I blog because I can. I write about what Is on my mind and what is left of it. All blogging is done from a little tiny Island in the West Indies. It's not always what you blog, but it's how you blog that matters. Scroll down to the bottom to begin reading.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Scuba Antigua dive shops
Indigo Divers Antigua
Box JH 155
Jolly Harbour
Antigua and Barbuda
http://indigo-divers.com
info@indigo-divers.com
268-562-3483
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
DIVE ANTIGUA
http://diveantigua.com/
PHONE 268 462-DIVE or 268 462-3483
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Seawolf Diving School
http://www.seawolfdivingschool.com/index.php
The Compton Building
Dockyard Drive
English Harbour, Antigua.
West Indies
By Phone
+1 (268) 783 3466
+1 (268) 783 3466
Box JH 155
Jolly Harbour
Antigua and Barbuda
http://indigo-divers.com
info@indigo-divers.com
268-562-3483
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
DIVE ANTIGUA
http://diveantigua.com/
PHONE 268 462-DIVE or 268 462-3483
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Seawolf Diving School
http://www.seawolfdivingschool.com/index.php
The Compton Building
Dockyard Drive
English Harbour, Antigua.
West Indies
By Phone
+1 (268) 783 3466
+1 (268) 783 3466
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Vote
So in 2008 you voted for change and you've been getting it. Thanks to George W Bush you got poverty and unemployment like you never knew before.
And now you want to screw up the chances of the president being able to fix things becuase you thought he had a magic wand and could fix the global economy in a few days after taking office.
Go ahead side with the tea baggers, you will be so freakin sorry.
And now you want to screw up the chances of the president being able to fix things becuase you thought he had a magic wand and could fix the global economy in a few days after taking office.
Go ahead side with the tea baggers, you will be so freakin sorry.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Wasilla home of Sarah Palin
Did you see her daughter dance? Neither did anyone else. Mrs. Brady beat her!
Did you see those thunder legs? Her husband is where? The under age mom with a baby daddy. Way to preach morality Sarah!
Did you see those thunder legs? Her husband is where? The under age mom with a baby daddy. Way to preach morality Sarah!
Sarah Palin
Just saying her name and talking about the Tea Baggers makes me laugh.
They will cut taxes and pay for the police, fire and teachers how? Don't ask they don't know but they are going to cut taxes.
Maybe I should get a helicopter so I could hunt moose?
They will cut taxes and pay for the police, fire and teachers how? Don't ask they don't know but they are going to cut taxes.
Maybe I should get a helicopter so I could hunt moose?
Vote for Sarah Palin
It's the funniest thing you could possibly do to scew up America.
Bunch of Tea Baggers.....
Bunch of Tea Baggers.....
Monday, September 13, 2010
Support your changes
I really don't understand US American's. We voted for change did we think it would happen over night. It took the previous administration 8 years to destroy the economy do you think this new guy can fix it in 18 months? Bernie Madoff and Allen Stanford got away with their nonsense for so many years and now they want the new president to fix it over night.
Thursday, August 5, 2010
The CIA, Banking Scams, and R. Allen Stanford the CIA Banker
Allen Stanford the American Criminal
The following is ripped from the internet and was written by Tom Burghardt follow the link above for the original artical.
In a scandal-plagued era such as ours, scarred by murderous wars, occupations and corruption that would make a Roman emperor blush, accused crooks have names; even juiced ones like R. Allen Stanford.
Last year, when a federal court in Texas handed down indictments charging Stanford International Bank (SIB) and its officers with "orchestrating a fraudulent, multibillion dollar investment scheme," I wondered: was there more to the story?
Indeed there was.
Once described by fawning media as a "flamboyant Texan" and "philanthropist," Stanford was founder and sole shareholder of a global banking empire once conservatively valued at $50 billion.
According to the federal indictment, "Sir Allen," as he was dubbed by a corrupt former minister of Antigua, ran a massive Ponzi scheme camouflaged as a bank that sold some $7 billion in self-styled "certificates of deposit" and $1.2 billion in mutual funds.
[For complete article features, please see original at Fascist Calling here.]
Operated from behind a façade of well-appointed offices and with a jet-set lifestyle to match, the Stanford grift may have been impressive but it was a scam from the get-go. Lured by "high rates that exceed those available through true certificates of deposits offered by traditional banks," thousands lost their shirts.
Those high rates were a lie and the bank's "unique investment strategy" about as legitimate as a penny-stock fraud or advance fee scam on the internet. Of the $8 billion hoovered up by the banker and his cronies, only about $500 million have been recovered.
Facing the prospect of years in prison, The Miami Herald reported that SIB's chief financial officer James Davis, once Stanford's college roommate and originally charged in the indictment, copped a plea to save his own neck.
Davis told the Justice Department that "his boss had been stealing from investors for decades while paying bribes to regulators and even performing blood oaths never to reveal his secrets."
Talk about a wise guy!
And with connections and generous pay-outs to U.S. politicians going back more than a decade, 65% of which went to Democrats including our "change" president, Allen Stanford was plugged-in.
Evidence also suggests he may have gotten an assist covering his tracks from regulators and U.S. secret state agencies, including the CIA.
SEC Stand Down
Allen Stanford did business the American way; he swindled depositors and then siphoned-off the proceeds into a spider's web of offshore accounts.
The indictment charges "it was part of the conspiracy that Stanford ... and others would cause the movement of millions of dollars of fraudulently obtained investors' funds from and among bank accounts located in the Southern District of Texas and elsewhere in the United States to various bank accounts located outside of the United States ... in order to exercise exclusive control over the investors' funds."
Auditors learned that funds were moved through Stanford-controlled accounts to offshore banks, including HSBC in London, Bank Julius Baer in Zurich and eight others; banks which have figured in past money laundering or tax-avoidance scandals. None have been charged with an offense in connection with the affair.
In all, 28 numbered accounts were listed by prosecutors, veritable black holes that escaped scrutiny; that is if regulators in Washington were minding the store, which they weren't.
Years earlier, SEC investigators at the commission's Ft. Worth office uncovered evidence of wrongdoing. According to an explosive report by the SEC's Office of the Inspector General, Ft. Worth examiners launched a series of probes in 1997, 1998, 2002 and 2004 exploring SIB practices but their diligence was sabotaged by high-level officials.
That report, Investigation of the SEC's Response to Concerns Regarding Robert Allen Stanford's Alleged Ponzi Scheme, Case No. OIG-526, March 31, 2010, paints a damning picture of the regulatory process.
The inspector general states: "While the Fort Worth Examination group made multiple efforts after each examination to convince the Fort Worth Enforcement program ('Enforcement') to open and conduct an investigation of Stanford, no meaningful effort was made by Enforcement to investigate the potential fraud or to bring an action to attempt to stop it until late 2005."
Last month, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported that staff members, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared management retaliation, told the newspaper that higher-ups wanted "tools to do away with people who have a dissenting opinion."
Senior managers called the probes a "goat screw" and ordered them killed.
The OIG investigation "found that the former head of Enforcement in Fort Worth, who played a significant role in multiple decisions over the years to quash investigations of Stanford, sought to represent Stanford on three separate occasions after he left the Commission, and in fact represented Stanford briefly in 2006 before he was informed by the SEC Ethics Office that it was improper to do so." (emphasis added)
In Florida, The Miami Herald revealed that state regulators did the SEC one better and gave the bank carte blanche to operate secretly, moving "vast amounts of money offshore--without reporting a penny to regulators."
