Deal or No Deal...
to the bailout for billionaires?
A Sighting from The Catbird Seat
~ o ~
September 25, 2008
Should U.S. taxpayers accept a quick, high-risk bailout DEAL where the $700,000,000,000 prize goes to Billionaire Racketeers, or should they say NO DEAL and go for a chance to save their jobs, their homes and their economy?
- The Catbird
Sightings from The Catbird Seat
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Ron Paul - Bailout is Unconstitutional
"Speaking immediately after todays catastrophic passing of the bailout bill in the House, Ron Paul said that - among other things - the bill was unconstitutional."
“This time the bill was much worse,” Paul said. “It’s amazing. You take a very very bad bill, you take it back out, and you make it much worse. It tells you a little bit about what’s going on here in Washington.
“The one very bad part of this bill was the fact that the tax portion of this bill was written by the Senate, and under the Constitution, only the House can originate tax bills. So that in itself was unconstitutional.
“But it’s been done before and it will be done again. But that’s just sort of the way things happen around here.”
Congressman Paul added that the bill doesn’t deal with the problem, and that it was simply symbolic of our overspending and over extension - “the absolute bankruptcy of this country.”
Congress Knows" $700 Billion Dollar Bailout "Unconstitutional"
This $700 BILLION DOLLAR BAIL-OUT is Unconstitutional, it is Excessive, Abusive, Despotic, Oppressive further Endangering the Rule of Law of the Constitution's Law of the Land. Attorneys in Congress.. You are aware of the LAW and the Oath of Office you took to uphold, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, against all parties, foreign and Domestic.., but you Attorney's are in to 'attournments' are'nt you.. You are into breaking Contracts rather than upholding them.. Isn't that so?! After years of being blindsided; WE, the People are not in agreement with what is going on in this FINANCIAL TERRORISM which involves our Homes, Farms, Business's, Industry, Manufacturing, Health Care, Education, Highways and By-ways, Waterways etc.. which we have discovered were sold off by Executive Order 12803 by former President George H.W. Bush which is verified in these Historic Documents at http://www.theantechamber.net/... . The President did not have the authority to grant, vest or convey that which did not belong to him.. these properties belonged to THE WE, THE PEOPLE because it was built with TAX DOLLARS. See: Marbury vs. Madison. U.S. S.Ct. in Res Judicata: http://www.law.cornell.edu/.... .
CONGRESS DID YOU READ: THIS U.S. DEPT OF THE TREASURY LETTER and, did you read this SECRETS OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE?
The following was copied from http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?read=132046
We the People appear to have a problem with our alleged Elected Representative Body albiet the Executive Branch, Legislative Branch and Judicial.. in the Acknowledgement they took an Oath to Uphold, Protect and Defend the Constitution i.e., Law of the Land, Against All Parties, Foreign and Domestic!" While of equal measure.. all the before mentioned have the opinion ALL are ABOVE ALL LAW and can set forth destructing and dismanteling the SUPREME LAW of this Nation by and through UNWHOLESOME EMERGENCY EXECUTIVE POWERS?!
A previous statement of COLOR OF ALL LAW was made.. Do you know what COLOR OF ALL LAW IS?
COLOR OF LAW. The appearance or semblance, without the substance, of legal right. Misuse of Power, possessed by virtue of state law and made possible only because wrongdoer is cloathed with authority of state, is action taken under "color of law" .. check out 42 U.S.C.A. Sec. 1983
TITLE 42 > CHAPTER 21 > SUBCHAPTER I > § 1983
§ 1983. Civil action for deprivation of rights
How Current is This?
Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage,
of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected,
any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the
deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws,
shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper
proceeding for redress, except that in any action brought against a judicial officer for an
act or omission taken in such officer’s judicial capacity, injunctive relief shall not be
granted unless a declaratory decree was violated or declaratory relief was unavailable.
