancing into brand new areas of incompetence. The prime minister has been boasting of his exciting plan to literally head a nanny state as he sets up, for new parents, an office to send texts, hold classes, and give “tiredness counseling.” (For a play-by-play of Britain’s collapse, consult the blogger-columnist Peter Hitchens, who, ever since writing The Abolition of Britain over a decade ago, invariably takes the most pessimistic imaginable view of things and yet is rarely wrong.)
On the business side of things, a government-commissioned venture capitalist’s report called for some obvious changes in labor regulations that would make it easier to fire workers (and consequently make businesses less leery of hiring in the first place). The left-wing, Liberal Democrat “business minister,” whose relationship with his field is much like that of an “infectious diseases specialist,” called the plan “completely bonkers” and suffered no repercussions from his boss whatsoever. The plan will gather dust. Another government minister, Conservative William Hague, actually gave an interview in which he told business to stop “complaining” and just hire. Currently, when a business wants to fire someone, it often has to justify the decision before a labor tribunal. A proposed reform would substitute a sort of pre-settlement in which the fired worker gets a cash payout instead of the right to endless litigation.
From offshore, Britain finds itself in the absurd version of a V-2 attack, with almost weekly regulatory strafing coming in from the European Union and the European Court of Human Rights. Britain, which voted simply to join a common market in 1973 but never voted to be ruled from the continent, is so used to such indignities as being told that it must not deport al-Qaeda terrorist Abu Qatada and must furnish prisoners with ballots, that even David Cameron’s Conservatives generally respond by being loudly huffy and doing nothing. Cameron’s latest solemn vow is that he will ignore the ECHR directive to give votes to prisoners. We’ll see. If he is going to deny the ECHR the sovereignty it plainly lacks, why doesn’t he go all the way?
Because he’s afraid of the BBC.
We joke about the “state media” in America, but in Britain by far the leading media outlet is the BBC, which operates independently but is effectively funded by a tax (a large one, more than you pay for HBO). Awash in public funding, it does exactly what you’d think it would do: attack competitors and promote a left-liberal worldview, for instance by portraying anyone opposed to the grand European project as eccentric and possibly demented. Now that Europe is imploding and Britons say, by a 51 to 28 margin, that they want to leave the EU, the political-media complex is scrambling to prevent the issue from ever coming to a vote (though if it does, the same complex will move mountains to ensure the vote is the correct, transnational one). George Osborne, the number two man in the Tory party, has actually suggested that the solution to Europe is more Europe — fiscal and policy integration, i.e., a superstate with its capital in Brussels and its biggest source of power in Berlin. Britain would finally relinquish all claim to authority over its own affairs and essentially cease to exist as a political entity. What Hitler and Napoleon couldn’t do, the dull Eurocrats and their silky-voiced, terribly respectable media cheerleaders are intent on doing. But then again, Britain is already dead, it just hasn’t been buried yet.

Denver Police Detained, Handcuffed Forty Innocent Bystanders

Prisonplanet.com
June 6, 2012
Police detained and handcuffed forty innocent bystanders after a bank robbery in Aurora, Colorado, on June 4. Nearly two dozen cars were stopped near a Wells Fargo Bank and the occupants held without probable cause as police searched for a suspect.

