The US central bank, the Federal Reserve, last night resisted calls for an interest rate cut but admitted that the threat of war in Iraq could derail America's fragile recovery, the Guardian reports. The Telegraphs says the reserve's chairman, Alan Greenspan, failed to come to the rescue of investors for the first time in five years as shares fell dramatically across the globe. More.

Speculation of a possible second Gulf War added to Wall Street's worries and triggered a spike in oil prices. Iraq vowed to reject any new Security Council resolution differing from an agreement reached with the U.N. secretary-general, while President George W. Bush reviewed military options for a possible attack on the oil-rich nation.

"There's also concern about geopolitical risk," said Gertsen. "Military positioning and diplomatic positions could have an impact on trade and therefore earnings."

The U.S. poverty rate rose for the first time in eight years and household income fell last year, a double dose of bad economic news that coincided with the first recession in a decade, the Census Bureau said Tuesday.

There were 32.9 million Americans living in poverty last year, up from 31.6 million in 2000. The rate of 11.7 percent was up from 11.3 percent the previous year, which was the lowest level since 1974. More.

General profits, pension funds, individual retirement accounts are getting HAMMERED:

DOW JONES , S&P 500, NASDAQ Indeces for the past two years:

While the rich and politicians get richer:

OIL

DEFENSE

APL: Atlas Pipeline: War Profiteer Ð- arm of the U.S. military -Ð corporate globalizer Neptune Orient Lines (APL's parent company) is "seen among the few to benefit from the war in Iraq, with unit APL carrying US military cargo to Baghdad."

Yes, Halliburton has positioned itself in both Oil and Defense sectors. Smart move. War with Iraq, even smarter:

RECONSTRUCTION

You guessed it, Halliburton again, and our old friends, BECHTEL, founded right here in Oakland. I think the company or the family still own the Georgian building across from the Oakland Hotel at the Lake. Passed by LMNOP-ers every Sunday. It's privately held. Bechtel Group

MEDIA

How much are they making off the war? Media giants like war because more people watch the news and that makes their profits go up. Let's watch the six media giants. Here's an article about them from FAIR.

Rupert Murdoch controls this conglomerate comprising 20th Century Fox and Fox news, among others. Stated Mary 13th: "Strength at its cable network and television businesses was driven by ratings increases at Fox News, amid coverage of the war."

Articles

Britain is to plunge into deficit of up to £20 billion as gloomy economic forecasts put the fragile growth of the country's economy under threat. Gordon Brown will admit in a major speech ahead of the Pre-Budget Report on Wednesday that the world economy is suffering its sharpest downturn since the oil crisis in 1974 and that such a 'synchronised slowdown' has been the most rapid for two decades.

The Pre-Budget Report, the major Treasury assessment of the state of the British economy, will say that continued falls in stocks and shares around the world is putting pressure on the British economy.

Since the Budget earlier this year, the value of stock markets has fallen by 22 per cent in the US and Britain, 25 per cent in Japan, 32 per cent in France and 40 per cent in Germany. Although the Chancellor will say that Britain has weathered much of the storm because of the fundamental strength of the economy, he will admit that the outlook is worse than was predicted in Treasury forecasts earlier this year.

Economists now predict that Brown will have to vastly increase borrowing if he is to keep the Government's massive public spending plans on track. The economic downturn and lack of business confidence has meant far lower tax receipts.

It will be the first time Britain has gone into the red since Tony Blair became Prime Minister in 1997. Although Treasury officials will say that they had budgeted for the country to go into deficit as part of the normal course of the economic cycle, critics say that the initial estimates of a deficit between £10bn and £15bn are short of the mark.

The passage of the most sweeping campaign finance measure in a generation has set off an explosion of fund-raising for the November elections that is likely to pump more than twice as much unregulated money into Congressional races as the last midterm campaign four years ago.

The McCain-Feingold campaign finance law, passed in March, bars national political parties and federal candidates from having anything to do with raising and spending soft money. Each party solicits such money, often in checks of $100,000 or more, from labor unions, corporations, trade associations, trial lawyers and wealthy individuals. But lawmakers delayed putting the restrictions on soft money into effect until after the Nov. 5 elections. That has spurred lawmakers and fund-raisers from both parties to move more aggressively than ever to pressure donors and wring the last bit of money from the system. More.

