The alleged terrorist pilot...

GREIFSWALD, Germany -- Nearly every weekend of his childhood and adolescence, Ziad Samir Jarrah's doting parents drove him from war-ravaged Beirut to the Bekaa Valley oasis of Al-Marj so he could play with his cousin Salim.

Born just 40 days apart to two brothers of a close-knit and prosperous family, Ziad and Salim learned how to ride bikes together, how to drive and how to dodge their parents' plans for their future. More like twins than cousins, the two left Lebanon together April 4, 1996, at the age of 20, heading to the eastern German town of Greifswald in pursuit of both an education and a good time.
http://web.archive.org/web/20020203214236/http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sns-worldtrade-jarrah-lat.story

Just down the road from Dekkers is the Florida Flight Training Center, where Ziad Samir Jarrah trained. Jarrah died aboard United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in a Pennsylvania field.
http://www.boston.com/news/packages/sept11/anniversary/wire_stories/0909_flight_schools.htm

Ziad Jarrah, the alleged pilot of Flight 93, arrives in the US, flying from Munich to Atlanta, Georgia (or Newark, according to the 9/11 Commission). He enters on a tourist visa, issued in Berlin on May 25, 2000. He then flies to Venice, Florida, where he has already arranged to take full-time lessons at the Florida Flight Training Center (FFTC). However, he never files an application to change his status from tourist to student. According to the 9/11 Commission, “This failure to maintain a legal immigration status provided a solid legal basis to deny him entry on each of the six subsequent occasions in which he reentered the United States. But because there was no student tracking system in place and because neither Jarrah nor the school complied with the law’s notification requirements, immigration inspectors could not know he was out of status.” Jarrah begins the private pilot program at FFTC on June 28, aiming to get a multi-engine license. His training will cost $16,000, which his parents wire to him.
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a062700jarrahenters&scale=0#a062700jarrahenters

After entering the United States (see June 27-28, 2000), Ziad Jarrah lives in Venice, Florida, while taking flying lessons (see (June 28-December 2000)). According to the 9/11 Commission, he stays with some of his flight school’s instructors. pp224
http://web.archive.org/web/20041020144854/http://www.decloah.com/mirrors/9-11/911_Report.txt

No explanation is ever given as to why they have two separate residences at the same time. However, a private consumer database will later reveal that Atta had 12 addresses, including two places where he lived and ten safe houses, so the Nokomis address could possibly be one of these safe houses (see Mid-September 2001). Interestingly, another of the alleged hijackers, Ziad Jarrah, also has a second residence he never stays at while he attends flight school in Venice (see (June 28-December 2000)).

9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah arrives in the US for the fifth time and is admitted at Newark as a business visitor, receiving a six-month stay. This is unusual, as inspectors usually give business visitors one to three months, depending on the port of entry, and six months only when the visitor can document the purpose of the stay, which Jarrah apparently does not do. Jarrah actually should not be admitted at all because he is out of status—he breached immigration rules by taking a flight training course despite entering the US as a tourist—but this is apparently not noticed (see June 27-28, 2000).
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a062700jarrahenters#a062700jarrahenters

Someone also has to be accountable for making sure that we modernize information technology. Before we go round up all these people and profile them because they're Muslims or Arabs or wear turbans, it'd be good to know that the government has the same information, checked it on a weekly basis, that's already in the computers of every mass mailing company in the country on the rest of us. We're all in somebody's computer. They know where we live, they know where we pay our utility bills, they know how many credit cards we have. They know what our debt is. The biggest of these companies is in Arkansas. My best childhood friend works there. He called me a couple of days after September 11th and said, we have four FBI agents here and we've already found five of these terrorists in our computers. Well you say, that's fine, but could they have known before September 11th? You tell me. One of the men who flew an airplane into the World Trade Center had 30 credit cards, a quarter of a million of dollars in debt, and a consolidated payout schedule of $9,800 a month. Now, since this information is already available on all of us, you could scan that once a week. If somebody if has been in this country for two years or less and already has 30 credit cards and a quarter a million dollars in debt, they're either really rich or up to no good and it shouldn't be that hard to figure out which.

Mohammed Atta, the ring leader, had 12 addresses, two places he lived and 10 safe houses, under the names Mohammed Atta, Mohammed J. Atta, J. Atta, and his middle initial spelled out. So if somebody has been here a couple years or less and has 12 homes, he's either really rich or up to no good. It shouldn't be that hard to figure out which. That's more important than all that reorganization. That's what we ought to advocate. We ought to drive it home, as part of our homeland security position.
http://www.dlc.org/print.cfm?contentid=251085

Never Heard Of Acxiom? Chances Are It's Heard Of You. How a little-known Little Rock company--the world's largest processor of consumer data--found itself at the center of a very big national security debate.
(FORTUNE Magazine)
By Richard Behar
February 23, 2004

(FORTUNE Magazine) – Last summer a sheriff in Cincinnati stumbled onto what may have been the biggest security breach of consumer data ever. Searching the home of Daniel Baas, a 24-year-old computer-systems administrator at a data-marketing firm, detectives found dozens of compact discs containing the personal data of millions of Americans. The information, it turned out, had been hacked by Baas over a period of two years from a giant server in Arkansas belonging to a company called Acxiom.

Never heard of Acxiom? The publicly traded, politically connected Little Rock company is the world's largest processor of consumer data, collecting and massaging more than a billion records a day. Its customers include nine of the country's top ten credit-card issuers, as well as nearly all the major retail banks, insurers, and automakers. It's a business that generates $1 billion in sales annually and, after a few bumpy years, is expected to produce $60 million in profits. Analysts project earnings to grow 15% annually over the next five years.

Since 9/11, the company has been campaigning for crucial federal contracts in homeland security. Retired general and presidential candidate Wesley Clark and the Clintons have helped.

Since 2001, Acxiom has engaged in research with the Pentagon and other agencies to find ways to consolidate, link, and share data. The federal Transportation Security Administration recently announced that this summer it will roll out its controversial second-generation Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System, or CAPPS II--a scheme that color-codes airline passengers in terms of their likelihood to be terrorists. The project will rely heavily on Acxiom's data and its identity-matching logarithms.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2004/02/23/362182/index.htm

In a little-noticed exchange at the commission’s hearings this spring between commission member John Lehman and former F.B.I. official Thomas Pickard, the bureau’s acting director in the summer before the attacks, Mr. Lehman asked Mr. Pickard (according to the official transcript): "As you know, very shortly after the September 11th attack, some of the commercial databases like Axion, ICSO (ph), ChoicePoint, so forth were queried and nearly all of the 19 hijackers were very prominently covered, with addresses, credit cards, locations et cetera. Why did not the F.B.I. make use of those commercial databases before 9/11?"

"We were prohibited from utilizing a lot of those commercial databases by statutes and things like that," Mr. Pickard replied. "That was one of the benefits of the Patriot Act, as I understand it."

In this exchange, Mr. Pickard maintained that an F.B.I. agent capable of querying the databases for the names of the hijackers prior to 9/11 would have found them—their addresses and credit cards, at any rate—because the hijackers had lived openly in the U.S. and had used their real names to accumulate a string of ID’s like drivers’ licenses. But by law, Mr. Pickard maintained, this trove of information was off-limits to the F.B.I.

But the F.B.I., then as now, is a client of the largest U.S. database containing public records about individuals: ChoicePoint, the bête noir of civil libertarians, and a company that made $796 million in 2003. Sources there and at the F.B.I. confirmed that the agency regularly taps this service for key information on people it seeks for criminal and intelligence investigations. In a mouse click, the database retrieves information like current phone numbers, for instance, through the F.B.I.’s secure ChoicePoint access. And in late August 2001, the F.B.I. had an investigation underway into two of the men who turned up on 9/11 as hijackers—Khalid al Mihdhar and Nawaf al Hazmi. The F.B.I. wanted to question them about the U.S.S. Cole bombing; the task of finding them was given to a counterterrorism agent in New York.

Both were on the State Department’s TIPOFF terrorist watch list.

"Searches of readily available databases," the 9/11 commission report notes, "could have unearthed" al Mihdhar’s and al Hazmi’s California drivers’ licenses, car registrations and telephone listings. A search on al Hazmi’s car registration "would have unearthed a license check" by the police in South Hackensack, N.J., that "would have led to information placing Hazmi in the area and placing Mihdhar at a local hotel for a week in early July, 2001." ChoicePoint also had up-to-date telephone listings for both men.

From there, it might have been possible to turn up al Hazmi and al Mihdhar in Paterson, where they’d been living with a group of the other hijackers. Al Hazmi was spending some time flying cross-country on the type of plane he would later hijack on 9/11.

"There was information about the people who turned out to be hijackers in the ChoicePoint databases prior to 9/11, that’s a true statement," ChoicePoint chairman and chief executive Derek Smith confirmed.

