Category: Social Issues
The analysis published under this category are as follows.
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Focus on the 20% Because You Can Replace Lost Money But Not Lost Time / Politics / Social Issues
By: Gary_North
If this were a law firm, you would be wise to hire another.
I define puttering as follows: "Unsystematic work that fills time without accomplishing much output." I define frittering as follows: "The refusal to take advantage of opportunities that have been placed in your hand."
I have known some very successful people over the years. Some have been rich. Others have been influential. All of them have had this in common. They have not puttered. They have also not frittered.
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Thursday, July 12, 2012
From Each According to His Inability, To Each According to His Greed / Politics / Social Issues
By: Ashvin_Pandurangi
I think the one recurring question that has been on everyone's minds since at least 2008-09 is - what will the government do? We all know what the large private corporations and high-level bankers are going to do - they are going to lie, cheat, scheme and steal their way into whatever forms of wealth and control they can get their grubby little hands on (see the Libor scandal for the most recent example). But then we must ask whether the government is going to help them do those things and how exactly they are going to help. After four painful years of betrayal, the answer to the first part of that question seems to be a resounding YES.
Thursday, July 12, 2012
Manchester Airport Terminal 1 Arrivals Suspected Laser Blinding Attack, Public Safety Warning / Local / Social Issues
By: N_Walayat
An epidemic of laser attacks on passenger air-liners during landing at Manchester and other airports has resulted in a firm police response in tracking down, arresting and successfully prosecuting the culprits who usually turn out to be local yobs.
However such firm police action may not go so far in protecting and acting on incidence involving the general public at least at Manchester Airport as recent experience illustrates.
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Monday, July 09, 2012
London Shard and Other Boomerang Towers of Hubris Before The Storm / Politics / Social Issues
By: Raul_I_Meijer
I was leafing through some recent Bloomberg articles and noticed this running thread connecting them: hubris, decisions based on false data, inertia, things like that. It wouldn't be hard to find dozens more pieces just like it in the press, but once you recognize the pattern, it stands out like a sore thumb anyway. It's pretty easy to see where mistakes are made, especially when they're big mistakes.
Sunday, July 08, 2012
Emulate Scrooge McDuck, Make a Bucket List / Politics / Social Issues
By: Gary_North
On October 3, 2009, I attended my 50th high school reunion. The 50th high school reunion is the last hurrah institutionally in the United States. No other final meeting will attract as many people from a person’s generation. There is nothing like your 50th high school reunion to remind you that the clock is ticking.
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
Grotesque Casino Of Corporate Fascism, Who Destroyed The Middle Class Part 3 / Politics / Social Issues
By: James_Quinn
This is the 3rd and final chapter of my series about the destruction of the middle class. In Part 1 of this series I addressed where and how the net worth of the middle class was stolen. In Part 2, I focused on the culprits in this grand theft and in Part 3, I will try to figure out why they stole your net worth and what would be required to restore sanity to this world.
Monday, June 25, 2012
Why Democracy Is Dangerous, the Enemy of Freedom / Politics / Social Issues
By: LewRockwell
Karel Beckman writes: People around the world are fighting autocratic regimes in the name of freedom and democracy. They are right to fight for freedom, but wrong to fight for democracy. Libertarians should try to make it clear to them that the democratic path will not lead to freedom, but to slavery.
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Destroying the Middle Class, Who Stole My Net Worth? / Politics / Social Issues
By: James_Quinn
In Part 1 of this three part series I addressed where and how the net worth of the middle class was stolen. In Part 2, I will tackle who stole your net worth and in Part 3, why they stole your net worth. Now let’s zero in on the culprits of this crime.
Dude, Who Stole My Net Worth?
“Thus far, both political parties have been remarkably clever and effective in concealing this new reality. In fact, the two parties have formed an innovative kind of cartel—an arrangement I have termed America’s political duopoly. Both parties lie about the fact that they have each sold out to the financial sector and the wealthy. So far both have largely gotten away with the lie, helped in part by the enormous amount of money now spent on deceptive, manipulative political advertising.” – Charles Ferguson – Predator Nation
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Who Destroyed The Middle Class? / Politics / Social Issues
By: James_Quinn
"Over the last thirty years, the United States has been taken over by an amoral financial oligarchy, and the American dream of opportunity, education, and upward mobility is now largely confined to the top few percent of the population. Federal policy is increasingly dictated by the wealthy, by the financial sector, and by powerful (though sometimes badly mismanaged) industries such as telecommunications, health care, automobiles, and energy. These policies are implemented and praised by these groups’ willing servants, namely the increasingly bought-and-paid-for leadership of America’s political parties, academia, and lobbying industry.” – Charles Ferguson – Predator Nation
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Compassion – Killer of Society? / Politics / Social Issues
By: Casey_Research
Rex van Schalkwyk, Casey Research Writes:
In politics, it is the idea that counts. So also in philosophy, pop music, pedantry and philanthropy. The idea is everything. And between the idea and the reality, there lies that vast uncharted terrain of promises unfulfilled, of lies and deceit and of naked hypocrisy, all of which account for the failure of the public discourse and of public life. In short, this self-inflicted deception accounts for the failure of society.