The arrangement between the bank and the Florida Office of Financial Regulation was so brazen, that Stanford's company "was allowed to sell hundreds of millions in bank notes without allowing regulators to check for fraud."
And once those suspect instruments were sold, the Herald reported that "employees shredded records of the trust agreements and CD purchases once the original documents were sent to Antigua, state records show."
A sweet deal if you can get it, or have powerful friends who might wish to avoid messy inquiries touching upon sensitive matters.
The New York Times reported last year that current charges "stem from an inquiry opened in October 2006," that is, nearly a decade "after a routine exam of Stanford Group, according to Stephen J. Korotash, an associate regional director of enforcement with the agency's Fort Worth office."
Korotash told the Times that the SEC "stood down" its investigation "at the request of another federal agency, which he declined to name."
According to BusinessWeek, in 2006 the Bush administration "bestowed on his intelligence czar ... broad authority, in the name of national security" to excuse companies from "their normal accounting and securities-disclosure obligations" if such disclosures revealed "certain top-secret defense projects."
At the time, William McLucas, the Securities and Exchange Commission's former enforcement chief told the publication that the ability to conceal financial information from regulators under the rubric of "national security" could lead some companies "to play fast and loose with their numbers."
The former official said, "it could be that you have a bunch of books and records out there that no one knows about."
In response to media reports, congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), wrote a letter to SEC Chair Mary Schapiro last year, demanding documents, and answers, why the SEC suspended investigations of the "Stanford Group under pressure from another unidentified federal agency."
The Ohio congressman said, "if this is true ... our subcommittee will demand that the SEC reveal the name of that agency which told it not to enforce federal laws which protect investors."
Neither documents nor answers were forthcoming.
Cynics might see something untoward here, but I think it's all just a coincidence, like drug planes bought with bundles of cash laundered through American banks.
Drug Probes Killed
In 1986 during the Iran-Contra period, Allen Stanford's Guardian International Bank set up shop on the sleepy Caribbean isle of Montserrat (pop. 5,870).
It didn't take long before the bank came under scrutiny. Guardian was the subject of a joint Scotland Yard-FBI investigation "into so-called 'brass-plate' banks," The Independent disclosed.
According to reporters David Connett and Stephen Foley, the bank "was suspected of laundering drug money from the notorious Medellin and Cali drug cartels run by Pablo Escobar and the Orejuela brothers."
During the Iran-Contra scandal, congressional investigators and journalists scrutinized links between Colombian drug traffickers and the CIA's Nicaraguan Contra army.
By 1986, evidence began to emerge that top Contra officials and the Agency enjoyed cosy ties with both Escobar and the Orejuela brothers. Under pressure from the Reagan administration however, both Congress and corporate media deep-sixed the story as the affair was covered-up.
A decade later, largely as a result of outrage generated by the late Gary Webb's Dark Alliance series, a memorandum of understanding between Reagan's Justice Department and the Agency entered the public record. That 1982 memo legally freed the CIA from reporting drug smuggling by their assets.
Former FBI agent Ross Gaffney who led the Guardian probe, told Connett and Foley that "we suspected that Stanford's bank was involved in money laundering." But before that investigation could be developed, Stanford suddenly pulled up stakes and "voluntarily surrendered his Montserrat banking licence and left the island."
Gaffney said that even after Guardian closed, the FBI "continued to take an interest in Stanford and set up a second inquiry into that bank after receiving intelligence that it continued to launder money for the Medellin and Cali cartels."
The former federal agent told The Independent, "We had hard intelligence about what he was doing and we began to develop it" but the investigation died or more likely, killed, by officials higher-up the food chain.
After leaving Montserrat, Stanford trained his sights on Antigua and Barbuda and developed a close relationship with former prime minister Lester Bird.
"Under the Bird family leadership" Connett and Foley reported, "the island was widely regarded as one of the most corrupt in the Caribbean, with well-documented links to arms and drug smuggling and money laundering."
According to The Independent, "in 1990, Israeli automatic weapons ordered by Mr Bird's brother Vere turned up in the hands of a notorious Colombian drug trafficker."
Despite suspicions, it appears that Stanford was golden as far as the feds were concerned; just another guy with an endless supply of "get-out-of-jail-free" cards.
One reason Stanford operated with impunity, the BBC informs us, is that he "may have been a US government informer."
DEA documents seen by BBC's investigative unit Panorama, suggest that "drug money [was] originally paid in to Stanford International Bank by agents acting for a feared Mexican drug lord known as the 'Lord of the Heavens'."
Confidential DEA sources believe that Stanford turned over "details of money-laundering from Latin American clients from Colombia, Mexico, Venezuela and Ecuador," thus "effectively guaranteeing himself a decade's worth of 'protection' from the authorities, especially the SEC."
"We were convinced that Stanford's bank attracted millions of narco-dollars," sources told Panorama, "but it was very difficult to get the evidence to nail him."
"The word is" BBC reported, "that Stanford has been a confidential informer for the DEA since '99."
Snitch or not, this raises intriguing questions.
Was Stanford's bank a black hole which U.S. intelligence agencies could exploit, in the interest of "national security" mind you, and therefore exempt from "normal disclosure obligations" as BusinessWeek averred?
If this were so, then even if Stanford were an informant he could have continued to launder drug money and profit nicely; such gentleman's agreements are not without precedent.
One need only glance at internal U.S. government documents released by the National Security Archive, documents which revealed the Cali cartel's close collaboration with corrupt Colombian police, neofascist paramilitaries and the CIA when Medellín drug lord Pablo Escobar was run to ground.
Pointedly, was Stanford's banking empire another in a long line of institutional channels that drug cartels and the CIA could both profit from?
Banks, Drugs and Covert Operations
Across the decades, historians, investigative journalists and researchers have uncovered strong evidence that various banks have served as virtual cut-outs for CIA covert operations.
Readers need only recall illegal activities by institutions as diverse as Paul Helliwell's Castle Bank and Trust in the Bahamas, Frank Nugan and Michael Hand's Nugan Hand Bank in Sydney and the Cayman Islands, or the far-flung empire of Agha Hasan Abedi's Bank and Credit and Commerce International.
Separated in time and geography, what all three banks had in common was their close proximity to international drug trafficking networks and the CIA, particularly in areas of acute interest to U.S. policy planners. Did Stanford International Bank have a similar arrangement with the Agency?
When the scandal finally broke, the Houston Chronicle reported that authorities had been "looking for ties to organized drug cartels and money laundering, going back at least a decade."
In the late 1990s, court documents revealed that "operatives of the Juarez cartel began opening accounts at Stanford's Antigua-based bank," laundering profits amassed by the Amado Carrillo Fuentes organization, the late "Lord of the Heavens" referred to in the BBC report.
The Chronicle notes that Fuentes' representatives "used Stanford International Bank to open 10 accounts and deposit $3 million." We should bear in mind however, these represent only known accounts. Were there others? Federal and state investigators have said that there were.
