-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.aci.net/kalliste/ <A HREF="http://www.aci.net/kalliste/">The Home Page of J. Orlin Grabbe</A> ----- Government Debt Government Deficit So Far This Fiscal Year:$136 Billion Come on! Time to roll out those budget "surplus" lies again. Debt on 04/07/1999 $5,663,113,018,155.76 Debt on 09/30/1998 $5,526,193,008,897.62 Debt Increase $136,920,009,258 .14 See for yourself at The Public Debt to the Penny United Europe European Central Bank Cuts Target Rate By a Half-Percent But it didn't lift the euro. Gee, fancy that. FRANKFURT - The European Central Bank Thursday aggressively lowered interest rates for the Continent's 11-nation single-currency bloc, citing an economic slowdown, slumping confidence and weak job creation. ''I wanted the move to be as convincing as possible,'' ECB President Wim Duisenberg said after the bank's governing board voted to cut its entire panoply of lending rates. The ECB reduced its benchmark money market rate to 2.5 percent from 3 percent, more deeply than many economists had expected. Simultaneously it reduced its other two official rates that create a corridor for euro-bloc overnight bank lending, dropping the upper-end marginal lending rate by a full percentage point to 3.5 percent and its lower-end deposit facility by a half-point to 1.5 percent. The deep easing in the terms of credit was intended to lubricate Europe's sluggish economies while shielding the ECB from its many political critics who have denounced the three-month-old bank for its previous inaction on interest rates. The action Thursday was the first interest-rate move since Europe's common currency, the euro, was introduced Jan. 1. But the move failed to give the currency a lift against the dollar Thursday, as the euro lost gains registered early in the day. In late trading in New York, the euro was quoted at $1.0743, down from $1.0783 on Wednesday. Mr. Duisenberg bluntly served notice that the credit easing Thursday would be the last in the current economic cycle, expressly shifting responsibility for the Continent's high unemployment to Europe's political leaders. ''The unacceptably high rate of unemployment is due to structural factors and inefficiencies in markets for labor and markets for goods,'' he said. Highlighting Europe's overall slowdown, Britain separately cut rates Thursday in hope of providing support to that country's nascent economic recovery. Now that the ECB has said it has done all it can, Mr. Duisenberg pressed governments to undertake painful structural deregulation and tax measures to unleash new activity. By cutting rates, the central banker said he wanted to disarm the politicians who had blamed unemployment on central banks, saying it would now be more clear than ever that monetary policy could not compensate for structural rigidities. Europe is dragging itself through an unexpectedly pronounced slump even as Asia is showing tentative signs of recovery and the United States has defied the effects of the Asian crisis with surprisingly powerful growth. While unemployment in the United States last month fell to a 29-year low, Mr. Duisenberg noted that euro-bloc job creation registered ''a certain deceleration'' in the last three months of last year. Germany - which accounts for more than a third of the euro bloc's output - reported Thursday that German unemployment fell in March by only 3,000 on a seasonally adjusted basis, keeping unemployment near its worst levels since the 1930s. But a recession remains out of the question for now, Mr. Duisenberg said. ''We see a slowdown in the economic development,'' he said. ''We do not see or do not yet see a recession to be on our hands.'' The ECB effectively has deployed every tool at its disposal to revive growth by adding Thursday's deep interest-rate reduction to its apparent acceptance of the euro's relatively weak exchange rate. A weak currency bolsters exports by making them cheaper on world markets. The ECB, the guardian of the new currency, seemed Thursday to indicate a new and more relaxed attitude about the euro's drop of nearly 10 percent against the dollar. ''We are not at all dissatisfied with that level,'' Mr. Duisenberg said. Acceptance of the relatively soft euro marks a shift from initial signs of alarm in the weeks immediately following the euro's birth, economists say. Since then, the political background has changed, starting with last month's surprise resignation as finance minister of Oskar Lafontaine, the German official who had taken the lead in blaming Europe's central bankers for the Continent's economic ailments. International Herald Tribune, April 9, 1999 Operation Allied Farce Nato Sends 8000 Troops to Albania Hopefully only Italians will die in the coming ground war NATO authorised the deployment of 8,000 ground troops to Albania yesterday to deal with the worsening Kosovar refugee crisis, amid growing calls for the use of Western soldiers to authorities to