How does he know? The F.B.I. got a court subpoena for ChoicePoint to go through its records and pull out what it had on al Hazmi and al Mihdhar after the Twin Towers fell. Why the F.B.I. didn’t do this before 9/11, Mr. Smith can’t say, but he confirmed that the F.B.I. didn’t seek this information before 9/11. With 20 days left before the attacks, would questioning these two men have been enough to prevent them? And why would Mr. Pickard tell the commission that he wasn’t allowed to do before Sept. 11 what his agency did do immediately after—but before the signing of the Patriot Act?
http://www.breakfornews.com/articles/QuestionsAboutFBI.htm

A major training exercise based upon a simulated terrorist attack is held in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, which neighbors Somerset County where Flight 93 crashes on 9/11. The exercise, called Mall Strike 2001, is conducted in Greengate Mall, Hempfield, and involves over 600 emergency first responders and emergency managers responding to the simulated release of a toxic chemical agent and the simulated release of radiation and radiological contamination.
http://www.co.westmoreland.pa.us/westmoreland/lib/westmoreland/cntrl/forms/01cafr.pdf

http://www.co.westmoreland.pa.us/westmoreland/lib/westmoreland/psfty/forms/june2001.pdf

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/s_90895.html

Regarding Flight 93, personal financial records do not reflect weapons being purchased by any of the hijackers. However, the FBI will reportedly recover “14 knives or portions of knives, including a box cutter,” at the crash site.
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a070801purchaseknives#a070801purchaseknives

August 27: Saeed Alghamdi uses his debit card to purchase tickets for United Airlines flight 93 for himself and Ahmed Alnami from the UA.com website. The tickets are not paid for until September 5, 2001, due to a problem with the debit card.
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a082401buyingtickets#a082401buyingtickets

The four hijackers of flight 93 apparently arrive in Newark from Florida on this day, although there is much confusion over this. Two of them, Ahmed Alnami and Saeed Alghamdi, take Spirit Airlines flight 1460 via Atlanta, leaving around 6:30 p.m. and arriving three hours later.
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a090701floridanewark#a090701floridanewark

Of the 33 passengers (excluding the four hijackers) who are on board Flight 93 on September 11, at least 16 are not originally booked on this flight, but arrange to be on it very shortly before 9/11, or—in some cases—on the morning of 9/11 itself:
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a091101unscheduledpassengers#a091101unscheduledpassengers

Their baggage is to be screened for explosives or held off the plane until they have boarded. Supposedly, the thinking behind this is that someone smuggling a bomb onto a plane won’t get onto that same flight. According to the 9/11 Commission, nine of the 19 hijackers are flagged by the CAPPS system before boarding Flights 11, 175, 77, and 93.
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a620hijackersarrive#a620hijackersarrive

About an hour before boarding Flight 93, Ziad Jarrah phones his girlfriend, Aysel Senguen, who is currently recovering from a minor operation in a hospital in Germany, where she lives. [Los Angeles Times, 10/23/2001; Observer, 8/22/2004] Senguen will later recount, “[H]e was very brief. He said he loved me three times. I asked what was up. He hung up shortly afterwards.… It was so short and rather strange him saying that repeatedly.” [Reuters, 11/19/2002; Guardian, 11/20/2002]
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a645jarrahphonecall#a645jarrahphonecall

Only Ahmad Alhaznawi is selected from Flight 93. His bag is screened for explosives, but he is not stopped. The 9/11 Commission later concludes that Alhaznawi and Ahmed Alnami, also headed to Flight 93, have suspicious indicators and that they could have been linked to al-Qaeda upon inspection, but it has not been explained why or how.
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a700someselected#a700someselected

On their way to boarding the plane, all four would pass through a security checkpoint, which has three walk-through metal detectors, two X-ray machines, and explosive trace detection equipment. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 97 pdf file] The 9/11 Commission later claims Newark Airport has no video cameras monitoring its security checkpoints, so there is no documentary evidence showing when the hijackers passed through the checkpoint or what alarms may have been triggered. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 4; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 35 pdf file] However, Michael Taylor, the president of a security company, who has done consulting work for the New York Port Authority (which operates the airport), claims that Newark does use security cameras at the time of 9/11. [Boston Herald, 9/29/2001]
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a703checkinboard#a703checkinboard

Two passengers leave Flight 93 after hearing an announcement that there will be a five-minute delay in the plane pushing back from the gate. This is according to Terry Tyksinski, a longtime flight attendant with United Airlines, who says a customer service supervisor who witnessed the incident told her about it six months after 9/11. The two first-class passengers are reportedly of dark complexion, “kind of black, not black.” According to Tyksinski, the supervisor notes their names and is subsequently twice interviewed by the FBI. [Longman, 2002, pp. xiii-xiv] No other accounts, including the 9/11 Commission Report, mention this incident. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004] And while Flight 93 is delayed on the ground until 8:42 a.m., reports state that it pushes back from the gate just one minute later than its scheduled departure, rather than there being a five-minute delay as Tyksinski suggests. [Boston Globe, 11/23/2001; MSNBC, 9/11/2006] There will only be 37 passengers on Flight 93, including the four hijackers. This is 20 percent of the plane’s passenger capacity of 182 and, according to the 9/11 Commission, “is considerably below the 52 percent average load factor for Flight 93 for Tuesdays in the three-month period prior to September 11.” [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 36 pdf file]
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a800passengersleave#a800passengersleave

A Fairfax, Virginia company that makes computer software that tracks and records the flight paths of planes helps media companies and airlines to reconstruct the paths of all four of the hijacked aircraft. [Washington Business Journal, 9/11/2001; Washington Post, 9/13/2001] Flight Explorer sells an Internet-accessible application that provides constantly updated information on the positions of aircraft in flight. It uses radar feeds that the FAA collects from control centers across the US. [Business Wire, 6/16/2000; St. Petersburg Times, 8/12/2001] All of Flight Explorer’s employees begin sorting through its data “after the first crash [of Flight 11] was reported,” so presumably this is at around 8:50 a.m. Whether any particular agency, such as the FAA, requests this or they do it of their own initiative is unknown. Although there are some 4,000 planes in the air above the US at the time of the attacks, the company is quickly able to pinpoint the paths of all four hijacked aircraft. It then creates charts and animated videos of the four flights’ actual and intended routes. About 12 news agencies, including all the major networks, request these animated illustrations. [Washington Business Journal, 9/11/2001; Washington Post, 9/13/2001] Flight Explorer is apparently unhindered by the fact that flights 11 and 93 have their transponders turned off during the hijackings. Its reconstruction of Flight 77’s path ends, however, at 8:57, around the time that aircraft’s transponder goes off and it disappears from controllers’ radar screens (see (8:56 a.m.-9:05 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Yet the 9/11 Commission will later say that, despite this disappearance, “Radar reconstructions performed after 9/11 reveal that FAA radar equipment tracked the flight from the moment its transponder was turned off.” Why the Flight Explorer illustration does not therefore show the rest of Flight 77’s journey is not clear. [AVweb, 9/11/2001; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] Until a few years back, Flight Explorer was the only company that recorded flight paths. Since the 1999 death of golfer Payne Stewart (see October 25, 1999) the FAA has also been recording these paths. [Washington Business Journal, 9/11/2001] The final report of the 9/11 Commission will make no mention of the Flight Explorer flight path recordings. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 222]
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a846flightexplorer#a846flightexplorer

A NORAD training exercise that is taking place this morning, presumably Vigilant Guardian (see (6:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001), is reportedly canceled shortly after 9:03, when the second World Trade Center tower is hit. [Airman, 3/2002] NORAD Commander Larry Arnold later says that after Flight 175 hits the South Tower, “I thought it might be prudent to pull out of the exercise, which we did.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 59] According to author Lynn Spencer: “The phone calls start flying between the various NORAD command centers. General Arnold calls Maj. Gen. Rick Findley” at NORAD’s operations center in Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado, “to give him the latest information and have him withdraw all forces from the simulated exercise.” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 86] Arnold will recall, “As we pulled out of the exercise we were getting calls about United Flight 93 and we were worried about that.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 59] Some early accounts say the military receives notification of the possible hijacking of Flight 93 at around 9:16 a.m. (see 9:16 a.m. September 11, 2001). [CNN, 9/17/2001; 9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003] However, the 9/11 Commission will later claim that NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) first receives a call about Flight 93 at 10:07 a.m. (see 10:07 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] Arnold will add, “Then we had another call from Boston Center about a possible hijacking, but that turned out to be the airplane that had already hit the South Tower but we didn’t know that at the time.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 59]
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a903exercisecancelled#a903exercisecancelled

According to some accounts, Vice President Dick Cheney is in the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) below the White House by this time, along with Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta and others. Mineta will recall that, while a suspicious plane is heading toward Washington, an unidentified young man comes in and says to Cheney, “The plane is 50 miles out.” Mineta confers with acting FAA Deputy Administrator Monte Belger, who is at the FAA’s Washington headquarters. Belger says to him: “We’re watching this target on the radar, but the transponder’s been turned off. So we have no identification.” According to Mineta, the young man continues updating the vice president, saying, “The plane is 30 miles out,” and when he gets down to “The plane is 10 miles out,” asks, “Do the orders still stand?” In response, Cheney “whipped his neck around and said, ‘Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?’” Mineta will say that, “just by the nature of all the events going on,” he infers that the order being referred to is a shootdown order. Nevertheless, Flight 77 continues on and hits the Pentagon. [BBC, 9/1/2002; ABC News, 9/11/2002; 9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003; 9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003; St. Petersburg Times, 7/4/2004]
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a927cheneyupated#a927cheneyupated

Around the vice president, Rice, deputy White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten and I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Cheney's chief of staff, tensed as the military aide repeated the question, this time with even more urgency. The plane was now 60 miles out.

