Story 1: The Illegal Alien Family That Is Deported Together Stays Together — Let The “Dreamers” Go Back To Their Country of Origin With Families– Enforce All Immigration Laws — Remove and Deport The 30-60 Million Illegal Aliens Who Invaded The United States in Last 20 Years — No DACA Fix Needed — Trump Will Lose Many of His Supporters If He Gives Amnesty or Citizenship To Dreamers — Video —
Story 2: Feral Hog Invasion of America — Hogs Eat Everything — Kill The Hogs — Boar Busters — Videos
Story 1: The Great Outing of Sexual Abusers in Big Lie Media and Congress — The CREEP List Grows Longer and Longer — Abuse of Power — Videos —
Story 2: A Two Charlie Day — Charlie Rose, Should Be Fired By CBS, and Charlie Manson, Dead At 83, Should Have Been Executed By State of California — Videos
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Story 2: Will The Senate Pass A Tax Reform Bill?– NO — Tax Cut Bill — Yes — Videos —
Story 3: Who is on the Congressional CREEP List of Sexual Harassers in Congress and Their Staffs ? — Who is next to be outed? — Shout Animal House — Intimacy — Getting To Know You– Dance With Me –Videos
Story 1: He Is Back — Let The Screaming Begin — Videos —
Story 2: Trial Balloon of Having Sessions Return To The Senate By Write In Campaign Shot Down By Attorney General Jeff Sessions — Political Elitist Establishment Trying To Overturn Alabama Voters — Videos —
Story 3: Attorney General Sessions Grilled By House Including Whether There Will Special Counsel For Hillary Clinton Alleged Crimes — Vidoes —
Story 4: Sexual Harassment in The Senate and House — Time To Expose the Exposers — Out Them By Naming Them — Publish The Creep List — Videos
I’ve written about Glenn Beck’s painful demise many times over the years, even giving my readers an early heads-up that his days at Fox News were numbered. “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned,” wrote 16th century playwright William Congreve. And he was right, because when it comes to Beck, I feel like a scorned woman. I really loved the guy in his early days at Fox, then suddenly he turned on me, along with the rest of his viewers.
In his first year at FNC, I was awed by Beck’s raw talent and no-holds-barred disrobement of the radical left. The fact that he was the most hated man in America was de facto proof that he was a fearless truth-teller, because the people of the lie — those millions of chronically dishonest folks in both the radical-left and conservative-establishment wings of the Demopublican Party — harbor venomous contempt for anyone who dares to expose their lies.
But after Beck’s first year at Fox, it was all downhill. The first time the thought crossed my mind that perhaps he wasn’t authentic was when he held a rally in Washington D.C. and a half million people showed up. I was there, and I can honestly say that I didn’t know what the point of the rally was, but the half million people in attendance were clearly mesmerized.
It wasn’t until much later I realized that the only purpose of the D.C. event was to provide a forum for Beck’s followers to assure him how much they loved him. Really, there was absolutely no agenda other than “We love Glenn Beck!”
Once that chink in Beck’s armor was exposed, the second chink came when he started restricting the guests on his show to clergymen and no-name religious scholars like David Barton, whom he stunningly, and often, referred to as “the most important man in America.” It was such a ludicrous statement that it made me wonder if Beck was once again getting cozy with Jack Daniels.
But it got even worse when, in his dwindling days at Fox, Beck sat on the edge of his desk for the entire hour of each show and gave what appeared to be an extemporaneous monologue. I was amazed at his ability to talk for an hour without notes, but, even so, it became very boring after a week or two. Increasingly, he appeared to be a beleaguered and lost soul.
Finally, as I had predicted to my readers, Beck parted ways with Fox News and started a new media company that he said would make his enemies wish he were back at Fox where he was on the air only an hour a day. Unfortunately for him, it hasn’t worked out quite that way.
As Beck began to realize he had become yesterday’s news, he started popping up on “The O’Reilly Factor” and “The Kelly File.” His slobbering all over Bill O’Reilly and Megyn Kelly was difficult to watch. (Fortunately, I no longer watch Malevolent Megyn at all.)
Beck’s attempts at getting attention are nothing short of embarrassing. When he was still at Fox, he somberly announced that his doctor had told him he was on the verge of possibly losing his eyesight. It’s nice to know that that didn’t happen. Then, after he left Fox, he supposedly had a mysterious, life-ending illness, but that apparently disappeared as well.
Finally, there was what he described as “the most deadly decision of [my] career” — announcing that, in a show of compassion, he was going to send truckloads of food and supplies to the Central American refugee kids who flooded the southern border of the U.S. in 2014.
Beck’s personality reminds me of Jim Jones of Jonestown fame. Perhaps becoming a cult leader is his ultimate destiny, because he desperately needs people to follow him, listen to him, and adore him. He is a man in search of true believers who will follow him to the ends of the earth.
On to the next chapter: Just when Beck was almost out of ideas on how to get attention and regain his stardom, along came an unlikely new politician by the name of Donald Trump. It was almost too good to be true. Beck saw what he thought was a golden opportunity to make himself into a hero by focusing his attention on bashing the media’s newest version of the Antichrist.
It’s now become his fulltime job. He demonizes Trump all day, every day, and has literally pleaded with his audiences to vote for anyone but The Donald. He even joined an angry bunch of establishment losers (people for whom he had always expressed considerable contempt) by signing on to the National Review’sdesperation piece to stop Trump.
As one would expect, he has repeatedly warned his listeners and readers that Trump’s rise to power parallels that of Adolf Hitler’s. And speaking of Hitler, in a recent article on his blog, Beck even said that he would vote for Hitlary Clinton if it came down to her or Trump. He then took it over the edge by saying, “I’m warning you now, you will say after two years of Donald Trump, ‘I’d give my right arm for Barack Obama.’”
In truth, of course, Beck’s mental disorder has nothing to do with Donald Trump and everything to do with his psychopathic need for attention. The only other theory I can come up with is that he is — as childish as it may seem — insanely jealous of Trump for all the attention he’s been getting.
It probably brings back painful memories of his own glory days in the spotlight — before those nasty mental demons gained control of his mind. It appears Beck is trying to piggyback onto Trump’s fame in an effort to get noticed. Unfortunately, it’s not working, and he’s only succeeding in making himself look ever more pathetic.
I would hate to see anything bad happen to this once-great talent, but I truly believe that if those closest to Glenn Beck don’t get him some serious psychiatric help soon (Where is Keith Ablow when you need him?), he could end up as a face-in-the-gutter alcoholic once again — or, worse, he might even do harm to himself or others.
Having said all this, in fairness, Glenn Beck isn’t alone when it comes to Trump Derangement Syndrome. The fact is that his views are shared by millions of Trump haters throughout the world.
Putting Beck’s mental issues aside for a moment, the Trump phenomenon is not all that complicated. Thanks to the radical left — and the establishment right that carries the left’s water — people’s anger over their loss of freedom and the intentional destruction of their country has reached the pitchfork stage.
Even so, the D.C. Crime Syndicate remains in denial, and its members are hysterical at the thought that they are in the process of losing their stranglehold — not just over Washington, but over all of America as well. They see Trump as a threat to both their power and their monopoly on legalized theft.
But the truth be known, Trump haters like Beck give Trump far too much credit. There’s no question he’s a narcissist. There’s no question he’s an egomaniac. There’s no question he’s rude, crude, and nasty. No one disputes any of these unflattering Trump qualities.
What Trump haters don’t get, however, is that these are the very qualities that millions of people actually want in a new president, so he can take down the Washington establishment. The best way to think of Trump is as a wrecking ball that has a good chance of destroying the D.C. Crime Syndicate.
Simply put, the Trump phenomenon is nothing more than long-overdue blowbackfrom everyday Americans — yet, amazingly, the delusional establishment still has no clue. What Trump actually does if he becomes president is almost secondary to those who support him. Right now, people just want the Washington power structure dismantled, and they figure that once that’s accomplished, they can sort things out later if Trump’s less than endearing qualities prove to be a problem.
In the meantime, in the event you’ve never read Glenn’s Beck’s The Blaze on the Internet, you should do so for a couple of days. His obsession over DT will take your breath away. I tell you, the man has a serious mental disorder, and I mean that literally. Sad … very, very sad.
Glenn Beck isn’t great at business or money management. Word on the street is The Blaze is about dead. They could really use a random billionaire bailout right about now. Cenk Uygur and John Iadarola, hosts of The Young Turks, break it down. Tell us what you think in the comment section below. http://tytnetwork.com/join
“Sources inside Glenn Beck’s once-mighty multimedia production company say that Beck is falling apart as his media empire collapses around him.
An employee of Beck’s flagship website TheBlaze.com told Huffington Post in an article published Wednesday that the few remaining staff are “looking for an exit” because they expect the site to be shuttered soon for good.
Huffington Post’s Michelle Fields said that TheBlaze.com is “suffering from a lack of editorial direction, staff attrition and internal discord” and that the mood among employees is “somber” as they’ve watched a 25-member editorial team get whittled down to six people — with more cuts expected.
“The few people who are still left are looking for an exit because they know The Blaze is over,” the source told Fields. “They haven’t told us straight up that they’re done with us, but all the signs point to it, and they’re not replacing people who are laid off or get out.”
Other employees report that their healthcare benefits were reduced over the summer and that in September, all of their travel and phone stipends were cut off. In June, the company closed its vast New York City newsroom and the remaining employees are working from home.”*
Glenn Beck Goes Bananas After Ted Cruz Endorses Trump
Glenn Beck’s ‘The Blaze’ Is Burning Down
Published on Aug 1, 2016
The Blaze is in a lot of trouble. Cenk Uygur, host of The Young Turks, breaks it down. Tell us what you think in the comment section below.
“Conservative television and radio host Glenn Beck has filed a lawsuit in Texas against the man who used to run his entertainment and news network, TheBlaze, according to sources close to Mr. Beck. The petition, obtained by LawNewz.com, was filed on behalf of Mercury Radio Arts, which serves as Beck’s production and operating company over TheBlaze. The complaint accuses Chris Balfe of breach of contract, general mismanagement, breach of fiduciary duty, and fraud. Balfe served as the COO of Mercury Radio Arts and was CEO of TheBlaze until he left in December 2014 to start his own company, Red Seat Ventures. Balfe had worked for Beck for more than 10 years, and was credited with helping to grow Beck’s business.
“I am embarrassed and saddened it has come to this. It is an ongoing legal matter so you will not hear me speak of this often but as always, I want you to hear it from me,” Beck wrote on his website on Monday.
Beck’s lawsuit comes amid reports of internal financial turmoil at TheBlaze. The complaint alleges between 2009 and 2014, Balfe’s compensation totaled in excess of $13 million.”
Glenn Beck: ‘I Think People Think That I’m … Nuts’
Glenn Beck’s Secret Brain Trouble, How He ‘Fixed’ It Is Most Troubling Of All
How Glenn Beck Overcame His Serious Health Issues: “It Was A Miracle”
Glenn Beck Describes His Pivot Point, And The Support of His Wife
Glenn Beck’s Secret Brain Trouble, How He ‘Fixed’ It Is Most Troubling Of All
Glenn Beck’s Mystery Illness Diagnosed By Quack Doctor
The Young Turks Are Falling Apart
“Up/Down” Bipolar Disorder Documentary FULL MOVIE (2011)
Tomi Lahren | Final Thoughts 11/28/16
Aerosmith – Crazy
Paul Simon – Still Crazy After All These Years
Lyrics
I met my old lover
On the street last night
She seemed so glad to see me
I just smiled
And we talked about some old times
And we drank ourselves some beers
Still crazy after all these years
Oh Still crazy after all these years
I’m not the kind of man
Who tends to socialize
I seem to lean on
Old familiar ways
And I ain’t no fool for love songs
That whisper in my ears
Still crazy after all these years
Oh still crazy after all these years
Four in the morning
Crapped out
Yawning
Longing my life away
I’ll never worry
Why should I?
It’s all gonna fade
Now I sit by my window
And I watch the cars
I fear I’ll do some damage
One fine day
But I would not be convicted
By a jury of my peers
Still crazy after all these years
Oh still crazy
Still crazy
Still crazy after all these years
Report: Glenn Beck’s The Blaze ‘Falling Apart’
by BREITBART NEWS13 Oct 20162,704
The Huffington Post reportson the continuing problems engulfing The Blaze founder Glenn Beck’s troubled media empire.
Glenn Beck’s website The Blaze is coming apart, suffering from a lack of editorial direction, staff attrition and internal discord, according to sources inside the news outlet.
The site, which Beck launched in 2010 to serve as the conservative counterpart to The Huffington Post, has dropped from 25 employees on its editorial side to just six. A source inside The Blaze, who requested anonymity for fear of retribution, told HuffPost that the mood among the rapidly diminishing news team is somber.
“The few people who are still left are looking for an exit because they know The Blaze is over,” the source said. “They haven’t told us straight up that they’re done with us, but all the signs point to it, and they’re not replacing people who are laid off or get out.”
Blazingly Mad Glenn Beck Sues His Fired CEO Christopher Balfe
The suit—in which Beck’s privately held company, Mercury Radio Arts, is the plaintiff and seeks a jury trial—alleges fraud, breach of contract, dereliction of duty, and various other misdeeds.
LLOYD GROVE
08.01.16 5:45 PM ET
In what one former associate of Glenn Beck described as “the last gasp of a dying empire,” the volatile right-wing radio, streaming video, and cable television personality is suing his longtime former chief executive, Christopher Balfe, whom Beck fired in December 2014.
The suit—in which Beck’s privately held company, Mercury Radio Arts, is the plaintiff and seeks a jury trial—alleges fraud, breach of contract, dereliction of duty, and various other misdeeds.
“I feel terrible for Glenn and I hope he finds the help that he needs,” Balfe, who worked closely with Beck for nearly two decades before their split, said Monday in a statement to The Daily Beast.
“The lawsuit speaks for itself,” said a spokesman for Beck—the only comment provided.
Beck, meanwhile, told listeners and viewers Monday of his syndicated radio program, which is video-streamed on his paid-subscription site TheBlaze.com: “I am—[Beck’s wife] Tania and I—are both really saddened by this and saddened that it has come to this.”
The 16-page complaint was filed quietly Friday in Dallas County, Texas, District Court, and apparently leaked Sunday night as an “exclusive” to the Lawnewz.com website, with another account splashed on GlennBeck.com.
“There are articles that have come out today on apparently lawsuit websites. I’m not going to give them publicity,” Beck told his fans. “And you’ll see more articles, I would assume, over the next few days. It’s an ongoing legal matter. And you’re not going to hear me talking much about it.”
Then, despite his insistence on not giving publicity to stories about the lawsuit, Beck recited the web addresses of the articles in question.
He is, of course, well known for changing his mind—campaigning hard during the Republican primaries for former presidential candidate Ted Cruz, for instance, mere months after announcing with spectacular fanfare that he was leaving politics for good.
Beck’s lawsuit is sharply at odds with previous expressions of gratitude he made three months after Balfe, along with fellow ex-Beck executive Joel Cheatwood, left Mercury Radio Arts, where Balfe was chief operating officer, and its subsidiary The Blaze, where Balfe was CEO.
“Chris and Joel helped me build one of the industry’s first truly independent multi-media companies,” Beck declared in March 2015, after Balfe and Cheatwood, who had steered Beck’s cable television career at HLN and Fox News, announced their formation of a new digital media company, Red Seat Ventures, and took several more top Beck executives with them. “I am sad to see them go but they left our company with an incredible foundation.”
Balfe retained minority ownership in The Blaze after he left, according to the lawsuit, and two sources familiar with the arrangement told The Daily Beast that his deferred compensation agreement featured monthly payments to satisfy around a million dollars that Balfe is owed under the agreement for both his ownership stake and his pro-rated share of company revenues.
But in recent weeks, say these sources, The Blaze has experienced cash-flow problems and has been having trouble paying vendors, while the website’s online traffic has plunged from around 26 million monthly global unique visitors in January 2015, the month after Balfe was dismissed, to around 10 million currently, according to the measuring service Quantcast.
Several more key executives have departed in the past year, along with Beck’s longtime television agent, George Hiltzik, as well George’s son Matthew Hiltzik, who recently resigned as the outside publicist for Beck and his companies; New York PR maven Davidson Goldin now has that account.
In another blow to The Blaze’s financial stability, the cable television distributor Cablevision recently stopped carrying Beck’s programming—representing an annual loss to The Blaze estimated at more than $2 million in subscriber fees and advertising sales, according to the sources.
These sources described Beck’s lawsuit as a pre-emptive strike.
They said that in June, after failing to receive his regular check, Balfe notified Beck’s company that if he wasn’t paid quickly, he would be exploring his options to obtain the money due him.
