Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Wednesday, January 11, 2012
2012 – The Year Of Living Dangerously / Politics / US Politics
“In retrospect, the spark might seem as ominous as a financial crash, as ordinary as a national election, or as trivial as a Tea Party. The catalyst will unfold according to a basic Crisis dynamic that underlies all of these scenarios: An initial spark will trigger a chain reaction of unyielding responses and further emergencies. The core elements of these scenarios (debt, civic decay, global disorder) will matter more than the details, which the catalyst will juxtapose and connect in some unknowable way. If foreign societies are also entering a Fourth Turning, this could accelerate the chain reaction. At home and abroad, these events will reflect the tearing of the civic fabric at points of extreme vulnerability – problem areas where America will have neglected, denied, or delayed needed action.” – Strauss & Howe - The Fourth Turning - 1997
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Washington’s Plan to Isolate Iran is Drifting Towards a Stalemate / Politics / Middle East
From the surface, the latest spat between the West and Iran looks like a step closer to war, with tensions reaching a fever pitch on both sides of this potential conflict. But upon closer examination however, present conditions are not particularly ideal for a preemptive strike against Iran. There is still much money to be made from the current crisis – on both sides, before the winds of war could be unleashed on the region.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
The A-Z Of Occupation, Occupy Wall Street / Politics / US Politics
Every social movement I have been involved with, or covering, develops invents its own language of liberation, its own alphabet, and its own buzzwords, rhetoric and discourse. Here are some of the key words I heard/retained in covering the Occupy Wall Street movement. I am sure there are many words, phrases, and slogans I overlooked, never heard or forgot. Send your favorites to: dissector@mediachannel.org.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Consumer Credit Advanced in the United States / Politics / US Politics
Consumer credit grew at an annual rate of 10.0% in November, inclusive of strong growth in revolving (+8.5%) and non-revolving credit (+10.7%). This is another metric that is indicative of improving economic conditions in the U.S. economy.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Russia Regime Change, Why Washington Wants ‘Finito’ with Putin / Politics / US Politics
Washington clearly wants ‘finito’ with Russia’s Putin as in basta! or as they said in Egypt last spring, Kefaya--enough!. Hillary Clinton and friends have apparently decided Russia’s prospective next president, Vladimir Putin, is a major obstacle to their plans. Few however understand why. Russia today, in tandem with China and to a significant degree Iran, form the spine, however shaky, of the only effective global axis of resistance to a world dominated by one sole superpower.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, January 09, 2012
The Ultimate Consumer Protection / Politics / US Politics
This week, partisan games in Washington reached a fevered pitch as Congress acted to prevent recess appointments, yet the administration made them anyway. Congress has been gaveling into session for less than a minute every three days for the express purpose of technically staying in session. The 40 second "pro forma" sessions may strike supporters of the President as obstructionist, but Congress was using its clear constitutional authority and playing by the rules. Frustrated, the President simply disregarded the Constitution, and appointed Richard Cordray as head of the new Consumer Financial Protection Board, and Sharon Block, Richard Griffin, and Terence Flynn to the National Labor Relations Board anyway.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, January 09, 2012
Getting Fired Don't Panic / Politics / Social Issues
It has happened before. I did not plan on it happening again.
On Wednesday, January 4, the server system that hosts my website, http://GaryNorth.com, crashed.
I did not get fired by my paying subscribers. I got fired by digits that failed.
Fortunately, I was re-hired on Friday. The site came back online.
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, January 08, 2012
Who's Worse: The Nazis or the US Government? / Politics / US Politics
The word "nazi" and all of its requisite icons have been so sensationalized that naming your child "Adolf Hitler" results in having your baby taken away by the government... and drawing a swastika is still illegal in many countries, including Germany, Hungary, Poland and Brazil.
Yet, in so many ways, the US Government has surpassed the nazis in evil... the only difference is that they are much, much smarter at how they do it.
Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, January 06, 2012
Failed Education Policy Has Crippled U.S. Economy / Politics / Education
Relative economic immobility in the United States is a function of our failed education policy during the past four decades.
According to the Economic Mobility Project conducted by The Pew Charitable Trust, work force participation by women increased 30 percentage points, from 40 percent to 70 percent, during this time. For 30 years (1974-2004), inflation adjusted income for women in their 30s surged 300 percent.
Friday, January 06, 2012
The Gilded Age of Bankers and Income Disparity / Politics / Social Issues
As a general rule, the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information
Between 1865 and 1898 the US economy grew at the fastest rate in its history with real wages, wealth, GDP, and capital formation all increasing rapidly:
Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, January 06, 2012
Slovakia's Nuclear Schizophrenia - Shut Down, Continue As Usual or? / Politics / Nuclear Power
The implosion of the USSR in December 1991 produced massive economic "collateral damage" in its East European allies, as they simultaneously sought both to assert their new-found independence and draw closer to their potential European allies on the western side of 1946's "Iron Curtain."
