[The Liberty Insight Newswire is an aggregation of what we consider to be important financial and political news and commentary from across the web.]

Today’s stories focus on the serious financial issues facing state and local governments, and some well deserved rants against the big banks………………………….

60 Minutes — State Budgets: Day of Reckoning
CBS News, Dec. 19, 2010

If you haven’t seen it, check out the 60 Minutes segment on the coming crisis with state and local governments. The austerity and bailout fiasco we saw unfold in Europe in 2010 is coming to America and it’s not good news for bondholders, banks and the economy in general.

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Bill Still is a leader in the push for Monetary reform. His documentary The Money Masters exposes our fractional reserve Federal Reserve banking system for what it is — a scheme to enrich bankers at the expense of the people. (You can check it out on youtube but be warned, it’s 3 1/2 hours and Still may be the world’s worst narrator.) Why on earth would a nation borrow money at interest when it could issue the money itself? Why should private banks be able to create money out of thin air to loan out at a profit? Check out his opening rant, er, remarks at a monetary reform conference in England.

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Jerry Brown: California Budget Is “Much Worse Than I Thought– We’ve Been Living In Fantasy Land”
Business Insider, Dec. 15, 2010

Be sure to click on the link for the 16 reasons California is like Greece.

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A Secretive Banking Elite Rules Trading in Derivatives
New York Times, Dec. 11, 2010

More evidence that the too big to fail banks just run everything.