After authorities determined the accounts were held by a notorious drug cartel, Stanford turned over the $3 million. Yet despite hard evidence of criminal wrongdoing, federal officials told the Chronicle that "any alleged Stanford connection to drug cartels and their money could lie buried in the paperwork gathered for the Security and Exchange Commission's civil inquiry."
One might even say rather conveniently.
During the same period, Texas state securities regulators uncovered more evidence of money laundering by Stanford entities. But because it involved offshore banks, they "referred it" to the FBI and SEC.
Texas Securities Commissioner Denise Voigt Crawford told a Senate Finance Committee last year, "Why it took 10 years for the feds to move on it, I cannot answer."
Miffed by government foot-dragging, Crawford added, "We worked with the FBI and the SEC and basically gave them the case. We told them what we'd seen and they were going to run with it."
But that investigation died on the vine.
Echoing similar themes, The Observer disclosed an FBI source close to the investigation confirmed that the Bureau "was looking at links to international drug gangs as part of the huge investigation into Stanford's banking activities."
The Observer reported that Mexican authorities seized one of Stanford's private jets in connection with alleged links to the Gulf cartel and said that "cheques found inside the plane were linked to the cartel, which is one of the most violent criminal organisations in the world."
DEA sources told the London newspaper "there may well have been a trail connecting his Mexican affairs to narco-trafficking interests." However, a second DEA official told The Observer, "I think we'll find that any possible drug-related trail and SEC priorities are not all in the same frame."
A curious statement considering the billions of dollars in fraudulent activities alleged against the bank, some of which may have been derived from laundering drug money.
One would assume that evidence of serious wrongdoing would be motive enough to take a hard look at the allegations and not concoct a fairy tale that these charges lie "buried in the paperwork"!
A U.S. drug enforcement official told The Observer, "Any major US interest seeking to avoid fully disclosed investments would have to go to pretty careful lengths to avoid encountering cartel interests."
"Anyone seeking to conceal or launder money would find it in safe and lucrative hands were they to forge alliances with, rather than skirt, the cartels," The Observer noted, and would "find them accommodating in terms of remuneration." The official hastened to add, it's "nothing anyone will confirm for Stanford right now."
The question is: why?
A Full-Service Bank
One possible answer may revolve around charges that SIB's Venezuela branch was a conduit for laundered CIA funds.
If true, then the Agency would be dead set against trial disclosures that revealed the bank had been involved in laundering drug money, particularly if narcotics syndicates are playing a role in U.S. destabilization efforts there.
Months before Stanford's empire collapsed, Venezuela's socialist government launched a raid on SIB offices in Caracas.
The Daily Telegraph reported that "Sir Allen Stanford, the Texan billionaire ... is now at the centre of an international spying row."
The conservative British newspaper disclosed that "officials from Venezuelan military intelligence raided a branch of his offshore bank over claims that its employees were paid by the CIA to spy on the south American country."
Although corporate media in the U.S. dismissed Venezuelan allegations as propaganda, questions persist.
While on a charm offensive before his arrest last year, Stanford gave an interview to CNBC's Scott Cohn. When asked about claims that his bank may have been a cut-out for the Agency, this curious exchange took place:
Cohn: "You just by nature of your position and where you were got to know a lot of people in Latin America, in Africa, in Europe, around the world, and it strikes me that somebody in your position would be useful to the authorities in the US trying to find out what was going on there, what was going on in places like Venezuela. Can you tell me about any sort of role you played that way, were you helpful to the authorities in the US?"
Stanford: "Are you talking about the CIA?"
Cohn: "Well, you tell me."
Stanford: "I'm not going to talk about that."
Cohn: "Why not?"
Stanford: "I'm just not going to talk about that."
Cohn: "Well, I mean, am I--is my premise correct that someone in your position would be helpful to those who wanted to know what was going on?"
Stanford: "I really don't have anything to add to that that would be of any value."
Stanford's reticence is certainly understandable, considering Frank Hand's fate 30 years ago.
During a similar scandal when the CIA-linked Nugan Hand bank collapsed amid charges of fraud and drug money laundering, the chief executive turned up dead in his Mercedes with a shot to the head.
Despite evidence uncovered by investigations going back to the 1980s, drug money laundering charges or any reference to Agency activities will not figure in the Justice Department's case when Stanford goes on trial in January.
As ABC News delicately put it, SEC action against Stanford "may have complicated the federal drug case."
Underscoring the federal government's reluctance to explore this dark corner of Allen Stanford's career, it might do well to keep in mind what one airline executive told investigative journalist Daniel Hopsicker during his probe into the 9/11 attacks.
"Sometimes when things don't make business sense, its because they do make sense...just in some other way."
Tom Burghardt is a researcher and activist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition to publishing in Covert Action Quarterly and Global Research, an independent research and media group of writers, scholars, journalists and activists based in Montreal, his articles can be read onDissident Voice, The Intelligence Daily, Pacific Free Press, Uncommon Thought Journal, and the whistleblowing website Wikileaks. He is the editor of Police State America: U.S. Military "Civil Disturbance" Planning, distributed by AK Press.
The following is ripped from the internet and was written by Tom Burghardt follow the link above for the original artical.
In a scandal-plagued era such as ours, scarred by murderous wars, occupations and corruption that would make a Roman emperor blush, accused crooks have names; even juiced ones like R. Allen Stanford.
Last year, when a federal court in Texas handed down indictments charging Stanford International Bank (SIB) and its officers with "orchestrating a fraudulent, multibillion dollar investment scheme," I wondered: was there more to the story?
Indeed there was.
Once described by fawning media as a "flamboyant Texan" and "philanthropist," Stanford was founder and sole shareholder of a global banking empire once conservatively valued at $50 billion.
According to the federal indictment, "Sir Allen," as he was dubbed by a corrupt former minister of Antigua, ran a massive Ponzi scheme camouflaged as a bank that sold some $7 billion in self-styled "certificates of deposit" and $1.2 billion in mutual funds.
[For complete article features, please see original at Fascist Calling here.]
Operated from behind a façade of well-appointed offices and with a jet-set lifestyle to match, the Stanford grift may have been impressive but it was a scam from the get-go. Lured by "high rates that exceed those available through true certificates of deposits offered by traditional banks," thousands lost their shirts.
Those high rates were a lie and the bank's "unique investment strategy" about as legitimate as a penny-stock fraud or advance fee scam on the internet. Of the $8 billion hoovered up by the banker and his cronies, only about $500 million have been recovered.
Facing the prospect of years in prison, The Miami Herald reported that SIB's chief financial officer James Davis, once Stanford's college roommate and originally charged in the indictment, copped a plea to save his own neck.
Davis told the Justice Department that "his boss had been stealing from investors for decades while paying bribes to regulators and even performing blood oaths never to reveal his secrets."
Talk about a wise guy!
And with connections and generous pay-outs to U.S. politicians going back more than a decade, 65% of which went to Democrats including our "change" president, Allen Stanford was plugged-in.
Evidence also suggests he may have gotten an assist covering his tracks from regulators and U.S. secret state agencies, including the CIA.
SEC Stand Down
Allen Stanford did business the American way; he swindled depositors and then siphoned-off the proceeds into a spider's web of offshore accounts.
The indictment charges "it was part of the conspiracy that Stanford ... and others would cause the movement of millions of dollars of fraudulently obtained investors' funds from and among bank accounts located in the Southern District of Texas and elsewhere in the United States to various bank accounts located outside of the United States ... in order to exercise exclusive control over the investors' funds."
