Obama Amnesty Edict Torpedoes Social Security

Posted on November 29, 2014November 29, 2014 by Denise Simon

If you don’t think that foreigners will be granted benefits at the expense of the legal American taxpayers, you need to think again. In a sweeping move, Barack Obama has redefined the definition of citizenship.

Stability of Social Security is at the core of the debate of Obama’s amnesty edict. The financial condition of Social Security is collapsing. The Social Security trust fund will be exhausted in 2033, three years sooner than projected last year, the administration said. And Medicare’s hospital insurance trust fund will be depleted in 2024, the same as last year’s estimate, it said.

“The projections in this year’s report are somewhat more pessimistic than last year’s projections,” Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said in issuing the annual report on the two programs, which together account for more than 35 percent of all federal spending.

Word spread like a fierce blowing wind south of the border.

Immigration Health Insurance: Undocumented Immigrants Eligible for Medicare, Social Security Benefits Under Obama’s Executive Orders

President Barack Obama’s immigration reform executive action has paved the way for undocumented immigrants to be eligible for Medicare and Social Security benefits, the White House has confirmed.

According to White House officials, undocumented immigrants who apply for work permits as a result of Obama’s executive action will be eligible for benefits because they will pay into the Social Security system through payroll taxes. The undocumented immigrants who will pay into the Social Security system, however, will not immediately receive such benefits. As with all Medicare and Social Security recipients, the individual has to work 10 years to become eligible for retirement and health care benefits.

With Obama’s immigration executive actions, none of the immigrants affected by the orders will receive federal assistance including food stamps, welfare or other income-based assistance. Immigrants will not be eligible to receive health insurance under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also referred to as Obamacare, both federal- and-state-level exchanges.

National Latino and immigrant rights groups have supported Obama’s executive action, but the belief is more can be done especially in the health sector. National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health Executive Director Jessica Gonzalez-Rojas commended Obama on addressing the record levels of deportations and injustices under current immigration laws and policies, and yet action could have been accomplished for one’s health.

“With this announcement, the president has taken a bold and necessary step to recognize the humanity of immigrant women and families — and he can and should do more. It’s time for this Administration to lift the bans on

health coverage for immigrant women and families, including those granted administrative relief, and to put an end to harmful detention policies,” Gonzalez-Rojas said.

The National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health executive director acknowledged that responsibility to create “lasting, comprehensive solutions” is by Congress. She said, “We look to the House and Senate to stop playing games with the lives of immigrant women and support the health of our families, communities, and economy.”

National Institute for Latino Policy President Angelo Falcon said Obama’s immigration executive action was “way too long overdue,” and it should be recognized as a “temporary band aid” on issues affecting immigrant workers and their families.

“We are also concerned that the President will not fully exercise his power of executive action to impact on all those who should be eligible for legalization, and expect that they will be shortchanged in terms of what should be basic human rights benefits such as health insurance,” Falcon said in a statement, adding the upcoming Republican-controlled Congress will take serious consideration of accomplishing comprehensive immigration reform.

As Latin Post reported, Obama’s immigration executive action will grant eligible undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. as of Jan. 1, 2010, to be deferred from deportation for a renewable three-year period. The three-year period rule will also affect recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), who previously was allowed to stay on a renewable two-year basis. The undocumented immigrants must pass criminal background checks and pay $465 for the “work authorization and biometrics fees” and no fee waivers and “very limited” fee exemptions.

Undocumented immigrants who arrived in the U.S. after Jan. 1, 2010, and in the future, are not eligible of Obama’s executive actions.

***

So the real fight begins and it is not racist, it is economic.

Fight brewing over Social Security benefits for illegal immigrants

A new clash over retirement benefits has come to a head following President Obama’s decision to unilaterally protect up to 5 million illegal immigrants from deportation.

The White House now acknowledges that many of the illegal immigrants spared from deportation under Obama’s sweeping executive action will become eligible for Social Security and Medicare benefits once they reach retirement age.

The conservative backlash has been swift and will certainly extend into a GOP Congress’ deliberations in 2015 over how to limit the reach of the president’s immigration blueprint.

A central argument in Obama’s defense of the most extensive overhaul to the immigration system in decades was that those given reprieves from deportation would not qualify for Obamacare benefits. The president reminded critics that Dream Act-eligible immigrants previously granted deportation deferrals could not enroll in federal health exchanges.

