Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Politicians and the Global Financial Crises / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Akhil_Khanna
Political System
The seeds of the global financial crises which were triggered by the collapse of Lehman Brothers in the USA in 2008 had been sown during the last number of decades. The basic reason for the emergence of the crises is the manner in which we select our leaders or politicians in our society. The politicians are the key persons responsible for laying down rules and regulations which the population of the country are expected to follow. The strict, severe and swift penalties for not adhering to the rules and regulations are supposed to act as deterrent for people from breaking the law. In the current system of elections there are some inbuilt weaknesses which do not allow the politicians to follow their basic responsibilities.
Friday, January 20, 2012
A Quartet of Fed Chairmen Body Slam Ben Bernanke / Politics / Central Banks
By: Fred_Sheehan
"Ben Bernanke's quest to make the U.S. Federal Reserve more transparent may be nearing an end as it debates a new statement of goals and strategy that is likely to put a number on its preferred inflation rate. A formal, numerical goal for inflation could become Mr. Bernanke's most durable legacy as chairman of the Fed. It would bind his successors to stable prices; end confusion caused by Fed officials who can have slightly different goals; and by reinforcing the Fed's determination to control inflation in the long-run, it could create space for monetary easing." -- "Fed Nears Inflation Target Decision;" Robin Harding in the Financial Times, January 17, 2012
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Living In A Real World House Of Lies: How Do We Foreclose? / Politics / US Politics
By: Danny_Schechter
If you go to the corner of 8th Avenue and 42nd Street near Times Square in Manhattan, just down from the Wax Museum and around the corner from the bus station, and look up, you’ll see an oversized billboard for Showtime’s, fast -paced “House of Lies,” a new cable TV series that is more like a realistic docudrama about the world of hard-charging management consultants.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
China to Aid Saudi Arabia in Nuclear Power Development / Politics / Nuclear Power
By: OilPrice_Com
Ever since the end of World War Two, the U.S. has come to regard Saudi Arabia as almost its exclusive oil producing enclave.
In February 1945, after the Yalta Conference with Soviet General Secretary Iosif Stalin and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, on his way home U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and King Ibn Saud met aboard the New Orleans-class heavy cruiser U.S.S. Quincy in the Suez Canal's Great Bitter Lake. During the meeting, instigated by Roosevelt, he and Ibn Saud concluded a secret agreement in which the U.S. would provide Saudi Arabia military security, including military assistance, training and a military base at Dhahran in Saudi Arabia, in exchange for secure access to supplies of oil.
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Thursday, January 19, 2012
A Bitter American Century / Politics / US Politics
By: Stephen_Merrill
Why the United States decided to enter World War I against Germany in 1917, with hindsight, is impossible to fathom from a geopolitical point of view. The US as a nation had no stake in a victory by either side, no stake in the war’s origin. By the time the US entered the war it had already become clear the war would end in a stalemate if the players stayed the same. A stalemated European war would have had little effect on the US, just like the many previous European wars during US history.Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Downward Social Mobility is Crushing the American Dream / Politics / Social Issues
By: Money_Morning
David Zeiler writes:
Forget about getting ahead. For many in the middle class these days it's more about not sliding backwards.
It's called downward mobility and it's crushing the American Dream.
According to a study conducted by the Pew Charitable Trusts, nearly one out of three U.S. citizens born into middle class households in the 1960s have lost their economic status.
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Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Ignore the New CPI™ at Your Peril / Politics / US Politics
By: Submissions
Paul Owen writes: The Corruption Price Index™ (CPI™)
Modern companies and organizations have a great need to quantify the processes and corruption level(s) of our current form of crony capitalist government. The Corruption Price Index™ (CPI™) does this. The CPI™ index will allow for prior planning to prevent poor performance. It will guarantee that you will not make major a faux pas when dealing with economic and legislative issues. Also as individual investors you will begin to understand why most of our major problems will never get fixed and why you must plan for the worst case scenario.
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Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Why Iran Can Whip the US and Israel Without Firing a Single Shot / Politics / Middle East
By: LewRockwell
Mark R. Crovelli writes: To the outside observer, the intensifying conflict between the United States, Israel and Iran (along with some lesser bellicose nations, like Britain) may appear like a classic "prisoner’s dilemma." The best option for both sides seems to be to pacify their domestic constituencies by escalating the conflict, which will ensure the worst possible outcome. The Israeli right-wing government is seemingly beholden to its extremist and terrorist voting blocs, while the American government is seemingly fenced in by the Israel lobby, neoconservative candidates vying for the imperial throne, the US empire and merchants of death, and the Israeli government itself. Meanwhile, the semi-totalitarian Iranian government is seemingly obliged to "stand up" to the aggressive Americans and their "Zionist client state," lest it be seen as "soft" or "weak" by its own citizens.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
The Middle Class Disappears, Rise of the Praetorian Class / Politics / Social Issues
By: Casey_Research
Pete Kofod writes:
Much attention has been paid to the “disappearing middle class” and the “vanishing American Dream.” While the observations are largely accurate, they are also misleading. The traditional three-tier model of the upper, middle and lower class broadly categorizes people according to income and net worth. One significant problem with this model is that membership in any particular class is very much in the eye of the beholder. One man’s “scraping by” is another man’s “opulent living.” This subjective and arbitrary grouping and boundary assessment inevitably gives rise to the simmering class warfare that is starting to rear its ugly head in many Western countries. Such categorization is therefore meaningless at best, if not outright deceptive as it conflates a variety of economic actors.
Monday, January 16, 2012
Russia Least Free Economy Plauged by Rampant Corruption, Hong Kong Most Free / Politics / Russia
By: Pravda
The country with the freest economy on the planet is Hong Kong. Such a statement was made by Heritage Foundation, a US-based NGO. The "Index of Economic Freedom" made by the organization is based on the degree of openness of markets, the effectiveness of the legal framework for business activities and the apparatus of government officials and regulatory authorities.
