10-09-16 AP US homes lost to foreclosure up 25 pct on year

US homes lost to foreclosure up 25 pct on year

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AFP/Getty Images/File – A child sits inside cardboard box during a rally to raise awareness about the home foreclosure crisis …

Slideshow:Housing Crisis

By ALEX VEIGA, AP Real Estate Writer Alex Veiga, Ap Real Estate Writer – Thu Sep 16, 3:27 am ET

LOS ANGELES – Lenders took back more homes in August than in any month since the start of the U.S. mortgage crisis.
The increase in home repossessions came even as the number of properties entering the foreclosure process slowed for the seventh month in a row, foreclosure listing firm RealtyTrac Inc. said Thursday.
In all, banks repossessed 95,364 properties last month, up 3 percent from July and an increase of 25 percent from August 2009, RealtyTrac said.
August makes the ninth month in a row that the pace of homes lost to foreclosure has increased on an annual basis. The previous high was in May.
Banks have been stepping up repossessions to clear out their backlog of bad loans with an eye on eventually placing the foreclosed properties on the market, but they can't afford to simply dump the properties on the market.
Concerns are growing that the housing market recovery could stumble amid stubbornly high unemployment, a sluggish economy and faltering consumer confidence. U.S. home sales have collapsed since federal homebuyer tax credits expired in April.
That's one reason fewer than one-third of homes repossessed by lenders are on the market, said Rick Sharga, a senior vice president at RealtyTrac. (Brad hmmm to many houses is too much supply, too little demand= lower prices)
"These (properties) are going to come to market, but very slowly because nobody wants to overwhelm a soft buyer's market with too much distressed inventory for fear of what it would do for house prices," he said.
As a result, lenders are putting off initiating the foreclosure process on homeowners who have missed payments, letting borrowers stay in their homes longer.
The number of properties receiving an initial default notice — the first step in the foreclosure process — slipped 1 percent last month from July, but was down 30 percent versus August last year, RealtyTrac said.
Initial defaults have fallen on an annual basis the past seven months. They peaked in April 2009.
Still, the number of homes scheduled to be sold at auction for the first time increased 9 percent from July and rose 2 percent from August last year. If they don't sell at auction, these homes typically end up going back to the lender.
More than 2.3 million homes have been repossessed by lenders since the recession began in December 2007, according to RealtyTrac. The firm estimates more than 1 million American households are likely to lose their homes to foreclosure this year.
In all, 338,836 properties received a foreclosure-related warning in August, up 4 percent from July, but down 5 percent from the same month last year, RealtyTrac said. That translates to one in 381 U.S. homes.
The firm tracks notices for defaults, scheduled home auctions and home repossessions — warnings that can lead up to a home eventually being lost to foreclosure.
Among states, Nevada posted the highest foreclosure rate last month, with one in every 84 households receiving a foreclosure notice. That's 4.5 times the national average.
Rounding out the top 10 states with the highest foreclosure rate in August were: Florida, Arizona, California, Idaho, Utah, Georgia, Michigan, Illinois and Hawaii.
Economic woes, such as unemployment or reduced income, are now the main catalysts for foreclosures.
Lenders are offering a variety of programs to help homeowners modify their loans, but their success rates vary. Hundreds of thousands of homeowners can't qualify or fall back into default.
The Obama administration has rolled out numerous attempts to tackle the foreclosure crisis but has made only a small dent in the problem. Nearly half of the 1.3 million homeowners who enrolled in the Obama administration's flagship mortgage-relief program have fallen out.
The program, known as Making Home Affordable, has provided permanent help to about 390,000 homeowners since March 2009.
Regardless, many troubled borrowers have seen their efforts to get a loan modification stymied.
Larry Book of Winter Garden, Fla., was one packet away from a permanent loan modification from Chase under the Obama administration's foreclosure prevention plan after more than a year of back and forth and one failed attempt.
But his modification never went through. Instead, his loan was transferred from Chase to IBM Lender Business Process Servicers in July and he was told he owed $9,562.62 and must bring his mortgage current by Sept. 15 or foreclosure proceedings will begin.
"It just becomes too exhausting," Book said about the modification process. "That's why some people walk away. But I've invested too much and given up too much to just let it go." 