Auditors learned that funds were moved through Stanford-controlled accounts to offshore banks, including HSBC in London, Bank Julius Baer in Zurich and eight others; banks which have figured in past money laundering or tax-avoidance scandals. None have been charged with an offense in connection with the affair.
In all, 28 numbered accounts were listed by prosecutors, veritable black holes that escaped scrutiny; that is if regulators in Washington were minding the store, which they weren't.
Years earlier, SEC investigators at the commission's Ft. Worth office uncovered evidence of wrongdoing. According to an explosive report by the SEC's Office of the Inspector General, Ft. Worth examiners launched a series of probes in 1997, 1998, 2002 and 2004 exploring SIB practices but their diligence was sabotaged by high-level officials.
That report, Investigation of the SEC's Response to Concerns Regarding Robert Allen Stanford's Alleged Ponzi Scheme, Case No. OIG-526, March 31, 2010, paints a damning picture of the regulatory process.
The inspector general states: "While the Fort Worth Examination group made multiple efforts after each examination to convince the Fort Worth Enforcement program ('Enforcement') to open and conduct an investigation of Stanford, no meaningful effort was made by Enforcement to investigate the potential fraud or to bring an action to attempt to stop it until late 2005."
Last month, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported that staff members, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared management retaliation, told the newspaper that higher-ups wanted "tools to do away with people who have a dissenting opinion."
Senior managers called the probes a "goat screw" and ordered them killed.
The OIG investigation "found that the former head of Enforcement in Fort Worth, who played a significant role in multiple decisions over the years to quash investigations of Stanford, sought to represent Stanford on three separate occasions after he left the Commission, and in fact represented Stanford briefly in 2006 before he was informed by the SEC Ethics Office that it was improper to do so." (emphasis added)
In Florida, The Miami Herald revealed that state regulators did the SEC one better and gave the bank carte blanche to operate secretly, moving "vast amounts of money offshore--without reporting a penny to regulators."
The arrangement between the bank and the Florida Office of Financial Regulation was so brazen, that Stanford's company "was allowed to sell hundreds of millions in bank notes without allowing regulators to check for fraud."
And once those suspect instruments were sold, the Herald reported that "employees shredded records of the trust agreements and CD purchases once the original documents were sent to Antigua, state records show."
A sweet deal if you can get it, or have powerful friends who might wish to avoid messy inquiries touching upon sensitive matters.
The New York Times reported last year that current charges "stem from an inquiry opened in October 2006," that is, nearly a decade "after a routine exam of Stanford Group, according to Stephen J. Korotash, an associate regional director of enforcement with the agency's Fort Worth office."
Korotash told the Times that the SEC "stood down" its investigation "at the request of another federal agency, which he declined to name."
According to BusinessWeek, in 2006 the Bush administration "bestowed on his intelligence czar ... broad authority, in the name of national security" to excuse companies from "their normal accounting and securities-disclosure obligations" if such disclosures revealed "certain top-secret defense projects."
At the time, William McLucas, the Securities and Exchange Commission's former enforcement chief told the publication that the ability to conceal financial information from regulators under the rubric of "national security" could lead some companies "to play fast and loose with their numbers."
The former official said, "it could be that you have a bunch of books and records out there that no one knows about."
In response to media reports, congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), wrote a letter to SEC Chair Mary Schapiro last year, demanding documents, and answers, why the SEC suspended investigations of the "Stanford Group under pressure from another unidentified federal agency."
The Ohio congressman said, "if this is true ... our subcommittee will demand that the SEC reveal the name of that agency which told it not to enforce federal laws which protect investors."
Neither documents nor answers were forthcoming.
Cynics might see something untoward here, but I think it's all just a coincidence, like drug planes bought with bundles of cash laundered through American banks.
Drug Probes Killed
In 1986 during the Iran-Contra period, Allen Stanford's Guardian International Bank set up shop on the sleepy Caribbean isle of Montserrat (pop. 5,870).
It didn't take long before the bank came under scrutiny. Guardian was the subject of a joint Scotland Yard-FBI investigation "into so-called 'brass-plate' banks," The Independent disclosed.
According to reporters David Connett and Stephen Foley, the bank "was suspected of laundering drug money from the notorious Medellin and Cali drug cartels run by Pablo Escobar and the Orejuela brothers."
During the Iran-Contra scandal, congressional investigators and journalists scrutinized links between Colombian drug traffickers and the CIA's Nicaraguan Contra army.
By 1986, evidence began to emerge that top Contra officials and the Agency enjoyed cosy ties with both Escobar and the Orejuela brothers. Under pressure from the Reagan administration however, both Congress and corporate media deep-sixed the story as the affair was covered-up.
A decade later, largely as a result of outrage generated by the late Gary Webb's Dark Alliance series, a memorandum of understanding between Reagan's Justice Department and the Agency entered the public record. That 1982 memo legally freed the CIA from reporting drug smuggling by their assets.
Former FBI agent Ross Gaffney who led the Guardian probe, told Connett and Foley that "we suspected that Stanford's bank was involved in money laundering." But before that investigation could be developed, Stanford suddenly pulled up stakes and "voluntarily surrendered his Montserrat banking licence and left the island."
Gaffney said that even after Guardian closed, the FBI "continued to take an interest in Stanford and set up a second inquiry into that bank after receiving intelligence that it continued to launder money for the Medellin and Cali cartels."
The former federal agent told The Independent, "We had hard intelligence about what he was doing and we began to develop it" but the investigation died or more likely, killed, by officials higher-up the food chain.
After leaving Montserrat, Stanford trained his sights on Antigua and Barbuda and developed a close relationship with former prime minister Lester Bird.
"Under the Bird family leadership" Connett and Foley reported, "the island was widely regarded as one of the most corrupt in the Caribbean, with well-documented links to arms and drug smuggling and money laundering."
According to The Independent, "in 1990, Israeli automatic weapons ordered by Mr Bird's brother Vere turned up in the hands of a notorious Colombian drug trafficker."
Despite suspicions, it appears that Stanford was golden as far as the feds were concerned; just another guy with an endless supply of "get-out-of-jail-free" cards.
One reason Stanford operated with impunity, the BBC informs us, is that he "may have been a US government informer."
DEA documents seen by BBC's investigative unit Panorama, suggest that "drug money [was] originally paid in to Stanford International Bank by agents acting for a feared Mexican drug lord known as the 'Lord of the Heavens'."
Confidential DEA sources believe that Stanford turned over "details of money-laundering from Latin American clients from Colombia, Mexico, Venezuela and Ecuador," thus "effectively guaranteeing himself a decade's worth of 'protection' from the authorities, especially the SEC."
"We were convinced that Stanford's bank attracted millions of narco-dollars," sources told Panorama, "but it was very difficult to get the evidence to nail him."
"The word is" BBC reported, "that Stanford has been a confidential informer for the DEA since '99."
Snitch or not, this raises intriguing questions.
Was Stanford's bank a black hole which U.S. intelligence agencies could exploit, in the interest of "national security" mind you, and therefore exempt from "normal disclosure obligations" as BusinessWeek averred?
If this were so, then even if Stanford were an informant he could have continued to launder drug money and profit nicely; such gentleman's agreements are not without precedent.