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Monday, January 16, 2012
Event Horizon For Low Carbon Energy, The End Of Fossil Fuels ? / Politics / Energy Resources
By: Andrew_McKillop
Official plans for Low Carbon energy transition in several countries, and for as long as the European Union's climate-energy package holds together, for all the EU's 27 member states, target a complete and total replacement of fossil energy within as little as 45 years. US president Obama in January 2011 called for a “Sputnik moment” to wean the US completely off fossil fuels. Since then however, carbon cap-and-trade legislation has failed in the US and increasing company failures in solar cell and wind turbine production industries have eroded the credibility of this "Sputnik moment". Today, White House briefing papers attribute much of the rebound in manufacturing which could help Obama back into power, to the boom in cheap shale gas supply made possible by "fracking" technology.
Monday, January 16, 2012
America, Welcome to the Fourth Reich / Politics / US Politics
By: BATR
American Fascism did not start with World War II. Before Operation Paperclip, the codename under which the US intelligence and military services extricated scientists from Germany, during and after the final stages of the conflict, the annals of internal despotism were well established. With the open door policy for German engineering, the political ideology of state worship was bound to travel across the Atlantic.
Monday, January 16, 2012
Why You Should Ignore the Coming Debt Ceiling Debate / Politics / US Debt
By: Money_Morning
David Zeiler writes: Under the guise of yet another debt ceiling debate, Republicans and Democrats will spend much of the week demonizing each other on the Washington stage.
But don't be fooled. This so-called debate will be nothing more than a planned-in-advance sideshow to supply each side with 2012 election campaign fodder.
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Sunday, January 15, 2012
Oil, Dollar Hegemony and Islam / Politics / US Politics
By: Global_Research
Francis A. Boyle writes: Little has changed in the imperialist tendencies of American foreign policy since the founding of the United States of America in seventeen eighty-nine. The fledgling United States opened the nineteenth century by stealing the continent of North America from the Indians, while in the process ethnically cleansing them and then finally deporting the pitiful few survivors by means of death marches (a la Bataan) to Bantustans, which in America we call reservations, as in instance of America's manifest destiny to rule the world.
Sunday, January 15, 2012
DEMOCRATIZE BANKING: How Counties Can Use Land Banks and Eminent Domain / Politics / Credit Crisis 2012
By: Ellen_Brown
An electronic database called MERS has created defects in the chain of title to over half the homes in America. Counties have been cheated out of millions of dollars in recording fees, and their title records are in hopeless disarray. Meanwhile, foreclosed and abandoned homes are blighting neighborhoods. Straightening out the records and restoring the homes to occupancy is clearly in the public interest, and the burden is on local government to do it. But how? New legal developments are presenting some innovative alternatives.
Sunday, January 15, 2012
Child Benefit Cuts to be Tapered For Higher Rate Tax Payers, Coalition Government Benefits Culture Failure / Politics / Taxes
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The government is seeking to amend the proposed Child Benefit cuts for families where there is a single higher rate tax payer, which is grossly unfair as in its current form would mean a family of 3 children with one tax payer earning £42,375 (Not £44k as stated in the mainstream press) would lose £2,200 in child benefit, whereas a family with two wage earners earning £42,000 each would retain their full child benefit despite having combined earnings of £84,000.
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Saturday, January 14, 2012
Wall Street’s Ratings Agencies Undermine Europe’s Attempt at Economic Recovery Acting Like Financial Terrorists / Politics / Eurozone Debt Crisis
By: Danny_Schechter
We live in an increasingly degraded country. Our politics are degraded and a laughing stock to the word. Our military is demoralized and degraded with soldiers urinating on dead civilians and awaiting deployment orders for the next illegal intervention.
Our education system has been degraded with standards falling and pervasive defunding. Our transportation system, ditto.
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Saturday, January 14, 2012
Fed Plays PR Games / Politics / Central Banks
By: John_Browne
The world was taken by surprise recently by the Federal Reserve Board's announcement that it would publish some of its economic forecasting that forms the basis for its short-term interest rate strategy. The Fed claims that the move will vastly increase so-called transparency, which has become a buzz word for honesty and virtue. However, the new policies do nothing to remove the cloak of secrecy that conceals still many of its most significant activities. This myth of new transparency will do little to lure investors back into the markets but as an unintended consequence will reveal just how profoundly the markets are currently guided from the top.
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Saturday, January 14, 2012
Burning Eurozone, All is Quiet on the Eastern Front? / Politics / Eurozone Debt Crisis
By: Andy_Sutton
2011 had been touted as the year that everything would change. Massive paradigm shifts would rock our world and many a prophecy was made regarding financial crises, currency crises, wars, rumors of wars, and there was even one fellow who said the world itself would end, although he later retracted his predictions, but not before his followers had spent their life savings putting up billboards. Such hysteria is certainly the hallmark of times such as these, but we have to keep in mind that just because some of the predicted events didn’t happen yet, we’re a long, long way from being out of the woods. There is an old saying that if you do what you’ve always done; you’re going to get what you’ve always gotten. If we continue to sow the seeds of false fixes and faulty economics, we’re going to continue to reap financial and economic crisis. It really is that simple.
Saturday, January 14, 2012
Food Provisions Shortage Sparked Arab Spring / Politics / Food Crisis
By: Richard_Mills
In 1798 32 year-old British economist Malthus anonymously published "An Essay on the Principle of Population" and in it he argued that human population's increase geometrically (1, 2, 4, 16 etc.) while their food supply can only increase arithmetically (1, 2, 3, 4 etc.).
"The power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man". Thomas Robert Malthus
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