"Should we engage?" Cheney was asked.

"Yes," he replied again.

As the plane came closer, the aide repeated the question. Does the order still stand?

"Of course it does," Cheney snapped.

The vice president said later that it had seemed "painful, but nonetheless clear-cut. And I didn't agonize over it."

It was, "obviously, a very significant action," Cheney said in an interview. "You're asking American pilots to fire on a commercial airliner full of civilians. On the other hand, you had directly in front of me what had happened to the World Trade Center, and a clear understanding that once the plane was hijacked, it was a weapon."

Within minutes, there was a report that a plane had crashed in southwestern Pennsylvania -- what turned out to be United Flight 93, a Boeing 757 that had been hijacked after leaving Newark International Airport. Many of those in the PEOC feared that Cheney's order had brought down a civilian aircraft. Rice demanded that someone check with the Pentagon.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/18/AR2006071801175_5.html

Cleveland flight controller Stacey Taylor has been warned to watch transcontinental flights heading west for anything suspicious. She later recalls, “I hear one of the controllers behind me go, ‘Oh, my God, oh my God,’ and he starts yelling for the supervisor. He goes, ‘What is this plane doing? What is this plane doing?’ I wasn’t that busy at the time, and I pulled it up on my screen and he was climbing and descending and climbing and descending, but very gradually. He’d go up 300 feet, he’d go down 300 feet. And it turned out to be United 93.” (Note the time of this incident is not specified, but presumably it is prior to when Cleveland controllers note Flight 93 descends 700 feet at 9:29 a.m.
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a928erraticmoves#a928erraticmoves

A small jet plane—ExecuJet 956—tracks Flight 93 for what is described as “a substantial period of time” before it crashes, and picks up some of the radio transmissions from it, as both planes are operating on the same frequency. [Government's motion for protective order regarding cockpit voice recorder pursuant to 49 USC 1154. United States v. Zacarias Moussaoui, 8/8/2002 pdf file; Washington Post, 8/9/2002] The exact period over which ExecuJet 956 follows Flight 93 is unclear. But as early as 9:31 it calls the FAA’s Cleveland Center and, referring to Flight 93, reports: “[W]e’re just answering your call. We did hear that, uh, yelling too.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 461] At 9:40, after being asked, “did you understand that transmission [from Flight 93]?” ExecuJet 956 tells Cleveland Center: “Affirmative. He said that there was a bomb on board.” [Associated Press, 4/12/2006] Cleveland Center then asks the ExecuJet pilot if he can change course and try to spot Flight 93. He sees it, loses it, and then sees it again. He then has to make an evasive turn, as Flight 93 is heading directly for him. [Longman, 2002, pp. 104]
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a928execujettracks#a928execujettracks

http://www.historycommons.org/searchResults.jsp?searchtext=flight+93&events=on&entities=on&articles=on&topics=on&timelines=on&projects=on&titles=on&descriptions=on&dosearch=on&search=Go

Transcript from 'Meet the Press':
http://emperors-clothes.com/9-11backups/nbcmp.htm

Washington Post article on the shoot down order:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50745-2004Jun17.html

Rumsfeld says Flight 93 was "shot down":



9/11 Flight 93 Rare Footage



Listen to what they say at 2 minutes and 41 seconds on this video:



Scar in earth already existed:



Puff of black smoke:

http://fromtheleftsideofmybrain.files.wordpress.com/2007/09/flight93.jpg

APRIL 12--This the transcript of the final moments of United Airlines Flight 93, as captured by the plane's cockpit voice recorder on September 11, 2001. While the actual 31-minute audiotape was played this morning for jurors in the federal death penalty trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, Judge Leonie Brinkema refused to publicly release the tape, opting instead to provide only a transcript, a copy of which you'll find below. The tape begins with a hijacker's announcement that, "Ladies and gentlemen, this is the captain...we have a bomb on board, so sit." As the recording continues, the hijackers can be heard praying to Allah and warning passengers to "Shut up" and "Don't move." Transcript excerpts in bold were translated from Arabic by government officials.
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0412061hijack1.html

Government to condemn land for Flight 93 memorial

PITTSBURGH – One man inherited property that his grandfather bought during the Depression. A Lutheran pastor owns a cottage where he planned to retire with his wife. Two others own businesses.

But they and other property owners in rural southwestern Pennsylvania knew things would change in the aftermath of United Flight 93's crash on Sept. 11, 2001, which killed 40 passengers and crew and four terrorist hijackers. Plans were soon in the works for a memorial to honor the victims. Property owners say they realized that and were willing to cooperate and help make it happen.

But now that the government intends to take their land by eminent domain so the Flight 93 memorial can be built by the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks, property owners say they're disappointed and surprised by the plan.

They also disputed that negotiations have taken place and said they've either not been made offers, or were only provided offers within the past week.

The park service "apologized about the way it's come together, but what's sad is they had all these years to put this together and they haven't," said Randall Musser, who owns about 62 acres that the park service wants to acquire.

"They haven't ever really gotten officially started with negotiations," he said Thursday. Appraisers were just at his land on Tuesday.

Musser served on the committee that helped establish the park's boundaries and said landowners were promised in 2002 that eminent domain would not be used.

While landowner Tim Lambert knew that eminent domain, or condemnation, was a possibility, he thought it was unlikely and that the park service and a victim's family group working to acquire land wanted to buy larger parcels before dealing with owners of smaller properties.

"It's absolutely a surprise. I'm shocked by it. I'm disappointed by it," said Lambert, who owns nearly 164 acres that his grandfather bought in the 1930s. The park service plans to condemn two parcels totaling about five acres — land he said he had always intended to donate for the memorial.

"To the best of my knowledge and my lawyer, absolutely no negotiations have taken place with the park service where we've sat down and discussed this," Lambert said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090507/ap_on_re_us/us_flight93_memorial

The chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Stephen J. Friedman, abruptly resigned on Thursday, days after a newspaper article raised questions about his ties to his former employer, Goldman Sachs.

Mr. Friedman, who led or co-led Goldman from 1990 until 1994 and remains a director, was chairman of the New York Fed at the same time. He also held a substantial stake in the firm as the Federal Reserve drew up plans to keep Wall Street’s banks afloat.

Denis M. Hughes, the New York Fed’s deputy chairman, will take over as interim chairman, the organization said in a statement.

The New York Fed had asked for a waiver, which, after about two and a half months, the Fed granted, the newspaper said. During that time, Mr. Friedman bought 37,300 more Goldman shares, which have since risen $1.7 million in value.

In his resignation letter, Mr. Friedman said his public service on the board was being characterized as “improper” despite his compliance with the rules. “The Federal Reserve System has important work to do and does not need this distraction,” he said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/08/business/08fed.html?_r=1&ref=business

WASHINGTON – The Federal Reserve could become the supercop for "too big to fail" companies capable of causing another financial meltdown under a proposal being seriously considered by the White House.

The Obama administration told industry officials on Friday that it was leaning toward making such a recommendation, according to officials who attended a private one-hour meeting between President Barack Obama's economic advisers and representatives from about a dozen banks, hedge funds and other financial groups.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and other officials made it clear they were not inclined to divide the job among various regulators as has been suggested by industry and some federal regulators. Geithner told the group that one organization needs to be held responsible for monitoring systemwide risk.

"Committees don't make decisions," said Geithner, according to one participant.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090509/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_financial_meltdown_supercop;_ylt=ApFHP9_8EXaZs3dujxHScYSyBhIF

May 8 (Bloomberg) -- Fannie Mae, operating under a federal conservatorship since September, asked the U.S. Treasury for a $19 billion capital investment as a seventh straight quarterly loss drove the mortgage-finance company’s net worth below zero.

