Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Haiti Earthquake Survivors Dying as Aid Struggles to Reach Them / Politics / Social Issues
By: Submissions
The distribution of humanitarian supplies to Haiti is being hampered by infrastructure damage, blocked roads and severed communication lines. Reports are that those who survived Tuesday’s massive earthquake are now dying in huge numbers, and clean water, food and medical supplies are desperately needed. Dead bodies lie everywhere on the streets, and the Red Cross says it has run out of body bags. Three million more—one third of Haiti’s population—had been hurt or left homeless.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
The Federal Reserve / Politics / Central Banks
By: Douglas_V._Gnazzo
Honest Money – Chapter 10
"Bankers own the earth. Take it away from them, but leave them the power to create money and control credit, and with a flick of
a pen they will create enough to buy it back." [1]
Friday, January 15, 2010
Fannie and Freddie, Another American Taxpayer Nightmare / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Michael_Pollaro
It’s official.
Fannie and Freddie are now full wards of the state, departments of the U.S. government. And their obligations are now the obligations of the American taxpayer.
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Friday, January 15, 2010
While Fed Dilly Dallies, China and Other Central Bankers Taking the Lead / Politics / Central Banks
By: Mike_Larson
I talked in last week’s column about how our Federal Reserve won’t raise interest rates until the cows come home. But you can’t say the same thing about many central banks overseas …
The men and women in charge there aren’t sitting idly by while new bubbles inflate. They’re not whistling past the graveyard while asset prices balloon ever higher. They’re actually starting to normalize policy — and since those moves have investment implications for you, you need to be aware of them.
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Friday, January 15, 2010
Greenspan and Bernanke Groveling at the Fed / Politics / Central Banks
By: Submissions
Frederick Sheehan writes: Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke gave a speech on January 3, 2010 that was incomprehensible. The address itself will be discussed later. It is important first to consider the precedent of Federal Reserve chairmen making absurd claims - and getting away with it.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Bilderbergs of the World Unite! / Politics / Global Financial System
By: William_Bowles
Read full article... Read full article...
And just in case you still haven’t got the point, the same Heritage Foundation document, dated 25 September, 2002 went on to tell us,
Thursday, January 14, 2010
H1N1, the False Pandemic, Pharma Companies Made Billions From Mass Hysteria / Politics / Global Pandemic
By: Pravda
Wolfgang Wodarg, Head of Health at the Council of Europe, considers that the A H1N1 scare was a “campaign of panic”, a “false pandemic”, “one of the great medicine scandals of the century” and claims that the vaccines, based on cancerous cells, spell the chilling message “there is worse to come”.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Google's China Hypocrisy Ignores Deep CIA Connections / Politics / Google
By: Pravda
The western media is currently full of articles on Google's 'threat to quit China' over internet censorship issues, and the company's 'suspicion' that the Chinese government was behind attempts to 'break-in' to several Google email accounts used by 'Chinese dissidents'.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Earth on the Brink of an Ice Age / Politics / Climate Change
By: Pravda
The earth is now on the brink of entering another Ice Age, according to a large and compelling body of evidence from within the field of climate science. Many sources of data which provide our knowledge base of long-term climate change indicate that the warm, twelve thousand year-long Holocene period will rather soon be coming to an end, and then the earth will return to Ice Age conditions for the next 100,000 years.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Blunder and Plunder, The History of War / Politics / GeoPolitics
By: John_Kozy
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) claimed that "Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it." Perhaps. But more serious are those who know history but learn nothing from it.
Victor Davis Hanson is a Distinguished Fellow in History at Hillsdale College, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, and a columnist for National Review Online—all institutions with admittedly right wing views. He writes about war but has never fought in one. He is a historian whose views of history are based on his biases, not the evidence.
