Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Tuesday, June 14, 2016
Philosophy of the New World Order / Politics / New World Order
The phrase, New World Order, just does not seem comprehensive enough to explain the circumstances that mankind is living under. The German expression, "weltanschauung" referred to as a philosophical view or apprehension of the universe is often used to ponder the human condition. Individual beliefs and understanding of the very nature of mankind was once seen in the convention of the Greek school of thought reflected in the teaching of Plato and Aristotle. Western Civilization essentially is based upon these principles and the cosmology of our heritage is involved and inseparable with an understanding of our spiritual dimension.
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Monday, June 13, 2016
Fascism: A Bipartisan Affliction / Politics / US Politics
If neoconservatives and progressives truly understood fascism, they would stop using the word as a smear term. That is because both groups, along with most political figures and commentators, embrace fascist ideas and policies.
Fascism's distinguishing characteristic is a "mixed economy." Unlike socialists and communists who seek to abolish private business, fascists are content to let business remain in private hands. Instead, fascists use regulations, mandates, and taxes to control business and run (and ruin) the economy. A fascist system, then, is one where private businesses serve politicians and bureaucrats instead of consumers. Does the modern American economy not fit the definition of fascism?
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Monday, June 13, 2016
Who’s Really The Fascist? / Politics / Social Issues
Like most of you, I too see an increase in the use of the term ‘fascism’ in the media, and it is -almost- always linked to the rise of Donald Trump in the US and various politicians and parties in Europe, Le Pen in France, Wilders in Holland, Erdogan in Turkey, plus a pretty bewildering and motley crew of ‘groups’ in Eastern Europe (Hungary’s Orban) and Scandinavia. I guess you could throw in Nigel Farage and UKIP in Britain as well.
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Monday, June 13, 2016
China’s Maritime Moves Are Nothing More Than a Show of Strength / Politics / China US Conflict
BY GEORGE FRIEDMAN : The Chinese have a strategic problem in the South and East China Seas. China is obviously interested in what happens in these waters, but there is much speculation as to why the level of interest is so high.
The answer is simple: China wants to keep foreign powers away from its coast and away from waters vital to its global trade routes.
China’s greatest threat in these waters is the United States. Given the size of the US Navy and the location of the islands off China’s coast, the Navy is capable of blocking China's access to the ocean. This would deal a serious economic blow to China.
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Monday, June 13, 2016
Presidential Dictatorship / Politics / Social Issues
Executive orders, undeclared wars, drone hits, assassination of citizens and non-citizens alike, the overthrow of foreign regimes, domestic spying, the abetting of known criminal activities through pardons, economic planning, opening borders, monetary manipulations are just some of the nefarious activities that routinely emanate from the most dangerous political office that the world has ever painfully come to know – the United States Presidency!
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Sunday, June 12, 2016
What Makes Venezuela Different / Politics / Venezuela
Ryan W. McMaken writes: Unlike other leftist South American regimes, the Venezuela regime has intentionally crushed even the middle and working classes.
The economic disaster in Venezuela has prompted many to take a look at the country and attempt to understand what it is that has made things so bad in Venezuela.
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Saturday, June 11, 2016
Senators Embedded Within a Brain Fog / Politics / US Politics
The U.S. Senate—under the leadership of Mitch McConnell who once said his primary mission was to see that the Senate didn’t agree with anything President Obama said or did, and to limit him to one term—continues to be one of the nation’s leading obstructionists. This time, the Senate isn’t meeting to advise or consent to the President’s nomination of Chief Judge Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court.
Garland was valedictorian in his class at Harvard College and a magna ***** laude graduate from the Harvard law school. He worked in the Department of Justice before becoming the chief judge on the D,C. Court of Appeals, having been confirmed by the Senate, March 1997.
Saturday, June 11, 2016
Who Shall Wear The Robe And Crown? / Politics / Social Issues
I was going to take a day off today, partly because a kind Automatic Earth reader in Athens insisted on taking me out to lunch, partly because I need a break, and partly because the Financial Times complained about their inclusion in my Debt Rattles, which makes me think about the whole thing. Nothing bad about that. Think is good.
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Friday, June 10, 2016
Bilderberg Will Not Allow Britain to BrExit - Where Is The Mainstream Media? / Politics / EU_Referendum
Bilderberg was founded in 1954 and is an annual private conference of 120 to 150 people of the European and North American political elite, leaders from industry, finance, academia and the media.
Along with Luke Rudkowski of We Are Change and Dan Dicks of Press For Truth, I infiltrated the conference last year. We were surprised to find the entire White House Press Corp. staying in the Bilderberg hotel in Austria. We wondered if Bilderberg was finally going to be more transparent.
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Thursday, June 09, 2016
How Fiat Money Destroys Culture / Politics / Fiat Currency
Jörg Guido Hülsmann writes: It may seem unusual that an economist would talk about culture. Usually, we talk about prices and production, quantities produced, employment, the structure of production, scarce resources, and entrepreneurship.
But there are certain things that economists can say about the culture, and more precisely, that economists can say about the transformation of the culture. So what is culture? Well, to put it simply, it is the way we do things. This can include the way we eat — whether or not we dine with family members on a regular basis, for example — how we sleep, and how we use automobiles or other modes of transportation. And of course, the way we produce, consume, or accumulate capital are important aspects of the culture as well.
