FBI, Russians and Saudis knew who these guys were at the time the pic was released asking people if they could identify the suspects. That’s the way it seems.
So what they really wanted was people to come forward that recognized them so that they could investigate those people and anyone connected to them.

People will discover over time that deficits don’t matter to the DC crowd…as long as all taxpayer money has been redirected to profit the well-connected middle man. It’s privatize the profits, socialize the losses.
Mussolini already told the world what this kind of political economy should be called.

Where is the Green Party? People who saw this coming and who voted for Green Party politicians would like to hear from them now. They can’t just show up at election time. And so-called progressive websites that claim to support SS and Medicare should’ve been prioritizing giving voice to the Green Party platform over the Democratic Party platform. The sites should have done it consistently…not just sidebars during election season.

Immigration laws and regulations should be the same in all nations or get rid of them all together.
Let’s spread more immigrant love (US citizens can be immigrants too) all around the world.

Viruses also develop reistance to vaccines.
With anti-biotics and vaccines, there should be more caution about mass innoculations and overuse of antibiotics for viruses and other bugs that most people already have the immune systems to fight naturrally. The worry becomes that in, a race to save a few, a resulting mutation of bacteria or a virus could evolve that would be more devasting.
But we’ll see more resistant strains in the future. We just have to hope our bodies can naturally adapt faster than the mutations.

I think it’s debateable how much politicians underestimate the liberal views of their constiuents. Too much effort goes into managing the questions on polls and other ways of narrowing the frame of debate.
But the people who have bought and paid for the services of the politicians do not have such illusions. That’s why you get politicians like Obama and Blair who use the language of liberalism to co-opt such messages. Look all over Europe and at some of the elected officials they’re tagging as “liberal”, “socialist” or “left”. Same in Egypt.
They want to redefine what “left” is…mainly to influence younger generations who are not aware of the social and economic struggles of the past.

Keep crying out for your tax and I’m sure you’ll get it. You’ll be taxed to death to the profit of the 1%. They’re going to party and continue on with business as usual as they shift all that burden to the wage slaves. They’ll have a grand ole time on the way out and corps won’t change a damn thing about their behavior. Taxes are for the little people even as the Navy spends $4 billion a year on fuel.

There’s plenty of “money supply” both real and imagined.
The problem is that it’s too concentrated in the hands of financial sector players.

I dare you try to make sense of his environmental / energy proposals.

The devil’s in the details…

Panetta is recommending paycuts for the troops.

Time for a new bumper sticker: Support our drones.

And the defense dept is also hoping protests from troops and families can put a stopper on some of the cuts, but in case they don’t, it’s just another in your face example of how expendable the “rif raf” is in the minds of the war mongering elite.

CFPB is already compromised. Some of the best points on the reality of the housing market are detailed in a series of articles by Mike Whitney.
Here are just a few…
Kabuki or not, it’s time people snapped out of it about “the American Dream” of family-home ownership. It’s a racket.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/10/18/the-consumer-financial-protection-bureau-plans-its-first-big-sellout/

“So now we know why the banks fought tooth-and-nail to prevent Elizabeth Warren from heading the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). It’s because they were already planning their next big coup and didn’t want Warren in a position where she could make waves.
Here’s the story from the Wall Street Journal:
“Federal regulators are considering giving mortgage lenders protection from certain lawsuits…
The potential move, which would be a partial victory for mortgage lenders, is part of a broader effort to write new rules for the U.S. housing market in the wake of the mortgage meltdown. The proposal for the first time would establish a basic national standard for loans, known as a ‘qualified mortgage.’ (“Home Loans May Get Shield”, Wall Street Journal)…”

“More from the WSJ:
“As part of its deliberation, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is considering providing a full legal shield for high-quality loans that qualify, mandating that judges rule in lenders’ favor if consumers contest foreclosures, these people say….
The shield against lawsuits would be a welcome move for mortgage lenders. Seven major U.S. banks have spent more than $76 billion on mortgage-related costs and litigation since 2008, according to Credit Suisse Group.
Ahhh, so that’s it. The banks want blanket legal protection when they boot people out of their homes. Nice. They want the CFPB to stipulate what’s meant by “qualified mortgage” so they can twist its meaning like a pretzel and not be challenged in court. Of course, consumer groups don’t like the idea of immunity– the so-called “safe harbor” provision–because they think that it will pave the way to more reckless and predatory lending. But mealy-mouth CFPB director, Richard Cordray, disagrees…”

http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/12/18/the-mysterious-new-housing-bubble/

“So, here’s how it’s going to go down: Bernanke’s going to twist arms at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to define a “qualified mortgage” in a way that allows the banks to dump their garbage loans on Uncle Sam without any risk to themselves. Once the new regulations are in place and the banks get the “safe harbor” provision they want; they’ll start issuing mortgages to anyone who’s strong enough to sit upright and put a “X” on the dotted line, which is how we got into this mess to begin with.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/01/25/the-all-powerful-fed/