10 Signs That The Highways Of America Are Being Transformed Into A High Tech Prison Grid

Michael Snyder The American Dream Wednesday, June 6, 2012

 Once upon a time, the open highways of America were one of our greatest symbols of liberty and freedom. Anyone could hop in a car and set off for a new adventure at any time and even our music encouraged us to “get our kicks on route 66″. But today everything has changed. Now the highways of America are being steadily transformed into a high tech prison grid. All over the country, thousands upon thousands of surveillance cameras watch our highways and automated license plate readers are actually being used to track vehicle movements in some of our largest cities. Many state and local governments have come to view our highways as money machines and our control freak politicians have established a vast network of toll booths, red light cameras and speed traps to keep cash endlessly pouring in. If all of that wasn’t enough, TSA “VIPR teams” are now hitting the interstates and conducting thousands of “unannounced security screenings” each year. Driving on the highways of America used to be a great joy, but now “Big Brother” is rapidly sucking all of the fun out of it. Eventually, it may get to the point where Americans simply dread having to go out on the highway. The following are 10 signs that the highways of America are being transformed into a high tech prison grid…. #1 Surveillance Cameras All over the United States, a vast network of surveillance cameras is carefully watching our highways. The following is an excerpt from a recent article in the Baltimore Sun about this phenomenon…. The room is large and well lit, and it buzzes with activity even though its occupants remain seated. The video screen at the front of the room is as wide as an IMAX, though not quite as tall. It consists of 64 smaller screens – 16 columns of four apiece – that monitor every inch of interstate between Great Wolf Lodge and the Virginia Beach Oceanfront. There is an emphasis on tunnels and bridges, and one corner screen is tuned in to a 24-hour weather report. If you are driving on an highway in Hampton Roads, VDOT is watching you. #2 Automated License Plate Readers In a previous article, I detailed how automated license plate readers are being used to track the movements of every single vehicle that enters Washington D.C. A recent Washington Post article explained that most people do not even know that they are there…. More than 250 cameras in the District and its suburbs scan license plates in real time, helping police pinpoint stolen cars and fleeing killers. But the program quietly has expanded beyond what anyone had imagined even a few years ago. With virtually no public debate, police agencies have begun storing the information from the cameras, building databases that document the travels of millions of vehicles. Nowhere is that more prevalent than in the District, which has more than one plate-reader per square mile, the highest concentration in the nation. Police in the Washington suburbs have dozens of them as well, and local agencies plan to add many more in coming months, creating a comprehensive dragnet that will include all the approaches into the District. A lot of police cruisers are being outfitted with this technology around the nation as well. So if you see a police car pull up behind you, there is a very good chance that a computer has already read your license plate and is giving the officer all of your information. #3 Ridiculous Regulations Some of the new “auto safety laws” going in around the nation are absolutely absurd. For example, do you buckle up your pet when you go for a ride? Well, in New Jersey you can now be fined up to $1000 for not having your pet properly restrained while you are out driving. #4 Outrageous Fines In many areas of the country, unpaid traffic tickets can rapidly become a major financial burden. For example, the new tolls on the 520 floating bridge in Seattle are absolutely killing some commuters….. Registered vehicle owners who do not pay their toll within 80 days or more will be mailed a $40 civil penalty for each unpaid toll transaction in addition to a $5 reprocessing fee. WSDOT confirmed some tolls plus penalty fees have added up to more than $1,000. #5 Oppressive Toll Roads Toll roads have become one of the favorite “revenue raising tools” for our politicians. At this point the tolls on some roads have become so incredibly oppressive that many people simply cannot afford to drive on them anymore. And for some reason the toll increases are coming especially fast and furious this year. A recent USA Today article summarized some of the oppressive toll increases that we are seeing all over the nation…. •California and Washington authorized high-occcupancy toll (HOT) lanes, where tolls rise or fall depending on traffic flow. Texas enacted laws authorizing private toll roads and allowing regional authorities to collect tolls. Indiana removed a provision requiring legislative approval for toll roads. •Some Maryland tolls will double this year as the state seeks money to rehabilitate aging roads, bridges and tunnels. The use of tolls on interstate highways also is spreading: •Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, a Republican, just won approval from the Federal Highway Administration to add tolls on Interstate 95 in his state. The state estimates that tolls on the heavily traveled corridor could generate $250 million over the first five years for expanding, improving and maintaining the highway. •New York and New Jersey recently announced that E-ZPass commuters will pay $1.50 more and cash customers $2 more to cross bridges and