Category: Social Issues
The analysis published under this category are as follows.
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Bangladesh Clothing Factory Collapse Tragedy Exposes Real Cost of Corporate Greed / Politics / Social Issues
By: Money_Morning
Greg Madison writes: We've known for a long time that the things that fuel our lifestyles can come from some pretty ugly places.
The coltan that's used in our mobile phones and entertainment systems is mostly mined in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where millions have died in what's been called "Africa's World War." The United Nations has reported that warlords, guilty of numerous crimes against humanity, vie for control of coltan production while enslaving and killing thousands.
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Thursday, April 25, 2013
A Message for America's Middle and Lower Class Slaves / Politics / Social Issues
By: Jeff_Berwick
Hi Slaveys,
What a month... near economic collapse in Cyprus giving us a taste of what's going to happen to our bank accounts here when things start to really fall apart (Bitcoin, anyone?), people blowing up people with bombs, badly maintained factories (inexplicably built near homes) exploding, Chicago under water, and a government that's 100% unresponsive and useless to anyone who isn't lining their pockets. Time to revisit Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs for some tips on how to live the calmest life possible for people who aren't able to leave the States.
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Wednesday, April 17, 2013
The Boston Massacre Theories / Politics / Social Issues
By: Michael_T_Bucci
Hours after the tragic massacre at the Boston Marathon on April 15, web writers and bloggers filled the internet with "theories", and professional new organizations did likewise.
Alex Spillius of UK's The Telegraph summarized these theories the morning after: "The first is that domestic right-wing extremists were responsible. The second is that Islamists, either foreign or American, and linked to al-Qaeda spiritually or practically, were to blame. A third possibility is killers with no ideological agenda whatsoever." However, Mr. Spillius, sitting 4,800 km from Back Bay Boston, strikingly missed theory Number Four: the bombing was a "false flag attack" by the US Government. Clearly, he didn't have full insight into the American Right, especially the faction called "Truthers" who generally believe the U.S. government commits acts of terrorism against itself to justify public support for state repression, i.e., beginning with a "cover-up" of 9/11.
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Tuesday, April 02, 2013
The Technocracy Plague / Politics / Social Issues
By: Andrew_McKillop
CONFUSED ORIGINS
Theories about how Technocracy emerged - and became so powerful it is now a dominant theme in Europe's unraveling macrame player's nightmare mix of economic, financial and political crises - are as confused as its true origins. What we can be sure of is that defenders of what are basically unelected Old Boy administrators like to give their Technocrats a classic pedigree, claiming it can be traced back to Ancient Greece and Rome.
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Americans Can't Afford the Future - Unemployment, Taxes and Unfunded Retirement are Squeezing Generation's / Politics / Social Issues
By: Submissions
Adam Taggart writes: The American spirit is rooted in the belief of a better tomorrow. Its success has been due to generations of men and women who toiled, through both hardship and boom times, to make that dream a reality.
But at some point over the past several decades, that hope for a better tomorrow became an expectation. Or perhaps a perceived entitlement is more accurate.
It became assumed that the future would be more prosperous than today, irrespective of the actual steps being taken in the here and now.
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Sunday, March 10, 2013
US Unemployment Figures Camouflage, Corporate Profits Boom From Collapsing Wages / Politics / Social Issues
By: Global_Research
Andre Damon writes: The number of jobs in the US grew by 236,000 in February, and the official unemployment rate fell to its lowest level since 2008, according to the Labor Department’s latest jobs report released Friday.
The media jumped on the jobs total—significantly higher than the 165,000 that had been predicted—to proclaim an economic turnaround, while the Obama White House said the report indicated that “the recovery that began in mid-2009 is gaining traction.”
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Friday, March 08, 2013
Advice to the Poor- Fix Your Attitude! / Politics / Social Issues
By: LewRockwell
Thomas Sowell writes: Most people are not even surprised any more when they hear about someone who came here from Korea or Vietnam with very little money, and very little knowledge of English, who nevertheless persevered and rose in American society. Nor are we surprised when their children excel in school and go on to professional careers.
Tuesday, March 05, 2013
Economic Fascism and the Power Elite / Politics / Social Issues
By: MISES
David S. D'Amato writes: The state—the organization of the political means—is the institution that allows an idle, unproductive class of parasites to live at the expense of ordinary, working people, whose means are industrious activity and consensual exchange in the marketplace. We ought not assume, however, that the indigent segment of society, those who receive social welfare aid from the state, are necessarily foremost among the parasites of the political means. Rather, free-market libertarians from Albert Jay Nock to Murray Rothbard and Butler Shaffer have demonstrated that in the statist economy of theft and wealth redistribution, it is the elite—powerful, entrenched commercial players—who most benefit. Historically and empirically, this phenomenon of elite command of the apparatuses of government is readily apparent and unmistakable in its expression, particularly as regards the twentieth-century American economy.
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
America's Middle Class Caught in a Vice / Politics / Social Issues
By: Money_Morning
Shah Gilani writes: This is a chicken and egg kind of discussion about what caused the housing crash.
It's not that there's a right answer (but I am right) or a wrong answer, it's about looking at what happened to determine whether it's going to happen again. It is.
I'm always right.
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Sunday, February 24, 2013
Leaders? We Don't Need No Stinkin' Leaders / Politics / Social Issues
By: Bill_Bonner
Leaders – you're better off without them!
The problem with the Fed-fueled stock market rally is that you can't trust it. It's not based on anything solid. Investors are not really investing in solid companies that are expected to produce solid growth and profits in the years ahead. They're speculating that the Fed's EZ money will boost share prices.
Maybe it will. And maybe it won't.