A wider first-quarter net loss of $23.2 billion, or $4.09 a share, pushed the company to request its second draw from a $200 billion funding commitment from the government, Washington- based Fannie Mae said in a filing today with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company took $15.2 billion March 31.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aumIiOBNig7A

At one bank in Alabama, the problem is a construction bust. At two in Ohio, the trouble is real estate. And in San Francisco, at Wells Fargo, the worry is credit cards — a staggering 26 percent of that bank’s card loans, federal regulators have concluded, might go bad if the economy takes a turn for the worse.

The stress tests released by the Obama administration Thursday painted a broad montage of the troubles in the nation’s banking industry and, for the first time, drew a stark dividing line through the new landscape of American finance.

On one side are institutions like JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs, which regulators deemed stronger than their peers — perhaps strong enough to repay billions of bailout dollars and wriggle free of government control.

On the other side are weaker institutions like Bank of America, which now confront the daunting challenge of raising capital on their own or accepting increased government ownership, along with whatever strings might be attached. Time is short: the banks have only until June 8 to draw up their plans for regulators. As the results of the tests streamed in from the Federal Reserve, banks began racing to raise money.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/08/business/08bank.html?ref=business

May 8 (Bloomberg) -- Wells Fargo & Co. and Morgan Stanley, ordered to increase capital after the U.S. stress tests, raised $16.6 billion in stock and bond sales today, the first banks to respond to the government’s mandate.

Wells Fargo sold $8.6 billion of common stock, 43 percent more than it planned. Morgan Stanley raised $8 billion by selling shares and debt, up from $5 billion announced yesterday. Citigroup Inc. is exchanging an additional $5.5 billion of preferred securities into common stock. Bank of America Corp. plans to sell as many as 1.25 billion shares of common stock in a shelf registration and an undetermined amount of debt that wouldn’t be guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aT.5odCkMJyE&refer=worldwide

The federal government reported yesterday that the financing arm of General Motors will need to raise $9.1 billion in new capital to ensure the firm's stability in the face of heavy losses in mortgage and auto lending and, sources said, possibly as much as $4 billion more to cover costs related to loans for Chrysler.

The sum is among the biggest required for any U.S. financial institution subjected to the government stress test, and could prove difficult for GMAC Financial Services to raise because of the limited nature of its business and the poor quality of its loans. The firm has struggled to raise money from private investors in the past and has already received $5 billion in federal assistance.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/07/AR2009050702777.html?nav=hcmoduletmv

WASHINGTON — After subjecting the nation’s biggest banks to the most public scrutiny in decades, federal regulators ordered 10 of them on Thursday to raise a total of $75 billion in extra capital and gave the rest a clean bill of health.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/08/business/08stress.html?_r=1&ref=business

NEW YORK (AP) -- Federal regulators on Friday shut down Westsound Bank of Bremerton, Wash., making it the 33rd bank to fail this year. Westsound Bank is the second bank based in the state of Washington to collapse this year, after the Bank of Clark County in January. Westsound, which served the Puget Sound area, was hit hard by losses in construction loans. It had total assets of $334.6 million as of March 31, and total deposits of $304.5 million.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/US-regulators-shut-down-33rd-apf-15191760.html?.v=2

The Bank of England is concerned that the UK's banking system is heading for a third wave of crisis that could snuff out fragile signs of recovery in the economy.

On Thursday the Bank surprised the City by announcing that it would pump an extra £50bn of new money into the economy despite recent stockmarket rallies.

Now the Guardian has learned that this increase in quantitative easing was driven by fears in Threadneedle Street that the credit crunch is still sucking the life out of the British economy and the banking sector remains in deep trouble.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/may/08/bank-england-recession-economy

A new gun law being considered in Congress, if aligned with Department of Homeland Security memos labeling everyday Americans as potential "threats," could potentially deny firearms to pro-lifers, gun-rights advocates, tax protesters, animal rights activists, and a host of others – any already on the expansive DHS watch list for potential "extremism."

Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., has sponsored H.R. 2159, the Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Terrorists Act of 2009, which permits the attorney general to deny transfer of a firearm to any "known or suspected dangerous terrorist." The bill requires only that the potential firearm transferee is "appropriately suspected" of preparing for a terrorist act and that the attorney general "has a reasonable belief" that the gun might be used in connection with terrorism.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=97491

A Texas member of Congress is warning Americans that unless they act – and act now – the nation soon will have a "hate crimes" law that actually was written so that it protects pedophiles and others with alternative sexual orientations such as voyeurism and exhibitionism.

"If you guys don't raise enough stink there's not chance of stopping it," U.S. Rep. Louis Gohmert said today on a radio program with WND columnist Janet Porter.
http://worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=97503

President Barack Obama is a "cult leader," former Rep. Tom Tancredo said this week on the conservative news-radio program "Dateline: Washington."

The remarks came on in a rush as a charged-up Tancredo was being asked about the new administration and its emerging immigration policy – an issue that Tancredo has adopted as his own and who ran for President on a platform to enforce immigration laws.

He described the President’s policy as representing nothing less than amnesty – although the chief executive obfuscated this obvious conclusion with his "Obamaesque" way of addressing the hot-button topic, reports The Hill newspaper.

He also criticized the Obama administration for not closing the border with Mexico as the Swine flu erupted there. Tancredo said that such a closure would have been in keeping with established protocols, and that it was a “mistake” not to follow them.

As to how Obama can apparently pull off anything on his agenda, Tancredo lashed out: “He is – you have to admit – he is a cult leader. And the cult will go with him wherever he wants to go,” Tancredo said

“You just don’t know about the size of the cult; how big it is – if it’s shrinking or growing,” Tancredo added. “He is not just a political figure; he is truly a cult leader.”
http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/tancredo_obama/2009/05/08/212470.html

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's budget proposal does away with funding to extend the border fence along the U.S.-Mexico border.

The move is significant departure from the approach to border security advocated by President George W. Bush, whose administration oversaw construction and planning of 670 miles of pedestrian fencing and vehicle barriers erected along roughly one-third of the nation's 1,947 mile border with Mexico.

President Obama's budget cuts do leave some funds for roads, lights and other minor border construction projects, but no money to extend the fence.

The proposal is also a bit of a turnaround for the president who, as a Democratic senator from Illinois, joined 79 other senators in 2006 to support construction of the border barrier system.
http://www.newsmax.com/headlines/obama_border_fence/2009/05/08/212449.html

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama's proposed foreign affairs budget calls for a massive hiring drive at the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development to staff a dramatic shift from military to civilian operations abroad.

The spending plan submitted to Congress on Friday calls for adding 1,226 new foreign and civil service diplomatic positions at the two agencies in the budget year that starts in October. It projects a 25 percent boost in the total number of foreign service officers by 2013 and doubling the number at USAID by 2012.

There are currently 6,600 foreign service officers at the State Department and another 1,000 at USAID.

"Smart power starts with people," said Jacob Lew, the deputy secretary of state for management and resources who detailed the specifics of the $53.9 billion budget proposal for reporters on Friday. "We want to be able to pursue the policies that we're calling smart power and we don't have the troops to do it without this buildup."
http://www.newsmax.com/politics/us_obama_budget_diplomats/2009/05/08/212455.html

President Barack Obama has asked Congress to end federal payments to states and communities for jailing illegal immigrants as he continues along a path toward legalization of undocumented aliens.

The budget plan Obama released on Thursday would end the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP), under which states received $400 million in the current fiscal year to cover the cost of incarcerating convicts and pre-trial detainees who are illegally in the U.S.
http://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/obama_no_jailing_illegals/2009/05/08/212393.html

KABUL -- A joint U.S.-Afghan investigation confirmed that an unspecified number of civilians died in a southern Afghan battle local officials say killed dozens of villagers, but the initial findings released Saturday appeared to blame Taliban militants who used locals as "human shields."
http://www.newsmax.com/international/as_afghanistan/2009/05/09/212638.html

MOSCOW -- Rows of missiles and tanks rolled through Moscow's Red Square and dozens of combat jets roared overhead in the Victory Day parade Saturday in the largest show of Russia's military might in its post-Soviet history.

Victory Day, marking the defeat of Nazi Germany, is Russia's most important secular holiday, and the parade reflected the Kremlin's efforts to revive the nation's armed forces and global clout.

In a speech opening the parade, President Dmitry Medvedev said the nation's armed forces are "ready to give adequate response to any aggression."

Saturday's parade displayed about 9,000 troops, more than 100 combat vehicles, including new Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missiles. For the first time, it featured the state-of-the art S-400 air defense missiles which Russian officials say are unrivaled in their combat capability.

Also taking part in the parade were 69 combat planes and helicopters _ twice the number featuring in last year's show. They included the world's heaviest An-124 Ruslan cargo plane, Tu-160 and Tu-95 strategic bombers and scores of fighter jets and helicopter gunships.
http://www.newsmax.com/international/eu_russia_victory_day/2009/05/09/212611.html

In late January, WikiLeaks released a 186 page secret Israeli Ministry of Defense database, which showed the full extent of illegal Israeli settlements in Gaza and the West Bank. A version of the document had first been obtained by the well regarded Israeli newspaper Haaretz. The leak made headlines, but its global political impact was limited by its presentation in Hebrew.

