Sounds like you should just delete you're account give up and go back to fiat 

The United States welcomes the news that the OSCE-led Trilateral Contact Group, supported by Chancellor Merkel and Presidents Hollande, Poroshenko, and Putin, reached agreement on a ceasefire and heavy weapons withdrawal in eastern Ukraine, and on the implementation of the September Minsk agreements. We particularly commend the diplomatic efforts of our European Allies, Chancellor Merkel and President Hollande, and their teams in making this agreement possible. Actions will be what matter now. The first test of this agreement and the prospects for a comprehensive settlement will be the full implementation of the ceasefire and the withdrawal of heavy weapons by all parties – by Ukraine, the separatists, and Russia. All the parties must show complete restraint in the run-up to the Sunday ceasefire, including an immediate halt to the Russian and separatist assault on Debaltseve and other Ukrainian towns.

The parties have a long road ahead before achieving peace and the full restoration of Ukraine’s sovereignty. The United States stands ready to assist in coordination with our European Allies and partners. We will judge the commitment of Russia and the separatists by their actions, not their words. As we have long said, the United States is prepared to consider rolling back sanctions on Russia when the Minsk agreements of September 2014, and now this agreement, are fully implemented. That includes a full ceasefire, the withdrawal of all foreign troops and equipment from Ukraine, the full restoration of Ukrainian control of the international border, and the release of all hostages.

We also welcome the news that the Government of Ukraine and the IMF have reached an agreement that will allow the IMF to provide Ukraine with $17.5 billion in financial assistance in support of economic reforms. This agreement will enable Ukraine to continue implementing the reforms it needs to build a stronger, more prosperous, democratic future for the people of Ukraine.

So Crimea, which was not mentioned, and whose "annexation" by Russia so infuriated the western leaders, is Vlad's to keep?

An entire ballroom of more than 1,000 stood to applaud Edward Snowden as he was introduced at the Students for Liberty convention in Washington, and again after Snowden challenged them to "win" against the government's attempt to expand its own power.

Of the rowdy reception, Snowden, the former contractor who exposed mass surveillance by the National Security Agency, said via Skype "It’s something I'm not used to in a number of different political settings.”

“You guys are going to make me blush.”

— Students For Liberty (@sfliberty) February 13, 2015

Snowden spoke for about 30 minutes including the time to take three questions from the moderator.

Surveillance, a Threat to Democracy

Addressing the libertarian group, Snowden spoke of the need for people to stand up against the government and demand an end to mass surveillance as a way to protect democracy.

“When we think about democracy, we think about the way we interact, the way we control our relationship with the government as a civil society,” he said. “We have to have an even playing field and, at the end of the day, not think about what divides us but about what holds us together.”

— Luke Rudkowski (@Lukewearechange) February 13, 2015

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"I didn't allege there is a connection," Paul said on Thursday. "I said I have heard of people who have said there is a connection."

Aside from briefly playing Gaffe Police, Arrington stuck to the techno-libertarian talking points of the conference, including the USA Patriot Act, net neutrality, and bitcoin.

Arrington, a libertarian, asked Paul what he thought about the idea of replacing the U.S. welfare program with a basic income policy that would give a sum of money to every American—an idea that has tantalized both libertarian and left-leaning economists. Paul brushed off the idea.

"I think that we sort of limit ourselves if we're talking about the minimum we want people to have," Paul said. "We should minimize what the government does—that's the nonproductive sector—and we should maximize the productive sector."

On net neutrality, Paul said the government should not regulate Internet service providers as utilities because it stifles innovation. Paul noted that the tunnels in New York City could likely accommodate "hundreds" of cables from different ISPs, which could spur competition.

"The way to fix this and to correct this is to open up competition within those monopolies," Paul said. "Why grant monopoly licenses?"