Fighting a war with Iraq could cost the United States between $6 billion and $9 billion a month, with preparing for a conflict and winding down after it adding another $14 billion to $20 billion to the total, congressional budget analysts said on Monday.

The Congressional Budget Office report comes as U.S. lawmakers debate President Bush's recent request for authority to use force if necessary to disarm Iraq and topple Saddam Hussein.

It is the latest in a series of war cost estimates, some ranging as high as $200 billion, which have garnered attention on Capitol Hill in light of growing U.S. budget woes.

The CBO said it could not assess how long any U.S. military action against Iraq would last and warned that any attempt to estimate its cost was, therefore, "highly uncertain."

But it said deploying U.S. forces to the Gulf region would likely cost between $9 billion and $13 billion and bringing them home after the conclusion of hostilities would add another $5 billion to $7 billion.

Fighting a war would cost $6 billion to $9 billion a month, while mounting a possible occupation of Iraq afterward would cost between $1 billion and $4 billion a month, it said. More.

The basic fear of another conflict with Baghdad is that it might be the last straw for an already weakened global economy, especially if crude oil prices soar much further.

"The risk/reward equation this time round has definitely far greater risk than potential reward," said Michael Joynson, business director in European equities at Invesco Asset Management. More.

The current bear market in stocks is already the longest in 60 years, and with few investors willing to step up and buy, the likelihood is it will go a little longer, market analysts say.

Worse news for some investors, the Standard & Poor's 500 index <.GSPC> is flirting with its most recent low, which makes it perilously close to making this the deepest bear market since 1938.

WASHINGTON, Sep 20 (IPS) - New U.S. agricultural subsidies benefit big business while impoverishing poor Third World farmers and they contradict advice from global institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), says a development group. More.

A middle-level official for one of America's hard-pressed airlines two weeks ago looked at the aviation fuel situation and fired off a confidential memo to a colleague: "I am afraid President Bush is going to be a one-term president, like his father. The U.S. economy does not need $30 (a barrel) oil. I can see the (gasoline) lines again. 'It's the economy.' Iraq will bring down another president."

The writer of this anguished prose is no political expert, and his death sentence for George W. Bush is at least premature. What he is expert about is the global fuel situation, and he doesn't like two activities by the Bush administration. First is the Department of Energy's continued purchase of oil for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). Second is the beating of war drums in preparation for an attack on Iraq with incalculable impact on oil prices...

This government intervention comes at a time when oil prices are being boosted by both the known and the unknown in the Middle East. The known is President Bush's firm commitment for a "regime change" in Iraq, which has already reduced Iraqi exports by more than one million barrels and surely will cost more if and when it comes to war. The unknown is what impact it will have among other oil-producing countries. More.

Doing business with the enemy is nothing new to the Bush family. Much of the Bush family wealth came from supplying needed raw materials and credit to Adolf HitlerÃs Third Reich. Several business operations managed by Prescott Bush - the presidentÃs grandfather - were seized by the US government during World War II under the Trading with the Enemy Act.

On October 20, 1942, the federal government seized the Union Banking Corporation in New York City as a front operation for the Nazis. Prescott Bush was a director. Bush, E. Roland Harriman, two Bush associates, and three Nazi executives owned the bankÃs shares. Eight days later, the Roosevelt administration seized two other corporations managed by Prescott Bush. The Holland-American Trading Corporation and the Seamless Steel Equipment Corporation, both managed by the Bush-Harriman bank, were accused by the US federal government of being front organizations for HitlerÃs Third Reich. Again, on November 8, 1942, the federal government seized Nazi-controlled assets of Silesian-American Corporation, another Bush-Harriman company doing business with Hitler.

Doing business with the bin Laden empire, therefore, is only the latest extension of the Bush familyÃs financial ties to unsavory individuals and organizations. Now that thousands of American citizens have died in terrorist attacks and the nation is going to war, the American people should know about George W. BushÃs relationship with the family of Osama bin Laden. More.

The New York Daily News reported on July 30 that Harken Energy Corporation set up a Cayman Islands subsidiary, the Harken Bahrain Energy Company, on Sept. 1, 1989, in connection with the company's $25 million contract to drill for oil off the coast of Bahrain, an island nation in the Persian Gulf.