One need only glance at internal U.S. government documents released by the National Security Archive, documents which revealed the Cali cartel's close collaboration with corrupt Colombian police, neofascist paramilitaries and the CIA when Medellín drug lord Pablo Escobar was run to ground.
Pointedly, was Stanford's banking empire another in a long line of institutional channels that drug cartels and the CIA could both profit from?
Banks, Drugs and Covert Operations
Across the decades, historians, investigative journalists and researchers have uncovered strong evidence that various banks have served as virtual cut-outs for CIA covert operations.
Readers need only recall illegal activities by institutions as diverse as Paul Helliwell's Castle Bank and Trust in the Bahamas, Frank Nugan and Michael Hand's Nugan Hand Bank in Sydney and the Cayman Islands, or the far-flung empire of Agha Hasan Abedi's Bank and Credit and Commerce International.
Separated in time and geography, what all three banks had in common was their close proximity to international drug trafficking networks and the CIA, particularly in areas of acute interest to U.S. policy planners. Did Stanford International Bank have a similar arrangement with the Agency?
When the scandal finally broke, the Houston Chronicle reported that authorities had been "looking for ties to organized drug cartels and money laundering, going back at least a decade."
In the late 1990s, court documents revealed that "operatives of the Juarez cartel began opening accounts at Stanford's Antigua-based bank," laundering profits amassed by the Amado Carrillo Fuentes organization, the late "Lord of the Heavens" referred to in the BBC report.
The Chronicle notes that Fuentes' representatives "used Stanford International Bank to open 10 accounts and deposit $3 million." We should bear in mind however, these represent only known accounts. Were there others? Federal and state investigators have said that there were.
After authorities determined the accounts were held by a notorious drug cartel, Stanford turned over the $3 million. Yet despite hard evidence of criminal wrongdoing, federal officials told the Chronicle that "any alleged Stanford connection to drug cartels and their money could lie buried in the paperwork gathered for the Security and Exchange Commission's civil inquiry."
One might even say rather conveniently.
During the same period, Texas state securities regulators uncovered more evidence of money laundering by Stanford entities. But because it involved offshore banks, they "referred it" to the FBI and SEC.
Texas Securities Commissioner Denise Voigt Crawford told a Senate Finance Committee last year, "Why it took 10 years for the feds to move on it, I cannot answer."
Miffed by government foot-dragging, Crawford added, "We worked with the FBI and the SEC and basically gave them the case. We told them what we'd seen and they were going to run with it."
But that investigation died on the vine.
Echoing similar themes, The Observer disclosed an FBI source close to the investigation confirmed that the Bureau "was looking at links to international drug gangs as part of the huge investigation into Stanford's banking activities."
The Observer reported that Mexican authorities seized one of Stanford's private jets in connection with alleged links to the Gulf cartel and said that "cheques found inside the plane were linked to the cartel, which is one of the most violent criminal organisations in the world."
DEA sources told the London newspaper "there may well have been a trail connecting his Mexican affairs to narco-trafficking interests." However, a second DEA official told The Observer, "I think we'll find that any possible drug-related trail and SEC priorities are not all in the same frame."
A curious statement considering the billions of dollars in fraudulent activities alleged against the bank, some of which may have been derived from laundering drug money.
One would assume that evidence of serious wrongdoing would be motive enough to take a hard look at the allegations and not concoct a fairy tale that these charges lie "buried in the paperwork"!
A U.S. drug enforcement official told The Observer, "Any major US interest seeking to avoid fully disclosed investments would have to go to pretty careful lengths to avoid encountering cartel interests."
"Anyone seeking to conceal or launder money would find it in safe and lucrative hands were they to forge alliances with, rather than skirt, the cartels," The Observer noted, and would "find them accommodating in terms of remuneration." The official hastened to add, it's "nothing anyone will confirm for Stanford right now."
The question is: why?
A Full-Service Bank
One possible answer may revolve around charges that SIB's Venezuela branch was a conduit for laundered CIA funds.
If true, then the Agency would be dead set against trial disclosures that revealed the bank had been involved in laundering drug money, particularly if narcotics syndicates are playing a role in U.S. destabilization efforts there.
Months before Stanford's empire collapsed, Venezuela's socialist government launched a raid on SIB offices in Caracas.
The Daily Telegraph reported that "Sir Allen Stanford, the Texan billionaire ... is now at the centre of an international spying row."
The conservative British newspaper disclosed that "officials from Venezuelan military intelligence raided a branch of his offshore bank over claims that its employees were paid by the CIA to spy on the south American country."
Although corporate media in the U.S. dismissed Venezuelan allegations as propaganda, questions persist.
While on a charm offensive before his arrest last year, Stanford gave an interview to CNBC's Scott Cohn. When asked about claims that his bank may have been a cut-out for the Agency, this curious exchange took place:
Cohn: "You just by nature of your position and where you were got to know a lot of people in Latin America, in Africa, in Europe, around the world, and it strikes me that somebody in your position would be useful to the authorities in the US trying to find out what was going on there, what was going on in places like Venezuela. Can you tell me about any sort of role you played that way, were you helpful to the authorities in the US?"
Stanford: "Are you talking about the CIA?"
Cohn: "Well, you tell me."
Stanford: "I'm not going to talk about that."
Cohn: "Why not?"
Stanford: "I'm just not going to talk about that."
Cohn: "Well, I mean, am I--is my premise correct that someone in your position would be helpful to those who wanted to know what was going on?"
Stanford: "I really don't have anything to add to that that would be of any value."
Stanford's reticence is certainly understandable, considering Frank Hand's fate 30 years ago.
During a similar scandal when the CIA-linked Nugan Hand bank collapsed amid charges of fraud and drug money laundering, the chief executive turned up dead in his Mercedes with a shot to the head.
Despite evidence uncovered by investigations going back to the 1980s, drug money laundering charges or any reference to Agency activities will not figure in the Justice Department's case when Stanford goes on trial in January.
As ABC News delicately put it, SEC action against Stanford "may have complicated the federal drug case."
Underscoring the federal government's reluctance to explore this dark corner of Allen Stanford's career, it might do well to keep in mind what one airline executive told investigative journalist Daniel Hopsicker during his probe into the 9/11 attacks.
"Sometimes when things don't make business sense, its because they do make sense...just in some other way."
Tom Burghardt is a researcher and activist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition to publishing in Covert Action Quarterly and Global Research, an independent research and media group of writers, scholars, journalists and activists based in Montreal, his articles can be read onDissident Voice, The Intelligence Daily, Pacific Free Press, Uncommon Thought Journal, and the whistleblowing website Wikileaks. He is the editor of Police State America: U.S. Military "Civil Disturbance" Planning, distributed by AK Press.
Allen Stanford and his American Crimes
Allen Stanford did business the American way; he swindled depositors and then siphoned-off the proceeds into a spider's web of offshore accounts.
Auditors learned that funds were moved through Stanford-controlled accounts to offshore banks, including HSBC in London, Bank Julius Baer in Zurich and eight others; banks which have figured in past money laundering or tax-avoidance scandals. None have been charged with an offense in connection with the affair.
In all, 28 numbered accounts were listed by prosecutors, veritable black holes that escaped scrutiny; that is if regulators in Washington were minding the store, which they weren't.
