NSA Internet Surveillance Scandal

I looked through alot of newspapers' websites today and this is the best article I found on the NSA scandal: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/medien/gespraech-mit-frank-rieger-vom-ccc-der-zugriff-auf-die-informationen-ist-total-12213355.html

The most important line in my opinion is this:

But once you look at what people are sitting at these companies in supervisory boards and how many former NSA employees are employed there, even in higher positions

I didn't know NSA employees work at Facebook, Google, Apple or Microsoft but it would make alot of sense, after all, intelligence agents used to (and perhaps still do) work at major news outlets (MI6 and the British Media), so why wouldn't they go where the largest troves of personal data are kept?

If you are concerned about your privacy then always work under the assumption that anything you post on the Internet can be spied upon. In fact even if you don't post something but it's on your computer as a file or keystroke it can be spied upon if you have an Internet connection, whether by a hacker or a government.

One person told me that your personal data may be a currency of the future.

But perhaps data mining can also be put to a good use, right now it seems like it can only be used maliciously but I think a Facebook profile has the potential to be used for positive data mining.

Thank you to The Guardian and The Washington Post for breaking this story, to FAZ for interviewing Frank Rieger, and to the Guardian, Telegraph and Toronto Star for reporting on the Bilderberg meeting going on right now (http://www.thestar.com/business/2013/06/05/six_canadians_invited_to_secretive_bilderberg_conference.html).

Bank of Canada Activity During the Second World War

Today I spent my afternoon at a library looking through old copies of the Canada Gazette. I found that alot of government created money was created during the Second World War. Here is a graph I made.

Notes In Circulation refers to legal tender in the country, Reserve Total refers to the total amount of foreign currency reserves held at the Bank of Canada, and Investments Total refers to the amount of government securities purchased by the Bank of Canada.

As you can see the amount of government securities purchased by the Bank of Canada (one way of creating money) skyrocketed, the currency in circulation went up considerably, and the foreign reserves were occasionally used for expenditures.

As far as I know there are 4 ways for a central bank to create money: printing legal tender, buying government securities (bonds, treasury bills, etc.), advances (loans) to chartered banks, and government deposit shifting (from the central bank account to a chartered bank account). There's also the option of drawing upon foreign reserves or the reserves of chartered banks (assuming the country in question has reserve requirements, Canada doesn't anymore). So I examined those five activities from 1938 to 1946. Here are my main findings.

1. Dramatic increase of notes in circulation - five-fold from 1939 to 1945
2. Dramatic increase of purchasing of government securities - eight-fold from 1939 to 1945
3. Occasional small advances to chartered banks
4. Minor changes in government deposits at chartered banks (now shown below)
5. Some variation in foreign reserves, presumably used for temporary war funding

The two methods the BoC chose, printing money and buying bonds, are the most effective ways of injecting money into the economy in my opinion because giving a chartered bank money doesn't guarantee that they'll loan it out or that they would have enough credit-worthy borrowers, where as giving money directly to the government guarantees that it will be spent into existence. Using reserves is a short term, unsustainable strategy but at least the money goes straight to the government.

Statements of Assets and Liabilities

September 28, 1938 (72-2, pg. 920)

Notes In Circulation: $174,132,964.18

Reserve Total: $214,306,415.79

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $194,857,867.48

June 21, 

1939 (72-4, pg. 3106)

Notes In Circulation: $165,036,073.70

Reserve Total: $251,575,234.96

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $159,882,240.69

September 30, 1939 (73-2, pg. 1187)

Notes In Circulation: $212,489,653.08

Reserve Total: $270,123,157.37

Advances to Chartered Banks: $1,000,000.00

Investments Total: $218,642,068.92

December 27, 1939 (73-2, pg. 2050)

Notes In Circulation: $232,677,657.47

Reserve Total: $292,585,383.25

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $227,245,767.70

March 27, 1940 (73-3, pg. 3116)

Notes In Circulation: $221,110,318.22

Reserve Total: $292,348,545.00

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $212,689,247.34

July 3, 1940 (74-1, pg. 44)

Notes In Circulation: $279,162,593.35

Reserve Total: $2,755,544.06

Advances to Chartered Banks: $3,500,000.00

Investments Total: $541,045,191.26

September 4, 1940 (74-1, pg. 808)

