Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Wednesday, July 04, 2012
Supreme Errors by U.S. Supreme Court in Upholding Obama's Health Care Plan / Politics / US Politics
By: Peter_Schiff
In the wake of my last commentary on the horrendous Supreme Court decision upholding Obama's health care plan, several people have pointed out that I erred in saying that the income tax is a "direct tax." While it is technically correct that the Court ultimately declared it to be an excise, not a direct tax, it is important to understand how it arrived at that opinion and why the decision has no practical relevance to the way the tax has been enforced. Just as it has done with Obamacare, the Court came up with a technically constitutional pathway to allow the government to collect a tax in a blatantly unconstitutional manner.Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, July 04, 2012
Angela Merkel Celebrates Declaration of Austerity / Politics / Eurozone Debt Crisis
By: Axel_Merk
Spain may have the best soccer team, but it lost control of its banking system. That's good news: the success of the Eurozone summit is not about money, but about process. For the first time in months, it appears there's a sensible path forward. For the budding euro rally to continue, actions must follow words; regardless, however, there will be investment opportunities, but don't count on the U.S. dollar to carry the day.
Tuesday, July 03, 2012
Governments Spend Wealth Instead of Building It / Politics / Government Spending
By: Bill_Bonner
Paris, France – “The US seems to have gotten the worst of it,” said a French friend this morning. We were taken aback. Everyone knows Europe is in a state of permanent crisis. The US seems solid by comparison, no?
“Now that the Supreme Court has approved Obamacare, you have the same problems we have in Europe, social welfare spending with no limits…plus you have your colossal military spending. You have both ‘bread and circuses,’ just like the ancient Romans. You are doomed.”
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Tuesday, July 03, 2012
U.S. Taxmageddon Just Got More Frightening / Politics / Taxes
By: Money_Morning
Diane Alter writes:
Political battles will take center stage in the second half of 2012, but few loom larger than the scheduled tax increases - "Taxmageddon" - set to take effect in January 2013.
Bush-era tax cuts, payroll tax breaks and other provisions set to expire next year could pack an enormous financial hit, harming the already-fragile U.S. economy and thousands of struggling families. While Democrats and Republicans alike are opposed to letting all the cuts expire, they disagree on exactly what to do about it.
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Tuesday, July 03, 2012
The Greatest Story Ever Written or Will be Written / Politics / US Politics
By: Money_Morning
Steve Christ writes:
Ask practically any American this week about their country, and they will likely tell you that - despite its faults - the United States is the greatest nation on earth.
I would even take it a step further by saying the United States is the greatest country there is, ever was, and ever will be...
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Tuesday, July 03, 2012
Notes On Mainstram Economics Is A Cult / Politics / Economic Theory
By: Submissions
Mark Blair writes:
‘Such disdain for empirical verification is not found in the physical sciences.’
Washington’s Blog
Maternal instinct? ‘Probably imaginary. An excuse to justify and perpetuate sexism.’
Encyclopedia of Feminism, Tuttle, L.
Tuesday, July 03, 2012
God Particle Finally Found: Brand New Physics Now In The Making? / Politics / Technology
By: DK_Matai
Scientists working with the world's most powerful atom smasher -- the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) -- outside Geneva at the European organisation for nuclear research (CERN) are expected to announce to the world on Wednesday 4th July 2012 that they have finally found the elusive Higgs boson – dubbed the 'God particle' because it brings mass and defines order in the universe. The results Cern scientists are preparing to announce are exactly like finding the very first fossilised imprint of a dinosaur: One sees the footprints and the shadow of the vast and formidable creature, but one doesn't actually see IT at all!
Tuesday, July 03, 2012
Audit the Fed Headed for the House Floor! / Politics / US Politics
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
Last week supporters of Federal Reserve transparency had a major victory when the House Committee on Government Oversight and Reform passed my Audit the Fed bill, HR 459 unanimously with all major audit provisions intact. This clears the way for a House floor vote expected sometime in late July, and with a whopping 263 cosponsors, the chances of it passing have never looked better! This is an unprecedented opportunity for transparency into how the currency of the United States is handled, and mishandled by the Federal Reserve. It is more important than ever that my colleagues in the House and Senate understand what this legislation does and why it is so important.
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Monday, July 02, 2012
The Exact Moment Greece Will Leave the Euro / Politics / Eurozone Debt Crisis
By: Graham_Summers
…the second Greek parliamentary elections in as many months came and went. While the media is making a big deal of the fact that the anti-bailout SYRIZA party didn’t win, the facts remain that the elections haven’t really accomplished anything of significance for Greece’s fiscal condition or the likelihood of it staying within the EU.
Monday, July 02, 2012
Marc Faber Says Germany Should have Abandoned the Eurozone Last Week / Politics / Eurozone Debt Crisis
By: Bloomberg
Marc Faber, publisher of the Gloom, Boom and Doom Report, spoke with Bloomberg Television's Betty Liu this morning and said that, "If I were running Germany, I would have abandoned the eurozone last week."
Faber went on to say, "In the case of Greece, one should have kicked out Greece three years ago. It would have been much cheaper."
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Monday, July 02, 2012
At Long Last the Euro Is Finally Being Saved / Politics / Euro
By: Christopher_Quigley
Friday the 29th of June 2012 will go down as one of the most important dates in the history of the Euro currency. In the early hours of that fateful morning German resistance to a rational and comprehensive
resolution to the Euro crisis was finally crushed. It will take some time for the full implications of this
historic result to filter through to the markets but the fact that the dark cloud of dissolution of the Euro is
now passing can only be positive.
