Answer this, ‘Bible Answer Man’

It could shape up to be a battle between theological titans. Religious teacher, human rights activist and New York Times best-selling author of “The Islamic Antichrist” Joel Richardson is calling for a public debate with Hendrik “Hank” Hanegraaff, president of the Christian Research Institute.

The subject would be “replacement theology,” a concept Hanegraaff recently confronted on his popular broadcast Bible Answer Man.

In response to a caller who brought up Richardson’s new book “When a Jew Rules the World: What the Bible Really Says About Israel in the Plan of God,” Hanegraaff rejected the label of “replacement theology,” a term used to describe those who believe God’s promises to the Jews as a people have been transferred to the Christian church.

Hanegraaff claimed of Richardson: “He intends the moniker ‘replacement theologian’ to be an insult. In reality it is inaccurate and highly ironic. And what I mean by that is if a Christian questions the notion of a pre-Tribulational rapture followed by a Holy Land holocaust, in which the vast majority of Jews perish, then that person is immediately shouted down as a peddler of godless heresy. In fact, popular dispensationalists are blunt in their denunciations.”

Hanegraaff said the use of “replacement theology” as a label is now designed to carry with it negative connotations, among them the belief supersessionists “are now carrying Hitler’s anointing and his message, hardly a charitable remark.”

In contrast, Hanegraaff stated: “This moniker is inaccurate because those who are labeled replacement theologians neither believe that the church has replaced Israel nor the other way around. Instead they hold that all who are clothed in Christ constitute one congruent chosen covenant community connected by the cross. And that’s precisely what you read in Galatians 3: ‘There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ.’ If you belong to Christ says Paul, then you are Abraham’s seed and you are an heir according to the promise. It’s not a matter of race, it’s a matter of relationship.”

“The promises that God made to Abraham have been fulfilled,” believes Hanegraaff. And for that reason, he finds it “ironic” those who condemn “replacement theology” are themselves “herding Jews into the Holy Land, firmly believing that these Jews will soon be slaughtered in a bloodbath that exceeds that of Hitler’s Holocaust.”

Joel Richardson says he is disappointed in Hanegraaff’s rhetoric and strongly disagrees with his interpretation of Scripture and how he characterized Richardson’s own views.

Richardson told WND: “Over the years, I have frequently listened to, enjoyed, and benefited from Hank Hanegraaff’s radio program. I for one think that Hank has made a fantastic contribution to the field of apologetics. So when a listener called in to ask if Hank had “When A Jew Rules the World”, my newest book, it was quite a personal disappointment to hear him quite brazenly misrepresent not only my work, but me personally, on national radio – all in a rather blasé manner.

“Ironically, rather than addressing the numerous very relevant biblical arguments carefully set forth in “When a Jew Rules the World,” Hank chose instead to spend most of his time engaging in theological demagoguery, casting those with whom he disagrees, as unable to provide any substantive biblical answers, and only resorting to insulting others.”

Richardson charges Hanegraaff falsely represented his position and his attitude towards those who disagree with him.

“Ironically Hank also said that those who reject replacement theology commonly resort to shouting down those with whom we disagree. Mind you, this accusation was spoken into a microphone and broadcast on national radio. But I believe I already used the word ironic.

“I must also point out that despite not having read my book, Hank quite ignorantly cast me as a pretribulational dispensationalist. I am in fact neither. I do believe it is high time that anti-Zionists like Hank recognize the vast and growing number of believers who are not dispensationalists, yet fundamentally reject supersessionism.”

Richardson believes he is part of a growing tendency among evangelical Christians. He opines, “When I consider the great diversity among theologians such as John Piper, Barry Horner, or Dr. Michael Brown, it is clear that the growing number of historical premillennialists can no longer be disregarded through inaccurate stereotyping.”

More importantly, Richardson frankly disagrees with Hanegraaff that all the promises made to Abraham have been fulfilled by God.