When asked how rural conservatives can find common ground with urban liberals, Paul noted that last year, he gave virtually the same speech about privacy at the Conservative Political Action Conference and the University of California (Berkeley). He held that fact up as evidence of a "leave me alone" coalition between Democrats and Republicans.
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China has become one of the world’s largest two economies, and is wealthy enough to buy up at least $1.3 trillion of the U.S. debt. But that hasn’t stopped Uncle Sam from continuing to send foreign aid to Beijing.

In 2014 the U.S. State Department and its USAID program provided nearly all of the $12.3 million in taxpayer-funded aid set aside for China. And another $6.8 million is on tap for Beijing this year, according to ForeignAssistance.gov.

In the big picture of things, China’s aid package — mostly centered around pollution and pro-democracy programs — is a mere drip from a foreign aid spigot that has been as great as $50 billion annually in recent years. But taxpayer watchdogs say it’s a classic example of the U.S. government not being able to reign in aid on projects whose effectiveness is immeasurable and could easily be funded by the country itself.

“The idea that China needs this foreign aid, and that it can make any difference in China, is laughable,” said Ian Vasquez, director of the Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank.

“In essence, what we’re doing is borrowing from China and giving some of that money back to China, so it’s a loan with interest. This is an expensive way to do business,” Mr. Vasquez said.

For sending Americans’ tax dollars to a well-heeled country capable of helping itself, the Department of State and USAID win this week’s Golden Hammer, a weekly award given by The Washington Times to highlight examples of questionable federal spending.

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Two-thirds of Americans want the U.S. to put some boots on the ground to fight the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, and a majority wants Congress to authorize President Obama’s plan for military action, according to a new NBC News/Maris poll released Friday.

A majority of Americans polled, 54 percent, said their member of Congress should vote to authorize U.S. military action against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), while 32 percent are opposed to it.

Positions on ground troops break down to 40 percent who support a “limited number” of troops on the ground, mostly in line with the president’s authorization. Twenty-six percent want the military to deploy a “large number of U.S. ground forces.”

The authorization request, released Tuesday, allows the president to fight ISIS for three years without geographic limitation but prohibits “enduring offensive ground combat operations.” Congressional resistance to the plan continues to grow on both sides of the aisle and many lawmakers have said they are unsure it will pass as is.

There’s a stark partisan split over the ground troop debate. Thirty-eight percent of Republicans support deploying a “large amount” of boots on the ground, while just 16 percent of Democrats back that strategy. That largely mirrors the debate in Congress: Republicans have panned the strategy for being too restrictive, while Democrats are worried the vague language could give the president too much power.

The American public also shows a partisan split over their confidence in Obama’s plan. In general, the public is about equally split — 48 percent of those polled don’t have much faith in the plan, while 45 percent do. But underneath the surface, that equilibrium comes from 82 percent of Republicans having minimal faith in Obama’s plan, compared to 71 percent of Democrats who trust the president.

Among Cold War presidents, from Truman to Bush I, there was an unwritten rule: Do not challenge Moscow in its Central and Eastern Europe sphere of influence.

In crises over Berlin in 1948 and 1961, the Hungarian Revolution in 1956 and the Warsaw Pact invasion of Prague in 1968, U.S. forces in Europe stayed in their barracks.

We saw the Elbe as Moscow’s red line, and they saw it as ours.

While Reagan sent weapons to anti-Communist rebels in Angola, Nicaragua and Afghanistan, to the heroic Poles of Gdansk he sent only mimeograph machines.

That Cold War caution and prudence may be at an end.

For President Obama is being goaded by Congress and the liberal interventionists in his party to send lethal weaponry to Kiev in its civil war with pro-Russian rebels in Donetsk and Luhansk.

America has never had a vital interest in Crimea or the Donbass worth risking a military clash with Russia. And we do not have the military ability to intervene and drive out the Russian army, unless we are prepared for a larger war and the potential devastation of the Ukraine.

What would Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon or Reagan think of an American president willing to risk military conflict with a nuclear-armed Russia over two provinces in southeastern Ukraine that Moscow had ruled from the time of Catherine the Great?