Subsequently the United States commissioned the Central Intelligence Agency’s Open Source Center to translate the leak to English. The translation was not released by the CIA, but a copy was obtained by Stephen Aftergood, editor of the US based Federation of American Scientist’s Secrecy News and is presented here.

According to Haaretz, “An analysis of the data reveals that, in the vast majority of the settlements - about 75 percent - construction, sometimes on a large scale, has been carried out without the appropriate permits or contrary to the permits that were issued,”, and “The database also shows that, in more than 30 settlements, extensive construction of buildings and infrastructure (roads, schools, synagogues, yeshivas and even police stations) has been carried out on private lands belonging to Palestinian West Bank residents.”
http://cryptogon.com/?p=8477

A high-seas mission departs from San Francisco next month to map and explore a sinister and shifting 21st-century continent: one twice the size of Texas and created from six million tonnes of discarded plastic.
http://cryptogon.com/?p=8472

May 7 (Bloomberg) -- Sallie Mae, the biggest U.S. provider of college loans, says it doesn’t oppose President Barack Obama’s plan to wipe out much of that business. The company just has a few suggestions.

“What we’ve thought about here is how to make the president’s proposal better,” Jack Remondi, chief financial officer of the company, known formally as SLM Corp., said in an interview.

Obama has proposed saving $94 billion over 10 years by issuing all federal college loans directly instead of using private lenders led by Sallie Mae.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=ayp9wC819vF0&refer=exclusive

The federal government projected that 19 of the nation’s biggest banks could suffer losses of up to $599 billion through the end of next year if the economy performs worse than expected and ordered 10 of them to raise a combined $74.6 billion in capital to cushion themselves.

The much-anticipated stress-test results unleashed a scramble by the weakest banks to find money and a push by the strongest ones to escape the government shadow of taxpayer-funded rescues.
http://cryptogon.com/?p=8470

The Bank of England stepped up its campaign to boost the struggling economy, raising the size of its asset purchase programme on Thursday in a surprise move tantamount to printing an extra 50 billion pounds to get banks lending again.

The central bank kept rates at a record low of 0.5 percent as expected, but surprised markets by moving swiftly to reassure them that its scheme to buy up government and corporate bonds with newly-created money would last at least 3 months more.
http://cryptogon.com/?p=8466

The Obama administration is considering an unprecedented fall vaccination campaign that could entail giving Americans three flu shots — one to combat annual seasonal influenza and two targeted at the new swine flu virus spreading across the globe.

If enacted, the multibillion-dollar effort would represent the first time that top federal health officials have asked Americans to get more than one flu vaccine in a year, raising serious challenges concerning production, distribution and the ability to track potentially severe side effects.
http://cryptogon.com/?p=8453

The Armed Forces will be drafted in to run state schools under plans to drive up discipline and respect in classrooms. Ministers are in talks with defence chiefs about taking over a handful of schools and turning them into military academies. Alongside daily lessons, pupils would be expected to take part in activities such as drills, uniformed parades, weapons handling and adventure training. The first state schools set to gain 'military academy' status are understood to be based in Portsmouth and Colchester. The controversial scheme will initially be in areas where there are a large number of military families, but is set to be rolled out across the country.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1178508/Right-fall-line-orrible-little-pupils-Government-wants-military-run-state-schools.html

There’s good news tonight for people in danger of losing their unemployment pay before they can find a job. Lawmakers voted to extend unemployment benefits by 20 weeks. But while the state is grabbing 418 million federal dollars to extend benefits, it’s passing up the chance to receive another half a billion dollars more. Jobless Floridians are eligible for 59 weeks of unemployment pay, but for many that’s not enough time to find a job. That’s why lawmakers voted to lengthen the eligibility period to by 20 weeks.

“What we are anticipating is, probably by the end of May having a notification out to those who are potentially eligible and hopefully by the beginning of July, having that money in Floridians hands.”

An estimated 250-thousand people will qualify to receive the extra 418 million in extended benefits from the federal stimulus package. While the state is taking the money to extend benefits another 400 million is being left on the table. To qualify for the money the state would have to loosen its unemployment qualification standards. Lawmakers turned their backs on the changes this year. Governor Charlie Crist hopes they’ll reconsider.

“I’m encouraged that the deadline isn’t until 2011 to get the additional money for unemployment compensation”

With the state paying out 60 million dollars a week in unemployment claims, more money will likely be needed before then. Lawmakers estimate the state’s unemployment compensation fund will run out of money by July. But unemployment benefits are mandated by the federal government so the state says people who are eligible will still receive a check.
http://www.wjhg.com/home/headlines/44483577.html

So the stimulus money bought them another 8 to 10 weeks...

WASHINGTON - Minnesota has been certified to receive $130 million in federal economic stimulus funds to help make unemployment payments and provide services to laid-off workers, U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said Wednesday. The money, which is available immediately, will help the state meet unemployment insurance obligations estimated at more than $1.5 billion this year, state officials said.

Minnesota and six other states, including South Dakota, have qualified for the additional federal aid under a program that requires states to help unemployed workers who entered the work force recently, work part time, or have lost their jobs due to "compelling family reasons" such as domestic violence. The additional funds do not increase or extend unemployment benefits, which were already beefed up under the $787 billion stimulus package approved by Congress earlier this year.
http://www.startribune.com/local/44503917.html?elr=KArksD:aDyaEP:kD:aUzyaUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aU7DYaGEP7vDEh7P:DiUs

LANSING, Mich., May 6 /PRNewswire/ -- The Democrat-controlled Michigan House of Representatives today passed legislation to permanently expand Michigan's 100 percent employer-financed unemployment system in an effort to accept one-time dollars from the federal government (HBs 4785-86).

"Today, House Republicans stood with Michigan businesses in support of job creation and retention while House Democrats pushed through a job-killing proposal (HBs 4785-86) to increase unemployment insurance taxes on Michigan employers at a time when they can least afford it."

"House Democrats took the easy and short-sighted route to $138 million in one-time federal money, while turning their backs on the job providers who will be left to foot the bill of the $69.7 million per-year expansion of the 100 percent employer-financed unemployment insurance system."

"The Democrats' action today will permanently increase costs and further strain the unemployment system and the ability of the state to fulfill its commitment to those who are currently eligible for unemployment benefits."

"While we recognize the appeal of money is alluring, the federal funding that is currently on the table is not a 'gift' from Congress."
http://news.prnewswire.com/DisplayReleaseContent.aspx?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/05-06-2009/0005020994&EDATE=

Vermont's unemployment insurance fund could run out of money in less than a year, but business groups are at odds with labor advocates over how to bail it out. More money is being taken out of the fund to pay benefits to roughly 17,000 unemployed Vermonters than is being raised in the taxes businesses pay into the fund.

"Contributions are down, expenses are up. It's just not sustainable," state Labor Commissioner Patricia Moulton Powden said Wednesday.

In January, the fund had $179 million. By April, it had shrunk to $79 million. The unemployment fund won't affect the state budget because it is a discreet pot of money paid for by businesses.
http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2009/05/06/ap6389004.html

The cost of doing business just went up another notch...for more check out my post on Government Capitalism...

http://yophat.blogspot.com/2009/05/government-capitalism.html

Indiana’s General Assembly last week approved a plan to replenish the state’s bankrupt jobless fund. The bill, which passed the Senate 46-3, is a bipartisan compromise that preserves worker benefits, restores the fiscal integrity of the system, and prevents premium increases for employers who do not lay off workers – generally speaking, Indiana’s vital family-owned small businesses.

For some time, premiums paid by businesses – which fund unemployment benefits for laid-off Hoosiers – have failed to keep pace with benefits paid-out to workers. As a result, Indiana’s fund is now partially sustained by a more than $800 million interest-free loan from the federal government, an amount estimated to top $1 billion by year’s end.

If lawmakers failed to find a fix in the near-term, we risked facing a federal government takeover of the fund – a move that could have resulted in a massive, permanent expansion of Indiana’s unemployment insurance system and additional premium increases on top of those required to balance the fund.

Thirty states have jobless funds which are already insolvent or at risk of insolvency, according to the National Association of State Workforce Agencies. But many of these states are placing the burden to replenish their funds solely on the shoulders of businesses without looking to find efficiencies in their systems. No general tax revenues are used to fund the UI system. All proceeds are paid in via insurance premiums paid by employers, and all of the premiums in the UI fund are used only to pay unemployed worker benefits.
http://www.lafayette-online.com/opinions/letters-to-the-editor/2009/05/bankrupt-unemployment-fund-fix/

Facing South has been covering the ongoing saga of Southern Republican governors vs. the federal stimulus. A handful of GOP rising star governors -- including those in Texas, Louisiana, South Carolina and Alabama -- have been making headlines in recent months for rejecting unemployment benefits from the $787 billion federal stimulus package.