This none-too-veiled threat prompted Beck to file his own lawsuit claiming, instead, that Balfe actually owes him money—a portion of the $13 million Beck claims Balfe was paid as an executive between 2009 and 2014.
“This is a shockingly excessive amount that far exceeds appropriate compensation for companies of Mercury and TheBlaze’s size and financial performance,” the lawsuit contends.
But back in March of last year, when Balfe and Cheatwood were launching Red Seat Ventures, the 52-year-old Beck gushed: “I am truly grateful that we remain friends and am very excited to see what they do next.”
Their friendship didn’t survive, however, after Beck hired a little-known tech entrepreneur named Jonathan Schreiber, a diehard “superfan” of Beck’s syndicated radio program, who arrived in September 2014 from Israel via Miami, networked his way into Beck’s inner circle, gained the boss’s confidence and began accumulating power in the operations of both Mercury Radio Arts and The Blaze.
According to company employees, as The Daily Beast reported last February, Beck seemed to have become infatuated with Schreiber, who first showed up at The Blaze’s now-defunct Manhattan studios, and later had been regularly spotted in Beck’s expansive, glass-walled office at the rambling company headquarters in the Dallas suburb of Las Colinas—sometimes hugging his idol after a heart-to-heart.
Schreiber’s Orthodox Judaism apparently was in sync with Beck’s ardent religiosity as a Mormon convert, although staffers said Schreiber—who became president of Beck’s parent company—had an off-putting, arrogant manner with underlings, who gave him the nickname “Voldemort.”
Back in February, as Beck increasingly complained about Balfe and others who had helped orchestrate his career, Schreiber defended his own leadership to The Daily Beast.
“Glenn Beck, brilliant media mogul, realized he was unhappy in the direction his company was going so he brought in new blood,” he said in an email. “The goal being to put the company in the right direction. Through that process we separated with many people. Some will be missed, some less so.”
He added: “I am very proud of my work here, I am very proud of the culture we have created AND PROUD OF [his capital letters] the people WE have been able to bring in to the fold… No one likes to admit that they are not here because of themselves, it must be Voldemort.”
In a special video posted to his website today, Glenn Beck addressed news reports of the latest mass layoffs at his troubled media empire.
According to a report yesterday in the Daily Beast, Beck laid off 40 employees of his Blaze media organization “in order to satisfy the requirements of a multimillion-dollar bank loan taken out recently to keep Beck’s revenue-challenged enterprise running.”
As the Daily Beast noted, “This latest round of mass firings comes as no surprise to insiders at The Blaze and Mercury Radio Arts, which laid off dozens of employees last May on a day referred to internally as ‘Black Monday,’ around the same time that Beck was purchasing a private jetliner and a $200,000 Maybach sedan.”
In the video released today, Beck is seen seated at a replica of the Resolute desk in his mock Oval Office set delivering the opening monologue of his radio show.
Below is the transcript of his remarks.
***
I wanted to start there today because there’s a story that maybe you have read that came out yesterday that is talking about how yesterday my company, TheBlaze, laid off 40 people. And my media empire is crumbling. And part of it is because I’m traveling around with Ted Cruz.
Well, I want you to know, yes, I’ve lost a lot of money traveling around with Ted Cruz. I’ve lost about half a million dollars. That’s my choice. I believe in something.
Did that cause the 40 people to lose their job? No.
I want to talk to you today because we’re in a community together, and I trust you. And I tried to be trustworthy. And when I make a mistake, I own up to it. And I’m a trusting guy.
I think anybody on the show will tell you my biggest problem is I trust everybody, until they prove otherwise. And I try to live my life in a transparent way. And I try to surround myself with others that I believe are trustworthy.
And then I went on to build my own company with an authentic voice, a trustworthy company. And one of my main principles — and you heard me saying Isaiah it a million times: We take on no debt. Root ourselves in principles and people. Live within our own means.
And I trusted the people that ran my company, that they wanted the same things. And in the beginning, maybe they did want the same things. But a couple of years ago, I realized there were problems in my own company, and that even though the managers were all saying the right things to me, those things were never getting done. And you know this to be true. Because I would talk about things that we were going to do on TheBlaze and everything else, and then they never seemed to materialize. And I was losing credibility with you, but behind the scenes, I was a holy terror for about a year because I couldn’t find out what was going on.
Without saying anything bad about anybody because we just have different principles, the people I had moved down to Dallas and the rest was in New York and Los Angeles and Washington, DC — and we were working now towards being, I guess, a normal, status quo kind of media company, a big media company, and I didn’t ever want that.
But because our team was split from Dallas, Los Angeles — I think we had people at one time in Chicago, Washington, and New York — I didn’t know who really got the vision and who didn’t, who got it and who didn’t.
It was almost two years ago when we had a museum here at the studios in Dallas. And we invited you to come and just see the museum. And I bet there were 10,000 people here that came through — and I loved it. And everybody kept telling me, go home. Go home. Go home. And I wouldn’t go home. None of us did. Nobody on the show went home.
We were there and we spent that whole weekend with you because we love you. We love you.
But I noticed one thing about my company. Not one single person from the management team actually showed up that entire weekend. And I realized, they didn’t love the audience like I did. They weren’t connecting to the message like you did and I did. I’m not sure they were part of the culture of the principles. And I knew I had to get a hold of my company again, and that would mean making really hard choices.
First one was, are you going to stick to your principles? You going to be honest with yourself? Stand for what you believe in, or are you going to give into the status quo and go along to get along? Because these people were my friends, they were my partners, and I don’t know at the time, I thought maybe they were right. But I knew they weren’t in my gut.
And my gut and my spirit said, “Stick by what you know, even if it’s hard and even in the end if you lose.”
I had to start firing people, people that I counted as my friends, best friends, partners. And the process that I began was the hardest process of my life. Yeah, almost as hard as picking myself up off of that carpet when I was facing suicide, that carpet that smelled like soup. But this time I had something I didn’t have before: I had you. I knew you existed. I knew that you believed in the same principles I believe and that we — no, that I had made a promise to you. Our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.
And so I kept going. This has been a really hard five years for me, but the last 18 months have been unbelievable. One thing I had to do was get everyone in my house under one roof so I could look everyone in the eye. Culture matters at a company.
I stopped telling you about the things that were coming on TheBlaze. It’s called the Phoenix project. We’ve been working on it now for about nine months. I haven’t talked to you about it, nor will I until we launch it. I’m tired of telling you the things that I think we’re going to do. I bet you are too. We’re just going to do them. Because I failed you too many times.
The reason the articles like the one that came out yesterday are coming out, part of it is political. Part of it is because Frank Sinatra was right, some people get a kick out of stomping on your dreams. They really do.
Some is, I guess, it’s news when somebody loses their job. Unfortunately, my media company isn’t the only place in America laying people off. My media company is not the only one that’s looking at their balance sheet and saying, “We can’t go into debt, or we’re going to lose all of the jobs.”
They said in this article yesterday — this has been claimed before that my business is failing. I will tell you, two years ago, it was. It was absolutely on fire. Because when I started to go into the books — I was a bad steward. And when I started going into the books and see what had been done to my company that didn’t ever take on debt, I was first told that we were, I think, $4 million in debt. And then it became $7 million in debt. And then when I got the final accounting, 18 months ago, my company that doesn’t take on debt was $13 million in debt.
If I’m going to tell you you shouldn’t have debt, how could I have a company that was $13 million in the hole? I made really hard decisions. And in 18 months, my company that is dying and struggling paid our debt down from 13 million to two.
A couple of months ago, we had a great sponsor of ours, about a 7-million-dollar-a-year sponsor go broke. I feel for that company because everybody that worked for that company, much larger than mine, went out of business. And they left us with a lot of debt.
You see, economies, it’s — it’s like Jenga. One person pulls one big thing out, and the whole thing could fall. But it definitely weakens. And the more pieces of stress or the more pieces that come out of Jenga, the weaker your house becomes. Somebody — Delco goes out of business because GM is no longer making their cars in Ohio, and so that hurts Delco. And then that hurts the grocery store down the street and the restaurants in the town.
We’re in this together. I’m not going to tell you that I’m not running a fail company because the proof is in the pudding. I will just tell you the old managers got us into $13 million of debt. And in less than 18 months, we’ve shaved that off by over $10 million. That doesn’t seem like a failing business. That seems like a business that is thriving and is doing its best to set its principles right.
But I want you to know, when you read TheBlaze, because I’m not happy with it — and I’ve quietly said that recently, over the last year or so. Not happy with it. But it’s changing. We just hired one of the guys who put together American Idol, Oreo cookies. We just hired a guy who was one of the main guys at Good Morning America and CNN. We just hired an HR person from Viacom. I’m rebuilding. And it will be a lot better for me honestly — honestly, it would be a lot better if I would have just filed Chapter 11. But I actually like Harry Truman too much. I don’t believe — Chapter 11, sometimes you have to do. Chapter 7, sometimes you have to do.
But I wanted to pay every single person back because it’s not their fault. It was my fault for not watching what people were doing underneath me.
One last thought and then I’ll move off: When I first put TheBlaze on the air, it was GBTV. And I won a hammer. It’s the Tribeca Disruptive Innovation Award. It’s a disrupter’s award. It goes to some of the best disrupters in the world. I couldn’t believe I was in the room when I won this award. That year, I earned that award because we broke television and we’re the first one to make it an app and put it online.
I haven’t earned this hammer a day since. But I will tell you this: Sometimes it takes a hammer to break what is broken so you can rebuild it. And in today’s world and economy, if you ever get fat and sassy, if you ever start to put profits over people, if you ever decide, “I really don’t need — I really don’t — I don’t care what the people say. Yeah, yeah, they’re customers. They’ll just keep coming.” No, they won’t. You have to innovate every day. You have to actually love your customer every day. You have to actually care about them and wonder, “How can I make their life better or easier?” And when you do that and you understand that by doing that you’re disrupting the entire system and you’ll go places that will scare the living daylights out of you, but you proceed without fear, that’s when you will win.
I’m not going to tell you we’re going to win. I’m just going to tell you, watch us. Watch us over the next year.
Head of Glenn Beck’s Media Empire Quits as The Blaze Burns Down
Kraig Kitchin will stay with the company, but resigned from the top job after friction with fellow Beck executive Jonathan Schreiber. A ‘mass exodus’ of staff may follow.
LLOYD GROVE
01.29.16 5:56 PM ET
In what knowledgeable observers say is a sign of increasing turmoil in Glenn Beck’s troubled media empire, Beck’s longtime mentor and corporate executive, Kraig Kitchin, has quit as CEO of The Blaze.
Kitchin’s replacement, Stewart Padveen, a digital startup entrepreneur who joined Beck’s company last summer, will be the fourth leader of The Blaze since late 2014.
Kitchin, 54, who took over operations of Beck’s conservative-leaning subscription digital and cable television enterprise last June—after two previous CEOs abruptly left in the space of six months—is resigning along with two other senior executives: Jeremy Price, director of advertising sales, and Liz Julis, director of marketing.
Both are based in New York, 1,500 miles removed from corporate headquarters in the Dallas suburb of Irving, Texas.
Several other key employees, including at least two senior producers based in The Blaze’s shrinking New York operation, are expected to follow them out the door.
A source close to the situation predicted a “mass exodus” from the New York studios, which are housed in a largely unoccupied 35,000 square-foot space at Midtown Manhattan’s Bryant Park, previously rented by Yahoo, under a 10-year lease costing Beck’s privately held company an estimated $2 million a year.
Kitchin—who co-founded Premiere Radio Networks three decades ago and has worked with personalities as diverse as Rush Limbaugh, Ryan Seacrest, Whoopi Goldberg, and Beck—tried to put the best face on his resignation in a company-wide email sent out Thursday night.
He described his apparently self-imposed demotion as a result of outside business obligations.
“Our organization—The Blaze—deserves and needs an exclusively focused leader and that’s something I cannot provide, given existing commitments I choose to honor,” Kitchin wrote, adding that “I’m not leaving this company. I’ll stay with The Blaze, working every day as the Interim Head of Sales with a focus on finding the right person for that position, assisting in the transition, on advertiser growth, program development, and industry relations.”
But according to multiple sources, Kitchin’s announcement comes out of frustration after continual friction with top Beck executive Jonathan Schreiber, the recently named president of Beck’s 14-year-old production company, Mercury Radio Arts.
According to multiple sources, Kitchin—who commuted from his home in Los Angeles to Dallas and New York—took the CEO job on an interim basis with the condition that Schreiber would agree not to interfere in The Blaze, an agreement that Kitchin realized was continually being breached. According to people familiar with the situation, Schreiber’s alleged meddling in Kitchin’s operation ultimately became intolerable.
Schreiber didn’t respond to an email from The Daily Beast, and Kitchin declined to comment.
Named president in April 2015 of Mercury Radio Arts—of which The Blaze is a subsidiary, all of it majority-owned by Beck—Schreiber is said to have a penchant for interfering in areas beyond his expertise, namely the staffing and content of The Blaze’s news and opinion site and its television production operation.
The Blaze cable channel reaches an estimated 13 million households which subscribe to DISH, Verizon Fios, and other paid television carriers.
Schreiber’s alleged intrusion is said to have also figured in the departure in June of then-Blaze chief executive Betsy Morgan, an experienced digital media executive who previously ran CBS News’s digital operations, helped grow The Huffington Post, and built TheBlaze.com into a news and aggregation site that—in November 2014—attracted 29 million unique visitors per month.
But by November 2015—according to figures from the Web traffic measuring service Quantcast—monthly traffic for TheBlaze.com had dropped to 16.4 million unique visitors, and traffic for the associated website GlennBeck.com, had plunged from 4.4 million to 1.4 million uniques.
Morgan—ironically, according to sources—had recommended Schreiber to Beck and helped secure his initial position with the company, shouldering a vague responsibility for “strategy and special projects.”
A religious man who practices Orthodox Judaism, Schreiber quickly hit it off with Beck, a devout Mormon convert.
Morgan had replaced Beck’s longtime CEO Chris Balfe, who abruptly exited the company in December 2014, along with fellow exec Joel Cheatwood, as Schreiber was gaining more prominence and influence.
Balfe, who along with Cheatwood retains a minority ownership stake in The Blaze, left after more than a decade of helping Beck build his brand and become a media personality, and was instrumental in the soft launch of The Blaze six years ago while Beck was still hosting his short-lived but wildly popular 5 p.m. program on the Fox News Channel.
Stewart Padveen, Schreiber’s personal friend and “mentor” (as Schreiber describes him in a LinkedIn endorsement), will assume control of The Blaze effective Monday.
Padveen, who lives in Los Angeles, wrote in a staff email that he plans to visit Dallas “next week to kick off this process,” with a later trip planned to New York.
“2015 was a tough year for sure, but thanks to many of you, it was a profitable one,” Padveen wrote concerning this latest corporate shakeup.
“We all owe a debt of gratitude to Kraig for guiding us through some rough times. We still have some history to redress, but if we continue down the path of making solid business decisions, we can get past the past and into the future.”
Besides a period of staff layoffs and turnover that continues to this day, and despite claims of profitability, that “history” apparently includes taking on more debt than the company’s principal owner was comfortable with.
At a staff meeting in New York last February, Beck exhorted his employees to pinch pennies and said the company’s debt was too high at $3 million—a figure sources said later grew to $5 million or more.
“I know much of what has happened since December of 2014, but also much of it has been structural and behind the curtain,” Beck wrote in his own email, in which he thanked Kitchin for his service. “We were a company that was swimming in debt. With the hard work of Kraig, Jonathan, and now Misty [Kawecki, the chief financial officer] we will be debt free by summer. This is miraculous and takes all of the downward pressure off of us.”
Schreiber, a digital startup entrepreneur in his early forties, is a controversial and mysterious figure within Mercury Radio Arts. According to colleagues, he has referred to himself as a “diehard Glenn Beck fan” who, after years of living in Israel, relocated to New York, talked his way into Beck’s confidence, and showed up as a “trusted advisor,” as Beck has called him, in the fall of 2014.
“I want to thank Kraig for everything he has done to help bring the Blaze to the place it is,” Schreiber wrote in his own email, “and welcome Stewart to help bring the Blaze to the places it can go.”
In what a couple of Beck veterans considered ominous corporate-speak, Schreiber added: “All of us, leadership in BOTH companies, have worked together to help ensure that every person will be put into the right role at the right company with clear responsibilities and direction. This will continue to be a process and not an event.”