10-09-26 Welcome Macedonia - Newest Country! // Bienvenido Macedonia - el país más reciente!

Welcome Macedonia - Newest Country!

10-09-26 Welcome Paraguay - Newest Country! // Bienvenido Paraguay - el país más reciente!

Paraguay - newest country!

10-09-26 Welcome Algeria - Newest Country! // Bienvenido Argelia - el país más reciente!

Newest Country Algeria Last Visited September 24, 2010

10-09-24 Richard Fine's video interview out of jail

10-09-21 Lawrence Summer, who initiated banking deregulation under Clinton, to quit as Obama's top economic adviser.

LAWRENCE SUMMERS, OBAMA'S TOP ECONOMIC ADVISER, QUITTING

September 21, 2010 Top economic adviser to leave White House   AP – FILE - In this Oct. 16, 2009, file photo, Lawrence Summers, White House chief economic adviser, speaks …   By JULIE PACE, Associated Press Writer Julie Pace   WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's top economic adviser, Lawrence Summers, plans to leave the White House at the end of the year, a move that comes as the administration struggles to show an anxious public it's making progress on the economy.   While administration officials Tuesday quickly sought to paint the announcement as an expected development, Summers' departure shakes up an economic team that has been under fire for its handling of the recovery. It's also a team already in transition following the recent departures of other high-profile Obama advisers. In a statement, the president said he is grateful for Summers' service during a time of "great peril for our country."   "While we have much work ahead to repair the damage done by the recession, we are on a better path thanks in no small measure to Larry's wise counsel," Obama said.   Summers will return to Harvard University, a move a senior administration official said was always part of Summers' long-standing plans. The official said the president asked Summers last fall to stay through 2010 in order to see through the passage of financial regulatory legislation and the continued implementation of the economic stimulus package. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to discuss internal White House matters.   Summers is the third high-level member of Obama's economic team to leave in recent months, following the departure of budget director Peter Orszag and Christina Romer, head of the Council of Economic Advisers, both of whom left this summer. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner would be the only one of Obama's top-tier economic advisers to remain with the administration should be stay through the end of the year....   Last month the top House Republican, Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, called on Obama to fire Summers, Geithner and other members of the economic team.   "Never before has the need for a fresh start in Washington been more pressing," Boehner said during a speech in Cleveland....   Summers, often seen with a Diet Coke in his hand, has a reputation as a brilliant, if occasionally smug, economist. During the debate over overhauling the nation's financial regulations, liberals bristled at Summers' rejection of proposals to place limits on the size of banks. They held him partly responsible for the deregulation of banks that occurred in 1999 while he was treasury secretary under President Bill Clinton....

10-09-20 Ongoing Fraud Alleged by Judge David Yaffe in Purported September 17, 2010 Order for Release of Richard Fine

Los Angeles, September 20 – Human Rights Alert (NGO) and Joseph Zernik, PhD, alleged ongoing fraud by Judge David Yaffe regarding false imprisonment of Richard Fine – through the issuance of an invalid court record, in lieu of a valid court order, for the release of Richard Fine from a year and a half of solitary confinement.

On March 4, 2009, Richard Fine was imprisoned by the Warrant Detail of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, albeit – with no Warrant ever issued, and with no Judgment/Conviction or Sentencing ever entered by the Judge David Yaffe.  Instead, Richard Fine was held under solitary confinement for a year and a half by the Sheriff under false and deliberately misleading records – stating that Richard Fine was arrested on location and by authority of a non-existent “Municipal Court of San Pedro”. [1]

On September 17, 2010, Richard Fine was released by the Sheriff. Again - with no valid Order ever entered by the Court. [2]

Instead, September 17, 2010 Minutes were issued under caption of Marina v LA County (BS109420), where issuance of an order was described, but no evidence of an actual Order ever being issued and signed by Judge Yaffe was ever found.  The Minutes failed to spell out that an Order was ever signed by Judge Yaffe to affect the release of Richard Fine on that date, either. 

Moreover, the September 17, 2010 Minutes fail to appear among the list of court records in the case, which was published online by the Court.  Likewise, the Case Summary failed to state that any Order was signed by Judge Yaffe on September 17, 2010, or entered by the Court on that date.

