News & Commentary
-
Social Security Trust Fund
By Chuck Gibson
With so many Americans reliant on Social Security for their retirement I find it helpful to check in a couple of times a year and see what, if anything, has changed. Bruce Krastin…
-
The Local Food Movement Takes Root
Continue reading the article . . .
-
Why I’m Suing Barack Obama
By Chris Hedges
Attorneys Carl J. Mayer and Bruce I. Afran filed a complaint Friday in the Southern U.S. District Court in New York City on my behalf as a plaintiff against Barack Obama and Secreta…
-
S&P Expects Greece to Default Soon
By Emelia Sithole-Matarise and Anirban Nag
Greece will default shortly on its debt obligations, a senior Standard & Poor’s official told Bloomberg Television on Monday.
“Greece will default very …
-
Stock Chart for BALTIC DRY INDEX (BDIY)
Source: Bloomberg
View Interactive Stock Chart
-
Where Can We Look For Hope?
Source: Wegelin & CO. Investment Commentary No. 280
1. History tells stories
It may be in the nature of the way we deal with crises, and are ultimately able to overcome them, that we need to …
-
M.I.T. Game-Changer: Free Online Education For All
M.I.T.’s Simmons Hall
By James Marshall Crotty
For Wall Street Occupiers or other decriers of the “social injustice” of college tuition, here’s a curveball bound to scramble your worldview: a to…
-
Top Tech Trends 2011
Continue reading the article . . .
-
Saving the Post Office: The Models of Kiwibank and Japan Post
By Ellen Brown
Neither rain nor sleet nor snow may have stopped the Pony Express, but the nation’s oldest and second largest employer is now under attack. Claiming the Postal Service is bankrup…
-
George Friedman on Stratfor’s Security Breach
YouTube
(10 Jan 12)Related reading:
Stratfor Back Online After Cyberhack
abc News (11 Jan 12) -
Ron Paul’s Plan to Restore America Challenges Secret Trillion Dollar Black Budget
By Michael E. Salla, Ph.D.
Ron’s Paul’s strong second place finish in New Hampshire’s Presidential Primary greatly raises his prospects in the Republican Presidential race, and will lead to m…
-
The Post Empire Survival Guide
By Sam Smith
Since 1989, we have occasionally published a guide to getting through the crummy era that we are still in. In 2003, we intially noted that the First American Republic was over. Last year…
-
2011 Stock Market Returns By Country
Source: Thomson Reuters
[click on the image for a larger version]
-
Thrive Named #1 Top Transformational Film of the Year
As we start 2012 with all of the promise that it brings for transformation, let’s take a look back at some of the amazing films or 2011 that brought us to this point. The results of the voting ar…
-
FDA: Novartis Recall May Also Affect Painkillers
By The Associated Press
The Food and Drug Administration is warning patients about a potential mix-up between powerful prescription pain drugs and common over-the-counter medications made at a Novart…
-
Swiss National Bank President Resigns
By Corinne Gretler
Stocks in Switzerland (SMI) dropped as the Swiss National Bank President Philipp Hildebrand resigned after a currency purchase by his wife last year became controversial.
Novart…
-
The Empire Strikes Back: US Moves Toward Legal Action Against Swiss Bank
Wegelin & Co one of last pure Swiss private banks
Negotiations at critical stage in Wegelin case
Investigations shake Swiss banking secrecy traditionBy Lynnley Browning
U.S. author…
-
What May Lay Ahead in 2012
By Chuck Gibson
As we finish putting the holiday decorations away and finalize the clean up of our champagne filled New Year’s celebration it’s a great time to refocus our attention back to wha…
-
Democracy and Debt
Aristotle’s Politics Book V and VI
By Michael Hudson
Book V of Aristotle’s Politics describes the eternal transition of oligarchies making themselves into hereditary aristocracies – which end…
-
Interactive Comparison Of GDP: America vs The World
By Tyler Durden
Curious how the US, on a state by state basis, stacks up against the rest of the world, in terms of economic (and population) prowess? The following interactive graphic from the Econo…
-
A Punch to the Mouth: Food Price Volatility Hits the World
By Gregor Macdonald
2011 was an abysmal year for the global insurance industry, which had to cover yet another enormous increase in damages from natural disasters. Unknown to most casual observers…
-
The Company That Ruled The Waves
As state-backed firms once again become forces in global business, we ask what they can learn from the greatest of them all.