allow displaced ethnic Albanians to go home. United States congressmen visiting American bases in Europe said that the time had come to consider the ground troops option. The possibility of Nato support for Kosovo's eventual secession from Serbia also came closer when James Rubin, the American State Department spokesman, said that the peace plan discussed at Rambouillet was effectively dead. Central to the plan was that Kosovo should have more autonomy but that it should remain within Serbia. The Serb authorities' campaign of ethnic cleansing appears to have undermined their claim to the province. The Nato force, code-named Operation Allied Harbour and led by Italian troops, will be sent to north-east Albania, one of the poorest regions of Europe, where more than 250,000 Kosovars have found a temporary home. Although such a force would not be powerful enough to intervene in Kosovo, it would provide a sound base on which to build a larger force. Nato has 14,000 troops in Macedonia, but there are worries that the authorities there would object to their territory being used to launch a ground attack on Kosovo. Macedonia's defence and foreign ministers have been invited to Nato's headquarters in Brussels today, where the possibility of a ground invasion is believed to be on the agenda. During a visit to the American air force base at Aviano in Italy Republican Jim Turner said: "The ground troops option needs to be there." Senator John McCain of Arizona, a member of the armed services committee, said: "You cannot rule out any options and still be credible." Art Eggleton, Canada's defence minister, said that his country was preparing to send ground troops into Kosovo and so were the other Nato allies. He said: "Nato has to look at other options and the military planners and the Canadian military are in the course of looking at other options as to when ground troops might be involved." He said that ground troops must be considered if air power alone failed to convince Slobodan Milosevic to grant some form of autonomy to Kosovo. He said: "There is no way under those circumstances that the people of Kosovo will be safe. They will not be safe under the thumb of President Milosevic." The flow of refugees out of Kosovo slowed yesterday, especially into Macedonia, where the border remained closed. But there were reports of tens of thousands of Kosovars still trying to flee the Serb security forces. Nato expressed worries about thousands of Kosovars forced back into the province by the Serbs when the border with Macedonia was sealed. Jamie Shea, Nato's chief spokesman, said: "We are very concerned about their safety and well-being. We do not want to see a second humanitarian crisis inside Kosovo, with all these displaced people without food." The Belgrade authorities had promised a ceasefire in Kosovo for the Orthodox Easter, but Nato said that there was no evidence of any cessation in hostilities. Reconnaissance planes photographed Serb paramilitaries burning villages. Rudolf Scharping, the German defence minister, said that more than 35 unarmed Kosovar civilians had been killed in massacres in the town of Pastric and the village of Sopi during the so-called ceasefire. Washington attacked Serb propaganda, saying that it had received "credible reports" of Kosovar civilians being murdered in eight towns. "Independently we have been able to confirm that the Serb forces are conducting this type of ethnic cleansing in Kosovo," Mr Rubin said at the State Department. "The Serbs have tried to present a phoney description to the world. These are eight towns where we have received what we regard as credible reporting - but not confirmed reporting - of mass killings. These reports have been remarkably consistent. We continue to gather as much information as we can." Nato jets again tried to attack individual Serb units yesterday, but were hindered by poor weather. Javier Solana, the Nato secretary general, said that lower-level operations would begin soon. Although these are likely to have better results against Serb armour, they also increase the risk of the jets being shot down. The Belgrade authorities took Western journalists into Pristina for the first time since the air raids began and showed them extensive damage to the city centre and residential areas, all of which they said had been caused by Nato bombs. Nato replied that all the sites hit in central Pristina were legitimate military targets. It said that most of the damage to the residential areas had been caused by Serb paramilitaries. The London Telegraph, April 9, 1999 Der Fuhrer ist Psycho Away From Public Eye, Bill Clinton Is a Violent, Profane Man "I can do any Goddamned thing I want. I'm President of the United States." Away from the public eye and the vaunted White House spin machine, President Bill Clinton is a vulgar, vengeful man who believes in "killing" people try to hurt him, those who know Clinton best say. White House staffers, Clinton confidants and others describe Clinton as "incredibly profane" and "an angry man who wants to inflict as much pain as possible on his enemies." Former White House senior staff member George Stephanopoulos in his book, All Too Human, writes about Clinton's mishandling of the Somalia crisis and shows the depth of the President's violent emotions: "'We're not inflicting pain on these fuckers,' Clinton said, softly at first. 