Such vague and ambiguous litigation was typical of the conduct of the Court under the caption of Marina v LA County all along.  To this date the Los Angeles Superior Court denies access to inspect and to copy the definitive record of the litigation in Marina v LA County  - the Register of Actions (California civil docket) – in apparent violation of First Amendment rights.  The habeas corpus and all appeals and petitions originating from it were subjected to pretense review in the United States courts, from the US District Court, Central District of California, through the Court of Appeals, 9^th Circuit, to the Supreme Court of the United States, without the docket – the foundation record of the case -  ever being produced by the Court.

Combined, the arrest, imprisonment, and release of Richard Fine are alleged as an example of arbitrary and capricious deprivation of Liberty through collusion of Judge David Yaffe and Sheriff Leroy Bacca.  

Combined, the publication of invalid records in the online public access system of the Court, and denial of access to true electronic Court records in Sustain – the case management system of the Court – have been previously shown to be the routine tools enabling such fraud and abuse of Human Rights.

Richard Fine had shown that judges in Los Angeles County had taken "not permitted" payments (called by media "bribes"). On February 20, 2009, the Governor of California signed "retroactive immunities" (pardons) for all judges in Los Angeles. Less than two weeks later, on March 4, 2009 Richard Fine was arrested in open court, with no warrant. He is held ever since in solitary confinement in Los Angeles, California. No judgment, conviction, or sentencing was ever entered in his case.

Richard Fine attempted to have his habeas corpus reviewed by the United States courts, from the US District Court, through the US Court of Appeals, to the Supreme Court of the United States; however, all United States courts involved in the matter denied Richard Fine access to valid judicial review; instead, Richard Fine was subjected only to pretense judicial review, while false and deliberately misleading dockets were published online, affecting the pretense that Richard Fine’s case was indeed accorded valid and effectual judicial review and was duly denied.

Human Rights Alert (NGO) is dedicated to discovering, archiving, and disseminating evidence of Human Rights violations by the justice systems of the State of California and the United States in Los Angeles, California, and beyond. Special emphasis is given to the unique role of computerized case management systems and online public access systems in the precipitous deterioration of integrity of the justice system.

LINKS
[1] Records pertaining to the March 4, 2009 arrest and booking of Richard Fine

http://www.scribd.com/doc/25555341/

[2]  Records pertaing to the September 17, 2010 release of Richard Fine

http://www.scribd.com/doc/37800280/

10-09-19 Correcting False Reporting by the Los Angeles Times re: Release of Richard Fine

From: jz
Sent: Sep 19, 2010 5:17 PM
To: newstips@latimes.com, lawsters@googlegroups.com
Cc: DARCY SMITH , Laurence Tribe , larry@tribelaw.com, lguinier@law.harvard.edu, rkennedy@law.harvard.edu, minow@law.harvard.edu, d.ramirez@neu.edu
Subject: Correcting misleading reporting by the Los Angeles Times in re: Release of Richard Fine

To the Editor:

Please accept the correction, below, to your misleading September 18, 2010 report "Attorney Richard Fine spent a year and a half behind bars on contempt-of-court charges. Is that justice?" [1] 

The report provided the readers false information, starting with its first sentence: "Richard Fine -- was released Friday from Los Angeles County Jail after spending a year and a half behind bars on contempt-of-court charges."

The true facts in the matter are that Richard Fine was both taken into custody and released from custody with no due process of law and with no valid and effectual court records to provide the legal foundation for the conduct of Sheriff Leroy Baca in this matter.

Isn't time that the Los Angeles Time start responsibly reporting regarding the conduct of the justice system in this county?
Truly,
Joseph Zernik, PhD
Human Rights Alert (NGO)

[1] Attorney Richard Fine spent a year and a half behind bars on contempt-of-court charges. Is that justice?
__________________________
Former US Prosecutor Richard Fine released last night - with no due process of law - additional evidence of false imprisonment