tunnels between the two states. •Georgia just created toll lanes on Interstate 85 in suburban Atlanta. The toll hikes are more than chump change: Cash tolls on the Chesapeake Bay Bridge jumped to $4 from $2.50, and to $12 from $8 on all the New York-New Jersey Hudson River crossings. Toll roads are one of my pet peeves. Any time I see a toll booth it immediately puts me in a bad mood. #6 Red Light Cameras Red light cameras are another favorite “revenue raising tool” for the control freaks that run things. Unfortunately, these cameras don’t always work right so a lot of innocent people end up getting ticketed. But politicians love them because they can raise a lot of cash. The following is from a recent Business Insider article…. According to U.S. PIRG (Public Interest Research Group), nearly 700 U.S. cities and towns installed the cameras, which accounted for more than 90 percent of tickets issued for illegal right turns, or rolling stops. In one New Jersey town, PIRG found 2,500 tickets were issued at one intersection within the first two months of installing a camera. #7 Speed Traps In the old days, speed traps were mostly about making the roads safer. Today, they are mostly about raising money. One police chief up in Michigan has even admitted that the nature of his job has fundamentally changed…. “When I first started in this job 30 years ago, police work was never about revenue enhancement, but if you’re a chief now, you have to look at whether your department produces revenues.” Speed traps are becoming more common almost everywhere, but some areas of the country are worse than others. A recent report from the National Motorists Association ranked how likely you are to get a speeding ticket in each of the 50 U.S. states…. After crunching the numbers, the NMA found that Nevada is the state most likely to issue you a traffic ticket, followed by Georgia and Alabama. In 2010 Florida took the top spot and Georgia and Nevada tied for second place. The state where you’re least likely to get ticketed is Wyoming, followed closely by Montana. These two ranked at the bottom in 2010 as well. #8 Government Spying It has been revealed that the federal government has been secretly putting GPS tracking devices on thousands of vehicles in order to track the movements of people that they are interested in watching. Most of the time the people involved have not even been charged with any crimes. The following is a short excerpt from a recent Wired magazine article about this phenomenon…. The 25-year-old resident of San Jose, California, says he found the first one about three weeks ago on his Volvo SUV while visiting his mother in Modesto, about 80 miles northeast of San Jose. After contacting Wired and allowing a photographer to snap pictures of the device, it was swapped out and replaced with a second tracking device. A witness also reported seeing a strange man looking beneath the vehicle of the young man’s girlfriend while her car was parked at work, suggesting that a tracking device may have been retrieved from her car. Then things got really weird when police showed up during a Wired interview with the man. The young man, who asked to be identified only as Greg, is one among an increasing number of U.S. citizens who are finding themselves tracked with the high-tech devices. The Justice Department has said that law enforcement agents employ GPS as a crime-fighting tool with“great frequency,” and GPS retailers have told Wired that they’ve sold thousands of the devices to the feds. #9 Extraction Devices If you get pulled over by police, you never know what to expect these days. Previously, I have written about how law enforcement authorities in some parts of the U.S. are using “extraction devices” to download data out of the cell phones of motorists that they pull over. The following is how a recent article on CNET News described the capabilities of these “extraction devices”…. The devices, sold by a company called Cellebrite, can download text messages, photos, video, and even GPS data from most brands of cell phones. The handheld machines have various interfaces to work with different models and can even bypass security passwords and access some information. #10 VIPR Teams If all of the above was not bad enough, now we have to deal with TSA “VIPR teams” terrorizing us on the highways. If you regularly travel across the country, there is a good chance that you have already encountered one of their “unannounced security screenings”. The following is from a local news report down in Tennessee about how local authorities are working with VIPR teams to fight “terrorism” on the interstates…. You’re probably used to seeing TSA’s signature blue uniforms at the airport, but now agents are hitting the interstates to fight terrorism with Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR). “Where is a terrorist more apt to be found? Not these days on an airplane more likely on the interstate,” said Tennessee Department of Safety & Homeland Security Commissioner Bill Gibbons. Tuesday Tennessee was first to deploy VIPR simultaneously at five weigh stations and two bus stations across the state. TSA VIPR teams now conduct approximately 8,000 “unannounced security screenings” at subway stations, bus terminals, seaports and highway rest stops each year. Are you starting to see what I am talking about? All of this “security” is becoming extremely oppressive. We don’t need “Big Brother” constantly watching us, tracking us and fining us on our highways. So do you have any examples of how the highways of America are being transformed into a high tech prison grid to add to the list above?

Please feel free to post a comment with your thoughts below….

