YES, we WON. Lord Blankfein and his Band of Merry Thugs blinked blinked, and we sliced their heads off.  Here is a link to the Stipulation Goldman Sachs recently signed in response to my Complaint against Goldman Sachs, after they sent me one of their bully-bully threatening letters.  True knuckheads that think they can bully anyone.  Well . . . they bullied Bush, and they’re bullying Obama and his Gang of Goofballs, but I hate the bad guys . . . and I never back down.

The Cocaine Standard

The Telegraph reports from Guerima, Colombia, where government troops recently drove out FARC guerillas:

Countless ordinary people depend on the coca trade. “We are sitting on a mountain of coca and a series of Farc ‘IOUs’ “, said one local. “We need the rebels back to pay the debts and buy the coca, otherwise the town will die.”

No money has reached Guerima for months and transactions are conducted in coca, with one gram enough to buy a soft drink.

Add that to your list of commodity moneys. I found the story via Wired for Strange, which also notes that bottle caps are being used as a currency in Cameroon and claims that drug-free urine is being used as a currency behind bars:

This strange alternative to money is used in the prison system; they have been known to use cigarettes, sardine cans and now urine. This has become a precious commodity because drug screening has become much more prominent in penitentiaries. Clean samples are traded and they are usually kept in a condom and warmed to body temperature by rectal insertion.

A commodity, yes — but a currency? Seems to me that the Piss Standard would be especially susceptible to inflation.

“Years ago Warren Buffett asked an amusing question in one of his annual letters to the shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway. He noted that he was perplexed by people’s mood swings in relation to stock prices. He wondered why people were happy when the stock market was high and somber when it was low because he believes it should be the other way around.

“To explain his point he asked the following question: If you ate only hamburgers your entire life, would you want the price of hamburgers to be high or low? Clearly, you would want the price to be low because in that way you would obviously maximize the purchasing power of your dollars. So too with stocks. When their price is low, you get more stocks for your dollars.

“I believe that this insight also applies to gold and silver. When their price is low, you are able to exchange more overvalued dollars for undervalued gold and silver. Consequently, my approach to the precious metal markets over the past several years has been based on one simple premise. Namely, continue to accumulate the precious metals month after month after month. Some months the price will be high; some months the price will be low. But consistently take that portion of your income you save every month and save sound money. Don’t save dollars; save gold and silver instead.

“Then by the time this bull market finally ends, you will have accumulated a meaningful amount of physical metal because gold bull markets span decades. Importantly, with this simple strategy you will have avoided the emotional roller-coaster ride that can come from looking at the market day-to-day and from reading newspaper headlines. Leave the daily, weekly and monthly price swings for the professional traders to worry about, and instead be a wealth accumulator, buying the precious metals month-in and month-out.”

Learn more about GoldMoney.com here.

Source: http://news.goldseek.com/DailyReckoning/1220472302.php

Do you remember the 1970′s in the United Sates, when gas prices went up?  No one really used credit cards then for everyday purchases. There was no free and easy credit back then.

A few people had cards but most did not.  When you pumped, you paid cash, at least that is what I can remember.

As the price of gas went up, people stopped driving.  Those two events occurred almost the same month. Higher prices meant less driving and there was no ‘lag time’. After prices rose and stayed up for a month or two, people sold their big cars for Japanese imports which delivered higher mileage.

Those big gas guzzling American cars like the Buick’s were out and the high mileage imports quickly became the norm. Does anyone remember the Datsun B210? How about those first Honda Civics?

Over the past few years gas prices have skyrocketed. While American’s complained a lot, they DID NOT stop driving.  Those SUVs kept rolling off the assembly lines and Detroit even tried to bring back “muscle cars”! WTF.

Meanwhile, as gas prices rose each month, the TV news interviewed drivers at gas stations asking them questions like this, “Well, gas has hit $3.00 per gallon has that slowed you down any? What price does gas have to top which will cause you to stop driving?”

No one talked about quickly selling their car and for for the past several years, no one really mentioned driving less.  This has been going on for almost 3 years, basically since Hurricane Katrina.

Katrina seems to have been the point in time and the catalyst event which caused gas prices to really make a run up in price.

Yes, the price has risen drastically since the storm, but unlike the 70′s American driving has not slowed down until last month, early summer.

For the past several years, there were more TV interviews and more images of an American man or woman standing next to a gas pump saying something like this, “Hey, we all have to get to work right?” or “I suppose I’ll slow down when it tops $5 per gallon, I love my car.” (I heard that a lot…American’s love their cars)

What happened the past three years?