Los Angeles, September 18 - 70 year old, former US prosecutor Richard Fine was released last night from a year and a half of solitary confinement with no evidence that his release was the outcome of due process of law. California law is explicit in stating that the Sheriff must not take any person into custody, or release any person from custody, without valid court orders to such effect. The release of Richard Fine with no evidence of court order to that effect, however, matches his taking into custody with no warrant and with no judgment/conviction or sentencing ever entered in his case.
Combined, Richard Fine's taking into custody and his release with no due process of law provide evidence of false imprisonment through collusion of Judge David Yaffe, Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles, and Los Angeles County Sheriff Leroy Baca.
As documented in court actions filed by Richard Fine over the past year and a half, such conduct was fully patronized by the United States courts - national tribunals for protection of rights - from the US District Court, Central District of California, through the US Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit, to the Supreme Court of the United States.
Richard Fine had shown that judges in Los Angeles County had taken "not permitted" payments (called by media "bribes"). On February 20, 2009, the Governor of California signed "retroactive immunities" (pardons) for all judges in Los Angeles. Less than two weeks later, on March 4, 2009 Richard Fine was arrested in open court, with no warrant. He is held ever since in solitary confinement in Los Angeles, California. No judgment, conviction, or sentencing was ever entered in his case.
Richard Fine attempted to have his habeas corpus reviewed by the United States courts, from the US District Court, through the US Court of Appeals, to the Supreme Court of the United States; however, all United States courts involved in the matter denied Richard Fine access to valid judicial review; instead, Richard Fine was subjected only to pretense judicial review, while false and deliberately misleading dockets were published online, affecting the pretense that Richard Fine’s case was indeed accorded valid and effectual judicial review and was duly denied.
Human Rights Alert (NGO) is dedicated to discovering, archiving, and disseminating evidence of Human Rights violations by the justice systems of the State of California and the United States in Los Angeles, California, and beyond. Special emphasis is given to the unique role of computerized case management systems and online public access systems in the precipitous deterioration of integrity of the justice system.

10-09-18 Richard Fine Released with no Due Process - Additional Evidence of False Imprisonment

Former US Prosecutor Richard Fine released last night - with no due process of law - additional evidence of false imprisonment

Los Angeles, September 18 - 70 year old, former US prosecutor Richard Fine was released last night from a year and a half of solitary confinement with no evidence that his release was the outcome of due process of law. California law is explicit in stating that the Sheriff must not take any person into custody, or release any person from custody, without valid court orders to such effect. The release of Richard Fine with no evidence of court order to that effect, however, matches his taking into custody with no warrant and with no judgment/conviction or sentencing ever entered in his case.

Combined, Richard Fine's taking into custody and his release with no due process of law provide evidence of false imprisonment through collusion of Judge David Yaffe, Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles, and Los Angeles County Sheriff Leroy Baca.

As documented in court actions filed by Richard Fine over the past year and a half, such conduct was fully patronized by the United States courts - national tribunals for protection of rights - from the US District Court, Central District of California, through the US Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit, to the Supreme Court of the United States.

Richard Fine had shown that judges in Los Angeles County had taken "not permitted" payments (called by media "bribes"). On February 20, 2009, the Governor of California signed "retroactive immunities" (pardons) for all judges in Los Angeles. Less than two weeks later, on March 4, 2009 Richard Fine was arrested in open court, with no warrant. He is held ever since in solitary confinement in Los Angeles, California. No judgment, conviction, or sentencing was ever entered in his case.

Richard Fine attempted to have his habeas corpus reviewed by the United States courts, from the US District Court, through the US Court of Appeals, to the Supreme Court of the United States; however, all United States courts involved in the matter denied Richard Fine access to valid judicial review; instead, Richard Fine was subjected only to pretense judicial review, while false and deliberately misleading dockets were published online, affecting the pretense that Richard Fine’s case was indeed accorded valid and effectual judicial review and was duly denied.

Human Rights Alert (NGO) is dedicated to discovering, archiving, and disseminating evidence of Human Rights violations by the justice systems of the State of California and the United States in Los Angeles, California, and beyond. Special emphasis is given to the unique role of computerized case management systems and online public access systems in the precipitous deterioration of integrity of the justice system.