America In Decline "The Mother Of All Financial Bubbles"

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The Federal Reserve Is Robbing You Blind… Click here for FREE Urgent Strategy Report Recent Posts America In Decline: The Soul Crushing Despair Of Lowered Expectations 21 Signs That This Could Be A Long, Hot, Crazy Summer For The Global Financial System 10 Things That We Can Learn About Shortages And Preparation From The Economic Collapse In Greece The Bad Jobs Report Is Just A Very Small Taste Of The Economic Nightmare That Is Coming 18 Examples Of The Nanny State Gone Wild How The Super Rich Avoid Taxes Even As They Demand That The Rest Of Us Pay More When The Derivatives Market Crashes (And It Will) U.S. Taxpayers Will Be On The Hook 25 Signs That The Smart Money Has Completely Written Off Southern Europe Turn Out The Lights – The Largest U.S. Cities Are Becoming Cesspools Of Filth, Decay And Wretchedness Eurobonds: The Issue That Could Shatter Europe Help Us Spread The News By Sharing These Articles With Others: America In Decline: The Soul Crushing Despair Of Lowered Expectations All over America tonight there are people that believe that their lives are over. When you do everything that you know how to do to get a job and you still can't get one it can be absolutely soul crushing. If you have ever been unemployed for an extended period of time you know exactly what I am talking about. When you have been unemployed for month after month it can be very tempting to totally cut yourself off from society. Those that are kind will look at you with pity and those that are cruel will treat you as though you are a total loser. It doesn't matter that America is in decline and that our economy is not producing nearly enough jobs for everyone anymore. In our society, one of the primary things that defines our lives is what we do for a living. Just think about it. When you are out in a social situation, what is one of the very first things that people ask? They want to know what you "do". Well, if you don't "do" anything, then you are not part of the club. But the worst part of being unemployed for many Americans is the relentless pressure from family and friends. Often they have no idea how hard it is to find a job in this economy - especially if they still have jobs. Sometimes the pressure becomes too great. Sadly, we are seeing unemployment break up a lot of marriages in America today. Things are really hard out there right now. A very large number of highly educated Americans have taken very low paying service jobs in recent years just so that they can have some money coming in even as they "look for something else". Unfortunately, in many cases that "something else" never materializes. In the past, America was "the land of opportunity" where anything was possible. But today America has become "the land of lowered expectations" and the worst is yet to come. We live during a time when "the American Dream" is literally being redefined. In the old days, just about anyone could get a good job that would pay enough to make it possible to buy a house, buy a nice car and raise a family. Unfortunately, those days are long gone. The following is from a recent NPR article.... The town of Lorain, Ohio, used to embody this dream. It was a place where you could get a good job, raise a family and comfortably retire. "Now you can see what it is. Nothing," says John Beribak. "The shipyards are gone, the Ford plant is gone, the steel plant is gone." His voice cracks as he describes the town he's lived in his whole life. "I mean, I grew up across the street from the steel plant when there was 15,000 people working there," he says. "My dad worked there. I worked there when I got out of the Air Force. It's just sad." We live in an economy that is in serious decline. In this environment no job is safe. In fact, even Goldman Sachs is laying off workers these days. Millions of Americans are suffering from deep depression because they can't find jobs. Many of them are sitting at home right now blankly starting at their television screens as they wonder why nobody wants to hire them. Some have been unemployed for years and have sent out thousands upon thousands of resumes. The following is from a recent article by J.D. Hicks.... I have a brilliant cousin with a $180K Syracuse education working part-time at a department store. She has literally sent out 38,000 resumes in the span of a year to no avail. I have another very bright friend with the kindest heart who is so desperate he has applied for dishwashing jobs and didn’t get them, sending him deeper into depression. I’m sure we all know people like this, or perhaps have even been there ourselves. Society has trained us to believe that we are worthless without a job. Indeed, we feel worthless when we are unemployed with few prospects of making money. Family, friends, and peers constantly remind us in subtle and not-so-subtle ways that we “need” a job. Have you ever been unemployed? How did it make you feel? How were you treated by your family and friends? In the old days, a college education was almost a guaranteed ticket to the middle class. But these days, a college education guarantees you absolutely nothing. As a recent article by Jed Graham detailed, most young unemployed workers in America today have at least some college education.... For the first time in history, the number of jobless workers age 25 and up who have attended some college now exceeds the ranks of those who settled for a high school diploma or less. Out of 9 million unemployed in April, 4.7 million had gone to college or graduated and 4.3 million had not, seasonally