He explains: “All ad hominem attacks, accusations, and misrepresenting aside, the real question is did the ‘Bible Answer Man’ provide any actual thoughtful biblical responses to the many challenges presented in “When a Jew Rules the World?” Unfortunately, the answer is no. In fact, Mr. Hanegraaff made a few significantly inaccurate statements. Let’s briefly consider his most glaring error.

“First, Hank claimed that all of the land promises made to Abraham have already been completely fulfilled, thus God is no longer obligated to honor His promises to the descendants of Abraham. The first glaring problem of course with such claims is that the Bible repeatedly says that promises made to Abraham are eternal and everlasting. While Hank and other supersessionists claim that God is no longer committed to honoring His promises, the Bible places no such statute of limitations on the faithfulness of God, and if we are careful students of the Scriptures, then neither should we.”

Richardson cites two passages of Scripture in particular:

“God said, ‘No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.’” (Genesis 17:19)

“The covenant which He made with Abraham, and His oath to Isaac. Then He confirmed it to Jacob for a statute, to Israel as an everlasting covenant.” (Psalm 105:9-10)

Richardson explains: “While Hank and other supersessionists claim that God has reneged on His eternal promises to give the land of Israel to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, what is clear is that the Gospel of the Apostles included a restored Kingdom of Israel. After Jesus arose from the dead and appeared for many days among the disciples, they asked Him: ‘Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?’ (Acts 1:6-7). Note that Jesus didn’t even hint at rebuking such expectations. Instead, he simply told them that it was not yet the time.

“Only a short time later, after Pentecost, when Peter preached the Gospel to the Jewish people, he specifically harkened back to Jesus’ words and spoke of ‘the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time’ (Acts 3:21). The word ‘restoration’ in Greek is apokatastasis, which infers the restoration not only of all creation as it was before the fall, but also of the Davidic royal dynasty, the true theocracy. The very word ‘restore’ infers a return to something that previously existed. It is both a restored Eden, and a restored Kingdom of Israel, with Jesus, the King of the Jews, ruling over the nations. To deny this is to deny the overwhelming testimony of the Scriptures.

“This is why, through the prophet Amos, the Lord spoke of the future eschatological restoration of ‘My people Israel’ to ‘their land which I have given them’ (Amos 9:14–15). What will Mr. Hanegraaff and other supersessionists say of the abundance of such yet-to-be-fulfilled promises?”

However, Richardson still finds common ground with Hanegraaff when it comes to evangelism. Hanegraaff stated in his broadcast: “We ought to leave Jerusalem, go to Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the Earth with the Gospel, for Jesus was never a parochial Jewish Messiah. Rather Jesus Christ was heir to the Gentiles as well, so that the Gospel may go out to the far reaches of the Earth.”

Richardson responds: “I must add that I am grateful that Mr. Hanegraaff did place a special emphasis on the necessity of the Great Commission and an urgency to see the Gospel proclaimed among the lost. This is also my passion. (So long as we maintain the Pauline priority of the Gospel to the Jews first, of course.)”

But Richardson wants a public debate with Hanegraaff in order to clear the air on replacement theology once and for all.

“I would like to take the opportunity of Mr. Hanegraaff’s comments concerning myself, my work and premillennialists in general, to invite Mr. Hanegraaff to a public debate or discussion concerning the Abrahamic covenant as well as the signs that must yet be fulfilled before Jesus returns. I genuinely believe that in light of the anti-Semitism that is now exploding around the world, that such a public discussion, carried out in a respectful and edifying manner, would greatly benefit the Body of Christ.”

from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/answer-this-bible-answer-man/

from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/answer-this-bible-answer-man/

‘Gay marriage’ all about attacking Christianity, says author

By Paul Bremmer

Aaron and Melissa Klein of Gresham, Oregon, have learned how dangerous it can be to fail to support “gay marriage” in this day and age.

The now-infamous bakers refused to bake a wedding cake for a lesbian couple and were subsequently slapped with a $135,000 fine from the state of Oregon. Negative national publicity forced them to shut down their bakery, Sweet Cakes by Melissa.

