Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Insurance Companies Profit from Obamacare / Politics / US Politics
By: BATR
No one can reasonably deny that the major Insurance Companies were the driving force behind the writing of the Affordable Care Act legislation. "The health care industry spent nearly $500 million lobbying for health care issues in 2012, and $243 million so far in 2013." Obamacare or Corporate-care: The Writing of the Affordable Care Act, sums up the process.
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Obama Lies to Merkel on NSA Spying / Politics / US Politics
By: Stephen_Lendman
He lied claiming otherwise. He’s a serial liar. He’s a moral coward. He’s a war criminal multiple times over. He did what supporters thought impossible.
He exceeds the worst of George Bush. He plans lots more ways to prove it through 2016. Humanity may not survive the ordeal.
On October 27, Deutche Welle (DW) headlined “Media reports suggest Obama knew NSA spied on Merkel.”
Der Spiegel said NSA’s Special Collection Service (SCS) monitored her cell phone conversations since 2002. Obama lied telling Merkel he knew nothing about it.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
India Taken Over by Foreign Banks? / Politics / Banksters
By: Global_Research
Kavaljit Singh writes: On October 12, Raghuram Rajan, the new Governor of the Reserve Bank of India, announced that the RBI will soon issue new rules allowing a more liberal entry of foreign banks in India. “That is going to be a big opening because one could even contemplate taking over Indian banks, small Indian banks and so on,” he stated in Washington at an event organized by the Institute of International Finance, a global banking lobby group.
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
From Sykes Picot To Anarchy In The Arab World / Politics / Middle East
By: Andrew_McKillop
SYKES PICOT AND LENIN
When it was signed in May 1916 the Sykes-Picot-Sazonov agreement was a secret carve-up accord set by the British and French diplomats, Sir Mark Sykes and Georges Picot, and Imperial Russia's foreign minister Sergei Sazonov. In 1916 the deal still included Imperial Russia for setting “spheres” of colonial power and influence in the soon-to-fall Turkish Ottoman empire. After the Bolshevik Revolution in November 1917, Vladimir Lenin found a copy of the agreement in Russian archives. By way of the agreement, Russia would control Turkish Armenia and northern Kurdistan. Lenin and the Communists were happy to widely publish agreement – because to them it was nothing but another Imperial carve-up of dominated peoples – and also fell far short of what Russia had expected from the deal, especially concerning Persia or Iran. The Communists totally rejected the deal.
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
The Postal Worker Assumed the Gun Wasn’t Loaded / Politics / Government Spending
By: Don_Miller
A man with a wooden leg worked with my dad at the post office. I could even hear his leg creak as he limped along. Remember, this was long before I needed a hearing aid. When I asked if he'd lost his leg in the war, my dad said "no." It was a hunting accident. Then he launched into a lecture on gun safety. "He assumed the gun was not loaded, and now he is crippled for life."
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
Expendable People as a Result of Murderous Academic Economics / Politics / Economic Theory
By: John_Kozy
The English who settled America brought English culture with them. The colonies were nothing but little Englands. When the colonists revolted, they were merely trying to get free of the tyrannical English monarchy, not trying to change the culture. They were perfectly happy with the English way of life. They carried on its practices and adopted the English system of common law.
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
The NSA’s Rent Is Too Damn High / Politics / Intelligence Agencies
By: Steve_H_Hanke
For months, the American public has received a steady stream of new information detailing the massive scale and scope of the United States’ spying activities. Of course, maintaining a surveillance state powerful enough to reach into the inboxes of world leaders, friend and foe, is not cheap. Indeed, as the Washington Post revealed when it released portions of the so-called Black Budget, this year’s price tag on America’s spook infrastructure comes out to a whopping $52.6 billion.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
France Suspends Its New Muppet Tax / Politics / France
By: Andrew_McKillop
THEY CALL IT THE ECOTAX
Reuters reported, October 29, that French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault is suspending the application of a planned environmental tax, called the “ecological” tax on vehicles above 3.5 tons weight after mounting protests in the western Britanny region, dealing another setback for President Hollande's Parti Socialiste government tax policies.