10-09-17 RICHARD FINE RELEASED FROM FALSE IMPRISONMENT

Attorney jailed on contempt charges freed after 1 1/2 years behind bars

September 17, 2010 | 10:39 pm

A 70-year-old lawyer who was sentenced to jail “indefinitely” on contempt-of-court charges was abruptly released Friday evening after spending a year and a half behind bars.
Richard Fine was released from Los Angeles County Jail in downtown Los Angeles shortly after 9 p.m. but did not wish to speak to a Times reporter, said his daughter, Victoria.
Fine, an antitrust and taxpayer advocate attorney, was thrown in jail last year by  Superior Court Judge David P. Yaffe for failing to answer questions about his finances and for practicing law without a license.
The contempt charges stemmed from a case Fine filed on behalf of Marina del Rey homeowners who sued local developers. Fine had been ordered to pay sanctions and attorneys’ fees in the case.
Fine contends he was being targeted by Yaffe because of his challenges to county-funded benefits that judges receive on top of their state pay.
Rather than comply with Yaffe’s orders and be released from jail, Fine vowed to take his case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In May, however, the court declined to take up his petition, meaning he could have remained in jail indefinitely as Yaffe had ordered. The judge could not be reached for comment late Friday.
While in solitary confinement, Fine filed habeas corpus petitions for his release with the California Supreme Court, district court and the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, alleging that Yaffe was biased against him and should have recused himself from the contempt-of-court case.
His imprisonment was “the latest encounter in the 10-year campaign by Fine to restore due process in the California judicial system,” the attorney, who has been representing himself, wrote in his petition to the U.S. Supreme Court.
“Fine is the only attorney, of the approximately 208,000 California attorneys, with the courage to challenge the California judiciary,” he wrote.
In a telephone interview with The Times in May, Fine said the U.S. Supreme Court had made the wrong decision by allowing him to remain in jail. He said he would be filing another petition.
“I'm in fighting condition,” he said. “They haven't broken me down, and they won't break me down.”
-- Scott Glover

10-09-14 From Lasters' Discussion RE: Digital Signatures and PACER & CM/ECF

From: jz
Sent: Sep 14, 2010 7:04 PM
To: lawsters
Subject: Electronic Transactions and Digital Signatures

Dear Bob:

Before getting lost in the technical details of digital signatures, here is a short overview.

There is no doubt that digital technology could have secured court and financial records much better than paper records.  The problem is that both banks and the courts, left on their own, with insufficient public scrutiny, abused the transition from the paper era to the digital era, to undermine the integrity of their records.

Following is Just one example - authentication of court records by the Clerk of the Court:

• A signature, be it "wet" or digital, is a symbol affixed with the intent to take responsibility.

• A digital signature, to be valid and effectual, has to be personal, confidential, encrypted, and certified by an independent certification system.
• Authentication of Court Minutes, Court Orders, and Court Judgments by the Clerk of the Court, was required to make them valid and effectual for any purpose.

In designing and implementing PACER and CM/ECF, all "wet" signatures and stamps of the Clerks of the United States courts were eliminated.  Instead, the courts implemented the NEFs (Notices of Electronic Filings - at the District Courts), and the NDAs (Notices of Docket Activity) at the US Courts of Appeals.

However, review and comparison of the new authentication forms (NEFs, NDAs) to the old, paper based forms of authentication by the clerks, shows most clearly the deliberate invalidity of PACER & CM/ECF on at least the following levels:

1) The paper forms were titled Certificate, or Certification.  The new forms are titled NEFs or NDAs, which in fact are vacuous names, with no relevant significant meaning relative to their purported function.

2) The paper based forms typically opened with a certification statement, similar to the following: 'I, the undersigned, hereby certify...".  The NEFs and NDAs include no certification statement at all.

3) The paper based forms invoked the authority of the clerk of the court in the signature box.  The NEFs and NDAs never invoke the authority of the Clerk of the Court. 

4) The paper based forms identified the person issuing the certification by name, and by authority, as Deputy Clerk of the Court.  The NEFs and NDAs have nothing of that.  Moreover, in a number of cases, it has been documented that the NEFs and NDAs were issued by unautorized persons.

5) The  paper based forms included a stamp and a hand signature of the  the Deputy Clerk, as a sign of intent to take personal responsibility.  The NEFs and NDA replaced the "wet" signature with a "Checksum" string, which they now call "Document Stamp".  However, the Checksum alphanumeric string, encrypted as it is, is not a digital signature, and has no meaning as a "symbol affixed with the intent to take responsibility".