Outrage from progressives has essentially ruined the Kleins’ lives, but journalist and author Jack Cashill, who wrote the forthcoming “Scarlet Letters: The Ever-Increasing Intolerance of the Cult of Liberalism,” believes this incident ultimately is not about “gay marriage.”

Rather, it is part of an attempt by hardcore progressives to destroy Christianity and the nuclear family. He noted Muslims are not tolerant of homosexuality either, but outrage among “gay” rights advocates has focused on the refusal of Christians, such as the Kleins, to promote homosexuality.

“If they were serious about gay rights, they would take this battle to not only the Islamic countries, but to the Islamic mosques in the United States,” Cashill told WND in an interview. “[Muslims] are not even questioned. They’re not in the picture. It’s really an attack on Judeo-Christian values.”

Brad Avakian, a commissioner with Oregon’s Bureau of Labor and Industries, ordered the Kleins to pay the $135,000 fine by July 13. They missed the deadline, so the state threatened to place a lien on the couple’s home until they paid. Avakian also placed something resembling a gag order on the Kleins that effectively prevents them from talking about the case.

Who put the American family in the bull’s-eye? Read “Takedown, From Communists to Progressives How the Left Has Sabotaged Family and Marriage” to read the origins of the war.

Cashill, a WND columnist, likened the gag order to something out of a totalitarian state.

“That’s Stalinist at its core, and it’s so un-American,” he said.

Paul Kengor, author of “Takedown: From Communists to Progressives, How the Left Has Sabotaged Family and Marriage,” shares Cashill’s concerns about the aggressiveness of gay marriage supporters.

“Sadly, the case against the Klein family will only get more common in our fundamentally transformed New America,” Kengor told WND. “This is how the forces of ‘tolerance’ and ‘diversity’ treat religious people who disagree with them. They sue them and seek to destroy them.”

One of the “scarlet letters” Cashill discusses in his book “Scarlet Letters” is the letter H for “homophobe.”

“It’s a label progressives frequently use to brand their ideological opponents, and Cashill believes the scarlet H applied to the Kleins shares similarities to Hester Prynne’s scarlet A in the famous novel “The Scarlet Letter.” In both cases, he noted, morality chieftains united with the law to totally suppress an individual’s rights.

But one major difference, according to Cashill, is that Hester Prynne knew she had done wrong and willingly accepted her punishment. This made her a figure of some respect in her community. But the Kleins don’t believe they’ve done wrong, and Cashill thinks the progressives in their community will never respect them.

See the big list of “same-sex marriage” entrapment and Christian coercion

“In Portland, Oregon, they just want more blood,” he said. “I mean, they’re just like sharks. Unless they continue moving forward, they die, and when they smell blood, they’re going after it.”

Kengor noted progressives have been emboldened now that Anthony Kennedy and the four liberal Supreme Court justices have declared “gay marriage” legal in all 50 states. He claimed the justices have “unleashed a terrible, protracted period of persecution by militant liberals against religious people.”

“The Klein family will be among the first victims in the cultural left’s crusade against people who refuse to redefine their faith’s 2,000-year standard for natural, traditional, biblical marriage,” Kengor said. “Prepare yourself to watch a lot of hate and anger and intolerance from the forces ‘tolerance.’ I warned people: do not trust the left with same-sex marriage!”

Cashill lamented that hardly anyone among progressive is speaking out in favor of Christians’ religious freedom. He said he has perused the comments sections of many stories, even on center-left websites, and found the majority of commenters siding with “gay marriage,” even if it means destroying the lives of Christians. Cashill thinks ordinary progressives might change their minds if they see one of their heroes stand up for religious freedom.

“I think one thing that could make a difference is if some major political figure or public figure went out to Gresham, Oregon, and held a press conference with the Kleins by his side,” he said. “And ideally, that person would be on the Left. I don’t think that’s going to happen, but it could conceivably make a difference.”

