Friday, August 31, 2018

Who's behind the race mixing agenda in advertising?



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Fox News Hits 200 Months At No. 1


Will anyone ever stop Fox News? The long-dominant cable news network hit a major milestone in August: 200 consecutive months as the most-watched network in cable news. Ratings data released Tuesday by Nielsen show Fox News won prime time and total day ratings, and marked 26 consecutive months as the top-rated network in all of cable TV, with an average total audience of 1.3 million.

The 200-month streak comes after a week in which huge political news lifted MSNBC to one of its best weeks ever, including four nights in a row finishing first ahead of Fox, with MSNBC's star host Rachel Maddow beating FNC's Sean Hannity to take the title of most-watched host in cable news. But Hannity won the month, finishing August with an average total audience of 3.079 million viewers. The Rachel Maddow Show was second with 2.882, followed by FNC's Tucker Carlson Tonight (2.552 million), FNC's The Ingraham Angle (2.461 million) and MSNBC's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell (2.229 million). The top five shows finished in the same order among viewers 25-54, the critical demographic valued by advertisers. With the win in August, Hannity has spent five months in a row as the most-watched cable news show.

MSNBC, meanwhile, crunched the numbers differently and declared Rachel Maddow the number one cable news host for August, with 557,000 viewers in the demo compared to Hannity's 547,000. How can that be? The difference comes down to four Hannity specials in August that FNC does not factor into the show's overall ratings.

MSNBC did see an overall bump in its prime time audience in August, with ratings up one percent compared to the same month a year ago. But Fox News Channel had an even bigger bump: up four percent compared to August 2017. Among viewers 25-54, all of the cable news networks saw declines, with CNN and MSNBC down 17 percent compared to last August and FNC down nine percent. The largest decline was CNN's performance in the key demo for the total day, where viewership was off 24 percent (FNC dipped 17 percent and MSNBC was down 16 percent).

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Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Record opposition among Canadians to taking in more immigrants

OTTAWA — Canadians have been dubious for decades about the merits of increasing levels of immigration, but a new report also suggests growing opposition to immigration over the past few years.

The report from the Angus Reid Institute analyzes polling data going back to 1975 to show that, throughout that period, a relatively constant number of Canadians — around one in four — have always said they think immigration levels should be decreased, while support for keeping levels the same has tended to be slightly higher. Only about 10 per cent of Canadians have supported increasing the levels during that time.


A survey conducted in late July by the Angus Reid Institute, however, does show a spike in opposition to immigration, which the organization says coincides with “more frequent and increasingly fraught conversations about policy regarding immigration and migration to Canada.”

The report puts the 2018 survey in context with previous polling on immigration done by Gallup and Harris/Decima over the past few decades, including a 2014 survey by Harris/Decima. The 2018 survey shows 49 per cent of respondents think immigration levels should be decreased (compared to 36 per cent in 2014), 31 per cent think levels should stay the same (compared to 48 per cent in 2014), and 6 per cent think levels should be increased (compared to nine per cent in 2014).

Shachi Kurl, executive director of the Angus Reid Institute, said they chose those past surveys as comparisons because they asked the same questions about immigration. But she also said the 2018 numbers have to be taken as cautionary until they do more study.

“We’re seeing a notable change in the trendline, but it’s one data point, so what we can’t know yet is: are we seeing a country that’s now trending in a particular direction, or are we experiencing a moment in time?”


She also said it’s hard to tell yet whether the heated political discussion around immigration is driving public opinion, or vice versa.

“One data point doesn’t make a trend. We have to wait and see where sentiment goes over the next couple of years.”

The 49 per cent who think immigration should be lower is the highest number in the historical data; the second-highest was in 1995, when 45 per cent wanted lower immigration.