6) Whereas  the paper based certifications by the clerks were integral part of the public records of the court, now the United States courts deny public access to the NEFs and NDAs, by concealing them in CM/ECF, and excluding them from PACER.

In short: The best legal minds in the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, under supervision of the United States judiciary toiled for over a decade at a cost of several billion dollars, and managed to create a convoluted system that entirely circumvented the accountability of the Clerk of the Court for integrity of court records, and undermines the First Amendment right to access court records - to inspect and to copy.  Accordingly, today, the Clerks of the US Courts refuse to certify the PACER dockets, indicating their refusal to take any personal responsibility for their content.

Needless to say, the position of the Clerk of the Court and the "ministerial arm of the court", which was never protected by judicial immunity, were specifically established to safeguard the integrity of the English speaking  courts against judicial corruption.

Otherwise put: In the design and operation of PACER and CM/ECF, the judicial arm of the court severed the ministerial arm of the court, which was supposed to keep the judges in check and prevent their corruption.  With it, PACER dockets, as published online by the courts today, are claimed to be in violation of Federal Rules of Civil Procedures and Federal Rules of Criminal Procedures, relative to duties of the Clerks of the Courts in constructing court dockets.

It is further alleged, that there could not possibly be a United States judge in his/her wits, who is not aware of the facts listed above.  Therefore, it was proposed that a Truth and Reconciliation Commission was required.  The United States judiciary, as a class failed to comply with the law relative to Code of Conduct of United States Judges, and alert the public against such fraud in the PACER & CM/ECF.

Joseph Zernik
-----Original Message-----
From: Bob Hurt
Sent: Sep 14, 2010 6:28 PM
To: lawsters
Subject: RE: Electronic Transactions and Digital Signatures

The security certificate causes an associated signed document to become encrypted so nobody can change it, particularly if you use Adobe Acrobat Pro or Reader.

Bob Hurt – http://bobhurt.com – 727 669 5511 2460 Persian Drive #70, Clearwater, Florida 33763 USA

 

From: lawsters@googlegroups.com [mailto:lawsters@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Larry Becraft
Sent: Sunday, September 12, 2010 8:26 PM
To: lawsters@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Electronic Transactions and Digital Signatures

Presently, I find electronic filing lots better than paper. With paper, you had to review it for printing, print it, sign, make copies and mail:  a lot of work if lots of paper. Lots is eliminated with electronic filing;  I simply review for appearance, then e-mail and everybody is served.  NO need for copies and lots quicker.

But, I can envision huge problems in the future because electronic files can be changed. Presently with history recorded in paper, and collected in libraries, it is impossible to change history, law, events, etc. But when everybody is dependent on something posted electronically, history, laws and events can be changed. Electronically, history, laws and events can be changed. Who knows: in the future, the War of Northern Aggression may vanish, the Revolution may disappear, etc. So may decisions in cases, old laws, and those protecting our rights. In the wrong hands, the world may be changed.

Larry

Bob Hurt wrote:

Let’s discuss

Electronic Transactions and Digital Signatures.

Most all states have enacted laws (see below) that allow you to create electronic transactions and sign documents digitally.  In order to sign digitally, you must have a personal security certificate.  The certificate consists of a long number that functions as an encryption key (like a password).  The issuing authority creates the certificate key based on your name and email address.

You may purchase a personal certificate or create your own.  You may buy a certificate from Verisign, Microsoft, Thawte, Comodo, and numerous other companies.  Or you may obtain PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) or GPG (a public domain equivalent) and use the software to create your own certificate.

Microsoft Office, OpenOffice.org, and Adobe Acrobat (Reader and Pro) allow you to sign a document electronically with your personal security certificate.  Governments throughout the USA accept digitally or electronically signed documents as valid documents to use in court.  However, because so few people actually use them, you sometimes have to badger “authorities” (public servants) to accept them.  For example, Court rules require pleadings in paper form with physical ink signatures on them.  Federal courts have an Electronic Filing System, but they allow onloy attorneys to use it for filing documents electronically.  No easy way exists to force a court clerk to accept your electronic filing, so you need to apply political pressure to get legislators to make constitutional changes that force courts into the computer age.

My advice to you:

Read the attached Uniform Electronic Transactions Act.  Most states have adopted it.

Get your own personal security certificate.  See the suggestions below for free options.