The author said people should have realized Christians are now the victims when gunman Floyd Corkins stormed the headquarters of the Family Research Council three years ago with the intention to shoot as many people as possible. Corkins later said he targeted the FRC because the Southern Poverty Law Center tagged it as an “anti-gay” group.

“It’s altogether possible that another Floyd Corkins will emerge who is more successful,” Cashill warned. “It’s also possible that crazies on the Right will do a similar thing.”

Cashill said there is a difference between modern progressives and old-school liberals. The liberals of yesteryear, he said, stood for values like the rule of law, civility, and innocence until proven guilty. He pointed to Atticus Finch from the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” as a model of those older liberal values. But modern progressives, Cashill believes, are different.

“The progressives are the guys standing in front of the courthouse demanding the head of Tom Robinson,” Cashill said, referring to the wrongly accused slave from “To Kill a Mockingbird.” “They’ve become the mob.”

The author said he doesn’t know if there’s an Atticus Finch on the American left today who is able and willing to reverse the mob mentality. Noted lawyers and commentators Alan Dershowitz and Jonathan Turley might be two such figures, Cashill argued, but not enough people listen to them.

“I think the mob is in control now, and the mob won’t be satisfied until some counterforce silences it,” Cashill predicted.

The Kleins of Oregon are certainly not the only people who have crossed the “gay” rights “mob.”

The Washington state attorney general sued 70-year-old florist Barronelle Stutzman for declining to provide flowers for a “gay” wedding. This was in spite of the fact the would-be customer was a longtime friend who didn’t initially press charges against Stutzman (he later did).

A judge ruled the florist had violated the state’s anti-discrimination law and ordered her to pay a $1,000 fine, as well as provide full support to same-sex “weddings” in the future. She was also ordered to pay the “gay” couple’s legal fees, a move that has the potential to ruin her financially.

Another baker, Jack Phillips of Colorado, refused to make a rainbow-themed cake for a “gay wedding” in July 2012. The state’s Civil Rights Commission ruled Phillips must either bake cakes for same-sex weddings or face fines. The baker appealed the ruling earlier this month.

Cashill believes Christians will rebel at some point against this new culture hostile to their beliefs. Granted, Stutzman and Phillips have rebelled by fighting the court rulings against them, but Cashill is talking about a more direct rebellion.

“Christians will have some constraints by the nature of Christianity, but at some point, you can get into John Brown territory, where you have a Bible in one arm and a musket in the other,” Cashill cautioned.

He was referring to a painting that hangs in the Kansas state capitol, depicting the famously violent abolitionist John Brown. Cashill noted with alarm that people celebrate Brown, even today.

“This could get ugly, and it shouldn’t,” he author warned. “I mean, the rule of law should intervene, cooler heads should prevail, but I don’t think there’s any guarantee that will happen.”

 

from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/gay-marriage-all-about-attacking-christianity-says-author/

from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/gay-marriage-all-about-attacking-christianity-says-author/

‘Gay’ slogan called ‘brilliant,’ but is it also dangerous?

The “love wins” slogan adopted by homosexuals in pursuit of laws and precedents from which they benefit is “brilliant,” an expert says.

And also dangerous.

“This is something you win campaigns with, by coming up with brilliant slogans. And in fact this is something corporate America understands really well. And this idea that love wins and ‘who are you to deny people who love each other the right to marry,’ that held sway with an awful lot of Americans,” said Paul Kengor, author of ”Takedown: From Communists to Progressives, How the Left Has Sabotaged Family and Marriage.”

The results are evident. From American Airlines to the Disney Corporation, from the White House to the Alamo, top American corporations and institutions are celebrating homosexuality these days.

Kengor, a professor and historian who specializes in the history of communism, explains the top-down war on Christian values has been made a lot more appealing as a modern marketing campaign than the grim socialist propaganda of old, which had the same goal.

Kengor believes many Americans came to support homosexual marriage because they wanted to feel good about giving people what they wanted, even though marriage ultimately has to be based on something more than feelings.