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Monday, June 06, 2016
Germany May Be a Bigger Threat to the European Union than Brexit / Politics / European Union
Two polls were recently released that call the European Union in question.
A poll in Italy reported that the Five Star Movement (a populist political party that wants to hold a referendum on whether Italy should remain in the European Union) was the most popular political party in the country ahead of local elections scheduled for next month.
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Monday, June 06, 2016
You Are Here, the Next Fourth Turning, No More Room to Increase Leverage / Politics / Social Issues
The next Fourth Turning is due to begin shortly after the new millennium, midway through the Oh-Oh decade. Around the year 2005, a sudden spark will catalyze a Crisis mood. Remnants of the old social order will disintegrate. Political and economic trust will implode. Real hardship will beset the land, with severe distress that could involve questions of class, race, nation and empire. The very survival of the nation will feel at stake. Sometime before the year 2025, America will pass through a great gate in history, commensurate with the American Revolution, Civil War, and twin emergencies of the Great Depression and World War II." - Strauss & Howe - The Fourth Turning
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Sunday, June 05, 2016
Muhammad Ali - Did The Greatest American Alive Just Die? / Politics / Social Issues
“Boxing legend dies”, is what most headlines say. And the news was first reported on sports pages, though it did soon move to frontpages, fast.
Muhammad Ali was so much more than a boxing legend. So much more that to mention boxing first doesn’t do him justice. Ali was first and foremost a very brave and intelligent man, who changed America for the better. Or should we say: changed Americans?
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Tuesday, May 31, 2016
Here’s Where the TSA Got This One Wrong / Politics / US Politics
My wife hates to fly. It’s not the planes that bother her, although she’s no fan of turbulence. It’s the security process. There’s something about passing through a low-level X-ray machine that can see through your clothes that gives her the willies. Who can blame her?And then there’s the Transportation Security Agency (TSA) agents themselves. Why is it that six or seven seem to be just hanging out while three of them work one security machine, as 200 people wait in line?
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Tuesday, May 31, 2016
Here’s How Greece’s Bailout Falls Short / Politics / Eurozone Debt Crisis
If you lent a guy money and he failed to pay you back, would you lend to him a second time? How about a third time?
That’s exactly what’s going on in Europe.
The European Central Bank (ECB), European Commission (EC), and the IMF – the three entities collectively known as the Troika – bailed out Greece in 2010… then again in 2012.
Tuesday, May 31, 2016
Alan Greenspan Warns That Venezuelan Style Martial Law Will Soon Come To The US / Politics / US Politics
It seems barely a day passes now without some big name person warning of imminent collapse. The latest is Alan Greenspan.
In an interview on Thursday he told Fox News that Venezuela is now under martial law and that “America is next.” He said that what was happening in Venezuela was inevitably going to take place in the US.
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Monday, May 30, 2016
Long Live the Flags of Dixie! / Politics / US Politics
On May 19, the House of Reprehensibles passed a proposal that would essentially ban the display of Confederate flags from national cemeteries. The amendment was added to a Veteran Affairs spending bill.
Not surprisingly, House Speaker Paul Ryan allowed the measure to be voted upon in hopes of not disrupting the appropriations process. Yes, by all means Paul, the redistribution of taxpayers’ confiscated wealth should take precedent over a draconian attempt to eradicate a heroic symbol of the country’s past. Hopefully, Ryan will be ousted this November as both Speaker and Congressman for not only his consistent sell out to Obummer and the Democrats on the budget, but his lack of understanding and appreciation of what is arguably the most important period of American history.
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Monday, May 30, 2016
This Is Not The America My Parents Immigrated To In 1957 / Politics / US Politics
Not that I remember what America was like in 1957, as I was not yet five years old. Years later, when I was old enough to understand, they told me their story. Briefly, it goes like this.
Dad was born in Romania (Czernowitz in Northern Bulovina), but he identified (haha) as German because, well, his dad was German, his mom was German, they spoke German and kept German customs, and lived in a German community so, applying the “quacking duck” theory, that’s what he was. Mom was born in Yugoslavia (now, Slovenia), but she identified as German for the same reasons as dad did. The Nazi regime would refer to folks such as my parents as “Volksdeutsche” —- being German as a people or race, regardless of citizenship. More on that here.
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Sunday, May 29, 2016
Retaking Raqqa From the Islamic State / Politics / ISIS Islamic State
The battle for Raqqa, the Islamic State's self-declared capital in Syria, has begun. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are advancing toward the city, engaging the jihadist group in the villages of al-Hisha, Tal Samen and Mutamshirij along the way. Because of Raqqa's strategic importance, the Islamic State will do everything in its power to keep the city within its grasp. Driving the militants from their stronghold will not be easy or cheap, but if the SDF is successful, it will greatly accelerate the Islamic State's defeat in Syria.
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Sunday, May 29, 2016
Memorial Day Crocodile Tears from Those Who Create Wars / Politics / US Politics
A few million Americans may be thinking about it, but won’t be celebrating Memorial Day. For them, there’s not much to celebrate or to remember.
They’re the low-wage employees who may have to work all three days, without overtime; about three million workers earn the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. Many work 30 to 35 hours a week, just low enough that their employers don’t have to pay for insurance, holidays, or sick leave. The corporate CEOs, of course, will be enjoying the long weekend at their alternate vacation homes in the mountains, or along the coasts, or at off-shore islands where they have found banks willing to hide their money and avoid U.S. taxes.