Use the certificate as appropriate to sign documents digitally and encrypt your sensitive email. 

Start coercing everyone to accept your digitally signed documents as “Proven authentic.”

Pound on the courts through political process to enable everyone to file documents with the court electronically and to make all court documents available free on the internet.

Uniform Electronic Transactions Act (see attached)

http://www.law.upenn.edu/bll/archives/ulc/fnact99/1990s/ueta99.htm

Free Comodo personal security certificate

http://www.comodo.com/home/email-security/free-email-certificate.php

Free CAcert personal security certificate

https://www.cacert.org/

Note:  as a notary public, I can notarize your documents digitally/electronically.  See this Florida statute:

117.021 Electronic notarization.

(1) Any document requiring notarization may be notarized electronically. The provisions of ss.117.01, 117.03, 117.04, 117.05(1)-(11), (13), and (14), 117.105, and 117.107 apply to all notarizations under this section.

(2) In performing an electronic notarial act, a notary public shall use an electronic signature that is:

(a) Unique to the notary public;

(b) Capable of independent verification;

(c) Retained under the notary public’s sole control; and

(d) Attached to or logically associated with the electronic document in a manner that any subsequent alteration to the electronic document displays evidence of the alteration.

(3) When a signature is required to be accompanied by a notary public seal, the requirement is satisfied when the electronic signature of the notary public contains all of the following seal information:

(a) The full name of the notary public exactly as provided on the notary public’s application for commission;

(b) The words “Notary Public State of Florida”;

(c) The date of expiration of the commission of the notary public; and

(d) The notary public’s commission number.

(4) Failure of a notary public to comply with any of the requirements of this section may constitute grounds for suspension of the notary public’s commission by the Executive Office of the Governor.

(5) The Department of State may adopt rules to ensure the security, reliability, and uniformity of signatures and seals authorized in this section.

10-09-12 De Gaulle would have hated the Saville inquiry

De Gaulle would have hated the Saville inquiry

The French leader glossed over his nation’s shortcomings. But sometimes cold examination of the truth is needed

