Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
The Real US Economic Misery Index / Politics / Market Manipulation
By: Money_and_Markets
Nilus Mattive writes: Santa Barbara is hardly the picture of poverty. Oprah's mansion is there, and the city's median house is worth a cool million. Heck, I proposed to my wife there — we ate some tremendous sushi on State Street and relished in the city's upscale vibe.
So imagine my surprise when I learned that 12 of Santa Barbara's parking lots have recently been converted into nightly homeless shelters!
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Tuesday, June 03, 2008
Sowing More Big Government with the Farm Bill / Politics / US Politics
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
Recently Congress sent the latest Farm Bill to the president. The bill features brand new federal programs, expansion of existing subsidies, more food stamps and more foreign food aid. This bill hits the taxpayer hard, while at the same time ensuring food prices will remain elevated. The president vetoed the bill, citing concerns over its costs and subsidies for the wealthy in a time of high food prices and record farm income. Nevertheless, this over-reaching, government-expanding Farm Bill will soon be law.Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, June 01, 2008
Bogus Global Peace Index Prelude to Regime Change for Venezuela and Iran / Politics / Venezuela
By: Stephen_Lendman
The Global Peace Index (GPI) was launched in May 2007 and claims to be the first study of its kind ranking nations according to their peacefulness. Last year's report covered 121 countries. The latest increased it to 140. Australian entrepreneur Steve Killelea conceived the idea and won some dubious endorsements. Among them, the Dalai Lama.
He served as a CIA asset from the late 1950s until 1974 and may again be in tow if the Bush administration's awarding him a Congressional Gold Medal last year and closeness to him now is an indication. Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, May 31, 2008
The End of Gold Manipulation / Politics / Gold & Silver
By: Alex_Wallenwein
Every investor has the power to end gold manipulation. All he must do is lift a single finger – but at the right time, and at the right place.
If you had a chance to end gold manipulation, would you use it?
I can remember the days of 1999, when Bill Murphy and Chris Powell of GATA were serving every member of Congress with their evidence of gold-price manipulation by the top US bullion banks, by the Federal Reserve, and via the Treasury Department's Exchange Stabilization Fund. The result was a lot of raised eyebrows and some frantic paper shuffling - followed by a roaring, deafening silence.
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Saturday, May 31, 2008
Electromagnetic Energy May Hold the Key to Climate Change / Politics / Climate Change
By: Brian_Bloom
One of the six topical themes of the storyline in Beyond Neanderthal is the likely impact of Climate Change on world-wide agricultural production and what we might do about that. Importantly, our response will need to be tailored to address causes, not symptoms. When I watched Al Gore's body language in the documentary, An Inconvenient Truth , I formed the view that his stepping onto that scissor lift was an act of salesmanship. This bothered me. If the “science is settled” why was this obviously sincere man in hard-sell mode? Did he lack confidence that the facts spoke for themselves? It was then I decided that – for the purposes of ensuring integrity of Beyond Neanderthal's storyline – it would be necessary for me to do my own detailed research as to the likely causes of Climate Change. Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, May 30, 2008
The Next American Revolution and Long-term Stock Market Cycles / Politics / Cycles Analysis
By: Clif_Droke
In the aftermath of the credit crisis, real estate deflation and stock market correction, there has been a startling rise in the talk of revolution among many Internet chat rooms and message boards.
This is no idle chit-chat, mind you. It's part of a serious discussion about the alarming possibility of a militant uprising should the economic situation deteriorate further. “Typical bombast from the lunatic fringe,” is how some have responded to the sudden appearance of revolutionary furor. In view of the market cycles, however, the longer-term implications behind this kind of talk can't be so easily dismissed.
