“Dead Broke” – Meet the Clintons’ $100,000 3-Week Hampton Rental

Submitted by Mike Krieger of Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

If being “dead broke” means dropping $100k on a 3-week rental in the Hamptons, then I’d like to be dead broke too.

In case you aren’t aware of what I’m referring to, recall that:

Clinton told ABC’s Diane Sawyer in a June interview, “We came out of the White House not only dead broke, but in debt.” The former first lady cited legal fees that she and her husband had to pay during his White House tenure.

Of course, this is total nonsense. The only true part about that statement is they were indeed “dead broke” compared to the oligarch level of wealth they have attained since. After all, delivering speeches to very wealthy, bailed out financial criminals pays extraordinarily well. 

So what’s a dead broke couple to do? Spend six figures on a Hamptons rental naturally. From the Daily News:

Former President Bill Clinton and ex-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are slated to arrive in the Hamptons hamlet of Amagansett Thursday, where they’re renting a palatial home owned by private art collector Andre Nasser and his wife Lois.

 

The political power couple will reportedly pay a total $100,000 for the three-week stay.

 

That’s quite a chunk of change but pales in comparison to the $200,000 they dropped on a Sagaponack hideaway last year.

 

The Clintons are likely to run into a string of celebrities during their stay. Their other next-door neighbor will be their close friend, Hollywood movie mogul Harvey Weinstein.

The rabble need not apply. So are you Ready for Oligarchy?

Screen Shot 2014-08-10 at 11.15.15 AM

 

Full article here.




via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1suwHpj Tyler Durden

"Dead Broke" – Meet the Clintons' $100,000 3-Week Hampton Rental

Submitted by Mike Krieger of Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

If being “dead broke” means dropping $100k on a 3-week rental in the Hamptons, then I’d like to be dead broke too.

In case you aren’t aware of what I’m referring to, recall that:

Clinton told ABC’s Diane Sawyer in a June interview, “We came out of the White House not only dead broke, but in debt.” The former first lady cited legal fees that she and her husband had to pay during his White House tenure.

Of course, this is total nonsense. The only true part about that statement is they were indeed “dead broke” compared to the oligarch level of wealth they have attained since. After all, delivering speeches to very wealthy, bailed out financial criminals pays extraordinarily well. 

So what’s a dead broke couple to do? Spend six figures on a Hamptons rental naturally. From the Daily News:

Former President Bill Clinton and ex-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are slated to arrive in the Hamptons hamlet of Amagansett Thursday, where they’re renting a palatial home owned by private art collector Andre Nasser and his wife Lois.

 

The political power couple will reportedly pay a total $100,000 for the three-week stay.

 

That’s quite a chunk of change but pales in comparison to the $200,000 they dropped on a Sagaponack hideaway last year.

 

The Clintons are likely to run into a string of celebrities during their stay. Their other next-door neighbor will be their close friend, Hollywood movie mogul Harvey Weinstein.

The rabble need not apply. So are you Ready for Oligarchy?

Screen Shot 2014-08-10 at 11.15.15 AM

 

Full article here.




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A. Barton Hinkle on Crony Capitalism and the Export-Import Bank

If you want a pluperfect example to epitomize the
stupidity of America’s team-sports approach to politics, look no
further than the Export-Import Bank. Once upon a time, liberals
condemned Ex-Im. It was “little more than a fund for corporate
welfare,” candidate Barack Obama said in 2008. Left-wingers
routinely deplored the way the bank did big favors for big
businesses such as Boeing and Enron, at the expense of the little
guy both at home and abroad. But lately, writes A. Barton Hinkle,
the bank—it’s actually a government agency—has come under fire from
tea party populists, too. They oppose it for many of the reasons
liberals did, plus one more: its distortion of the free market.
Government, they say, should not be picking winners and losers.

Lo and behold, suddenly Ex-Im is becoming a cause célèbre on the
left, with so-called progressives like Elizabeth Warren rushing to
its defense. Apparently, Hinkle writes, some folks would rather
think the other side is wrong than be right themselves.

View this article.

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California Congressman Wants to Ban Civilians from Buying Body Armor

California is already notorious
for its strict regulations on firearms, but now one public servant
in the golden state wants to take that prohibition-happy mindset in
a new direction by banning body armor.

