113 Federal Reserve Staff Members Make $250,000 Annually

Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

Just in case you need another reason to dislike the thieving Federal Reserve. From Reuters:

(Reuters) – The top 113 earners among staff at the Federal Reserve’s Washington headquarters make an average of $246,506 per year, excluding bonuses and other benefits – more than Fed Chair Janet Yellen and nearly double the normal top government rate.

Don’t worry Janet, once you leave, you can earn $250k per speech like your hero Banana Ben Bernanke.

The details on Fed pay were provided to Reuters in response to a Freedom of Information Act request for data on all employees of the U.S. central bank’s board whose salaries outstrip $130,810, which is the top of the government’s pay scale in most areas.

 

Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives have sponsored a bill that would require the Fed to divulge that information publicly.

 

“It certainly bolsters the case for more oversight,” said Maggie Seidel, a spokeswoman for New Jersey Republican Scott Garrett, a co-sponsor of the bill.

 

As of July 31, the Fed’s inspector general led the list with an annual salary of $312,000, followed by the central bank’s four division directors, its general counsel and its chief operating officer, who each earn a base of $265,000.

Not a bad gig. All you have to do is be complicit in the destruction of the American middle class.




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

Don’t Work, Get Money: Tens of Thousands of Federal Employees Paid to Sit at Home

Then God blessed paid leave for federal
employees under investigation and made it holy, reports

The Washington Post:

Tens of thousands of federal workers are being kept on paid
leave for at least a month — and often for longer stretches
that can reach a year or more — while they wait to be punished for
misbehavior or cleared and allowed to return to work.

A report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) … found
that 53,000 civilian employees were kept home for one to three
months during the three fiscal years that ended in September 2013.
About 4,000 were idled for three months to a year and several
hundred for one to three years.

Over the three year period, idle federal employees were paid
$775 million in salaries to sit tight and wait in
bureaucratic purgatory. And if full pay wasn’t enough to mollify
the unoccupied exiles, employees “also built their pensions,
vacation and sick days and moved up the federal pay scale.” The
report is most likely lowballing those statistics as
well: The GAO only looked at about three-fifths of the federal
government because many agencies don’t report the number of
employees on paid leave.

But getting paid to do nothing is no stint on the Isles of the
Blessed, according to some inactive feds. The Washington
Post tells the, uh, maudlin tale of Scott Balovich, an IT
systems worker for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration in Alaska:

Balovich, who makes $108,000 a year, was paid not to work while
investigators examined how pornographic images had gotten onto his
computer hard drive.

Perhaps he should talk to an
Environmental Protection Agency employee, who faced similar
queries. Balovich describes the hardship of getting paid to do
jack:

“Six months went by, and we didn’t hear anything…You’re so
anxious. You don’t know if you’ve got a job. You’re getting paid,
but it’s no vacation.”

No vacation, indeed. Another Washington Post
exposé from 2012 details the travails of Paul Brachfield, the
inspector general for the National Archives:

He planned to ring in the new year with his wife with a relaxed
visit to their vacation home near Bethany Beach, Del. In October,
the couple took a cruise to Puerto Rico. Brachfeld runs every
morning in Silver Spring, hikes with Spree, his Jack Russell
terrier, in the woods most afternoons and catches up with his adult
daughters in the evening. All while collecting his $186,000
government salary. These days, his life seems like one long
vacation.

Unsurprisingly, the government’s Office of Personnel Management
already has rules regulating paid leave, though apparently no one
follows them. Except for “rare circumstances,” such as when an
someone is a direct threat, an employee is to “remain in a duty
status” during disciplinary proceedings. As the
fictional Sgt.
Bilko said, “We have rules, rules, and regulations!” It would
seem those rules fly out the window when managers need an easy way
to shunt aside problem employees.

from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2014/10/21/dont-work-get-money-tens-of-thousands-of
via IFTTT

Russia Deploys Troops, Robots Along Entire “2nd Middle East” Arctic Belt

On the heels of Sweden's military deployment (following the discovery of a damaged Russian sub), it appears Russia is taking no chances with its access to Arctic resources.As Reuters reports, the Russian defense minister announced today that Russian military units will be deployed along the entire Arctic border from Murmansk to Chukotka in 2014.

 

 

 

Interfax adds that combat robots are also being deployed to protect Russian oil and gas infrastructure in the harsh environment of the Arctic. This should be no surprise as The Guardian notes, the Arctic’s hydrocarbon resources nevertheless exert a powerful pull. It has been compared to "a second Middle East", with oil and gas reserves thought to represent 17% and 30%, respectively, of the global total.

 

 

This of course, is nothing new…

On 11 October, in an attempt to forestall such criticism, the Russian defence ministry announced plans to build “a regional environmental centre […] to prevent pollution in areas where Russian forces are deployed”. Russian troops systematically receive “training and briefings on environmental safety and compliance with legislation”, deputy minister Dmitry Bulgakov added. But it will take more than this to reassure the western powers.

