Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Liberal Democrats to Tax the Rich Out of Britain with 0.5% Property Tax / Politics / UK Politics
By: Nadeem_Walayat
One of the great things about being the third small party is that there is literally ZERO chance of becoming the next government, hence the party can announce ridiculous policies that pander to the masses but make little if any economic sense.
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Saturday, September 19, 2009
Afghanistan, Where Empires Go to Die / Politics / Afghanistan
By: Dahr_Jamail
Genghis Khan could not hold onto Afghanistan. Neither will the United States
On September 7 the Swedish aid agency Swedish Committee for Afghanistan reported that the previous week US soldiers raided one of its hospitals. According to the director of the aid agency, Anders Fange, troops stormed through both the men's and women's wards, where they frantically searched for wounded Taliban fighters.
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Saturday, September 19, 2009
For Britons, The Party Game Is Over / Politics / UK Politics
By: Submissions
John Pilger writes: On the day Prime Minister Gordon Brown made his “major policy speech” on Afghanistan, repeating his surreal claim that if the British army did not fight Pashtun tribesmen over there, they would be over here, the stench of burnt flesh hung over the banks of the Kunduz River. Nato fighter planes had blown the poorest of the poor to bits. They were Afghan villagers who had rushed to siphon off fuel from two stalled tankers. Many were children with water buckets and cooking pots. “At least” 90 were killed, although Nato prefers not to count its civilian enemy. “It was a scene from hell,” said Mohammed Daud, a witness. “Hands, legs and body parts were scattered everywhere.” No parade for them along a Wiltshire high street.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, September 19, 2009
A Radical Solution for America's Insolvent Financial System / Politics / Credit Crisis 2009
By: Mansoor_H_Khan
The core problem of the United States' banking system (and maybe the world's banking system) is not liquidity but insolvency. The liabilities of the United States' banking system exceed the value of its assets. The issue is not only the toxic assets (toxic mortgage backed securities, toxic commercial real estate loans, sub-prime mortgages, alt-A loans, adjustable loans likely to go bust, increase in prime mortgage default rates, etc) but also off-balance sheet liabilities (such as expected huge unaccounted for future derivatives losses).
Friday, September 18, 2009
Lehman Brothers Bankruptcy Revisited / Politics / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Peter_Schiff
As we pass the one year anniversary of the fall of Lehman Brothers, journalists, politicians and market analysts have seized on the occasion to offer seemingly sober assessments of what went wrong and what went right in the lead up and aftermath of the biggest financial event since Black Tuesday.
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Friday, September 18, 2009
The Cold War Fraud / Politics / GeoPolitics
By: Mark_G_Brennan
For fifty years after the end of World War II, the United States based much of its Cold War strategy on the principle that the Soviet Union thought nothing of nuclear annihilation. In order to counter the communist hordes from the east, the United States spent itself into insolvency building up its defense forces, both conventional and nuclear. American leaders spared no expense – in terms of taxpayer treasure or military conscripts’ blood – to counter the postwar communist threat.
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Friday, September 18, 2009
Lehman Died So TARP and AIG Might Live / Politics / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Mike_Whitney
"Lehman's fate was sealed not in the boardroom of that gaudy Manhattan headquarters. It was sealed downtown, in the gloomy gray building of the New York Federal Reserve, the Wall Street branch of the U.S. central bank." ~ Stephen Foley, UK Independent
Friday, September 18, 2009
Defeat the Debt- the TV ad and the American Right / Politics / US Debt
By: Michael_T_Bucci
A TV ad that Mr Benjamin A Shobert describes in disturbing detail in Asia Times this week is part of an overall campaign that includes this national television commercial, which is currently airing on Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, and CNBC. Additionally, full-page ads are running in The New York Times, USA Today, The Washington Times, The Washington Examiner, The San Francisco Chronicle, and The Las Vegas Review-Journal. Mr Shobert rightly deduces that for the US, China is the financial bogeyman.
Friday, September 18, 2009
How to Pay Off the National Debt / Politics / US Debt
By: Nikki_Alexander
It’s all the rage these days to sell public assets to pay off government debt. We mustn’t default, after all. We just hate to see our national parks, public roads, energy grids, water, hospitals and schools being sold to robber barons. Do we have anything to sell that the majority of Americans wouldn’t mind parting with?