Here's the conflict: Not everyone who loses a job automatically qualifies for unemployment benefits, but the federal stimulus package gives states a chance to expand eligibility, a move that could help thousands of unemployed Americans weather the recession. The unemployment funds would make it easier for more jobless people to qualify for benefits and draw checks for longer periods, as well as cover laid-off part-time workers. In some states the shift would require changes to state law in order to qualify for the stimulus funds. The handful of Southern governors that have argued against the unemployment funding have said that the aid comes with "too many strings" attached and would hurt employers in the way of higher taxes down the line.
http://www.southernstudies.org/2009/05/the-battle-for-unemployment-funds-continues.html

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Missouri has delayed tax refunds and quietly borrowed $325 million from its cash reserves to keep the state afloat.

State financial documents obtained by The Associated Press show the state borrowed $175 million from its reserves in February and an additional $150 million in March. But Gov. Jay Nixon's administration never publicized the borrowing.

If the state had not borrowed the money, it would have been $100 million in the hole at the start of April.

Documents also show the state paid out $65 million less in income tax refunds as of April 1 compared to the same point last year. Those refunds aren't projected to be paid until later this month.

A Revenue Department spokesman said budget constraints are one reason for the delay.
http://www.kmbc.com/money/19105336/detail.html

State Budget Director Linda Luebbering said Monday that an estimated $1.39 billion in total refunds will be paid to taxpayers. She also said all refunds will be paid out by or before June 30, the last day of this fiscal year.

"It's just a matter of managing our cash to make sure we can pay all of our bills," Luebbering said.
http://www.columbiamissourian.com/stories/2009/04/07/state-revenue-shortfall-will-delay-tax-refund-payments/

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - Some of the 2,900 state employees paying into a reimbursement plan are expressing outrage that the state has fallen behind in returning their money for medical care and other expenses.

The state of New Mexico dutifully deducts pre-tax money from those employees' paychecks and puts it into individual flexible-spending accounts. The plan functions like a savings account, but employees only get reimbursed when they submit an authorized claim for things like child care and medical care.

Workers, some living paycheck to paycheck, first pay those expenses out of their own pockets. And now some of those workers are saying the state hasn't held up its part of the deal.
http://www.krqe.com/dpp/news/politics/politics_krqe_albuquerque_state_lags_in_worker_repayments_200904062237

SAN FRANCISCO, March 31 (Reuters) - California will not need to borrow an additional $1.5 billion from Wall Street and has enough cash to meet all its payment obligations in full through June, or the end of its current fiscal year, the state controller said on Tuesday.

Earlier this year, California's state government was on the verge of running out of cash, and required officials to withhold tax refunds along with payments to local governments and vendors.

The crisis eased in February when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and lawmakers agreed to a budget deal that closed a shortfall of more than $40 billion.

A recent $500 million note from Golden 1 Credit Union, internal borrowing and federal stimulus aid further bolstered the state's cash account.

"With sufficient cash on hand, we will be able to meet all of our obligations in full and on time, including tax refunds to California taxpayers and payments to private businesses and local programs that provide needed services to our most vulnerable residents," State Controller John Chiang said in a statement.

Chiang said the state government has already made $3 billion in delayed payments, including $2.2 billion in tax refunds.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/marketsNewsUS/idUKN3143693320090331

Property-tax revenue has fallen more than 9 percent as valuations drop, stressed homeowners delay paying property taxes and the number of foreclosures continues to rise.
http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/article/20090407/NEWS01/904070311/1002

A shrinking pipeline of state aid and tax credit reimbursement has north metro cities at the budget chopping block.

Although cuts won't be final until the end of the legislative session, cities are planning for the worst-case scenario. And cities' decisions are guided by Gov. Tim Pawlenty's budget, which cuts millions in local government aid (LGA) and withholds a piece of cities' property tax revenues.
http://www.startribune.com/local/north/42481682.html?elr=KArks:DCiUHc3E7_V_nDaycUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU

CHARLESTON, W.Va. - Lawmakers are moving forward with a plan to impose surcharges on West Virginia businesses and workers to keep the state's Unemployment Compensation Fund from going broke, amid warnings the fund has already reached a crisis point.

On Monday evening, members of the House Judiciary Committee advanced Gov. Joe Manchin's bill (SB246) to the Finance Committee - despite concerns from some that the plan would hurt businesses already struggling in the recession.

Surcharges for employees and employers would kick in if the fund's reserves fall below $180 million, something that has already happened, state Unemployment Compensation Director Michael Moore told delegates.

Unemployment claims are up 60 percent compared to this time last year, and the fund paid out more than $32 million in March, Moore said. That left it with about a $170 million balance.

"I think it's pretty obvious," he said. "If we don't do anything, we're going to go broke, probably before the end of the year."
http://sundaygazettemail.com/News/200904063534286

State unemployment claims for the third week of March have risen 153 percent since 2008 and 182 percent since 2007 for the same period, said Jeff Hentschel, director of communications for the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development.

The state paid unemployment claims to 115,865 people in the third week of March, up from 45,651 people in 2008, Hentschel said.

"Generally speaking," he said, "we are paying out about $25 million per week."

The exorbitant increase in unemployment claims has caused the state's Unemployment Trust Fund Reserve to fall from $650 million to below $450 million in the last six months. Now, state legislators are considering making changes to the tax laws to stabilize the fund.

Employers now pay an average of 2.7 percent on the first $7,000 paid to each of their employees into the trust fund.

Proposed legislation would increase the base to $9,000 and add a surcharge of .06 percent to the payment as well to increase fund reserves, said Jim Brown, Tennessee director of the National Federation of Independent Business.

Brown said the combined increases would be the equivalent of an average 3.3 percent unemployment tax on each employer.
http://www.jacksonsun.com/article/20090331/BUSINESS/903310307

DENNIS TOWNSHIP, N.J. - New Jersey has joined the list of states unable to pay the escalating number of unemployment insurance claims without borrowing from the federal government, Gov. Jon S. Corzine said Monday.

Corzine told a group of small-business owners in south Jersey that the state's unemployment insurance fund has temporarily run out of money. The fund expects a cash boost from businesses to begin the second quarter in April, but until then it must borrow from Washington. The loan is interest-free through December 2010, Corzine said.

"There is a standard procedure that is in place when you run down your unemployment fund," Corzine said.

New Jersey's unemployment claims have continued to rise as the recession deepens. They're running about double the number as last year.

Labor Department spokesman Kevin Smith said that about $75 million in claims was being paid out weekly as of Feb. 28, compared with $45 million in claims the prior year.

Unemployment claims are funded mostly through a payroll tax on businesses, with a smaller contribution from workers. Last year, New Jersey employers paid $1.5 billion into the fund, while workers contributed $350 million, Smith said.

New Jersey began borrowing from the federal government on March 5, said Leni Fortson, of the federal Department of Labor in Philadelphia. As of March 19, the state had borrowed $120 million. Fourteen states are borrowing federal cash to pay for jobless claims, Fortson said.

New Jersey's fund has been depleted by years of raids by lawmakers of both parties, and as a result is now chronically underfunded. About $4.7 billion has been diverted from the fund since 1993 to pay for charity care to hospitals and other programs.
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newjersey/ny-bc-nj--njbudget-business0323mar23,0,6332989.story

There is a high chance a majority of the States within the United States of America could file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy. There are currently 46 states with high budget deficits, Arizona being one of them.

In fact, Jan Brewer, the newly appointed Governor of Arizona has a major crisis on her hands, one that Arizona and national media isn’t covering. The alarming news is the State of Arizona has 90 to 120 days before they completely run out of money. After that, all bills and tax refunds owed to the citizens will go unpaid.

Before Janet Napolitano left for her new Homeland secretary position, she had a stand-off with Arizona Treasurer Dean Martin. The AZ Treasurer forewarned Napolitano about Arizona’s financial crisis, but she refused to heed his words.

With neighboring California on the verge of bankruptcy this year, many States will follow in their steps.

Many States are already scurrying to cut unwanted costs, cut State-funded programs, raise taxes, not issue tax refunds to their citizens, and borrow money just to survive in 2009. Unfortunately, many banks — the same banks the Fed bailed out — are refusing to loan money to the States and their Treasury agencies.

It’s very possible you’ll see the end of the United States as we know it. If the Fed doesn’t bailout the States when their cash dries up and the banks don’t loan them money, then our States will be left in financial ruin. This would be a tragic and unprecedented event never experienced in the United States.

No State has ever filed bankruptcy, but it could be coming to a State near you this year.