The 2018 survey was conducted among 1,500 Canadian adults who are members of the Angus Reid Forum. The survey doesn’t have a margin of error, but a probability sample of this size would carry a margin of error of 2.2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

The report notes that immigration targets have risen steadily since the 2014 survey, from 260,000 then to 310,000 now. However, immigration as a proportion of the Canadian population has stayed roughly the same since 1975, at between 0.5 per cent and 1 per cent annually. An exception is the late 1970s and early 1980s, when the percentage of immigrants was well below 0.5 per cent annually.


Broken down by province, the 2018 survey shows fairly even numbers across Canada, with Manitoba and British Columbia showing the least opposition.

“In Ontario, the province where most immigrants settle by a wide margin, one-third are satisfied with national levels, while half say they should be reduced,” the report notes.

Overall, past Conservative voters were most likely to want reduced immigration levels, with 67 per cent wanting them lowered compared to 39 per cent for both Liberal and NDP voters. Only one in ten of both Liberal and NDP voters supported increasing immigration levels, while just two per cent of Conservatives supported that.

Kurl said the left-wing parties shouldn’t underestimate their own numbers. “There is a significant segment of that left-of-centre base that is also of the view that we’re accepting too many immigrants,” she said.

The report shows education levels substantially affect views on immigration. “Those with (university) degrees are twice as likely to say more immigrants should be accepted,” the report says.

Respondents were also asked their views on immigration levels by class: economic class (people who immigrate here to work), family class (people who are sponsored by family members already living here) and refugee/humanitarian class (people fleeing conflict or persecution).


Economic immigrants were the most supported group, with 20 per cent of all respondents saying levels should be increased and 32 per cent saying they should be decreased. Conservative voters were the most likely to support increasing this class, with 26 per cent in favour.

Family class was the least supported group, as just nine per cent of respondents said levels should be increased. In comparison, 18 per cent of respondents said refugee/humanitarian immigration levels should be increased. In both cases, Conservative voters were significantly more opposed than Liberal and NDP voters.


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Saturday, August 18, 2018

Demise of print newspapers may have far-reaching consequences

For those of us who still love getting our news from newspapers, those inky, crinkly, thin sheets of wood pulp you hold in your hands and read, these indeed are sad times. Print newspapers, thanks in large part to the meteoric rise of smartphones and online and social media, are in serious decline.

That decline is even more dramatic in places where they are are needed most – the villages, towns and smaller cities across America where print newspapers have long been a key link to the community.

In the short four-year period between 2012 and 2016, the number of daily newspapers in the United States fell from 1,425 in 2012 to 1,286 in 2016.

And the print decimation continues. In late June, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published a long explanation of why it is cutting the weekly number of days it prints from seven to five. The stated reason in a letter to union employees, those most-hurt by the cutback: “We have decided that becoming a digital newspaper is our future.”

This week Post-Gazette Editor David Shribman explained to readers that the cutback is a “… dramatic step into the digital future of news, transforming itself from a medium steeped in print into a fresh new profile committed to all the potential of the new communications world.” 

Translation: Print newspapers are not our top priority anymore.  It is much cheaper to place news stories onto a website with the click of a button than to print them on paper. Newspapers require buying newsprint by the ton, ink by the barrel, hugely expensive printing presses and trucks to distribute them, not to mention paying the many carriers needed to deliver them to your home.

Newspapers feeling the financial strain have already made deep cuts where it is easiest: in newsroom reporters and editors. The Pew Research Center recently reported that due to declining readership and advertising sales, employment of news personnel since 2007 – a time when smartphones and social media burst onto the scene - dropped by nearly half: 74,000 to 39,000.

Many media analysts believe it won’t be long before print newspapers disappear. If it happens, they in large part will be devoured by a voracious horde of online and social media, many of which have little respect for the notion that the first function of news reporting is to present good, honest, factual and relevant information about the community it serves.

That means holding up a mirror to the community and reflecting it back – an honest mirror, not a distorted fun house mirror, as is often the case these days.