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Saturday, February 23, 2013
Zen And The Decline Of Innovation / Politics / Social Issues
By: Andrew_McKillop
BOEING DREAMLINER
The Dreamliner is grounded but Boeing CEO Jim McNerney says that redesign of its faulty lithium-ion batteries is moving ahead in a bid to satisfy regulators’ safety concerns and the jet can get back into the air "within weeks". The Boeing battery crisis is however just a part of Boeing's corporate troubles, and critics of Boeing attack its record on innovation - from both sides, for and against innovation.
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
America's Suffering Middle Class, Still Worse Off than 2008 / Politics / Social Issues
By: Money_Morning
David Zeiler writes:
The government's numbers - primarily the monthly data on unemployment and inflation - tell the story of a slow but gradual recovery by the U.S. economy.
But the experience of millions of Americans tells a far different story.
According to a new national survey conducted by the John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University, many Americans continue to suffer from the impact of the Great Recession.
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Monday, February 11, 2013
Only in California - The Media Loves Manhunts: Can Chris Dorner Survive? / Politics / Social Issues
By: Danny_Schechter
New York, New York, February 8, 7 PM: Only in California, home of the late Huey P Newton and then the Symbionese Liberation Army that went several steps further, do characters emerge that transcend every action movie fantasy and stereotype, characters like an ex-cop who has declared war on the police on, of all places, Facebook in a 6000 word statement that’s being described as “rambling.” (He never claimed he was writer.)
He denounces police practices that he considers racist and abusive, although the sheer drama of the manhunt will make it unlikely that media outlets will seriously delve into the substance of his charges.
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Wednesday, January 30, 2013
Meet the Global Corporate “Supra-Government” / Politics / Social Issues
By: Andrew_G_Marshall
We live in a corporate culture, where most of us have worked or currently work for corporations, we spend our money at corporate venues, on corporate products, watch corporately-owned television shows and movies, listen to corporate-sponsored music; our modes of transportation, communication and recreation are corporately influenced or produced; our sports stadiums and movie theaters are named after car companies and global banks; our food is genetically altered by multinational conglomerates, our drinking water is brought to us by Coca-Cola, our news is brought to us by Pfizer, and our political leaders are brought to us by Exxon, Shell, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan Chase.
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
Decline of the Middle Class Under Obama / Politics / Social Issues
By: Money_Morning
Ben Gersten writes: U.S. President Barack Obama often makes a point of talking about how important our country's middle class is to our economic growth - something he reiterated yesterday (Monday) in his second inauguration speech.
"Our country cannot succeed when a shrinking few do very well and a growing many barely make it," President Obama said. "We believe that America's prosperity must rest upon the broad shoulders of a rising middle class."
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Saturday, January 12, 2013
Insights into U.S. Cultural Shifts from a Visit to a Hardware Store / Politics / Social Issues
By: Casey_Research
Pete Kofod writes: "So this is what it looks like when a society is starting to collapse," the man standing behind the counter at the hardware store said matter-of-factly. The remark had been directed at no one in particular, but generally at anyone standing nearby. As I was among that audience, I looked at him inquisitively, eliciting in return a look indicating that his observation should be intuitively obvious to even the casual observer.
Wednesday, January 09, 2013
The Rich and Poor Divide Isn’t Good for America / Politics / Social Issues
By: InvestmentContrarian
George Leong writes: There is a crisis in America, relative to the widening income gaps between the rich, the middle class, and the poor. This ultimately impacts consumer spending.
In the fiscal cliff talks, President Obama decided to compromise on the Bush-era tax cuts after raising income taxes on those individuals earning in excess of $400,000 annually and over $450,000 for married couples. These groups account for roughly the top one percent of income earners, according to the Tax Policy Center. (Source: “Fiscal Cliff Deal Will Raise Taxes On 77 Percent Of Americans: Tax Policy Center Analysis,” Huffington Post via Associated Press, January 2, 2013.)
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Tuesday, January 08, 2013
The Crisis of the American Middle Class, The Long-Term Threat to U.S. Power / Politics / Social Issues
By: STRATFOR
Last week I wrote about the crisis of unemployment in Europe. I received a great deal of feedback, with Europeans agreeing that this is the core problem and Americans arguing that the United States has the same problem, asserting that U.S. unemployment is twice as high as the government's official unemployment rate. My counterargument is that unemployment in the United States is not a problem in the same sense that it is in Europe because it does not pose a geopolitical threat. The United States does not face political disintegration from unemployment, whatever the number is. Europe might.
Tuesday, January 08, 2013
Successful, But Looking For An Escape Hatch from America / Politics / Social Issues
By: Jeff_Berwick
[Editor’s Note: The following post is by TDV legal correspondent, Jim Karger]
Jerry Loftus is laid back, inquisitive, and easy to talk to. He is also a successful US businessman, co-owner of a masonry and concrete repair and restoration company in Chicago, Illinois, and an avid TDV reader. He and his charming wife, Gina, spent 10 days with us in our San Miguel de Allende compound. Jerry is 53 years old, never been in trouble with the law, but like so many of our TDV visitors, is considering leaving the United States. I interviewed him on our rooftop in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, sharing margaritas on a typical cloudless 70 degree afternoon.
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Sunday, January 06, 2013
The Mayans Have Competition, Mutant War Future / Politics / Social Issues
By: Andrew_McKillop
Mayans believed that robot-like warriors, linked to their alphabet soup of sombre and deadly gods with names like Yum Cimil and Ah Puke (sic), were prowling on dark nights and inauspicious days: about 9 out of 10 days and nights, that is. In the USA of today, bionic warfare is rapidly emerging from the shadows of the imagination and with it, the fear of robot soldiers. Under a gripping photo of a US Army soldier testing the Lockheed Martin HULCE or HUman Load Carrier Exoskeleton, 'Wired Magazine', on January 1st, told its readers they have a mutant future coming - defined as a robot military future.