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Friday, May 30, 2008
Britain's North Sea Crude Oil Revenue Bonanza / Politics / Crude Oil
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The surge in the crude oil price has greatly benefited the major oil exporters such as the gulf states, Russia, Venezuela, and Norway. Despite Britains consumption of crude oil roughly matching production, the rise in crude oil has resulted in a huge continuing revenue bonanza for the British government through profit share on production, taxes on oil company profits and from tax revenues on domestic consumption, which has lead to protests amongst hauliers and motorists.Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, May 30, 2008
History is Moving- The Geopolitics of Crude Oil $130 / Politics / Crude Oil
By: John_Mauldin
The greyhairs among us remember the Arab Oil Embargo in 1973 and that economists of the time called it an "exogenous" shock to the system. For the first time, geopolitical events had a huge impact on world energy markets. All the financial models in the world got thrown out the window when OPEC simply said, "We won't sell at any price."
Since then, of course, geopolitics has been an integral topic for everybody that follows energy markets. And other commodities. And currencies. And debt and equity. In other words, the economists' distinction between "market factors" and "geopolitical events" has blurred into meaninglessness.
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Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Investigate Big Congress, Not Big Oil / Politics / US Politics
By: Alex_Epstein
With gasoline prices exceeding $4 a gallon in some states, politicians are responding as usual: Blame Big Oil First. Several prominent senators have once again summoned industry leaders to Capitol Hill, subjecting them to yet another barrage of rhetorical questions, interruptions, accusations, and sermons. The lawmakers' goal, claims Sen. Patrick Leahy, is to identify "causes of the rising price of oil on which Congress can act." But the foregone conclusion is that "price gouging," "collusion," and "market manipulation" by Big Oil, or speculation by financiers, is responsible.Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Will We See the End of Empire in Our Time? / Politics / Global Financial System
By: Richard_C_Cook
The following is based on a talk given by the author at the “End of Empire” session of the “Building a New World” Conference of the Prout World Assembly at Radford University, Radford, Virginia, on May 22, 2008.
I believe we have had two Americas. One started with the imperialist state which Alexander Hamilton tried to put into place in the 1790s with the First Bank of the United States. Thomas Jefferson overthrew this early expression of empire in the Civic Revolution of 1800 and created a strong and free America which lasted until 1913 in spite of the convulsion of the Civil War.
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Sunday, May 25, 2008
Government Aims to Axe 2000 Incompetent NHS GP Surgeries / Politics / NHS
By: N_Walayat
In an attempt to provide competent GP healthcare services, the government is planning to proceed with the first phase of the creation of 150 super surgeries across Britain.
Currently the NHS and GP Surgeries discriminate against men and those living within deprived wards, which comprises more than 60% of the UK population. Therefore barely 40% of the UK population is receiving competent GP surgery services and NHS hospital healthcare. This despite a tripling in the NHS budget which is increasingly seen by the voters as money wasted.
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Friday, May 23, 2008
UK House Values Have Fallen by 25%, Contributing to Labour Vote Meltdown / Politics / UK Politics
By: Nadeem_Walayat
Whilst the mandarins of the Labour government scratch their collective heads as to why the voters have lost total confidence in Gordon Browns government, one of the key reasons for the meltdown in the Labour vote in the
Crewe and Nantwich
by-election is the housing bear market.Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, May 19, 2008
Britains Incapacity Benefits Culture Costs Tax Payers £16 Billion Annually- BBC One 8.30pm / Politics / Social Issues
By: BBC
The Government will need to make big reductions in the numbers "on the sick" in Britain's former industrial heartlands if it is to get anywhere near its ambitious UK-wide target of a million off Incapacity Benefit by 2015, according to Professor Steve Fothergill of Sheffield Hallam University.
He tells BBC One 's Panorama that in the Incapacity Benefit hotspot of Merthyr Tydfil in South Wales – where nearly one in five of working age population is on the sick – around 3,000 new jobs would have to be created.
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Friday, May 16, 2008
The Geopolitics Of Israel: Historic and Modern / Politics / Israel
By: John_Mauldin
This week we step outside the box of conventional geopolitical analysis to hear the thinking of George Friedman, founder and chief executive officer of Strategic Forecasting, Inc. (Stratfor), on the geopolitics of Israel. George makes the key point that Israel's geography has been fundamentally important to its geopolitical successes and limitations, and has lent a surprising continuity to its foreign policy from the Biblical era forward to the present day.