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Monday, July 02, 2012
Time for the Second American Revolution / Politics / US Politics
By: BATR
For well over the last decade BATR has argued that the Republic is dead. Now that the Supreme Court has rendered their decision on Obamacare, there can be no doubt that the funeral for a nation, born out of a revolution for liberty, is over. The country, buried in the ashes of totalitarian despotism, is now history.
Monday, July 02, 2012
Italy in Crisis: The Decline of the Roman Democracy and Rise of the ‘Super Mario’ Technocracy / Politics / Italy
By: Andrew_G_Marshall
The European debt crisis continues into its third year, with four government bailouts – of Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain – and having imposed harsh austerity measures upon the people of Europe, forcing them to pay – through reduced standards of living and increased poverty – for the excesses of their political and financial rulers. Italy, as Europe’s third largest economy, with one of the largest debt-to-GDP ratios, plays a central role in the unfolding debt crisis across Europe. Part 1 of this excerpt from a chapter on the economic crisis in my upcoming book covers the “suspension” of democracy in Italy and the imposition of a ‘Technocracy’ – an unelected government led by academics and bankers – with a mandate to punish the people, facilitate the financial elite, and serve the interests of the supranational, unelected, technocratic European Union. Power centralized, power globalizes, power plunders and profits on the punishment and impoverishment of people everywhere. This is the story of Italy’s debt crisis.
Sunday, July 01, 2012
Free Markets, Libertarians, Trade Deficits,Economic Decline: Joseph Cotto Interviews Ian Fletcher / Politics / Economic Theory
By: Ian_Fletcher
Journalist Joseph Cotto interviewed me recently. Our conversation is below.
Q: Today, many people tend to confuse the concepts of free markets, free trade, and fair trade with one another. How would you describe each?
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Sunday, July 01, 2012
NO - A Profound Exercise of Freedom / Politics / Financial Markets 2012
By: Barry_M_Ferguson
From Dictionary.com, the word ‘no’ means ‘a negative used to express dissent, denial, or refusal, as in response to a question’. It seems to be such a simple word. But, the power of ‘no’ is lost on modern society. The ability to exercise the word ‘no’ is a profound exercise of freedom. If we can’t say ‘no’, then we have no freedom. Slaves cannot exercise the word ‘no’.
Saturday, June 30, 2012
British Parliament: the Mother of all Deceptions / Politics / UK Politics
By: William_Bowles
There -- it sickens one to have to wade through this grimy sea of opportunism. What a spectacle of shuffling, lies, vacillation and imbecility does this Game Political offer to us? I cannot conclude without an earnest appeal to those Socialists, of whatever section, who may be drawn towards the vortex of Parliamentarism, to think better of it while there is yet time. If we ally ourselves to any of the presen[t] parties they will only use us as a cat's-paw; and on the other hand, if by any chance a Socialist slips through into Parliament, he will do so at the expense of leaving his principles behind him; he will certainly not be returned as a Socialist, but as something else; what else is hard to say. As I have written before in these columns, Parliament is going just the way we would have it go. Our masters are feeling very uncomfortable under the awkward burden of GOVERNMENT, and do not know what to do, since their sole aim is to govern from above. Do not let us help them by taking part in their game. Whatever concessions may be necessary to the progress of the Revolution can be wrung out of them at least as easily by extra-Parliamentary pressure, which can be exercised without losing one particle of those principles which are the treasure and hope of Revolutionary Socialists. -- William Morris, the Commonweal, Volume 1, Number 10, November 1885, p. 93.[1]
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Mainstream Economics is a Cult / Politics / Economic Theory
By: Washingtons_Blog
Neoclassical Economics Is Based on Myth
Neoclassical economics is a cult which ignores reality in favor of shared myths.
Economics professor Michael Hudson writes:
Read full article... Read full article...[One Nobel prize winning economist stated,] “In pointing out the consequences of a set of abstract assumptions, one need not be committed unduly as to the relation between reality and these assumptions.”
Saturday, June 30, 2012
The Global Debt Trap, Come on People, Wake Up! / Politics / Global Debt Crisis 2012
By: Joseph_Russo
The never-ending D-Days of the 21st Century are getting extremely dangerous.
The revolving 'D's are all disgustingly circular, establishing a vile state, destabilizing in its nature, which entrenches a widespread destructive status-quo paralysis throughout the fabric and core of all societies subject to them.
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Saturday, June 30, 2012
U.S. Healthcare Legal Gimmickry Rescues Obamacare / Politics / US Politics
By: Peter_Schiff
Despite the celebrations among Democrats, yesterday a majority of Supreme Court justices ruled that the Constitution does not allow the government to force Americans to buy health insurance. However in providing the swing vote to uphold the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) Chief Justice John Roberts broke with the four other justices who shared that view by declaring that the methods chosen to get individuals to buy insurance were not penalties but taxes. He declared that the government wasn't legislating behavior, but simply taxing it. In reaching this tortured decision he erred by declaring the penalties to be taxes and then compounded the mistake by classifying them as "indirect taxes" that are not imposed on individuals. Apparently Roberts feels that these two wrongs will make a right. But his mistake will cost this country dearly.
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Bank of England, FSA and Politicians Try to Insulate themselves from Bankster Fraud Fallout / Politics / UK Banking
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The Bank of England, FSA and politicians of all parties have been busy all week putting up multiple screens of smoke and mirrors to try and separate themselves from their bankster brethren despite the facts of close relationships between all parties that amounts to negligence to regulate and hold bankster's to account where the fundamental fact remains that despite all of the continuing crimes amounting to an ongoing risk of actual bankruptcy of Britain i.e. continuing to inflict far more financial damage than the likes of Al-Qeeda could ever have hoped to have imagined to achieve, NO bankster criminal has gone to prison! The only consequence so far has been to lose a bonus for a year or two, let alone face the sack.