By The Economist
A POPULAR parlour game among historians is debating wh…
-
‘If You Don’t Take a Job as a Prostitute, We Can Stop Your Benefits’
By Clare Chapman
A 25-year-old waitress who turned down a job providing “sexual services” at a brothel in Berlin faces possible cuts to her unemployment benefit under laws introduced this year.
P…
-
A History of the Exchange Stabilization Fund
[arve url=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/J3UbUR9lrFc” frameborder=”0″ width=”325″ height=”242″>
YouTubeRelated Videos:
Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 and Part 5
-
Hmmm…..Obama’s Motion Denied, He Must Prove His Qualifications
The Georgia Election Code (the “Code”) mandates that “[e]very candidate for federal and state office who is certified by the state executive committee of a political party or who files a notice of can…
-
Fed Minutes Show Plans to Alter Monetary Policy Communications
By jturbin
The latest Fed minutes, a recap of the December 2011 Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting, revealed that the U.S. central bank is making several noteworthy changes to the manner …
-
Economic Cycle Research Institute Leading Index
By Doug Short
Click for a larger image
Continue reading the article . . .
-
Panetta to Offer Strategy for Cutting Military Budget
Reductions are expected in the program for the F-35 fighter jet.
By Elisabeth Bumiller and Thom Shanker
Washington — Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta is set this week to reveal his strategy that …
-
World’s Biggest Economies Face $7.6T Debt
A man walks on a container at a shipping terminal in Tokyo on Dec. 21, 2011.
Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi/BloombergBy Keith Jenkins and Anchalee Worrachate
Governments of the world’s leading eco…
-
Catherine Austin Fitts on Wall Street’s Corruption, the Austrian School and Who’s ‘Really’ in Charge
By Staff Report
The Daily Bell is pleased to publish an interview with financial advisor Catherine Austin Fitts.
Continue reading the article . . .
The Austrian School, and Who’s “Really”…
-
Montana High Court Says ‘Citizens United’ Does Not Apply In Big Sky State
By Steven Rosenfeld
Montana’s Supreme Court has issued a stunning rebuke to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision in 2010 that infamously decreed corporations had constitutional r…
-
Here’s How Every Asset Class Performed In 2011
By Scott Barber
[Click image to view larger print]
Continue reading the article . . .
-
$6.3 Trillion Wiped Off Global Markets in 2011
By Robin Wigglesworth in London
Almost $6.3 trillion was erased from global stock markets this year as the euro zone financial crisis reverberated across the world in the latter half of 2011, calli…
-
Dissent from the Majority Report of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission
By Peter J. Wallison
Peter Wallison has published his Dissent from the Majority Report of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission. It’s a must read for those of us interested in the financial crisi…
-
2011 Year in Review: Signs of an American Spring and a Fourth Turning
By David B. Collum
Precious metals were in a Utopian bull market for almost a decade. The early bulls lounged poolside, taking the occasional dip and enjoying returns in the high teens. It was a leis…
-
“The Great Culling”
YouTube
Related reading:
The Great Culling
Home Page -
Attributes of Kali Yuga
A discourse by Markandeya in the Mahabharata identifies some of the attributes of Kali Yuga:
In relation to rulers
Rulers will become unreasonable: they will levy taxes unfairly.
Rulers will … -
Clouded Title: The Gross Illegality of MERS
By Barry Ritholtz
“What’s happened is that, almost overnight, we’ve switched from democracy in real-property recording to oligarchy in real-property recording. There was no court case behind t…
-
The History of Superinsulated Houses in North America
By Martin Holladay, GBA Advisor
Several GBA readers have requested a copy of a presentation I gave at the recent annual meeting of the British Columbia Building Envelope Council in Vancouver. The p…
-
China Begins Using New Global Positioning Satellite “Big Dipper”
By Reuters
Beijing (Reuters) – China took a further step on Tuesday toward ending its dependence on U.S. satellites to provide navigation and positioning services with the start of trial operations…
-
The Myth of Japan’s ‘Lost Decades’
By Eamonn Fingleton
Tokyo, Japan — In this slot a few days ago I posed some historical questions that, judging by the email I have been receiving, have perplexed a lot of readers.
Let me now f…
-
The Watchdogs That Didn’t Bark
By Scot Paltrow
Four years after the banking system nearly collapsed from reckless mortgage lending, federal prosecutors have stayed on the sidelines, even as judges around the country are pointing…
-
James Koutoulas Explains Why JP Morgan’s Involvement In MF Global Is Suspicious
By Lisa Du
James Koutoulas, one of the founders of the Commodity Customer Coalition—which represents the interests of over 8,000 MF Global customers, was just on CNBC to talk about the recent blitz…
-
Judge: Iran, Taliban, al Qaeda liable for 9/11
People walk over the Brooklyn Bridge from Manhattan to Brooklyn after the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center Sept. 11, 2001.