“Like we said earlier, a healthy (housing) market is characterised by low unemployment, solid wage growth, and low personal debt levels. These are the conditions that support new homes sales, move up sales and organic sales. They are the life’s-blood of the industry. This new wave of speculation has been brought on by the Fed’s zero rate policy and QE which have generated an ocean of liquidity looking for higher yield. In other words, there’s tons of money sloshing around the system looking for a place to go. This is why the yield on junk bonds is at all-time lows, because the Fed’s easy money policies have created uneven inflation in various financial assets. Now the trouble is spilling over into housing. Here’s more on the same topic from OC Housing News:
“The massive amounts of money hedge funds are spending on foreclosures clearing impacting the real estate economy. Last year several dozen investment firms backed by $6 to 8 billion in private equity hedge funds announced plans to purchase between 40,000 and 80,000 previously foreclosed homes….
Just last week Blackstone Group LP, the largest U.S. private real estate owner, accelerated purchases of single-family homes as prices jumped faster than it expected. According to Bloomberg, Blackstone has spent more than $2.5 billion on 16,000 homes to manage as rentals, deploying capital from the $13.3 billion fund it raised last year, said Jonathan Gray, global head of real estate for the world’s largest private equity firm. That’s up from $1 billion of homes owned in October, when Blackstone Chairman Stephen Schwarzman said the company was spending $100 million a week on houses.” (“Housing speculation explodes but with institutional investors this time”, OC Housing News)
So this is what a recovery looks like?
Give me a break. This is a disaster. The Fed’s policy is not creating more jobs or contributing to growth. It’s fueling another speculative ponzi-bubble that will lead to another meltdown…”

And this is the added layer to the cycle of crashes your reply does not account for – governments around the globe using the crashes to achieve the same means:

“How else can you explain the fact that we’ve seen a rash of these monster bubbles across the industrial world which have ravaged their respective economies and led inevitably to the implementation of harsh austerity measures?”

Watch Canada’s response to their bursting bubble.

Exuberance might explain people and investors falling for the “bubble”, but the “conspiracy” is in the cover up of crimes.

Hindsight may be 20/20, but it’s time to put this discussion in the global context so that people truly get it drilled into their minds that this isn’t just about political party differences in the USA.

Here’s an article on what’s happening in Canada. It should sound familiar.
Excerpt is from the article:

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/01/17/how-central-banking-works/

“I mean, how many times have we seen this sort of thing before? Let’s see, there’s the US, the UK, Ireland, Spain, Japan, Australia, and now Canada. That’s a pretty impressive list of coincidences, isn’t it? And isn’t it funny how the exact same policies were put in place (low interest rates and lax lending standards), that produced the exact same results?

It’s almost like the folks at the central banks and government wanted to blow up the system from the very start. How else can you explain the fact that we’ve seen a rash of these monster bubbles across the industrial world which have ravaged their respective economies and led inevitably to the implementation of harsh austerity measures? Coincidence?

Not bloody likely. Easy-money bubblemaking is just part of a bigger plan to crush labor, eviscerate the safety net, and restructure the economy. There’s nothing random about it. Check out this clip from Dr. Housing Bubble:

“I was trying to find a time in history where the world experienced correlated housing bubbles and could not find a time similar to the one we are living in when it comes to real estate. The reason for this is central banking policy around the world is very similar…..

Part of it has to do with easy banking policies mimicking one another. If you think that all of this came at no cost just look at the balance sheet of big central banks….

Central banks have boosted their balance sheets from $2 trillion in 2008 to being on path to reaching $6 trillion this year. The Fed alone is inching closer to $3 trillion especially if they continue with QE3 and their mortgage backed security purchasing plan. It is very clear that the Fed became the bad bank to induce this housing boom and went as far as to take off MBS from the hands of these banks.” (“Global Housing Bubbles in Perspective”, Dr. Housing Bubble)

So they’re all doing the very same thing at the very same time, right? And they don’t care how much money they print, because the money never goes beyond their buddies at the banks and the brokerages. So there’s no threat of inflation. It all stays in the family.

And how do you like that part about “correlated housing bubbles”? Now there’s an understatement. The fact is, the world’s biggest central banks (The Fed, the ECB, the BOJ, the BOC and the BOE) are a de facto cartel…’

What makes me laugh the most is how they keep predicting the “demise of the Republcan Party” if they don’t “change.” The Republican Party doesn’t have to change with the Democratic Party establishment always there to throw them a lifeline.

I expect another economic crash to happen around the time of the 2016 election, which will bring in the executive branch administration. When alot of changes are happening, it’s an opportune time for another heist. And the financial sector is filled the same degenerate gamblers, only now even more emboldened because of weak, corrupt officials.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Party is going to learn that the divisions aren’t just Center-left progressives vs Corpo Democrats. They’re going to learn there’s a big difference between Center-left/progressives and Demo crats AND Obamatons. You have a whole wing of the Democratic Party that doesn’t really care or maybe they don’t understand the implications of policies…they just know what Obama is for or against. They support Obama and not policies (though they may try to argue otherwise).

“You say, “The real wacky ones call me a Republican because they can’t seem to comprehend that there is ample room to oppose Obama from the left.”

I could not agree with you more. Huffingtonpost readers belong to this categorization – what I refer to the most naive (replace it with “the dumbest” if you are havingg a bad day) subset of the Democratic base…

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They’re probably over at HP now making fun of the Republican’s conspiracy theories regarding Newtown. Meanwhile, if many of the comments here were posted about opposition to Obama policies, then they’d swear everyone that wrote them was on Karl Rove’s payroll.

Why would the healthy employee be less valuable to the big corp?

The pension plan. The healthy employee is more likely to live longer and collect more in pension.