Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Tuesday, October 01, 2013
U.S. and Iranian Realities / Politics / GeoPolitics
By: Anonymous
U.S. President Barack Obama called Iranian President Hassan Rouhani last week in the first such conversation in the 34 years since the establishment of the Islamic Republic. The phone call followed tweets and public statements on both sides indicating a willingness to talk. Though far from an accommodation between the two countries, there are reasons to take this opening seriously -- not only because it is occurring at such a high level, but also because there is now a geopolitical logic to these moves. Many things could go wrong, and given that this is the Middle East, the odds of failure are high. But Iran is weak and the United States is avoiding conflict, and there are worse bases for a deal.
Tuesday, October 01, 2013
Ridiculous Ways U.S. Government Shutdown Will Affect You / Politics / Government Spending
By: Jeff_Berwick
Millions around the world today are hoping the US federal government shuts down at midnight on Monday. Many have thoughts of wars and occupations ending in their regions... but, sadly, this is not part of the "services" that will be cut during a shutdown.
In fact, not only will the Department of Offense continue on as usual but so will all the tyrannical agencies such as the DEA, IRS, ATF, CIA and countless other alphabet soup agencies of oppression.
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Monday, September 30, 2013
U.S. Government Shutdown - A Grand Bargain for Liberty? / Politics / US Politics
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
As I write this, it appears that the federal government is about to shut down because the House and Senate cannot agree on whether to add language defunding or delaying Obamacare to the "Continuing Resolution". Despite all the hand-wringing heard in DC, a short-term government shut down (which doesn't actually shut down the government) will not cause the country to collapse.
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Monday, September 30, 2013
Crude Oil Helps Unfreeze US-Iranian Relations / Politics / Crude Oil
By: Andrew_McKillop
SAVING PRESIDENT OBAMA
Missing in the diplomatic and media hoopla surrounding US-Iranian relations, for example the missing “photo op” handshake between the USA's Obama and Iran's new president Rouhani at the UN General Assembly, the three-letter-word oil was also absent.
For some, given Obama's often farcical and fumbling foreign policy initiatives, it might seem the mounting momentum for an end to Iranian sanctions is only another initiative with no real goal except saving the president. As we know, a phone call between the two turned out to be “almost as good as a handshake”. As we also know, ending sanctions and normalizing US-Iranian relation may move very rapidly – whatever Israel can do trying to slow it.
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Sunday, September 29, 2013
Did Putin Quietly Play the Debt Card Over Syria? / Politics / GeoPolitics
By: Ron_Holland
"They are living beyond their means and shifting a part of the weight of their problems to the world economy. They are living like parasites off the global economy and their monopoly of the dollar. If [in America] there is a systemic malfunction, this will affect everyone. Countries like Russia and China hold a significant part of their reserves in American securities. There should be other reserve currencies." – Vladimir Putin in 2011
Saturday, September 28, 2013
Barack Obama - The Blackberry President / Politics / US Politics
By: Andrew_McKillop
TIME MOVES ON
At the height of his short-lived media acclaim and uncritical public support, Obama was happy to show he knew how to use, and liked his Blackberry cellphone. Time has also moved on for Blackberry. Like Nokia it missed the boat for upmarket Internet devices. It was unable to adapt to the surge of new and flashier gimmicks from Samsung and Apple. Blackberry is now a corporate disaster. On its August sales, it lost nearly $24 for every $100 of the dwindling sales it could garner. T-Mobile, the fourth-largest US wireless provider said it will no longer stock Blackberry devices in its shops and will only ship them when people make a written request.
Saturday, September 28, 2013
Why Israel will Not Join the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty / Politics / Israel
By: Global_Research
Timothy Alexander Guzman writes: Iran’s New President Hassan Rouhani has requested that Israel to sign and become a member of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as he spoke for a second time at the United Nation General Assembly. “As long as nuclear weapons exist, the threat of their use exists,” Rouhani said, citing the American bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Rouhani is calling for “nuclear-free zone” in the Middle East. Israel is the only country in the Middle East that had not and will not sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Israel would use nuclear weapons if it felt it was threatened by any nation in the Middle East.
Saturday, September 28, 2013
CNN Broadcast Fake Translation of Iran President Rouhani’s Statement Regarding Holocaust / Politics / Mainstream Media
By: Global_Research
Farsnews writes: TEHRAN (FNA)- American news channel CNN fabricated the remarks made by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in response to the network’s question about the Holocaust.
Saturday, September 28, 2013
The Student Loan Bubble / Politics / Student Finances
By: Jeff_Berwick
James Guzman and Ben Vincent write: In 2008 the prospective career paths for much of America went up in smoke as jobs became more and more sparse. Many, still desperately clinging to the fantasy of the American Dream, are getting money the only way that they know how; borrowing it.
Friday, September 27, 2013
Reasons for U.S. Income Inequality / Politics / Social Issues
By: Richard_Mills
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist David Cay Johnston says the incomes of the bottom 90 percent of Americans, after being adjusted for inflation, grew by only $59 on average between 1966 and 2011, over the same period the average income of the top 10 percent of Americans grew by $116,071.
A 2011 study from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reported incomes for the bottom fifth of Americans grew 20 percent between 1979 and 2007. Members of the top one percent saw their incomes grow by 275 percent during the same period,
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Thursday, September 26, 2013
The Perfect Alternative to Wall Street Banks / Politics / Banksters
By: Ellen_Brown
A national postal and infrastructure bank could protect our money, rebuild the nation, and won't cost taxpayers a dime.
