Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Monday, June 16, 2008
US Guaranteed Social Security Benefits: Make It So / Politics / US Politics
The comically complicated PSA (Personal Savings Account) legislation bouncing around Congress will raise taxes, increase investment risk, and expand the size of government. Let's stop applying Band-Aids to spouting arteries. We are looking for a guaranteed retirement benefit program, and organizations capable of providing one. Additionally, we want the new program to reduce taxes, create jobs, boost the economy, cut prices, and increase salaries. Difficult? Not really.Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, June 16, 2008
Barrack Obama's Economic Folly and Paul Krugman’s Hypocrisy / Politics / US Politics
Barrack Obama's economic policy is one of incredible stupidity. He plans to bludgeon the economy with massive tax increases while flooding it with astronomical spending. Is this bloke a genius or what. (The question, of course, is rhetorical). But how in heavens name does such economic idiocy become common currency, particularly in the politically corrupt media?Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Bush Administration Corruption- Trillions of Missing Dollars / Politics / US Politics
Information for this article comes from long-time business, finance and political writer and analyst Bob Chapman who publishes the bi-weekly International Forecaster. It's power-packed with key information and a valued source for this writer. He obtained voluminous material directly from its source. People need to know it. Read on.Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Irish Say NO to European Super State / Politics / Euro-Zone
On Friday, Ireland delivered a knockout punch to European elites and corporatists and shattered their plan for an EU Superstate. The so-called Lisbon Treaty was nothing more than a repackaging of the European Constitution that was defeated by French and Dutch voters in 2005. The treaty was loaded with the typical "democratic" gobbledygook to conceal the vicious neoliberal policies at its heart. If it had passed, the treaty would have paved the way for greater privatization of public services, diminished workers rights, less state control over trade policies and civil liberties, and an aggressive plan to militarize Europe.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, June 14, 2008
Irish "No Vote" Plunges EU Into Crisis / Politics / Euro-Zone
The euro dipped Friday as news broke that Ireland's voters rejected the EU Lisbon Treaty in yesterday's national referendum. Although the Treaty's fate has no direct economic impact on the EU, the resulting uncertainty will add to market anxiety over more pressing issues like rising inflation, oil price protests, and looming recessions in Spain and even Ireland.Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, June 13, 2008
Super Surgeries: GP's Accused of Lying to Patients! / Politics / NHS
In an attempt to halt the governments programme for the implementation of Polyclinics or ‘Super Surgeries', the political arm of GP's the British Medical Association (BMA) delivered a petition of more than 1 million signatures to Downing Street against the implementation of 150 ‘Super Surgeries' and for existing GP Surgeries to be protected.
The Health Minister, Ben Bradshaw lashed out at the scare tactics accusing the BMA of "misleading and mendacious" behaviour in getting patients to sign up to the petition.
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Wednesday, June 11, 2008
The Next Big Federal Spending Spree / Politics / US Economy
As the economic indicators turn down and election year politics heats up, the calls from politicians for more government intervention and enhanced economic stimulus are becoming more strident. Last week, with the onset of the general presidential campaign, and with increased attention on the economy shown by the Bush administration, I could not help but think that something big was in the air. And by big, I mean the kind of massive new Federal spending initiatives that we haven't seen since the Great Society of the 1960's.Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, June 09, 2008
Rising Energy Prices and the Falling US Dollar / Politics / Money Supply
Oil prices are on the minds of many Americans as gas hits $4 a gallon, and continues to surge. How high can prices go? How can we solve these problems? What, or who, is to blame?Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, June 09, 2008
Democrats and Recessions / Politics / US Economy
Now that Obama is the Democrats' contender for the presidency, they can resume their attacks on the US economy. These moral cretins have still got the effrontery to assert that the Bush economy is one of the worst in the country's history when that appellation should be awarded to the Roosevelt administration. (The second worst would be the Hoover administration).Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, June 08, 2008
Personal Reflections on the Crisis in America- Darkness in America- Part3 / Politics / US Politics
The first decade of the new millennium—the 2000s—produced a catastrophe for the U.S. when the Supreme Court designated my former Yale classmate George W. Bush as president in December 2000.
Democrat Albert Gore had won the popular vote in the November election but was behind in electoral votes. The controversy centered on Florida , where the official tally showed Bush the winner by a narrow margin, but where the Court decided a complete recount might leave the nation with an undecided election for too long. It later turned out that many eligible Florida voters had been improperly excluded from voting by partisan state election officials.
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Saturday, June 07, 2008
Personal Reflections on the Crisis in America- Reagon and Clinton- Part2 / Politics / US Politics
“The Reagan Revolution”After Ronald Reagan assumed the presidency, I worked for two years at the U.S. Office of Consumer Affairs, which was an extension of the White House consumer office. The president's special assistant for consumer affairs was now Virginia Knauer, who had held the same office under President Richard Nixon, and for whom I wrote speeches and reports. We were afraid that with the Reagan cuts of the federal civilian budget our office would be abolished, but that didn't happen.