'When people kill us, they should be killed in greater numbers.' Then, with his face reddening, his voice rising, and his fist pounding his thigh, he leaned into Tony [Lake], as if it were his fault. 'I believe in killing people who try to hurt you. And I can't believe we're being pushed around by these two-bit pricks.'" Those who have known Clinton since his days in Arkansas say the quote is "vintage Bill." "Only an idiot would buy the public persona of Bill Clinton," says Walter Erricson, a retired reporter who covered Clinton in his early political days in Arkansas. "He is an incredibly profane individual. He is now and always has been an angry man who wants to inflict as much pain as possible on his enemies." White House staff members say Clinton curses like a sailor, has temper tantrums that cause people to back away from him and uses the word "kill" often to describe what he wants to do with his enemies. "Once, when the House was finishing up its impeachment investigation, the President slammed his fist down on the table and said 'I'd like to kill all of these sons of bitches and just be done with it!' There was a long, painful period of silence until he regained his composure. Then everybody went on like it was never said," says one former White House staffer. Samuel Wilson, a former political worker in Clinton's second campaign for governor, remembers the candidate encountering a critic at a campaign appearance in a small town. After the critic told Clinton he was nothing but a "two-bit politician" and then walked away, Clinton turned to a campaign aide and said "write down the name of that motherfucker. When I'm back in office, he's a dead man." "I remember his look. It was cold," Wilson said. "I don't want to think he wanted to kill him literally, but I'm sure some sort of revenge was inflicted later on." In fact, it was fear of what Attorney General Bill Clinton could do to her business that kept nursing home operator Juanita Broaddrick from reporting Clinton's rape of her 21 years ago in a Little Rock hotel room. "Her fears were justified," says retired reporter Erricson. "Everybody knew Bill Clinton was a man who got even, any way he could." Helen Shannon, who worked in the Arkansas Statehouse during Clinton's second term as governor, said the governor would personally order state contracts canceled when he got angry with people. "The word would come down from the governor's office that somebody was off limits and we would cancel their contracts and put them on a 'don't use' list. It happened a lot," she says. Shannon, who was dating a member of Clinton's staff, says Clinton would order audits of contracts and tell the the Arkansas State Police to "turn up the heat" on somebody he didn't like. "When Bill Clinton ran Arkansas, it was a police state," she says. White House staff members tell similar stories. At one meeting, Clinton told staff members he wanted everyone in the Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr's office audited by the IRS. "Several people in the meeting told the President he shouldn't do that," the staff member remember. "He slammed his fist down on the table and said: 'I can do any Goddamned thing I want. I'm President of the United States. I take care of my friends and I fuck with my enemies. That's the way it is. Anybody who doesn't like it can take a hike." The White House did not return calls for comment. Capitol Hill Blue, April 8, 1999 Gee, I was right about this, too Chinese Money Routed Through Lippo Bank to Clinton Campaign Mochtar and James Riady knew how to buy influence Read also: Tenacious Tenacles Read also: Vince Foster, Part 31 re the Hong Kong Chinese Bank Chinese military intelligence officers diverted illegal campaign donations to the Clinton-Gore Re-Election Committee through a Hong Kong bank controlled by an Indonesian family with long-standing ties to President Clinton, authorities said. Federal law enforcement officials, congressional investigators and others said several hundred thousand dollars in cash went to the campaign through several emissaries handpicked by the People's Liberation Army (PLA). The money, the sources said, originated in Beijing and initially was routed by the PLA to China Resources Holding Company Ltd. in Hong Kong. >From there, it was transferred to the Hong Kong Chinese Bank -- jointly owned by the Chinese government and Lippo Group, a multibillion-dollar Indonesian conglomerate owned by longtime Clinton supporters Mochtar and James Riady, the sources said. Eventually, the cash was moved to