The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) is the nation’s second largest civilian employer after WalMart. Although successfully self-funded throughout its long history, it is currently struggling to stay afloat. This is not, as sometimes asserted, because it has been made obsolete by the Internet. In fact the post office has gotten more business from Internet orders than it has lost to electronic email. What has pushed the USPS into insolvency is an oppressive 2006 congressional mandate that it prefund healthcare for its workers 75 years into the future. No other entity, public or private, has the burden of funding multiple generations of employees who have not yet even been born.
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Thursday, September 26, 2013
Iran Hell Bent On An Nuclear Bomb / Politics / Middle East
By: Andrew_McKillop
IN ISRAELI EYES
In Israeli eyes, Iran is ruled by a gang of religious fanatics whose nearly unique aim in life is to annihilate Israel. They are hell bent on producing The Bomb, which will enable them to do so. They are crazy fanatics so they don't care that Israel will make a second strike with its own nuclear weapons if it is A-bombed. Iran will be destroyed forever. So Iran must be prevented from having the bomb at all costs, certainly including world oil supplies being cut by 33% or more and the Strait of Hormuz closed, for a period that will depend on how quickly Iran can be bombed flat.
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Just Say No to the Fed's Next Bernanke / Politics / US Federal Reserve Bank
By: Don_Miller
So long Larry Summers! In this game of eeny meeny miny moe, it appears that Obama's index finger will ultimately land on Janet Yellen to replace Bernanke as chairman of the Federal Reserve. Summers was Wall Street's choice, but he withdrew from consideration, citing potential obstacles in the Senate confirmation process. While I greeted that update favorably, Yellen isn't high on my list either.
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Fukushima Radiation Leaks Totally Out of Control - Threatening Human Survival / Politics / Environmental Issues
By: Global_Research
Harvey Wasserman writes: We are now within two months of what may be humankind’s most dangerous moment since the Cuban Missile Crisis.
There is no excuse for not acting. All the resources our species can muster must be focussed on the fuel pool at Fukushima Unit 4.
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Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Corporate Profits and Worker Unemployment / Politics / Unemployment
By: BATR
The informative business publication, Zero Hedge, featured the voice of common sense and economic insight, Rick Santelli.
"CNBC's Rick Santelli asks the (rhetorical) question that everyone should ask: "[What the Fed minutes said] is, listen, we have to wait for bigger confirmation that the economy is doing better; and for that, we're going to look at the employment side. [At the same time] we have the fewest people working that can work in 30 years, and all-time-record-high profits for corporations. Now, does that strategy sound rational to you?" It seems, now that Bernanke has seemingly promised that it will really never end, that Santelli's question will become increasingly critical in this country."
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Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Angela Merkel Must Reform Energiewende / Politics / Germany
By: Andrew_McKillop
PROMISED AND DUE
Angela Merkel promised on repeated occasions during her election campaign that reform of Germany's energy transition plan – Energiewende – would be high on her agenda if she received another mandate to govern. Following her triumphal re-election and the political horsetrading on forming a Grand Coalition with the SDP and the Greens, this reform will have to come.
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
From Greek Tragedy To Travesty: Troika Selling Off The Cradle Of Democracy / Politics / Eurozone Debt Crisis
By: Raul_I_Meijer
Is it merely a coincidence that the troika rode its Trojan horse into Athens again on the very day Angela Merkel went awfully close to an absolute majority in German elections? I'm sure it is. But it's still very bad news for the Greeks, who now have their perhaps last chance to throw out the international financial system and decide their own fate, before most of their valuables have been sold off to foreign interests. Greece is where democracy started, and the way things are going, it may be where it will end as well.
Monday, September 23, 2013
Ron Paul - Internet Sales Tax Could Crush Small Businesses / Politics / Taxes
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
One unique aspect of my homeschool curriculum is that students can start and manage their own online business. Students will be responsible for deciding what products or services to offer, getting the business up and running, and marketing the business's products. Students and their families will get to keep the profits made from the business. Hopefully, participants in this program will develop a business that can either provide them with a full-time career or a way to supplement their income.
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Monday, September 23, 2013
Why Is Angela Merkel So Popular? / Politics / Germany
By: Andrew_McKillop
READ IT IN THE POLLS
Angela Merkel became Europe's most popular leader by telling Germans they don't need to change, their national energy security was guaranteed, the economy was powerful – at least for car exports - and they were shielded from the stressful Club Med debt and deficit crisis that tore southern Europe apart. Also, despite it being unpopular she had shown her European credentials. Using German money, with German conditions attached she had helped save, or delay the end of, the Euro-zone.
Monday, September 23, 2013
Obama - CIA Manchurian Candidate Groomed by Communists to Destroy America / Politics / Conspiracy Theory
By: Submissions
John Rolls Submits: Dave Hodges writes: Former FBI Weatherman Task Force supervisor, Max Noel, noted that the FBI utilized a CARL test when it conducted background checks on various suspects. The acronym CARL stands for Character, Associates, Reputation, and Loyalty is used to assess candidates fitness to hold the highest office in the country. On each of these four points of power, Obama fails and fails miserably. Like many FBI law enforcement agents and officials, Noel was alarmed by the fact that someone like Barack Obama could capture the presidency. For some unexplained reason, Obama was never vetted before he became a candidate for the presidency by the FBI. This is an unacceptable result of our national security system and is wholly suggestive of internal plot to allow the installation of a blatantly communist advocate into the highest political position in America.