Story 1: Fed Desperate To Rise Above the Near Zero Fed Funds Rate Target Range — Need Three Months Of 300,000 Plus Per Month Job Creation, Wage Growth and 3% First Quarter 2015 Real Gross Domestic Product Growth Numbers To Jump to .5 – 1.0% Range Fed Funds Rate Target — June 2015 Launch Date Expected — Fly Me To The Moon — Summertime — Launch — Abort On Recession — Videos
Amazing seven year old sings Fly Me To The Moon (Angelina Jordan) on Senkveld “The Late Show”
Forrest Gump JFK “I Gotta Pee” Scene
Fed Decision: The Three Most Important Things Janet Yellen Said
Press Conference with Chair of the FOMC, Janet L. Yellen
Monetary Policy Based on the Taylor Rule
Many economists believe that rules-based monetary policy provides better economic outcomes than a purely discretionary framework delivers. But there is disagreement about the advantages of rules-based policy and even disagreement about which rule works. One possible policy rule would be for the central bank to follow a Taylor Rule, named after our featured speaker, John B. Taylor. What would some of the advantages of a Taylor Rule be versus, for instance, a money growth rule, or a rule which only specifies the inflation target? How could a policy rule be implemented? Should policy rule legislation be considered? Join us as Professor Taylor addresses these important policy questions.
Murray N. Rothbard on Milton Friedman pre1971
On Milton Friedman | by Murray N. Rothbard
Who Was the Better Monetary Economist? Rothbard and Friedman Compared | Joseph T. Salerno
Joseph Salerno “Unmasking the Federal Reserve”
Rothbard on Alan Greenspan
Milton Friedman – Money and Inflation
Milton Friedman – Abolish The Fed
Milton Friedman On John Maynard Keynes
Hayek on Keynes’s Ignorance of Economics
Friedrich Hayek explains to Leo Rosten that while brilliant Keynes had a parochial understanding of economics.
On John Maynard Keynes | by Murray N. Rothbard
Hayek on Milton Friedman and Monetary Policy
Friedrich Hayek: Why Intellectuals Drift Towards Socialism
Capitalism, Socialism, and the Jews
The Normal State of Man: Misery & Tyranny
Peter Schiff Interviews Keynesian Economist Laurence Kotlikoff 01-18-12
Larry Kotlikoff on the Clash of Generations
Extended interview with Boston University Economics Professor Larry Kotlikoff on his publications about a six-decade long Ponzi scheme in the US which he says will lead to a clash of generations.
Kotlikoff also touches on what his projections mean for the New Zealand economy and why Prime Minister John Key should take more attention of New Zealand’s ‘fiscal gap’ – the gap between all future government spending commitments and its future revenue track.
Thomas Sowell on Intellectuals and Society
Angelina Jordan – summertime
Angelina Jordan synger Sinatra i semifinalen i Norske Talenter 2014
Release Date: March 18, 2015
For immediate release
Information received since the Federal Open Market Committee met in January suggests that economic growth has moderated somewhat. Labor market conditions have improved further, with strong job gains and a lower unemployment rate. A range of labor market indicators suggests that underutilization of labor resources continues to diminish. Household spending is rising moderately; declines in energy prices have boosted household purchasing power. Business fixed investment is advancing, while the recovery in the housing sector remains slow and export growth has weakened. Inflation has declined further below the Committee’s longer-run objective, largely reflecting declines in energy prices. Market-based measures of inflation compensation remain low; survey-based measures of longer-term inflation expectations have remained stable.
Consistent with its statutory mandate, the Committee seeks to foster maximum employment and price stability. The Committee expects that, with appropriate policy accommodation, economic activity will expand at a moderate pace, with labor market indicators continuing to move toward levels the Committee judges consistent with its dual mandate. The Committee continues to see the risks to the outlook for economic activity and the labor market as nearly balanced. Inflation is anticipated to remain near its recent low level in the near term, but the Committee expects inflation to rise gradually toward 2 percent over the medium term as the labor market improves further and the transitory effects of energy price declines and other factors dissipate. The Committee continues to monitor inflation developments closely.
To support continued progress toward maximum employment and price stability, the Committee today reaffirmed its view that the current 0 to 1/4 percent target range for the federal funds rate remains appropriate. In determining how long to maintain this target range, the Committee will assess progress–both realized and expected–toward its objectives of maximum employment and 2 percent inflation. This assessment will take into account a wide range of information, including measures of labor market conditions, indicators of inflation pressures and inflation expectations, and readings on financial and international developments. Consistent with its previous statement, the Committee judges that an increase in the target range for the federal funds rate remains unlikely at the April FOMC meeting. The Committee anticipates that it will be appropriate to raise the target range for the federal funds rate when it has seen further improvement in the labor market and is reasonably confident that inflation will move back to its 2 percent objective over the medium term. This change in the forward guidance does not indicate that the Committee has decided on the timing of the initial increase in the target range.
The Committee is maintaining its existing policy of reinvesting principal payments from its holdings of agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities in agency mortgage-backed securities and of rolling over maturing Treasury securities at auction. This policy, by keeping the Committee’s holdings of longer-term securities at sizable levels, should help maintain accommodative financial conditions.
When the Committee decides to begin to remove policy accommodation, it will take a balanced approach consistent with its longer-run goals of maximum employment and inflation of 2 percent. The Committee currently anticipates that, even after employment and inflation are near mandate-consistent levels, economic conditions may, for some time, warrant keeping the target federal funds rate below levels the Committee views as normal in the longer run.
Voting for the FOMC monetary policy action were: Janet L. Yellen, Chair; William C. Dudley, Vice Chairman; Lael Brainard; Charles L. Evans; Stanley Fischer; Jeffrey M. Lacker; Dennis P. Lockhart; Jerome H. Powell; Daniel K. Tarullo; and John C. Williams.
Note: Projections of change in real gross domestic product (GDP) and projections for both measures of inflation are percent changes from the fourth quarter of the previous year to the fourth quarter of the year indicated. PCE inflation and core PCE inflation are the percentage rates of change in, respectively, the price index for personal consumption expenditures (PCE) and the price index for PCE excluding food and energy. Projections for the unemployment rate are for the average civilian unemployment rate in the fourth quarter of the year indicated. Each participant’s projections are based on his or her assessment of appropriate monetary policy. Longer-run projections represent each participant’s assessment of the rate to which each variable would be expected to converge under appropriate monetary policy and in the absence of further shocks to the economy. The December projections were made in conjunction with the meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee on December 16-17, 2014.
1. The central tendency excludes the three highest and three lowest projections for each variable in each year. Return to table
2. The range for a variable in a given year includes all participants’ projections, from lowest to highest, for that variable in that year. Return to table
3. Longer-run projections for core PCE inflation are not collected. Return to table
Figure 1. Central tendencies and ranges of economic projections, 2015-17 and over the longer run
Central tendencies and ranges of economic projections for years 2015 through 2017 and over the longer run. Actual values for years 2010 through 2014.
Change in real GDP Percent
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
Longer Run
Actual
2.7
1.7
1.6
3.1
2.4
–
–
–
–
Upper End of Range
–
–
–
–
–
3.1
3.0
2.5
2.5
Upper End of Central Tendency
–
–
–
–
–
2.7
2.7
2.4
2.3
Lower End of Central Tendency
–
–
–
–
–
2.3
2.3
2.0
2.0
Lower End of Range
–
–
–
–
–
2.1
2.2
1.8
1.8
Unemployment rate Percent
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
Longer Run
Actual
9.5
8.7
7.8
7.0
5.7
–
–
–
–
Upper End of Range
–
–
–
–
–
5.3
5.2
5.5
5.8
Upper End of Central Tendency
–
–
–
–
–
5.2
5.1
5.1
5.2
Lower End of Central Tendency
–
–
–
–
–
5.0
4.9
4.8
5.0
Lower End of Range
–
–
–
–
–
4.8
4.5
4.8
4.9
PCE inflation Percent
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
Longer Run
Actual
1.3
2.7
1.6
1.0
1.1
–
–
–
–
Upper End of Range
–
–
–
–
–
1.5
2.4
2.2
2.0
Upper End of Central Tendency
–
–
–
–
–
0.8
1.9
2.0
2.0
Lower End of Central Tendency
–
–
–
–
–
0.6
1.7
1.9
2.0
Lower End of Range
–
–
–
–
–
0.6
1.6
1.7
2.0
Note: Definitions of variables are in the general note to the projections table. The data for the actual values of the variables are annual.
Figure 2. Overview of FOMC participants’ assessments of appropriate monetary policy
Appropriate timing of policy firming
2015
2016
Number of participants
15
2
Note: In the upper panel, the height of each bar denotes the number of FOMC participants who judge that, under appropriate monetary policy, the first increase in the target range for the federal funds rate from its current range of 0 to 1/4 percent will occur in the specified calendar year. In December 2014, the numbers of FOMC participants who judged that the first increase in the target federal funds rate would occur in 2015, and 2016 were, respectively, 15, and 2.
Appropriate pace of policy firming: Midpoint of target range or target level for the federal funds rate Number of participants with projected midpoint of target range or target level
Midpoint of target range
or target level (Percent)
2015
2016
2017
Longer Run
0.125
2
0.250
0.375
1
1
0.500
0.625
7
0.750
0.875
3
1.000
1.125
1
1
1.250
1.375
2
1.500
1.625
1
6
1.750
1.875
3
2.000
1
2.125
1
2.250
1
2.375
2.500
2.625
1
3
2.750
2.875
2
3.000
1
3.125
4
3.250
3.375
2
1
3.500
7
3.625
2
3.750
1
2
6
3.875
1
4.000
1
2
4.125
4.250
1
Note: In the lower panel, each shaded circle indicates the value (rounded to the nearest 1/8 percentage point) of an individual participant’s judgment of the midpoint of the appropriate target range for the federal funds rate or the appropriate target level for the federal funds rate at the end of the specified calendar year or over the longer run.
Janet Yellen Isn’t Going to Raise Interest Rates Until She’s Good and Ready
The key words in Janet L. Yellen’s news conference Wednesday were rather pithy, at least by central bank standards. “Just because we removed the word ‘patient’ from the statement doesn’t mean we are going to be impatient,” Ms. Yellen, the Federal Reserve chairwoman, said.
With this framing, Ms. Yellen was putting her firm stamp on the policy of an institution she has led for just over a year — and making clear that she will not be boxed in. Her words and accompanying announcements conveyed the message that the Yellen Fed has no intention of taking the support struts of low interest rates away until she is absolutely confident that economic growth will hold up without them.
Photo
Janet Yellen held a news conference after a meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee in Washington on Wednesday.CreditChip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Ms. Yellen’s comments about patience versus impatience were part of that dance. But the dual message was even more powerful when combined with other elements of the central bank’s newly released information, which sent the signal that members of the committee intend to move cautiously on rate increases.
By eliminating the reference to “patience,” Paul Edelstein, an economist at IHS Global Insight, said in a research note, “The Fed did what it was expected to do.”
“But beyond that,” he added, “the committee appeared much more dovish and in not much of a hurry to actually pull the trigger.”
Fed officials’ forecasts of how high rates will be at year’s end for 2015, 2016 and 2017 all fell compared to where they were in December. They marked down their forecast for economic growth and inflation for all three years, implying that the nation’s economic challenge is tougher and inflation risks more distant than they had seemed a few months ago.
Particularly interesting was that Fed officials lowered their estimate of the longer-run unemployment rate, to 5 to 5.2 percent, from 5.2 to 5.5 percent. With joblessness hitting 5.5 percent in February, that implied that policy makers are convinced the job market has more room to tighten before it becomes too tight. Fed leaders now forecast unemployment rates in 2016 and 2017 that are a bit below what many view as the long-term sustainable level, which one would expect to translate into rising wages.
In other words, they want to run the economy a little hot for the next couple of years to help spur the kinds of wage gains that might return inflation to the 2 percent level they aim for, but which they have persistently undershot in recent years.
Apart from the details of the dovish monetary policy signals Ms. Yellen and her colleagues sent, it is clear she wanted to jolt markets out of any feeling that policy is on a preordained path.
At times over the last couple of years, the Fed had seemed to set a policy course and then go on a forced march until it got there, regardless of whether the jobs numbers were good or bad, or whether inflation was rising or falling. That is certainly how it felt when the Fed decided in December 2013 to wind down its quantitative easing policies by $10 billion per meeting, which it did through the first nine months of 2014 with few signs of re-evaluation as conditions evolved.
In her first news conference as chairwoman a year ago, Ms. Yellen had suggested that rate increases might be on a similar preordained path by saying that she could imagine rate increases “around six months” after the conclusion of quantitative easing. (That comment increasingly looks to have been a rookie mistake, and she later backed away from it.)
There are likely to be plenty of twists and turns in the coming months. After this week’s meeting, Ms. Yellen reinforced the message she has been trying to convey that the committee really will adapt its policy to incoming information rather than simply carry on with the path it set a year ago.
If the strengthening dollar and falling oil prices start to translate into still-lower expectations for future inflation, the Fed will hold off from rate rises — and the same if wage gains and other job market indicators show a lack of progress.
Conversely, if the job market recovery keeps going gangbusters and it becomes clear that inflation is going to rise back toward 2 percent, Ms. Yellen does not want to be constrained by language about “patience.”
“This change does not necessarily mean that an increase will occur in June,” Ms. Yellen said, “though we cannot rule that out.”
She has now bought herself some latitude to decide when and how the Fed ushers in an era of tighter money. Now the question is just how patient or impatient American economic conditions will allow her to be.
In economics, a Taylor rule is a monetary-policy rule that stipulates how much the central bank should change the nominal interest rate in response to changes in inflation, output, or other economic conditions. In particular, the rule stipulates that for each one-percent increase in inflation, the central bank should raise the nominal interest rate by more than one percentage point. This aspect of the rule is often called the Taylor principle.
The rule of was first proposed by John B. Taylor,[1] and simultaneously by Dale W. Henderson and Warwick McKibbin in 1993.[2] It is intended to foster price stability and full employment by systematically reducing uncertainty and increasing the credibility of future actions by the central bank. It may also avoid the inefficiencies of time inconsistency from the exercise ofdiscretionary policy.[3][4] The Taylor rule synthesized, and provided a compromise between, competing schools of economics thought in a language devoid of rhetorical passion.[5] Although many issues remain unresolved and views still differ about how the Taylor rule can best be applied in practice, research shows that the rule has advanced the practice of central banking.[6]
As an equation
According to Taylor’s original version of the rule, the nominal interest rate should respond to divergences of actual inflation rates from target inflation rates and of actual Gross Domestic Product (GDP) from potential GDP:
In this equation, both and should be positive (as a rough rule of thumb, Taylor’s 1993 paper proposed setting ).[7] That is, the rule “recommends” a relatively high interest rate (a “tight” monetary policy) when inflation is above its target or when output is above its full-employment level, in order to reduce inflationary pressure. It recommends a relatively low interest rate (“easy” monetary policy) in the opposite situation, to stimulate output. Sometimes monetary policy goals may conflict, as in the case of stagflation, when inflation is above its target while output is below full employment. In such a situation, a Taylor rule specifies the relative weights given to reducing inflation versus increasing output.
The Taylor principle
By specifying , the Taylor rule says that an increase in inflation by one percentage point should prompt the central bank to raise the nominal interest rate by more than one percentage point (specifically, by , the sum of the two coefficients on in the equation above). Since the real interest rate is (approximately) the nominal interest rate minus inflation, stipulating implies that when inflation rises, the real interest rate should be increased. The idea that the real interest rate should be raised to cool the economy when inflation increases (requiring the nominal interest rate to increase more than inflation does) has sometimes been called the Taylor principle.[8]
During an EconTalk podcast Taylor explained the rule in simple terms using three variables: inflation rate, GDP growth, and the interest rate. If inflation were to rise by 1%, the proper response would be to raise the interest rate by 1.5% (Taylor explains that it doesn’t always need to be exactly 1.5%, but being larger than 1% is essential). If GDP falls by 1% relative to its growth path, then the proper response is to cut the interest rate by .5%.[9]
Alternative versions of the rule
While the Taylor principle has proved very influential, there is more debate about the other terms that should enter into the rule. According to some simple New Keynesian macroeconomic models, insofar as the central bank keeps inflation stable, the degree of fluctuation in output will be optimized (Blanchard and Gali call this property the ‘divine coincidence‘). In this case, the central bank need not take fluctuations in the output gap into account when setting interest rates (that is, it may optimally set .) On the other hand, other economists have proposed including additional terms in the Taylor rule to take into account money gap[10] or financial conditions: for example, the interest rate might be raised when stock prices, housing prices, or interest rate spreads increase.
