The Immorality Crisis not lack of Transparency caused the Financial Collapse

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | DECEMBER 5, 2012

The European Union countries most affected by the global economic and financial collapse are also some of the most corrupt. But the highest levels of immorality and corruption are not seen at the national level, but on the international stage.

A recent publication by Transparency International which assesses the perception of corruption through a well established index, calls the results ”disappointing” in the sense that countries, especially those hit the hardest by the current financial collapse, are corrupt at heart, indeed.

The Index 2012 Corruption Perceptions from Transparency International shows that Greece obtained the worst result of all the European Union with a score of 36 out of 100, in 94th place out of 174 countries in the table. The Hellenic country is below Bulgaria and Romania.

Among the members of the European Union, Spain is in 13th place, after Denmark, Finland, Sweden, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany, Belgium, UK, France, Austria, Ireland and Cyprus. The report from TI shows the stagnation of Spain, the second country in Europe on its way down the cliff. Spain shares the 30th position with Botswana in the latest report of the corruption index.

“Among the countries hardest hit by the crisis are Italy and Greece — both join Spain on their way to total collapse — as corruption in the public sector is a major problem,” said Corbus de Swardt, spokesman for the NGO. He then added that ”the fight against corruption is one of the keys so that Greece can emerge from the crisis. True point, although the type of corruption that pulled Greece down to the abyss, did not necessarily originate inside the  country. As it happens in most nations, the bureaucrats who manage the destiny of countries and their people are front men and women whose work is to be ‘YES MEN’ and who represent the interests of the European oligarchy; where the highest levels of corruption emanate from.

In Germany and France, De Swardt believes that “one of the main problems is the relationship between politics and business.” The report reveals the existence of interest groups and a culture of secrecy. He is particularly concerned about the funding of political parties in Germany. Interest groups of course are not limited to women’s rights groups or unions, but to large conglomerates of companies that operate locally and outside the countries and who dictate the policies that the governments follow.

At a press conference Wednesday in Madrid, the President of Transparency International Spain, Jesús Lizcano, innocently advocated for giving good training to staff. He also called for issuing punishments to institutions that do not comply with transparency.

In this context, Antonio Garrigues Walker, executive committee member of IT, reminded people that in the past 18 years, corruption has increased gradually but forcefully mainly because, he said, that most countries do not have transparency laws in place. But reality shows otherwise. Countries with significant rules and regulations about transparency also suffer the consequences of corruption mainly because the rules on transparency are written for the people, not for the corrupt politicians in government and the corporations, who always manage to find back doors and legal windows to get away with cheating the system. Therefore, the crisis is not one of corruption, but of morality. Corruption is just the direct result of a society whose morality has been removed.

“Transparency is an absolute obligation of institutions and an absolute right of citizenship,” said the lawyer, who also lamented that countries like Spain have a civil society that is “weak and dependent.” In his opinion, corruption is “a true leukemia” especially in the economic system and transparency is the instrument to combat it.”

The agreement among most of the attendees is the ”truly alarming” intensification of corruption worldwide. The highest levels of corruption speakers said have been seen during the current global financial collapse caused by the corrupt financial system upon which the world functions and which is managed by a few powerful elites.

Since the first Corruption Perceptions Index was published in 1995, both Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian countries remain at the top of the corruption ladder, even though the index does not always shows it. That is not a surprise as many of the oligopolies that are the source of corruption are established there. Outside Europe, countries such as Afghanistan, North Korea and Somalia are three of the most corrupt in the world.

Although the Transparency International Index is just a main stream kind of thermometer which superficially gauges the levels of corruption around the world, it is a good starting point. Its results however contrasts with the reality of corruption and transparency. It is important to remember that in the case of the TI Index, it only reports the “perception” of corruption and not the real, factual levels in a country. That is why in its 2012 edition, countries like the United States, Uruguay and Germany hold distinctive positions, despite the fact these countries are submerged deeply into a sea of corruption. Another caveat is that the TI Index only includes the perception of corruption in the public sector and leaves out its twin out-of-control unregulated corporations.

Do we need a global index to know how bad corruption is in a determined country? Not likely. A more faithful gauge would be an honest look around the city and country where we live.

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Brussels sees darker times for Spain and Europe

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | NOVEMBER 6, 2012

Brussels sees no green grass across the fence when it comes to an economic recovery. The economic forecasts for 2013, which will be made public on Friday, will describe a dark and rainy future for Spain and most likely the rest of Europe.

Forecasts are just that, good or bad omens based on leading indicators. But it remains to be seen whether or not they are right. But if the predictions issued by Brussels become reality, that reality will mean serious trouble for Spain and the rest of Europe. The European Commission anticipates that the GDP falls 1.6% this year and 1.5% in 2013.