However, Obama was less eager to wade into the debate about what to do with newly protected immigrants now paying into Social Security. He didn’t address the matter while outlining his immigration plan in a prime-time address to the nation, but White House aides later confirmed GOP suspicions about how Obama’s unilateral move would affect retirement benefits.

Analysts said that Republicans would use the admission to argue the president is misleading the public about the details of his immigration action.

“It is a bit of surprise,” said Michael Tanner, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute who focuses on entitlement programs. “For a long time, there was an argument made by the administration that [undocumented immigrants] would not be eligible for such benefits. It does seem to be a contradiction.”

For Republicans, this debate is about far more than just Social Security. It fits into the broader narrative of painting the president as unwilling to spotlight an unpopular provision of his agenda until after it has been enacted.

“It’s Obamacare all over again, ‘If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor,” one House GOP leadership aide told the Washington Examiner. “Obama was very clear on this issue. He said no benefits. What the president says just isn’t credible. That couldn’t be any more obvious by now.”

The administration says Obama’s move is sound fiscal policy, that it makes sense to grow the tax base. They also argue that it would be unfair to force people to pay into Social Security and not reap the same benefits as everybody else.

Immigrants would have to work at least 10 years to qualify for Social Security and Medicare benefits, administration officials said, and Obama’s executive action could always be reversed by any of his successors.

Though quiet about the Social Security implications of the president’s latest executive action, the White House has long argued that comprehensive immigration reform would strengthen the long-term outlook of entitlement programs.

“Over 500 days ago, the United States Senate passed legislation with bipartisan support to improve border security, streamline the immigration process and establish a firm but fair path to citizenship,” Vice President Joe Biden wrote in an op-ed this week in Irish Central. “It would be an absolute game-changer for our economy, adding $1.4 trillion to our economy and reducing the deficit by nearly $850 billion over 20 years, and extending the solvency of Social Security by another two years.”

However, some fiscal hawks say that any short-term benefit of having more people paying into Social Security would be eclipsed by the burden of paying out benefits to potentially millions of additional people.

Republicans also point to the illegal immigrants not yet covered by Obama’s unilateral action.

“It is also important to keep in mind that while 5 million [illegal immigrants] benefit affirmatively from executive amnesty with work permits, photo ID’s and social security numbers, almost all of the other 7 million illegal immigrants continue to remain functionally immune from enforcement,” said Stephen Miller, a spokesman for Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. “The problem for American workers will be compounded even more when the amnesty produces the ensuing wave of new illegal and chain migration.”

Ayatollah Rebukes Kerry on Nuclear Talks

Posted on November 28, 2014November 28, 2014 by Denise Simon

The New York Times reported that Khamenei posted a statement on his personal website attacking America but approving of the decision to continue negotiations with world leaders on his country’s nuclear program.

“I do not disagree with the extension of the negotiations, as I have not disagreed with negotiations in the first place,” the ayatollah said in speech published on Khamenei.ir.

Western negotiators – the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and Germany (P5+1) – and Iran failed to meet the second deadline for a comprehensive nuclear agreement on Monday, announcing an extension of talks that started last year.

During that time, the parties have operated under an interim agreement that has limited Iran’s production of enriched uranium, imposed stricter international inspections of the current nuclear program and stopped the country from firing up unused centrifuges. In exchange, the United States and European Union have scaled back sanctions on Iran and released portions of frozen assets.

“America is a chameleon, and every day makes new statements,” he said in comments that were to be delivered to an audience of paramilitary Basij forces, according to his website, Khamenei.ir. “It also says different things in public and in private.”

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in his first response to the extension of talks over the country’s nuclear program, said world powers have failed to humiliate the Islamic Republic.

“The U.S. and all the European colonialist countries gathered together and tried everything to bring the Islamic Republic of Iran to its knees, but they couldn’t and they never will,” Khamenei said today, according to state-run media.

Diplomats from Iran and the so-called P5+1 group — the U.S., Germany, France, the U.K., Russia and China — gave themselves until March to come up with a political framework and July to spell out technical steps needed for a final accord.

Where does this leave John Kerry and his reputation in Washington for failing to get a deal?

But after having preached patience for a long time, Kerry, the designated defender of the talks, is coming under increasing pressure to deliver an agreement or give up.

Although he has never said a deal with Iran would be easy, Kerry has sometimes raised expectations—as he did in September of last year, when he told “60 Minutes” that a nuclear deal might be reached in less than three to six months.