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Friday, June 06, 2008
Personal Reflections on the Crisis in America- Carter White House and Monetary Reform - Part1 / Politics / US Politics
I moved back to Williamsburg a year ago, after retiring from the federal government, in order to live write at the home of my elderly mother. She resides near the Restored Area, a half-mile from the reconstructed colonial Capitol. At this site on May 15, 1776 , the Second Virginia Convention voted 112-0 to instruct its delegates in Philadelphia to enter a motion for independence. If the U.S. was born in Philadelphia , it was conceived here.Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Obama Victory and America's Two Party Dictatorship / Politics / US Politics
Each election cycle, hope springs eternal. Candidates promise change and voters buy it. Intelligent ones. People who know better or should. The current campaign highlights it. A surge is building for Obama, not for what he is. For what people think or hope he is - a populist, progressive, man of the people, a new course for America.After the final June 3 primaries and "rush of superdelegates," according to The New York Times, they're stuck with him. The Times reports that he crossed "over the threshold (to) the 2118 delegates needed to be nominated...." Obama marked the occasion as his chance to "bring a new and better day to America (as) the 'Democratic' nominee for president of the United States of America."
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Wednesday, June 04, 2008
The Real US Economic Misery Index / Politics / Market Manipulation
Nilus Mattive writes: Santa Barbara is hardly the picture of poverty. Oprah's mansion is there, and the city's median house is worth a cool million. Heck, I proposed to my wife there — we ate some tremendous sushi on State Street and relished in the city's upscale vibe.
So imagine my surprise when I learned that 12 of Santa Barbara's parking lots have recently been converted into nightly homeless shelters!
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Tuesday, June 03, 2008
Sowing More Big Government with the Farm Bill / Politics / US Politics
Recently Congress sent the latest Farm Bill to the president. The bill features brand new federal programs, expansion of existing subsidies, more food stamps and more foreign food aid. This bill hits the taxpayer hard, while at the same time ensuring food prices will remain elevated. The president vetoed the bill, citing concerns over its costs and subsidies for the wealthy in a time of high food prices and record farm income. Nevertheless, this over-reaching, government-expanding Farm Bill will soon be law.Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, June 01, 2008
Bogus Global Peace Index Prelude to Regime Change for Venezuela and Iran / Politics / Venezuela
The Global Peace Index (GPI) was launched in May 2007 and claims to be the first study of its kind ranking nations according to their peacefulness. Last year's report covered 121 countries. The latest increased it to 140. Australian entrepreneur Steve Killelea conceived the idea and won some dubious endorsements. Among them, the Dalai Lama. He served as a CIA asset from the late 1950s until 1974 and may again be in tow if the Bush administration's awarding him a Congressional Gold Medal last year and closeness to him now is an indication.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, May 31, 2008
The End of Gold Manipulation / Politics / Gold & Silver
Every investor has the power to end gold manipulation. All he must do is lift a single finger – but at the right time, and at the right place.If you had a chance to end gold manipulation, would you use it?
I can remember the days of 1999, when Bill Murphy and Chris Powell of GATA were serving every member of Congress with their evidence of gold-price manipulation by the top US bullion banks, by the Federal Reserve, and via the Treasury Department's Exchange Stabilization Fund. The result was a lot of raised eyebrows and some frantic paper shuffling - followed by a roaring, deafening silence.
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Saturday, May 31, 2008
Electromagnetic Energy May Hold the Key to Climate Change / Politics / Climate Change
One of the six topical themes of the storyline in Beyond Neanderthal is the likely impact of Climate Change on world-wide agricultural production and what we might do about that. Importantly, our response will need to be tailored to address causes, not symptoms. When I watched Al Gore's body language in the documentary, An Inconvenient Truth , I formed the view that his stepping onto that scissor lift was an act of salesmanship. This bothered me. If the “science is settled” why was this obviously sincere man in hard-sell mode? Did he lack confidence that the facts spoke for themselves? It was then I decided that – for the purposes of ensuring integrity of Beyond Neanderthal's storyline – it would be necessary for me to do my own detailed research as to the likely causes of Climate Change.Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, May 30, 2008
The Next American Revolution and Long-term Stock Market Cycles / Politics / Cycles Analysis
In the aftermath of the credit crisis, real estate deflation and stock market correction, there has been a startling rise in the talk of revolution among many Internet chat rooms and message boards.
This is no idle chit-chat, mind you. It's part of a serious discussion about the alarming possibility of a militant uprising should the economic situation deteriorate further. “Typical bombast from the lunatic fringe,” is how some have responded to the sudden appearance of revolutionary furor. In view of the market cycles, however, the longer-term implications behind this kind of talk can't be so easily dismissed.
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Friday, May 30, 2008
Britain's North Sea Crude Oil Revenue Bonanza / Politics / Crude Oil
The surge in the crude oil price has greatly benefited the major oil exporters such as the gulf states, Russia, Venezuela, and Norway. Despite Britains consumption of crude oil roughly matching production, the rise in crude oil has resulted in a huge continuing revenue bonanza for the British government through profit share on production, taxes on oil company profits and from tax revenues on domestic consumption, which has lead to protests amongst hauliers and motorists.Read full article... Read full article...