The bill, H.R.
5344, the Responsible Body Armor Possession Act of 2014
, comes
from Rep. Michae Honda, a San Jose Democrat, and it would “prohibit
the purchase, ownership, or possession of enhanced body armor by
civilians, with exceptions.” That is to say, Honda wants to treat
innocent civilians like
convicted felons
.

Honda announced the legislation last week at a press conference
with various law enforcement officials in his district who have
endorsed the propsal. From
NBC
:

“This bill will keep military body armor out of the wrong
hands,” Honda said. “It would ensure that only law enforcement,
firefighters and other first responders would be able to access
enhanced body armor.”

“We’re not talking about just a standard bullet-proof vest,” he
said. “We’re talking about body armor that is designed for warfare,
designed to protect against law enforcement ammunitions.” …

“There’s nothing more dangerous than an unstoppable,
well-armored shooter,” he said. “The law enforcement community sees
an increase in use of body armor in violent, gun-related
crimes.”

The congressman cited a shooting on July 22 in Riverside County,
where a man wearing body armor and armed with an assault rifle shot
and killed two sheriff’s deputies and wounded another.

“We should be asking ourselves, why is this armor available to
just anyone, if it was designed to be used only by our soldiers to
take to war?” Honda said.

Of course, Honda is overlooking a lot of other
scenarios, and outright ignoring the possibility that law-abiding
citizens would have any reason to wear protective garments, whether
they’re in danger from armed criminals or a no-knock police raid
gone awry. The San Jose Police Department’s ethics are questionable
already: One of its former chiefs has been sounding
the alarm
for years about the dangers of police militarization,
meawhile the department has been
pushing
for greater surveillance capabilities and was just

caught lying
about owning a camera-equipped drone. Even if the
force were squeaky clean, its
snipers
, air
support
, and camo-covered SWAT
team
, cannot and should not be expected to be there to protect
every endangered individual.

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Harsher Sex Offender Restrictions Won’t Make Anyone Safer

Chain gangSteve
Blow
 and Josh
Gravens
 are two of my new heroes. I met them both when I
went to Dallas three weeks ago to speak at the Reform Sex Offender
Laws
 convention. Gravens is a sex offender who also spoke
at the convention. I went with him to see what it’s like to
register and that
became a story in itself
.

Blow is a beloved columnist at The Dallas Morning
News
. He’s a local institution. Last week, he wrote a column

about me
 and Free Range Kids.

In
his latest column
, Blow talks to Gravens and explains why harsh
laws restricting sex offenders’ movements are unwise:

We’ve talked here lately about how our laws on sexual misconduct
have gone badly overboard. And now the City Council looks at
joining in.

In a briefing session last week, the council heard a proposal to
impose residency restrictions on registered sex offenders — setting
distances on how far they must live from parks and schools and
such.

Josh, a Lake Highlands resident, was among those who spoke
against the idea. He introduced his wife and five children.

Josh and I talked at length the next day. “It would be one thing
if these residency restrictions had some proven safety benefit,” he
said. “But there is not one study that has found any benefit.”

Don’t take his word for it. Here’s what the experts say:
“Residence restrictions are simply not a feasible strategy for
preventing child sexual abuse.” That’s from the Association for the
Treatment of Sexual Abusers.

free-range-kids

Blow goes on to quote more experts who concur “that—contrary to
popular belief—registered sex offenders have one of the very lowest
recidivism rates.”

Really, it is very hard to get anyone to believe that point,
although all
the evidence
 (as opposed to hearsay) I’ve seen reaches the
same conclusion.

The evidence also concludes that 1) Residency restrictions don’t
make anyone safer, although they do make it very hard for sex
offenders to live normal lives and hence gives them less incentive
not to re-offend. And 2) Sex offender lists are teeming with people
like Gravens who pose no actual threat to kids. As Blow
concludes:

Evidence is mounting that our broad-brush approach to sex
offenders is doing more harm than good. We mistakenly came to
equate “sex offender” with “pedophile predator.”

A tiny percentage truly fall into that second category. And they
need close monitoring, which can be accomplished through better
parole and probation oversight.

The rest pose little or no threat of re-offending. And we only
increase that possibility by preventing them from working, from
living in decent housing, from reuniting with family.

It may take a bit of courage, but if the Dallas City Council
wants to make a decision based on evidence, it will stay off the
hysteria bandwagon.

Amen.