But he explained: “It’s a very flawed premise because if you’re arguing that love wins and that’s how you should define marriage, that’s going to create all sorts of problems with marriage that not even the Left would support, or at least not most same sex marriage advocates would support.

“We all love each other’

“For example, if love defines marriage, as a number of people have said, the more love, the better, then you could use the same argument to argue for a polygamist marriage, for a men with two or three women. And if your other arguments is consenting adults who love each other ought to get married… and a man comes up to you with two women who want to marry him, what can you say? They say, ‘I don’t get it, you said love wins, well, we all love each other, the three of us love each other we want our marriage rights now, we want our marriage equality, why can’t we have that?’”

Despite the radical implications of same-sex “marriage,” many major American corporations celebrated the decision to mandate homosexual “marriage” nationwide by the U.S. Supreme Court. These included iconic American businesses such as American Airlines, Macy’s, Target, Honey Maid, JetBlue Airways, Visa, Jell-O, and many others. Even those behind the official social networking account of popular television program Game of Thrones expressed support for homosexual marriage.

Kengor confesses he couldn’t understand why so many American companies were so eager to defend homosexual marriage. However, he suggested the root was cause was intimidation.

“Obviously it’s because some of the people at some of the companies support this. But I think too they’re probably reacting to threats, threats of boycotts, intimidation. And if I was on the Left and supported same sex marriage, I wouldn’t want the support of people who feel like they’re forced to support me because that’s inauthentic. But I think there’s probably a lot of that going on.”

Such intimidation, says Kengor, actually “vindicates the concerns of the state of Indiana and other legislatures that feel the need to protect the freedom of religious believers.”

Since the powerful have already caved, Kengor fears individual believers are even more vulnerable.

“If you have even companies acting like this, let alone what’s been going on with florists, and bakers, and photographers and so forth, then people who are traditional Christians or orthodox Jews or faithful Muslims who believe in male/female marriage will think holding to that position is going to give them this unbelievable backlash by the forces of ‘tolerance’ and ‘diversity’ as they call themselves. They’re crying out and screaming for religious protection.

‘There is freedom of religion’

“Keep in mind, Anthony Kennedy and four other liberals on the Supreme Court may think that gay marriage exists in the Constitution, which it doesn’t, but there is something on the First Amendment in the Constitution called freedom of religion. So that is clearly there. And clearly people, Christians like myself, look at this and we think this is an onslaught, this is a juggernaut, it’s an incredibly intolerant force claiming tolerance and I need my legislature or somebody to protect my religious rights, before they come for me.”

Carl Gallups, a pastor, talk show host, and author of the upcoming book “Be Thou Prepared: Equipping the Church for Persecution and Times of Trouble,” agrees there is a deliberate push to promote homosexuality.

“There is no doubt in my mind that there is, and has been, for a very long time a ‘gay agenda’ in America. The reasons for the nefarious agenda are multitudinous (politically, culturally, sexually, educationally, and geopolitically speaking), however the bottom line for a person who comes from a biblical worldview is that we know it is a deeply spiritual, and even demonic, agenda,” he said.

“But the fact of the ‘gay agenda’ cannot be denied with any credibility simply because the homosexual activists have been quite outspoken, and heavily documented in the media, about the plan for their agenda for a number of decades. This is not a ‘conspiracy theory’ hatched by people with tin foil hats. The gay agenda pushers have worked slavishly, and often rather openly, toward their goals while the majority of America’s churches and voters slumbered and shirked their responsibilities of being watchmen on the wall. The gay activists were counting on that reaction – and America, by and large, did not disappoint them.”

Kengor notes that part of the reason for the agenda’s success was not because of a lack of challenge, but because homosexual activists simply lied about their positions.

One of the most outrageous deceivers, charges Kengor, is none other than the president of the United States, Barack Obama.

“One of the things I show in “Takedown,” is Barack Obama himself has not fundamentally changed on the same sex marriage issue,” commented Kengor.