Monday, October 28, 2013
Canada Bans "Disappearing Palestine" The Theft of a Whole Nation / Politics / Middle East
By: Global_Research
Ali Abunimah writes: The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) has rejected a group’s bus ad showing Israel’s expropriation of Palestinian land over time, claiming the ad could incite anti-Jewish discrimination and violence. The ad, sponsored by Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME), is similar to others that have appeared in cities all over North America – including Vancouver. CJPME has said it is ready to appeal the censorship of the ad all the way to Canada’s Supreme Court.
Monday, October 28, 2013
America's Culture of Ignorance / Politics / Social Issues
By: James_Quinn
“Five percent of the people think; ten percent of the people think they think; and the other eighty-five percent would rather die than think.” - Thomas Edison
The kabuki theater that passes for governance in Washington D.C. reveals the profound level of ignorance shrouding this Empire of Debt in its prolonged death throes. Ignorance of facts; ignorance of math; ignorance of history; ignorance of reality; and ignorance of how ignorant we’ve become as a nation, have set us up for an epic fall. It’s almost as if we relish wallowing in our ignorance like a fat lazy sow in a mud hole. The lords of the manor are able to retain their power, control and huge ill-gotten riches because the government educated serfs are too ignorant to recognize the self-evident contradictions in the propaganda they are inundated with by state controlled media on a daily basis.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, October 28, 2013
Ron Paul - Saudi Arabia Insists that the U.S. Fight its Battles, a Welcome Reset / Politics / US Politics
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
Last week it was reported that Saudi Arabia decided to make a "major shift" away from its 80 years of close cooperation with the United States. The Saudi leadership is angry that the Obama administration did not attack Syria last month, and that it has not delivered heavy weapons to the Syrian rebels fighting to overthrow the Assad government. Saudi Arabia is heavily invested in the overthrow of the Assad government in Syria, sending money and weapons to the rebels.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, October 28, 2013
Nuclear Power Dirty Bomb / Politics / Nuclear Power
By: Andrew_McKillop
THE 100-YEAR CURSE
Within the next 15 – 20 years as many as 100 industry standard Westinghouse-type 900 MW PWR pressurized water reactors, concentrated in the "old nuclear' countries will have to be decommissioned, dismantled and their sites made safe - unless political deciders maintain the sinister farce of rubber stamping reactor operating lifetime extensions. The decontamination process could take as long as 100 years. In several countries, especially Germany, Switzerland and probably Japan the dangerous game of politically-decided reactor life extensions – to push back the date of final decommissioning - has already ended or is ending.
Sunday, October 27, 2013
NSA Spying on America's Closes Allies - Merkel, Hollande, Rouseff, Nieto, … / Politics / Intelligence Agencies
By: Stephen_Lendman
On October 24, London’s Guardian headlined “NSA monitored calls of 35 world leaders after US official handed over contacts,” saying:
Snowden released documents revealed it. “An official in another US government department” gave NSA over 200 private phone numbers.
Thirty-five world leaders were included. They weren’t named. It’s not hard imagining likely targets. Germany’s Angela Merkel is one. So is France’s Francois Hollande.
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, October 27, 2013
Why Did Global Warming Stop? / Politics / Climate Change
By: Andrew_McKillop
TRY, TRY, TRY AGAIN
Have you heard the one about how global warming stopped in 1998? The warmist lobby certainly heard it, and it hurts.
They tried calling it a “pause,” a “hiatus,” a “slowdown” and then groped around to an “unknown mechanism”. Of warming, of course. Despite everything, warming goes on. Even when the figures show it isn't happening it is happening but you, the ignoramus, are unable to appreciate its subtleties. Warmists and their glove puppet friends in the media therefore made a point of ignoring NASA's most recent satellite report on the world's ice sheets.