That was fourteen months ago.

In comments from Vienna Monday, Kerry dangled new hope that a long-term nuclear agreement is close at hand. “[I]n these last days in Vienna, we have made real and substantial progress, and we have seen new ideas surface,” Kerry said, expressing hope that a broad framework could be completed in just four more months.

But administration allies are beginning to worry that Kerry is chasing an ever-moving rainbow’s end.

Shortly after the announcement of the deadline extension, GOP Senate foreign policy figures John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Kelly Ayotte in a joint statement said, “We believe this latest extension of talks should be coupled with increased sanctions and a requirement that any final deal between Iran and the United States be sent to Congress for approval.”

Interestingly, the presidential waiver authorities that are included in the relevant acts have been ratified by the Congress, yet now that Obama is likely to use them, fierce Congressional opposition has emerged.

Under the Joint Plan of Action agreed between Iran and the P5+1, the US should refrain from imposing new nuclear-related sanctions. In January, Obama explicitly threatened a veto on any new Iran sanction bill. Any new sanction bill would be considered as a violation of the JPOA on the part of the United States.

Fading List to Replace Hagel

Posted on November 28, 2014November 28, 2014 by Denise Simon

SecDef Chuck Hagel has an on camera reputation of being slow and lagging in control. But more that comes out since his termination that tells us otherwise. The position of Secretary of Defense is the least sought position in the Obama administration due in part to two wars, the Guantanamo detainee release program and most of all the shrinking budget for defense.

Politico explains why no one wants the job. Then there is the matter of releasing more detainees from Gitmo which is under the full authority of the Pentagon, and Hagel fought back hard under pressure from the White House to apply his signature for releases. More detainees are slated for release, trade or transfer.

Deputy Defense Secretary Work flew to Afghanistan to spend Thanksgiving with the troops and for meetings on the matter of recent Taliban attacks on ISAF. It was only yesterday that the Taliban attacked a NATO base. Matters in Afghanistan are sliding south and the Pentagon officials went to the White House demanding immediate action to prevent a rise in the Taliban and al Qaeda. Simply put a military leadership revolt occurred a few weeks ago such that Obama finally got the message and secretly approved an extended operation in Afghanistan including more aggressive operations.

Sequestration is the biggest threat to protecting national security at home and globally. If sequestration continues, Hagel said last week when he presented his “Strategic Choices and Management Review,” DOD might try to end civilian pensions for retired military troops who work for DOD, or cut unemployment payments.

Carter said changes in pensions, health care and other benefits would likely be grandfathered. Still, a $100 million dollar cut would do damage to DOD and its personnel that officials currently can’t calculate.

The Daesh containment strategy which is to manage the terror group to Iraq and Syria has already failed as Islamic State has moved into North Africa and Libya has fallen.

Little support and attention has been paid to NATO, Poland, Ukraine and the Baltic States except to throw money at building defenses. President Barack Obama, Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel pledged to defend the continent and announced $1 billion in additional military measures aimed at deterring Russia. They also pleaded with NATO members to use their bully pulpits to convince their governments to boost defense spending. U.S. leaders promised that America would fulfill its obligations to protect Europe and urged other NATO members to do to the same. Obama cited the U.S. Article 5 commitment to Poland – referring to the portion of the NATO charter which states that a threat against one nation is a threat against all. “As president, I’ve made sure that the United States is upholding that commitment.”

So who will approve staying on the list to replace SefDef Hagel? There are rumors that include Colin Powel and Tom Donilon, beyond that others are being considered. None of them frankly will have the military in their best interest and national security will likely continue to suffer.

Obama proposed his Pentagon budget for 2015 and it is less than 2014 while the global threat matrix increases. Another matter of great importance is keeping pace of the higher quality, readiness and assets of adversaries of the United States, those countries like China and Russia who are both jointly cooperating in military advancements.

Putin, Oligarchs, Wealth and More

Posted on November 26, 2014November 26, 2014 by Denise Simon

While there is so much going on globally, in recent weeks very little has been said about Russia, Putin and his aggressions.

Creating global wealth undercover to the masses does not go without recognition to many of the worldwide elite class and Russian collusion is no exception. You may very well know the names and locations. The list is fascinating.

The Russian Foreign Ministry has taken a jab at its U.S. counterpart by uploading a picture of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and his predecessors “digging out trenches of the Cold War.”

