Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Tuesday, October 08, 2013
The Roots of the U.S. Government Shutdown / Politics / US Politics
By: STRATFOR
In general, Stratfor deals with U.S. domestic politics only to the extent that it affects international affairs. Certainly, this topic has been argued and analyzed extensively. Nevertheless, the shutdown of the American government is a topic that must be understood from our point of view, because it raises the issue of whether the leading global power is involved in a political crisis so profound that it is both losing its internal cohesion and the capacity to govern. If that were so, it would mean the United States would not be able to act in global affairs, and that in turn would mean that the international system would undergo a profound change. I am not interested in the debate over who is right. I am, however, interested in the question of what caused this shutdown, and ultimately what it tells us about the U.S. capacity to act.
Tuesday, October 08, 2013
Will Russia Survive U.S. Debt Default? / Politics / Global Debt Crisis 2013
By: Pravda
U.S. President Barack Obama said that the conservative wing of the Republican Party could lead the U.S. to a default on public debt. Experts agree that this is an internal political crisis, but it will affect the countries that have invested in U.S. Treasuries. Since 2009 Russia has been consistently reducing the share of this investment in its state currency reserves.
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Monday, October 07, 2013
Is Homeland Security Preparing for the Next Wall Street Collapse? / Politics / US Politics
By: Ellen_Brown
The government seems to be getting ready for the next crisis. What about you?
Reports are that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is engaged in a massive, covert military buildup. An article in the Associated Press in February confirmed an open purchase order by DHS for 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition. According to an op-ed in Forbes, that’s enough to sustain an Iraq-sized war for over twenty years. DHS has also acquired heavily armored tanks, which have been seen roaming the streets. Evidently somebody in government is expecting some serious civil unrest. The question is, why?
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Monday, October 07, 2013
U.S. Debt Ceiling Deception / Politics / US Debt
By: Michael_Pento
Former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson weighed in on the budget and debt ceiling gridlock in Washington and offered a solution last week by saying, "I hate the whole concept of a debt ceiling". He also indicated that putting a legal limit on our nation's borrowing authority is a "flaw in the system". In other words, if we just did away with the strictures of a debt limit our problems would go away. Unfortunately, this view is shared by most in our government.
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Monday, October 07, 2013
Nuclear Weapons Now / Politics / Nuclear Weapons
By: Andrew_McKillop
WHY WORRY?
Pretending the destructive threat of nuclear weapons is overblown, or just as bad that they have been around a long time and haven't been used – so we can forget all about them – are two themes attacked by Eric Schlosser. Described as a techno-thriller by critics and given major acclaim and wide publicity, the book by reporter and author Schlosser, “Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident and the Illusion of Safety” (Kodiak-Penguin) includes a minute-by-minute account of a near-fatal accident at a Titan II nuclear missile silo in Arkansas, in 1980.
Monday, October 07, 2013
Effects of U.S. Government Shutdown on Paying Taxes and Economic Reports / Politics / US Politics
By: Money_Morning
Garrett Baldwin writes: Welcome to the decade of the politicization of everything. With the government shutdown in its first week, it is starting to look more and more like this temper tantrum from both sides could lead up to the debt ceiling deadline.