Empirical relevance
Although the Federal Reserve does not explicitly follow the Taylor rule, many analysts have argued that the rule provides a fairly accurate summary of US monetary policy under Paul Volcker and Alan Greenspan.[11][12] Similar observations have been made about central banks in other developed economies, both in countries like Canada and New Zealand that have officially adopted inflation targeting rules, and in others like Germany where the Bundesbank‘s policy did not officially target the inflation rate.[13][14] This observation has been cited by Clarida, Galí, and Gertler as a reason why inflation had remained under control and the economy had been relatively stable (the so-called ‘Great Moderation‘) in most developed countries from the 1980s through the 2000s.[11] However, according to Taylor, the rule was not followed in part of the 2000s, possibly leading to the housing bubble.[15][16] Certain research has determined that some households form their expectations about the future path of interest rates, inflation, and unemployment in a way that is consistent with Taylor-type rules.[17]
Criticisms
Athanasios Orphanides (2003) claims that the Taylor rule can misguide policy makers since they face real-time data. He shows that the Taylor rule matches the US funds rate less perfectly when accounting for these informational limitations and that an activist policy following the Taylor rule would have resulted in an inferior macroeconomic performance during the Great Inflation of the seventies.[18]
Jump up^Henderson, D. W.; McKibbin, W. (1993). “A Comparison of Some Basic Monetary Policy Regimes for Open Economies: Implications of Different Degrees of Instrument Adjustment and Wage Persistence”. Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy39: 221–318. doi:10.1016/0167-2231(93)90011-K.
Jump up^Paul Klein (2009). “time consistency of monetary and fiscal policy,” The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. 2nd Edition. Abstract.
Jump up^Kahn, George A.; Asso, Pier Francesco; Leeson, Robert (2007). “The Taylor Rule and the Transformation of Monetary Policy”. Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City Working Paper 07-11. SSRN1088466.
Jump up^Asso, Pier Francesco; Kahn, George A.; Leeson, Robert (2010). “The Taylor Rule and the Practice of Central Banking”. Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City Working Paper 10-05. SSRN1553978.
Jump up^Benchimol, Jonathan; Fourçans, André (2012). “Money and risk in a DSGE framework : A Bayesian application to the Eurozone”. Journal of Macroeconomics34 (1): 95–111, Abstract.
Jump up^Taylor, John B. (2009). Getting Off Track: How Government Actions and Interventions Caused, Prolonged, and Worsened the Financial Crisis. Hoover Institution Press. ISBN0-8179-4971-2.
Jump up^Carvalho, Carlos; Nechio, Fernanda (2013). “Do People Understand Monetary Policy?”. Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco Working Paper 2012-01.SSRN1984321.
Story 1: Asset Price Bubble Bursts Coming In October With 69 Months of Near Zero Federal Funds Interest Rates! — Interest Rate Suppression or Price Control and Manipulation Will Blow Up Economy — Suppressing Savings and Investment With Low Interest Rates Is A Formula For Diaster and Depression — Panic Time — Start A War Over Oil — Meltdown America –Videos
TABLE I -- SUMMARY OF TREASURY SECURITIES OUTSTANDING, AUGUST 31, 2014
(Millions of dollars)
Amount Outstanding
Title Debt Held Intragovernmental Totals
By the Public Holdings
Marketable:
Bills....................................... 1,450,293 1,704 1,451,998
Notes....................................... 8,109,269 7,365 8,116,634
Bonds....................................... 1,521,088 57 1,521,144
Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities..... 1,031,836 52 1,031,888
Floating Rate Notes 21 ................... 109,996 0 109,996
Federal Financing Bank 1 ................. 0 13,612 13,612
Total Marketable a........................... 12,222,481 22,790 2 12,245,271
Nonmarketable:
Domestic Series............................. 29,995 0 29,995
Foreign Series.............................. 2,986 0 2,986
State and Local Government Series........... 105,440 0 105,440
United States Savings Securities............ 177,030 0 177,030
Government Account Series................... 193,237 4,993,277 5,186,514
Hope Bonds 19............................... 0 494 494
Other....................................... 1,443 0 1,443
Total Nonmarketable b........................ 510,130 4,993,771 5,503,901
Total Public Debt Outstanding ................ 12,732,612 5,016,561 17,749,172
TABLE II -- STATUTORY DEBT LIMIT, AUGUST 31, 2014
(Millions of dollars)
Amount Outstanding
Title Debt Held Intragovernmental Totals
By the Public 17, 2Holdings
Debt Subject to Limit: 17, 20
Total Public Debt Outstanding............... 12,732,612 5,016,561 17,749,172
Less Debt Not Subject to Limit:
Other Debt ............................... 485 0 485
Unamortized Discount 3................... 15,742 12,421 28,163
Federal Financing Bank 1 ............ 0 13,612 13,612
Hope Bonds 19............................. 0 494 494
Plus Other Debt Subject to Limit:
Guaranteed Debt of Government Agencies 4 * 0 *
Total Public Debt Subject to Limit ......... 12,716,386 4,990,033 17,706,419
Statutory Debt Limit 5..................................................................... 0
COMPILED AND PUBLISHED BY
THE BUREAU OF THE FISCAL SERVICE
www.TreasuryDirect.gov
Interest Expense on the Debt Outstanding
The Interest Expense on the Debt Outstanding includes the monthly interest for:
Amortized discount or premium on bills, notes and bonds is also included in the monthly interest expense.
The fiscal year represents the total interest expense on the Debt Outstanding for a given fiscal year. This includes the months of October through September. View current month details (XLS Format, File size 199KB, uploaded 09/05/2014).
Note: To read or print a PDF document, you need the Adobe Acrobat Reader (v5.0 or higher) software installed on your computer. You can download the Adobe Acrobat Reader from the Adobe Website.
Even after the Dow and the S&P 500 closed at new all-time highs, closely followed contrarian Marc Faber keeps sounding the alarm.
“We have a bubble in everything, everywhere,” the publisher of The Gloom, Boom & Doom Report told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Friday. Faber has long argued that the Federal Reserve’s massive asset purchasing programs and near-zero interest rates have inflated stock prices.
The catalyst for a market decline, as he sees it, could be a “raise in interest rates, not engineered by the Fed,” referring an increase in bond yields.
Faber also expressed concern about American consumers. “Their cost of living have gone up more than the salary increases, so they’re getting squeezed. So that’s why retailing is not doing particularly well.”
A real black swan event, he argued, would be a global recession. “The big surprise will be that the global economy slows down and goes into recession. And that will shock markets.”
If economies around the world can’t recovery with the Fed and other central banks pumping easy money into the system, that would send a dire message, Faber added. He believes the best way for world economies to recover is to cut the size of government.
There’s a dual-economy in the U.S. and around the world with the rich doing really well and others struggling, he said. “[But] the rich will get creamed one day, especially in Europe, on wealth taxes.”
The Wharton School professor sees second half economic growth of 3 to 4 percent, S&P 500 earnings near $120, and the start of Fed rate hikes in the spring or summer of 2015
Fed and TWTR Overvaluation, Evidence of Looming Market Crash: Stockman
The Federal Reserve Wednesday reassured investors that it will hold interest rates near zero for a “considerable time” after it ends the bond-buying program known as quantitative easing in October. In response, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) closed at a new record high.
Former Director of the Office of Management and Budget and author of the book, The Great Deformation, David Stockman, has significant concerns about that very policy.
“I’m worried… that we’ve got the greatest bubble created by a central bank in human history,” he told Yahoo Finance.
In a recent blog post, Stockman offered a handful of high-flying stocks as evidence of what he sees as “madness.”
“…Twitter, is all that is required to remind us that once
again markets are trading in the nosebleed section
of history, rivaling even the madness of March 2000.”
Behind the madness
In an interview with Yahoo Finance, Stockman blamed Fed policy for creating that madness.
“We have been shoving zero-cost money into the financial markets for 6-years running,” he said. “That’s the kerosene that drives speculative trading – the carry trades. That’s what the gamblers use to fund their position as they move from one momentum play and trade to another.”
And that, he says, is not sustainable. While Stockman believes tech stocks are especially overvalued, he warns that it’s not just tech valuations that are inflated. “Everything’s massively overvalued, and it’s predicated on zero-cost overnight money that continues these carry trades; It can’t continue.”
And he still believes, as he has for some time – so far, incorrectly – that there will be a day of reckoning.
“When the trades begin to unwind because the carry cost has to normalize, you’re going to have a dramatic re-pricing dislocation in these financial markets.”
As Yahoo Finance’s Lauren Lyster points out in the associated video, investors who heeded Stockman’s advice last year would have missed out on a 28% run-up in stocks. But Stockman remains steadfast in his belief that the current Fed policy and the resultant market behavior can not continue. “I think what the Fed is doing is so unprecedented, what is happening in the markets is so unnatural,” he said. “This is dangerous, combustible stuff, and I don’t know when the explosion occurs – when the collapse suddenly is upon us – but when it happens, people will be happy that they got out of the way if they did.”
Factors Affecting Reserve Balances of Depository Institutions and Condition Statement of Federal Reserve Banks
September 11, 2014
1. Factors Affecting Reserve Balances of Depository Institutions
Millions of dollars
Reserve Bank credit, related items, and
reserve balances of depository institutions at
Federal Reserve Banks
Averages of daily figures
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Week ended
Sep 10, 2014
Change from week ended
Sep 3, 2014
Sep 11, 2013
Reserve Bank credit
4,377,690
+ 4,183
+ 761,693
4,379,719
Securities held outright1
4,159,537
+ 2,675
+ 765,361
4,160,521
U.S. Treasury securities
2,439,657
+ 2,671
+ 401,376
2,440,637
Bills2
0
0
0
0
Notes and bonds, nominal2
2,325,368
+ 2,678
+ 386,333
2,326,351
Notes and bonds, inflation-indexed2
97,755
0
+ 11,737
97,755
Inflation compensation3
16,534
– 7
+ 3,306
16,531
Federal agency debt securities2
41,562
0
– 22,868
41,562
Mortgage-backed securities4
1,678,317
+ 4
+ 386,851
1,678,322
Unamortized premiums on securities held outright5
208,963
– 219
+ 5,815
208,907
Unamortized discounts on securities held outright5
-18,664
+ 21
– 12,958
-18,654
Repurchase agreements6
0
0
0
0
Loans
291
– 8
+ 18
352
Primary credit
10
– 18
– 8
53
Secondary credit
0
0
0
0
Seasonal credit
247
+ 9
+ 94
266
Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility7
34
0
– 68
34
Other credit extensions
0
0
0
0
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane LLC8
1,664
– 1
+ 171
1,665
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane II LLC9
63
0
– 1
63
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane III LLC10
22
0
0
22
Net portfolio holdings of TALF LLC11
44
0
– 80
44
Float
-675
– 69
+ 94
-627
Central bank liquidity swaps12
77
+ 1
– 243
77
Other Federal Reserve assets13
26,369
+ 1,784
+ 3,517
27,349
Foreign currency denominated assets14
22,933
– 353
– 737
22,801
Gold stock
11,041
0
0
11,041
Special drawing rights certificate account
5,200
0
0
5,200
Treasury currency outstanding15
46,103
+ 14
+ 820
46,103
Total factors supplying reserve funds
4,462,967
+ 3,844
+ 761,776
4,464,863
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding. Footnotes appear at the end of the table.
1. Factors Affecting Reserve Balances of Depository Institutions (continued)
Millions of dollars
Reserve Bank credit, related items, and
reserve balances of depository institutions at
Federal Reserve Banks
Averages of daily figures
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Week ended
Sep 10, 2014
Change from week ended
Sep 3, 2014
Sep 11, 2013
Currency in circulation15
1,292,467
– 442
+ 84,956
1,291,993
Reverse repurchase agreements16
266,584
+ 818
+ 173,996
267,602
Foreign official and international accounts
102,228
– 296
+ 9,640
107,303
Others
164,356
+ 1,115
+ 164,356
160,299
Treasury cash holdings
165
+ 4
+ 23
164
Deposits with F.R. Banks, other than reserve balances
52,715
– 6,170
– 19,233
53,117
Term deposits held by depository institutions
0
0
0
0
U.S. Treasury, General Account
39,081
– 3,787
+ 530
31,872
Foreign official
5,432
– 1,134
– 3,562
5,241
Other17
8,202
– 1,248
– 16,201
16,004
Other liabilities and capital18
63,991
– 1
+ 818
63,033
Total factors, other than reserve balances,
absorbing reserve funds
1,675,922
– 5,792
+ 240,561
1,675,910
Reserve balances with Federal Reserve Banks
2,787,045
+ 9,636
+ 521,214
2,788,954
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding.
1.
Includes securities lent to dealers under the overnight securities lending facility; refer to table 1A.
2.
Face value of the securities.
3.
Compensation that adjusts for the effect of inflation on the original face value of inflation-indexed securities.
4.
Guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae. The current face value shown is the remaining principal balance of
the securities.
5.
Reflects the premium or discount, which is the difference between the purchase price and the face value of the securities that has not been amortized. For U.S. Treasury and Federal agency debt securities, amortization is on a straight-line basis. For mortgage-backed securities, amortization is on an effective-interest basis.
6.
Cash value of agreements.
7.
Includes credit extended by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to eligible borrowers through the Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility.
8.
Refer to table 4 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
9.
Refer to table 5 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
10.
Refer to table 6 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
11.
Refer to table 7 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
12.
Dollar value of foreign currency held under these agreements valued at the exchange rate to be used when the foreign currency is returned
to the foreign central bank. This exchange rate equals the market exchange rate used when the foreign currency was acquired from the
foreign central bank.
13.
Includes accrued interest, which represents the daily accumulation of interest earned, and other accounts receivable. Also, includes Reserve Bank premises and equipment net of allowances for depreciation.
14.
Revalued daily at current foreign currency exchange rates.
15.
Estimated.
16.
Cash value of agreements, which are collateralized by U.S. Treasury securities, federal agency debt securities, and mortgage-backed securities.
17.
Includes deposits held at the Reserve Banks by international and multilateral organizations, government-sponsored enterprises, and designated financial market utilities.
18.
Includes the liabilities of Maiden Lane LLC, Maiden Lane II LLC, Maiden Lane III LLC, and TALF LLC to entities other than the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, including liabilities that have recourse only to the portfolio holdings of these LLCs. Refer to table 4 through table 7 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9. Also includes the liability for interest on Federal Reserve notes due to U.S. Treasury. Refer to table 8 and table 9.
Sources: Federal Reserve Banks and the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
1A. Memorandum Items
Millions of dollars
Memorandum item
Averages of daily figures
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Week ended
Sep 10, 2014
Change from week ended
Sep 3, 2014
Sep 11, 2013
Securities held in custody for foreign official and international accounts
3,338,309
– 417
+ 61,832
3,343,937
Marketable U.S. Treasury securities1
3,010,563
– 456
+ 86,414
3,016,027
Federal agency debt and mortgage-backed securities2
285,805
+ 28
– 29,008
285,934
Other securities3
41,942
+ 12
+ 4,427
41,976
Securities lent to dealers
10,669
+ 1,648
– 1,429
11,123
Overnight facility4
10,669
+ 1,648
– 1,429
11,123
U.S. Treasury securities
9,860
+ 1,721
– 1,405
10,373
Federal agency debt securities
810
– 72
– 23
750
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding.
1.
Includes securities and U.S. Treasury STRIPS at face value, and inflation compensation on TIPS. Does not include securities pledged as collateral to foreign official and international account holders against reverse repurchase agreements with the Federal Reserve presented in tables 1, 8, and 9.
2.
Face value of federal agency securities and current face value of mortgage-backed securities, which is the remaining principal balance of the securities.
3.
Includes non-marketable U.S. Treasury securities, supranationals, corporate bonds, asset-backed securities, and commercial paper at face value.
4.
Face value. Fully collateralized by U.S. Treasury securities.
2. Maturity Distribution of Securities, Loans, and Selected Other Assets and Liabilities, September 10, 2014
Millions of dollars
Remaining Maturity
Within 15
days
16 days to
90 days
91 days to
1 year
Over 1 year
to 5 years
Over 5 year
to 10 years
Over 10
years
All
Loans1
118
234
0
0
0
…
352
U.S. Treasury securities2
Holdings
0
90
3,194
1,037,162
742,261
657,930
2,440,637
Weekly changes
0
0
0
+ 1,615
– 1
+ 2,037
+ 3,651
Federal agency debt securities3
Holdings
1,556
1,329
3,584
32,746
0
2,347
41,562
Weekly changes
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Mortgage-backed securities4
Holdings
0
0
0
10
4,698
1,673,614
1,678,322
Weekly changes
0
0
0
0
+ 863
– 857
+ 6
Asset-backed securities held by
TALF LLC5
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Repurchase agreements6
0
0
…
…
…
…
0
Central bank liquidity swaps7
77
0
0
0
0
0
77
Reverse repurchase agreements6
267,602
0
…
…
…
…
267,602
Term deposits
0
0
0
…
…
…
0
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding.
…Not applicable.
1.
Excludes the loans from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) to Maiden Lane LLC, Maiden Lane II LLC, Maiden
Lane III LLC, and TALF LLC. The loans were eliminated when preparing the FRBNY’s statement of condition consistent with consolidation
under generally accepted accounting principles.