Notes In Circulation: $312,955,496.60

Reserve Total: $14,263,687.42

Advances to Chartered Banks: $1,000,000.00

Investments Total: $555,599,509.12

November 13, 1940 (74-2, pg. 1750)

Notes In Circulation: $334,745,498.85

Reserve Total: $65,175,656.99

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $575,701,921.87

March 1, 1941 (74-4, pg. 3117)

Notes In Circulation: $350,311,461.23

Reserve Total: $51,027,330.25

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $569,325,683.63

June 4, 1941 (74-5, pg. 4370)

Notes In Circulation: $382,673,945.48

Reserve Total: $220,730,215.07

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $497,841,285.35

January 21, 1942 (75-3, pg. 2824)

Notes In Circulation: $478,789,998.22

Reserve Total: $263,571,841.15

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $472,725,161.72

January 6, 1943 (77-1, pg. 161)

Notes In Circulation: $689,865,818.86

Reserve Total: $499,191.73

Advances to Chartered Banks: $1,250,000.00

Investments Total: $1,016,400,722.18

January 5, 1944 (78-1, pg. 159)

Notes In Circulation: $874,696,877.50

Reserve Total: $558,336.23

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $1,268,813,537.30

January 10, 1945 (79-1, pg. 181)

Notes In Circulation: $1,030,521,574.40

Reserve Total: $172,257,272.83

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $1,525,456,241.73

August 29, 1945 (79-5, pg. 3873)

Notes In Circulation: $1,094,644,410.81

Reserve Total: $204,679,962.33

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $1,635,214,166.69

January 9, 1946 (80-1, pg. 187)

Notes In Circulation: $1,115,578,750.41

Reserve Total: $156,830,762.18

Advances: N/A

Investments Total: $1,869,440,420.55

Other data

Statement 1938 & 1939 (73-2, pg. 1189-1191)

Interest on Public Debt: (1937 - 1938) $132,117,421.58; (1938 - 1939) $127,995,616.75

Total Ordinary Expenditure: (1937 -1938) $414,891,410.41; (1938 - 1939) $413,032,202.44

So from 1937 to 1938 the interest on the public debt amounted to 31.84% of the total ordinary expenditure, and from 1938 to 1939 it accounted for 30.98%.

Receipts Sept 1939 (73-2, pg. 1192)

Ordinary Expenditure

Interest on Public Debt: (Sept. 1939) $6,075,018.44

National Defence: (Sept. 1939) $2,651,460.57

Pensions and National Health: (Sept. 1939) $4,909,330.52

Notice how interest on debt is the largest expenditure (I didn't include all expenditures).

References

Canada Gazette - CA1YX99 G191 (Robarts Library):

      72-2, 1938

... : 72-4, 1939

... : 73-2, 1939

... : 73-3, 1940

... : 74-1, 1940

... : 74-2, 1940

... : 74-4, 1941

... : 74-5, 1941

... : 75-3, 1941 - 1942

... : 77-1, 1943

... : 78-1, 1944

... : 79-1, 1945

... : 79-5, 1945

... : 80-1, 1946

Here are 2 pictures of what the Statements look like.

Ownership of the Central Banks of G20 Nations

After a weekend of research I have compiled a list of which of the G20 central banks are completely government owned and which are not. Here it is.

Argentina: Banco Central de la Republica Argentina - 100% public, nationalized in 1946

Australia: Reserve Bank of Australia - 100% public, has objective to maintain full employment

Brazil: Banco Central do Brasil - 100% public

Canada: Bank of Canada - 100% public, nationalized in 1938

China: People's Bank of China - 100% public, regularly alters reserve requirements and I think it creates a lot of government created money (note China's low debt to GDP ratio)

European Union: European Central Bank - owned by 17 EU member central banks

France: Banque de France - 100% public, nationalized in 1945, made "independent" in 1993 but not privatized as some may claim

Germany: Deutsche Bundesbank - 100% public

India: Reserve Bank of India - 100% public, nationalized in 1949

Indonesia: Bank Indonesia - 100% public

Italy: Banca d'Italia - semi-public, has shareholders (mostly private banks), Governor nominated by shareholders and approved by the President, reports to government

Japan: Bank of Japan - semi-public, has shareholders, Governor nominated by President and approved by Parliament

