Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Do We Have a Medicare Budgetary Problem or an Aging Population Problem? / Politics / Demographics
By: Paul_L_Kasriel
Chart 1 shows what is driving the projections of federal spending (and, implicitly, the national debt) in the upcoming 11 fiscal years - mandatory federal outlays and interest on the debt. What is driving up mandatory outlays is spending on retirees - Medicare and Social Security.
Monday, July 18, 2011
Unfair U.S. Tax Burden Falls Disproportionately on Individuals and Small Business / Politics / Taxes
By: Jesse
Although the nominal US corporate tax rate of 35% seems high, and especially so given all the corporate funded propaganda promoting more tax cuts and givebacks, in fact the realized corporate rates are relatively low both in terms of historical experience and other countries. This is because of the many loopholes, subsidies, and accounting gimmicks available to its more influential corporate citizens from the corporate friendly government.
Monday, July 18, 2011
Global Economic Crisis: Finance Is the New Mode of Warfare / Politics / Credit Crisis 2011
By: Michael_Hudson
“When I was in Norway earlier this year, one of its politicians sat next to me at a dinner and said, “You know, there’s one good thing that President Obama has done that we never anticipated in Europe. He’s shown the Europeans that we can never depend on America again. No matter how good he sounds, no matter what he promises, we’re never again going to believe the patter talk of an American President. Mr. Obama has cured us. Our problem is what to do about the American people that don’t realize this nightmare that they’ve created, this smooth-talking American Tony Blair in the White House.”
Monday, July 18, 2011
The Death of the Welfare States, We're All Greeks Now / Politics / Global Debt Crisis
By: LewRockwell
Patrick J. Buchanan writes: Departing for New Hampshire in November 2010, Sen. Judd Gregg, the fiscal conservative President Obama wanted in his Cabinet, blurted an inconvenient truth: "This nation is on a course where if we don't do something about it, get ... fiscal policy (under control), we're Greece."
Monday, July 18, 2011
The Free Market Currency Manifesto / Politics / Fiat Currency
By: Michael_S_Rozeff
Currency is the blood of human exchange. From currency arise prices, and prices are the air that peaceful exchange breathes, an air that communicates living information. Currency is the division of labor’s partner. Currency is our means to transfer labor and energy through time and space, to bring future goods into commerce today. It is that vital means by which we convey the benefits of our labor to others and they to us.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Financial Crimes on Wall Street and the Debt Crisis / Politics / US Debt
By: Bob_Chapman
Crime on Wall Street, in banking and in corporate America pays. One just neither admits or denies and lets the corporate shareholders pay the fines. These are today’s untouchable, who steal billions and get away with it. Financial institutions are too big to fail, as are their key employees.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Economic Medicine and the U.S. Debt Ceiling Debate / Politics / US Debt
By: Washingtons_Blog
The blood pressure of the patient in the emergency room drops precipitously.
The blood pressure of the patient in the emergency room drops precipitously.The ER docs have already given 15 pints of blood over the course of many hours. But the patient is still on the verge of dying.
Medical rules and regulations say that more than 15 pints of blood should never be given, as too much transfusion can cause other fatal problems.
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Sunday, July 17, 2011
Mainstream Media Won't Report on the CIA's Secret Wars / Politics / US Politics
By: Videos
As the CIA expands covert missions, it's no surprise than many of their operations go unreported. Jeremy Scahill of The Nation says, though, that many outlets are aware of some injustice carried out by the CIA and are just failing to report them.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
We Don't Need Free Trade Agreements with Panama, Colombia, and Korea / Politics / US Politics
By: Ian_Fletcher
Obama is still pushing for free trade agreements with Panama, Colombia, and Korea, albeit with the thin fig leaf of demanding they be accompanied by money for so-called Trade Adjustment Assistance, a "painkiller" program designed to blunt the harm to laid-off workers.
The Republicans don't like TAA, which has held up passage of these agreements momentarily, but both sides are still gunning to pass these agreements some time soon.
Saturday, July 16, 2011
U.S. Debt Ceiling Political Theater Diverting Attention from Theft of Americans Wealth / Politics / US Politics
By: Submissions
Dennis Kucinich writes: The rancorous debate over the debt belies a fundamental truth of our economy -- that it is run for the few at the expense of the many, that our entire government has been turned into a machine which takes the wealth of a mass of Americans and accelerates it into the hands of the few. Let me give you some examples.