Spanish government forecasts were more hopeful before the statement from the EU with phrases such as ”We emerge from the crisis” and “there are hopeful signs”. These phrases were issued by the Minister for Employment, Fatima Banez, who had said that Spain would see a contraction of 1.5% for this year and a decrease of 0, 5% for 2013.

Next to the real exit from the crisis, the troubling data made public by Brussels is the government’s deficit. The massive austerity measures adopted by Spain only helped reduce the deficit by a meager 0.2 %. The painful measures that combined tax increases with deep cuts in expenses related to social programs did not work; just as it was intended to. The deficit will end the year at 8%, according to the Commission, but this number does not take into account the effect of recapitalization of banks. Expect the Spanish deficit to be much larger.

For 2013, the fiscal gap is 6%, and 5.8% by 2014. These numbers again do not include the bailouts of the banking system and the possible bailout of Spain as a whole. As predicted months ago, Spain will not be able to lower its deficit to 3 % of the GDP, which is the target requested by Brussels. That leaves three possibilities. The first is to extend the deadlines to meet targets, which has been demanded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Brussels. This alternative is now getting stronger and is supported by several countries that are hanging from the debt cliff.

The second is to ask Spain for additional efforts. That is, more austerity and spending cuts, which as it has been seen in Greece, would result in no solution whatsoever. Most economists expect that agreements reached during future meetings will include a combination of both austerity and an extension for Spain and the other countries to reach their deficit goals.

Spain’s Economy Minister Luis de Guindos, expected a deficit of 7.3% this year, 4.5% next year and 2.8% in 2014, far below the projections made by analysts and official data from both Brussels as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for next year and the next.

The Commission did not comment yesterday on the data. Clearly on all forecasts, Brussels and the Spanish government, weigh several unknowns, especially those relating to the effect of the increase in VAT (a real social experiment, with the country in recession) and the tax amnesty.

However, the Vice President and Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia, gave some clues in Madrid yesterday about the situation: government budgets for 2013 and associated economic forecasts show the efforts being made by both sides – income and expenses — but the accompanying macroeconomic picture is “far from the consensus.”

Almunia also hinted that Brussels has the feeling that Spain has denied the complete evidence, the depth of the crisis and the need to act thoroughly. “The delayed reaction is too often associated with Spain,” he said. Speaking at the New Economy Forum, he called “giving in to defeatism” and explained that the crisis “has a solution, tha will be overcome and is beginning to be overcome.”

“Trees should not impede us all to see the forest,” said Almunia. But the trees are just too tall. Brussels projections that approximate the most to those of the Spanish government are related to public debt. And even in that section the figures speak for themselves: the debt will end this year at 83.7%, the next at 89.5% and will be at 93.9% of GDP by 2014.

One thing is for sure: there is no sign that shows when the debt will stop growing. Meanwhile, Europe continues to advance an agenda that keeps on using the same old recipe of more austerity, while government expenses continue to grow. As we have explained here in multiple occasions, both Spain and Europe are — intentionally — going through a vicious cycle that will not result in the reduction of the deficit or the rescue of the economies that are heavily burdened by debt.

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If no one believes in the recovery, why are Europe and the world Trying?

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | OCTOBER 23, 2012

I don’t know you, but I’m sick and tired of hearing about the financial collapse. The financial crisis we are now in was predicted long ago, and those predictions were correct. So why hasn’t it happened? First of all, it is happening. In fact it began a while ago. While many people expected to have a sudden collapse, which dragged the world into a whole, the fall of the international financial system was not planned to take place that way. Second of all, the financial collapse was planned to occur slowly and painfully, not only because the elites that planned it are financial sadists, but also because that is the only way to carry out their plan successfully.

The slow financial collapse allows the perpetrators to slowly bite off pieces from the grand pie, inflicting lethal but manageable pain and damage into the world’s economic and financial systems. This tactic in turn prepares the field for further deterioration and acquiescence from the public and the governments who they control. The kind of financial terrorism carried out by the largest financial entities in the history of the world, which are controlled by the smallest amount of people ever, makes it possible to successfully materialize the elite’s dream to create the most powerful monopoly of money and resources while they present themselves as the saviors.

The truth however, is that they are not saving anyone but themselves. While they buy off politicians and buy up land and essential resources for pennies on whatever currency they want, governments continue to fail to hold them accountable for their crimes. In fact, the bureaucrats in governments are faithful accomplices of the elites. Only one country has been able to partially defeat these monopoly men, and that country is Iceland. After kicking the bankers out, Iceland is now racing on the path of recovery, with a growing economy that simply sparked to life after telling the bankers that the illegal debt they had put under Iceland’s name was not theirs.