Mexico: Banco de Mexico - 100% public

Russia: Central Bank of Russia - 100% public

Saudi Arabia: Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority - 100% public

South Africa: South African Reserve Bank - semi-public, has shareholders, accountable to parliament, meets regularly with Minister of Finance

South Korea: Bank of Korea - mostly public, 2 top committee members recommended by private sector

Turkey:  Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey - semi-public, has shareholders but majority of shares (55.12%) are owned by the Treasury, appointments must be approved by President

United Kingdom: Bank of England - 100% public, nationalized in 1946, see http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Pages/foi/disc091106.aspx and http://prosperityuk.com/2011/10/investigating-the-bank-of-england-nominees-limited/
United States: Federal Reserve - semi-public, all Board members appointed by the President, only discloses selected information to the government, has shareholders

As you can see two thirds (13/19) of the G20 central banks are publicly owned, and the remainder are a strange mix of private and public. None of the central banks are entirely private. Five of the banks were once private but later nationalized. I was surprised to learn that the Bank of England is actually publicly owned (now).

My criteria for a central bank being 100% public is that all of the governors and deputy governors be appointed by the government, or by a governor who was appointed by the government, and that the central bank have no shareholders other than the government.

Semi-public means at least some of the governors are government appointed but not all, or it has private shareholders.

Most of these central banks boast about their independence, signalling that being government owned may not make it any easier to convince of the error of their ways than a privately owned central bank. Furthermore if a government is corrupt, like Saudi Arabia, then it makes little difference who in the country owns it. So knowing how many central banks are government owned doesn't necessarily paint an accurate picture of how open the international financial community would be open to new (or old) ideas.

I used the central banks' websites and "The Central Banks" by Deane & Pringle (1994) as references.

Media Blackout Case Study: March for Life 2013

March for Life is an anti-abortion protest which occurs every year on Parliament Hill, for the past 44 years if I'm not mistaken. I want to be clear that I am pro-choice and do not support the idea behind the protest, but with that being said I am concerned about how little media coverage March for Life receives.

Searching Google News (in Canada) for "march for life" on May 9th, 2013 at 2:21 pm Eastern time returns:

• a National Post article (I'm not sure if Holy Post articles show up in the print edition) -http://life.nationalpost.com/2013/05/08/fr-tim-moyle/
• two CBC blog articles by Kady O'Malley - http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/inside-politics-blog/2013/05/hill-braces-for-arrival-of-up-to-20-k-protesters-at-annual-march-for-life.html and http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/inside-politics-blog/2013/05/march-for-life-organizers-ready-to-take-the-hill-by-storm.html
• an Ottawa Citizen article from yesterday (May 8th) about how the protest will disrupt traffic - http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/March+Life+disrupt+downtown+traffic+Thursday/8354443/story.html
• a CBC.ca article from yesterday - http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2013/05/08/pol-march-for-life-wednesday.html
• two Catholic newspapers - http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2013/05/08/pol-march-for-life-wednesday.html and http://www.catholicregister.org/news/canada/item/16184-march-for-life-spotlight-shines-on-gendercide
• and several small blogs, some of which focus exclusively on abortion related topics

The topic also received coverage from the Ottawa Sun, though the article was not listed in Google News - http://www.ottawasun.com/2013/05/08/live-abortion-advocates-take-march-for-life

Searching CTV.ca, GlobalNews.ca, TheGlobeAndMail.com, and TheStar.com for "march for life" yields no results related to the protest.

This is not an isolated phenomenon, in previous years the protest received just as little, if not less, mainstream media coverage. Why would a protest on Parliament Hill, which closes streets in downtown Ottawa, with up to 20,000 participants, not be covered on every major network news program and in every large newspaper? I do not have an answer, my best guess is that the thought process in newsrooms is: how come I haven't heard of it before? The problem with this type of thinking is that those very newsrooms have the power to make a topic enter the public discourse, or not. So preventing a topic from becoming publicized because it wasn't previously publicized creates a self-fulfilling prophecy.

A well functioning democracy requires a broad spectrum of ideas on all topics, and the news media is essential to maintaining the public discourse, because our country is too large to rely solely on word of mouth or even Twitter, Facebook and blogs.

