"Go home, he's no con artist,"  "You'll lose your life next time you go to the police," "We know him and we can't help you,"  "I'm not allowed to make even a report of this robbery."  Some of the comments from a Fed; a criminal and police.  Smooth Criminal, a one man American crime wave, exposes the secret release of a select few prisoners to carryout clandestine operations in foreign countries.  Those able to survive are among us and some return to a life of crime that sent them to prison in the first place.  This is a story of innocent Americans who were drugged, lost their homes and businesses and yet had no where to turn for help as the Feds initiated a local police hands-off policy.  You should know such criminals are on the loose and can hurt you and your friends.  Read SMOOTH CRIMINAL, A One Man American Crime Wave, via Amazon Kindle.

Sad cheating is so rampant that job resumes and campaign promises are meaningless.  Now comes a report that 675 harness racing horses over a 28-month period were doped in New York State.  That's a pretty hefty offense if accused violator Luis Pena is found guilty as up to 25-thousand dollars per incident can be administered.  Pena's accused of administering 14 different drugs hours before the races, when trainers are not allowed to administer pain-relieving medicine or anti-inflammatory drugs.  The entire racing industry is being pressured to enforce its rules.  Often charged violators are having their cases drag out for years while they continue to work in the industry.  While there is no evidence I'll Have Another, this year's Derby and Preakness victor and now potential first Triple Crown Winner since Affirmed did it 34 years ago, has been drugged.  But trainer Doug O'Neill is a 2-time loser before racing boards. Why is he trusted?   The California Horse Racing Board is now deciding the guilt or innocence over whether O'Neill drugged a horse named Argenta at a track 2 years ago.  The board is under pressure to delay its decision and has decided to postpone any decision until after the Belmont on June 9th.  While the board is under pressure to postpone or forever reject the case, racing fans would always have doubt whether I'll Have Another was the great horse he's claimed to be.   The only way to handle this is show the world some integrity.  O'Neill's long history of drugging horses will always taint the horse's reputation. Racing can't hide from that and the industry's consistent foot dragging on punishments only prolongs the agony.  Yes, breeders and owners and the tracks themselves appear ready for new rules that would raise standards and the sport's reputation. Stricter rules on medication and tougher penalties are coming, but there is only one way to clean up the present questions on whether I'll have Another was illegally drugged and that is to bring in a new trainer before the Belmont and unfortunately that will never happen.  Racing's in a real bind and this O'Neill problem will only hurt its dwindling business.  Jockey Club president and COO James Gagliano knows, "Penalties should act as deterrents to potential rule violators as as done in other sports, should be handed down more expeditiously, to the extent permitted by law."  The influential club's president calls for "uniformity of rules and penalties from state to state to speed adjudications."

Google always at odds with privacy advocates, is facing a challenging case not here but in Europe which will certainly have implications in the United States if behind the door talks in Brussels this summer exit with tough recommendations.  At issue are Google's Street View cars as they prowl ingesting all kinds of private internet communication, intimate e-mails, revealing photographs, searches for help, love or escape.   German data protection  official Johannes Caspar calls the electronic pickup of e-mails, photographs, passwords, and social network postings "one the biggest violations of data protection laws we have ever seen."  Caspar says Google ignores local laws. And just this week Google received an ultimatum from European anti-trust regulators: either change your search business or deal with the legal consequences.  History shows the EU is ahead of the US in privacy matters as in Europe this is a fundamental rights issue, while privacy is simply for consumer business.   Microsoft, the most feared tech company of the 1990s was slapped with restrictions first in Europe and then US regulators took on the Gates company.  The danger is personal information is lifted to create a profiles that may or may not reflect who you are.  For example, two many hits on gun and ammunition websites can list you as unstable; or someone researching alcohol abuse could warn companies of a possible alcoholic.  Former Federal Communications Commissioner Michael Copps resignedly acknowledges, "the industry has gotten more powerful, the technology more pervasive and it's getting to the point  where we can't do too much about it."  While the FCC sides more with Google, Europeans are outraged blasting Google for invading fundamental rights.  Says one 74 year old German, "We are outraged that Google would come in, invade our privacy and send data back to America, where we have no idea what it would be used for."  When Google relented allowing Caspar to inspect one of the Street View cars, the hard drive with data had been taken out, with Google of all organizations claiming protection under present privacy laws.  In the early fifties US survey companies put cars on  the streets too, but to monitor what of the 5 or so television channels were on in each house.  That was declared an illegal invasion  of privacy and stopped.   We've certainly come a long way from that as virtually everything is now monitored.  As the government seeks a record of data supplying details of everything we do, the eroding dollar is on its way out and it will be credit cards for everything.  Noew that will make "Big Brother," very, very happy.  