The loaded comment was made alongside a picture of the politicians holding spades at a construction site, taken last Thursday at a ceremony for a future museum at the U.S. Diplomacy Center in Washington.

“Let’s hope that this is not the mobilization of veterans on digging out trenches of the Cold War,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said Monday on its Facebook account.

Also pictured in the photograph are former state secretaries Hillary Clinton, Colin Powell, Henry Kissinger, James Baker and Madeleine Albright.

Then comes Ukraine and why it has been rather easy for Putin’s aggressions going unchallenged by the West.

SPECIAL REPORT-Putin’s allies channelled billions to Ukraine oligarch

By Stephen Grey, Tom Bergin, Sevgil Musaieva and Roman Anin

MOSCOW/KIEV Nov 26 (Reuters) – In Russia, powerful friends helped him make a fortune. In the United States, officials want him extradited and put behind bars. In Austria, where he is currently free on bail of $155 million, authorities have yet to decide what to do with him.

He is Dmitry Firtash, a former fireman and soldier. In little more than a decade, the Ukrainian went from obscurity to wealth and renown, largely by buying gas from Russia and selling it in his home country. His success was built on remarkable sweetheart deals brokered by associates of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, at immense cost to Russian taxpayers, a Reuters investigation shows.

Russian government records reviewed for this article reveal for the first time the terms of recent deals between Firtash and Russia’s Gazprom, a giant gas company majority owned by the state.

According to Russian customs documents detailing the trades, Gazprom sold more than 20 billion cubic metres of gas well below market prices to Firtash over the past four years – about four times more than the Russian government has publicly acknowledged. The price Firtash paid was so low, Reuters calculates, that companies he controlled made more than $3 billion on the arrangement.

Over the same time period, other documents show, bankers close to Putin granted Firtash credit lines of up to $11 billion. That credit helped Firtash, who backed pro-Russian Viktor Yanukovich’s successful 2010 bid to become Ukraine’s president, to buy a dominant position in the country’s chemical and fertiliser industry and expand his influence.

The Firtash story is more than one man’s grab for riches. It demonstrates how Putin uses Russian state assets to create streams of cash for political allies, and how he exported this model to Ukraine in an attempt to dominate his neighbour, which he sees as vital to Russia’s strategic interests. With the help of Firtash, Yanukovich won power and went on to rule Ukraine for four years. The relationship had great geopolitical value for Putin: Yanukovich ended up steering the nation of more than 44 million away from the West’s orbit and towards Moscow’s until he was overthrown in February.

“Firtash has always been an intermediary,” said Viktor Chumak, chairman of the anti-corruption committee in the previous Ukrainian parliament. “He is a political person representing Russia’s interests in Ukraine.”

A spokesman for Putin rejected claims that Firtash acted on behalf of Russia. “Firtash is an independent businessman and he pursues his own interests, I don’t believe he represents anyone else’s interests,” said Dmitry Peskov.

The findings are the latest in a Reuters examination of how elites favoured by the Kremlin profit from the state in the Putin era. In the wild years after the fall of the Soviet Union, state assets were seized or bought cheaply by the well connected. Today, resources and cash flows from public enterprises are diverted to private individuals with links to Putin, whether in Russia or abroad.

Putin’s system of comrade capitalism has had huge costs for the ordinary people of Russia: By granting special cheap deals to Firtash, Gazprom missed out on about $2 billion in revenue it could have made by selling that gas at market prices, according to European gas price data collected by Reuters. Four industry analysts said that Gazprom could have sold the gas at substantially higher prices to other customers in Europe.

At the same time, the citizens of both Russia and Ukraine have seen unelected oligarchs wield political influence.

Firtash, whose main company, Group DF, describes him as one of Ukraine’s leading entrepreneurs and philanthropists, was arrested in Austria on March 12 at the request of U.S. authorities. The Americans accuse him of bribery over a business deal in India unrelated to events examined in this article. Firtash denies those allegations and is currently free on bail.

Firtash imported the cheap Russian gas through a Cypriot company of which he is sole director, and a Swiss one set up by Group DF. He and Group DF declined to answer questions about those two companies and their gas dealings. A spokesman said Firtash was not available to discuss his business operations, and that Group DF did not wish to comment on “any of the questions you put forth.”