But is a major escalation along such a massive border…

 

*  *  *

And finally, Interfax reports, Combat robots to protect Russian oil and gas infrastructure in Arctic

Undersea combat robots will be protecting Russian oilrigs and transportation networks in the Arctic region at some point, Deputy General Director of the Russian Foundation for Advanced Research Projects, Chairman of the Foundation's Scientific and Technological Board Vitaly Davydov told Interfax-AVN.

 

"The Foundation is not designing robotic sharks but it is working on undersea robots and autonomous gadgets capable of protecting infrastructure, controlling the waters and detecting, tracking and, if necessary, destroying a potential enemy. The prospective machinery may be deployed on the sea bottom and specialized submersibles," he said.

 

So far, the Foundation is focused not so much on defense issues as on mineral development projects, Davydov said.

 

"The rivalry in this region will be centered on its natural resources. A key task to be solved in the Arctic is access to mineral resources, first and foremost, hydrocarbons. This goal can be achieved through the completion of numerous tasks in the discovery, production and transportation of resources, sub-glacial operations and infrastructural security. This is the target of the Foundation's research programs," he said.

*  *  *

As The Guardian concludes, The Arctic, which is governed by international maritime law, is also the focus of other disputes. Canada regularly carries out military exercises in its Arctic territory. Relations between Ottawa and Moscow have cooled significantly since the start of the Ukraine crisis.




via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1w49FaL Tyler Durden

What John Grisham Got Right About Child Pornography

Last week, as
Elizabeth Nolan Brown
noted here, best-selling novelist John Grisham got into hot
water by suggesting there might be such a thing as an excessively
long sentence for someone convicted of possessing child
pornography. In a Time essay that went up today, I explain
why Grisham was right. Here is how the piece starts:

Last week John Grisham, the best-selling author of legal
thrillers, triggered a storm of online criticism by
arguing in an interview with The
Telegraph that criminal penalties for possessing child
pornography are unreasonably harsh. Grisham, who has
since apologized, spoke rather loosely, overstating the extent
to which honest mistakes account for child porn convictions and the
extent to which those convictions expand the prison population.

But he was right on two important points: People who
download child pornography are not necessarily child molesters, and
whatever harm they cause by looking at forbidden pictures does not
justify the penalties they often receive.

Read the
whole thing.

from Hit & Run http://ift.tt/10jlgWr
via IFTTT

California Criminalizes Produce, Fights Farm-Market Fraud at the Expense of Farmers

The goal of farmers markets is
simple: provide people with a place to buy relatively local produce
and food products. Those interested in precisely where and how
their sweet potatoes are grown can ask questions of farmers
directly; those who don’t care can still pick up fresh produce
pretty cheaply and easily. And if some of that produce wasn’t
directly grown by the farmer selling it, does it make a difference?
The state of California thinks it does. 

The issue has been churning for a while now. In 2010, an NBC Los
Angeles investigation
discovered “farmers market fraud” afoot at L.A.-area
markets, with some vendors “making false claims and flat-out
lies about the produce they’re selling.” The station followed one
farmer to a wholesale produce warehouse in downtown L.A. and
watched him purchase items there to pass off as the fruits of his
own labor. It tested berries marketed as organic and found
pesticide residue. It bought broccoli allegedly from a farm where
reporters later found no broccoli growing.

At the time of NBCLA’s investigation, county
departments of agriculture were already empowered to issue
fines to those caught selling food fraudulently or suspend their
market vending privileges. One of the fraudulent farmers NBCLA
“uncovered” had already been issued a fine earlier in the year. But
a slew of subsequent media reports on farm-market fraud kept the
issue in the public consciousness.

Soon politicians needed to look like they were doing!
something!, so they drew up and passed another bill, which Gov.
Jerry Brown signed October 3. The new law, which goes into effect
in January 2015, is aimed specifically at cracking down on
faux-homegrown goods at farm markets. It requires farmers to
conspicuously advertise the name and location of their farm, along
with a sign saying “We grow what we sell.” And it makes “false,
deceptive, or misleading” advertising or assertions about produce a
misdemeanor crime punishable by up to 6 months in county jail or a
$2,500 fine.

Fining fraudulent farmers or revoking their vending privileges,
as the county agriculture departments did, seems like a sufficient
enough solution—but not for the criminalize all the things camp.
Nothing is sufficient until we have the option of throwing folks in
jail. 

To add insult to injury, enforcement of the new law will come at
the expense of non-fraudulent farmers. Starting next year, vendors
participating and selling goods at California farmers markets must
pay $2 each time they participate—up from 60 cents per market day
previously. The new fees apply to all food and craft
sellers at the market as well, whereas previously only agricultural
vendors had to pay.