Perhaps it's a mistake, but UN nuclear inspectors are finding tiny amounts of Iranian enriched uranium as high as 27 percent, closing the gap to bomb grade.  In this week's Baghdad talks, Iran desperately trying to get the effective embargo off its back, said it would be more than willing to lower its enrichment below 20 percent, far below the minimum required for making any kind of effective bomb.  The report is being delivered today to the International Atomic Energy Agency headquarters in Vienna.  An IAEA diplomat carefully puts the issue in perspective, first calling it a potentially alarming development and then poses two possibilities: One. That the spike is accidental and Two, "There's a decent chance that it's an operator error."  But never before has there been a number from Iranian production, above 20 percent.  Remarkably, The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, written in the President Johnson years, makes no restriction on how pure a nation can make its enriched uranium, only that military and civilian uses must always be separate.  However, it certainly can be considered the most significant question the Six Nations group is asking Iran in-the-on-again-off-again talks  Iran insists all its nuclear work is for civilian, not military benefit.  The Six Nations, US, Great Britain, France, Germany China and Russia, in meeting with the Iranians this week aren't so sure.  While bomb grade fuel requires 90 per cent purity, it's a small step between 20 and 90 once the process is started.    Stay tuned, as "they say" on this one.     

The Financial Times in an excellent enterprise story by David Oakley and Alice Ross in London, has learned some of Europe's biggest fund managers have been dumping euro assets as fears grow about a possible Greek eurozone exit.  It's a case of the unknown, what brokerage firms fear most and most being sold are pension funds.  "We sold our last euro on May 15," says Alex Merk, CIO of US-based Merk Investments. "We're concerned about how dysfunctional  the process is.  No one is there to talk to in Greece."  Amundi, Europe's second-biggest private fund manager, handling lots of pension funds says the risk of the financial crisis spreading to Spain and Italy is growing as the diplomats haven't been able to convince investors there is now a sufficient firewall.  Just Wednesday, a summit of financial experts put off any shoring up of euro banks.  Chief economist of Hermes Fund Managers, Neil Williams zeros in on a "failure of the politicians to convince the markets they are tackling the problems in the eurozone."  Threadneedle, the big UK investment firm joined Amundi in cutting its explosure in recent days.  Amazing what one little country of 10-Million can do to an entire continent.  Yesterday, the euro hit a 22-month low against the dollar and with the possibility of a messy exodus, Citigroup projects the EU currency could fall to parity from its parapit in the mid 120s.   Europe's currency has lost 5 percent against the dollar in the past three weeks.  

This year's hoped-for Triple Crown Winner could shortly be tainted.  With the final leg, The Belmont Stakes in New York on June 9th, trainer Doug O'Neill has been handed a 45-day suspension starting no sooner than July first.  The California Horse Racing Board has upheld a 15-thousand dollar fine, after one of his horses had an illegal performance enhancer drug at a California racetrack.  A similar suspension and fine took place in Illinois two years ago.  O'Neill will still be able to prepare the possible first Triple Crown winner since Affirmed did it 34 years ago.  He has the right to appeal the California decision, saying "I plan on examining and reviewing all my options following the Belmont Stakes, but right now I plan on staying focused on preparing and winning the Triple Crown."     The California horse exceeded the limit for carbon dioxide, indicating a mix of baking soda, sugar and electrolytes had been delivered through a tube into the horse's nose or through feed or water.   This year's case was the third time time one of his horses had been found to have the elements of an illegal enhancing substance. In all, O'Neill has had about a dozen less serious drug violations in four states.  

A roller coastal ride in 2 days.  From surprising high hopes to no clear signs of progress, the Nuclear talks with Iran and the 6 powers is over to meet again the middle of next month in Moscow.  From "significant progress" to "significant problems" with the Iranian side, according to EU's foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, though she didn't reveal what the problems are.   As a member of the Nuclear Nonproliferation nations, Iran is allowed to enrich some nuclear fuel, but the big six of the US, Britain, France, Germany, China and Russia disagree.  Sanctions are obviously hurting Iran economically and the six nations have not included an agreement to delay a new wave in July.  Iran on the ropes, claims new sanctions run counter to an atmosphere of progress that both sides were trying to develop.  An American official remarked Iran would be hard hit when the European oil embargo sets in this July.   The Iranians had been planning on talking about lowering the uraniam enrichment process, but that will have to wait until the opening of the talks in Russia, starting in June 18th.  