All of that is too bad, not only for reporters and editors who are losing jobs, but more so for newspaper readers themselves. They are missing out on a daily chance come together as a community and celebrate the things that unite us, not the things that divide us. Much of today’s news reporting, in all media. doesn’t make us feel better. It makes us feel worse.

Back in the days when most households read a daily paper, we were a kinder and gentler people. While newspapers reported on the mayhem of day-to-day living – crime, war, disease, crooked politics and human tragedies -- they also balanced it with plenty of human-interest news about the good in people:

The burly construction workers who raised dimes and quarters for a little boy with cerebral palsy to buy a computer, so he could “talk.”

The first-grade teacher who taught her students to read, took them on their first trip to a library and opened their eyes to a whole new world.


The fireman who had his hands burned into two lumps of charcoal, but expressed no bitterness about his fate. “Part of the job,” he said.


The Confirmation class of a Catholic school that attended the funeral of a homeless man who had no one to mourn him.


The politician who went out and spent time working at everyday jobs, so he could feel and understand what his constituents go through every day.


These examples are all real. I know. I wrote all of them, and more. And I got more positive reader reaction from those kinds of stories than all the hundreds of political stories I wrote in a nearly 50-year career.


Where are such stories now?  There might be some, but they are few and far between.  Reporters are reluctant to suggest such stories for fear that their editors might accuse them of “going soft” and relegate them to the back bench. So, they give them what they want: more nasty, negative stories about politics and politicians. 

Moreover, newspapers I worked for took their roles as community citizens seriously.  The Buffalo (N.Y) Evening News sponsored a crippled children’s summer camp, the annual Western New York Science Fair, a Newspaper in the Classroom program, a summer snapshot contest and (talk about a day gone by) a teen Back-to-School Fashion Show.

The News even sent reporters out in summer to cover “neighborhood days” at Crystal Beach, an amusement park, across the Niagara River in Canada. Their task was to gather the results of the kids’ (the word “kids” was banned from The News; it was always “children”) three-legged races, beanbag-throwing and horseshoe-pitching contests, all of which were reported in the afternoon paper by the time they got home. And as grizzled editors warned us under penalty of death: “Don’t spell anyone’s name wrong.”

The Utica (N.Y.) Observer-Dispatch sponsored Operation Sunshine which raised money for needy children and families at Thanksgiving, Christmas and in the summer for camp.  Stories of children, whether it be for sports or for school or for just good deeds, were always a big feature in the O-D.

Many other newspapers had similar programs. And some still do.  But will that kinder and gentler reporting and community involvement continue when print newspapers are gone?

If the steady stream of negative reporting and snarky comment that dominate online and social media today become the norm, and our political polarization as a people escalates, I doubt it.

But I prefer to be an optimist. As a founding member of USA Today, I took seriously the words of the late Al Neuharth, chairman of the Gannett Co.  printed in 1982 on the paper’s first front page:

“USA Today hopes to serve as a forum for better understanding and unity to make the USA truly one nation.”

Without print newspapers, that hope is likely to dwindle and fade away.

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Tuesday, August 14, 2018

Investigative Journalist Found Dead in D.C. Hotel Room Weeks After Reporting Bill Clinton to FBI & DHS for Allegedly Raping Boy

Investigative Journalist Jen Moore was found dead in a suburban Washington D.C. hotel room Monday, according to police and shocked and distraught friends and colleagues.

Moore died of an apparent seizure. Police are closely investigating the cause of death after former FBI Agent Robyn Gritz, a friend of Moore’s, made inquiries with homicide detectives Monday afternoon in Prince Georges County, Maryland. Preliminary reports from police said the death was not the result of suicide.

Moore’s body was found by employees at the Country Inn & Suites by Radisson, Washington, D.C. East – in Capitol Heights, Maryland. The investigation is ongoing. An autopsy had not been scheduled as of late Monday.

Moore, an advocate who investigated abused and trafficked children, had been in the process of investigating allegations by a 26-year-old man that — as a young boy — he was sexually assaulted by Bill Clinton and pimped out at private sex parties attended by other D.C. elites.