What is happening in Ukraine is a tragedy and a disaster. And we are in part responsible, having egged on the Maidan coup that overthrew the elected pro-Russian government.

But a greater disaster looms if we get ourselves embroiled in Ukraine’s civil war. We would face, first, the near certainty of defeat for our allies, if not ourselves. Second, we would push Moscow further outside Europe and the West, leaving her with no alternative but to deepen ties to a rising China.

When President Dwight D. Eisenhower on January 17, 1961 delivered his farewell address and warned about the Military-Industrial Complex, he surely was thinking of men like Ashton Carter, the new Secretary of Defense.

Carter appears to move easily between the higher echelons of the military and the business world.

From October 2011 to December 2013, he served as the Department of Defense’s Chief Operating Officer overseeing more than $600 billion per year. During the Bush administration, he was a member of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's International Security Advisory Board; co-chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Policy Advisory Group; a consultant to the Defense Science Board; a member of the National Missile Defense White Team; and a member of the National Academy of Sciences Committee on International Security and Arms Control.

When not working in a military capacity and doling out of billions, he has worked in the private sector for many of the firms that have benefited handsomely from the billions spent by the Defense Department.

He has served on the Boards of Directors of the MITRE Corporation, Mitretek Systems, MIT Lincoln Laboratory, and as a member of the Draper Laboratory corporation.
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In addition to the board seats, Carter is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Aspen Strategy Group.
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The neocons are going to love him in his new DOD role, as will the entire military-industrial complex. In 2006, he authored a report advocating use or threat of force to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
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Yale anti-fossil fuel campaigners have indefinitely postponed a protest that was set for this weekend due to “unfavorable weather conditions and other logistical issues.”

Fossil Free Yale, a group pushing the university to divest itself from fossil fuels, told the Yale Daily News that frigid, snowy weather set for this weekend will mean their global warming protest will have to be postponed.

FFY’s Mitch Barrow said that “unfavorable weather conditions and other logistical issues, including some cancellations from speakers and performance groups” would mean they would not be able to rally on Global Divestment Day — a day where environmental groups urge institutions like Yale to divest from fossil fuels, like coal, natural gas and oil.

As this reporter writes this article, the weather in New Haven, Connecticut where Yale is located stands at -9 degrees Fahrenheit with wind chill. Saturday is expected to have weather in the low 30s with snow and Sunday will be 20 degrees with snow and rain, according to the Weather Channel.

In the United States, 2014 was marked by judicial harassment of New York Times investigative reporter James Risen in connection with the trial of Jeffrey Sterling, a former CIA officer charged under the Espionage Act with giving him classified information. US journalists are still not protected by a federal shield law that would guarantee their right not to name their sources or reveal other confidential information about their work. Meanwhile, at least 15 journalists were arbitrarily arrested during clashes between police and demonstrators protesting against black teenager Michael Brown’s fatal shooting by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri.

The early dinner crowd near the Capitol on Thursday yielded at least one notable pairing, with overtones of the presidential election cycle to come: Sen. Ted Cruz and former Ambassador John Bolton.

Sharing a meal at Johnny’s Half Shell before Bolton was set to appear on Fox News, Cruz launched into a discussion of 2016 strategy audible to anyone within earshot, including a reporter for the Washington Examiner.

Bolton has himself flirted with the idea of running for president in 2016, but his conversation with Cruz suggested the Texas senator, at least, views Bolton as a source of valuable input, not as a potential challenger.

In a discussion spanning roughly one hour, Cruz appealed to Bolton for policy advice and gamed out the potential 2016 landscape with him, including sizing up other potential Republican candidates.

“It seems to me that Rand is running,” Cruz said of Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who has stepped eagerly toward the presidential campaign trail, although he has yet to announce his candidacy.

Cruz seemed unintimidated by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who last month ended his show on Fox News to weigh a presidential bid. Huckabee is viewed as having strong appeal among many of the same conservative Republicans Cruz would be courting — but Cruz predicted he would be able to take a bite out of Huckabee’s base.