Years earlier, SEC investigators at the commission's Ft. Worth office uncovered evidence of wrongdoing. According to an explosive report by the SEC's Office of the Inspector General, Ft. Worth examiners launched a series of probes in 1997, 1998, 2002 and 2004 exploring SIB practices but their diligence was sabotaged by high-level officials.
Auditors learned that funds were moved through Stanford-controlled accounts to offshore banks, including HSBC in London, Bank Julius Baer in Zurich and eight others; banks which have figured in past money laundering or tax-avoidance scandals. None have been charged with an offense in connection with the affair.
In all, 28 numbered accounts were listed by prosecutors, veritable black holes that escaped scrutiny; that is if regulators in Washington were minding the store, which they weren't.
Years earlier, SEC investigators at the commission's Ft. Worth office uncovered evidence of wrongdoing. According to an explosive report by the SEC's Office of the Inspector General, Ft. Worth examiners launched a series of probes in 1997, 1998, 2002 and 2004 exploring SIB practices but their diligence was sabotaged by high-level officials.
Friday, July 23, 2010
Free Oil
Just head on down to the Gulf of Mexico which is mostly in the United States with a bucket and you can have all the oil you can scoop up.
Busted in Antigua for Drugs
The four men who were intercepted on a vessel in Antiguan waters in the country’s largest cocaine bust ever, are expected to be charged in a day or two as officials from the Organisation of National Drug and Money Laundering Control Policy (ONDCP) continue to conduct their investigations.
The Class A drug which was seized in a speedboat arriving from Venezuela on Wednesday, has a street value of EC $126,360,000.
The three Venezuelans and a Colombian, ranging in ages from 40 to 43, were captured in the southern section of the island.
The joint operation between the ONDCP and the Antigua & Barbuda Defence Force (ABDF), on Wednesday evening, netted 900 kilos (1,984.1 pounds) of cocaine.
“If the cocaine had arrived in the UK it would be sold at a street value of £90,000,000 while in the USA the street value would be approximately US $90,000,000,” a communiqué from the ONDCP read.
The illegal substance was found in more than 32 tightly wrapped and sealed plastic packages that were stacked in a large, black bag, amongst cargo.
The Director of ONDCP Lieutenant Colonel Edward Croft told The Daily OBSERVER, “We are indeed elated that we were able to make a contribution of peace and security through the interception of this very dangerous drug.
“This success would have saved the lives of hundreds of persons whether in Antigua & Barbuda, in the region or internationally. We are happy that Antigua & Barbuda was able to play its role in the fight against individuals who engage in criminal activity.
Colonel Croft said he was extremely pleased to know that his team played an integral role in keeping the illicit drugs off the streets.
“I’m just thankful of the women and men of the ONDCP and I also wish to recognise the professionalism of the Coast Guard and other agencies involved in the effort.”
The director has pledged to keep patrolling to protect the lives of residents.
This cocaine seizure, the largest in the history of Antigua & Barbuda is also possibly one of the largest within the Eastern Caribbean.
Just last month, an Antiguan and two Montserratian men were caught with $3.871 million worth of cocaine at the Deep Water Harbour. The 24 sealed packages totalled 27.4 kilos or 60.28 pounds. The men have since been charged and each released on $4 million bail. The matter is pending in the court.
Reprinted from the Daily Observer - Antigua
The Class A drug which was seized in a speedboat arriving from Venezuela on Wednesday, has a street value of EC $126,360,000.
The three Venezuelans and a Colombian, ranging in ages from 40 to 43, were captured in the southern section of the island.
The joint operation between the ONDCP and the Antigua & Barbuda Defence Force (ABDF), on Wednesday evening, netted 900 kilos (1,984.1 pounds) of cocaine.
“If the cocaine had arrived in the UK it would be sold at a street value of £90,000,000 while in the USA the street value would be approximately US $90,000,000,” a communiqué from the ONDCP read.
The illegal substance was found in more than 32 tightly wrapped and sealed plastic packages that were stacked in a large, black bag, amongst cargo.
The Director of ONDCP Lieutenant Colonel Edward Croft told The Daily OBSERVER, “We are indeed elated that we were able to make a contribution of peace and security through the interception of this very dangerous drug.
“This success would have saved the lives of hundreds of persons whether in Antigua & Barbuda, in the region or internationally. We are happy that Antigua & Barbuda was able to play its role in the fight against individuals who engage in criminal activity.
Colonel Croft said he was extremely pleased to know that his team played an integral role in keeping the illicit drugs off the streets.
“I’m just thankful of the women and men of the ONDCP and I also wish to recognise the professionalism of the Coast Guard and other agencies involved in the effort.”
The director has pledged to keep patrolling to protect the lives of residents.
This cocaine seizure, the largest in the history of Antigua & Barbuda is also possibly one of the largest within the Eastern Caribbean.
Just last month, an Antiguan and two Montserratian men were caught with $3.871 million worth of cocaine at the Deep Water Harbour. The 24 sealed packages totalled 27.4 kilos or 60.28 pounds. The men have since been charged and each released on $4 million bail. The matter is pending in the court.
Reprinted from the Daily Observer - Antigua
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
BP implodes
Don't say you did not hear it from me first but I did say it. BP is folding like a house of cards and there will be no money left before the year ends. The executives at BP are stuffing their pockets with as much gold as they can.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Monday, June 21, 2010
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
BP's Oil Spill song
This song is called BP’s Oil Spill, and it's about BP, and the
Oil Spill, but BP’s Oil Spill is not the name of the Oil Spill,
that's just the name of the song, and that's why I called the song BP's
Oil Spill.
You can get anything you want at BP’s Oil Spill
You can get anything you want at BP’s Oil Spill
Swim right in it's around the back
Just a half a mile from the oil rig stack
You can get anything you want at BP’s Oil Spill stack
Now it all started two May 24th 2010, was on - when my friend and I went up to visit BP at the Oil Spill, but BP doesn't live in the Oil Spill, they live in the
Mansion nearby the Oil Spill, in the bell-tower, with Tony Hayward and
Fasha the dog. And livin' in the bell tower like that, they got a lot of
room downstairs where the clean water used to be in. Havin' all that room,
seein' as how they took out all the clean water, they decided that they didn't
have to take out their oil for a long time.
We got up there, we found all the oil in there, and we decided it'd be
a friendly gesture for us to take the oil down to the gulf. So
we took the half a ton of oil, put it in the back of a red Grady white
Fishing boat took shovels and buckets and implements of destruction and headed on toward the Gulf Stream.
Well we got there and there was a big sign and a chain across across the
Gulf saying, "Closed to Polluters." And we had never heard of a gulf
closed before, and with tears in our eyes we sailed off
into the sunset looking for another place to put the oil.
We didn't find one. Until we came to a side of the gulf, and off the side of the
side gulf there was another fifteen foot wave and at the bottom of the
wave there was another spill of oil. And we decided that one big spill
is better than two little spills, and rather than bring that one up we
decided to pour our's in.
That's what we did, and sailed back to the rig, had a thanksgiving
dinner that couldn't be beat, went to sleep and didn't get up until the
next morning, when we got a phone call from officer Obama. He said, "Hayward, we found your name on an oil can at the bottom of a half a ton of
oil, and just wanted to know if you had any information about it." And
I said, "Yes, sir, Officer Obama, I cannot tell a lie, I put that oil can
under that spill."