Friday, June 08, 2012
Socialist Utopia / Politics / Social Issues
By: Phill_Tomlinson
Another generation, another group of people who believe they can take us all to the promised land. A recent article written by Owen Jones, a left wing activist and author, titled "If socialists really did run the show, working people would benefit" displays the usual naivety and/or arrogance that has persisted with each successive generation of state planners who believe they can change the world for the good. Excepts taken from the article, accompanied with my commentary can be read below.
Tuesday, June 05, 2012
Stiglitz and Conrad Battle Over U.S. Income Inequality Stagflation or Prosperity / Politics / Social Issues
By: Bloomberg
Today on Bloomberg TV: Top private equity investor (and former Bain Capital managing director) Edward Conard debates Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz about income inequality and whether Americans are better or worse off due to innovation in the economy.
Have we just experienced a half-century of stagflation, or have financial risk-takers kept us ahead of Europe and Japan? What does the data show about how much income inequality has helped - or hurt - the average American?
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Wednesday, May 30, 2012
GFC: Quality, Quantity, and The Chicken Little Phenomenon / Politics / Social Issues
By: Submissions
Mark Blair writes: The more complex a system is, the more vulnerable it is to collapse. This article offers insights into the ‘qualities’ and ‘quantities’ of stock-market prediction (which for me is human psychology vis a vis political systems).
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Thursday, May 24, 2012
America's Downward Social and Economic Spiral / Politics / Social Issues
By: James_Quinn
America MORE THAN 30 BLOCKS OF GREY & DECAY
It happened again yesterday morning. There was an accident on the Schuykill Expressway so I had the pleasure of navigating through the 30 Blocks of Squalor, again. After having made at least 25 posts about the 30 Blocks of Squalor over the years, I keep thinking I've run out of things to say. But it seems to be a never ending treasure trove of insights about our society and the people who live in this country. It was a particularly grey day in Philadelphia with a dreary overcast and intermittent rain. It seemed fitting for this trek through the slowly decaying landscape leading to my workplace in West Philly. I've talked previously about the stretch of highway leading to the 30 Blocks of Squalor. It's called West Chester Pike (Route 3) and it cuts through Delaware County where I grew up. It cuts through Havertown, Haverford, Drexel Hill, and Upper Darby and eventually spits you out at 69th Street, where I’ve previously detailed the flash mob of savages rampaging through the Sears stealing everything in sight (all caught on surveillance cameras to be shown on a future reality TV show). In a shocking turn of events, Sears decided to later close this retail establishment.
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Monday, May 21, 2012
Are Homo Sapiens an Endangered Species? / Politics / Social Issues
By: Ashvin_Pandurangi
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Sunday, May 20, 2012
Looming Reversal of Centralization as Empires Disintegrate / Politics / Social Issues
By: Gary_North
"Centralization induces apoplexy at the center and anemia at the extremities." ~ Lamenais
The present political system is clearly insane. It suffers from schizophrenia. Around the world, almost no one trusts the politicians, yet almost everyone votes for incumbent politicians who promise to reform the government.
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Sunday, May 13, 2012
The Nightshade Nightmare / Politics / Social Issues
By: Submissions
John Roth writes writes: I am a male over 60 and have [or had] a serious health problem that I tried to ignore for the last three years. I tried every holistic treatment, supplement, vitamin and herb under the sun.
During that period my gastrointestinal tract quit working three times. I had a lot of trouble breathing and although I had the urge nothing would come out of my body. You get the picture.
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Friday, May 11, 2012
Does the West Have a Future? / Politics / Social Issues
By: Paul_Craig_Roberts
Living in America is becoming very difficult for anyone with a moral conscience, a sense of justice, or a lick of intelligence. Consider:
We have had a second fake underwear bomb plot, a much more fantastic one than the first hoax. The second underwear bomber was a CIA operative or informant allegedly recruited by al-Qaeda, an organization that US authorities have recently claimed to be defeated, in disarray, and no longer significant.
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Wednesday, May 09, 2012
The Great Myth of the Welfare State Disintegrates / Politics / Social Issues
By: LewRockwell
Jack D. Douglas writes: he Great Myth of the Welfare State and all of the lesser myths and lies on which it was built are now being totally confounded by the harsh realities of human nature and finance and economic life and politics built on human nature. Socialism, Communism, Fascism, Nazism, Mixed Economies, Democratic Fascism, and all the other brands of this Great Myth of the Welfare State are rapidly imploding. The utopian ideologists of all stripes of this insane and fierce certitude of impending heaven on earth are completely confused and in a state of total denial and are trying every wild-eyed scheme they can to revive the dying Great Myth.
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Wednesday, May 09, 2012
The Majority Is Always Wrong, Except by Accident / Politics / Social Issues
By: LewRockwell
Al Lowi writes: Sifting the historical record for cases affirming that the majority was on the right side of an issue fails to turn up a single "decision" where this was the result. So where is it written that the majority should rule? In the absence of affirmative evidence, a clever wag once offered the following argument:
Read full article... Read full article...The majority is infallible. Because no matter how stupid the propositions decided or the ones elected, the majority was always the stupider for having done so.