If Iran diplomats were expecting a quick positive response to the offer allowing inspection of its nuclear facilities, they were shocked at the opening day of talks.  The 6 world powers handed Iran with a list of new demands to cut uranium enrichment.  If Iran went along the sanctions which have cut Iran's GDP in half in a year, would still be with them.  The 6 powers of the US, Russia, China, Germany France and Britain are in a no compromising mood and Iran is responding, this new offer goes beyond the goals reached in the Istanbul talks in April.  An Iranian diplomat close to the talks told The Christian Science Monitor the new demands include "capping" uranium enrichment and scrapping its deeply buried facility.  Steps were meant to be "reciprocal, simultaneous, and...balanced" in their value to each side, says the diplomat.  Instead Iran was told there would be "consideration" of easing sanctions "later," after Iran made concessions.  A former advisor to the Iranian nuclear negotiating teams, Kaveh Afrasiabi, now in Cambridge, Massachusetts, commented, "Such a hard-line approach is not conducive to successful talks."  Iran says it will never accept an end to all nuclear enrichment.  Knocking down uranium enrichment below weapons grade is an area for compromise in the acrimonious Baghdad talks.  Iran, as a member of the "Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty has a right for limited enrichment. The Iranians desperate for a lifting of the sanctions  will not get any immediate action on that front regardless of whether it accepts the new demands imposed by the Big 6.  

As the Six Global powers gather in Amman, Jordan today for the start of talks aimed at settling the Iranian nuclear weapons threat, preliminary talks may have achieved the necessary compromise to defuse the threat.  The usual equivocation of diplomatic language is missing as the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Yukiva Amano specifically stated,  since yesterday Iran has shown a willingness to allow international experts inspection rights of the secret military facilities.  The US, France, Britain, Germany, Russia and China want Iran to stop enriching 20% purity uranium which can make a nuclear weapon.   The preliminary talks did not issue a detailed statement over when the inspections might start.  While skeptics are advising the Iranians may have agreed to what the west and Israel have wanted all along for world propaganda, or as a starting point for the talks.  Then as problems occur during the talks, Iran from its new position of strength, will look like the good guy.  We came here for a settlement and the west is now equivocating, might be Iran's charge.    White House spokesman Jay Carney, says the president welcomes the news but cautions it's an agreement in principle that represents a step in the right direction....We will make judgements about Iran's behavior based on actions, not just promises.  Iran, hurt financially by the west's effective embargo appears anxious to get a deal where the sanctions would be lifted as soon as an agreement is reached on the nuclear talks.  Iranian negotiator Saeed Jalili acknowledges there are some differences, but unlike past meetings, expresses confidence this time that they will not be an obstacle to reaching a final agreement.  

Fidelity's webpage reads: "Fidelity continues to deal with the aftermath of Friday's market issues in delayed processing of orders for Facebook (F stock.  Our clients continue to feel the effects of these issues, in some cases. "  Finger-pointing at NASDAQ, Fidelity is still waiting for final responses on this"industry-wide issue."  It certainly is industry-wide with NASDAQ making all kinds of apologies for not being able to handle the deluge of orders last Friday.  Not even the systemwide 1987 stock market crash took this long to settle down.  It was then I learned you put in limit sell and buy orders in volatile markets or you might find you sold a stock even 40% below what the board was saying.   I blogged that on OurMissingNews.com hours before the market opened that fateful Friday.  With the market once again bringing up the old adage, "Go away in May," FB hopes challenged that and encouraged thoughts the I.P.O. would turn an entire 2012 disappointing market around.  Instead, millions of Americans who joined the crowd are now backing away from their initial stock venture, vowing "Never again!" Orders that usually take just 2-seconds were handled in hours and here on the dawn of FB disaster plus 6, NASDAQ is still trying to match a few thousand buy-sell orders by hand.   Just as with the American tax system, markets need the little guy as there are so many more of us.  Tax the rich as Obama says, but there aren't enough of them to make much of a difference.  Same with the financial markets and yet the big investors can work their deals outside the market while we, the little guys can't.  The huge off-market trades had to have been handled smoothly or we would have heard about it by now.  It was the little guy that learned his lesson and so many now realizing for the first time the market is rigged for the rich, won't be back.  Market equality isn't there and that needs to be fixed.