“In fact, according to David Axelrod, who would know, one of the things Axelrod says is way back in 1996, as a state senator in Illinois, Obama way back then supported same sex marriage. But according to Axelrod, he could not say that publicly and therefore said he supported traditional marriage because of his Christian beliefs. Axelrod said too one of the main reasons Obama did that was political, in particular to get the support of African-American voters, who have always been very traditional on marriage.

‘Considerable deception’

“So if that’s the case, if Axelrod is right – and there’s no reason to believe he is not – you’d have to say that Obama led a pretty considerable deception on this issue over the last 10 years,” Kengor concluded.

Jack Cashill, a WND columnist and author of the upcoming “Scarlet Letters: The Ever-Increasing Intolerance of the Cult of Liberalism,” suggests despite the slick marketing efforts, the campaign of intimidation directed against Christians is at heart another manifestation of Bolshevik style hate campaigns.

“Paul Kengor has this figured out. Although the Soviet Union is dead, its playbook lives on. Until recently, the Left had no use for gays. They were considered bourgeois and counter-revolutionary. Che and his colleagues imprisoned and tortured them at will, and no one on the American Left objected. Then the ideologues on the top discovered that by linking gay marriage and equality they could enlist an army of the muddle-headed and stick a dagger into the heart of Christianity. To date, they have been successful. The very unnaturalness of this effort will eventually undo them, but their undoing will not be pretty.”

Kengor warns conservatives need to adjust to the new reality that modern leftism, or Cultural Marxism, is chiefly about culture, rather than economics.

“Barack Obama talked about fundamentally transforming America. Not an economic transformation, not a transformation of class or anything like that but a fundamental transformation on sexual and gender issues,” he said.

“This cultural offensive is a fundamental transformation. That’s what it is.”

from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/gay-slogan-called-brilliant-but-is-it-also-dangerous/

from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/gay-slogan-called-brilliant-but-is-it-also-dangerous/

50 ways to rig the gold market

Editor’s note: Mark Leibovit is one of the investment world’s top-rated gold timers, and helps investors anticipate and benefit from both the ups and the downs of the precious metals markets with his Leibovit VR Gold Letter (available to WND readers at a huge discount).

*****

From Mises.org:

Central banks and our dysfunctional gold markets

The account of gold market rigging has made its way to the Mises Institute, thanks to an essay by financial writer Marcia Christoff-Kurapovna:

Many investors still view gold as a safe-haven investment, but there remains much confusion regarding the extent to which the gold market is vulnerable to manipulation through short-term rigged market trades, and long-arm central bank interventions. First, it remains unclear whether or not much of the gold that is being sold as shares and in certificates actually exists. Second, paper gold can theoretically be printed into infinity just like regular currency – although private-sector paper-gold sellers have considerably less leeway in this regard than central banks. Third, new electronic gold pricing – replacing, as of this past February, the traditional five-bank phone-call of the London Gold Fix in place since 1919 – has not necessarily proved a more trustworthy model. Fourth, there looms the specter of the central bank, particularly in the form of volume trading discounts that commodity exchanges offer them.

The question of rigging has been brought to media attention in the past few months when 10 banks came under investigation by the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and the US Department of Justice in price-manipulation probes. Also around that time, the Swiss regulator FINMA settled a currency manipulation case in which UBS was accused of trading ahead of silver-fix orders. Then, the UK Financial Conduct Authority, which regulates derivatives, ordered Barclays to pay close to $45 million in fines against a trader who artificially suppressed the price of gold in 2012 to avoid payouts to clients. Such manipulations are not limited to the precious-metals market: in November of last year, major banks had to pay several billion dollars in fines related to the rigging of foreign-exchange benchmarks, including LIBOR and other interest-rate benchmarks.

These cases followed on the heels of a set of lawsuits in May 2014 filed in New York City in which twenty-five plaintiffs consisting of hedge funds, private citizens, and public investors (such as pension funds) sued HSBC, Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Bank Scotia, and Société Génerale (the five traditional banks of the former London Gold Fix) on charges of rigging the precious-metals and foreign-exchange markets. “A lot of conspiracy theories have turned out to be conspiracy fact,” said Kevin Maher, a former gold trader in New York who filed one of the lawsuits that May, told The New York Times.