For the purposes of this section, any Act of Congress applicable exclusively to the
District of Columbia shall be considered to be a statute of the District of Columbia.
source: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/42/1983.html .
http://www.tollscreategridlock.org/
BAILOUT BALLYHOO UPDATES
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December 30, 2008
GMAC Adds Loans as U.S. Injects
$6 Billion to Aid GM
By Rebecca Christie and David Mildenberg
Dec. 30 (Bloomberg) -- GMAC LLC, bolstered by a $6 billion federal bailout, resumed lending to General Motors Corp. customers with lower credit scores as the U.S. stepped up efforts to keep the automaker in business.
The Treasury said yesterday it will take a $5 billion stake in Detroit-based GMAC, the financing arm of GM, and lend $1 billion to the automaker that will be invested in GMAC to boost its capital. Within hours, GM was offering five-year, no- interest loans to halt this year’s 22 percent slide in sales, which dealers have blamed on a lack of financing for customers.
Reviving GM’s sales has become a priority for U.S. policy makers including the Federal Reserve because of concern that the automaker and its suppliers might go bankrupt and deepen the year-old recession by firing millions of workers. The funds for GMAC are on top of $13.4 billion the Treasury agreed earlier this month to lend to GM and Chrysler LLC.
“The economy has stopped on a dime, and the Fed is looking anywhere there are large markets they can affect in big ways,” said Greg Prost, chief investment officer at Ambassador Capital Management in Detroit, which manages about $800 million. “If they are going to save the car companies, there is going to have to be financing.”
GMAC will now lend to vehicle buyers with credit scores of 621 or higher, compared with a previous standard of at least 700, according to a company statement. The higher threshold had excluded about 42 percent of U.S. consumers.
Helping GM
The company said it won’t finance “higher-risk transactions,” instead concentrating on prime customers who are more likely to repay using “responsible credit standards.” The relaxed policy “will allow us to return to more normal levels of financing volume, and should help in efforts to stabilize the U.S. auto industry,” GMAC President Bill Muir said in today’s statement.
The lender financed about 35 percent of GM’s retail customers and about three-quarters of dealer inventory last year. GM, which sold 51 percent of GMAC in 2006 to a group led by private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP, is seeking a permanent federal bailout to avert bankruptcy. Cerberus also owns Chrysler.
Markets React
GMAC ran short of cash this year after $7.9 billion of losses over five quarters, mostly from record defaults on subprime mortgages, which are made to homebuyers with the worst records. The lender was shut out of credit markets and had to limit lending only to people with the top repayment histories, a policy that GM dealers said had cut deeply into sales....
Rescue Program
GM’s $1 billion loan from the Treasury would be used to support a GMAC rights offering, which is designed to help the lender bolster its balance sheet. The loan may be completed by about Jan. 16, the Treasury said.
The agreement opens a new rescue program for the car industry as part of the Treasury’s $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program. The bailout, originally designed to buy soured loans and securities from banks, has since become a tool for Treasury to prop up lenders, insurers, carmakers and now auto-finance companies.
The investment in GMAC is “part of a broader program to assist the domestic automotive industry in becoming financially viable,” the Treasury said in a statement yesterday.
GMAC will pay an 8 percent dividend on the Treasury’s $5 billion of senior preferred equity. The company will also issue warrants in the form of additional preferred equity that will equal 5 percent of the preferred-stock purchase and pay a 9 percent dividend if exercised.
No Deadline
The Bush administration has already agreed to loan GM $4 billion this month and $5.4 billion next month. If Congress agrees to approve funding of a second $350 billion for TARP, GM may get another $4 billion in February.
A Treasury official said there is no cap or deadline for aid for the auto industry under TARP. Congress “will need to release” the second half of the $700 billion under the Treasury’s rescue plan, the official said on condition of anonymity during a conference call with reporters....
With GM selling cars at the slowest pace in 26 years and the country in its worst housing crisis since the Great Depression, GMAC and its Residential Capital LLC mortgage unit have had no way to revive their own revenue. ResCap has faced speculation about bankruptcy after $9.1 billion of losses in two years.
Slow Sales
ResCap will continue to make new mortgages “that can be sold or funded in the secondary market,” Proia said today. The company isn’t making new subprime loans, she said.
“Also, a more stable operating environment will be a positive for our servicing operations.”
The company’s loan-servicing unit handled billing and record-keeping for about $410 billion of loans last year, making it the seventh-largest U.S. mortgage servicer.