We are on the brink of something far worse than the Great Depression.
http://freedomarizona.org/2009/01/30/46-of-50-states-could-file-bankruptcy-in-2009-2010/

States are facing a great fiscal crisis. At least 46 states faced or are facing shortfalls in their budgets for this and/or next year, and severe fiscal problems are highly likely to continue into the following year as well. Combined budget gaps for the remainder of this fiscal year and state fiscal years 2010 and 2011 are estimated to total more than $350 billion.

States are currently at the mid-point of fiscal year 2009 — which started July 1 in most states — and are in the process of preparing their budgets for the next year. Over half the states had already cut spending, used reserves, or raised revenues in order to adopt a balanced budget for the current fiscal year — which started July 1 in most states. Now, their budgets have fallen out of balance again. New gaps of $51 billion (over 10% of state budgets) have opened up in the budgets of at least 42 states plus the District of Columbia. These budget gaps are in addition to the $48 billion shortfalls that these and other states faced as they adopted their budgets for the current fiscal year, bringing total gaps for the year to 15 percent of budgets.

The vast majority of states cannot run a deficit or borrow to cover their operating expenditures. As a result, states have three primary actions they can take during a fiscal crisis: they can draw down available reserves, they can cut expenditures, or they can raise taxes. States already have begun drawing down reserves; the remaining reserves are not sufficient to allow states to weather a significant downturn or recession. The other alternatives — spending cuts and tax increases — can

further slow a state’s economy during a downturn and contribute to the further slowing of the national economy, as well.
http://www.cbpp.org/9-8-08sfp.htm

The downward spiral....we are just beginning!

Continuing economic problems have created budget problems in many states, leading at least 40 states to propose or enact reduced services to their residents, including some of their most vulnerable families and individuals. Additional cuts are likely in the coming months as states develop budgets for the fiscal year that begins July 1, 2009. In addition, at least 14 states have increased taxes or otherwise raised new revenue; governors in six more states have proposed new revenue measures.

Thirty-six states have cut education or proposed such cuts because they face massive, devastating budget deficits in this recession.

The combination of rising unemployment, declining consumer spending, declining asset values, and foreclosures has led to declining state revenues. And the number of people in poverty is growing, adding costs to state budgets for programs such as Medicaid and social services.

Education is by far the largest component of state budgets. Some 46 percent of all state general fund expenditures is devoted to elementary, secondary, and higher education.

Nearly all states are required to balance their general fund budgets. When large budget deficits develop, education often is cut deeply.
http://www.cbpp.org/12-17-08sfp.htm

States that collectively cut $40 billion in spending to balance their budgets over the summer are now facing an additional $32 billion shortfall as tax receipts come in below estimates, the report said.
http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1864620,00.html

Here's the kink in the works...the guy on the bottom...you know the "tax payer"...is insolvent. Game over!

When the states start stealing from their citizens....

TOPEKA, Kan. - Kansas has suspended income tax refunds and may not be able to pay employees on time, the state's budget director said Monday.

The state doesn't have enough money in its main bank account to pay its bills, prompting Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius to suggest transferring $225 million from other accounts throughout state government. But the move required approval from legislative leaders, and the GOP refused Monday.

Budget Director Duane Goossen said that without the money, he's not sure the state can meet its payroll. State employees are due to be paid again Friday.

Goossen said the state stopped processing income tax refunds last week.

GOP leaders are hoping to pressure Sebelius into signing a bill making $326 million in adjustments to the budget for the fiscal year that ends June 30.

Legislators approved that bill last week, but it has not reached her desk.

Goossen said the state might also have to delay payments to public schools and to doctors who provide care to Kansans under the Medicaid program.
http://www.kansas.com/735/story/701750.html

Last minute update...

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas officials say a budget impasse that held up state income tax refunds and threatened to delay state employees' paychecks has come to an end.

Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius met a key demand from Republican legislative leaders by signing a bill Tuesday to balance the state's current budget.

Republican leaders say they will now approve a plan from Sebelius to borrow money internally to shore up the state's main bank account.

The move eases a cash crunch that had threatened to prevent the state from meeting its payroll on Friday and had halted tax refunds.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hGIgMQ6KdGHUR7mOjWMM9ZXRgUFQD96DKMMG0

They didn't mention where the funds where coming from internally???

New York State’s unemployment insurance system, besieged by claims from laid-off workers, ran out of money on the first business day of the year and is borrowing daily from the federal government to bridge a fast-growing and potentially huge deficit, state labor officials say.

Despite paying lower benefits to its jobless residents than other Northeastern states, the state’s unemployment fund has been borrowing about $90 million a week from the federal unemployment trust fund, state officials said. The deficit has already reached $212 million and is expected to exceed $2.5 billion by the end of 2010, they said.

State officials say that the deficit does not threaten the continued payment of benefits.

But the loans could wind up costing the state’s unemployment fund more than $100 million in interest and could result in a punitive tax on all employers across the state two years from now, state officials and experts on the unemployment insurance system said.

More than 500,000 people were collecting unemployment checks in New York State in the first week of this year, nearly three times as many as a year before.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/nyregion/22benefits.html

Nearly 400,000 North Carolinians were unemployed and seeking work in December – a record number. The number of unemployed jumped by 185,000 in 2008.

“We’re having some days where we pay out $26 million a day and those payouts will sometimes out pact collections,” said. David Clegg, deputy chairman of the state Employment Security Commission.

North Carolina's jobless rate was 8.7 percent in December, the highest rate in 25 years. About a third of the state's 100 counties reported at least 10 percent unemployment for that month, twice the number with double-digit unemployment in November.

“We’re paying benefits for about 400,000 and the wages in North Carolina are the highest in the southeast, which makes our benefit levels the highest in the southeast,” Clegg said.

The ESC has paid out $17 million in benefits over the past two days and will likely have to borrow more money next week, spokesman Larry Parker said.
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/4527803/

First-time claims for state unemployment in Georgia have shot up yet again. And the state's labor commissioner predicted Georgia's 8.1 percent unemployment rate would likely get worse before it improves.

"I believe that we will see double-digit unemployment in Georgia," Michael Thurmond told reporters at the state Capitol on Thursday.

Thurmond's comments came after the Georgia Department of Labor reported that the number of people filing first-time claims for state unemployment insurance benefits jumped 80.7 percent in January from the same month in 2008. Labor officials said Thursday that 120,139 people who have been laid off filed for benefits in January.

It's placing unprecedented pressure on the state's unemployment insurance trust fund, which pays jobless claims.

The fund paid out $140 million in January and another $144 million in December. Those are, by far, the highest payouts in the state's history, Thurmond said. The fund still has $753 million and Thurmond said he remained confident it would remain solvent for the remainder of 2009.
http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2009/02/12/ap6046879.html

The state to move to....

So many North Carolina residents are unemployed that the state has borrowed $13 million from the federal government to pay its jobless benefits this week and likely will need to borrow again.

Employment Security Commission spokesman Larry Parker said Thursday that the $13 million covered two days of payments this week. The state, which has a $540 million line of credit with the federal government, may need to borrow again as early as Monday.

"Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays are the biggest payout days," Parker said. Although the unemployment insurance trust fund is "near zero right now," there was enough money to cover Thursday night's smaller payout, he said.

The loans are interest-free if repaid by October.

One reason for concern is that the state just received $71 million from 200,000 employers, which is the ESC's major quarterly payment, Parker said. The state does get some smaller employer payments throughout the quarter, but another large payment isn't due until May, he said.

The $71 million covers the fourth quarter, which typically is the smallest of the four major payments from employers, whose taxes fund unemployment benefits.

North Carolina's unemployment increased every month in 2008, almost doubling by the end of the year. The state started the year by paying $99.4 million in January and ended it with $194.2 million in December, Parker said.
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/breaking/story/533575.html

Thirty U.S. states are at risk of having the funds that pay out unemployment benefits become insolvent over the next few months, according to the National Association of State Workforce Agencies.

Indiana's unemployment trust fund became insolvent last month and has borrowed twice from Washington since then - the first such loans to the state since 1983. It also expects to request an additional $330 million early next year.

Michigan, which has been borrowing money from the federal government for the past few years to replenish its fund, is now $508.8 million in the hole and unable to repay it. Next month the state, where the unemployment rate is more than 9 percent, will begin levying a special "solvency tax" against some employers to replenish its trust fund.

California, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island and other states are inching toward insolvency as well and may have to borrow from the federal government to get through at least the first quarter of 2009.

In South Carolina, officials recently requested a $15 million line of credit.

"Right now we have $40 million in our trust fund, and we are paying out around $11 million a week," said Allen Larson, deputy executive director for the unemployment insurance program at the South Carolina Employment Security Commission. "So we think it is going to be very close as to whether or not we can get through this year. We have never experienced anything like this."

Officials in New York said the state was not in dire straits but very well may need to borrow in the first quarter of next year.