The Cayman Islands are a well-known offshore tax haven for both individuals and corporations. The Internal Revenue Service alleged, for example, that Halliburton Company used a Cayman Islands subsidiary, Halliburton Global Limited, to avoid payment of $38 million in taxes owed in 1990 and 1991. Vice President Dick Cheney became Halliburton's CEO in 1995; during his tenure, the company fought the IRS's findings in United States Tax Court. The Center for Public Integrity reported on Halliburton's tax court case in our 2001 book, The Cheating of America.

The White House confirmed that Harken had set up the subsidiary, but argued that it provided no tax advantages. The Washington Post reported that administration aides said that Harken Bahrain Oil was formed primarily to limit the parent company's legal liability that would result from an accident stemming from the company's Bahrain operation. The Post added that, "Bush had opposed the deal and Harken never struck oil or made money, the White House said..."

The minutes of the Dec. 6, 1989 board meeting, however, show that after a presentation from Monte Swetnam, president of the Harken Exploration Company and the company's point man on the Bahrain deal. "Mr. Swetnam reviewed and discussed the background of the Bahrain transaction with the Board including the discussions and negotiations conducted in Bahrain on his several trips there. Mr. Swetnam further discussed with the Board the potential benefits which the Company could realize from this opportunity. The Board discussed and reviewed the matters raised by Mr. Swetnam concerning this foreign opportunity and after which discussion, the Board unanimously approved HEX's [Harken Exploration Company] proceeding towards finalization of a formal agreement with the State of Bahrain—" More.

Bush did not make his fortune in the oil fields. He made it at a major-league ball park heavily subsidized by taxpayers.

Bush takes credit for conceiving The Ballpark at Arlington, home of the Texas Rangers baseball team, which he bought in 1989 with a wealthy group of investors. Among them: billionaire Richard Rainwater of Fort Worth.

Bush invested just over $600,000, but Arlington taxpayers invested a lot more.

"It was $135 million worth of sales tax money," said attorney Glenn Sodd. "The city donated a good bit of land to the project. They got a sales tax exemption on all the items that were purchased for the stadium. We have a property tax in Texas and they were given as part of the deal a property tax exemption." A total of at least $200 million, according to Sodd.

"He put $600,000 into this project and he did a little bit better than Hillary Clinton," Runzheimer said. "She only made ... $100,000 or $200,000, from her dealing in commodities. Gov. Bush has made $15 million."

Fans love the stadium. And the team has flourished financially.

"Looking at it from the perspective of a businessman, this was an awfully sweet deal for the business," said Sodd. "Looking at it as a public official, we think it's lousy policy to use government money to subsidize billionaires in the pursuit of their business interests."

So Bush the businessman did prosper. But not by his bootstraps -- with help from wealthy friends and taxpayer subsidies. More.

President Bush and the bin Laden family have been connected through dubious business deals since 1977, when Salem, the head of the bin Laden family business, one of the biggest construction companies in the world, invested in Bush's start-up oil company, Arbusto Energy, Inc.

James R. Bath, a friend and neighbor, was used to funnel money from Osama bin Laden's brother, Salem bin Laden, to set up George W. Bush in the oil business, according to The Wall Street Journal and other reputable sources.

Through a tangled web of Saudi multi-millionaires, Texas oilmen, and the infamous Bank of Credit and Commerce International, Bush was financially linked with the bin Laden family until Salem met an untimely end in a freak flying accident near San Antonio in 1988.

The infamous BCCI was shut down in 1991 with some $10 billion in losses.

In June 1977, George W. Bush formed his own oil drilling company, Arbusto Energy, in Midland, Tex.

"Arbusto" actually means "shrub" in Spanish, but the Bush family interpreted it as "bush". Salem bin Laden, a close friend of the Saudi King Fahd had "invested heavily in Bush's first business venture," according to The Daily Mail (U.K.).

Arbusto later became Bush Exploration, when Bush's father became vice president. As the company neared financial collapse in September 1984, it was merged with Spectrum 7 Energy Corp. in an effort to stay afloat.

The 50 investors who propped up the Bush company with $4.7 million were "mainly friends of my uncle" who "did pretty good" in Bush's words, although they lost most of the money they invested in the company. Jon Bush, George's uncle, raised money for Arbusto from political supporters of the Reagan-Bush administration. More.

National Debt

One year ago the National Debt was projected by the current administration to be a surplus of $5.5 trillion. National Debt is mounting.

Here are the trillions -- up to the second -- The U.S. is now in DEFICIT.

Current National Debt.

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