2.
Face value. For inflation-indexed securities, includes the original face value and compensation that adjusts for the effect of inflation on the
original face value of such securities.
3.
Face value.
4.
Guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae. The current face value shown is the remaining principal balance of the securities.
5.
Face value of asset-backed securities held by TALF LLC, which is the remaining principal balance of the underlying assets.
6.
Cash value of agreements.
7.
Dollar value of foreign currency held under these agreements valued at the exchange rate to be used when the foreign currency is returned to
the foreign central bank. This exchange rate equals the market exchange rate used when the foreign currency was acquired from the foreign
central bank.
3. Supplemental Information on Mortgage-Backed Securities
Millions of dollars
Account name
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Mortgage-backed securities held outright1
1,678,322
Commitments to buy mortgage-backed securities2
80,643
Commitments to sell mortgage-backed securities2
0
Cash and cash equivalents3
4
1.
Guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae. The current face value shown is the remaining principal balance of the securities.
2.
Current face value. Generally settle within 180 days and include commitments associated with outright transactions, dollar rolls, and coupon swaps.
3.
This amount is included in other Federal Reserve assets in table 1 and in other assets in table 8 and table 9.
4. Information on Principal Accounts of Maiden Lane LLC
Millions of dollars
Account name
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane LLC1
1,665
Outstanding principal amount of loan extended by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York2
0
Accrued interest payable to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York2
0
Outstanding principal amount and accrued interest on loan payable to JPMorgan Chase & Co.3
0
1.
Fair value. Fair value reflects an estimate of the price that would be received upon selling an asset if the transaction were to be conducted in an orderly market on the measurement date. Revalued quarterly. This table reflects valuations as of June 30, 2014. Any assets purchased after
this valuation date are initially recorded at cost until their estimated fair value as of the purchase date becomes available.
2.
Book value. This amount was eliminated when preparing the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s statement of condition consistent with consolidation under generally accepted accounting principles. Refer to the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
3.
Book value. The fair value of these obligations is included in other liabilities and capital in table 1 and in other liabilities and accrued dividends in table 8 and table 9.
Note: On June 26, 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) extended credit to Maiden Lane LLC under the authority of section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act. This limited liability company was formed to acquire certain assets of Bear Stearns and to manage those assets through time to maximize repayment of the credit extended and to minimize disruption to financial markets. Payments by Maiden Lane LLC from the proceeds of the net portfolio holdings will be made in the following order: operating expenses of the LLC, principal due to the FRBNY, interest due to the FRBNY, principal due to JPMorgan Chase & Co., and interest due to JPMorgan Chase & Co. Any remaining funds will be paid to the FRBNY.
5. Information on Principal Accounts of Maiden Lane II LLC
Millions of dollars
Account name
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane II LLC1
63
Outstanding principal amount of loan extended by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York2
0
Accrued interest payable to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York2
0
Deferred payment and accrued interest payable to subsidiaries of American International Group, Inc.3
0
1.
Fair value. Fair value reflects an estimate of the price that would be received upon selling an asset if the transaction were to be conducted in an orderly market on the measurement date. Revalued quarterly. This table reflects valuations as of June 30, 2014. Any assets purchased after
this valuation date are initially recorded at cost until their estimated fair value as of the purchase date becomes available.
2.
Book value. This amount was eliminated when preparing the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s statement of condition consistent with consolidation under generally accepted accounting principles. Refer to the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
3.
Book value. The deferred payment represents the portion of the proceeds of the net portfolio holdings due to subsidiaries of American
International Group, Inc. in accordance with the asset purchase agreement. The fair value of this payment and accrued interest payable are
included in other liabilities and capital in table 1 and in other liabilities and accrued dividends in table 8 and table 9.
Note: On December 12, 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) began extending credit to Maiden Lane II LLC under the authority of section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act. This limited liability company was formed to purchase residential mortgage-backed securities from the U.S. securities lending reinvestment portfolio of subsidiaries of American International Group, Inc. (AIG subsidiaries). Payments by Maiden Lane II LLC from the proceeds of the net portfolio holdings will be made in the following order: operating expenses of Maiden Lane II LLC, principal due to the FRBNY, interest due to the FRBNY, and deferred payment and interest due to AIG subsidiaries. Any remaining funds will be shared by the FRBNY and AIG subsidiaries.
6. Information on Principal Accounts of Maiden Lane III LLC
Millions of dollars
Account name
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane III LLC1
22
Outstanding principal amount of loan extended by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York2
0
Accrued interest payable to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York2
0
Outstanding principal amount and accrued interest on loan payable to American International Group, Inc.3
0
1.
Fair value. Fair value reflects an estimate of the price that would be received upon selling an asset if the transaction were to be conducted in an orderly market on the measurement date. Revalued quarterly. This table reflects valuations as of June 30, 2014. Any assets purchased after
this valuation date are initially recorded at cost until their estimated fair value as of the purchase date becomes available.
2.
Book value. This amount was eliminated when preparing the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s statement of condition consistent with consolidation under generally accepted accounting principles. Refer to the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
3.
Book value. The fair value of these obligations is included in other liabilities and capital in table 1 and in other liabilities and accrued dividends in table 8 and table 9.
Note: On November 25, 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) began extending credit to Maiden Lane III LLC under the authority of section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act. This limited liability company was formed to purchase multi-sector collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) on which the Financial Products group of American International Group, Inc. (AIG) has written credit default swap (CDS) contracts. In connection with the purchase of CDOs, the CDS counterparties will concurrently unwind the related CDS transactions. Payments by Maiden Lane III LLC from the proceeds of the net portfolio holdings will be made in the following order: operating expenses of Maiden Lane III LLC, principal due to the FRBNY, interest due to the FRBNY, principal due to AIG, and interest due to AIG. Any remaining funds will be shared by the FRBNY and AIG.
7. Information on Principal Accounts of TALF LLC
Millions of dollars
Account name
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Asset-backed securities holdings1
0
Other investments, net
44
Net portfolio holdings of TALF LLC
44
Outstanding principal amount of loan extended by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York2
0
Accrued interest payable to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York2
0
Funding provided by U.S. Treasury to TALF LLC, including accrued interest payable3
0
1.
Fair value. Fair value reflects an estimate of the price that would be received upon selling an asset if the transaction were to be conducted in an orderly market on the measurement date.
2.
Book value. This amount was eliminated when preparing the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s statement of condition consistent with consolidation under generally accepted accounting principles. Refer to the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
3.
Book value. The fair value of these obligations is included in other liabilities and capital in table 1 and in other liabilities and accrued dividends in table 8 and table 9.
Note: On November 25, 2008, the Federal Reserve announced the creation of the Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility (TALF) under theauthority of section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act. The TALF is a facility under which the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) extended loans with a term of up to five years to holders of eligible asset-backed securities. The Federal Reserve closed the TALF for new loan extensions in 2010. The loans provided through the TALF to eligible borrowers are non-recourse, meaning that the obligation of the borrower can be discharged by surrendering the collateral to the FRBNY.
TALF LLC is a limited liability company formed to purchase and manage any asset-backed securities received by the FRBNY in connection with the decision of a borrower not to repay a TALF loan. TALF LLC has committed, for a fee, to purchase all asset-backed securities received by the FRBNY in conjunction with a TALF loan at a price equal to the TALF loan plus accrued but unpaid interest. Prior to January 15, 2013, the U.S. Treasury’s Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) committed backup funding to TALF LLC, providing credit protection to the FRBNY. However, the accumulated fees and income collected through the TALF and held by TALF LLC now exceed the remaining amount of TALF loans outstanding. Accordingly, the TARP credit protection commitment has been terminated, and TALF LLC has begun to distribute excess proceeds to the Treasury and the FRBNY. Any remaining funds will be shared by the FRBNY and the U.S. Treasury.
8. Consolidated Statement of Condition of All Federal Reserve Banks
Millions of dollars
Assets, liabilities, and capital
Eliminations from consolidation
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Change since
Wednesday
Wednesday
Sep 3, 2014
Sep 11, 2013
Assets
Gold certificate account
11,037
0
0
Special drawing rights certificate account
5,200
0
0
Coin
1,930
+ 8
– 62
Securities, unamortized premiums and discounts, repurchase agreements, and loans
4,351,126
+ 3,534
+ 756,847
Securities held outright1
4,160,521
+ 3,657
+ 763,739
U.S. Treasury securities
2,440,637
+ 3,651
+ 399,549
Bills2
0
0
0
Notes and bonds, nominal2
2,326,351
+ 3,661
+ 385,784
Notes and bonds, inflation-indexed2
97,755
0
+ 10,546
Inflation compensation3
16,531
– 10
+ 3,219
Federal agency debt securities2
41,562
0
– 22,654
Mortgage-backed securities4
1,678,322
+ 6
+ 386,844
Unamortized premiums on securities held outright5
208,907
– 132
+ 5,820
Unamortized discounts on securities held outright5
-18,654
+ 19
– 12,787
Repurchase agreements6
0
0
0
Loans
352
– 10
+ 75
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane LLC7
1,665
+ 1
+ 167
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane II LLC8
63
0
– 1
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden Lane III LLC9
22
0
0
Net portfolio holdings of TALF LLC10
44
0
– 68
Items in process of collection
(0)
94
– 22
– 31
Bank premises
2,255
0
– 29
Central bank liquidity swaps11
77
+ 1
– 243
Foreign currency denominated assets12
22,801
– 404
– 925
Other assets13
25,095
+ 2,704
+ 3,719
Total assets
(0)
4,421,408
+ 5,821
+ 759,373
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding. Footnotes appear at the end of the table.
8. Consolidated Statement of Condition of All Federal Reserve Banks (continued)
Millions of dollars
Assets, liabilities, and capital
Eliminations from consolidation
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Change since
Wednesday
Wednesday
Sep 3, 2014
Sep 11, 2013
Liabilities
Federal Reserve notes, net of F.R. Bank holdings
1,247,980
– 2,086
+ 84,510
Reverse repurchase agreements14
267,602
+ 17,296
+ 175,438
Deposits
(0)
2,842,072
– 8,612
+ 499,663
Term deposits held by depository institutions
0
0
0
Other deposits held by depository institutions
2,788,954
– 24,799
+ 513,312
U.S. Treasury, General Account
31,872
+ 10,836
+ 1,852
Foreign official
5,241
– 1,326
– 3,524
Other15
(0)
16,004
+ 6,676
– 11,978
Deferred availability cash items
(0)
721
– 482
– 163
Other liabilities and accrued dividends16
6,693
– 299
– 1,529
Total liabilities
(0)
4,365,067
+ 5,817
+ 757,919
Capital accounts
Capital paid in
28,170
+ 2
+ 726
Surplus
28,170
+ 2
+ 726
Other capital accounts
0
0
0
Total capital
56,341
+ 4
+ 1,454
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding.
1.
Includes securities lent to dealers under the overnight securities lending facility; refer to table 1A.
2.
Face value of the securities.
3.
Compensation that adjusts for the effect of inflation on the original face value of inflation-indexed securities.
4.
Guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae. The current face value shown is the remaining principal balance of the securities.
5.
Reflects the premium or discount, which is the difference between the purchase price and the face value of the securities that has not been amortized. For U.S. Treasury and Federal agency debt securities, amortization is on a straight-line basis. For mortgage-backed securities, amortization is on an effective-interest basis.
6.
Cash value of agreements, which are collateralized by U.S. Treasury and federal agency securities.
7.
Refer to table 4 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
8.
Refer to table 5 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
9.
Refer to table 6 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
10.
Refer to table 7 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9.
11.
Dollar value of foreign currency held under these agreements valued at the exchange rate to be used when the foreign currency is returned to
the foreign central bank. This exchange rate equals the market exchange rate used when the foreign currency was acquired from the foreign
central bank.
12.
Revalued daily at current foreign currency exchange rates.
13.
Includes accrued interest, which represents the daily accumulation of interest earned, and other accounts receivable.
14.
Cash value of agreements, which are collateralized by U.S. Treasury securities, federal agency debt securities, and mortgage-backed securities.
15.
Includes deposits held at the Reserve Banks by international and multilateral organizations, government-sponsored enterprises, and designated financial market utilities.
16.
Includes the liabilities of Maiden Lane LLC, Maiden Lane II LLC, Maiden Lane III LLC, and TALF LLC to entities other than the Federal
Reserve Bank of New York, including liabilities that have recourse only to the portfolio holdings of these LLCs. Refer to table 4 through table 7 and the note on consolidation accompanying table 9. Also includes the liability for interest on Federal Reserve notes due to U.S. Treasury.
9. Statement of Condition of Each Federal Reserve Bank, September 10, 2014
Millions of dollars
Assets, liabilities, and capital
Total
Boston
New York
Philadelphia
Cleveland
Richmond
Atlanta
Chicago
St. Louis
Minneapolis
Kansas
Dallas
San
City
Francisco
Assets
Gold certificate account
11,037
352
4,125
338
464
824
1,349
706
278
173
291
880
1,257
Special drawing rights certificate acct.
5,200
196
1,818
210
237
412
654
424
150
90
153
282
574
Coin
1,930
32
94
124
123
320
222
276
25
46
153
182
332
Securities, unamortized premiums and discounts, repurchase agreements,
and loans
4,351,126
88,009
2,670,390
104,231
94,993
243,168
240,542
177,833
53,725
26,795
57,330
132,586
461,524
Securities held outright1
4,160,521
84,160
2,553,576
99,673
90,839
232,534
229,991
170,046
51,317
25,497
54,804
126,772
441,311
U.S. Treasury securities
2,440,637
49,370
1,497,974
58,470
53,288
136,409
134,917
99,752
30,104
14,957
32,149
74,367
258,881
Bills2
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Notes and bonds3
2,440,637
49,370
1,497,974
58,470
53,288
136,409
134,917
99,752
30,104
14,957
32,149
74,367
258,881
Federal agency debt securities2
41,562
841
25,509
996
907
2,323
2,298
1,699
513
255
547
1,266
4,409
Mortgage-backed securities4
1,678,322
33,949
1,030,093
40,207
36,644
93,803
92,777
68,595
20,701
10,285
22,107
51,139
178,021
Unamortized premiums on securities held outright5
208,907
4,226
128,220
5,005
4,561
11,676
11,548
8,538
2,577
1,280
2,752
6,365
22,159
Unamortized discounts on securities held outright5
-18,654
-377
-11,449
-447
-407
-1,043
-1,031
-762
-230
-114
-246
-568
-1,979
Repurchase agreements6
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Loans
352
1
44
0
0
0
34
11
61
132
20
17
33
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden
Lane LLC7
1,665
0
1,665
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden
Lane II LLC8
63
0
63
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Net portfolio holdings of Maiden
Lane III LLC9
22
0
22
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Net portfolio holdings of TALF LLC10
44
0
44
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Items in process of collection
94
0
0
0
0
0
93
0
0
1
0
0
0
Bank premises
2,255
121
434
74
110
222
209
198
124
97
243
224
200
Central bank liquidity swaps11
77
4
25
6
6
16
4
2
1
0
1
1
11
Foreign currency denominated assets12
22,801
1,037
7,335
1,714
1,813
4,754
1,311
629
192
96
240
381
3,299
Other assets13
25,095
535
15,039
739
546
1,547
1,374
1,014
356
219
347
798
2,580
Interdistrict settlement account
0
+ 10,547
– 58,585
+ 2,678
+ 9,252
+ 197
+ 8,040
– 10,297
– 10,950
– 2,083
– 134
+ 2,635
+ 48,701
Total assets
4,421,408
100,833
2,642,468
110,114
107,543
251,460
253,799
170,787
43,900
25,434
58,623
137,969
518,478
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding. Footnotes appear at the end of the table.