Ben Macintyre

Charles de Gaulle would have been baffled and outraged by the Saville inquiry. Not by its findings, but that any country would go to such lengths to explore a painful and complicated chapter from the past.
This week a handful of surviving members of the French Resistance will come to London to commemorate the 70th anniversary of de Gaulle’s famous radio address from London, in which he told the French people: “The flame of French Resistance must not and will not be extinguished.”
The great French leader changed history in more ways than one: after the war, he assiduously nurtured the fable of national self-liberation, ignoring the realities of French collaboration: the myth of French Resistance should not and would not be extinguished.
De Gaulle and Lord Saville of Newdigate represent diametrically opposed attitudes to history: one sought to soften and simplify the past, the other has worked to expose the truth, however ugly.
The Saville inquiry into the fatal shooting of 13 protesters by British troops in Londonderry on “Bloody Sunday” in January 1972, has been stupefyingly expensive (£191 million) and painfully protracted (12 years). It is scandalous that a single senior counsel was paid £4.5 million, almost half the original estimated budget. The final report weighs in at a staggering 45lb and 5,000 pages, making it the most unpickupable publication of the year.
But there can be no doubting the nobility of the inquiry’s purpose, the thoroughness of Lord Saville’s methods and his determination to dig as deeply as possible. Some 2,500 people were interviewed, amassing 30 million words of evidence. Lord Widgery’s 1972 tribunal was accused of applying a thin layer of whitewash — no one could say that of Lord Saville.
De Gaulle, by contrast, allowed his country’s traumatic wartime history to be distorted by the demands of politics, leaving France with what one writer has called a “poisoned memory”.
The Resistance included individuals of supreme heroism and patriotism. That they were few in number only underlines their extraordinary bravery. “I love France,” declared the captured fighter Boris Vildé, shortly before he was shot by the Germans. “For the true France to be reborn one day, sacrifices will need to be made.”
But Vildé spoke for a minority. Most French people acquiesced under Nazi occupation and some enthusiastically collaborated. The Resistance was hopelessly fragmented, made up of myriad groups with competing aims. The partisans, undisciplined, disunited and capable of hideous brutality, were seen as dangerous bandits by many ordinary Frenchmen and women, who feared (rightly) that they would provoke German reprisals.
When Albert Speer, Hitler’s architect, was asked to assess the impact of the French Resistance, he responded: “What French Resistance?” He had a point. The Resistance was a moral and national necessity, but a military irrelevance. The sabotage and assassinations carried out by the underground had little impact on the course of the war.
De Gaulle persuaded Eisenhower to say that the Resistance had been worth an “extra six divisions”. Both knew it wasn’t true.
None of this should detract from the significance of de Gaulle’s rallying call on June 18, 1940. The BBC did not consider the speech important enough to record, but it would be seen by many as the moment when France began to recover her honour.
Four years later, de Gaulle hailed the liberation of Paris as a French-only victory, conveniently forgetting the roles of Britain and America. “Paris outraged, Paris broken, Paris martyred, but Paris liberated! Liberated by herself, liberated by her people, with the help of the whole of France, that is to say of fighting France, the true France, eternal France.”
De Gaulle needed the French people to believe that French Resistance had won the day. The plaques he erected around Paris commemorating individual acts of heroism were not statements of historical fact, but unifying exhortations.
A new breed of French historians has begun to tackle the myths and denials of the period, but for the earlier generation, the wilful suppression of memory became a habit. For decades, a history that was messy and uncomfortable was rendered one-dimensional and uplifting — Resistance was all but universal, the collaborators merely criminal aberrations. The role of Vichy in the Final Solution was similarly obscured. “The French nation was never involved in that matter;” declared François Mitterrand, who himself worked for the Vichy Government, although he later claimed to have spied for the Free French.
In The Sorrow and the Pity, the 1969 documentary by Marcel Ophüls exposing the reality of wartime collaboration, Anthony Eden astutely observed that a country that has not suffered the horror of occupation should not pass judgment on one that has. I have often wondered whether Britain, under Nazi occupation, would have behaved any differently from the French. Probably not, but the long, detailed, painful investigation into Bloody Sunday suggests that we have at last learnt the benefits of confronting the darkest moments in our history, and the danger of hoping that, if ignored for long enough, they will simply go away.
The top brass was never enthusiastic for another inquiry into Bloody Sunday. Some dismissed it as just a sop to Sinn Féin, offered by Tony Blair at a critical moment in the peace process. Lord Saville’s insistence that each killing and wounding be examined individually added hugely to the length and expense of the process.
Yet the inquiry has fulfilled the essential function of clearing the air, for Bloody Sunday cast a toxic cloud over Northern Irish politics, in much the same way that the unacknowledged truth about French collaboration was allowed to taint postwar French history.
The Saville Report was never going to offer universal satisfaction, but that, too, is a measure of success. The purpose of historical inquiry is not to provide easy answers, or revenge, or even closure for the families of the bereaved. This inquiry set out to discover, once and for all, what happened; to set the record straight, and so to take the venom out of Northern Ireland’s poisoned memory.
For 38 years, the symbolism of Bloody Sunday helped to fuel a vicious conflict. That war is now over, and with publication of the Saville Report, its most notorious single event should be peacefully consigned to the past.

10-09-12 ACLU is Dismissed - Torture Flights will Continue... // Se cierra la ACLU - Tortura vuelo continuará ...

The ACLU Is Dismissed

Obama wins one for the Presidency on the state-secrets privilege.

Another week, another legal vindication for the Bush, er, the Obama Administration's war on terror. On Wednesday, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals cited the executive branch's state-secrecy privilege to dismiss an ACLU attempt to challenge the legality of sending terror suspects from the U.S. to other countries. Our friends on the left are now going nuts about "torture flights," but we'll take this decision as evidence that this Administration has its grown-up moments.

The case involves flight-logistics company Jeppesen DataPlan Inc., a Boeing subsidiary the ACLU accuses of being involved in arranging flights to move five terrorist suspects to ...

10-09-12 Justice Louis Brandeis on Criminal Conduct by Government // El juez Louis Brandeis en la Conducta Criminal por el Gobierno.

 Justice Louis Brandeis (in office: 1916-1939)

"In a government of laws," said Mr. Justice Brandeis, "existence of the government will be imperiled if it fails to observe the law scrupulously. Our Government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the Government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy."
Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438 , at 469, 471