After speaking to Obama for about fourty-five minutes on the telephone we
finally arrived at the truth of the matter and said that we had to go down
and lick up the oil, and also had to go down and speak to him at the
White House. So we got in the red Grady white Fishing Boat with the
shovels and pails and implements of destruction and headed on toward the
Presidents White House.
Now friends, there was only one or two things that Obama coulda done at
the White House, and the first was he could have given us a medal for
being so brave and honest on the telephone, which wasn't very likely, and
we didn't expect it, and the other thing was he could have bawled us out
and told us never to be seen drilling oil around the vicinity again,
which is what we expected, but when we got to the President’s White House
there was a third possibility that we hadn't even counted upon, and we was
both immediately arrested. Handcuffed. And I said "Obama, I don't think I
can lick up the oil with these handcuffs on." He said, "Shut up, Hayward.
Get in the back of the patrol car."
And that's what we did, sat in the back of the patrol car and drove to the
quote Scene of the Crime unquote. I want tell you about the Gulf of Mexico where this happened here, they got a lot of bouys and signs, two police officers, and one police car, but when we got to the
Scene of the Crime there was 1200 boats and three hundred police cars,
being the biggest oil spill since the Exxon Valdez, and everybody wanted to
get in the newspaper story about it. And they was using up all kinds of
government equipment that they had hanging around the federal officers station.
They was taking oil samples, water samples, salad oil samples, and
they took twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy photographs with circles and deep sea video and arrows and a paragraphs on the back of each one explaining what each
one was to be used as evidence against us. Took pictures of the approach,
the getaway, the northwest corner the southwest corner and that's not to
mention the aerial photography.
After the ordeal, we went back to the jail. Obama said he was going to put
us in the cell. Said, "Hayward, I'm going to put you in the cell, I want your
wallet and your belt." And I said, "Obama, I can understand you wanting my
wallet so I don't have any money to spend in the cell, but what do you
want my belt for?" And he said, "Hayward, we don't want any hangings." I
said, "Obama, did you think I was going to hang myself for Polluting America?"
Obama said he was making sure, and friends Obama was, cause he took out the
toilet seat so I couldn't hit myself over the head and drown, and he took
out the toilet paper so I couldn't bend the bars roll out the - roll the
toilet paper out the window, slide down the roll and have an escape. Obama
was making sure, and it was about four or five hours later that BP
(remember BP? It's a song about BP), BP came by and with a few
nasty words to Obama on the side, bailed us out of jail, and we went back
to the oil rig, had a another thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat,
and didn't get up until the next morning, when we all had to go to court.
We Sailed in, sat down, Obama came in with the twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten
colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back
of each one, sat down. Man came in said, "All rise." We all stood up,
and Obama stood up with the twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures, and the judge Sailed in sat down with a seeing eye dog, and he
sat down, we sat down. Obama looked at the seeing eye dog, and then at the
twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows
and a paragraph on the back of each one, and looked at the seeing eye dog.
And then at twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles
and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one and began to cry,
'cause Obama came to the realization that it was a typical case of Oil Company payoff justice, and there wasn't nothing he could do about it, and the
judge wasn't going to look at the twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures with the circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each
one explaining what each one was to be used as evidence against us. And
we was fined $50,000 and had lick up the oil in the sun, but thats not
what I came to tell you about.
Came to talk about deep water drilling,
They got a building down Washington D.C, it's called the oil drilling permit office,
where you buy in, you get injected, inspected, detected, infected,
neglected and selected. I went down to get my oil rig examination one
day, and I Swam in, I sat down, got good and drunk the night before, so
I looked and felt my best when I went in that morning. `Cause I wanted to
look like the Oil King kid from BP, man I wanted, I wanted
to feel like the all-, I wanted to be the Oil King from BP,
and I Swam in, sat down, I was hung down, brung down, hung up, and all
kinds o' mean nasty ugly things. And I walked in and sat down and they gave
me a piece of paper, said, "Hayward, see the phsychiatrist, room 604."
And I went up there, I said, "Shrink, I want to pollute. I mean, I wanna, I
wanna pollute. Pollute. I wanna, I wanna see, I wanna see oil and slime and
grease and dead birds in my teeth. Eat dead oily bodies. I mean pollute, Pollute,
Pollute, Pollute." And I started jumpin up and down yelling, "Pollute, Pollute," and
he started jumpin up and down with me and we was both jumping up and down
yelling, "Pollute, Pollute." And the Coast Guard came over, pinned a medal on me,
sent me down the hall, said, "You're our Hayward."
Oil Spill, but BP’s Oil Spill is not the name of the Oil Spill,
that's just the name of the song, and that's why I called the song BP's
Oil Spill.
You can get anything you want at BP’s Oil Spill
You can get anything you want at BP’s Oil Spill
Swim right in it's around the back
Just a half a mile from the oil rig stack
You can get anything you want at BP’s Oil Spill stack
Now it all started two May 24th 2010, was on - when my friend and I went up to visit BP at the Oil Spill, but BP doesn't live in the Oil Spill, they live in the
Mansion nearby the Oil Spill, in the bell-tower, with Tony Hayward and
Fasha the dog. And livin' in the bell tower like that, they got a lot of
room downstairs where the clean water used to be in. Havin' all that room,
seein' as how they took out all the clean water, they decided that they didn't
have to take out their oil for a long time.
We got up there, we found all the oil in there, and we decided it'd be
a friendly gesture for us to take the oil down to the gulf. So
we took the half a ton of oil, put it in the back of a red Grady white
Fishing boat took shovels and buckets and implements of destruction and headed on toward the Gulf Stream.
Well we got there and there was a big sign and a chain across across the
Gulf saying, "Closed to Polluters." And we had never heard of a gulf
closed before, and with tears in our eyes we sailed off
into the sunset looking for another place to put the oil.
We didn't find one. Until we came to a side of the gulf, and off the side of the
side gulf there was another fifteen foot wave and at the bottom of the
wave there was another spill of oil. And we decided that one big spill
is better than two little spills, and rather than bring that one up we
decided to pour our's in.
That's what we did, and sailed back to the rig, had a thanksgiving
dinner that couldn't be beat, went to sleep and didn't get up until the
next morning, when we got a phone call from officer Obama. He said, "Hayward, we found your name on an oil can at the bottom of a half a ton of
oil, and just wanted to know if you had any information about it." And
I said, "Yes, sir, Officer Obama, I cannot tell a lie, I put that oil can
under that spill."
After speaking to Obama for about fourty-five minutes on the telephone we
finally arrived at the truth of the matter and said that we had to go down
and lick up the oil, and also had to go down and speak to him at the
White House. So we got in the red Grady white Fishing Boat with the
shovels and pails and implements of destruction and headed on toward the
Presidents White House.
Now friends, there was only one or two things that Obama coulda done at
the White House, and the first was he could have given us a medal for
being so brave and honest on the telephone, which wasn't very likely, and
we didn't expect it, and the other thing was he could have bawled us out
and told us never to be seen drilling oil around the vicinity again,
which is what we expected, but when we got to the President’s White House
there was a third possibility that we hadn't even counted upon, and we was
both immediately arrested. Handcuffed. And I said "Obama, I don't think I
can lick up the oil with these handcuffs on." He said, "Shut up, Hayward.
