NC Renegades

The last four occupiers of an Oregon wildlife refuge have posted a series of defiant videos in which one of them calls FBI agents losers, shows a defensive perimeter they have built and takes a joyride in a government vehicle.

The videos were posted Sunday on a YouTube channel called Defend Your Base, which the armed group has been using to give live updates. The holdouts are among 16 people charged with conspiracy to interfere with federal workers in the armed standoff over federal land policy that has surpassed five weeks.

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Federal authorities are accusing a Dearborn Heights man of supporting Islamic State extremists and planning to “shoot up” a Detroit church.

Khalil Abu-Rayyan, 21, hasn’t been charged with terrorism-related crimes but faces federal charges of illegally having a firearm while using a controlled substance.

But a complaint unsealed Thursday in U.S. District Court reveals the FBI has been investigating him since May “regarding increasingly violent threats he has made to others about committing acts of terror and martyrdom — including brutal acts against police officers, churchgoers and others — on behalf of the foreign terrorist organization Islamic State of Iraq and Levant.”

Besides allegedly using Twitter to express support for the terror group — often referred to as ISIS or ISIL — Abu-Rayyan reportedly told an undercover FBI employee about a plot to target a church.

“I tried to shoot up a church one day,” Abu-Rayyan is quoted as saying in court records. “I don’t know the name of it, but it’s close to my job. It’s one of the biggest ones in Detroit. Ya, I had it planned out. I bought a bunch of bullets. I practiced a lot with it. I practiced reloading and unloading. But my dad searched my car one day, and he found everything. He found the gun and the bullets and a mask I was going to wear.”

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There is so much chaos going on that I don’t even know where to start.  For a very long time I have been warning my readers that a major banking collapse was coming to Europe, and now it is finally unfolding.  Let’s start with Deutsche Bank.  The stock of the most important bank in the “strongest economy in Europe” plunged another 8 percent on Monday, and it is now hovering just above the all-time record low that was set during the last financial crisis.  Overall, the stock price is now down a staggering 36 percent since 2016 began, and Deutsche Bank credit default swaps are going parabolic.  Of course my readers were alerted to major problems at Deutsche Bank all the way back in September, and now the endgame is playing out.  In addition to Deutsche Bank, the list of other “too big to fail” banks in Europe that appear to be in very serious trouble includes Commerzbank, Credit Suisse, HSBC and BNP Paribas.  Just about every major bank in Italy could fall on that list as well, and Greek bank stocks lost close to a quarter of their value on Monday alone.  Financial Armageddon has come to Europe, and the entire planet is going to feel the pain.

The collapse of the banks in Europe is dragging down stock prices all over the continent.  At this point, more than one-fifth of all stock market wealth in Europe has already been wiped out since the middle of last year.  That means that we only have four-fifths left.  The following comes from USA Today…

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U.S. investigators have found evidence to confirm what is believed to be the first-of-its-kind cyberattack on a power grid that caused a blackout for hundreds of thousands of people in Ukraine in December.

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For years, U.S. officials have expressed worry about the vulnerability of the U.S. power grid. And the U.S. investigation of the Ukrainian attack has confirmed what until now has been largely theoretical: that cyberwarfare can be used to disable the U.S. power grid. U.S. systems aren’t any more protected than those breached in Ukraine, the U.S. official said.

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A hacker, who wishes to remain anonymous, plans to dump the apparent names, job titles, email addresses and phone numbers of over 20,000 supposed Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) employees, as well as over 9,000 alleged Department of Homeland Security (DHS) employees, Motherboard has learned.

The hacker also claims to have downloaded hundreds of gigabytes of data from a Department of Justice (DOJ) computer, although that data has not been published.

On Sunday, Motherboard obtained the supposedly soon-to-be-leaked data and called a large selection of random numbers in both the DHS and FBI databases. Many of the calls went through to their respective voicemail boxes, and the names for their supposed owners matched with those in the database. At one point, Motherboard reached the operations center of the FBI, according to the person on the other end.

One alleged FBI intelligence analyst did pick up the phone, and identified herself as the same name as listed in the database. A DHS employee did the same, but did not feel comfortable confirming his job title, he said.