The Kremlin spokesman Peskov said Putin has met Firtash but that they are not close acquaintances. He said Russia supplied gas at “lower prices” to Ukraine because Yanukovich had asked for it and Russia wanted to help Ukraine’s petrochemical industry. Peskov said the deals were arranged through Firtash because “the Ukrainian government asked for it to be that way.”

Yanukovich, who fled to Russia in February after mass demonstrations against his government, could not be reached for comment.

THE MIDDLEMAN

From the moment he first became Russia’s president, Putin moved to take control of his country’s most valuable resource: natural gas. After assuming power in 2000, he replaced the management of Gazprom, put trusted allies in charge, and ensured the Russian state controlled more than half the shares.

The corporate behemoth now supplies about a third of Europe’s gas, generating vital revenue for Russia and giving Putin a powerful economic lever. “Gazprom is very much a tool of Russian foreign policy,” says Rem Korteweg, senior research fellow at the Centre for European Reform. Every major deal that Gazprom signs is approved by Putin, people in the energy industry say.

Putin’s spokesman rejected such assertions: Gazprom, he said, “is a commercial, public company, which has international shareholders. It acts in the interests of its shareholders, which also include the Russian state.”

In normal times, Gazprom’s second biggest customer in Europe is Ukraine; Russian gas was piped directly across the border between the two countries until Russia cut off supplies earlier this year.

In the 2000s, though, Gazprom decided to sell gas not directly to Ukraine’s state gas company Naftogaz, but to intermediaries – in particular Firtash, an international gas dealer who had risen from humble origins.

Firtash grew up in west Ukraine, where his father worked in education and his mother in a sugar factory, according to an account Firtash gave during a meeting with the U.S. ambassador in Kiev in 2008. Both his parents disdained communism and lacked the contacts needed to get their son into university, he said.

He joined the army in 1986, then trained to be a fireman. When the Soviet Union collapsed, leading to Ukraine’s independence in 1991, Firtash found himself having to make a living in an uncertain world, according to his account to the ambassador. With his first wife, he set up a business in west Ukraine shipping canned goods to Uzbekistan, according to local media reports researched by the U.S. embassy.

A U.S. diplomatic cable, which summarised Firtash’s discussion with the ambassador, drily noted: “Due to his commodities business, (Firtash) became acquainted with several powerful business figures from the former Soviet Union.”

According to the cable, Firtash told the U.S. ambassador he had been forced to deal with suspected criminals because at that time it was impossible to do business in Ukraine cleanly. He said he had needed and received permission from a man named Semion Mogilevich to establish various businesses. Mogilevich, an alleged boss of organised crime in eastern Europe, is wanted by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation for an alleged multi-million-dollar fraud in the 1990s involving a company headquartered in the United States. He was indicted in 2003, and described by the FBI in 2009 as having an “extensive international criminal network.”

Firtash has repeatedly denied having any close relationship with Mogilevich. Mogilevich could not be contacted for comment. He has previously denied any wrongdoing or any connection to the gas trade in Ukraine.

By 2002, a company called Eural Trans Gas, registered in Hungary, was transporting gas from Turkmenistan through Russia to Ukraine. Its ownership was unclear, but Firtash represented it. In July 2004, a new company, RosUkrEnergo, became the intermediary for gas deals between Russia and Ukraine. The owners of RUE were unknown at first, but it later emerged that nearly all of the company was owned by Firtash and Gazprom.

RUE bought gas cheaply and sold it on at a higher price in Ukraine and Europe. This arrangement guaranteed profits for RUE and was hugely controversial among Ukrainians who saw RUE as an unnecessary intermediary. Another U.S. diplomatic cable, from March 2009, described RUE as a “cash cow” and a “serious source of … political patronage.” In a website posting, RUE said that in 2007 it sold nearly $10 billion worth of gas and had net income of $795 million.

After Yulia Tymoshenko, herself a former gas trader, became prime minister of Ukraine in 2008, she reacted to public anger about the gas trade and moved to cut Firtash and RUE out of the business. She struck her own gas deal with Putin in 2009.

By that time, Firtash was rich. In the country’s 2010 presidential election, Firtash, by his own admission, aided the pro-Russian Yanukovich. A U.S. diplomatic cable described Firtash as a “major financial backer” of Yanukovich.