In fact, just four weeks before her death, Moore filed details of the alleged victim’s claims with the Department of Homeland Security, detailing the allegations against Clinton. Moore contacted Homeland Security beginning on July 6th through July 9th, records show. A week later, she contacted the FBI with identical details about the victim and the shocking allegations against Clinton.

FBI sources report no case has been opened on the evidence supplied by Moore. Homeland Security officials could not be reached for comment.

Moore had approached True Pundit’s Thomas Paine in June with the allegations against Clinton. Paine conducted a series of face-to-face interviews with Moore and the alleged victim in various locales. By July, the victim agreed to tell his story to Paine. But Moore and the traumatized victim wanted to contact Homeland Security and the FBI first to see if they would open a criminal case against Clinton prior to publicizing the claims.

“Jen thought that with a criminal probe, federal agents could use the victim possibly to dangle in front of Clinton to see if he made a mistake or tried to pay him off,” Paine said. “She was worried about the safety of the victim and was working to find him safe harbor until this story broke.
Now she is the one who turned up dead.”

Paine and True Pundit were vetting the details provided by the victim. Paine said the allegations were “credible” and the victim’s testimony and details were beyond convincing.
Paine said Moore accepted the risks with the story and understood things could get very ugly very fast. Per conversations with True Pundit’s Paine:

“She was worried about the victim because he was the first to break the ice,” Paine said. “There were others waiting to tell their stories but he was the catalyst.

Did she think she could be harmed? Absolutely. This woman was fearless. Absolute warrior. A former cop. I don’t think she was afraid of anyone or anything.”

According to interviews, the victim in this case claimed he was sexually assaulted by Clinton on a yacht in New England and knows the identities of several other child victims who were subjected to identical abuses. The victim also confirmed he witnessed other children and people being sexually and physically abused and possibly worse on numerous “boat parties.” These parties were attended by elite members of D.C. political class, according to Moore and the victim.

Both young boys and young girls, the victim said.

Moore supplied these details to federal agents and documented the interactions with a number of alleged victims. Within a month, she is dead.

In the exchange below, Moore discusses an extended stay with the alleged Clinton victim after his interview with Paine. During the interview, the victim sporadically vomited and shivered as he recalled details of his alleged abuse, Paine said.

This story is developing.
More on Wednesday.
https://truepundit.com/investigative-journalist-found-dead-in-d-c-hotel-room-weeks-after-reporting-bill-clinton-to-fbi-dhs-for-allegedly-raping-boy/

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Sunday, August 12, 2018

Dutch Politician Gang Raped for Fighting Islam Leaves Chilling Message Before Committing Suicide

Dutch politician, Willie Dillie, committed suicide to save her family. This is the result of a progressive society that prefers to defend Islam instead of defending the many victims of Islam. Islam is an intolerant culture. It is not a religion. Despite the numerous cases of gang rapes by Muslims, death threats to those who fight against the evils in Islam, and more intolerance, progressives are silent about the evils in Islam. This Dutch politician finally took her own life because she did not feel protected by her own government and no longer wanted to endanger her family.



A Tragedy

This video message is chilling. It is the message of a woman who was let down by her own government, her own people, her own culture. Her suicide should be a wake-up call to the Western world taking in millions of Muslim immigrants and illegal migrants. While it is wonderful to be a welcoming society, it is suicidal to ignore the cultural changes that the mass arrival of Muslims are having on Western countries they now live in.

Not All Muslims

No, not all Muslims are bad. Not all Muslims believe in jihad, subjugating infidels or are intolerant of non-Muslims. Not all Muslims want to move to Western countries in order to culturally destroy them and instead turn them into part of the Islamic caliphate. But hundreds of millions of Muslims do believe in all that. And they also now live in Holland, the USA, Canada, Britain, Australia etc.