“The relationship with GM is probably a key reason it’s being bailed out,” said Thomas Atteberry, who helps manage $3.5 billion in fixed-income assets at First Pacific Advisors in Los Angeles. “I’m not very happy about the fact that the government has to save an auto-finance company because management ran it into the ground.”
GMAC shook up management in April, naming Al de Molina, a former finance chief at Bank of America Corp. , as chief executive officer of GMAC Financial Services. Thomas Marano, who led mortgage trading and originations at Bear Stearns Cos., was named non-executive chairman of the Residential Capital mortgage unit and later promoted to CEO.
New Managers
“GMAC’s new management team has a strong background in banking,” said GMAC’s Proia. “They have had the vision and been able to execute these initiatives that will position the company for longer-term health.”
Management of Cerberus includes former Treasury Secretary John Snow, who is chairman of the New York-based private-equity firm. That poses a potential conflict of interest in a Treasury Department rescue of GMAC, said Josh Lerner, a Harvard Business School investment banking professor. It’s countered by the need to help GM, Lerner said.
“You can criticize the whole bailout process for a lack of transparency and this is no exception,” Lerner said. “On the other hand, it’s widely accepted that saving GM is an important public policy goal, at least in the short run.”
Cerberus spokesman Jim Olecki didn’t immediately return calls for comment.
To contact the reporters on this story: Rebecca Christie in Washington at rchristie4@bloomberg.net; David Mildenberg in Charlotte at dmildenberg@bloomberg.net
(Catbird Questions: 1) How is GMAC going to pay back the loans and make a profit when they are lending money at 0% interest for a 5-year period? 2) Whatever happened to our "unfair competition", "fair trade" and "insider trading", principles, laws and agreements? 3) When was our Constitution repealed, and when did we become a socialist nation?)
November 11, 2008
Stocks Close Down; Citi Has Purchase Plans
Evelyn Rusli
Stocks ended lower on Monday, but well off their worst levels. The Dow fell 73 points at the closing bell. The S&P 500 fell 12 points while the Nasdaq slipped 31 points.
Early optimism about China's stimulus package and the expanded AIG bailout quickly fizzled. Nearly all of the Dow's 30 components were in the red at the end of trading.
Financial stocks were under pressure, led by Goldman Sachs. Goldman fell sharply on concerns that the firm will post a loss in the fourth quarter. If the Street is right, that will be the company's first loss since it went public. There was some speculation that Goldman could go private or link up with another company.
Goldman's pain is Warren Buffett's loss. The billionaire investor recently purchased a $5 billion stake in the firm through Berkshire Hathaway. Berkshire fell a few points on Monday after the company said profits plunged 77% in the last quarter.
Meanwhile, Citigroup could be on the brink of a new acquisition. According to reports, the firm is looking to take over a U.S. regional bank. Last month, Citi gave up on a possible deal with Wachovia
Finally, General Motors plunged on Monday, hitting its lowest level in roughly 60 years.
A Deutsche Bank analyst downgraded the troubled automaker to a price target of $0. In other news, the company warned that the mortgage unit of GMAC may not survive because of the devaluation of mortgage loans and the challenge of raising more cash. GM and the rest of Detroit are waiting on Washington for a highly anticipated bailout.
WHERE BILLIONS OF TAXPAYER DOLLARS HAVE GONE IN THE AIG BILLIONAIRES’ BAILOUT
http://www.kycbs.net/AIG-Insider-Transactions-11-11-8.mht
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/it?s=aig
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See also: AIG; Confessions of a Whistleblower; The Chubb Group; C.V. Starr; Goldman Sachs; Marsh & McLennan; PricewaterhouseCoopers; Wall Street
September 29, 2008
A TRUE STORY
As I was attempting to send another e-mail to my representatives in Congress urging them to vote NO on the current flawed Bailout of Wall Street Billionaires bill, I found that I could not connect to the Internet. My service provider is AT&T (after the merger with my original carrier, Bell South).