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The Credit Bubble’s “Final Frontier” – Meet Goldman’s Fixed Income Global Structured Covered Obligation

Fixed Income Global Structured Covered Obligation. Say that three times fast.

According to yesterday’s Wall Street Journal, the bailed out financial criminals at Goldman Sachs are set to launch the latest and greatest toxic derivative product directly into the portfolios of willing muppets the world over. It all starts this September, so public pension funds may as well just start taking out stacks of hundreds and torching them at Burning Man while they still have a chance.

Yes, it’s called the “Fixed Income Global Structured Covered Obligation,” and no, you will not have a clue what’s in it. No seriously, you won’t have a clue. continue reading

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No Clever Innovation Goes Unpunished: Maine Shuts Down Really Awesome Food Boat


Not lobster girl. Lobster woman.
The Portland (Maine)
Press Herald
had a fun slice-of-life feature on their hands.
They found a woman, Reilly Harvey, who takes a small boat out into
the state’s waters full of delicious homemade pies and entire
lobster dinners to sell to boaters.
Here’s a quick, mouth-watering description
:

The desserts were just the beginning. Harvey’s boat, Mainstay,
is rigged with a three-burner propane stove set in the stern, and
three pots sat waiting for lobster, clams and butter, all of which
Harvey had aboard. There were tubs of cauliflower-curry tofu salads
with yogurt-lime-cilantro dressing and homemade biscuits that had
come out of the oven less than an hour ago. Very deliberately,
Harvey tries to make Mainstay look like a boat you’d see on a
Venetian canal, loaded down with beautifully arranged wares. She’d
succeeded. The vase full of flowers tipped the whole thing over the
top. Her new customers couldn’t stop gushing. “This is like a
Fellini movie,” said Peter Polshek, as the dog made a valiant
attempt to board.

By now his wife, Nina Hofer, was perched on the gunwale of the
Adeline, smiling like the Cheshire cat, her hands clapped together
in glee. “Who are you and where are you coming from?” she asked
Harvey.

I want one to show up here right now, even though I’m about
eight miles from the Pacific Ocean, very, very far away from
Harvey. She started her business in 2012, looking for a way to
build a stable life for herself in the area. The Press
Herald
thoroughly profiles her background and tags along as
she serves happy boaters thrilled at the opportunity to buy fresh
food without having to leave the water.

The day after the story appeared in the newspaper it was over.
The state shut her down. There are rules, man! Where are her sinks?
She has to have running water! From the Press Herald’s

follow-up coverage
:

“It makes me feel sick to my stomach and sad,” said Reilly
Harvey, who runs Mainstay Provisions out of an old boat she keeps
on Andrews Island. Harvey said she was contacted by a state health
inspector and told she must pass health inspection standards for
mobile vendors – think food trucks – and get her vintage 22-foot
wooden launch, the Mainstay, fitted with sinks and hot and cold
running water if she is going to continue to serve hot food.

That licensing would happen through the Division of
Environmental Health’s inspection program. If she wants to continue
to serve desserts, she must pass an additional inspection by the
Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry.

There are only 3½ weeks left in her season. Unless she is able
to comply with the regulations, it is unlikely she’ll be able to
operate Mainstay Provisions as usual in 2014.

The state requires her to add to her little boat a three-bay
sink and a separate hand sink, and must have hot and cold running
water and follow the same rules as food trucks. They also
complained about her being barefoot in the boat. They’ve offered to
“expedite” her application as soon as she gets one in, though it’s
unclear in the story how her small boat could meet these
requirements. It sounds like she may be done, at least for this
summer season.

(Hat tip to Jayel
Aheram
)

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Ukraine Says 45,000 Russian Troops On Border With Tanks, Missiles, Warplans And Attack Helicopters

Another day, another round of the usual warmongering soundbites, because someone clearly is on a mission to escalate the cross border hostilities into all out war. From Reuters:

  • UKRAINE MILITARY SPOKESMAN LYSENKO SAYS RUSSIA HAS 45,000 TROOPS ON ITS BORDER WITH UKRAINE WITH TANKS, MISSILE SYSTEMS, WARPLANES AND ATTACK HELICOPTERS

Meanwhile:

  • RUSSIA’S PUTIN TELLS EU’S BARROSO BY TELEPHONE THAT RUSSIA IS COORDINATING WITH INTERNATIONAL RED CROSS ON SENDING HUMANITARIAN AID TO UKRAINE – KREMLIN