Iceland did what no other country had the guts to do: let the banks fail. Four years later, the country is being praised by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). That’s right. One of the most important globalist organizations who are out to destroy countries like Italy, Greece, Portugal and Spain, congratulates Iceland for doing the right thing. The Icelandic people did not need to go through austerity programs, they did not lose millions of jobs and neither did they have their pensions or retirement accounts looted by the bankers. “The recovery has been quite impressive. GDP growth has picked up in the last couple of years and is now running around three percent a year,” says Franek Rozwadowski, a visitor from the IMF.

On the other side of the road there are countries like Spain, Italy, Greece and Portugal, all of which chose to follow the bankers’ path to destruction. Spain has increased its debt dramatically in a supposed effort to curb the government’s deficit, imposed massive austerity measures, looted pension and retirement accounts, cut public jobs, accumulated a 24% unemployment rate, “rescued” its banks at least twice, adopted deadly economic policies as ordered by Brussels, but still is on its way to the financial precipice. The same model has been used by Greece, Italy and Portugal, who are following Spain on their way to social collapse. It is estimated that the Spanish debt will reach  23 billion euros by the end of the year, with no hope to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

The main reason for this is that the pact completed between the Spanish government and Brussels never intended to take Spain out of the dark tunnel. As explained in the documents obtained from the World Bank, the collapse of most European nations is part of a well-crafted plan that the elite has applied over and over again throughout the world. It happened in small countries like Guatemala, Nicaragua, mid-size countries like Argentina, and now in larger economies like Spain, the United States, France, Italy, Greece and others.

As it turns out, the so-called bailouts are not such things. They are more like acquisitions. As explained by Journalist and researcher Greg Palast — who broke the story about the World Bank’s plan — the idea is to secretly repossess the assets of every country in the world. This is achieved through a bribery system in which the global bankers buy off the politicians in different countries so that they adopt IMF and World bank policies that intend to destroy their economies. Once the policies have been adopted, the bankers begin to slowly but surely subtract the resources of those countries unnoticeably, mainly through financial aid programs and trade agreements.

The mistaken belief that a recovery will come out of the current austerity measures and financial bailouts stems from the well engineered propaganda campaign orchestrated by the banking system and the main stream media, who have gone from denying that there is a crisis to accepting there is one and that the same bankers who caused it, who planned it, are going to be the saviors. Little do most people know that the kind of crisis we are now going through is part of the plant to carry out a planet wide extortion scheme through which the globalist banking elite once again walks away with significant amounts of resources.

The difference is that this time the looting is not limited to once small or mid-sized nation, but to several large countries in Europe and the world. Greek islands are now for sale to the best bidder, because the country cannot pay its debt. Guess who will come to the rescue? The monopoly men will come and buy the islands for cents on the Dragma. The same situation will happen in Spain, once Mariano Rajoy requests the financial rescue. So if you are asking yourself why is it that the economy isn’t getting better despite the continuous assurances that everything on the books is being done to get to that point, the truth is that the banker plan does not contemplate a recovery. At least not one where everyone will have the opportunity to thrive.

Read the complete interview given by Greg Palast after learning about and getting the World Bank’s secret documents that detail how the global financial entities destroy nations.

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Spanish Government Wants to Ban Recording Police ‘in action’

Is this a ploy to cover up Police brutality?

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | OCTOBER 18, 2012

The Spanish Director General of Police, Ignacio Cosidó said today that coming changes to the Public Safety Act will prohibit the collection and dissemination of images of police on the internet if those pictures show them doing their job, because these images could endanger their physical integrity and their work.

Cosidó stated his idea in a meeting with the Independent Trade Union of Civil Servants (CSI-F), the Spanish Confederation of Police (CEP) and the European Confederation of Independent Trade Unions (CESI). The meeting intended to analyze the consequences of the crisis on the labor performed by security forces.

Mr. Cosidó said that the reform of the Public Safety Act, now being studied by the Interior Ministry, seeks to “find a balance between protecting the rights of citizens and those of the security forces.”

The Director General of Police believes that by banning the publication of images that show police action in public places will help protect them and their work. That is why he has suggested changes to the existing law. His proposal will make it illegal to “record, reproduce and process images, sounds or information of members of the security forces in the exercise of their functions as this may endanger their lives or risk the operation they are developing.”

Mr. Cosidó’s initiative refers the public back to times when governments banned recording police action in order to cover up their abuses and crimes against the citizenry. Today, recording police actions in public places does not prevent some of them from using a badge and a gun to take the law into their hands as supposed to serve the people. One needs to ask how much further will they go if assured that no one is documenting their abuses.

The latest example of what police are willing to do to impose their ‘rule’ was seen during the public protests on the streets of Madrid, where people were beaten and temporarily kidnapped by policemen for things such as directing a question to the ‘officers’, or calling on Congress to stop the deadly round of austerity measures.