Travesty

The true travesty? Thousands of Muslims left their Muslim countries in the Middle East and Africa to escape Shariah law and the intolerance of Islam. Yet, Western governments are also not protecting them from the evils of Islam that they tried to escape from.

Problem with Islam

The West has a problem with Islam. The biggest problem is that the progressive Western countries are denying a problem exists. The ones who suffer are victims of Islam, Muslims and non-Muslims, like Willie Dillie.

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Thursday, August 2, 2018

Sweden: Muslim migrant who was sentenced for assault and deported was thwarted by “hero” student Elin Ersson

“I’m trying to change my country’s rules. I don’t like them. It’s not right to send people to hell.”

Except, apparently, one’s own countrymen.

“Despite lacking information about the man who was being deported, most media organizations jumped on the story, with the Washington Post calling Ersson’s stunt a ‘dramatic act of civil disobedience’ while Newsweek magazine described the student as a ‘hero.'”

Typical establishment media propaganda.

“Afghan migrant whose deportation was thwarted by ‘hero’ Swedish student was actually sentenced for assault,” by Lukas Mikelionis, Fox News, July 31, 2018:

    Elin Ersson, a student at Gothenburg University, was subjected to fawning media coverage over her stunt earlier this month when she refused to take her seat on the plane until the 52-year-old Afghan deportee was released. She was successful and authorities weren’t able to deport the man.

    The Swedish student who was branded a “hero” and captured worldwide attention after she stopped the deportation of an Afghan migrant by refusing to sit down on a plane instead prevented the extradition of a man sentenced for assault and whose asylum application was rejected.

    Elin Ersson, a student at Gothenburg University, was subjected to fawning media coverage over her stunt earlier this month when she refused to take her seat on the plane until the 52-year-old Afghan deportee was released. She was successful and authorities weren’t able to deport the man.

    However, Swedish Police confirmed to Fox News that the man whose deportation Ersson prevented had received a prison sentence in Sweden for assault. The police spokesman declined to go into more details about the crime the migrant has committed. His asylum application was also rejected….

    Despite lacking information about the man who was being deported, most media organizations jumped on the story, with the Washington Post calling Ersson’s stunt a “dramatic act of civil disobedience” while Newsweek magazine described the student as a “hero”….

    The Swedish student live streamed the whole incident and it was viewed nearly 5 million times on Facebook alone. In the video, she’s heard saying “there is a man who is going to get deported to Afghanistan, where he will most likely get killed” and the she won’t “sit down until this person is off the plane.”…

    “I’m trying to change my country’s rules. I don’t like them. It’s not right to send people to hell,” she added.
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The IMF, Edmond Safra, Russia, Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin: the Real Story.

The following is by Martin Armstrong.

In the movie The Forecaster, I explained that they got Yeltsin to take money from the IMF loans and then they steered that wire through the Bank of New York. As soon as that wire hit, Republic National Bank and Edmond Safra, who was the MAJORITY shareholder of Hermitage Capital at that time, ran to the government and reported that Bank of New York just did a $7 billion money laundering. Then Yeltsin was blackmailed to step down and they were looking to install their puppet and control all the commodities of Russia.

That is when Yeltsin turned to Putin for help and this is how he became the head of Russia. Many people have tried to claim that I just made up the story and nobody ever reported IMF money was stolen.

Besides the fact that I would NEVER make up such a story, CNN reported the guts of this BEFORE my case began. Afterward, the story of funds being stolen from the IMF vanished and was replaced in the Bank of New York case with a ransom for a businessman and the judge taking the plea NEVER asked who.

Here are the two CNN Stories. I strongly urge you to print them out before they vanish from the web. This PROVES what I said in the movie and it PROVES what Putin is talking about asking to question Americans in return.