“That can be over $250 a year of additional cost, so it’s just
going to drive up the cost of farmers market produce for customers,
and it’s an additional regulatory burden on the farmers,” Mark
Larson, co-founder of San Diego’s Hillcrest Farmers Market,

told NBC San Diego. He insists that the county already does a
good job of rooting out fraudulent farmers, and “the farmers also
police themselves. If they know of anybody that’s selling what they
don’t grow, they report it.”

The market literally regulating itself? Blasphemy! (This is
California after all.) Bring in the produce police…

from Hit & Run http://ift.tt/125KsQP
via IFTTT

Subprime Bubble Pop 2.0? Department Of Financial Services Slams America’s Largest Subprime Servicer

Once upon a time, in the distant 2005 and 2006, the world just couldn’t get enough of such subprime mortgage superstars as New Century Financial. In fact, some may have forgotten, but none other than David Einhorn was a director of New Century until March 2007, when suddenly everything fell apart and a few weeks later the company was bankrupt. The subprime collapse that followed, which contrary to Ben Bernanke’s promises was “not contained”, is what according to most catalyzed the plunge of the US economy into the greatest depression since 1929, led to the default of Lehman Brothers and nearly ended the financial system. 

Fast forward to 2014, when the US has a new subprime servicing superstar, which just like in 2006, also happens to be a hedge fund darling. The company: Ocwen Financial (a name which originated when some drunk banker or executive spelled Newco in reverse) which currently is responsible for servicing over $106 billion in subprime mortgages. A darling so prominent among the hedge fund community, it was one of the most beloved hedge fund hotel stocks in late 2012 and 2013, and judging by its current list of holders, still has a plethora of who-is-who hedge and mutual fund holders.

Well, in what may be a resounding echo of March 2006, moments ago the New York Superintendent of Financial Services said that Ocwen had engaged in abuses that could potentially harm hundreds of thousands of borrowers. As AP reports, the state regulator issued a letter Tuesday to Ocwen Financial Corp., documenting the same kinds of suspicious actions that worsened the housing crisis and the Great Recession.

Ocwen inappropriately backdated foreclosure warnings and letters that denied mortgage loan modifications, making it nearly impossible for borrowers to appeal the company’s decision, according to the letter from Benjamin Lawsky, New York’s Superintendent of Financial Services.

 

The letter refrains from saying whether the backdating was intentional or the result of poor oversight by Ocwen. The company managed $106 billion worth of subprime mortgages at the start of 2014, according to Inside Mortgage Finance.

Here is the full letter:

 

Moments ago Ocwen replied. Its explantion – nothing is criminal here, it was a glitch, see?

  • OCWEN ADDRESSES LETTER FROM NY DEPARTMENT OF FINL SERVICES
  • OCWEN INADVERTENTLY SENT IMPROPERLY DATED LETTERS
  • OCWEN CITES SOFTWARE ERRORS IN CORRESPONDENCE SYSTEMS

See: “software errors”, i.e., glitches. So you must acquit

The full laughable statement:

Ocwen Financial Corporation (NYSE:OCN), the nation’s largest independent mortgage servicer, today made the following statement in response to a letter it received from the New York Department of Financial Services (“DFS”) related to erroneously dated borrower correspondence, and subsequent media coverage of the DFS’s letter.

 

“Ocwen regrets that, due to software errors in our correspondence systems, we inadvertently sent improperly dated letters to some borrowers. As always, our goal is to avoid foreclosure. In the case of the 283 borrowers in New York who received letters with incorrect dates, 281 are currently borrowers with us. We are continuing to review the rest of the cases. We believe that we have resolved the letter dating issues that have been identified to date, and we continue our investigation as to whether there are additional letter dating issues that need to be resolved. We are working with and fully cooperating with DFS and the Monitor to address their concerns.”

So will the US Superintendent of Financial Services, Benjamin Lawski, let this too be swept under the rug or will he inevitably fold, and pretend that nothing has happened, instead chosing to believe the company that it has now “fixed the glitch.”

For now OCN’s investors are not too happy and OCN was down some 15% after being unhalted. Down, that is, at least until the BTFD crew – completely oblivious of the fundamental reality – comes in, and bids the stock back into the green again. Because in the New Normal, the fraud is not in just one stock: it is the entire market.




via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1yVA7UX Tyler Durden

Video: Sex, Spice, and Small-Town Texas Justice: The Purple Zone Raid

“Sex, Spice, and Small-Town Texas Justice: The Purple Zone Raid”
is the latest video from Reason TV. Watch above or click on the
link below for video, full text supporting links, downloadable
versions, and more Reason TV clips. 