Read the entire essay at the Mises Institute’s website.

*****

From Zero Hedge:

Zero Hedge: Citigroup just cornered the “precious metals” derivatives market

Zero Hedge reports that analysis of the latest quarterly report of the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency discloses that precious metals derivatives, excluding gold, held by Citigroup have exploded and that the investment bank likely has cornered the silver market, which likely explains the metal’s failure to respond to the international financial turmoil, just as gold has failed to respond to it. The big question, Zero Hedge notes, is: Who is Citigroup’s counterparty?

Here’s betting the U.S. Treasury Department and Federal Reserve know but won’t be telling.

Read Zero Hedge’s report here.

*****

From King World News:

Bank for International Settlements is trying to hide a terrifying nightmare that is going to send the whole world into a full-blown panic

The explosive growth in derivatives held by banks threatens to cause an explosion that central banks will try to forestall by creating nearly infinite money, only to fail as the world financial system collapses, gold fund manager Egon von Greyerz tells King World News. His interview is excerpted at the KWN blog.

*****

From MarketWatch.com:

China wants to steal gold market ‘reins’ from New York and London

China has been making it very clear that it wants more control over the global gold market, but will have to go through New York and London first.

“Given that China is the epicenter of the physical gold market, it does make sense that the Chinese government would want its physical Shanghai gold market to supplant the Comex derivative market (and others) as the primary global price-setting mechanism,” said Anthem Blanchard, chief executive officer of online precious-metal retailer Anthem Vault.

China is, after all, the world’s largest producer and one of the biggest buyers of the metal, often running neck and neck with India as the globe’s top consumer. …

Read the whole story.

*****

Special offer: WND readers can get a huge discount on the insider investor newsletter produced by top-rated gold market timer Mark Leibovit, the Leibovit VR Gold Letter.

from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/50-ways-to-rig-the-gold-market/

from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/50-ways-to-rig-the-gold-market/

Builders forced to purchase art to receive permits

A new program adopted by the city of Oakland, Calif., to force builders to fund projects by artists who are chosen by the city is being challenged in federal court, where the builders have filed a lawsuit alleging violations of the Constitution’s First and Fifth Amendments.

The case has been brought by the Pacific Legal Foundation on behalf of the Bay Area Building Industry Association, whose members are being required to pay an additional one percent of the cost of any commercial project to a city-picked artist.

For residential projects, it’s half of that, but still can add hundreds of thousands of dollars to the cost of a large development, the complaint explains.

The new city demand for payments, imposed just months ago, violates the Fifth Amendment’s ban on uncompensated takings and the First Amendment’s prohibition against compulsory speech, the legal team is arguing.

WND called the city on Friday to request a comment, but there was no answer at the city number.

Tony Francois, a spokesman for the PLF, said there’s been just enough of treating business owners as piggy banks for the city.

“Commissioning more public art might be a laudable goal, but the responsibility to fund it should rest with city government and taxpayers as a whole, not with builders and the home buyers and renters who will have to pay more,” he said.

“Oakland is committing a broad-brush violation of the Constitution by treating builders, as well as home purchasers and renters, as ATMs to fund the city council’s wish list for public art projects,”

He continued, “The construction of new housing and commercial projects doesn’t create a new aesthetic need that justifies a public art funding mandate. To the contrary, the design review process and state environmental laws already ensure that new construction will meet reasonable aesthetic standards. The public art-funding mandate is just a scheme to grab money from a convenient source – local builders – for a program the politicians favor. The Fifth Amendment forbids this kind of abuse of the land use permit process.”

The case targets the Oakland Public Arts Requirements Ordinance, adopted last December and implemented in February.

“As a condition for a construction permit, the law orders builders either to install public art works in their projects, or pay the city an in-lieu fee for public art works on public property,” PLF said.