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Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Fed Publishing Mathematical Gibberish to Hide Balance Sheet Secrets / Politics / Central Banks
By: Mike_Shedlock
The Fed is pulling out all stops to defend its secrets, including publishing self-serving mathematical gibberish. Please consider the St. Louis Fed article on the Social Cost of Transparency.
Unless you are an academic wonk, you will be stymied by pages that look like this ...
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
The Fed Seeks Control Not Profits To Protect the Banking Cartel / Politics / Central Banks
By: Gary_North
This report is from Fortune. It says that the Federal Reserve System made $51 billion in 2009, and it returned over $46 billion to the government.
If you are a regular reader of my reports, you are well aware of this. I write articles on this at least once a year. Why? Because so few critics of the FED understand this. I keep getting questions on the forums about how the FED works.
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Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Geithner in Increasing Trouble Over AIG Bailout Decisions / Politics / US Politics
By: Mike_Shedlock
Representative Edolphus Towns, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee plans a Subpoena to probe Geithner's AIG decisions.
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Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Bank Shareholders Should Reject Bankster Bonuses / Politics / Credit Crisis Bailouts
By: Janet_Tavakoli
In July 2009, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's report found that, among other things, the compensation structures at most banks were "a major impetus for the subprime fiasco."*
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Why the Fed Likes Independence / Politics / Central Banks
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
Last week it was revealed that when Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner was Chairman of the New York Federal Reserve, he urged AIG officials not to disclose to the Securities Exchange Commission relevant details of agreements with banks to bail out Goldman Sachs. Apparently he felt at the time that regulators and the public would be angry that taxpayer money was used to fully compensate bankers who made some horrifically bad investment decisions. These banks should have suffered the consequences of the huge risks they were taking. After all, they kept plenty of rewards when times were good. Instead, the Fed found a way to socialize these major losses so these banks could survive and continue making more bad decisions, at the expense of the American people and the value of the dollar.
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Monday, January 11, 2010
Americans Walking Away From Mortgages / Politics / Credit Crisis 2010
By: Andrew_Abraham
It seems now almost acceptable that Americans can walk away from their mortgages. Why not? So many are upside down, owing more money on a house than the house is actually worth.
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Monday, January 11, 2010
The Military-Industrial Complex is Ruining the U.S. Economy / Politics / US Politics
By: Washingtons_Blog
Everyone knows that the too big to fails and their dishonest and footsy-playing regulators and politicians are largely responsible for trashing the economy.
But the military-industrial complex shares much of the blame.
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Monday, January 11, 2010
Gold and United States Steepening Slippery Slope Towards Facism / Politics / US Politics
By: Adam_Brochert
The United States is rather rapidly sliding into a fascist-type state (you can use the "corporatism" euphemism if the truth is too difficult to swallow). The government and their corporate oligarchy are stealing from the people and no longer care if the people have any cake to eat. The process was gradual at first, then accelerated during George Bush Jr's tenure.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Why Paying Your Mortgage May Be Financially Irresponsible / Politics / Credit Crisis 2010
By: Karen_De_Coster
Roger Lowenstein has written one of the best articles I have read on the topic: walking away from your house. The prominent author and journalist published a January 7, 2010 article in the New York Times with the headline, "Walk Away From Your Mortgage!" Lowenstein acknowledges that it may be financially careless for homeowners who are upside down on their mortgage to keep paying it in order to hang onto a fantasy of ownership and avoid the shame of default. In this article, Lowenstein’s subject is the borrower who can afford to pay the mortgage but considers opting out for reasons of financial benefit and survival. This is referred to as a strategic default.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Tim Geithner Must Go As Unemployment Festers A New Economic Strategy Team Is Needed / Politics / Recession 2008 - 2010
By: Danny_Schechter
When a pitcher gets tired, starts throwing walks or being hit, most attentive managers take him out of the game. When policies fail, as in the case of the security system that didn’t work to spot the alleged Christmas bomber, the President starts acting tough with bluster about the buck stopping here and orders to straighten out a failed system.