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Thursday, September 17, 2009
Russia Loans Venezuela $2.2 Billion to Buy Russian Arms / Politics / Russia
By: Pravda
Venezuela has spent about $4.5 billion on Russia’s military hardware within the scope of 12 contracts that were officially signed during the recent several years. The Latin American nation particularly bought 24 Su-30 jets, tens of battle choppers and 100,000 Kalashnikov assault rifles.
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Thursday, September 17, 2009
Missile Defense and Washington’s Foolish Eurasia Strategy / Politics / GeoPolitics
By: F_William_Engdahl
Eight months into the Obama Presidency the outlines of Administration foreign policy are becoming very clear and what is emerging is a foreign policy establishment flying blind on automatic pilot, evidently unable to make the fundamental policy changes required of its new geopolitical and economic position in the world since the collapse of the Greenspan “revolution in finance” September 2008.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
9/11 and the Mysterious Collapse of WTC Seven / Politics / Conspiracy Theory
By: David_Ray_Griffin
Why NIST’s Final 9/11 Report is Unscientific and False
At 5:21 in the afternoon of 9/11, almost seven hours after the Twin Towers had come down, Building 7 of the World Trade Center also came down. The collapse of this building was from the beginning considered a mystery. [1]
The same should have been true, to be sure, of the collapse of the Twin Towers. But they had been hit by planes, which had ignited big fires in them, and many people assumed this combination of causes to be sufficient to explain why they came down.
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Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Americans Get Screwed Again by Bought-Off Washington Officials / Politics / Healthcare Sector
By: Mike_Stathis
After meeting yesterday to wrap up the final touches on the Senate Finance committee's healthcare reform bill, Committee Chairman, Senator Max Baucus - a very good friend of the healthcare industry, has announced the bill is ready for a vote as early as next week.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Ron Paul's Battle for Financial Sanity / Politics / Central Banks
By: David_Gordon
Ron Paul has since the inception of his tenure in Congress waged a heroic battle for financial sanity, and in End the Fed he gives us insights from that struggle available nowhere else. Dr. Paul had from an early age an affinity for the free market. "In the 1960s," he tells us, "I discovered the writings of economists such as Ludwig von Mises, F.A. Hayek, Murray N. Rothbard, and Hans F. Sennholz. I gradually found the answers I had been searching for. Even for the experts, it literally took centuries to fully understand the nature of money and the business cycle." (p.43)
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
How High Will the Financial Fraud Reach? / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Marilyn_M_Barnewall
Most Americans are very aware that something is drastically wrong with their government. The majority doesn’t know exactly how to define the problem(s), but they innately sense that a train is headed down the tracks toward them. Unfortunately, they can see neither the train nor the tracks.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Misreading the Iranian Nuclear Situation / Politics / Iran
By: STRATFOR
The Iranians have now agreed to talks with the P-5+1, the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council (the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia and China) plus Germany. These six countries decided in late April to enter into negotiations with Iran over the suspected Iranian nuclear weapons program by Sept. 24, the date of the next U.N. General Assembly meeting. If Iran refused to engage in negotiations by that date, the Western powers in the P-5+1 made clear that they would seriously consider imposing much tougher sanctions on Iran than those that were currently in place. The term “crippling” was mentioned several times.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Smash the Labor Monopolies! / Politics / Employment
By: Ayn_Rand
Thomas Bowden writes: When President Obama addresses the AFL-CIO on Sept. 15, he is expected to reiterate his support for the so-called Employee Free Choice Act. Congress is sharply divided over the proposed law, which would change the voting and arbitration procedures by which federal law forces companies to deal with labor unions.
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Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Imminent $30 Billion Bailout of Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Nilus_Mattive
I’ve talked about corporate pension plans before, but in a few short weeks I think we’re going to get some shocking news. Namely, that the government backup for failed pension plans is more underfunded than it has ever been before.
Back in April, I told you a bit about the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation and its decade of running in the red.
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Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Health Care Deceit / Politics / Healthcare Sector
By: Paul_Craig_Roberts
The current health care “debate” shows how far gone representative government is in the United States. Members of Congress represent the powerful interest groups that fill their campaign coffers, not the people who vote for them.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Lehman Post Mortem, Did Bernanke and Paulson Blackmail Congress? / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Mike_Whitney
"Lehman's fate was sealed not in the boardroom of that gaudy Manhattan headquarters. It was sealed downtown, in the gloomy gray building of the New York Federal Reserve, the Wall Street branch of the U.S. central bank." Stephen Foley, U.K. Independent