"With longer-term solvency issues due to the sharp increase in unemployment, federal borrowing quickly becomes expensive," said Loree Levy, a spokeswoman for the Employment Development Department in California, which is already facing a multibillion-dollar budget gap. "We are anticipating interest payments of $20 million in 2009-10, and if nothing is done to revise the revenue generation model, the interest would be $150 million in 2010-11."

As such, states then have to raise taxes or cut services, or both.

"Unemployment taxes are one of a number of taxes that make it difficult to do business here," said Robert Vincent, a spokesman for Gtech, a technology company in Rhode Island that focuses on the lottery industry.

In many cases, states that have kept unemployment tax rates artificially low, or in some cases decreased them, find themselves in the most dire situation. Indiana legislators, for example, reduced the tax rates for businesses by 25 percent in 2001.

"Frankly, they created the perfect storm," said John Ruckelshaus, the deputy commissioner for the Indiana Department of Workforce Development. "The Legislature will have to go in and look at the whole unemployment trust fund first thing when they begin their session."
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/12/15/business/funds.php

Barry Baer, a member of the subcommittee, said Indiana will probably have to borrow between $400 million and $500 million from the federal government to cover benefits between now and when the legislature can changes the law. And it will take an additional $500 million to $800 million to rebuild the fund so it is strong for the future.
http://archives.chicagotribune.com/2008/nov/13/business/chi-ap-in-insolventunemploy

A little dry humor for you....
http://www.toonpool.com/cartoons/The%20Insolvent%20States%20of%20America_25592

April 23 (Bloomberg) -- The number of Americans filing first-time applications for unemployment insurance rose last week to 640,000 as forecast, while total benefit rolls reached a record, indicating the labor market continues to deteriorate.

“There is nothing suggesting at this point that payroll declines are going to abate,” said Tom Porcelli, a senior economist at Castlestone Management Ltd. in New York. “We could bounce along the bottom here for a while.”

The U.S. lost 663,000 jobs last month, Labor said April 3, and the unemployment rate jumped to 8.5 percent, the highest level since 1983.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a9ic3gU8H.Ok&refer=home

More detail here...

http://hectorowen.blogspot.com/2007/06/kgb-psyops-from-horses-mouth.html

Sentient world: war games on the grandest scale

Perhaps your real life is so rich you don't have time for another.

Even so, the US Department of Defense (DOD) may already be creating a copy of you in an alternate reality to see how long you can go without food or water, or how you will respond to televised propaganda.

The DOD is developing a parallel to Planet Earth, with billions of individual "nodes" to reflect every man, woman, and child this side of the dividing line between reality and AR.

Called the Sentient World Simulation (SWS), it will be a "synthetic mirror of the real world with automated continuous calibration with respect to current real-world information", according to a concept paper for the project.

"SWS provides an environment for testing Psychological Operations (PSYOP)," the paper reads, so that military leaders can "develop and test multiple courses of action to anticipate and shape behaviors of adversaries, neutrals, and partners".

SWS also replicates financial institutions, utilities, media outlets, and street corner shops. By applying theories of economics and human psychology, its developers believe they can predict how individuals and mobs will respond to various stressors.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/06/23/sentient_worlds/

Purdue University's Synthetic Environment for Analysis and Simulations, or SEAS, is currently being used by Homeland Security and the US Defense Department to simulate crises on the US mainland.[1] SEAS "enables researchers and organizations to try out their models or techniques in a publicly known, realistically detailed environment."[2] It "is now capable of running real-time simulations for up to 62 nations, including Iraq, Afghanistan, and China. The simulations gobble up breaking news, census data, economic indicators, and climactic events in the real world, along with proprietary information such as military intelligence. [...] The Iraq and Afghanistan computer models are the most highly developed and complex of the 62 available to JFCOM-J9. Each has about five million individual nodes representing things such as hospitals, mosques, pipelines, and people."[1]

SEAS was developed to help Fortune 500 companies with strategic planning. Then it was used to help "recruiting commanders to strategize ways to improve recruiting potential soldiers". In 2004 SEAS was evaluated for its ability to help simulate "the non-kinetic aspects of combat, things like the diplomatic, economic, political, infrastructure and social issues".[3]

Sentient World Simulation is the name given to the current vision of making SEAS a "continuously running, continually updated mirror model of the real world that can be used to predict and evaluate future events and courses of action."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_Environment_for_Analysis_and_Simulations

CASHMERE — Small community banks — like Cashmere Valley Bank — that had nothing to do with the excesses of big Wall Street firms that led to the finanical meltdown are now paying a price they protest is unfair.

Community bankers find themselves under tighter scrutiny from federal regulators. They say the $700 billion financial bailout has favored large institutions. And they are upset about a special assessment the government wants to charge to shore up the Federal Deposit Insurance Fund, which failed banks are draining.

"We've run a successful, safe financial institution," Ken Martin, president of the Cashmere-based bank said Tuesday. "Those of us who were responsible and still exist are getting hit with those huge premium increases. And at the same time they're giving these huge bailout amounts to the Citigroups."

In 2007, Cashmere Valley Bank paid about $89,000 in 2007 in premiums to the FDIC, the federal entity that insures bank deposits.

This year, it expects to pay $1.35 million in premiums, plus an additional $900,000 to $1.8 million "special assessment" needed because the premium increase still won't be enough to shore up the FDIC.

"The small, community bank is just being hammered with these huge premiums," Martin said. "It's huge. That's like 25 percent of our 2008 earnings in increased premiums."
http://wenatcheeworld.com/article/20090501/NEWS04/705019920/-1/WEATHER?Small-banks-say-they%E2%80%99-re-paying-for-big-bank-failures

The Fed’s quarterly senior loan officer survey revealed that 39.7% of banks tightened credit standards for businesses, 5.7% considerably and 34% somewhat with the balance unchanged. 65% of banks, up from 45%, said they lowered credit limits to either new or existing credit card customers. About 55% of the banks, somewhat more than the previous quarter, said they raised minimum required credit scores on credit card accounts.
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2009/05/feds-loan-survey/

Warren Buffet is on CNBC this morning, and said that the economy is very slow and getting slower.
http://www.trivisonno.com/mondays-trading-5409

Well well well Senator Durbin:

"And the banks -- hard to believe in a time when we're facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created -- are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place."

Now that had to be uncomfortable.
http://market-ticker.denninger.net/archives/1006-Senator-Tells-Truth-Whos-Listening.html

WASHINGTON – Regulators have told Wells Fargo & Co. it may need to shore up its finances after government "stress tests" showed the bank would have trouble surviving a deeper recession.

Wells Fargo is one of several banks that regulators said would need larger buffers to protect them against possible future losses, according to two people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the process.

The initial stress test results were revealed to the banks last month. Wells Fargo has until Tuesday to convince officials the results were mistaken and that the bank does not need to adjust its finances.

Wells Fargo spokeswoman Julia Tunis Bernard declined to comment.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/banks_stress_test_wells_fargo;_ylt=AvPPJiTCee7lsBIHQyUqWMus0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTJ2a2JtbDdvBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMDkwNTA0L2JhbmtzX3N0cmVzc190ZXN0X3dlbGxzX2ZhcmdvBGNwb3MDNQRwb3MDMTIEc2VjA3luX3RvcF9zdG9yeQRzbGsDd2VsbHNmYXJnb2Fz

From February...

Two smart and meticulous financial analysts - Reggie Middleton and Mish - argue that Wells Fargo is insolvent.

In yesterday's update to his June 11, 2008 analysis, Reggie shows that the lion's share of Wells Fargo's assets are in mortgages in the California, Florida and Arizona markets, which are all tanking. He concludes:

Wells Fargo has an impaired balance sheet. Marking mortgage assets ANYWHERE near what they are worth results in insolvency.
http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2009/02/wells-fargo-is-effectively-insolvent.html

WASHINGTON (AFP) — China, wary of the troubled US economy, has already "canceled America's credit card" by cutting down purchases of debt, a US congressman said Thursday.

China has the world's largest foreign reserves, believed to be mostly in dollars, along with around 800 billion dollars in US Treasury bonds, more than any other country.

But Treasury Department data shows that investors in China have sharply curtailed their purchases of bonds in January and February.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5i4estRSYeFBIII9kezxnP4jgoGZQ

BRUSSELS (AP) -- Deepening the economic gloom in Europe, the European Union admitted Monday that its previous forecasts were way off the mark. It now predicts "a deep and widespread recession" across the continent and says unemployment among nations using the euro currency will rise to a postwar record of 11.5 percent in 2010.

The new forecasts expect the economies of the 27-nation EU and the 16-nation euro-zone to shrink by 4 percent this year -- more than double a January estimate.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/EU-says-eurozone-jobless-to-apf-15120412.html

I would dive into this but I couldn't do it the justice that has already been done....but I do want to draw more attention (hence the post)....so check it out...

http://aangirfan.blogspot.com/2009/04/swine-flu-and-plan-mexico.html