Why did EVERYONE with a car in the 70′s stop driving, sell their vechicles and begin carpooling but in 2005 no one even seemed to slow down?  Why don’t high gas prices of today have that same effects?  How is it possible that soccer mom, can still afford to drive her family Suburban to the gym each day and stop by Starbucks for a latté on the way home?

Well the answer is simple.

Personal credit cards.

These past three years as gas prices rose, American’s simply ‘CHARGED IT’.    No driver sitting behind the wheel of an SUV wanted to give it up their comfort…. so they charged the gas.

“Oil prices are up but we can charge it and wait for them to fall.”  When American’s ran low on cash, they reached for plastic. I’ve actually heard this one, “we have 6 more cards in our purse, we have plenty of money.”

Sure I say, you have plenty of money left because you still have checks in your checkbook too….

Today, it is three years later after the storm and it’s time to pay the piper.

The only problem here, is that after years of living on charge cards and supporting that high quality comfortable lifestyle, no one has any real cash left.  No one can make those payments because wages and savings have slumped during this period.

Here is the number one looming problem which will push America over the financial cliff by next year. The article is by Geoff Colvin from Fortune online CNNMoney.com

“The next credit crunch”

Our easy access to plastic is about to dry up – and with it our ability to fake living the good life.

(Fortune Magazine) — We made it through the bursting of the Internet bubble and now the bursting of the real estate bubble. Next we may be approaching the end of the most worrisome bubble of all: the standard-of-living bubble.  That conclusion comes from the latest data on credit card debt. It’s growing fast, but the problem is bigger than that – and to understand what it means, we have to take a few steps back. (Read the full article…)

Turn up the Irony Meter to 11. After all, with all of the complaints in the US about gold farming, it takes the Chinese to stand up and do something about it.

Yep, police in China has arrested 2 men for running a World of Warcraft gold farming operation and charged them with “unfair revenue distribution” (CHINESE READER ALERT – what in the world is “unfair revenue distribution”?).

The two men ran the operation for 7 months and earned 1.4 Million RMB (just over US$200,000). They had 20 computers and 20 employees (no shifts, I guess) and were based in Chengdu‘s Shuangliu county. The men were targeting The9‘s China-based World of Warcraft operation… I’m not sure if this makes their revenue more impressive or not.

(Chengdu Evening News via Pacific Epoch)

This web site is dedicated to exposing a dangerous & devious professional
Internet crime syndicate. They are very convincing and very clever.

Similarities can be made to the boiler rooms of South East Asia in that they win
consumer confidence and continue to take, take, take after the initial sting with
promises that are never fulfilled.  Indeed the reason that Asianpay have come to
Thailand is so that their fraudulent activity can continue without reprisals.

http://kanitamo.com/carlossorioasianpaychiangmaihostingstoleourmoney.html

http://www.utac.org/

We should be extremely concerned about the scope of the credit card fraud problem involving terrorists. There is limited or no empirical data to gauge the extent of the problem. However, there are compelling signs that an epidemic permeates. [1]

Recently, there has been a string of articles in the main steam media attempting to link Digital Gold Currency and terrorist financing. However, the reality of the situation is that no Digital Gold Currency has ever been connected to a terror financing case or crime. Last month, even one very visible government report on Digital Currency stated, “Such emerging electronic payment systems are vulnerable to money laundering and terrorist financing.” [2]

As far back as January 2006, the main stream media began an effort to connect terrorist funding and Digital Gold Currency. This trend seems to have started when a BusinessWeek “investigative report”, quoted some dialog from Mr. Phil Williams, a professor of international affairs at the University of Pittsburgh and consultant to the United Nations on terrorism financing.

The article points out that while discussing digital currency, Mr. Williams says, “At some point, this is going to be used” by terrorists. Of course it is obvious from his comment that Mr. Williams has never seen the extensive Customer Verification Process required by GoldMoney, e-dinar or Crowne Gold. It is also doubtful that Mr. Williams has ever transacted an exchange of dollars into e-gold digital currency using a professional exchange agent.[3](Businessweek Article By Brian Grow, John Cady, Susann Rutledge, and David Polek)

Credit card fraud has become an ever present tool for funding terror networks while Digital Gold Currency has never even been mentioned during the prosecution of a terror crime. Look at the facts as far back as 2001.

Ali Al Marri was arrested in Illinois in December 2001 for having lied to FBI Agents about having contact with facilitators of the 9/11 terrorist attack. At the time of arrest, Al Marri had 36 credit card numbers and account information in his possession. A subsequent search of his computer found he had compiled over 1,000 credit card numbers and other identifying information. [4]

Doesn’t “The truth” still have a place in main stream media? Isn’t it important to discuss the facts as received directly from law enforcement professionals and not the suspicions and gossip of investigative reporters?