Cosidó is worried about the safety of the policemen and their privacy but says nothing about protecting the people from police abuses. The move is, he says, an attempt to ensure that the agents and their families are protected and their privacy respected. Mr. Cosidó is probably not aware that under common law, there is no expectation of privacy in public places.

The same criterion that governments and police use to snoop on the people while they walk or drive through public settings is the one that enables the press and the people to record police action on the street or a park, for example. Cosidó says his proposal is “a step forward” to provide more security for police to work ” from the legality and the strict enforcement of the rule of law. ” Where does he place the security of the people, given all the documented abuse that his officers have perpetrated lately?

“Only the recognition of the immense work done by the security forces can help us progress in the achievement of a more just, secure and peaceful society,” stressed the head of the police, who announced last week that the Public Safety Act could also ban covering the face or the head while protesting. So, what Cosidó really wants is to monopolize accountability, privacy and anonymity in the hands of the government and police. Police can use brutality, wear Darth Vader outfits to protect their faces and on top of this, they cannot be recorded while beating up protesters because it would endanger their lives.

Cosidó also praised changes proposed on a bill to amend the Penal Code, which, in his opinion, will be the base to “prevent and prosecution conduct that seriously undermines the public order.” Although these changes may seem harmless to some, the proposals on the table regarding public order and police action are two important steps towards giving police the green light to become even less accountable to the people and to ban public protesting once and for all.

Similar measures already adopted in the United States, makes it a crime for a public protester to protect himself against police abuse. A person’s denial to put his hands behind his back is now qualified as assault on a police officer which enables that officer to use lethal force if necessary. Under the changes suggested by Cosidó, the understanding of ‘crime’ and ‘assault’ will vary to include all cases of resistance, and denial from the part of a citizen to comply as assault, use of violence or serious threats of violence against an agent. The action of passive resistance, with disobedience, remains punishable by six months to a year in jail.

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Spain extends and enhances American occupation in Cadiz

American presence is extended until 2021.

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | OCTOBER 5, 2012

The government of Spain authorized the signing of the amendment to the military agreement between Spain and the U.S. to allow the deployment of a new missile shield system at the Naval Base of Rota in Cadiz.

The Government granted plenipotentiary powers to the Defense Minister Peter Morenés, to sign the amendment to the convention. Morenés will seal the deal with American Defense Secretary Leon Panetta next week at a NATO meeting next week in Brussels.

Morenés and Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel García-Margallo, requested to appear in Congress to report on the reform, which must be ratified by Parliament. The reform, agreed on last July by the delegations of Spain and the U.S., is describes the equipment that will be deployed in Rota beginning in 2014. They include four Arleigh Burke destroyers that are equipped with the Aegis combat system, and around 1,100 American troops.

With this new agreement, the United States continues with its policy of militarizing the planet. Last month, we reported on an agreement between the United States and Japan, to deploy a similar missile shield system in the Asian nation. The agreement was completed while Japanese-Chinese relations took a turn for the worse as a diplomatic war began because of territorial disputes.

The agreement signed by Spain sets the ceiling of American military troops at 4,750. According to the agreement, the main goal of the missile shield is to collaborate on missile-defense system against ballistic missile threats as those developed by Iran and North Korea, but also do other activities under bilateral relations or through NATO operations.

The accord to deploy the missile shield system was closed during the meetings held last Wednesday and Thursday in Madrid by delegations of the two countries, which included the defense minister, Peter Morenés, and his U.S. counterpart, Leon Panetta. The two men met in the Pentagon.

The protocol amendment to the military agreement between the US and Spain is a very short text and includes the extension of the whole agreement for eight years until 2021. The current agreement was signed in 1988. Since 2011 it has been automatically renewed each year.

Green light for deployment of the missile shield system in Rota’s Naval Base was given on October 2011, by former Spanish Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, with the approval of Mariano Rajoy. The main change introduced during the negotiations has been to add a provision that extends the military arrangement for eight years until 2020. So far it extended automatically from year to year, but the Pentagon has sought assurances of long-term permanence to justify investments in the Cadiz base.

Back in October of 2011, the former Foreign Affairs Minister Trinidad Jimenez answer questions about the secrecy of the approval by Rodriguez Zapatero saying this was nothing secret about the agreement to let Americans occupy the Rota Naval Base. “It was a surprise to those who were not informed,” she said.

Jimenez also ensured that all the bay of Cadiz would benefit from the establishment of the missile shield at the Naval Base in Rota. It will “renew the entire area”, said the former minister, who explained that there would be new jobs created and as well as workers arriving from the United States, which would generate indirect jobs for maintenance.

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