After spending hours trying to determine what was wrong, I finally decided to try to talk to a human being rather than a machine, and after a long wait was finally able to talk with a helpful fellow on the other end of the line. He led me through several steps, but to no avail. Due to a large amount of static on the line I had to ask him several times to repeat his instructions. Finally, he asked if I minded if he put me on hold while he checked to see if there were any outages in my area. He returned shortly and apologized for the inconvenience and advised that AT&T was installing an upgrade to their systems in my area and that it would probably be finished in another 24 hours.
I thanked him, and then asked him about all the static on the line, and if that was also due to the changeover. He said that, no, he thought that was a problem on his end of the line. So, I asked him what State he was in.
He said, “Actually, I’m in the Philippines.”
I think this says more about our country’s present financial crisis than anything I’ve heard from our “elected” servants in Washington. How will a $700 billion taxpayer bailout of huge, international corporations, which dodge paying taxes through setting up offshore, tax-sheltered shell corporations, and out-source domestic operations to cheap foreign labor which does not pay U.S. taxes, work to provide relief to distressed homeowners with no jobs? Our root economic problem, as I see it, is due to the fact that so many hundreds of thousands of jobs, our manufacturing plants, etc., have all gone overseas – sent there, in the first place, by these same Wall Street, tax-dodging gangsters.
And now, to “save” our economy, our pensions, our educational system, our American way of life, etc., the solution of these INTERNATIONAL corporations is to “borrow” another $700 billion from U.S. taxpayers so that they can continue down the same path of sending more jobs and capital to foreign countries (including China, Russia, Iraq, etc.), avoid paying taxes themselves, and leave us common taxpayers strapped to pay the ever-increasing bills with ever-decreasing assets, savings and income.
The initial, alternative “common-sense” solution that I had written previously, based upon hardly any details of what the Bush administration was proposing, follows this new introduction. However, since that time, I have learned more details and some promising alternative proposals from some of our legislators who are strongly against the flawed administration proposal. So, I am presenting another common-sense alternative idea which may be less expensive and quicker to implement.
Simply put: Instead of giving the $700 billion to Wall Street gang, make this money available for mortgage lending by the smaller, locally-owned State Banks and Credit Unions across the country. This will “spread the risk” among many institutions in locales with differing economic conditions. These local banks should be allowed to refinance existing “distressed” mortgages for local homeowners as well as offering new loans for homes, businesses, college, etc. The profits will stay largely in the tax-payers’ own home town. The Wall Street banks benefit by getting the “distressed” mortgages off their books. The local taxpayers benefit by saving their homes from foreclosure, an infusion of new capital, new jobs, and new farms or businesses.
The original plan is included here, as many of the comments still apply to the new plan. The IMPORTANT thing is TO CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS IMMEDIATELY!!!
TO CONTACT YOUR CONGRESSIONAL REPRESENTATIVE
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PLEASE PASS THIS PAGE ON.
The original proposed solution:
September 24, 2008
A COMMON-SENSE SOLUTION TO THE FINANCIAL CRISIS
Most U.S. citizens are already painfully aware of their own personal economic situations and don’t need me, or anyone else, to explain what the nation’s “economic problems” are, so I’ll get right to a proposed solution:
1. Take the same $700 billion, or whatever figure may be prudent, and set up a BRAND NEW, independent, taxpayer-owned, taxpayer-operated bank. Taxpayers should NOT buy an OLD, TROUBLED “pig-in-a-poke” financial institution for billions of dollars – especially without having an independent audit of what the ASSETS and LIABILITIES of that company are, and without any business plan or any details provided on how the common, tax-payer homeowner is going to benefit from this “bailout”.
2. This NEW taxpayer-owned bank, initially should be chartered for the sole purpose of assuming the troubled home mortgages from ALL financial institutions in the United States. This gives a quick “bailout” to the troubled banks by relieving them of their non-performing home mortgages, and at the same time gives the homeowner a chance to avoid immediate foreclosure and loss of their homes.