This is the first in a series of monographs by George on the geopolitics of countries that are currently critical in world affairs, and he has kindly let us have a preview.
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Thursday, May 15, 2008
Ratcheting Up For US War On Iran / Politics / Iran
By: Stephen_Lendman
Led by Dick Cheney, Bush administration neocons want war on Iran. So does the Israeli Lobby, but it doesn't mean they'll get it. Powerful forces in Washington and the Pentagon are opposed and so far have prevailed. Nonetheless, worrisome recent events increase the possibility and must be closely watched.Recall George Bush's January 10, 2007 address to the nation. He announced the 20,000 troop "surge" and more. "Succeeding in Iraq," he said, "also requires defending its territorial integrity and stabilizing the region in the face of extremist challenges. This begins with addressing Iran and Syria. These two regimes are allowing 'terrorists' and 'insurgents' to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt (those) attacks....we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq."
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Wednesday, May 14, 2008
The Battle for America Has Begun- Strategic Forecasts / Politics / New World Order
By: Richard_C_Cook
This article contains several forecasts, including the possible start of a major war with unforeseeable consequences, if the U.S. should happen to attack Iran .
Of course it is in the nature of forecasts to be speculative. There are also forecasts that are intended to serve as warnings and thereby contribute to preventing the events under analysis from ever taking place. The world's financial elite, long having made their homes in the metropolises of Western Europe, also with a major branch in New York City , may be the party that is really behind what could be an attempt to start World War III by pitting the U.S. against the Asiatic land powers, most notably Russia
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Wednesday, May 14, 2008
After Hillary, Voting for Obama's Slick Rhetoric? / Politics / US Politics
By: Joel_S_Hirschhorn
This general election more than most will test the courage of voters to avoid lesser-evil strategic voting that has propped up our two-party plutocracy. People with intelligence and conscience must resist peer pressure and the temptation to vote against John McCain by voting for Barack Obama. Of course, a McCain presidency that pursues much of the same policies and values of the totally inept and morally bankrupt Bush administration is something to loathe. But lesser-evil voting sustains our corrupt political system.
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Tuesday, May 13, 2008
US Government Responsible for the Housing Boom and Bust / Politics / US Housing
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
The House passed two bills attempting to rehabilitate the housing and mortgage market this week. There doesn't seem to be any shortage of criticism and blame for the bad decisions, and rightly so. Lenders and banks do share much of the blame for the overheated market. Lending standards were relaxed, or even abandoned altogether, creating an exaggerated pool of homebuyers that led to ballooning home prices that many, especially real estate investors, expected to continue forever. Now that the bubble has burst, the losses are staggering.Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
UK Tax U-turn Rebates to Buy Votes- Personal Allowances Up by £600 / Politics / UK Tax & Budget
By: Nadeem_Walayat
Gordon Browns Darling today made clear of how he will perform the Tax U-turn alluded to in recent weeks. The U-turn will take the form of an across the board increase in the personal allowances of every tax payer by £600, thus those on the standard tax code of 543L will see their tax allowance rise from 5435 to 6035. This has the effect of handing very tax payer a tax cut of £120 at the basic rate of 20%. The estimated cost of this measure is put at some £2.7 billion which is substantially more than the £700 million of the original extra tax burden placed on the 5 million low paid workers that were hit by the abolition of the 10% tax band.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Government Energy Plan Political Pandering / Politics / Energy Resources
By: Mike_Shedlock
Whenever Congress puts together a bill attempting to find a solution to some sort of real or imagined problem, my immediate thought is that the bill do one of four things:
- It will worsen the problem at hand
- It will do nothing to solve the problem but instead create a new problem somewhere else
- It will worsen the original problem and create new problems
- In the very best case it will do nothing at all