9. Statement of Condition of Each Federal Reserve Bank, September 10, 2014 (continued)
Millions of dollars
Assets, liabilities, and capital
Total
Boston
New York
Philadelphia
Cleveland
Richmond
Atlanta
Chicago
St. Louis
Minneapolis
Kansas
Dallas
San
City
Francisco
Liabilities
Federal Reserve notes outstanding
1,443,974
44,572
489,349
42,766
65,118
103,568
212,875
94,569
37,360
21,242
36,783
115,911
179,862
Less: Notes held by F.R. Banks
195,994
5,311
63,063
6,357
8,870
11,177
20,690
11,915
4,937
4,278
5,302
25,736
28,359
Federal Reserve notes, net
1,247,980
39,261
426,285
36,409
56,248
92,391
192,186
82,654
32,423
16,964
31,481
90,175
151,503
Reverse repurchase agreements14
267,602
5,413
164,244
6,411
5,843
14,956
14,793
10,937
3,301
1,640
3,525
8,154
28,385
Deposits
2,842,072
53,409
2,030,175
62,876
40,791
131,999
42,547
75,315
7,510
6,356
22,882
38,429
329,783
Term deposits held by depository institutions
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Other deposits held by depository institutions
2,788,954
53,397
1,977,410
62,837
40,788
131,731
42,538
75,306
7,510
6,355
22,881
38,428
329,774
U.S. Treasury, General Account
31,872
0
31,872
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Foreign official
5,241
2
5,214
3
3
8
2
1
0
0
0
1
6
Other15
16,004
11
15,679
36
0
260
7
7
0
0
1
0
3
Deferred availability cash items
721
0
0
0
0
0
611
0
0
110
0
0
0
Interest on Federal Reserve notes due
to U.S. Treasury16
1,693
19
1,199
20
10
23
86
73
20
12
20
54
155
Other liabilities and accrued
dividends17
5,000
167
2,179
211
208
544
361
282
142
118
126
208
454
Total liabilities
4,365,067
98,270
2,624,083
105,927
103,101
239,913
250,583
169,261
43,395
25,200
58,034
137,021
510,279
Capital
Capital paid in
28,170
1,282
9,193
2,093
2,221
5,773
1,608
763
252
117
295
474
4,099
Surplus
28,170
1,282
9,193
2,093
2,221
5,773
1,608
763
252
117
295
474
4,099
Other capital
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Total liabilities and capital
4,421,408
100,833
2,642,468
110,114
107,543
251,460
253,799
170,787
43,900
25,434
58,623
137,969
518,478
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding. Footnotes appear at the end of the table.
9. Statement of Condition of Each Federal Reserve Bank, September 10, 2014 (continued)
1.
Includes securities lent to dealers under the overnight securities lending facility; refer to table 1A.
2.
Face value of the securities.
3.
Includes the original face value of inflation-indexed securities and compensation that adjusts for the effect of inflation on the original face value of such securities.
4.
Guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae. The current face value shown is the remaining principal balance of the securities.
5.
Reflects the premium or discount, which is the difference between the purchase price and the face value of the securities that has not been amortized. For U.S. Treasury and Federal agency debt securities, amortization is on a straight-line basis. For mortgage-backed securities, amortization is on an effective-interest basis.
6.
Cash value of agreements, which are collateralized by U.S. Treasury and federal agency securities.
7.
Refer to table 4 and the note on consolidation below.
8.
Refer to table 5 and the note on consolidation below.
9.
Refer to table 6 and the note on consolidation below.
10.
Refer to table 7 and the note on consolidation below.
11.
Dollar value of foreign currency held under these agreements valued at the exchange rate to be used when the foreign currency is returned to the foreign central bank. This exchange rate
equals the market exchange rate used when the foreign currency was acquired from the foreign central bank.
12.
Revalued daily at current foreign currency exchange rates.
13.
Includes accrued interest, which represents the daily accumulation of interest earned, and other accounts receivable.
14.
Cash value of agreements, which are collateralized by U.S. Treasury securities, federal agency debt securities, and mortgage-backed securities.
15.
Includes deposits held at the Reserve Banks by international and multilateral organizations, government-sponsored enterprises, and designated financial market utilities.
16.
Represents the estimated weekly remittances to U.S. Treasury as interest on Federal Reserve notes or, in those cases where the Reserve Bank’s net earnings are not sufficient to equate surplus to capital paid-in, the deferred asset for interest on Federal Reserve notes. The amount of any deferred asset, which is presented as a negative amount in this line, represents the amount of the Federal Reserve Bank’s earnings that must be retained before remittances to the U.S. Treasury resume. The amounts on this line are calculated in accordance with Board of Governors policy, which requires the Federal Reserve Banks to remit residual earnings to the U.S. Treasury as interest on Federal Reserve notes after providing for the costs of operations, payment of dividends, and the amount necessary to equate surplus with capital paid-in.
17.
Includes the liabilities of Maiden Lane LLC, Maiden Lane II LLC, Maiden Lane III LLC, and TALF LLC to entities other than the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, including liabilities that have recourse only to the portfolio holdings of these LLCs. Refer to table 4 through table 7 and the note on consolidation below.
Note on consolidation:
The Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) has extended loans to several limited liability companies under the authority of section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act. On June 26, 2008, a loan was extended to Maiden Lane LLC, which was formed to acquire certain assets of Bear Stearns. On November 25, 2008, a loan was extended to Maiden Lane III LLC, which was formed to purchase multi-sector collateralized debt obligations on which the Financial Products group of the American International Group, Inc. has written credit default swap contracts. On December 12, 2008, a loan was extended to Maiden Lane II LLC, which was formed to purchase residential mortgage-backed securities from the U.S. securities lending reinvestment portfolio of subsidiaries of American International Group, Inc. On November 25, 2008, the Federal Reserve Board authorized the FRBNY to extend credit to TALF LLC, which was formed to purchase and manage any asset-backed securities received by the FRBNY in connection with the decision of a borrower not to repay a loan extended under the Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility.
The FRBNY is the primary beneficiary of TALF LLC, because of the two beneficiaries of the LLC, the FRBNY and the U.S. Treasury, the FRBNY is primarily responsible for directing the financial activities of TALF LLC. The FRBNY is the primary beneficiary of the other LLCs cited above because it will receive a majority of any residual returns of the LLCs and absorb a majority of any residual losses of the LLCs. Consistent with generally accepted accounting principles, the assets and liabilities of these LLCs have been consolidated with the assets and liabilities of the FRBNY in the preparation of the statements of condition shown on this release. As a consequence of the consolidation, the extensions of credit from the FRBNY to the LLCs are eliminated, the net assets of the LLCs appear as assets on the previous page (and in table 1 and table 8), and the liabilities of the LLCs to entities other than the FRBNY, including those with recourse only to the portfolio holdings of the LLCs, are included in other liabilities in this table (and table 1 and table 8).
10. Collateral Held against Federal Reserve Notes: Federal Reserve Agents’ Accounts
Millions of dollars
Federal Reserve notes and collateral
Wednesday
Sep 10, 2014
Federal Reserve notes outstanding
1,443,974
Less: Notes held by F.R. Banks not subject to collateralization
195,994
Federal Reserve notes to be collateralized
1,247,980
Collateral held against Federal Reserve notes
1,247,980
Gold certificate account
11,037
Special drawing rights certificate account
5,200
U.S. Treasury, agency debt, and mortgage-backed securities pledged1,2
1,231,743
Other assets pledged
0
Memo:
Total U.S. Treasury, agency debt, and mortgage-backed securities1,2
4,160,521
Less: Face value of securities under reverse repurchase agreements
257,508
U.S. Treasury, agency debt, and mortgage-backed securities eligible to be pledged
3,903,013
Note: Components may not sum to totals because of rounding.
1.
Includes face value of U.S. Treasury, agency debt, and mortgage-backed securities held outright, compensation to adjust for the effect of inflation on the original face value of inflation-indexed securities, and cash value of repurchase agreements.
2.
Includes securities lent to dealers under the overnight securities lending facility; refer to table 1A.
Story 1: National Government Bureau of Land Management Saves The Desert Tortoises And Confiscates Cattle on Federal Land While Beef Prices Skyrocket — Videos
George Carlin -“Who Really Controls America”
Bobby Fuller I fought the law
Nevada Cattle Rancher Wins ‘Range War’ With Feds, All Cows Are Released
SHOCKING: Harry Reid behind This Bundy Cattle Ranch Standoff in Nevada
Cliven Bundy on Nevada Rancher standoff with feds: It’s for freedom and liberty – Lone Wolf
Showdown at Nevada Cattle Ranch
BREAKING: Feds prep for Waco style raid of Bundy Ranch
Lone Rancher ShowDown to Fight Feds for land April 9-14,Waco 2
Cliven Bundy bullied by the Fed’s
Food prices at grocery store skyrocketing
Beef Prices Skyrocketing
Land ownership in the American West
Revolution NOW in Nevada to Save Cliven Bundy
Yesterday Cliven Bundy’s friends & family Move In & Police Moved Out
We won ONE battle!
Range war 2014 Cliven D Bundy!
Cliven Bundy Under Siege, Call To Arms
The Heat is On: Desert Tortoises and Survival (Full video)
A Nevada cattle rancher appears to have won his week-long battle with the federal government over a controversial cattle roundup that had led to the arrest of several protesters.
Cliven Bundy went head to head with the Bureau of Land Management over the removal of hundreds of his cattle from federal land, where the government said they were grazing illegally.
Bundy claims his herd of roughly 900 cattle have grazed on the land along the riverbed near Bunkerville, 80 miles northeast of Las Vegas, since 1870 and threatened a “range war” against the BLM on the Bundy Ranch website after one of his sons was arrested while protesting the removal of the cattle.
“I have no contract with the United States government,” Bundy said. “I was paying grazing fees for management and that’s what BLM was supposed to be, land managers and they were managing my ranch out of business, so I refused to pay.”
The federal government had countered that Bundy “owes the American people in excess of $1 million ” in unpaid grazing fees and “refuses to abide by the law of land, despite many opportunities over the last 20 years to do so.”
However, today the BLM said it would not enforce a court order to remove the cattle and was pulling out of the area.
“Based on information about conditions on the ground, and in consultation with law enforcement, we have made a decision to conclude the cattle gather because of our serious concern about the safety of employees and members of the public,” BLM Director Neil Kornze said.
“We ask that all parties in the area remain peaceful and law-abiding as the Bureau of Land Management and National Park Service work to end the operation in an orderly manner,” he said.
The roundup began April 5, following lengthy court proceedings dating back to 1993, federal officials said. Federal officers began impounding the first lot of cows last weekend, and Bundy responded by inviting supporters onto his land to protest the action.
“It’s not about cows, it’s about freedom,” Utah resident Yonna Winget told ABC News affiliateKTNV in Las Vegas, Nevada.
“People are getting tired of the federal government having unlimited power,” Bundy’s wife, Carol Bundy told ABC News.
By Sunday, April 6, one of Bundy’s sons, Dave Bundy, was taken into custody for refusing to disperse and resisting arrest, while hundreds of other protesters, some venturing from interstate, gathered along the road few miles from Bundy’s property in solidarity. Dave Bundy was later released.
A spokesman for the Bundy encampment told ABC News roughly 300 protesters had assembled for the protest, while a BLM representative estimated there were around 100 people.
“We want a peaceful protest, but we also want our voices heard,” said Cliven Bundy’s sister, Chrisie Marshall Bundy.
But clashes between demonstrators and authorities took a violent turn on Wednesday, with cell phone video showing some being tasered at the site, including Bundy’s son, Ammon Bundy. Two other protesters were detained, cited and later released on Thursday, according to the BLM.
As the movement grew by the day, and demonstrators rallied together, bonding by campfires at night, local protest leaders warned people not to wear camouflage and keep their weapons inside their vehicles.
Both sides said the issue is one of fairness, with the federal government maintaining that thousands of other cattle ranchers are abiding by the law by paying their annual grazing fees, while Bundy’s family and supporters say the government’s actions are threatening ranchers’ freedoms.
“It’s about the freedom of America,” said another of Bundy’s sisters, Margaret Houston. “We have to stand up and fight.
The federal government backed down and ended their siege against Nevada cattle rancher Cliven Bundy less than 24 hours after an Infowars exposé connecting the land grab to Harry Reid and a Chinese-backed solar farm went viral, becoming the biggest news story on the Internet.
Last night, we revealed how the feds were using the Bureau of Land Management to bully and intimidate ranchers like Bundy, pushing them off public land in order to pave the way for lucrative “green energy” projects backed by the Communist Chinese government and linked to Nevada Senator Harry Reid.
This morning, the Sheriff of Clark County, Nevada, Douglas Gillespie, announced to thousands of Bundy supporters gathered in Bunkerville that a deal had been brokered with Cliven Bundy that would see the BLM cease its roundup of the rancher’s cattle.
A press release has already been put forth that the BLM is going to cease this operation,” stated Gillespie, to a huge roar from the crowd of Bundy supporters.
Further reports established that, “the BLM wants to proceed with the sale of the cattle already gathered during the roundup but is reportedly willing to share the revenue from the sale with Bundy.”
This represents a huge victory in the fight against big government and the federal agenda to seize public land in the name of pursuing notoriously corrupt and wasteful “green energy” projects.
It serves to remind us of the power of media spotlight and grass roots activism in affecting real change.
The victory also illustrates the increasing irrelevance and declining influence of mainstream media. The national corporate media was forced to reluctantly carry this story only in the last couple of days, before which it had already generated a firestorm of interest solely as a result of grass roots media like Infowars.com, Drudge and other burgeoning independent news outlets.
If this operation was a test on behalf of the feds of where Americans draw their line in the sand, then the outcome spells disaster for big government, which has been handed a huge defeat in the battle to restore constitutional freedoms and property rights in the face of out of control tyranny.
Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Infowars.com and Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a host for Infowars Nightly News.
This article was posted: Saturday, April 12, 2014 at 1:19 pm
US senator joins critics of federal cattle roundup
By KEN RITTER
A Republican U.S. senator added his voice Wednesday to critics of a federal cattle roundup fought by a Nevada rancher who claims longstanding grazing rights on remote public rangeland about 80 miles northeast of Las Vegas
Sen. Dean Heller of Nevada said he told new U.S. Bureau of Land Management chief Neil Kornze in Washington, D.C., that law-abiding Nevadans shouldn’t be penalized by an “overreaching” agency.
Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval pointed earlier to what he called “an atmosphere of intimidation,” resulting from the roundup and said he believed constitutional rights were being trampled.
Heller said he heard from local officials, residents and the Nevada Cattlemen’s Association and remained “extremely concerned about the size of this closure and disruptions with access to roads, water and electrical infrastructure.”
The federal government has shut down a scenic but windswept area about half the size of the state of Delaware to round up about 900 cattle it says are trespassing.
BLM and National Park Service officials didn’t immediately respond Wednesday to criticisms of the roundup that started Saturday and prompted the closure of the 1,200-square-mile area through May 12.
It’s seen by some as the latest battle over state and federal land rights in a state with deep roots in those disputes, including the Sagebrush Rebellion of the 1970s and ’80s. Nevada, where various federal agencies manage or control more than 80 percent of the land, is among several Western states where ranchers have challenged federal land ownership.
The current showdown pits rancher Cliven Bundy’s claims of ancestral rights to graze his cows on open range against federal claims that the cattle are trespassing on arid and fragile habitat of the endangered desert tortoise. Bundy has said he owns about 500 branded cattle on the range and claims the other 400 targeted for roundup are his, too.
BLM and Park Service officials see threats in Bundy’s promise to “do whatever it takes” to protect his property and in his characterization that the dispute constitutes a “range war.”
U.S. Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Las Vegas, noted that BLM officials were enforcing federal court orders that Bundy remove his animals. The legal battle has been waged for decades.
Kornze, the new BLM chief, is familiar with the area. He’s a natural resource manager who grew up in Elko, Nev., and served previously as a senior adviser to Senate Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid.
Reid aide Kristen Orthman said her boss “hopes the trespassing cattle are rounded up safely so the issue can be resolved.”
Sandoval, a former state attorney general and federal district court judge, weighed in late Tuesday after several days of media coverage about blocked roads and armed federal agents fanning out around Bundy’s ranch while contractors using helicopters and vehicles herd cows into portable pens in rugged and remote areas.
“No cow justifies the atmosphere of intimidation which currently exists nor the limitation of constitutional rights that are sacred to all Nevadans,” the governor said in a statement.
Sandoval said he was most offended that armed federal officials have tried to corral people protesting the roundup into a fenced-in “First Amendment area” south of the resort city of Mesquite.
The site “tramples upon Nevadans’ fundamental rights under the U.S. Constitution” and should be dismantled, Sandoval said.
BLM spokeswoman Kirsten Cannon and Park Service spokeswoman Christie Vanover have told reporters during daily conference calls that free-speech areas were established so agents could ensure the safety of contractors, protesters, the rancher and his supporters.
The dispute between Bundy and the federal government dates to 1993, when land managers cited concern for the federally protected tortoise and capped his herd at 150 animals on a 250-square-mile rangeland allotment. Officials later revoked Bundy’s grazing rights completely.
Cannon said Bundy racked up more than $1.1 million in unpaid grazing fees over the years while disregarding several court orders to remove his animals.
Bundy estimates the unpaid fees total about $300,000. He notes that his Mormon family’s 19th century melon farm and ranch operation in surrounding areas predates creation of the BLM in 1946.
Since the cattle roundup began Saturday, there has been one arrest.
Bundy’s son, Dave Bundy, 37, was taken into custody Sunday as he watched the roundup from State Route 170. He was released Monday with bruises on his face and a citation accusing him of refusing to disperse and resisting arrest. A court date has not been set.