1  BoNY fires 2nd employee  September 2, 1999

NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Bank of New York Thursday fired a second employee in a widening probe concerning allegations that billions of dollars in illicit Russian funds were funneled through the bank's coffers.
     Svetlanda Kudryautsev, an international banking associate with the bank's New York operations, was terminated for not cooperating with the ongoing investigation into accounts that authorities allege were opened and used by Russian businessmen to launder as much as $15 billion in ill-gotten funds, sources familiar with the investigation said. She was not an officer of the bank.
     Kudryautsev's termination follows by less than a week the dismissal of Lucy Edwards, a Russian-born vice president who was responsible for its Eastern European division. The two senior-level executives worked under Natasha Kagalovsky. Kagalovsky, who worked in the bank's London office, has been suspended, according to sources.
     Bank of New York spokesman Cary Giacalone confirmed that Kudryautsev was dismissed.

    

The plot thickens

     Authorities have been investigating whether Russian immigrant Peter Berlin's accounts at the Bank of New York were used to launder money -- an act intended to disguise the origins of money procured from illegal activities. Part of the process involves depositing the money in numerous legitimate bank accounts, making it difficult to trace.
     Berlin was married to Edwards, one of the central figures authorities are investigating for criminal activities. And Edwards was fired last week for alleged "gross misconduct," violations of the bank's internal policies, falsification of bank records and failure to cooperate in the investigation, according to people familiar with the situation.
     Kudryautsev's firing is the latest incident related to allegations of fraud swirling about the Bank of New York and a widening list of other U.S. and European banks and securities firms.
     Reports published Thursday quote investigators as saying they suspect Russian organized crime groups are actively trying to infiltrate the U.S. financial system. They accuse the groups of setting up "moles" within key positions at major Western banks and securities firms to help them launder money and conduct other illegal transactions.
    
"Pure speculation"

     According to people close to the investigation, the Federal Reserve is reviewing the practices and procedures Bank of New York had in place to combat money laundering. The district attorney in New York City's borough of Manhattan is also investigating money transfers at the bank, and Internal Revenue Service investigators are also assisting in the federal probe.
     At the same time, a senior source within the Federal Bureau of Investigation told CNNfn that the notion of Russian "moles" planted in various U.S. banks is "pure speculation," noting that its recent FBI sting operation involving narcotics and money laundering was "totally unrelated" to events unfolding at Bank of New York and other institutions.
     The BankBoston case involves a customer service representative indicted on charges that she helped a group of Russian businessmen launder what undercover agents posing as narcotics traffickers represented to the Russians as drug money, according to sources involved.
     The agents gave more than $2.7 million in cash to the businessmen, who were based mostly in New York. In return, they sent the agents checks from more than 64 bank accounts, a number of which were from the West Newton, Mass., BankBoston branch where the customer-services representative, Oksana Galchanskaya, worked.
     Galchanskaya's lawyer says she wasn't involved in the alleged scheme and didn't know the alleged launderers.
    
IMF speaks out

     A number of accounts at other U.S. banks are believed by authorities to be connected to the case, the paper said. These include business or individual accounts at Citigroup Inc.'s Citibank, First Union Corp.'s CoreStates Bank, Chase Manhattan Corp.'s Chase Manhattan Bank.
     Separately, the International Monetary Fund Thursday said it will not cut off its support payments to Russia, and that it is maintaining its stance that it has no evidence that monetary aid has been diverted into the alleged money laundering scandal.
     In the first of what is expected to be a regular series of briefings to reporters, IMF External Affairs director Thomas Dawson said the IMF was considering implementing safeguards to determine how Russia uses future IMF money and to avoid potential abuse of those funds.
     At the same time, he said the organization will wait for a new report from auditors PriceWaterhouse Coopers before deciding whether to pay further installments on an existing $4.5 billion loan.
     "There is absolutely no evidence of any diversion or misuse of IMF funds," Dawson said, in the first of a planned series of regular IMF news briefings. "We take the allegations extremely seriously, but we have found no evidence in that regard."
     No date had been set for the IMF to discuss Russia, though officials will convene in Washington for the IMF-World Bank annual meetings later this month.
     Dawson noted that the claims of money-laundering remained vague and he stressed that the IMF, which has loaned Russia some $22 billion since 1992, did not make payments to commercial banks. Back to top
2 Russian scandal widens August 26, 1999