View this article.

from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2014/10/21/video-sex-spice-and-small-town-texas-jus
via IFTTT

In Uncharted Waters

Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,

What I see as extremes that must necessarily end badly, others see as mere extensions of recently successful policies and trends.

A long-time reader recently chastised me for using too many maybe's in my forecasts. The criticism is valid, as "on the other hand" slips all too easily from qualifying a position to rinsing it of meaning.

That said, given that we're in uncharted waters, maybe's become prudent and certainty becomes extremely dangerous. I have long held that the financial policy extremes that are now considered normal are unprecedented in the modern era: extremes in debt, leverage, risk, complexity and willful obfuscation of these extremes.
 
Consider the extent to which sky-high asset valuations and present-day "prosperity" depend on extremes of leverage: autos purchased with no money down, homes purchased with 3.5% down payments and FHA loans, stocks bought on margin, stock buybacks funded by loans, student loans issued with zero collateral, and so on–an inverted pyramid of "prosperity" resting precariously on a tiny base of actual collateral.
 
Since we have no guide to the future other than the past, we extrapolate past trends. Human nature hasn't changed over the short time-frames of civilizations (i.e. the past few thousand years), so in terms of human drives, emotions and responses, the past is an excellent guide to the range of human responses to crisis, euphoria, greed, fear, etc.
 
But extending trends is a shifting foundation for forecasts, as trends end and reverse, generally without telegraphing the end of an era. Few in 1639 China foresaw the collapse of the status quo Ming Dynasty a mere five years hence.
 
With the hindsight of history, we can discern the cracks in the Ming Dynasty before its collapse, but once we shift to our own era, things become less certain.
 
In my view, we're drifting in uncharted seas.
 
I have covered the dangers of certainty before: Certainty, Complex Systems, and Unintended Consequences (February 14, 2014)
 
What I see as extremes that must necessarily end badly, others see as mere extensions of recently successful policies and trends. Let's review a few of the many extremes that we now accept as ordinary and harmless.
 
Consider how much new debt is now required to lift GDP ("growth") off the flat line:
 
 
The slightest pause in the expansion of credit nearly collapsed the entire global economy:
 
Extraordinary central state and bank policies have boosted the wealth of those closest to the Federal Reserve's money spigot and left everyone else poorer:
 
 
It's not just real income that's declined–so has household wealth.
 
 
Incentives to borrow money to obtain a college degree are declining while student loan debt hits astounding extremes:
 
 
Feel free to extend this line of Federally funded student debt: where does it end?
 
 
The Federal Reserve has pushed astonishingly extreme policies for six years. Now that the Fed owns significant chunks of the Treasury bond and mortgage bond markets, it's being forced to limit these easing programs:
 
All the Fed money-printing and bond buying has sent money velocity in the real economy into a tailspin: this is good, right? No, actually it's a calamity. Money has slipped into a coma.
 

Extend the trendlines in these charts, and then ask yourself: where do they end? What will they trigger as they push ever deeper into uncharted waters?




via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1w3T8U5 Tyler Durden

WTF Chart Du Jour: The Broken Market Fallacy

UPDATE: And then this happened…

 

As every good Keynesian ‘knows’, broken-windows are good for the economy; so that must mean that ‘broken markets’ are good for the… markets?

 

Having started to fade after the opening ramp, since the NYSE broke, stocks have levitated linearly…

 

…driven by a surge in XIV (the inverse VIX ETF, which was among the 150 symbols that ‘broke’ today)…

 

As Stocks decouple from any fun-durr-mental carry driver…

 

 

As well as Bonds and credit markets’ perspective on ‘recovery’ and ECB rumors…

 

and equity volume is well below average… (again)

 

*  *  *

Why anyone would trust this shambles of a US equity “market” anymore…?




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

#WINNING: Afghan Poppy Production “At An All-Time High”

Via the Washington Free Beacon comes a
link to this new study from the Special Inspector General for
Afghan Reconstruction (SIGAR). The title kind of gives it away:

POPPY
CULTIVATION IN AFGHANISTAN: AFTER A DECADE OF RECONSTRUCTION
AND OVER $7 BILLION IN COUNTERNARCOTICS EFFORTS,
POPPY CULTIVATION LEVELS ARE AT AN ALL-TIME
HIGH 

There’s this:

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
(UNODC), Afghan farmers grew an unprecedented 209,000 hectares
of opium poppy in 2013, surpassing the previous peak
of 193,000 hectares in 2007. With deteriorating security in
many parts of rural Afghanistan and low levels of eradication
of poppy fields, further increases in cultivation are likely in
2014. 

As of June 30, 2014, the United States has spent
approximately $7.6 billion on counternarcotics efforts in
Afghanistan.

Whole
report here.


Free Beacon account here.

from Hit & Run http://ift.tt/1oqLL79
via IFTTT