And Cruz noted Mitt Romney’s assessment, reported in multiple press accounts as the former Massachusetts governor toyed with a third bid for the presidency, that the Republican field as it is developing is inherently flawed.

The stickiest point of strategy for Cruz seemed to be fundraising, which at this stage of the invisible primary is the focus among likely candidates. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush has crisscrossed the country looking to lock up the Republican Party’s biggest donors, in hopes of posting a “shock and awe” first fundraising quarter for his Right To Rise political action committee.

Bush is perceived as a major fundraising threat to most other Republicans, but he will likely prove especially strong in Florida, his home state, and Texas, the power center of his family’s political network — eating in to fundraising by Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry and Cruz.

In his conversation with Bolton, Cruz acknowledged the tough fundraising climb ahead.

“I view the Jeb operation as, they’re going to have all the money they need,” Cruz said, “whereas we need sufficient grassroots support to get the message out.”

Cruz has acknowledged he is looking at running for president, and he has said publicly that he will decide by June. In the meantime, he has acted unmistakably like a candidate: traveling to Iowa recently to speak at the Freedom Summit, with plans to return to New Hampshire next month. Cruz also joined Paul and Rubio last month for a forum hosted by the Koch brothers network of outside groups, which any Republican contender for the presidency would be wise to court.

Cruz’s political operation is also beginning to take shape. At the helm are Jason Johnson, who engineered Cruz’s unlikely Senate victory in 2012, and Jeff Roe, a Republican operative based in Kansas City. This week, former Newt Gingrich spokesman Rick Tyler signed on with Cruz’s Jobs, Growth and Freedom PAC as a senior communications adviser.

Now, Cruz is looking to build a stable of policy advisers to help shape his campaign platform, he told Bolton.

“We are putting together policy advisers,” Cruz said, “and I would love your thoughts on that.”

Tyler, Cruz’s spokesman, characterized the meeting as a standard one for anyone looking at a bid for president, as Cruz is.

“Sen. Cruz is seriously considering a run in 2016, and he is actively seeking advice from other thoughtful leaders,” Tyler said Friday. “John Bolton would certainly qualify as someone you’d want to reach out to, particularly on national security issues.”

Speaking at the American Spectator Gala in Washington D.C. last night, Sen. Rand Paul delighted the crowd with a strong anti-government speech.


He began with a defense of the government shutdown in 2013, pointing out that many Americans in “fly-over country” didn’t really care, and only a third of government was shut down at the time.


Paul blamed Obama for shutting down national parks and national monuments to raise public concern, praising World War II veterans for ignoring the barriers placed in front of their monument in Washington D.C.


“I tell people who don’t understand America, don’t understand that we need to shut the damn thing down, I tell people the image you need to remember is when the World War II veterans got off their bus, took their wire cutters, cut the barricades, and threw them on the lawn,” he said.


Paul and his wife Kelly attended the annual gala, seated at the same table as David Koch, one of the two billionaire brothers who serve as philanthropists for conservative ideas.


After highlighting more incidents of mismanaged government spending, Paul pointed out that leaders in Washington D.C. can not be trusted to properly run the country.


“Everything in Washington is broken, nothing works here,” he said. “We can’t run the post office, we are not to be trusted with money. Congress is not good with money, we shouldn’t be trusted with almost any responsibility up here. Most of government should be shut down and devolved and sent back to the states.”

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said Thursday that lawmakers should "scrap" the tax code.

Paul was responding to a question during a Facebook question-and-answer session in which he was asked if Congress should abolish the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

"The IRS is too big, too powerful, and we absolutely should scrap the code," Paul, a prospective 2016 presidential candidate, answered. "Look for my tax plan later this spring."

Paul was touting his "Audit the Fed" proposal, which has 30 co-sponsors and would allow the comptroller general to audit the Federal Reserve. Fed officials oppose the policy, saying that it'd politicize monetary policy.