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Buy your book here. Is it time to feed the pigs?

• Beyonce delivered her message during performance of new single Formation at halftime during Super Bowl 50
• Her backing dancers appeared dressed as Black Panthers activists with all-black outfits and signature black berets 
• Several dancers also appeared in an image holding a piece of paper reading ‘justice 4 Martin Woods, a black man shot dead by around a dozen police in San Francisco after refusing to drop a knife
• The Black Panthers were an armed group involved in the black power movement of the Sixties and Seventies
• They followed the teachings of men such as Malcolm X, who advocated the use of violence to overcome oppression 
• Tina Knowles, Beyonce’s mother, also posted an image of herself and the dancers giving the black power salute
• See the latest updates on Beyonce’s performance at the Super Bowl at www.dailymail.co.uk/superbowl

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I have been writing about the two-tiered justice system implemented by the Obama administration. This philosophy is now celebrated by the media. No matter what is written concerning this “philosophy”, any opposition is labelled as racist or the newly minted “hater”. For those who are sentient, there is no need for me to add anything else to make my point.

David DeGerolamo

And yet there is a new element to the latest European selloff, one which turned vicious just minutes after Europe opened for trading this morning with not just commercial banks (who are now all subject to bail-ins courtesy of the BRRD) being dumped with the Deutsche Bank water, but peripheral spreads and equity markets have all joined in.

Case in point: Spanish, Portuguese and Italian yields and spreads to Germany are blowing out…

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Following Hillary Clinton’s discovery in Iowa that she is less popular among young females than a yeast infection, the former first lady is pulling out all the stops in New Hampshire to try to upset what is expected to be a runaway win in the bimbo demographic for doddering socialist Bernie “Sugar Grandaddy” Sanders.

To that end, Hillary asked herself what vivacious, high-powered celebrity superstar could help her reel in those youthful females votes, and she came up with…Madeleine Albright. The 78-year old Secretary of State under (so to speak) Bill Clinton, who helped negotiate an Iran-style deal with the North Koreans which would give them billions of dollars in aid to keep them from everbuilding the kind of nuclear weapons they tested last month, or ever developing an intercontinental ballistic missile of the type they launched Saturday.

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NARAL Pro-Choice America chose to live-tweet its response to commercials broadcast during Super Bowl 50 on Sunday night, but touched a raw nerve with many after complaining that an ad featuring a baby during an ultrasound amounted to “humanizing fetuses.”

The ad from Australia portrays a lively unborn baby on an ultrasound screen reacting with enthusiasm to the Dorito-munching expectant Dad’s packet of snacks. Each time the husband moves a chip towards his wife’s belly and the baby on the screen makes a lunge for it. When the annoyed Mom throws a chip across the room the baby, to everyone’s consternation, decides to make an early arrival.

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#NotBuyingIt – that @Doritos ad using #antichoice tactic of humanizing fetuses & sexist tropes of dads as clueless & moms as uptight. #SB50

— Reproductive Freedom for All (@reproforall) February 8, 2016

Here is a brief summary of the European carnage so far:

• European banks decline, SX7P close to session low as of 11:52am CET (declines 2.6%, previously down as much as 3.3%).
• Greek banks Eurobank Ergasias, Alpha Bank at record low; Monte Paschi follows as 3-worst performer today
  • Eurobank Ergasias sinks ~20% (as much as 21%)
  • Alpha Bank plummets 14% (as much as 18%)
  • Monte Paschi retreats 5.9% (as much as 8%)
• AXIA Ventures notes first round of talks between Greek govt and heads of creditors’ representatives ended on Feb. 5;says all major issues still open, unclear when they’ll return to Athens to continue discussions
• NOTE: Greek Bank Mgmt Review to Start End-Feb: Xenofos in Naftemporiki
• Separately, Italian 10-yr spread with bunds widens for 3rd session; Currently at highest since July

Why the dramatic shift in European risk, where things were relatively stable for months on the heel of Europe’s QE? Perhaps Morgan Stanley’s note flagged last night had something to do with it. To wit:

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