It gets better, from Bloomberg:

  • BARROSO WARNS PUTIN AGAINST UNILATERAL MILITARY ACTIONS

Or else…

And concluding the comedy, from Interfax:

  • LAVROV SAYS ALL DETAILS OF HUMANITARIAN MISSION AGREED WITH UKRAINE GOVT, EXPRESSES HOPE MISSION WILL TAKE PLACE SOON
    RUSSIA HOPES THAT HUMANITARIAN ACTION FOR DONBAS WILL NOT BE OBSTRUCTED BY PARTNERS – LAVROV
  • LAVROV: IF MEDIA REPORTS, SAYING THAT BRITISH, FRENCH, GERMANY LEADERS AGREED NO NEED FOR HUMANITARIAN AID EXISTS IN UKRAINE, ARE TRUE, THIS IS OUTRAGEOUS CYNICISM MANIFESTATION
  • INTRODUCTION OF FOOD IMPORT RESTRICTIONS CONDITIONED, AMONG OTHER THINGS, WITH SANCTIONS AGAINST RUSSIAN AGRICULTURAL BANK, WHICH COMPLICATES FINANCING AGRICULTURE PRODUCERS – LAVROV
  • IT IS HARD TO CALL GOOD PARTNERS THE COUNTRIES UNITING AGAINST RUSSIA – LAVROV
  • LAVROV: ONE MAY GET THE IMPRESSION THAT THE COUNTERTERRORISM OPERATION IN UKRAINE AIMS TO WIPE OFF SOUTHEASTERN UKRAINE FROM THE FACE OF THE EARTH AND TO MAKE ALL RUSSIANS GO

Then again, judging by today’s latest plunge in the VIX, it is quite clear that the most recent warning by the TBAC against low vol and complacent markets, almost had an impact.




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Forget iPhones – 100s Of Russians (& Mickey Rourke) Line-Up For Putin T-Shirts

While the West is used to long lines of people waiting patiently for the next big thing from Apple, it appears there is another ‘must-own’ item this summer. As Sky reports, hundreds of people have gathered in one of Moscow’s most expensive stores to buy T-shirts with Vladimir Putin’s picture on them. Somewhat amusingly, among the crowd was no lesser celebrity than Mickey Rourke who snapped one up.

 

 

 

As Sky reports,

Anna Trifonova and Ivan Yershov, known as the Anyavanya design duo, said their collection was inspired by Russia’s numerous victories on the international stage, such as the Sochi Olympics triumph, the world ice hockey championship and reunification with Crimea.

 

Their stall at Moscow’s prestigious GUM department store gathered crowds as some 7,000 new T-shirts went on sale. They sell for 1,200 roubles ($33). Putin fans can also buy an iPhone case for 600 rubles ($17).

 

In early June, some 5,000 Putin T-shirts sold out in one day.

 

The collection has 15 T-shirt prints, including Putin wearing military camouflage with the slogan “The politest of people,” and Putin on horseback, with the slogan “They’re not gonna get us”.

*  *  *




via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1uiqHRf Tyler Durden

Forget iPhones – 100s Of Russians (& Mickey Rourke) Line-Up For Putin T-Shirts

While the West is used to long lines of people waiting patiently for the next big thing from Apple, it appears there is another ‘must-own’ item this summer. As Sky reports, hundreds of people have gathered in one of Moscow’s most expensive stores to buy T-shirts with Vladimir Putin’s picture on them. Somewhat amusingly, among the crowd was no lesser celebrity than Mickey Rourke who snapped one up.

 

 

 

As Sky reports,

Anna Trifonova and Ivan Yershov, known as the Anyavanya design duo, said their collection was inspired by Russia’s numerous victories on the international stage, such as the Sochi Olympics triumph, the world ice hockey championship and reunification with Crimea.

 

Their stall at Moscow’s prestigious GUM department store gathered crowds as some 7,000 new T-shirts went on sale. They sell for 1,200 roubles ($33). Putin fans can also buy an iPhone case for 600 rubles ($17).

 

In early June, some 5,000 Putin T-shirts sold out in one day.

 

The collection has 15 T-shirt prints, including Putin wearing military camouflage with the slogan “The politest of people,” and Putin on horseback, with the slogan “They’re not gonna get us”.

*  *  *




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