His mother, Carol Bundy, alleged that her son was roughed up by BLM police.
Meanwhile, federal officials say 277 cows have been collected. Cannon said state veterinarian and brand identification officials will determine what becomes of the impounded cattle.
A long-simmering dispute between a Nevada cattle rancher and the federalBureau of Land Management has reached a boiling point, and participants have their fingers crossed it won’t erupt into violence.
Since 1993, Cliven Bundy has been battling the agency, as well as the National Park Service, the Center for Biological Diversity and the courts, to graze his cattle on 150 square miles of Gold Butte scrub land in the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. He stopped paying his grazing fees back then, saying he “fired” the Bureau of Land Management as land manager. His Mormon ancestors had tilled the unforgiving soil since 1887, long before the 1934 Taylor Grazing Act allowed the federal government to seize control, TheBlaze reported.
“I have raised cattle on that land, which is public land for the people of Clark County, all my life. Why I raise cattle there and why I can raise cattle there is because I have preemptive rights,” he asserted, explaining to TheBlaze that this includes the right to forage, too.
Furthermore, Bundy has argued that it is the United States trespassing on Clark County, Nev., land, not he, and that he is a better steward of the land. He points out that the manure from his cows fertilizes the soil, that he’s built water sources for wildlife, and that his cattle prevent the vegetation from growing overly dense and creating a fire hazard.
But environmentalists, federal officials and the courts disagree. Armed federal officials and contract cowboys have been brought in to execute a 2013 court order and remove the trespassing cattle.
“It’s high time for the BLM to do its job and give the [endangered desert] tortoises and the Gold Butte area the protection they need and are legally entitled to,” senior Center for Biological Diversity scientist Rob Mrowka told theMesquite Local News. “As the tortoises emerge from their winter sleep, they are finding their much-needed food consumed by cattle.”
Bundy’s herd also hinders the plants’ ability to recover from wildfires, tramples rare species, damages ancient American Indian cultural sites and endangers recreationists, Mrowka added.
The Bureau of Land Management website says Bundy has defied trespass laws for more than two decades, ignored rules and fees that other cattle ranchers have observed and refused “repeated attempts to resolve the matter administratively and judicially,” according to TheBlaze. While Bundy stated that he owed the BLM $300,000 in back grazing fees, spokeswoman Kirsten Cannon put the figure closer to $1.1 million.
Plus, the roundup of the approximately 900 unwelcome cattle could cost as much as $3 million. But the 68-year-old Bundy has remained unintimidated.
The Bureau of Land Management “has overstepped its boundaries by not letting me access my rights,” he said, and contended that it had inserted “200 armed officers watching our every move and stealing our cattle.” Bundy’s wife, Carol, said snipers are patrolling the family’s ranch.
Spokeswoman Cannon responded that “There are law enforcement and other personnel in place as needed to ensure that the BLM and National Park Service’s employees and contractors are able to conduct operations safely.”
Bundy has vowed to do whatever it takes to protect his property, and his 14 children and hundreds of supporters stand behind him. Dave Bundy, his son, was arrested on Sunday afternoon while attempting to film the contract cowboys at work, and cited for failing to disperse and resisting arrest.
Thus far, 234 cows have been impounded as the Bureau of Land Management has temporarily closed the public recreation area. Bundy’s plea to the Clark County Sheriff to intervene was stymied as the action fell under federal jurisdiction.
While the last rancher in southern Nevada argues “it’s a freedom issue,” federal officials are executing the “no trespassing” court mandate.
Whether violence and bloodshed can be avoided remains to be seen.
Armed federal agents deployed last week to northeast Clark County, Nev., for what can only be described as a major escalation in a decades-long standoff between a local cattle rancher and the U.S. government.
Cliven Bundy, the last remaining rancher in the southern Nevada county, stands in defiance of a 2013 court order demanding that he remove his cattle from public land managed by the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management.
The 67-year-old veteran rancher, who has compared the situation to similar confrontations with government officials inRuby Ridge and Waco, Texas, told TheBlaze that his family has used land in the 600,000-acre Gold Butte area since the late 1800s.
“I have raised cattle on that land, which is public land for the people of Clark County, all my life. Why I raise cattle there and why I can raise cattle there is because I have preemptive rights,” he said, explaining that among them is the right to forage.
“Who is the trespasser here? Who is the trespasser on this land? Is the United States trespassing on Clark County, Nevada, land? Or is it Cliven Bundy who is trespassing on Clark County, Nevada, land? Who’s the trespasser?”
Claiming that all other options have been exhausted, the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. National Park Service responded to Bundy’s inflexibility on the issue by calling on federal agents and contract cowboys to restrict access to the public land and to confiscate Bundy’s “trespass cattle.”
“Cattle have been in trespass on public lands in southern Nevada for more than two decades. This is unfair to the thousands of other ranchers who graze livestock in compliance with federal laws and regulations throughout the West,” the Bureau of Land Management stated on its website about the case.
“The Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service have made repeated attempts to resolve this matter administratively and judicially. An impoundment of cattle illegally grazing on public lands is now being conducted as a last resort,” it added.
The restrictions on the land are expected to stay in place until May 12. Earlier news reports stated that federal officials were considering auctioning the cattle to buyers in nearby counties in Utah. However, a Bureau of Land Management spokeswoman told TheBlaze Monday that the agency has no plans to ship impounded cattle for auction “in the near future.”
The government’s move to assert itself in the Gold Butte area shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise considering the fact that it’s a move years in the making. In fact, the tense relationship between Bundy and federal government dates back to well before the 2013 court order.
The fight began when Bundy stopped paying the Bureau of Land Management’s grazing fees in 1993, arguing in court filings that he had no obligation to pay the agency because his Mormon ancestors had worked the land decades before the agency was formed.
Bundy claims he owes roughly $300,000 in back fees, but the federal government says it’s more than that.
“It’s a freedom issue. It’s not about cows. It’s a state rights issue.”
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“That number, the $300,00, that was a number estimated through Sept. 11, 2011,” Bureau of Land Management spokeswoman Kirsten Cannon said in a phone call with reporters Monday. “Since then, the estimated amount owed by him – so including the $300,000 – totals $1.1 million.”
In addition, the cost of removing the rancher’s cattle from the public land will cost taxpayers roughly $3 million, according to initial estimates.
The land was finally declared off-limits for cattle in 1998 and became a designated habitat for the federally protected desert tortoise. That same year, a judge ordered Bundy to remove his cattle. He refused to comply.
All throughout his decades-long struggle with the federal government, the veteran rancher has maintained that Washington has no right to order him from the land.
The Bureau of Land Management has “overstepped its boundaries by not letting me access my rights, not recognizing state’s sovereignty, and having over 200 armed officers watching our every move and stealing our cattle,” Bundy said.
The rancher’s wife, Carol, said there now appear to be snipers stationed around the family’s 150-acre ranch.
Asked about the Bundys’ sniper claim, Cannon would neither confirm nor deny the allegation.
“There are law enforcement and other personnel in place as needed to ensure that the BLM and National Park Services employees and contractors are able to conduct the operation safely,” Cannon said. “Specific operations information regarding this impoundment will not be released.”
“Who is the trespasser here? Who is the trespasser on this land?”
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But the presence of what appear to be heavily armed agents isn’t the only thing that has the Bundys on edge: Their son, Dave, was arrested and allegedly roughed up Sunday for filming federal agents while outside an area designated for First Amendment activity on the restricted property. He was held overnight.
The 37-year-old Bundy was arrested “following failure to comply with multiple requests by BLM law enforcement to leave the temporary closure area on public lands,” Cannon said. She declined to comment on the claim that he was brutally treated.
Dave Bundy was released from custody Monday and cited for refusing to disperse and resisting issuance of a citation or arrest, she added. Cannon could not explain why Dave was held overnight.
The rancher said that he hopes Clark County Sheriff Doug Gillespie intervenes soon and ends the face-off once and for all.
“The federal government has no authority here,” Bundy said. “The sheriff has the authority. All he has to say is, ‘no’ and that’ll get the federal government out of here. I think he has that much power.”
It seems unlikely at this point, however, that the sheriff will intervene, as he has opted to let federal agents handle the situation. The sheriff has in the past advised Bundy on seeking legal counsel while the sheriff has extended federal deadlines.
The sheriff’s office referred media inquiries to the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, which confirmed to TheBlaze Monday that federal officials are handling the Bundy operation.
“That incident is being handled by another agency,” a Las Vegas police spokeswoman said. “It’s something we’re referring people to the BLM.”
Asked about Bundy’s claim that the sheriff’s office has ignored him, the spokeswoman added: “There’s nothing further that’s coming from this department about that incident, this operation. We’re just referring everything over to BLM. It’s not our operation. There’s no statement that has been issued about it.”
But with or without the sheriff, Bundy remains defiant.
“It’s a freedom issue. It’s not about cows. It’s a state rights issue. I really hope that we can learn and defend our liberties here and keep on fighting until the end,” he said. “I don’t when the end is going to be, but I believe that America is the greatest land in the world and it needs to be protected.”
“Our rights and liberties need to be protected and we’re going to stand for that,” he added.
Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval has inserted himself into the escalating standoff between cattle rancher Cliven Bundy and federal officials by blasting the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) over their creation of a ‘First Amendment Area’ outside of which free speech is banned.
Image: First Amendment Area (YouTube).
The ‘First Amendment Area’ set up by BLM agents is a crudely taped off piece of land inside which supporters of Bundy, who is engaged in a long running dispute with feds over grazing rights on a 600,000 acre expanse in northeastern Clark County, are allowed to express their free speech.
However, protesters have completely ignored the area, instead staging large demonstrations on Bundy’s ranch. The only presence inside the ‘First Amendment Area’ are signs which read “1st Amendment is not an area” and another that states, “Welcome to Amerika – Wake Up” alongside a hammer and sickle logo.
“Most disturbing to me is the BLM’s establishment of a ‘First Amendment Area’ that tramples upon Nevadans’ fundamental rights under the U.S. Constitution,” said Sandoval in a statement. “To that end, I have advised the BLM that such conduct is offensive to me and countless others and that the ‘First Amendment Area’ should be dismantled immediately.”
“No cow justifies the atmosphere of intimidation which currently exists nor the limitation of constitutional rights that are sacred to all Nevadans. The BLM needs to reconsider its approach to this matter and act accordingly,” asserted the Governor.
The Bundy family responded to Sandoval’s statement by saying they were disappointed that he didn’t take a more firm stance to back them in their dispute with the BLM, but they were pleased with his sentiments regarding the ‘First Amendment Area’.
“Whenever you designate an area, then you’re restricting it everywhere else. When you designate an area like that for first amendment rights, you [don’t] give the people any rights. You [take them] away, and every other location,” said Ryan Bundy.
The Bundy family came face to face with the consequences of violating the free speech zone on Sunday when Dave Bundy was arrested for taking video footage from a state highway of BLM agents rounding up his family’s cattle. Video footage later proved that armed snipers had their guns trained on the family during the incident.
On Sunday, Cliven Bundy promised to launch a “range war” on federal officials after they began rounding up his cattle. Authorities are justifying the move by pointing out they are simply enforcing a 1993 rule change which prevents Bundy’s livestock from grazing on the land in order to protect the endangered desert tortoise.
Bundy and his supporters see the spat as something entirely different, portraying it as a clash between out of control big government and patriotic American family farmers.
With Bundy’s ranch under constant surveillance from armed agents ensconced inside what Ryan Bundy described as a “military compound,” some fear the standoff could lead to a Ruby Ridge or Waco-style tragedy.
Wake up America,’ says family involved in BLM cattle dispute
By Faith Heaton Jolley and Dave Cawley
April 7th, 2014 @ 6:56pm
CLARK COUNTY, Nevada — A man has been released after being arrested Sunday during an ongoing dispute over grazing rights between the Bureau of Land Management and a family in southern Nevada, and the family is calling for action.
A federal judge in Las Vegas first ordered Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy to remove his trespassing cattle in 1998, according to reports from the Associated Press. Similar orders were issued in July 2013, and again in October.
Saturday, the BLM began taking some of the 908 cattle from Bundy. The BLM says Bundy’s cattle have been trespassing on U.S. land without required grazing permits for over 25 years. However, Bundy said he doesn’t recognize federal authority on land that he says belongs to the state of Nevada.
The BLM released a statement on its website saying, “Cattle have been in trespass on public lands in Southern Nevada for more than two decades. This is unfair to the thousands of other ranchers who graze livestock in compliance with federal laws and regulations throughout the west. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the National Park Service (NPS) have made repeated attempts to resolve this matter administratively and judicially.”
The situation escalated Saturday after Cliven Bundy’s son, Dave Bundy, 37, was arrested. Members of the Bundy family had gathered to film and take pictures of the removal of their cattle in an effort to document the event, according to Cliven Bundy’s daughter, Bailey Bundy Logue.
The family members had parked on the side of Nevada state Route 170, but the highway was included in the temporary closure of public lands, according to BLM representative Kirsten Cannon. Dave Bundy was arrested and cited with a criminal charge of refusing to disperse and resisting officers. Cannon said all public lands are closed within the designated closure area during the removal of the trespassing cattle.
Wake up America. Look what our ancestors fought for and we need to stand up for that. We need to realize what’s happening. They are taking everything away from us. This isn’t only about one family. This is about everyone’s family.
–Bailey Bundy Logue
Logue said Dave Bundy was taking pictures and recording on his iPad when he was asked by federal employees what he was doing. Logue said that Dave Bundy told the BLM workers that he was “exercising (his) First Amendment rights.”
“He did not resist arrest, but they continued to beat him,” Logue told KSL. “They put him on the ground and were standing on his head and had a dozen officers on top of him and dogs.”
The Bundy family was asked to leave the premises after Dave Bundy’s arrest. Logue said that there were snipers and uniformed men on the scene during the cattle impoundment.
“That’s scary,” Logue said. “I was angry, but there was nothing I can do. We were so outnumbered. With nothing but weapons of our cameras, we did our best at taking pictures. But when you’re in that situation your mind is not thinking very straight.”
Dave Bundy was released Monday afternoon. However, the Bundy family said they feel that their First Amendment rights were violated and that they were entitled to meet on state Route 170 to take pictures.
“That is against our First Amendment right,” Logue said. “They say it’s a First Amendment area, but we have rights everywhere. Since when have we had First Amendment areas? That’s not what it says in the Constitution.”
The Bundy family said they organized a rally for people to meet to support their First Amendment rights and their rights to public land. The rally was held near state Route 170 and I-15 on private land and around 100 people held a peaceful protest, Cannon said.
“We have got together hundreds of people from all over the world and they are here, not because this is about cattle,” Logue said. “We are asking people to come and stand up for their rights. We have lost all state sovereignty. I mean (it’s like) martial law in our home town, in America.”
Cannon said 134 cattle had been impounded by federal employees as of Monday afternoon, but the location will not be released during the ongoing operation. The cattle roundup was estimated to take between 21 to 30 days with further temporary closures during the operation.
“Wake up America,” Logue said. “Look what our ancestors fought for and we need to stand up for that. We need to realize what’s happening. They are taking everything away from us. This isn’t only about one family. This is about everyone’s family. This is martial law and it’s in America and so what are you going to do to have it stay out of America?”
Cliven Bundy reportedly owes the BLM and U.S. government $1 million in back grazing fees, according to Cannon.