“Firtash supported Yanukovich in various ways,” said Vadym Karasiov, an aide to Viktor Yuschenko, Ukraine’s president from 2005 to 2010, in an interview. Karasiov said the mogul used his influence in the media to promote Yanukovich. In April 2010, in the aftermath of the election, Karasiov told the Kiev Post: “Without Dmitry Firtash there wouldn’t have been a (Yanukovich) victory.”

With Yanukovich president, Tymoshenko stepped down as prime minister. Business associates of Firtash were appointed to influential positions in the new administration. He had allies in the corridors of power, and ambitious plans to expand his business empire and get back into the gas trade. His friends in Russia were happy to help him.

THE LOANS

Tucked away in Nicosia, Cyprus, a bundle of tattered papers wrapped in string records Russian credit agreements made to Firtash companies. The documents, reviewed by Reuters, detail a series of financing deals worth billions of dollars.

The deals were arranged by a Russian lender called Gazprombank. Despite its name, the bank is not controlled by Gazprom, which holds only a minority stake. It is a separate business, overseen by people linked to Putin. They include Yuri Kovalchuk, a banker who until March 2014 controlled an investment firm that manages a majority stake in Gazprombank.

In a statement, Gazprombank said: “We do not receive any instructions from the Kremlin … The strategy of the bank is developed by its management board and approved by the board of directors. No other influence is possible.”

Asked whether Putin had any role in issuing the loans to Firtash companies, Kremlin spokesman Peskov said: “Putin, as president, does not have anything to do with this.”

Gazprombank began lending money to Firtash companies soon after Yanukovich took power in Ukraine in February 2010.

In June that year, Firtash established a company called Ostchem Investments in Cyprus. A month later, Gazprombank registered a credit line to the company of $815 million, according to the Cyprus documents. In September, Ostchem Investments bought a 90 percent stake in the Stirol fertiliser plant in Ukraine. It was perfect synergy: Firtash knew the gas business, and natural gas is a major feedstock for making fertiliser.

Further loans and deals with Firtash companies followed.

Reuters found that by March 2011, Gazprombank had registered credit lines of up to $11.15 billion to Firtash companies. The companies may not have borrowed that whole sum, but the documents indicate that loans up to that amount were available, according to Cyprus lawyers.

In the space of seven months in 2011 alone, Firtash acquired control of two more fertiliser plants in Ukraine, Severodonetsk Azot and Rivne Azot. He also bought the Nika Tera sea port, through which fertiliser and other dry bulk goods are shipped. He acquired a lender called Nadra Bank and invested in the titanium processing industry.

Such was his expansion that Firtash became the fifth largest fertiliser producer in Europe. Being a large employer brought not just potential profits but also political clout, he boasted. “We have relations with MPs,” Firtash told Die Presse in Austria in May. “We are big employers in the regions that they represent. Entire cities live on our factories. Election candidates seek our support.”

When asked in 2011 where the money came from to pay for his acquisitions, Firtash was coy. At a press conference called to announce his purchase of the Severdonetsk plant, he declined to name his major lenders. “It’s a secret,” he told Ukrainian journalists.

But a Gazprombank manager told Reuters that the Russian bank had led a consortium of lenders which in 2011 agreed to lend about $7 billion to Firtash. The official said Gazprombank itself lent Firtash $2.2 billion, and that Firtash still owed the bank $2.08 billion. The official declined to name other lenders in the consortium.

A $2.2 billion loan was a big commitment for Gazprombank: It amounted to nearly a quarter of the bank’s total capital, the maximum loan allowed by Russian banking rules for any single client or group. Based on regulatory filings, the loan facility made Firtash the biggest single borrower from Gazprombank.

Reuters was unable to establish exactly how much in total the Gazprombank consortium lent to Firtash companies.

In a statement, Gazprombank said that “the aggregate amount of loans disbursed to Ostchem Group” was “several times lower” than $11 billion. “And all capital requirements and limitations of the Central Bank of Russia in respect of loans granted have always been complied with by Gazprombank, including loans to Ostchem Group,” the statement said.

The bank declined to give any further details, saying it had to protect client confidentiality. The central bank had no comment.

GAS PROFITS

Firtash now had money, political connections and businesses that relied on large supplies of gas. What he needed next was fuel.

In January 2011, Firtash signed an unpublished agreement, seen by Reuters, with Gazprom to buy gas through a company called Ostchem Holding in Cyprus, where he is the sole director listed.