adjusted Labor Department data show. Overall, 53 percent of all Americans with a bachelor's degree under the age of 25 were either unemployed or underemployed last year. It is tough to tell young college graduates with their whole lives ahead of them that they need to lower their expectations because America is in decline. So where did all the jobs go? Well, one place they went is overseas. Over the past couple of decades, millions upon millions of good jobs have left the United States and have gone over to the other side of the world. That is why you see gleaming new factories going up all over China even while our once great manufacturing cities are turning into crime-infested warzones. But as a recent WND article reported, the WTO has a solution. They plan to replace "Made in China" labels with "Made in the World" labels so that we don't feel so bad about losing our jobs and our economic infrastructure... The World Trade Organization is moving closer to eliminating country-of-origin labels and replacing them with “Made in the World” initiative labels because they say we need to “reduce public opposition to free trade” and “re-engineer global governance.” As the number of middle class jobs has steadily declined in recent years, the number of low paying service jobs has increased. In a previous article, I discussed how approximately one out of every four U.S. workers now makes $10 an hour or less. Could your family survive on 10 dollars an hour? Today, you can find hordes of very smart, very talented Americans flipping burgers, waiting tables and welcoming people to Wal-Mart. Sadly, the United States now has a higher percentage of workers doing low wage work than any other major industrialized nation does. Perhaps we should applaud our leaders for doing such a great job of destroying the American Dream. Because so many Americans are working crappy jobs, a very large percentage of them have absolutely no savings to speak of. According to one survey, 42 percent of all American workers live paycheck to paycheck. I am constantly encouraging people to save up an "emergency fund" that will enable them to pay their bills for at least 6 months if they suddenly become unemployed. Unfortunately, for many Americans that is simply not possible. Way too many families are just barely scraping by from month to month. Another area of the economy where Americans are facing lowered expectations is in housing. In the old days, most Americans dreamed of owning their own homes. But today we are being told that things have changed. For example, a recent USA Today article was entitled "Home rentals — the new American Dream?".... Steve and Jodi Jacobson bought their Phoenix-area "dream home" in 2005. They built flagstone steps to the front door. They tiled the kitchen and bathroom. They entertained often, enjoying their mountain views. "We put our soul into that house," says Steve Jacobson, 37. Then, home prices tanked more than 50%. Steve, a software quality assurance engineer, suffered pay cuts. In 2010, foreclosure claimed the home and their $100,000 down payment. The Jacobsons didn't lose their desire to live in a single-family home, however. They now rent one, like many other former homeowners displaced by foreclosure. Is that what we are supposed to tell future generations of Americans? "Listen Johnny and Suzie, if you work really, really hard at your minimum wage jobs perhaps someday you will be able to rent a home that has been foreclosed by a big, greedy bank". It is so sad to watch what is happening to this country. These days many Americans are scratching and clawing and doing everything that they can to make it, but they still find themselves short on money at the end of the month. Many are turning to debt in an attempt to bridge the gap. According to CNN, 40 percent of "low- and middle-income households" are using credit cards to pay for basic living expenses. Overall, U.S. consumers have more than 11 trillion dollars in debt right now. That is an incredible number. As the economy has declined, a lot of families have completely given up trying to make it on their own and have turned to the U.S. government for financial help. Today, an astounding 49.1 percent of all Americans live in a home where at least one person receives government benefits. Just think about that number for a while. It is one of the clearest signs that America is in deep, deep decline. Unfortunately, things are about to get even worse. The next wave of the financial crisis is unfolding in Europe and we will all be talking about another "major global recession" very soon. That means that unemployment in the United States is going to get a lot worse. For the millions upon millions of Americans that are already suffering through the horror of unemployment, that is really bad news. Posted below is a trailer for a new HBO documentary entitled "Hard Times: Lost on Long Island". Please take a few minutes to watch this video, because I think it does a good job of showing the soul crushing despair that many unemployed Americans are going through right now.... So do any of you have any stories of lowered expectations to share? Please feel free to post a comment with your thoughts below.... Help Make A Difference By Sharing These Articles On Facebook, Twitter And Elsewhere: Facebook Google Bookmarks Fark Ping.fm Reddit StumbleUpon Tumblr Twitter Current NewsVine Posterous Diigo LinkedIn del.icio.us Digg email June 5th, 2012 | Tags: America, Decline, Educated, Family, Friends, Get A Job, Jobs, Lives, Low Paying, Money, Opportunity, Our Economy, The Worst, This Economy, Unemployed | Category: Economic Despair, Unemployment