Monday, October 07, 2013
What Government Shutdown? These Facts Prove That Almost Everything Is Still Running! / Politics / US Politics
By: LewRockwell
Michael Snyder writes:
All of this whining and crying about a “government shutdown” is a total joke. You see, there really is very little reason why this “government shutdown” cannot continue indefinitely because almost everything is still running. 63 percent of all federal workers are still working, and 85 percent of all government activities are still being funded during this “shutdown”. Yes, the Obama administration has been making a big show of taking down government websites and blocking off the World War II Memorial, but overall business in Washington D.C. is being conducted pretty much as usual. It turns out that the definition of “essential personnel” has expanded so much over the years that almost everyone is considered “essential” at this point. In fact, this shutdown is such a non-event that even referring to it as a “partial government shutdown” would really be overstating what is actually happening. The following are 36 facts which prove that almost everything is still running during this government shutdown…
Monday, October 07, 2013
Man Sets Himself on Fire, The Madness of Crumbling Empires / Politics / US Politics
By: Jack_D_Douglas
Setting one’s self on fire is a form of the ancient practice of “committing suicide on the head of someone” to blame them for something serious. The modern form of this as a political protest has been world famous since the Buddhist monk’s self-immolation in South Vietnam which helped to galvanize the Buddhist majority against the U.S. and the U.S.-Francophile puppet regime. That single act against the repressors of Buddhists, the majority of people, was a crucial trigger in the national revolt that led to the total defeat of the vast U.S. war machine even thought it cost the Vietnamese many millions of dead, maimed, wounded, MIA’s, and destroyed families and lives. [Gen. Giap, who led that total defeat of the U.S. by a poor peasant guerrilla army died yesterday at 102.
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Monday, October 07, 2013
Obama Phone Call an Opening for Iran? / Politics / Iran
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
Last week, for the first time since the 1979 Iranian revolution, the US president spoke with his Iranian counterpart. Their 15 minute telephone call was reported to open the door to further high-level discussions. This is a very important event.
I have been saying for years that we should just talk to the Iranians. After all, we talked to the Soviets when they actually had thousands of nuclear missiles pointed at us! The Iranians have none, according to our own intelligence services. I even suggested a few years ago that we should "offer friendship" to them. Unfortunately, so many so-called experts have a stake in keeping tensions high and pushing us to war. They did not want to hear what I was saying. It seems, though, this is beginning to change now with these recent events.
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Sunday, October 06, 2013
US Government Shutdown - Wall Street Signals Concern on Debt Ceiling / Politics / US Debt
By: Global_Research
Bill Van Auken writes: With the partial shutdown of the US government ending its fourth day on Friday, leaving 800,000 federal employees out in the street and vital social, environmental and other services paralyzed, the US Congress appeared no closer to an agreement on a bill that would provide the appropriations to keep the government running in the new fiscal year that began Tuesday.In immediate jeopardy are programs like WIC, which provides supplemental food assistance to some 9 million low-income women, infants and children, and Head Start, with nearly 20,000 children in programs whose grants kick in on October 1 already facing the threat of being locked out.
Sunday, October 06, 2013
An Empire of Money and Privilege in Decline: Portrait of a Tragic Policy Error / Politics / US Debt
By: Jesse
"Everybody, sooner or later, sits down to a banquet of consequences." Robert Louis Stevenson
"They don't have intelligence. They have what I call thintelligence. They see the immediate situation. They think narrowly and they call it 'being focused.' They don't see the surroundings. They don't see the consequences." Michael Crichton
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Sunday, October 06, 2013
US Government Shutdown Theatre Of The Absurd / Politics / US Debt
By: Andrew_McKillop
DEBT AND ANARCHY
Claims in the US media, from left and right, that anarchy is rising and is being encouraged are easy to find. This is nothing more or less than a diversionary tactic to keep everybody's mind off the real subject which is out-of-control debt. Journalists as wide-ranging as arch-keynesian Paul Krugman to left wing senator Elizabeth Warren, and “moderates” like the collective Bloomberg Editorial Board or anonymous editorialists at Wall Street Journal work the anarchy theme.
Sunday, October 06, 2013
Healthcare Revolution - The Road to a New Medical Order / Politics / Healthcare Sector
By: John_Mauldin
There is no doubt that the single most contentious topic I can bring up in a small group discussion or speech is the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare. You can feel the tension rise, as everyone has an opinion they want to express – most of them based essentially on preconceived philosophical positions, nearly all of which can be can seen through their own eyes as reasonable and consistent with civilized behavior. And the facts that can be trotted out to support their positions, pro and con, could fill up a document almost as long as the original 2,300+ page bill. I have avoided writing about the Affordable Care Act (ACA) for a variety of reasons but primarily because it is so difficult for us to get our heads around the economic implications.