Following the euphoria amity quickly devolved down to practical issues, one of which was that the European Union was leery of welcoming new members after the collapse of Communism that relied on power from Soviet-era nuclear power facilities, especially in the wake of the April 1986 nuclear disaster at Chernobyl in Ukraine.
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, January 05, 2012
Playing the 'Free Markets' Canard and the Myth of Self Regulation / Politics / Market Regulation
ca·nard/kəˈnär(d)/
Noun:
a. An unfounded or false, deliberately misleading story : a fabricated report
b. a groundless rumor or belief.
Thursday, January 05, 2012
Why Attacking Iran Will Not Work in 2012 / Politics / Iran
All signs coming out of Washington, London, Paris and Tel Aviv are pointing towards a pre-emptive military strike against Iran in 2012. But a number of key indicators are also pointing towards an unsuccessful, unlikely operation, whose failure could result in a military and economic tailspin from which the United States and Israel are unlikely to recover.
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, January 05, 2012
America in Desperate Need for a Revolution / Politics / US Politics
Shah Gilani writes: Rampant profiteering by Congress and greedy bankers is forcing us to weigh the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune against honesty and transparency - both of which are being trampled by crony capitalists in pursuit of the almighty dollar.
What's at stake is whether gross criminal activity and reckless disregard for the public will continue to be whitewashed by regulators like the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the U.S. Federal Reserve, courts, and Congress, which encourage half-baked civil fraud charges followed by non-prosecution agreements and nickel-and-dime fines.
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, January 05, 2012
Getting Out Before the Gates Slam Shut on the U.S. Police State / Politics / US Politics
(Interviewed by Louis James, Editor, International Speculator) : L: Doug, a lot of readers have been asking for guidance on how to know when it's time to exit center stage and hunker down in some safe place. Few people want to hide from the world in a cabin in the woods while life goes on in the mainstream, but nobody wants to get caught once the gates clang shut on the police state the US is becoming. How do you know when it's time to go?
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, January 05, 2012
US, EU Warmongers Wage Economic War on Iran / Politics / Iran
One might think the US and EU would have enough economic problems already to risk oil soaring to stratospheric heights by an embargo of Iranian oil.
Unfortunately, common sense never gets in the way of bureaucrats and fools or their foolish missions.
Thursday, January 05, 2012
Please Daddy-Cool Bomb Iran, Just One More War… And I Need The Money / Politics / US Politics
The first really big irony is when “we” were trying to persuade that lunatic Khomeini to stop beating the living daylights out of “our good friend” Saddam Hussein, no matter how much sophisticated ordinance and poison gas we sold him, there were two conditions for the lunatic to stop:
1: Saddam Hussein had to go.
2: There had to be some approximation of democratic elections in Iraq.
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
Hot Air Rises But Carbon Markets Fall / Politics / Climate Change
The potential for carbon finance to hit a final limit to its credibility, and implode in 2012 is high and rising. As we know, global warming theorists would be short of talkshow material without "tipping points" and climate forcing, drawing on everything from heavily overworked CO2 to more exciting, seemingly higher tech specialty themes like the possible role of adipic acid, freons and halocarbons, 'black carbon' and heavy metals, even cosmic ray breakdown particles in the atmosphere - - to explain why they believe global average temperatures have to rise. As we also know or are invited to believe, carbon traders huddled over their playstation consoles doing the Fibonaccis and losing other peoples' money are preventing this happening.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
U.S. Iran War Imminent in Straits of Hormuz? $200 a Barrel Oil? / Politics / Crude Oil
The pieces and policies for potential conflict in the Persian Gulf are seemingly drawing inexorably together.
Since 24 December the Iranian Navy has been holding its ten-day Velayat 90 naval exercises, covering an area in the Arabian Sea stretching from east of the Strait of Hormuz entrance to the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Aden. The day the maneuvers opened Iranian Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari told a press conference that the exercises were intended to show "Iran's military prowess and defense capabilities in international waters, convey a message of peace and friendship to regional countries, and test the newest military equipment." The exercise is Iran's first naval training drill since May 2010, when the country held its Velayat 89 naval maneuvers in the same area. Velayat 90 is the largest naval exercise the country has ever held.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
The American Empire is Over, Brace for an Horrifying Decent / Politics / US Politics
Chris Hedges "Brace Yourself! The American Empire Is Over & The Descent Is Going To Be Horrifying!"
"We have undergone, I think, in the last few decades a kind of slow motion coup d'état."