The gas deal was later extended to include sales to Ostchem Gas Trading AG in Switzerland. It was also agreed by Naftogaz, Ukraine’s state-owned gas firm, where Yanukovich had installed new senior management. Firtash needed Naftogaz’s sign-off because it controlled pipelines delivering gas and, until that point, had an exclusive deal to import gas from Gazprom.

Naftogaz’s decision to agree to the deal was an odd one. Not only did it mean Naftogaz would surrender its monopoly on Russian gas imports, but the deal could also potentially damage the state firm. Naftogaz had previously agreed with Gazprom to pay for a set amount of gas whether it could sell it in Ukraine or not. Firtash’s deal could leave the Ukrainian state firm buying gas it would struggle to sell.

Firtash’s return to importing gas became public knowledge after Yanukovich’s election victory. But the price he paid Moscow, and how much cheap gas he bought, remained unclear. An Ostchem spokesman told Reuters the price was “confidential information.”

Russian customs records seen by Reuters show that in 2012, Moscow sold the gas to Firtash for $230 per 1,000 cubic metres (the standard unit used in gas sales). In 2013 the average cost was $267 per unit. Those prices were at least one-third less than those paid by Ukraine’s Naftogaz.

Ukrainian customs documents and corporate filings show that Firtash’s Ostchem companies in Cyprus and Switzerland resold the gas to his chemical plants in Ukraine for $430 per unit. The prices and volumes suggest that the two offshore Ostchem companies made an operating profit of approximately $3.7 billion in two years.

Naftogaz’s current management is highly critical of the way in which Gazprom favoured Firtash’s companies. Aliona Osmolovska, chief of press relations, said: “These special deals for Ostchem were not in the interest of Ukraine.”

The real loser in the deal, though, was Gazprom. The arrangement, which Putin described during a press conference as having been made with the “input of the Russian leadership,” meant Russia sold its gas to Firtash for at least $100 per unit less than it could have made in Western Europe, according to Emily Stromquist, head of Russian energy analysis at Eurasia Group, a political risk research firm.

In addition, the profits from the subsequent resale of the gas were all reaped offshore by companies that did not benefit the Russian taxpayer. Those profits in 2012 and 2013 would have meant an additional $2 billion for Gazprom, whose ultimate majority owners are Russia’s citizens.

Gazprom declined to comment on its sales to Firtash’s companies.

Putin’s spokesman Peskov said Naftogaz agreed to Firtash receiving gas at low prices because the deal was intended to help Ukraine’s petrochemical industry. Asked why the gas was sold to companies in Cyprus and Switzerland, Peskov said: “Putin doesn’t need to approve this action. These operations are technical and were made by Gazprom according to the structures which are always used by its Ukrainian partners.”

Neither of the two Firtash companies that bought gas from Russia publishes accounts. Firtash declined to comment on the firms or their results.

UNEASY STANDOFF

The new government in Ukraine alleges that Yanukovich had allowed corruption to flourish and stolen millions of dollars. In the longer term, the new government says it wants to forge closer ties with the European Union and reduce its dependence on Russian gas.

In June, Moscow cut off supplies of gas to Kiev, claiming that it was owed billions of dollars by Ukraine’s state-owned Naftogaz. Late last month, the two countries struck a deal allowing supplies to resume, but the agreement runs only until March. Firtash retains large stocks of gas but has not imported new supplies since Yanukovich was ousted.

Firtash remains in Austria awaiting the outcome of extradition hearings. According to a U.S. indictment unsealed in April, he is suspected of a scheme to bribe Indian government officials to procure titanium. Two U.S. government officials said the American investigation into Firtash is continuing; they declined to give further details.

The Ukrainian oligarch has said the allegations are “without foundation” and has accused Washington of acting for “purely political reasons.” He has hired an all-star legal defence team. It includes Lanny Davis, who helped President Bill Clinton weather a series of White House scandals in the 1990s.

In his time of trouble Firtash has not been deserted by the Russians. Since his arrest he has received another loan in order to pay his bail: $155 million from Vasily Anisimov, the billionaire who heads the Russian Judo Federation, the governing body in Russia of Putin’s beloved sport.