Sunday, October 06, 2013
John Frum And The Cargo Cult Of Debt / Politics / Global Debt Crisis 2013
By: Andrew_McKillop
JOHN FRUM WHERE?
Wikipedia tells us the Melanesian cargo cult called John Frum arose in the late 1930s, in Vanuatu which was then known as the New Hebrides. The movement was heavily influenced by the existing cult practice of worshipping Keraperamun, a god associated with Vanuatu's highest mountain, Mount Tukosmera. Here, we can already wheel on the Japanese cult of calling anybody friendly and worthy “Fuji San”, or my soul brother Fuji – named for Japan's Mount Fuji which has magical powers.
Saturday, October 05, 2013
Do U.S. Taxpayers Want to Pay For the Shut Down Government Services? / Politics / Government Spending
By: MISES
Ryan McMaken writes: There is a common assumption among politicians that voters want a lot of government services, but don’t want to pay for them. It’s certainly true that taxpayers don’t like paying taxes, and this is demonstrated in the fact that the federal government runs a deficit virtually every single year. If the taxpayers didn’t mind paying the full cost of government, the feds would be able to collect enough in revenue to pay the bills. As it is, the political realities of public opposition to taxation drive the feds to resort to deficit spending to cover their costs.
Saturday, October 05, 2013
Humanitarian Wars, We Love You As We Kill You / Politics / GeoPolitics
By: MISES
Daniel McAdams writes: In February, 2011, Soliman Bouchuiguir told a lie. It was a big one. As the head of the Libyan League for Human Rights, Bouchuiguir initiated a petition that was eventually signed by 70 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) demanding that the US, EU, and UN “mobilize the United Nations and the international community and take immediate action to halt the mass atrocities now being perpetrated by the Libyan government against its own people.”
Saturday, October 05, 2013
Why Obama Should Give his Nobel Peace Prize to Putin / Politics / Russia
By: Pravda
Nomination of President Vladimir Putin for the Nobel Peace Prize is actively discussed in the world. In the West the idea was taken mostly with skepticism, but there is some unexpected support. Putin is thanked for singlehandedly preventing the third world and being able to resist the pro-Israel lobby in the United States.
On Wednesday, the initiative of All-Russian Fund of Education and the International Academy of Spiritual Unity and Cooperation was supported by Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro. He said that if anyone in this historic moment deserved the Nobel Peace Prize, it was President Vladimir Putin who helped to stop a war that threatened the Syrian people, Maduro said as quoted by EFE.
Saturday, October 05, 2013
Cut the Debt by Ending the Empire - Bring the Legions Home / Politics / US Politics
By: LewRockwell
Eric Margolis writes: NEW YORK – “Banana Republicans,” sneered the Democrat’s leader, Senator Harry Reid. It’s not certain if Reid was comparing his conservative Republican opponents to monkeys or citizens of a Central American banana republic.
Either way, Reid’s nasty remark captured the bitter animosity surging through the US Congress as the mighty United States faces running out of money on 18 October.
Friday, October 04, 2013
First U.S. Government Shutdown in 17 Years. If Only It Will Last? / Politics / US Debt
By: Profit_Confidential
At the very core, this U.S. government shutdown means that about one million federal employees will be told to go home without pay. Non-essential services will be stopped until further notice. This will be mainly due to a lack of funds. (Source: Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, September 24, 2013.) National parks will be closed; museums will be shut along with many other services.
Friday, October 04, 2013
U.S. Government Shutdown: Next Step Dollar Collapse? / Politics / US Dollar
By: Sahil_Hafeez
Not a single person might make a conciliatory sentiment for rehashing cautioning that, on account of the grim Obama administration and Republicans, Uncle Sam is closed down. Genuine monetary analysts are currently anticipating mobs in the streets that there is presently nothing the USA can do to avert the fall of its currency, and its economy. It has no reserves to back its worth, and has the most indebted country in the world, is dependant of the credit from America's previous foes. Read full article... Read full article...