The facts show us that for many years credit card fraud has been used to fund murderous bombings and acts of terror. The facts also show us that companies like e-gold which have been in business for over a decade, have never been connected to an act of terror funding.

The October 2002 the Bali nightclub bombings killed 202 people, most of whom were just visiting tourists.

Iman Samudra, convicted and now awaiting execution for taking part in the 2002 bombings of two Bali nightclubs…urges Muslim youth to obtain credit card numbers and use them to fund the struggle against the United States and its allies. *John Rollins & Clay Wilson, Specialists in Terrorism and International Crime, Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division – “Terrorist Capabilities for Cyberattack: Overview and Policy Issues” Updated January 22, 2007, CRS Report for Congress

The next time that your credit card is used to buy gas, dinner at a restaurant, clothing, or for online shopping please recognize that your card numbers and personal information just might end up buying plan tickets, binoculars or a GPS system to outfit a terrorist and equip an extremist planning to kill innocent civilians. This is the everyday reality of credit card fraud.

That decade old bank “customer not liable for fraud” technology, along with the magnetic stripe and the 40 year old plastic card design is widely abused by criminal every waking moment of every day. Card fraud is a decades old global epidemic. Credit card fraud has been omnipresent throughout the past 3 decades.

The Nigerian credit card fraud problems of the late 1970s and 1980s attests to this. Epidemics can only be treated and eliminated through detective and preventive treatment. [5]

What is your bank doing to prevent such crimes? Why doesn’t the media focus more on correcting this global epidemic?

Tariq al-Daour, is one of three British residents who pleaded guilty in July of 2007 to using the Internet to incite murder.

Investigators said al-Daour and his compatriots made more than $3.5 million in fraudulent charges using credit card accounts they stole via phishing scams and the distribution of Trojan horses — computer programs embedded in innocent-looking e-mail messages or Web sites that give criminals control over infected computers. On a computer seized from al-Daour’s West London apartment, investigators said they found 37,000 stolen credit card numbers. Alongside each credit card record was other information, such as the account holders’ addresses, dates of birth, credit balances and credit limits. …[Tsouli] and his two associates used at least 72 stolen credit card accounts to register more than 180 domains at 95 different Web hosting companies in the United States and Europe.  Investigators said he became the de facto administrator of the online jihadist forum Muntada al-Ansar al-Islami, which once was the main Internet public relations mouthpiece of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq who was killed last month. [6]

The public should correctly, place blame for these horrible crimes squarely where it belongs and that is with the profitable credit card companies. Do not pander to the public’s ignorance of digital currency and their fear of the digital unknown. Don’t follow the path that Fox News has cut in today’s digital media.

Did you know that the according to a German intelligence report, the Madrid bombers partially financed that attack through credit card fraud?  According to the Associated Press, 190 innocent people died in that attack.

According to FBI officials, Al Qaeda terrorist cells in Spain used stolen credit card information to make numerous purchases. Also, the FBI has recorded more than 9.3 million Americans as victims of identity theft in the past 12 month period. Report by the Democratic Staff of the House Homeland Security Committee, Identity Theft and Terrorism, July 1, 2005, p.10. [7]

The media needs to expose the actual funding sources for these terror crimes and not try to point the finger at Digital Gold Currency. The public should focus on fixing the problem and stop being guided like scared sheep away from  promising new technologies like m-payments and Digital Gold Currency.

Why doesn’t the government make more of an effort to close the ‘credit card data’ loopholes and prevent data thefts from occurring? Can’t the government force the profitable billion dollar credit card companies to advance their 40 year old plastic card technology?

It is no longer acceptable to dismiss credit card fraud as a petty crime. This is not a petty crime when 200 or more people are killed from a terrorist bomb.  It is also not acceptable for the media to try and demonize digital currency when the blame for these acts of violence falls squarely on the credit card industry.

A North African terrorist funding group accumulated details of nearly 200 stolen cards and raised more than GBP 200 000 to fund the al-Qaeda terrorist network through international credit card fraud. Twenty to thirty ‘runners’ collected the names and credit card details of almost 200 different bank accounts from contacts working in service industries such as restaurants. These details were not used in their country of origin (the UK) but sent on to associates in Spain and the Netherlands. These associates used the cards to fraudulently collect more than GBP 200 000 for al-Qaeda cells around Europe. [8]

DGCs have never been linked to terror financing.