If a developer elects to install public art, part of his or her private property then must be opened to the public, and the only artists in the program are those “verified” by the city.

But the complaint argues the Fifth Amendment prohibits “unrelated demands for property or money as the price of a building permit.”

“Oakland’s art mandate violates this rule by forcing owners to underwrite a public benefit – public art works – with no reasonable connection to any impact from their projects,” PLF said.

And under the First Amendment, the government it not supposed to be able to require someone to speak its message – but this compels builders to engage in expressive activity against their will, according to the claim.

“Hitting up builders with unjustified costs also harms the public interest in general. Oakland’s public art-funding mandate adds tens of thousands of dollars or more to the cost of building homes, and to other kinds of building projects,” said Francois.

“The art-funding mandate is yet another government deterrent to the creation of more housing in Oakland. Already, there are thousands of homebuilding projects that have been approved in Oakland, but not acted upon, because high construction costs make them unaffordable. As a recent report by the state legislative analyst documented, high construction costs are driven in significant part by expensive government mandates and regulations on homebuilders.”

Bob Glover, an association spokesman, said, “We as a region need to decide if we are serious about increasing housing opportunities in the Bay Area for working households in a responsible and sustainable way. We cannot do that if local governments continue to pile the cost of providing every conceivable social program on new housing development. It is simply irresponsible to bemoan the lack of new housing affordable to working households while refusing to make the tough decision to say ‘no’ to increasing the cost of new housing.”

The case was filed in U.S. District court for the Northern District of California.

The complaint states the Constitution forbids “the government from forcing property owners to fund and convey government message, including through art, as a condition of granting a permit.”

It continues, “On its face, the ordinance exacts property from building applicants – including physical property, money and the right to exclude strangers from private property – without just compensation and without any reasonable connection between these exactions and the social impacts of development.”

It seeks an injunction halting enforcement.

 

from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/builders-forced-to-purchase-art-to-receive-permits/

from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/builders-forced-to-purchase-art-to-receive-permits/

Iranian book: How to outwit U.S., destroy Israel

(New York Post) While Secretary of State John Kerry and President Obama do their best to paper over the brutality of the Iranian regime and force through a nuclear agreement, Iran’s religious leader has another issue on his mind: The destruction of Israel.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has published a new book called “Palestine,” a 416-page screed against the Jewish state. A blurb on the back cover credits Khamenei as “The flagbearer of Jihad to liberate Jerusalem.”

Obama administration officials likely hope that no American even hears about it.

Khamenei makes his position clear from the start: Israel has no right to exist as a state.

He uses three words. One is “nabudi” which means “annihilation.” The other is “imha” which means “fading out,” and, finally, there is “zaval” meaning “effacement.”

Khamenei claims that his strategy for the destruction of Israel is not based on anti-Semitism, which he describes as a European phenomenon. His position is instead based on “well-established Islamic principles.”

from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/iranian-book-how-to-outwit-u-s-destroy-israel/

from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/iranian-book-how-to-outwit-u-s-destroy-israel/

DNC treating Trump like serious candidate

(The Guardian) The Democratic National Committee is treating Donald Trump like a serious presidential candidate.

The Guardian has learned that Trump has joined the tier of Republican White House hopefuls to whom the DNC assigns a full-time staff member, devoted to responding to statements and pushing back against his campaign.

Previously, the staffer in question only had New Jersey governor Chris Christie to monitor. But as Trump’s fortunes have risen in the polls and Christie’s have fallen, the DNC has changed its focus.

The decision makes Trump the ninth candidate (out of 17) to which the DNC is devoting such resources. In addition to Christie, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, John Kasich, Rand Paul, Rick Perry, Marco Rubio and Scott Walker are also so monitored.

Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson, Lindsey Graham, George Pataki, Mike Huckabee, Bobby Jindal, Jim Gilmore and Rick Santorum do not make the list.

from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/dnc-treating-trump-like-serious-candidate/

from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2015/08/01/dnc-treating-trump-like-serious-candidate/