The Antarctic ice sheet has grown to its biggest on record since regular satellite recordings started in 1979. The Arctic ice sheet has also grown, by a huge amount in the past 12 months.
Saturday, October 26, 2013
Time Out For The PetroDollar Conspiracy / Politics / Fiat Currency
By: Andrew_McKillop
FIRST YOU HAVE TO BELIEVE
I have plenty of articles published on this subject, and I break up the 40-odd years of “the petrodollar system” into at least 3 clear main phases. More important, the present one is the last one. For a valedictory and uncertain, but official argument for the present phase, the US Federal Reserve Bank of NY has a full statement http://www.newyorkfed.org/research/current_issues/ci12-9/ci12-9.html.
Thursday, October 24, 2013
What an 81% Increase in Food Stamp Use Really Means for the U.S. Economy / Politics / US Economy
By: DailyGainsLetter
Mohammad Zulfiqar writes: Each day, there’s growing evidence that suggests the American economy isn’t experiencing any economic growth. Unequal job creation is just one of the main topics discussed in the mainstream, but sadly, there are many other facts and figures that show a gruesome image of the U.S. economy as well.
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, October 24, 2013
Mexico's Zetas Are Not Finished Yet / Politics / Mexico
By: STRATFOR
Scott Stewart and Tristan Reed write: During the question-and-answer portion of our quarterly Mexico Security Monitor webinar, we were asked a question pertaining to the current status of Los Zetas. The question was something to the effect of: "Some Mexican media outlets and analysts claim that Los Zetas have been dismantled as an organization and are now little more than a 'ragtag operation.' Why do you disagree with that assessment?"
This question apparently came in response to our quarterly cartel report (an abbreviated version is available here), in which we wrote that despite the leadership losses suffered by Los Zetas, including the arrest of their leader, Miguel "Z-40" Trevino Morales, there were no signs that other leaders were challenging the current leader and Miguel's brother, Omar Trevino Morales. We also wrote that we believed Los Zetas have maintained their operational capabilities in terms of drug smuggling and other criminal activity, and that they have retained the ability to defend their operations and to continue conducting offensive operations deep in their rivals' territory.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Greenspan - No Apologies, I'm Not Superman! / Politics / US Federal Reserve Bank
By: Bloomberg
In an interview with Bloomberg Television's Sara Eisen, Alan Greenspan defends his actions on monetary policy, offering no apologies for missing economic forecasts.
Greenspan said: "I am in the business where, Harry Truman once said, 'If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen'... I apologize for something I did wrong, and I do apologize. I don't apologize...I was doing the best I can. The arguments, some of which are quite accurate is I missed certain forecasts, you don't apologize for that. Do you? I don't. We are not omniscient. I am a human being. I cannot see beyond the horizon any more than anyone else can. Now to apologize for not being Superman, I just refuse to do that because that never entered my mind."
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Europe's Very Distressed Energy Transition / Politics / Energy Resources
By: Andrew_McKillop
DISTRESSED ASSETS
Excepting Europe's stalled and shrunken, and totally uneconomic biofuels programme, and its more successful energy saving, the continent's energy transition is almost entirely focused on the power sector, aiming to “back out” fossil fuels for power generation by nearly-100% within 35 years.
Not so long ago, in 2008, Europe's top-20 market traded electric power companies bundled into European utility indices like Stoxx Europe 600 Utilities, the Bloomberg European Utilities Index and the MSCI European Utilities Index had a combined market value of more than 1000 billion euros.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Transfers Excluded, JP Morgan Chase is Wired / Politics / Banksters
By: BATR
The rumblings of capital and currency controls are causing a stir among perceptive financial observers. You do not have to be a business-banking customer to fear the consequences of restricting the transfer of money. Both domestic and international wires are no longer available to be sent from a business savings account, may seem unimportant to the average Chase customer. Many do not have enough money on deposit to pay the wire fee. However, the kicker is that you can still receive wire transfers.