NEW YORK (CNNfn) - An investigation into alleged money laundering by a Russian crime syndicate through two U.S. banks widened Thursday as Russian investigators and the Manhattan District Attorney's office joined a growing list of legal and regulatory officials seeking answers.
     A week ago, allegations arose that a Russian crime syndicate had laundered some $10 billion - possibly funds diverted from International Monetary Fund payments - through accounts at the Bank of New York (BK) and Republic National Bank (RNB).
     From there, more details of money laundering and mobsters have surfaced, prompting officials in the Washington to call for Congressional hearings. The New York Times first reported the story last Thursday.
     To delve to the bottom of the alleged money laundering operations, a wide array of government and regulatory agencies from at least three different countries are launching a full-blown investigation into the matter - with the cooperation of the U.S. banks involved, according to sources familiar with the situation.


That list of investigators widened Thursday to include the New York U.S. District Attorney's office as well as the Russian government. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the British government and the International Monetary Fund are also part of the probe.
     "We are completely cooperating with authorities," said Frank Scarangella, a spokesman for the Bank of New York. There have been no allegations at all of the Bank of New York's involvement."
    
A sordid tale

     According to published reports in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today, the story began in 1994 when Russia's IMF representative, Konstantin Kagalovsky, left the organization to join the Menatep Bank in Moscow.
     Over the next three years, it's alleged, Kagalovsky arranged to funnel billions of IMF money meant to help fix Russia's financial woes through a private company called Benex Worldwide Ltd. and eventually into and back out of the two New York-based banks.
     In 1998, Republic Bank alerted authorities about unusually large wire transfers coming through its coffers from Russia. From that point, British and U.S. law enforcement officials monitored the ebb and flow of cash through both banks, including monitoring an account specifically held open at their request.
     "There was an account, not in the name of Benex, that was opened at Republic National Bank, and it has remained open at the specific written request of U.S. authorities," said spokeswoman Melissa Krantz. "We have been cooperating with U.S. law enforcement officials for some time. We were the ones who filed the report that initially triggered them onto this," she said.
     As for Bank of New York, it has suspended two executives - Natasha Gurfinkel Kagalovsky and Lucy Edwards - both of whom worked for the bank's Eastern European division. Konstantin Kagalovsky is Ms. Kagalovsky's husband.
    
The list goes on

     Other key players in the ever-widening saga include Peter Berlin, the husband of Ms. Edwards who opened Benex-related accounts at the Bank of New York and Semion Mogilevitch, an alleged Russian money launderer who at one point was suspected of channeling funds through YBM Magnex International Inc., a now-defunct industrial magnet producer whose shares were listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange, according to the Journal.
     Money laundering typically involves taking large cash deposits from individuals or businesses when the money is either suspected or known to have been obtained from illegal activities or for illicit purposes. The Bank Secrecy Act requires all U.S. banks to report cash deposits of $10,000 or more, as does the Money Laundering Act of 1986.
     With all the accusations and suggestions focusing on Russia, at least one U.S. lawmaker suggested that, if money has been stolen, IMF loan payments to Russia should be suspended. Russia said on Wednesday it expects to receive the next $640 million installment of a $4.5 billion IMF package.
     "Clearly the loan payment shouldn't go out if it's going to be handled the way the past has been handled," said House of Representatives Banking Committee Chairman Jim Leach. "If money is to be stolen it shouldn't be transferred."
     The House Banking Committee plans to hold hearings next month to explore the impact on U.S. banks of money laundering and on international financial corruption.
     For its part, the IMF has opted to downplay its role in the sordid tale.
     Repeating a statement prepared by the IMF on Monday, spokesman William Murray said "the allegations of money laundering in Russia are extremely serious and we are looking further into the matter." Back to top
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