In Australia, credit card fraud and identity theft cost hundreds of millions of dollars a year. Internationally, some estimates put the cost of cyber-related identity theft at more than $200 billion – bigger than the entire cocaine market. [9]

Digital Gold Currency has only been around since the mid 1990′s and has in just the past 3-4 years gained retail popularity. Credit cards have been in use and popular for over 40 years! The next time you buy a discount shirt or sweater, will your card and personal information be forwarded overseas to aid in the set up of a new terror training camp?

March. 30, 2007, BOSTON – A hacker or hackers stole data from at least 45.7 million credit and debit cards of shoppers at off-price retailers including T.J. Maxx and Marshalls in a case believed to be the largest such breach of consumer information. Associated Press story[10]

Is it possible that while the card companies pocket hundreds of millions in profit….they fail to address or correct this epidemic of fraud? The facts show us without question that credit card fraud offers an easy and direct funding source for global terror networks. Why don’t the card companies fix it and stop passing on the expense to their customers?

Case study: Columbus, Ohio: Somali native Nuradin Abdi told U.S. investigators that he provided stolen credit card numbers to a man accused of buying gear for al-Qaida, according to federal prosecutors… The credit card information was in turn provided to an acquaintance who was in the process of buying a laptop, global positioning satellite watch, a laser range finder and other equipment. Abdi is accused of planning to blow up a Columbus, Ohio, area shopping mall along with other al-Qaida operatives, including an admitted member of the terror group, Iyman Faris, who is currently imprisoned for a scheme to sabotage the Brooklyn Bridge. Prosecutors say Abdi attended a guerilla training camp in Ethiopia, with the shopping mall plot hatched shortly after he returned to Ohio in March 2000. [11]

The horrible reality of this situation is that the next transaction you make with that antiquated bank card, may be sending funds for the a future terrorist attack.

Can you guarantee that immediately after your next credit card purchase the card data will not be copied and sold to extremist? It happens all the time….

According to Identity Theft Resource Center there were 167 data breaches in the first three months of this year. At least 8.3 million records containing sensitive information were potentially compromised in the same time period.[12]

The is the ugly truth is that credit card fraud often directly funds terror networks.

One Recent Event: Data from 4 Million credit cards stolen. Recently, Hannaford announced what security experts call a sophisticated attack on their computer network that resulted in the theft of credit and debit card account information. The arrest of Al Qaeda’s top cyber terrorist provided hard evidence of their use of stolen credit card data for funding. In one case, terrorist groups use the stolen credit card information to purchase $3 million of materials to carry out terrorist attacks. Al Qaeda’s top cyber terrorist 23 year old Younes Tsouli (online name – Irhaby007), recently admitted conspiring to defraud banks, credit card companies and charge card companies.– Kevin Coleman [13]

In stark contrast, no charges have ever been brought against a terror funding suspect that included any connection to Digital Gold Currency. What is being done by the card companies and banks to prevent future use of card fraud in the funding of terror networks? Surely this is a national security problem and not a petty crime as it is often labeled.

The mastermind behind the international credit card fraud for funding the LTTE terrorist organization has been arrested… He had a large number of Personal Identification Numbers (PIN) and bank receipts issued by both local and foreign banks, amounting to a massive sum of money, over Rs. 100 million, in his possession when he was arrested. In the past, it’s been widely reported that Al Qaeda training manuals teach their minions to use credit card fraud as a way to survive in foreign lands. [14]

The next time you read a main stream media article about Digital Gold Currency, which includes ambiguous language like “may be” or “are vulnerable to” please remember the facts. Contact your card company today and ask them what is being done to secure your card and personal information. Let’s all work together to prevent the next terror attack from being funded by your stolen credit card.

[1] *http://counterterrorismblog.org/2008/02/terrorists_and_credit_card_fra.php
[2] *http://www.usdoj.gov/ndic/pubs28/28675/index.htm
[3] *http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_02/b3966094.htm
[4] *http://counterterrorismblog.org/2008/02/terrorists_and_credit_card_fra.php
[5] *http://counterterrorismblog.org/2008/02/terrorists_and_credit_card_fra.php
[6] *http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/05/AR2007070501945_pf.html
[7]*http://www.cyberconflict.org/pdf/WilsonNov012005.pdf
[8] *http://www.fatf-gafi.org/dataoecd/28/43/40285899.pdf
[9] *http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/content/2005/s1435556.htm
[10] *http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17871485/
[11] *http://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/credit-cards-terrorism-1282.php
[12] *http://www.nationmedia.com/dailynation/nmgcontententry.asp?category_id=25&newsid=127163
[13] *http://www.defensetech.org/archives/004105.html
[14] *http://www.defence.lk/new.asp?fname=20080615_03