“Advocates of Bitcoin were surely elated to hear the virtual currency has gone mainstream — at least a little. New Hampshire state Representative Mark Warden, a Republican, announced recently that his campaign is accepting Bitcoin donations.”
http://www.banktech.com/payments-cards/240006657
“Not only did the exchange lose the virtual money, but it does not have the U.S. dollars to repay site members who had balances in BTC. Consequently, Shtylman is looking at the possibility of bankruptcy proceedings. If such measures are taken, it will be interesting to economists and Bitcoin users how the courts handle the valuation and repayment of this very unusual currency.”
http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/technolog/250-000-worth-bitcoins-stolen-net-heist-980871
“Various sources — I saw it on VentureBeat — are reporting that PricewaterhouseCoopers, the big accounting firm, might have been hacked and that cyberthieves have made off with Mitt and Ann Romney’s tax returns. None of this is substantiated, but here’s the zany part: the hackers are asking for a $1-million ransom, to not release Romney’s tax returns, a source of campaign controversy, to the media. The ransom must be paid in Bitcoin, the cybercurrency with a checkered past but a devoted following amond the tech-libertarian set.”
“Liechtenstein is considering automatically sharing information on bank accounts held by foreigners in the Alpine nation, enabling taxation by their home countries, Prime Minister Klaus Tschütscher said in a newspaper interview on Wednesday. Contrary to Liechtenstein, Switzerland has ruled out any hint of an automatic information exchange, and has stressed that if the German parliament rejects the negotiated tax deal it will maintain its current system.”
http://www.thelocal.ch/page/view/liechtenstein-mulls-lifting-banking-secrecy-pm
“There are ‘some 30 billion’ euros held by Belgian taxpayers in Swiss bank accounts, Belgian Foreign Minister Didier Reynders said on Thursday as he advocated a possible deal to claw back one third. The minister says Switzerland, which has already brokered deals to tackle tax evasion with Germany and London, and is also in talks at present with Greece and others, has offered to sign an agreement that would see a forfeit on deposits held by Belgian nationals.”
http://www.thelocal.ch/page/view/belgian-minister-eyes-citizens-swiss-bank-accounts
“On Sept. 12, the German Constitutional Court will rule on lawsuits seeking to prevent the government from participating in the new bailout fund with its €700 billion firewall. Some 37,000 Germans have joined the complaint, making it the largest such case in the history of the court. The EFSF head has decided to proceed as though everything were going according to plan, choosing to ignore the lawsuits and the looming verdict and hiring new staff to expand the workforce from 57 to 75 employees by the end of the year and establishing a new website. A new logo has already been created. Klaus Regling will continue to make over €300,000 a year.”
“Nothing says ‘New World Order’ better than a memo from faceless bureaucracies ordering an entire nation to work harder. As all this unfolds, it becomes clear that our instinct about the manipulated nature of the Euro-crisis was accurate. One can see the pegs slotting into holes. The idea was to create a crisis and then centralize political authority. […] Your leaders spend recklessly and you work six days a week for the rest of your life just because you happen to live in a given geographical region. Welcome to the 21st century.”
http://www.thedailybell.com/4256/Work-Those-Greeks-Advent-of-Modern-Slavery
“The first person to register as a caregiver under Montana’s now gutted medical marijuana program has died in federal prison. Richard Flor, 68, died at a Bureau of Prisons facility outside Las Vegas last Wednesday just a few months into a five-year federal prison sentence. Flor was also the co-owner of Montana Cannabis, one of the state’s largest medical marijuana providers until it was raided by the DEA as part of the massive raids in March 2011. Although there were no allegations of Flor or his family violating state laws, they could not escape the wrath of the federal government.”
http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2012/aug/30/montanas_first_caregiver_medical
“In many ways, the worst outcome would be some watered down, pseudo-gold standard under the management of the Fed. If the crisis then persisted, which it would, the easy-money advocates would blame everything on the ‘gold standard’ tying the hands of ‘our saviour, the central bank’. This is also a problem for a Romney-win in general, which is unlikely to bring the pro-market changes America needs although his policies will be branded ‘free market’ by the statist media. If Obama remains in office, at least nobody will call his program ‘capitalism’.”
“Detlev Schlichter, author of Paper Money Collapse, on Sky News Business with Jeff Randall 5th Oct 2011. Book http://www.amazon.co.uk/Paper-Money-Collapse-Monetary-Breakdown/dp/1118095758 ”