Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
How We Became Debt Slaves And Learned to Love It / Politics / Global Debt Crisis
By: Submissions
Gordon Arnaut writes: Who is in charge of these United States?
If you guess that it’s the people with the money, then you are correct. Not the elected representatives of the people. Not the men and women in uniform, not the factory workers, or farmers, or teachers, or bus drivers and pilots. Just the guys and gals with the moneybags.
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Saturday, May 15, 2010
Market "Thumbs Down" on the EU Bailout / Politics / Euro-Zone
By: Mike_Whitney
Barack Obama must have been very frightened, indeed. Otherwise he never would have inserted himself so forcefully into Greece's debt crisis. The truth is, there's much more at stake then people seem to realize. A Greek default would be a major blow to the banking system and the damage would not be limited just to Europe. It could easily spread to the United States and trigger another meltdown. That's why Obama spent most of his weekend on the phone, exhorting EU finance ministers to take swift action to put out the brushfire. Not surprisingly, the details were omitted in the US. media. Here's an excerpt from the UK Independent explaining what happened behind the scenes last weekend:
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Saturday, May 15, 2010
Democracy’s in Debt Death Spiral From Greece to the United States, Enemies of the State / Politics / US Politics
By: David_DeGraw
As the Economic Elite continue their plunder, the people in Greece riot and the big banks score yet another big blow against the people of the United States.
Democracy throughout the world is under attack. Many people can make the argument that our democracy here in America is only an illusion, but even the illusion of democracy is crashing down. Tragedies are currently playing out across the world on an epic scale. Unprecedented economic and environmental catastrophes have become the norm. Billions of people, the overwhelming majority of humanity, have been sentenced to a slow death due to a concentration of wealth and resources within humanity’s economic top 0.5%. Ultimately, short-sighted greed has proven to be humanity’s most severe disease.
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Saturday, May 15, 2010
U.S. Big Bank Bailout Costs Trillions More than Stated / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Washingtons_Blog
Granted, the $700 billion dollar TARP bailout was a massive bait-and-switch. The government said it was doing it to soak up toxic assets, and then switched to saying it was needed to free up lending. It didn't do that either. Indeed, the Fed doesn't want the banks to lend.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
United States Political Insurrection Has Begun / Politics / US Politics
By: Gary_North
On Saturday, May 8, an extraordinary event took place. United States Senator Bob Bennett, a 3-term Republican, failed to make the cut for his party's primary. Not only was he not nominated to run, he did not make the cut to get nominated. He was a distant third. Two Tea Party candidates beat him.
Bob Bennett is a legacy Senator. His father served as Senator before him.
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Thursday, May 13, 2010
Global Economic War, Will The Wall Street Banksters Ever Be Held Accountable? / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Danny_Schechter
We are all still stuck in the “big Muddy.” No, not the wars of old or even the oil disaster. The mud I am referring to is more like quicksand and it sucks anyone who wants to look at what happened in the financial crisis deeper and deeper into it.
Soon, you are buried in shifting sea of so-called “exotic financial instruments,” and tranches, derivatives, credit default swaps, naked short-selling, etc and so forth, ad fin item. It’s murkier in there than in the oil-infested waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
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Thursday, May 13, 2010
Fed Transcripts Shows A Methodical, Diabolical Destruction of America's Wealth / Politics / Central Banks
By: Fred_Sheehan
The Federal Reserve releases transcripts of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meetings with a five-year lag (as required by law, the Fed would like to burn them). Transcripts for 2004 meetings were released on April 30, 2010. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 998 points on May 6, 2010. The 2004 transcripts help explain why the Dow could have disappeared last week.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Financial Reform, How We Can Save Our Economy / Politics / Market Regulation
By: David_DeGraw
The next few weeks will culminate into a defining moment in American history and lay the course for our economic future. After two years of being asleep at the switch, Congress is finally stepping up and taking action on financial reform. The resulting bill will be a clear indication and definitive proof as to who is actually running our country. Will it reinforce the dominance of the Wall Street elite, or will it mark a rebirth of the rule of law and economic prosperity for millions of Americans who have seen their standard of living decline?
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
EuroZone Bailout Band Aids for Everyone / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: John_Browne
As the health of much of the global economy weakens on a daily basis, political leadership increasingly ignores the source of the malady and instead focuses on short term "band-aid" remedies. These measures which may buy a few months, or years, of relative well being, will convince the public that problems have been solved and will thereby take pressure off governments to make the needed structural changes.
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Tuesday, May 11, 2010
New UK Government Tax Cut, Annual Tax Free Allowance to Rise to £10,000 / Politics / Taxes
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The New Conservative / Lib-Dem coalition UK government is expected to cut UK taxes for most tax payers by £705 per year as part of coalition deal. The Lib-Dem Tax cut policy to be phased in over x years will take the form of the annual tax free allowance rising from £6,470 to £10,000 which is aimed at lifting the low paid totally out of income tax, however it will at the same time benefit all tax payers.
