December 2010

One of Glenn Beck’s big gold sponsors is in some serious trouble:

Glenn Beck might, for once, be right: the government iscoming for your gold. But only if you happened to buy it from one of Beck's advertisers, the Superior Gold Group. At the request of prosecutors from LA County and Santa Monica city who have filed a civil suit against the company, Los Angeles County judge has ordered that Superior Gold be placed into receivership and all of its assets—bank accounts, real estate, and presumably gold stored for customers—frozen. On Monday, a court-appointed lawyer actually physically seized control of the company, presumably to prevent further wrongdoing. The lawsuit alleged that among other things, Superior had defrauded its customers by overcharging them, fraudulently inducing them to buy overpriced collectors' coins rather than the bullion that they wanted, and taking customers' money for coins they never produced. The prosecutors hope that the lawsuit will provide restitution for all of the company's ripped off customers. The judge will hold a hearing later this month to decide whether the company's assets should remain frozen until the case goes to trial.

(h/t Cesca)

One of the saddest losses we have experienced in a long time:

Elizabeth Edwards, who as the wife of former Senator John Edwards gave America an intimate look at a candidate’s marriage by sharing his quest for the 2008 presidential nomination as she struggled with incurable cancer and, secretly, with his infidelity, died Tuesday morning at her home in Chapel Hill, N.C. She was 61.

The Wikileaks document dump is bringing some in the Senate to action:

Sens. John Ensign (R-Nev.), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Scott Brown (R-Mass.) introduced a bill Thursday aimed at stopping WikiLeaks by making it illegal to publish the names of military or intelligence community informants.

Ensign accused WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and his "cronies" of hindering America's war efforts and creating a "hit list" for U.S. enemies by outing intelligence sources.

“Our sources are bravely risking their lives when they stand up against the tyranny of al Qaeda, the Taliban and murderous regimes, and I simply will not stand idly by as they become death targets because of Julian Assange," Ensign said. "Let me be very clear, WikiLeaks is not a whistleblower website and Assange is not a journalist.”

And what’s the name of this bill?

The Securing Human Intelligence and Enforcing Lawful Dissemination Act (SHIELD) would give the government the flexibility to pursue Assange for allegedly outing confidential U.S. informants.

YES! This is a MARVELous idea. I bet Stan Lee can help come up with some new agents to go after Assange.

Austin Powers arch nemesis, Dr. Evil, has transformed into a real life character named Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks. First off, here’s a look at the datacenter for Wikileaks.

Steel and glass doors frame its entrance, which is carved into the hard rock of Vita Bergen - The White Mountains - in the centre of Stockholm, Sweden.

Then you got Assange issuing a Dr. Evil style threat to the world:

Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder, has circulated across the internet an encrypted “poison pill” cache of uncensored documents suspected to include files on BP and Guantanamo Bay.

One of the files identified this weekend by The Sunday Times — called the “insurance” file — has been downloaded from the WikiLeaks website by tens of thousands of supporters, from America to Australia.

Assange warns that any government that tries to curtail his activities risks triggering a new deluge of state and commercial secrets.