Get in the back of the patrol car."
And that's what we did, sat in the back of the patrol car and drove to the
quote Scene of the Crime unquote. I want tell you about the Gulf of Mexico where this happened here, they got a lot of bouys and signs, two police officers, and one police car, but when we got to the
Scene of the Crime there was 1200 boats and three hundred police cars,
being the biggest oil spill since the Exxon Valdez, and everybody wanted to
get in the newspaper story about it. And they was using up all kinds of
government equipment that they had hanging around the federal officers station.
They was taking oil samples, water samples, salad oil samples, and
they took twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy photographs with circles and deep sea video and arrows and a paragraphs on the back of each one explaining what each
one was to be used as evidence against us. Took pictures of the approach,
the getaway, the northwest corner the southwest corner and that's not to
mention the aerial photography.
After the ordeal, we went back to the jail. Obama said he was going to put
us in the cell. Said, "Hayward, I'm going to put you in the cell, I want your
wallet and your belt." And I said, "Obama, I can understand you wanting my
wallet so I don't have any money to spend in the cell, but what do you
want my belt for?" And he said, "Hayward, we don't want any hangings." I
said, "Obama, did you think I was going to hang myself for Polluting America?"
Obama said he was making sure, and friends Obama was, cause he took out the
toilet seat so I couldn't hit myself over the head and drown, and he took
out the toilet paper so I couldn't bend the bars roll out the - roll the
toilet paper out the window, slide down the roll and have an escape. Obama
was making sure, and it was about four or five hours later that BP
(remember BP? It's a song about BP), BP came by and with a few
nasty words to Obama on the side, bailed us out of jail, and we went back
to the oil rig, had a another thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat,
and didn't get up until the next morning, when we all had to go to court.
We Sailed in, sat down, Obama came in with the twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten
colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back
of each one, sat down. Man came in said, "All rise." We all stood up,
and Obama stood up with the twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures, and the judge Sailed in sat down with a seeing eye dog, and he
sat down, we sat down. Obama looked at the seeing eye dog, and then at the
twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows
and a paragraph on the back of each one, and looked at the seeing eye dog.
And then at twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles
and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one and began to cry,
'cause Obama came to the realization that it was a typical case of Oil Company payoff justice, and there wasn't nothing he could do about it, and the
judge wasn't going to look at the twenty seven thousand eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures with the circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each
one explaining what each one was to be used as evidence against us. And
we was fined $50,000 and had lick up the oil in the sun, but thats not
what I came to tell you about.
Came to talk about deep water drilling,
They got a building down Washington D.C, it's called the oil drilling permit office,
where you buy in, you get injected, inspected, detected, infected,
neglected and selected. I went down to get my oil rig examination one
day, and I Swam in, I sat down, got good and drunk the night before, so
I looked and felt my best when I went in that morning. `Cause I wanted to
look like the Oil King kid from BP, man I wanted, I wanted
to feel like the all-, I wanted to be the Oil King from BP,
and I Swam in, sat down, I was hung down, brung down, hung up, and all
kinds o' mean nasty ugly things. And I walked in and sat down and they gave
me a piece of paper, said, "Hayward, see the phsychiatrist, room 604."
And I went up there, I said, "Shrink, I want to pollute. I mean, I wanna, I
wanna pollute. Pollute. I wanna, I wanna see, I wanna see oil and slime and
grease and dead birds in my teeth. Eat dead oily bodies. I mean pollute, Pollute,
Pollute, Pollute." And I started jumpin up and down yelling, "Pollute, Pollute," and
he started jumpin up and down with me and we was both jumping up and down
yelling, "Pollute, Pollute." And the Coast Guard came over, pinned a medal on me,
sent me down the hall, said, "You're our Hayward."
Friday, June 11, 2010
Project ARK, now is the time to start
Project ARK, now is the time to start
I would like to propose "Project ARK". My concept is for fish farms wildlife sanctuaries and aquariums to be built along the Gulf States with the purpose of preserving the different species of the area.
In doing such a project that I believe should be funded mostly by BP and completely by all those drilling in the Gulf would not only help to preserve but also create jobs, and save some of the fishing industry and preserve it until some kind of clean up can be done.
We have killed, not injured, not damaged we have killed a large section of the planet during this spill. Now not later is the time to start our ARK.
I hope through this post someone can help get this message out so the process to save what’s left can begin before it is gone forever.
I would like to propose "Project ARK". My concept is for fish farms wildlife sanctuaries and aquariums to be built along the Gulf States with the purpose of preserving the different species of the area.
In doing such a project that I believe should be funded mostly by BP and completely by all those drilling in the Gulf would not only help to preserve but also create jobs, and save some of the fishing industry and preserve it until some kind of clean up can be done.
We have killed, not injured, not damaged we have killed a large section of the planet during this spill. Now not later is the time to start our ARK.
I hope through this post someone can help get this message out so the process to save what’s left can begin before it is gone forever.
Monday, June 7, 2010
The end of the world by BP
I've lost track what day is this? 48, 49 and dying? The earth is dying and when aliens come here they will find a sign over our planet "Humans Rest In Peace" This sign by BP.
Monday, May 31, 2010
BP oil spill Solution
So everyone has a solution why not me?
Solution for the BP problem. As a Scuba diver I make the following suggestion. Use a Y shaped valve. One side open the other side to a hose or pipe to the surface. Once the connector is slipped over the leak then a valve on the open side could be closed diverting the oil up to the side with the pipe. As long as they keep trying to put their devices over the leak with out a way to vent the system at that depth they will continue to fail.
It's really a simple process that is being over complicated.
Did you ever hear the story of the child that figured out to simply let the air out of the truck tires to get it under the bridge? Same thing. They keep trying to put something over a busted pipe that has pressure but the pressure just keeps blowing them away. it needs to be vented until its on. Once on just redirect the flow.
I know it sounds too easy but it really is that simple. You can't fight all that pressure you can redirect it. Liquids flow you can't stop them you must redirect them.
Solution for the BP problem. As a Scuba diver I make the following suggestion. Use a Y shaped valve. One side open the other side to a hose or pipe to the surface. Once the connector is slipped over the leak then a valve on the open side could be closed diverting the oil up to the side with the pipe. As long as they keep trying to put their devices over the leak with out a way to vent the system at that depth they will continue to fail.
It's really a simple process that is being over complicated.
Did you ever hear the story of the child that figured out to simply let the air out of the truck tires to get it under the bridge? Same thing. They keep trying to put something over a busted pipe that has pressure but the pressure just keeps blowing them away. it needs to be vented until its on. Once on just redirect the flow.
I know it sounds too easy but it really is that simple. You can't fight all that pressure you can redirect it. Liquids flow you can't stop them you must redirect them.
Friday, May 28, 2010
BP and the disaster
Tony Hayward of BP and Benjamin Linus of LOST....
Does anyone see anything freaky going on? The series finale and then the disaster? Could it be DARMA!
BP a/k/a Big Polluters and Boycott BP
Here we are its been 6 weeks! and still the oil is pumping in to the Gulf. The entire region is destroyed and government is still busing trying to figure out who to Blame.
Boycott BP
Boycott BP
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