Pronk Palisades 
Fed Desperate To Rise Above the Near Zero Fed Funds Rate Target Range — Need Three Months Of 300,000 Plus Per Month Job Creation, Wage Growth and 3% First Quarter 2015 Real Gross Domestic Product Growth Numbers To Jump to .5 – 1.0% Range Fed Funds Rate Target — June 2015 Launch Date Expected — Fly Me To The Moon — Summertime — Launch — Abort On Recession — Videos
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The Pronk Pops Show Podcasts
Pronk Pops Show 430: March 19, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 429: March 18, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 428: March 17, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 427: March 16, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 426: March 6, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 425: March 4, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 424: March 2, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 423: February 26, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 422: February 25, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 421: February 20, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 420: February 19, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 419: February 18, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 418: February 16, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 417: February 13, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 416: February 12, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 415: February 11, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 414: February 10, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 413: February 9, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 412: February 6, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 411: February 5, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 410: February 4, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 409: February 3, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 408: February 2, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 407: January 30, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 406: January 29, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 405: January 28, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 404: January 27, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 403: January 26, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 402: January 23, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 401: January 22, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 400: January 21, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 399: January 16, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 398: January 15, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 397: January 14, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 396: January 13, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 395: January 12, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 394: January 7, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 393: January 5, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 392: December 19, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 391: December 18, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 390: December 17, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 389: December 16, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 388: December 15, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 387: December 12, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 386: December 11, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 385: December 9, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 384: December 8, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 383: December 5, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 382: December 4, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 381: December 3, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 380: December 1, 2014
Story 1: Fed Desperate To Rise Above the Near Zero Fed Funds Rate Target Range — Need Three Months Of 300,000 Plus Per Month Job Creation, Wage Growth and 3% First Quarter 2015 Real Gross Domestic Product Growth Numbers To Jump to .5 – 1.0% Range Fed Funds Rate Target — June 2015 Launch Date Expected — Fly Me To The Moon — Summertime — Launch — Abort On Recession — Videos
Amazing seven year old sings Fly Me To The Moon (Angelina Jordan) on Senkveld “The Late Show”
Forrest Gump JFK “I Gotta Pee” Scene
Fed Decision: The Three Most Important Things Janet Yellen Said
Press Conference with Chair of the FOMC, Janet L. Yellen
Monetary Policy Based on the Taylor Rule
Many economists believe that rules-based monetary policy provides better economic outcomes than a purely discretionary framework delivers. But there is disagreement about the advantages of rules-based policy and even disagreement about which rule works. One possible policy rule would be for the central bank to follow a Taylor Rule, named after our featured speaker, John B. Taylor. What would some of the advantages of a Taylor Rule be versus, for instance, a money growth rule, or a rule which only specifies the inflation target? How could a policy rule be implemented? Should policy rule legislation be considered? Join us as Professor Taylor addresses these important policy questions.
Murray N. Rothbard on Milton Friedman pre1971
On Milton Friedman | by Murray N. Rothbard
Who Was the Better Monetary Economist? Rothbard and Friedman Compared | Joseph T. Salerno
Joseph Salerno “Unmasking the Federal Reserve”
Rothbard on Alan Greenspan
Milton Friedman – Money and Inflation
Milton Friedman – Abolish The Fed
Milton Friedman On John Maynard Keynes
Hayek on Keynes’s Ignorance of Economics
Friedrich Hayek explains to Leo Rosten that while brilliant Keynes had a parochial understanding of economics.
On John Maynard Keynes | by Murray N. Rothbard
Hayek on Milton Friedman and Monetary Policy
Friedrich Hayek: Why Intellectuals Drift Towards Socialism
Capitalism, Socialism, and the Jews
The Normal State of Man: Misery & Tyranny
Peter Schiff Interviews Keynesian Economist Laurence Kotlikoff 01-18-12
Larry Kotlikoff on the Clash of Generations
Extended interview with Boston University Economics Professor Larry Kotlikoff on his publications about a six-decade long Ponzi scheme in the US which he says will lead to a clash of generations.
Kotlikoff also touches on what his projections mean for the New Zealand economy and why Prime Minister John Key should take more attention of New Zealand’s ‘fiscal gap’ – the gap between all future government spending commitments and its future revenue track.
Thomas Sowell on Intellectuals and Society
Angelina Jordan – summertime
Angelina Jordan synger Sinatra i semifinalen i Norske Talenter 2014
Release Date: March 18, 2015
For immediate release
Information received since the Federal Open Market Committee met in January suggests that economic growth has moderated somewhat. Labor market conditions have improved further, with strong job gains and a lower unemployment rate. A range of labor market indicators suggests that underutilization of labor resources continues to diminish. Household spending is rising moderately; declines in energy prices have boosted household purchasing power. Business fixed investment is advancing, while the recovery in the housing sector remains slow and export growth has weakened. Inflation has declined further below the Committee’s longer-run objective, largely reflecting declines in energy prices. Market-based measures of inflation compensation remain low; survey-based measures of longer-term inflation expectations have remained stable.
Consistent with its statutory mandate, the Committee seeks to foster maximum employment and price stability. The Committee expects that, with appropriate policy accommodation, economic activity will expand at a moderate pace, with labor market indicators continuing to move toward levels the Committee judges consistent with its dual mandate. The Committee continues to see the risks to the outlook for economic activity and the labor market as nearly balanced. Inflation is anticipated to remain near its recent low level in the near term, but the Committee expects inflation to rise gradually toward 2 percent over the medium term as the labor market improves further and the transitory effects of energy price declines and other factors dissipate. The Committee continues to monitor inflation developments closely.
To support continued progress toward maximum employment and price stability, the Committee today reaffirmed its view that the current 0 to 1/4 percent target range for the federal funds rate remains appropriate. In determining how long to maintain this target range, the Committee will assess progress–both realized and expected–toward its objectives of maximum employment and 2 percent inflation. This assessment will take into account a wide range of information, including measures of labor market conditions, indicators of inflation pressures and inflation expectations, and readings on financial and international developments. Consistent with its previous statement, the Committee judges that an increase in the target range for the federal funds rate remains unlikely at the April FOMC meeting. The Committee anticipates that it will be appropriate to raise the target range for the federal funds rate when it has seen further improvement in the labor market and is reasonably confident that inflation will move back to its 2 percent objective over the medium term. This change in the forward guidance does not indicate that the Committee has decided on the timing of the initial increase in the target range.
The Committee is maintaining its existing policy of reinvesting principal payments from its holdings of agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities in agency mortgage-backed securities and of rolling over maturing Treasury securities at auction. This policy, by keeping the Committee’s holdings of longer-term securities at sizable levels, should help maintain accommodative financial conditions.
When the Committee decides to begin to remove policy accommodation, it will take a balanced approach consistent with its longer-run goals of maximum employment and inflation of 2 percent. The Committee currently anticipates that, even after employment and inflation are near mandate-consistent levels, economic conditions may, for some time, warrant keeping the target federal funds rate below levels the Committee views as normal in the longer run.
Voting for the FOMC monetary policy action were: Janet L. Yellen, Chair; William C. Dudley, Vice Chairman; Lael Brainard; Charles L. Evans; Stanley Fischer; Jeffrey M. Lacker; Dennis P. Lockhart; Jerome H. Powell; Daniel K. Tarullo; and John C. Williams.
http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/press/monetary/20150318a.htm
Advance release of table 1 of the Summary of Economic Projections to be released with the FOMC minutes
Percent
Note: Projections of change in real gross domestic product (GDP) and projections for both measures of inflation are percent changes from the fourth quarter of the previous year to the fourth quarter of the year indicated. PCE inflation and core PCE inflation are the percentage rates of change in, respectively, the price index for personal consumption expenditures (PCE) and the price index for PCE excluding food and energy. Projections for the unemployment rate are for the average civilian unemployment rate in the fourth quarter of the year indicated. Each participant’s projections are based on his or her assessment of appropriate monetary policy. Longer-run projections represent each participant’s assessment of the rate to which each variable would be expected to converge under appropriate monetary policy and in the absence of further shocks to the economy. The December projections were made in conjunction with the meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee on December 16-17, 2014.
1. The central tendency excludes the three highest and three lowest projections for each variable in each year. Return to table
2. The range for a variable in a given year includes all participants’ projections, from lowest to highest, for that variable in that year. Return to table
3. Longer-run projections for core PCE inflation are not collected. Return to table
Figure 1. Central tendencies and ranges of economic projections, 2015-17 and over the longer run
Central tendencies and ranges of economic projections for years 2015 through 2017 and over the longer run. Actual values for years 2010 through 2014.
Change in real GDP
Percent
Unemployment rate
Percent
PCE inflation
Percent
Note: Definitions of variables are in the general note to the projections table. The data for the actual values of the variables are annual.
Figure 2. Overview of FOMC participants’ assessments of appropriate monetary policy
Appropriate timing of policy firming
Note: In the upper panel, the height of each bar denotes the number of FOMC participants who judge that, under appropriate monetary policy, the first increase in the target range for the federal funds rate from its current range of 0 to 1/4 percent will occur in the specified calendar year. In December 2014, the numbers of FOMC participants who judged that the first increase in the target federal funds rate would occur in 2015, and 2016 were, respectively, 15, and 2.
Appropriate pace of policy firming: Midpoint of target range or target level for the federal funds rate
Number of participants with projected midpoint of target range or target level
or target level (Percent)
Note: In the lower panel, each shaded circle indicates the value (rounded to the nearest 1/8 percentage point) of an individual participant’s judgment of the midpoint of the appropriate target range for the federal funds rate or the appropriate target level for the federal funds rate at the end of the specified calendar year or over the longer run.
http://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/fomcprojtabl20150318.htm
Janet Yellen Isn’t Going to Raise Interest Rates Until She’s Good and Ready
The key words in Janet L. Yellen’s news conference Wednesday were rather pithy, at least by central bank standards. “Just because we removed the word ‘patient’ from the statement doesn’t mean we are going to be impatient,” Ms. Yellen, the Federal Reserve chairwoman, said.
With this framing, Ms. Yellen was putting her firm stamp on the policy of an institution she has led for just over a year — and making clear that she will not be boxed in. Her words and accompanying announcements conveyed the message that the Yellen Fed has no intention of taking the support struts of low interest rates away until she is absolutely confident that economic growth will hold up without them.
Ms. Yellen’s comments about patience versus impatience were part of that dance. But the dual message was even more powerful when combined with other elements of the central bank’s newly released information, which sent the signal that members of the committee intend to move cautiously on rate increases.
By eliminating the reference to “patience,” Paul Edelstein, an economist at IHS Global Insight, said in a research note, “The Fed did what it was expected to do.”
“But beyond that,” he added, “the committee appeared much more dovish and in not much of a hurry to actually pull the trigger.”
Fed officials’ forecasts of how high rates will be at year’s end for 2015, 2016 and 2017 all fell compared to where they were in December. They marked down their forecast for economic growth and inflation for all three years, implying that the nation’s economic challenge is tougher and inflation risks more distant than they had seemed a few months ago.
Particularly interesting was that Fed officials lowered their estimate of the longer-run unemployment rate, to 5 to 5.2 percent, from 5.2 to 5.5 percent. With joblessness hitting 5.5 percent in February, that implied that policy makers are convinced the job market has more room to tighten before it becomes too tight. Fed leaders now forecast unemployment rates in 2016 and 2017 that are a bit below what many view as the long-term sustainable level, which one would expect to translate into rising wages.
In other words, they want to run the economy a little hot for the next couple of years to help spur the kinds of wage gains that might return inflation to the 2 percent level they aim for, but which they have persistently undershot in recent years.
Apart from the details of the dovish monetary policy signals Ms. Yellen and her colleagues sent, it is clear she wanted to jolt markets out of any feeling that policy is on a preordained path.
At times over the last couple of years, the Fed had seemed to set a policy course and then go on a forced march until it got there, regardless of whether the jobs numbers were good or bad, or whether inflation was rising or falling. That is certainly how it felt when the Fed decided in December 2013 to wind down its quantitative easing policies by $10 billion per meeting, which it did through the first nine months of 2014 with few signs of re-evaluation as conditions evolved.
In her first news conference as chairwoman a year ago, Ms. Yellen had suggested that rate increases might be on a similar preordained path by saying that she could imagine rate increases “around six months” after the conclusion of quantitative easing. (That comment increasingly looks to have been a rookie mistake, and she later backed away from it.)
There are likely to be plenty of twists and turns in the coming months. After this week’s meeting, Ms. Yellen reinforced the message she has been trying to convey that the committee really will adapt its policy to incoming information rather than simply carry on with the path it set a year ago.
If the strengthening dollar and falling oil prices start to translate into still-lower expectations for future inflation, the Fed will hold off from rate rises — and the same if wage gains and other job market indicators show a lack of progress.
Conversely, if the job market recovery keeps going gangbusters and it becomes clear that inflation is going to rise back toward 2 percent, Ms. Yellen does not want to be constrained by language about “patience.”
“This change does not necessarily mean that an increase will occur in June,” Ms. Yellen said, “though we cannot rule that out.”
She has now bought herself some latitude to decide when and how the Fed ushers in an era of tighter money. Now the question is just how patient or impatient American economic conditions will allow her to be.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/19/upshot/janet-yellen-isnt-going-to-raise-interest-rates-until-shes-good-and-ready.html?_r=0&abt=0002&abg=1
Taylor rule
John B. Taylor
In economics, a Taylor rule is a monetary-policy rule that stipulates how much the central bank should change the nominal interest rate in response to changes in inflation, output, or other economic conditions. In particular, the rule stipulates that for each one-percent increase in inflation, the central bank should raise the nominal interest rate by more than one percentage point. This aspect of the rule is often called the Taylor principle.
The rule of was first proposed by John B. Taylor,[1] and simultaneously by Dale W. Henderson and Warwick McKibbin in 1993.[2] It is intended to foster price stability and full employment by systematically reducing uncertainty and increasing the credibility of future actions by the central bank. It may also avoid the inefficiencies of time inconsistency from the exercise ofdiscretionary policy.[3][4] The Taylor rule synthesized, and provided a compromise between, competing schools of economics thought in a language devoid of rhetorical passion.[5] Although many issues remain unresolved and views still differ about how the Taylor rule can best be applied in practice, research shows that the rule has advanced the practice of central banking.[6]
As an equation
According to Taylor’s original version of the rule, the nominal interest rate should respond to divergences of actual inflation rates from target inflation rates and of actual Gross Domestic Product (GDP) from potential GDP:
In this equation,
is the target short-term nominal interest rate (e.g. the federal funds rate in the US, the Bank of England base rate in the UK), 
is the rate ofinflation as measured by the GDP deflator, 
is the desired rate of inflation, 
is the assumed equilibrium real interest rate, 
is the logarithm of real GDP, and 
is the logarithm of potential output, as determined by a linear trend.
In this equation, both
and 
should be positive (as a rough rule of thumb, Taylor’s 1993 paper proposed setting 
).[7] That is, the rule “recommends” a relatively high interest rate (a “tight” monetary policy) when inflation is above its target or when output is above its full-employment level, in order to reduce inflationary pressure. It recommends a relatively low interest rate (“easy” monetary policy) in the opposite situation, to stimulate output. Sometimes monetary policy goals may conflict, as in the case of stagflation, when inflation is above its target while output is below full employment. In such a situation, a Taylor rule specifies the relative weights given to reducing inflation versus increasing output.
The Taylor principle
By specifying
, the Taylor rule says that an increase in inflation by one percentage point should prompt the central bank to raise the nominal interest rate by more than one percentage point (specifically, by 
, the sum of the two coefficients on 
in the equation above). Since the real interest rate is (approximately) the nominal interest rate minus inflation, stipulating 
implies that when inflation rises, the real interest rate should be increased. The idea that the real interest rate should be raised to cool the economy when inflation increases (requiring the nominal interest rate to increase more than inflation does) has sometimes been called the Taylor principle.[8]
During an EconTalk podcast Taylor explained the rule in simple terms using three variables: inflation rate, GDP growth, and the interest rate. If inflation were to rise by 1%, the proper response would be to raise the interest rate by 1.5% (Taylor explains that it doesn’t always need to be exactly 1.5%, but being larger than 1% is essential). If GDP falls by 1% relative to its growth path, then the proper response is to cut the interest rate by .5%.[9]
Alternative versions of the rule
While the Taylor principle has proved very influential, there is more debate about the other terms that should enter into the rule. According to some simple New Keynesian macroeconomic models, insofar as the central bank keeps inflation stable, the degree of fluctuation in output will be optimized (Blanchard and Gali call this property the ‘divine coincidence‘). In this case, the central bank need not take fluctuations in the output gap into account when setting interest rates (that is, it may optimally set
.) On the other hand, other economists have proposed including additional terms in the Taylor rule to take into account money gap[10] or financial conditions: for example, the interest rate might be raised when stock prices, housing prices, or interest rate spreads increase.
Empirical relevance
Although the Federal Reserve does not explicitly follow the Taylor rule, many analysts have argued that the rule provides a fairly accurate summary of US monetary policy under Paul Volcker and Alan Greenspan.[11][12] Similar observations have been made about central banks in other developed economies, both in countries like Canada and New Zealand that have officially adopted inflation targeting rules, and in others like Germany where the Bundesbank‘s policy did not officially target the inflation rate.[13][14] This observation has been cited by Clarida, Galí, and Gertler as a reason why inflation had remained under control and the economy had been relatively stable (the so-called ‘Great Moderation‘) in most developed countries from the 1980s through the 2000s.[11] However, according to Taylor, the rule was not followed in part of the 2000s, possibly leading to the housing bubble.[15][16] Certain research has determined that some households form their expectations about the future path of interest rates, inflation, and unemployment in a way that is consistent with Taylor-type rules.[17]
Criticisms
Athanasios Orphanides (2003) claims that the Taylor rule can misguide policy makers since they face real-time data. He shows that the Taylor rule matches the US funds rate less perfectly when accounting for these informational limitations and that an activist policy following the Taylor rule would have resulted in an inferior macroeconomic performance during the Great Inflation of the seventies.[18]
See also
References
External links
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylor_rule
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