other banks, then wired to the emissaries, who distributed it to the Clinton-Gore campaign and to other state and federal races, the sources said. U.S. intelligence officials believe the PLA bought into the Hong Kong bank after Mr. Clinton's 1992 election as a way of gaining access to the president through the Riady family, which has been a supporter of -- Continued from Front Page -- Mr. Clinton since he was governor of Arkansas. Johnny Chung, a California businessman who gave more than $350,000 to the Democratic Party, has linked Democratic fund-raisers John Huang and Charles Yah Lin Trie to the PLA fund-raising scheme in grand jury testimony and sworn statements as part of a plea agreement in a Justice Department probe. Chung, an admitted bagman for Chinese intelligence, testified that his former business partner, Liu Chao-ying, a Chinese aerospace executive and lieutenant colonel in the PLA, told him Mr. Trie and Mr. Huang were "directed in their fund-raising activities by the Chinese government." At least one House committee is investigating the leadership of China Resources, based on preliminary information showing that top PLA officers have assumed key positions with the firm to continue efforts to influence U.S. policy on several issues. Of particular concern, the sources said, is a possible connection between China Resources and the PLA's chief military intelligence officer, Gen. Ji Shengde, who -- according to Chung's grand jury testimony -- ordered that $300,000 be transferred to Chung for donations to the Democratic Party. That transfer -- first reported by the Los Angeles Times -- took place after Chung personally met with Gen. Ji in Hong Kong in a meeting arranged by Miss Liu. The sources said Chung testified that Gen. Ji told him he already was engaged in similar transactions with others serving as conduits for Chinese money for Mr. Clinton. The cash eventually was wired to Chung's account at the Overseas Trust Bank in Hong Kong. He gave $35,000 to the Democratic National Committee. The rest was moved to a separate account at a California bank. It is not clear how it was used. China denies using illegal campaign donations to influence the 1996 elections. In a joint press conference Thursday with Mr. Clinton, Chinese Prime Minister Zhu Rongji denounced the accusations. "I think this shows that some Americans really have underestimated us. If the political contribution were to be really that effective, I have 146 billion U.S. dollars of foreign-exchange reserve, so I should have put out at least 10 billion U.S. dollars for that purpose, why just $300,000?" he said. "That would be too foolish." Mr. Zhu promised to cooperate in any probe of the accusations; similar promises in the past have not been honored. It is against the law for foreign governments to donate to U.S. political campaigns. Lippo denies any wrongdoing in its relationship with the president, although the sources said the PLA was counting on the Riadys' ties to Mr. Clinton for access of its own. They said the PLA knew the Riadys' Worthen National Bank in Little Rock, Ark., had given Mr. Clinton a multimillion-dollar loan to get through the 1992 presidential election, and had handed over $100,000 to former Associate Attorney General Webster L. Hubbell after he quit the Justice Department and before he pleaded guilty to two Whitewater felonies. Lippo sold a 15 percent interest in its Hong Kong bank to China Resources in 1993, four days after Mr. Clinton's 1992 election victory. By July 1992, the company had sold off half the bank to China Resources in what U.S. authorities believe was a continuing effort by the PLA to cash in on the Riadys' relationship with Mr. Clinton. China Resources paid what U.S. intelligence officials said was a huge premium over the net asset value of the bank, giving Lippo a profit of $164 million. A key player in the suspected plot appears to be Mr. Huang, a former Lippo employee, Commerce Department official and Democratic National Committee fund-raiser, who served as vice president of the Hong Kong bank from 1985 to 1986. When Mr. Huang left Lippo to join Commerce, he received a $780,000 bonus. China Resources, according to the sources, was used by the Chinese government as a cover for its spying activities. Owned by the PLA, Chinese military intelligence officials are said to be free to penetrate its operations for economic espionage. More recently, it has invested in several Lippo ventures within Indonesia. The company describes itself as a government-affiliated trading concern supplying Hong Kong with water and food from China, but testimony last year before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee documented that the firm was used as a front for Chinese espionage operations. Washington Times, April 9, 1999 ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End Kris DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! 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