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Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Engineered Inflation Bailouts Cannot Beat the Markets / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Michael_S_Rozeff
Once again the leaders of the western world have engineered a bailout Who pays for it? We hicks and dupes and taxpayers. Once again the politicians, central bankers, and IMFers have patched together a paper dike, in an attempt to hold up the prices of the euro and junk debts, and to prevent the liquidation of banks that hold the bad paper. Once again, they have kept banks and lenders from realizing losses. Once again they have jacked up the moral hazard in the system. Once again they have saved, if only temporarily, the fiat money-fractional-reserve system that works hand-in-hand with big government.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Just Saying No to Social Security Taxes … / Politics / US Politics
By: Nilus_Mattive
Lancaster — known throughout the U.S. as Pennsylvania Dutch Country — is about 40 minutes away from my house. And whenever I pass through the area, I’m reminded of what it means to be truly self-sufficient.
The region’s many Amish inhabitants grow their own food … help each other build their houses … and use horse and buggies instead of gas-addicted cars. Heck, they were “green” before the term became fashionable.
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Tuesday, May 11, 2010
High Frequency Financial Terrorism, Wall Street Bankster's Maintain Death Grip on United States / Politics / Market Regulation
By: David_DeGraw
III: Financial Terrorism Operations: 9/29/08 & 5/6/10
In the aftermath of Goldman Sachs’ public flogging before the world in Congress, and while under investigation, on the very day that Congress was voting on the "break up the too big to fail banks" amendment and cutting behind the scenes deals to gut the audit of the Federal Reserve, the stock market had its greatest sudden drop in history, plummeting 700 points in ten minutes - shades of September 29, 2008 all over again.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
"Drop Dead Economics": The Financial Crisis in Greece and the European Union / Politics / Global Debt Crisis
By: Michael_Hudson
Riddle: How are the Greek rioters like America’s Tea Party movement?
Answer: Both reject government being taken over by the financial oligarchy to shift the tax burden onto labor.
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Tuesday, May 11, 2010
EU Bailout Lootathon / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: LewRockwell
Sally Copperwaite writes: On May 5th, three bank workers died in a blaze at their Athens office block after violence broke out in a mass demonstration against the Greek government.
This was the tragic result of a decision taken in 1992, to impose a single currency on twelve very different economies.
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Tuesday, May 11, 2010
European Financial Crisis Moving To a New Level, Nationalism and Shared Fate / Politics / Euro-Zone
By: STRATFOR
The European financial crisis is moving to a new level. The Germans have finally consented to lead a bailout effort for Greece. The effort has angered the German public, which has acceded with sullen reluctance. It does not accept the idea that it is Germans’ responsibility to save Greeks from their own actions. The Greeks are enraged at the reluctance, having understood that membership in the European Union meant that Greece’s problems were Europe’s.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
The Big Short – How Wall Street Destroyed Main Street / Politics / Credit Crisis 2008
By: James_Quinn
Day after day, bankers have been paraded before Congressional committees regarding their role in the financial crisis which brought the financial system to the edge of the abyss on September 18, 2008. Every one has claimed that they were not responsible in any way for the disaster. They blame once in a lifetime circumstances that no one could have anticipated. It was a perfect storm and they had no way of knowing. These Harvard MBA Wall Street geniuses, who collected compensation in excess of $100 million each before the collapse, had no idea what was going on within their own firms. Ignorance and stupidity is no excuse for losing a trillion dollars.Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, May 10, 2010
Europe: Taking the Path Blazed by the U.S. with Similar Consequences to Come / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Mike_Stathis
After the threat of a continued sell-off in the global capital markets, leaders of the EU, IMF (and most likely members of the White House) arranged an emergency bailout fund to calm the markets.
Today, Wall Street is celebrating the news of a proposed $1 trillion bailout for European nations in danger of defaulting on sovereign debt.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Fed Audit Under Fire / Politics / Central Banks
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
It doesn't come as too much of a surprise that the measure to audit the Federal Reserve is coming under continuous fire from the central bank and its cronies. For the first time since the Federal Reserve was created nearly a century ago, they have hired an actual lobbyist to pound the pavement on Capitol Hill. This is a desperate effort to hang on to the privilege of secrecy and lack of accountability they have enjoyed for so long. Last week showed they are getting their money's worth in the Senate.
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Monday, May 10, 2010
Sovereign Debt Crisis, Washington Complicit in Massive Financial Wall Street Fraud / Politics / Credit Crisis 2010
By: Bob_Chapman
It was 7 years ago we said Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were bankrupt. Most everyone within the beltway knew it, but no one would say anything about it. This as it now turns out they were the poster companies, which led to sovereign debt problems, but also showed that they were involved in massive fraud over several years and many in Washington knew it. Earnings were fabricated in order to create conditions, so that the officers could collect millions of dollars in bonuses. Part of this scam was engineered by Goldman Sachs, which pushed more than $100 million in earnings into future years. Earnings were structured so that they justified larger payouts for executives.