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Ron Paul: Fed's 'independence' means only unaccountability
Toward Sensible Monetary Policy
By U.S. Rep. Ron Paul
Monday, January 10, 2011
http://paul.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1816:...
Last week the 112th Congress was sworn in. I am pleased that I will be chairing the Monetary Policy Subcommittee of the Financial Services Committee, which has oversight of the Federal Reserve. Obviously, this position will facilitate my efforts to ensure that the Fed provides the American people with more information about what they have been doing with and to our money.
Not surprisingly, since my chairmanship was announced, apologists for the Fed have been recycling the old canard about how increased transparency threatens the Fed's so-called political independence.
By independence, they are referring to the Fed's ability to greatly impact the economy with virtually no meaningful oversight. We only recently learned that the bankers at the Fed were able to use the latest financial crisis to bail out Wall Street cronies and foreign central banks with billions of dollars that were created and wasted, instead of appropriated and voted on by representatives of the people.
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Prophecy Receives Permit To Mine at Ulaan Ovoo in Mongolia
VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- Prophecy Resource Corp. (TSX-V:PCY, OTCQX: PRPCF, Frankfurt: 1P2) announces that on November 9, 2010, it received the final permit to commence mining operations at its Ulaan Ovoo coal project in Mongolia. Prophecy is one of few international mining companies to achieve such a milestone. The mine is production-ready, with a mine opening ceremony scheduled for November 20.
Prophecy CEO John Lee said: "I thank the government of Mongolia for the expeditious way this permit was issued. The opening of Ulaan Ovoo is a testament to the industrious and skilled workforce in Mongolia. Prophecy directly and indirectly (through Leighton Asia) employs more than 65 competent Mongolian nationals and four expatriots. The company also reaffirms its commitment to deliver coal to the local Edernet and Darkhan power plants in Mongolia."
The Ulaan Ovoo open pit mine is 10 kilometers from the Russian border and within 120km of the Nauski TransSiberian railway station, enabling transportation of coal to Russia and its eastern seaports. Thermal coal prices are trading at two-year highs at Russian seaports due to strong demand from Asian economies.
For the complete press release, please visit:
http://prophecyresource.com/news_2010_nov11.php
The Fed and its supporters in Congress fought even this small bit of transparency and without this one-time provision in the financial reform act forcing disclosure, we would still not have this information. Indeed, we are in the dark on so much of what the Fed has done. This is extremely dangerous for our country, yet this power and secrecy are defended as some kind of public good, which is patently ridiculous.
Our government is based on a system of checks and balances. With no check on the Fed, it is no surprise it has thrown the economy wildly off balance.
The solution is not to re-inflate the bubbles the Fed created, or to continue to devalue the currency, or to throw billions at failing banks and corporations. The solution is to return sanity and freedom to monetary policy. Forcing the entire country to use a medium of exchange that is subject to the whims of elite bankers and their cronies on Wall Street is not sanity. Hoping that an unchecked, all-powerful, behemoth banking cartel will solve any economic problem is not sanity.
The problems the Fed was created to solve now look miniscule compared to the problems it has created. If "political independence" erodes the purchasing power of the currency by 98 percent and destabilizes the economy with radical booms and busts, all while increasing unemployment and tipping us ever closer to hyperinflation, perhaps it is time to try a little transparency and accountability instead. Better still -- we should try giving the people true economic freedom.
Make no mistake: The Fed is not truly independent of political pressure. Its chair is appointed by the president, and it is a creature of Congress. Congress has a duty, albeit a neglected one, to exercise oversight of the Fed. However, even if it was politically independent, it is not independent of the influences of Wall Street. One has to look only at the revolving door between the Fed and the big banks to know that. Disclosures on TARP funds confirm this.
It is nothing short of cruel and criminal for Congress to stand idly by while the life savings of Americans are inflated away to nothing. It is high time that Congress insist on getting complete information on what the Fed has been doing, and for whom. My hope is that exposing the truth will demonstrate the insanity of the status quo and more people will call for sensible changes, such as legalizing competing currencies.
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Yukon Mining Investment e-Conference
Wednesday-Thursday, January 19-20, 2011
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Vancouver Resource Investment Conference
Vancouver Convention Centre West
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Sunday-Monday, January 23-24, 2011
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Thursday, January 27, 2011
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Sona Drills 85.4g Gold/Ton Over 4 Metres at Elizabeth Gold Deposit,
Extending the Mineralization of the Southwest Vein on the Property
Company Press Release, October 27, 2010
VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- Sona Resources Corp. reports on five drillling holes in the third round of assay results from the recently completed drill program at its 100 percent-owned Elizabeth Gold Deposit Property in the Lillooet Mining District of southern British Columbia. Highlights from the diamond drilling include:
-- Hole E10-66 intersected 17.4g gold/ton over 1.54 metres.
-- Hole E10-67 intersected 96.4g gold/ton over 2.5 metres, including one assay interval of 383g of gold/ton over 0.5 metres.
-- Hole E10-69 intersected 85.4g gold/ton over 4.03 metres, including one assay interval of 230g gold/ton over 1 metre.
Four drill holes, E10-66 to E10-69, targeted the southwestern end of the Southwest Vein, and three of the holes have expanded the mineralized zone in that direction. The Southwest Vein gold mineralization has now been intersected over a strike length of 325 metres, with the deepest hole drilled less than 200 metres from surface. "The assay results from the Southwest Zone quartz vein continue to be extremely positive," says John P. Thompson, Sona's president and CEO. "We are expanding the Southwest Vein, and this high-grade gold mineralization remains wide open down dip and along strike to the southwest."
For the company's full press release, please visit:
