swine flu and other government enabled opportunities for profit....

(Image: Lance Page / t r u t h o u t; Adapted:
MayaEvening, kevindooley, PinkMoose, *Louise**)


Swine Flu Didn't Fly

Previously, the WHO had offered scant response to allegations of corruption, but deigned to defend itself after the Council of Europe meeting was announced. At the hearing, the WHO's flu director, Dr. Fukuda, denied the accusations against the WHO. "Let me state clearly for the record - the influenza pandemic policies and responses recommended and taken by WHO were not improperly influenced by the pharmaceutical industry."

The public meeting to examine accusations against WHO was set up by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), which represents 800 million people in 47 countries. Established by various European nations in 1949 to promote human rights and the democratic rule of law, the Council's January 26 meeting involved WHO officials, European drug makers and medical experts. PACE's findings are expected to be announced January 29 and will likely be followed by an in-depth study and recommendations to European governments.

The PACE hearing is the latest in a series of investigations into the WHO's propriety, which also includes a 2009 Danish Parliamentary inspection of links between WHO expert, Albert Osterhaus, and makers of the swine flu drugs. Russian lawmaker Igor Barinov has also started an inquiry into the WHO's ties to H1N1 drug makers.

Starting in 2011, we are prepared to freeze government spending for three years.

Not the spending on our two wars mind you, or in aid to Israel, or on money to prime the bankers' pumps, and certainly not on national security programs. But you will still keep your Medicare and Medicaid, if you can afford the new charges we're adding. And naturally your Social Security, the one you paid for all your life as an insurance policy -- which continues to be pillaged by Congress -- will not be affected. Rest assured you will be paid in shrinking funny money until you croak.

We've already identified $20 billion in savings for next year.

All you folks gotta do is come up with the $20 billion so we can show it on the books.

... at a time of record deficits, we will not continue tax cuts for oil companies, investment fund managers and those making over $250,000 a year.

No further tax cuts, but they can keep the ones they enjoy now.

Now, even after paying for what we spent on my watch

Which world economists say can never be paid off anyway, so fuck it.

we will still face the massive deficit we had when I took office.

The bad bank has a dual purpose:

Firstly, its priority is to protect West European banks from defaults on billions of euros of loans—such as those recently declared by the German Bavarian State Bank—by centralizing such toxic assets and other securities in the new “bad bank.”

Secondly, banks freed from the burden of such bad loans on their balance sheets will once again be able to trade and speculate freely. The “toxic assets” will be exchanged on the basis of a decreased book value for debenture bonds. Banks with large bad loans on their balance sheets, which until now were denied fresh capital from central banks, will now be able to submit their debenture bonds with central banks as security for new credits. The whole circus of highly speculative and profitable financial speculations that led to the financial crisis in the first place can recommence, as if nothing had happened.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Stalinist regimes in Eastern Europe two decades ago many banks in Germany, Austria, Italy, Sweden and other states awarded loans amounting to several hundred billion euros to Eastern Europe countries. These loans are now overdue. Even the loss of just one of these loans could lead to the state bankruptcy of some countries. According to the World Bank, credits of least €200 billion are under threat.