3. The EXPENSES of the NEW taxpayer-owned bank will be drastically less than those of the OLD corporate-owned-banks. There will be no multi-million dollar salaries for CEO’s and managers, no golden parachutes to worry about, no millions for attorneys involved in the old bank’s lawsuits, no millions for unpaid fines for criminal activities, no assumption of liability for UNFUNDED or UNDERFUNDED PENSION PLANS, NO SURPRISES when audits of the old company reveal massive fraud and cooked books, no payola and under-the-table payoffs, etc. The NEW taxpayer-funded and taxpayer-owned bank should have excellent credit - unencumbered with the debts and liabilities (both known and unknown) of the current banks. Thus, the NEW bank should have no difficulty in borrowing from the Federal banks at the same or lower rates as the troubled commercial banks.
4. With greatly reduced expenses, current homeowners who are having difficulty with their mortgages should be able to REFINANCE their homes with the NEW taxpayer-owned bank at greatly reduced rates, with lower payments spread out over longer periods of time, etc. Under this plan, the OLD bank benefits by getting the troubled mortgages off their books. The NEW bank benefits by not assuming the huge liabilities the OLD banks have run up over the years as a result of their greed, corruption and mismanagement. The homeowner benefits by avoiding foreclosure and having a new, lower-interest-rate mortgage in a sound financial institution which he or she owns.
5. The creation of a NEW taxpayer-owned, taxpayer-operated bank would be truly...
FAIR - Each individual homeowner-borrower should treated equally which totally avoids the controversy and haggling over which of the OLD banks would get bailed out and which wouldn’t. This plan for a NEW bank would treat all current financial institutions equally - whether or not they are in trouble.
FAST - There would be no need to audit the old financial institutions, no need to wait for FBI to investigate the current wrongdoers in the firms; no need to “work-out” millions of dollars old loans, etc.. Since this NEW bank solution is fair, simpler, and addresses the immediate as well as long-term needs of ALL the citizens in the country (not just the Wall Street millionaires), there should be no partisan bickering over the passage of legislation.
SAFE AND SENSIBLE - Instead of rushing to pour $700,000,000,000 into a deep, dark, unknown cesspool, with no guarantee as to where it will go or if it will solve any problems, using the SAME MONEY for a brand NEW institution owned by taxpayers and operated by taxpayers, and unencumbered by the excesses, corruption and liabilities of the old institution, has multiple benefits for the economy.
MULTIPLE ECONOMIC BENEFITS - This money will be used to construct new, taxpayer-owned banking facilities across the country, quickly creating new business for contractors and hundreds of thousands of new jobs for supporting businesses as well as for those who will be employed in these local banks. As it’s highly doubtful that it would take $700 billion in borrowed money to set up these new banks, savings on interest alone will be in the hundreds of millions. This should free up substantial amounts to channel into funding the financial needs of our schools, our hospitals, medical care for our returning veterans, our roads, our bridges, our parks, our police forces, our homeland security, etc., etc., which, in turn, would go a very long way to restarting and to restoring our nation’s economy.
OWNERSHIP, CONTROL, INTEREST PAYMENTS, TAXES, AND PROFITS REMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES: There is talk of foreign banks - even the government of China - buying up distressed American banks. This proposal for a NEW BANK is a common sense alternative to help curtail the takeover of our financial institutions by foreign interests. Under this plan, we would set up a corporation with one share of stock given (as a tax rebate) to every taxpayer in the United States. In order to avoid stock speculation and the accumulation of this new bank stock by the wealthy few, sale or redemption of this stock would be back to the bank corporation. Every taxpayer then shall own no more than one share of stock, which could be redeemed upon that person’s retirement or death. Mortgages would be limited to the U.S. taxpayer’s primary residence only. This plan is designed to help the ordinary citizen protect the roof over his head - not to bail out the developers, real estate speculators, landlords and banks who made bad business decisions. Under this simple plan, there is NO BLANK CHECK to be given to these questionable organizations, their highly-paid officers and directors, their cronies, their lawyers, their lobbyists, etc. Under this plan for a NEW bank, there would be NO TIME-CONSUMING ARGUMENTS ABOUT MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR SALARIES OR GOLDEN PARACHUTES, WHO GETS FIRED, WHAT DO WE DO ABOUT UNDER-FUNDED PENSION PLANS, WHAT TAX-FREE DIVIDENDS GET PAID, etc. . The corporations continue to control their own affairs, pay their own people, pay their own taxes, etc. for NOW. (Later, in calmer times, Congress really should get involved in passing laws outlawing interlocking directorships, limiting executive payrolls, restoring the Glass-Steagall Act, etc., and establish a strong oversight panel to curb abuses. And, the new administration should appoint a strong, fair Attorney General and make sure the Justice Department performs as required to investigate and prosecute any and all persons in these financial and insurance organizations who engage in fraudulent activity.)