Other controversial issues such as supposed UFO sightings, or unpopular and misunderstood issues such as monetary reform, receive almost no mainstream news media attention at all. Of course one can justify lack of media coverage on these issues due to their unpopularity and lack of credibility, but anti-abortion is a relatively mainstream position on a very well known political issue. In other words: if you support an unpopular position on any political issue then you should be concerned about media blackouts on any topic, even topics you may disagree with. Or even if all your political positions fall within the mainstream you should still be concerned about unpopular positions not receiving media attention, because many ideas which are now mainstream or even unquestionable, such as a woman's right to vote, were once considered fringe opinions.

In summary: March for Life has been censored, most likely unintentionally, and this is bad because censoring one unpopular opinion opens the door to censoring all unpopular opinions. The news media has a responsibility to foster an educated public discourse in order to maintain our democracy.

Why Do Governments Borrow From Private Banks?

"Q. Will you tell me why a government with power to create money, should give that power away to a private monopoly, and then borrow that which parliament can create itself, back at interest, to the point of national bankruptcy?

Mr. Towers: If parliament wants to change the form of operating the banking system, then certainly that is within the power of parliament."

http://www.michaeljournal.org/appenE.htm

U.S. Newspapers Ranked By Pulitzer Prizes

I was googling a list of newspapers by Pulitzer Prizes won and surprisingly I couldn't find any. The closest I found was an article on answers.com, so I decided to make my own since I have alot of free time in the summer. This is based on the information from the Pulitzer Prize's official website. I hope this can be used as a rough gauge of quality. All newspapers are not created equal, the difference between a world renowned newspaper like the New York Times, a solid broadsheet like The Montreal Gazette, and a sensationalist tabloid like The Toronto Sun, is quite dramatic if you're looking for information that's as objective, detailed, and will written as possible.

I included all the wins and finalist nominations in the table to make it more accurate, after all, getting nominated for a Pulitzer is pretty outstanding already. It turned out to make little difference. This is from 2008 to 2012, so 5 years. I was originally going to do 10 years but I got tired. Why not the entire history? Well it doesn't make much sense to compare a newspaper 30 years ago with the newspaper of the same name today, it has changed alot. In fact even 10 years ago may be a big difference and 5 years may in fact be a better choice because it's after the change in ownership of the LA Times and Chicago Tribune, and of course, the impact of The Internet which put all newspapers into financial troubles and forced them to lay off editorial staff.

So here it is, excluding all the papers with only 1 win or nomination because that would make it over twice as large and you probably never heard of any of them unless you live in the region covered by them. I took out the "The" which is in front on the majority of the newspapers names so that the list wouldn't look too redundant.

Name	Won	Finalist	Total
New York Times	12	20	32
Washington Post	11	10	21
Chicago Tribune	2	9	11
Los Angeles Times	3	8	11
Wall Street Journal	1	8	9
Associated Press [newswire]	1	6	7
Plain Dealer	0	5	5
Philadelphia Inquirer	1	4	5
Tampa Bay Times	1	4	5
Boston Globe	3	2	5
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel	3	2	5
Dallas Morning News	1	3	4
Denver Post	3	1	4
Bloomberg News [newswire]	0	3	3
St.Louis Post-Dispatch	0	3	3
Miami Herald	1	2	3
Politico.com	1	2	3
Sarasota Herald-Tribune	1	2	3
Star-Ledger	1	2	3
ProPublica.org	2	1	3
Wisconsin State Journal	0	2	2
The Oregonian	0	2	2
Getty Images	0	2	2
Las Vegas Sun	1	1	2
Agence France-Press [newswire]	1	1	2
Thomson Reuters [newswire]	1	1	2
Detroit Free Press	1	1	2
Seattle Times	2	0	2

To no one's surprise The New York Times came first. The list up to AP confirmed what I've heard from journalists about the other quality U.S. newspapers, the one surprise being the Wall Street Journal being at the bottom of that group since some people consider it to be 2nd in quality, or even 1st depending on how much their political views interfere with their processing of the news.

There are 4 cases where a newspaper received more awards than nominations, so kudos to them!

If anyone needs the original Excel file for research or a school project or something you can email me and I'll probably send you it.

If you enjoyed the fruits of my labour the please share this blog post with your friends via facebook, twitter, Google+, email, reddit, etc.

Good night.