“I have known Mr. Firtash for a number of years, though he is neither my friend nor business partner,” Anisimov told Reuters in an email. “I confirm that I loaned 125 million euros to him. This was a purely business transaction.” (Additional reporting by Michele Kambas in Cyprus, Elizabeth Piper and Jason Bush in Moscow, Oleksandr Akymenko and Pavel Polityuk in Kiev, Jack Stubbs in London, Warren Strobel in Washington and Michele Martin in Berlin; Edited by Richard Woods and Michael Williams)

Behind Obama’s Executive Order on Immigration

Posted on November 26, 2014November 26, 2014 by Denise Simon

Some key items are coming to the surface with regard to the executive order on immigration. Preferential treatment of chosen classes and conditions are targets of the White House while others are going to pay monetarily.

But off script, Obama admitted this past week that he DID change the law on immigration.

Fast forward to Tuesday, when Obama was speaking on immigration reform to a group in Chicago. When protesters began yelling at Obama to stop all deportations, the president became frustrated and answered: “There have been significant numbers of deportations. That’s true. But what you’re not paying attention to is the fact that I just took action to change the law.”

Rather than employing U.S. citizens that already have high tech skills and work history or rather than training U.S. citizens for employment in the technology sector, the White House has chosen foreigners to first priority.

Opportunities for Tech Workers, Firms in Obama’s Immigration Order

With Washington and much of the country abuzz about the politics and legality of President Barack Obama‘s executive order on immigration, it is useful to recognize the economic benefits of certain overlooked features of that order–things that, to a modest degree, enhance work opportunities for skilled immigrants.

For example, as immigration expert Vivek Wadhwa has highlighted, the president’s order makes the temporary (six-year) H-1B visa for technical workers portable.

H-1B visas, currently capped at 65,000 per year, are loved by the tech industry, and why not? They give employers market power over visa holders. Making it easier for these skilled immigrants to move to other employers benefits not only them but potentially many new or young companies in need of tech talent. While “coding academies” are springing up around the U.S. to train Americans of all ages on software coding, the tech market could still use a lot more talent, even if some of it comes from abroad.

The president’s order also could allow as many as 10,000 additional immigrant entrepreneurs to remain in the U.S. This step is significant in light of evidence compiled by Mr. Wadwha and his research colleagues that immigrants punch well above their weight in forming successful tech companies: They accounted for 25% of successful tech enterprises from 1995 to 2005, almost double the share of the U.S. population born elsewhere (13%). These successful immigrant-founded companies generate jobs for native-born Americans and are clearly a win for the U.S. economy. Read more here.

But it gets worse. There is a money component, and collusion enters the White House plan.
Hiring Illegal Immigrants Will Earn Businesses $3,000 Per Employee Under President’s Plan

Hiring illegal immigrants used to come with a hefty punishment if a business owner was found out, but now under President Obama’s plan announced through executive action last week, job creators will be rewarded.

The president’s call to offer undocumented workers a path to citizenship will come with a $3,000 per employee financial incentive to any business that wants to hire these workers.

Fox News points out that because of a “kink” in the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare), “businesses will not face a penalty for not providing illegal immigrants health care.” Furthermore, these workers will not be eligible for public benefits “such as buying insurance on ObamaCare’s health exchanges.”

“If it is true that the president’s actions give employers a $3,000 incentive to hire those who came here illegally, he has added insult to injury,” Rep. Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican, commented to The Washington Times. “The president’s actions would have just moved those who came here illegally to the front of the line, ahead of unemployed and underemployed Americans.”

President Obama doesn’t believe that bringing undocumented workers into the workforce is a bad thing, as he stated in recent comments on the executive action.

“Immigrants are good for the economy. We keep on hearing that they’re bad, but a report by my Council of Economic Advisers put out last week shows how the actions we’re taking will grow our economy for everybody,” he said.

John Husing, chief economist for the Inland Empire Economic Partnership in California, one of the most immigrant-heavy states in the nation, agreed that President Obama’s plan was a good thing in comments to the Pasadena Star News.

“Most of those people are probably already working anyway,” Husing said. “And when you talk to any demographer they will tell you that one of the biggest problems we have as a society is that our labor force is getting very old. Most of the undocumented people who are here tend to be younger and they would add to the available workforce in the age group that employers need.”

In the same publication, California Republican assemblyman Tim Donnelly disagreed.

“If you introduce 5 million individuals into the labor force — and I think that’s a really low figure — it will have a dramatic impact on those who are already seeking work…. It will especially have an effect on people who are working at lower income levels where any change in the labor market has the effect of lowering wages. This could depress wages. That’s a real concern.”

What do you think about giving employers financial incentives to hire illegal immigrants — good move, or will it depress the job hunt for native workers?