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Friday, July 15, 2011
Lower the U.S. Debt Ceiling / Politics / US Debt
By: Mark_Thornton
Currently, the big show in Washington, DC, centers around raising the debt ceiling. Congress began setting this ceiling in 1917 so that the Treasury could independently issue debt. The debt ceiling is like the limit on your credit card, except the federal government sets the limit on itself. When President Nixon took us off the gold standard in 1971, the national debt was $400 billion. The increase in the national debt last year alone was four times the entire debt in 1971.
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Friday, July 15, 2011
Mandela's Contested South Africa Legacy / Politics / Africa
By: Danny_Schechter
At 94, Nelson Mandela is still kicking, inspiring an international day of community service on July 18th in his name. This seems to be an idea that Barack Obama borrowed for similar events in the USA.
While activists and athletes and entertainers, are honoring him by responding to his call for engagement, journalists in the obit departments of the world’s news networks are quietly, even secretly, combing their archives for footage and tributes that will air when he moves on to the next world. They are getting ready and seem to think it will happen sooner rather than later.
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Thursday, July 14, 2011
The Intellectual Legacy of the Federal Reserve / Politics / Central Banks
By: Aftab_Singh
Ron Paul and Ben Bernanke had an amusing exchange of words yesterday about whether or not gold is money. Needless to say, Ben answered in the negative and appealed to tradition during the conversation. Now, although I hesitantly agree with his conclusion (as in, strictly speaking, gold isn’t a widely used medium of exchange right now), I can scarcely agree with his modes of reasoning. Here, I consider the Federal Reserve’s intellectual legacy and outline a few possible reasons as to why central bankers generally fail to think and act prudently.
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Beware, Taxpayers: The Days of U.S. Bank Bailouts Might Not Be Over / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Money_Morning
Kerri Shannon writes: The U.S. government has spent more than $12 trillion to prop up large financial institutions since the 2008 financial meltdown, but more taxpayer money could still be used for U.S. bank bailouts.
A Standard & Poor's report Tuesday said that despite the government's efforts at financial reform through the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the U.S. Treasury, U.S. Federal Reserve and Congress could still bail out a "too-big-to-fail" bank if it felt it necessary to contain risk.
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Thursday, July 14, 2011
What Congress Doesn’t Want You to Know About the Debt Ceiling Debate / Politics / US Debt
By: Money_Morning
Martin Hutchinson writes:
At this point, there can't be anyone left who truly believes that the debt ceiling debate taking place in Washington is really about what's good for America.
The truth is it's about the 2012 election - and the party that wins the debt ceiling debate will be the party that comes out on top next year.
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Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Europe and America are Financially Burning / Politics / Credit Crisis 2011
By: Bob_Chapman
Markets are what they are today because that is the way government wants them. The stock market has stayed up for quite some time, but the best earnings are fading. The Street is well aware of what has been happening for a number of years. They just do not say anything and go along with the program. They have come to overlook situations worldwide as well as in America, because they believe that, “The President’s Working Group on Financial Markets” won’t let the market fall.
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Memo to Obama: "Create More Jobs or Resign" / Politics / Employment
By: Mike_Whitney
"Abysmal".
That's the only way to describe Friday's job's report. The whole thing stunk. And, on top of that, the unemployment rate has been heading higher for the last 3 months. It's now at 9.2 percent a full two years into the recovery. That's unprecedented. Where are the jobs, that's what everyone wants to know.
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Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Politicians Repeating Public Proclamations & Denouncements of Early-1930s / Politics / Economic Depression
By: Aftab_Singh
In light of the monetary woes that have spread across the globe, I thought I’d demonstrate that the continuing montage of oratory acrobatics coming from our politicians are not a new thing. Here, I show a few examples of the demagogic proclamations that emerged during the early-1930s.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Big Banks Waging Warfare Against the People of the World / Politics / Credit Crisis 2011
By: Washingtons_Blog
Michael Hudson is a highly-regarded economist. He is a Distinguished Research Professor at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, who has advised the U.S., Canadian, Mexican and Latvian governments as well as the United Nations Institute for Training and Research. He is a former Wall Street economist at Chase Manhattan Bank who also helped establish the world’s first sovereign debt fund.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Run on U.S. Government is Coming / Politics / US Debt
By: Michael_S_Rozeff
A run is a mass withdrawal of cash funds from a borrower. We are in the midst of a continuing worldwide credit crisis, punctuated by "runs" of varying prominence and publicity.
These runs are rational, not panics and not due to quirks of psychology. They occur when investors realize that their funds are endangered in an institution. They try to get them out before they lose them.
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