SO WHAT’S YOUR DECISION, CITIZENS?
A BAILOUT FOR BILLIONAIRES DEAL
OR
NO DEAL?
Let your legislator know now!
CONTACT YOUR CONGRESS PERSON
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PLEASE PASS THIS PAGE ON.
More reasons why the bailout proposals now being put before Congress won’t work...
1. Lack of factual details and transparency in the current proposals to allow for informed discussions and for the public and lawmakers to make informed decisions. Full AUDITS of these companies in financial crisis should be made by government auditors, and full reports issued and published in the media and on the internet so that there is full transparency and opportunity for ALL CITIZENS to review (not just the billionaire corporate executives behind closed doors) and THEN carefully consider alternative proposals to resolve the crisis. Without full audits U.S. citizens do not know what ASSETS and LIABILITIES they are buying with the $800 billion of their tax dollars. No private firm is going to invest heavily in a company without a trustworthy audit of that organization.
2. Many of these financial firms, and their top officers, being considered for bailouts are currently under investigation by the FBI for fraud, stock manipulation, withholding information from investors, etc., much of which is related to the current mortgage crisis. The FBI cannot give the public and the lawmakers any details regarding who is being investigated or when the investigations will be completed. Congress SHOULD NOT blindly give hundreds of billions of dollars to these businesses UNTIL THESE INVESTIGATIONS ARE COMPLETED, and the criminals prosecuted. Not a single taxpayer dollar should go into the pockets of these racketeers until all prosecutions have been completed.
3. The proposals thus far have not explained what kind of help, if any, the millions of ordinary American homeowners now in default on their loans, and on the brink of losing their homes, are going to benefit from this bailout of billionaires.
The Bush Administration is now pushing to RUSH the bailout through Congress.
Bailout NOW to save the economy and work out the details later, the Administration says. Don’t wait for audits. Don’t wait for investigations. Don’t worry about the taxpayers being twice-fooled and twice-burned by BAILING OUT THE GANGSTERS bailing out the perpetrators of this crisis WITH THEIR OWN TAX MONEY. Our entire financial system is about to go down, dragging down our whole economy, Bush says. If we don’t rush this through, we’re in for a long, deep recession. RUSH! RUSH!
RELATED SITES:
www.kycbs.net/AlliedWorldAssurance.htm
www.kycbs.net/Bank-of-America.htm
www.kycbs.net/Bank-of-Hawaii.htm
www.kycbs.net/Bankruptcy-Buzzards.htm
www.kycbs.net/BlackstoneGroup.htm
www.kycbs.net/Broken-Trust-Book.htm
www.kycbs.net/CarlyleGroup.htm
www.kycbs.net/ConnecticutConnection.htm
www.kycbs.net/First-Hawaiian-Bank.htm
www.kycbs.net/Freedom-To-Sing.htm
www.kycbs.net/GoldmanSachs.htm
www.kycbs.net/Hawaiian-Air.htm
www.kycbs.net/Henry-Paulson.htm
www.kycbs.net/Impeach-Bush.htm
www.kycbs.net/IndonesianConnection.htm
www.kycbs.net/Kissinger-of-Death.htm
www.kycbs.net/Lost-Generations.htm
www.kycbs.net/NatureConservancy.htm
www.kycbs.net/Nature-Conservancy-Hawaii.htm
www.kycbs.net/Peregrine-Fund.htm
www.kycbs.net/Peregrine-Gallery.htm
www.kycbs.net/Peregrine-Henry-Paulson.htm
www.kycbs.net/PriceWaterhouse.htm
www.kycbs.net/PunaConnection.htm
www.kycbs.net/RICO-In-Paradise.htm
www.kycbs.net/Whistleblowers.htm
COMMENTS?