Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

For over 14 centuries, the Vatican was the undisputed wealthest single economic entity in the world.

The problem is that the Catholic Church hides its wealth behind tens of thousands of front companies, blind trusts, off shore accounts and other financial loopholes to both avoid tax and the revelation of its wealth.

Globally, the wealth of the Catholic Church is estimated to be in excess of $3,000 Billion

The Vatican is by far the largest holder of land titles for any organisation or government in the world with visible title to around US $316 Billion of property (churches, schools, hospitals etc) and around US $2,623 Billion of investment property hidden in an extremely complex networks of hundreds of thousands of trusts and front companies.

The current market property value of Vatican City, in the heart of Rome alone is worth between US $1 Billion and $3 Billion. This excludes the value of the priceless artworks and valuables stored within its walls.

The most valuable property holdings of the Catholic Church by nation is the United States with around $50 Billion in visible property holdings and around $507 Billion in hidden property holdings through a massively complex network of front companies and trusts.

I was told two weeks ago by a man who's friend had a degree in economics left his job and became a Priest , not sure what church it was thing it was C&E , and the church asked him to work for them as an accountant. He found out that all the clergy in London had sandwiches delived to them every day from Fortam & Masons at a cost of £ 10,000 a week, when he reported this he was told his job was to do the accounts and not to question the workings of the church.

It sounds like some of the churches are akin to the the City of London and its apparatchiks, wannabes and other riff raff living on the Thames Embankments, begging for the state to bail them out.

The Catholic Church has huge holdings in banks across the world and in the US in particular. The Federal Bank of the US is not a public institution as many believe. It is owned by US banks as was our BoE until 1948. The Catholic Church could easily have prevented the most recent bank crash. They are alleged to have 30% of all the gold ever mined. There was a calculation made that in 1800, they could have employed every person on earth and paid them in gold for several centuries. Their yearly income has been estimated at $175bn a year.

Haze.


Your missionary zeal amazes me.

8-)

That is one of my positions!

Anyone else think BBC's Preston should be stood against a wall and shot ???

What a waste of airtime he is and even worse some people actually believe the crap he spouts !!!

about what? ..... i assume there was some article to which you objected

electionista ‏@electionista
UK - Opinium/Observer poll:

CON 28%
LAB 37%
LDEM 8%
UKIP 17%

Morning gf.

does that poll by the graun indicate seat totals?

In case Manuel missed it!

Update - Labour lead at 7
by YouGov in Politics
Sun February 16, 2014 6 a.m. GMT

Latest YouGov / Sunday Times results 14th February - Con 32%, Lab 39%, LD 9%, UKIP 12%;

The monthly online ComRes poll for the Independent on Sunday and Sunday Mirror is out tonight with topline figures of

CON 32%(+2), LAB 37%(+2), LDEM 9%(+1), UKIP 15%(-4).

Wee Eck has a problem....



Jose Manuel Barroso: nearly impossible for Scotland to join EU

Major blow for Scottish indendence as EU's most senior official warns it would be 'extremely difficult' to get approval of all member states



By Matthew Holehouse, Political Correspondent

11:50AM GMT 16 Feb 2014



IT would be almost impossible for Scotland to join the European Union if the country becomes independent, the EU’s most senior official has warned in a major blow to Alex Salmond.


Jose Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission, said it would be “very difficult, if not impossible” for Scotland to get the agreement of all EU states to join the bloc.


Membership of the EU is central to Alex Salmond’s blueprint for separation.


The Scottish Government has claimed that following a vote for separation, they would negotiate with the EU commission and member states for a “smooth transition” so that Scotland is a full EU member on independence day, marked as 24 March 2016.



http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scotland/10641833/Jose-Manuel-Barroso-nearly-impossible-for-Scotland-to-join-EU.html

Before Cameroon and his loony mates jump for joy with what Barroso said;

These are the smaller members of the EU, many of whom may have links to Scotland and would be happy to see another small country join,

Malta 419,000
 Luxembourg 542,000
 Cyprus 888,000
 Estonia 1,283,000
 Latvia 2,011,000
 Slovenia 2,062,000
 Lithuania 2,956,000
 Croatia 4,258,000
 Ireland 4,662,000
 Slovakia 5,413,000
 Finland 5,436,000
 Denmark 5,612,000
 Bulgaria 7,261,000
 Austria 8,477,000
 Sweden 9,595,000
 Hungary 9,894,000
 Czech Republic 10,519,000
 Portugal 10,609,000
 Greece 10,758,000
 Belgium 11,162,000
 


-=======.

Also, if they did win the referendum they have the pound in "their pocket" and have a 2 year + period to disentangle themselves from the UK Union.

It would probably push them into using the Euro as Slovenia, Montenegro, Bosnia.

They would be tied to the exchange rate of the Euro.

Probably, initially chaos, but would settle down within a five year period.

======

The little ones have little influence on the value of the currency, but benefit by protection of it.

If little Englanders succeed and leave the EU completely, much of future overseas investment will go straight into the EU, slowly more and more bye passing the C.of.L.

Interesting to watch from the sidelines.

You are missing the point Fred, the €uroburgers don't want Scootland to join as a separate entity, it would open too many other doors....think Spain and the Catalans for one.

fossy miss the point?
how could you accuse our resident, supercilious, armchair pedagogue of such a crime?

Manuel.

Go back to waitering, your record is stuck

======

My guess, if the the Scots vote is for separation, then the EU will accept them as another minor sized group.

The same "moans" were said about the Eire.

Croatia, Slovenia and other countries before they were accepted.

The Scot's values have more in common with the EU than England.

I think it may leave Labour with few problems to overcome if the the Scots vote to leave the Union, but if the Scots vote to stay in the Union I can't see the torrid party or UKIP having more than one Scottish seated MP at Westminster, which may be what Milliband and Balls are thinking.

Balls, Cameron and Darling, may be gambling that the threat will back fire on Osborne (The Baronet) and Wavy Dave.

========


But they don't have to be "in" the E.U to use the euro, other states do.

But some in Scotland look to the Krona.

=========

Read http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/16/scotland-independence-sterling-george-osborne


Interesting reflection of the possible emotional effect of the Bullying,

The article is to long for Manuel's feeble intellect.

Actually putting Manuel and intellect is a bit unfair.















to the the meaning of the word "intellect"!

Fred you are a raz pe fin vye granmoun. :-))