By The Associated Press
(AP) New York – A federal judge has si…
-
Response to Charles Eisenstein’s Critique of THRIVE
By Foster Gamble
Charles Eisenstein, the author of Sacred Economics, has written an article,”Synchronicity, Myth and the New World Order”, and a critique of THRIVE: What on Earth Will It Take? , …
-
Marcin Jakubowski: Open-sourced Blueprints For Civilization
By TED and The Huffington Post
Watch Open Source Ecology Founder Marcin Jakubowski discuss the prospects for an open source, do it yourself civilization. Then read Isaiah Saxon’s follow-up blog post …
-
The Truth About Wealth
Illustration by M.K. Perker
By Robert Frank
Who says the rich always get richer?
Despite heated rhetoric emanating from politicians and pundits, the top 1% is hardly a fixed group that enjoys consi…
-
Nevada Attorney General Sues Lender Processing Services for Fraud
OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
Catherine Cortez Masto, Attorney General
555 E. Washington Avenue, Suite 3900
Las Vegas, Nevada 89101
Telephone – (702) 486-3420
Fax – (702) 486-3283
Web – http://ag.s… -
The Book of Jobs
By Joseph E. Stiglitz
It has now been almost five years since the bursting of the housing bubble, and four years since the onset of the recession. There are 6.6 million fewer jobs in the United Sta…
-
CME in Talks to Enter China Derivatives Market
By Reuters
CME Group Inc., operator of the world’s leading energy, grains and precious metals markets, is in talks with China’s securities regulator to enter the mainland’s financial derivati…
-
Old Answers to the New Atheism: An Interview with Peter Hitchens
By Peter Hitchens
TT: What is the major failure of Christian education in the modern West?
PH: Its lack of poetry. The abandonment of the great poetic text of the King James Bible (and of the Boo…
-
Anonymous Donors Pay Off Kmart Layaway Accounts
By Margery A. Beck
Maha, Neb. (AP) — The young father stood in line at the Kmart layaway counter, wearing dirty clothes and worn-out boots. With him were three small children.
He asked to pay so…
-
The Biggest Company You’ve Never Heard of…
YouTube
By Nina Bernstein
The men showed up in a small town in Australia’s outback early last year, offering top dollar for all available lodgings. Within days, their company, Serco, was flying i…
-
Kauffman’s Hottest Research and Video Topics in 2011
By Barbara Pruitt
Kauffman’s most popular content this year discovered a “jobs leak,” illustrated entrepreneurs’ contributions and recommended policy reforms for growth.
(Kansas City, Mo.), Dec. 1…
-
IRS Releases Guidance on Foreign Financial Asset Reporting
By IRS
Washington—The Internal Revenue Service in coming days will release a new information reporting form that taxpayers will use starting this coming tax filing season to report specified fo…
-
Payroll Tax Cut and Spending Bill Stall in Senate, Raising Threat of Shutdown
By Rosalind S. Helderman
Negotiations over how to extend a payroll tax holiday for 160 million Americans and avoid a government shutdown this weekend ground to a halt Wednesday after a standoff in…
-
Census Data: Half of U.S. Poor or Low Income
The St. Columbanus Church food pantry in Chicago feeds 500 households a week, but some weeks it struggles to keep up with demand. (CBS)
By CBS
Washington – Squeezed by rising living costs, a record …
-
Regulators Know Where MF Global Funds Went
Corzine is sworn in to testify about MF Global’s bankruptcy before a US senate committee in Washington, December 8, 2011.
By Christopher Doering
Regulators now have a more complete picture of mon…
-
SOPA: Washington Vs. The Web
By Ryan Grim
Washington — A month ago, Google lobbyist Katherine Oyama absorbed one of the more unusual congressional tongue-lashings in years when she appeared before a hearing of the House Judi…
-
Cities, States Pushed on Financial Projections
By Michael Corkery
Cities and states would be required to release projections of cash flows and pension costs five years into the future under a proposed financial-reporting rule due to be released…
-
HSBC Sues MF Global Over $850,000 of Gold
HSBC Holdings plc is a public limited company incorporated in England in 1990, and headquartered in London since 1993.
By Linda Sandler and Tiffany Kary
An HSBC Holdings Plc (HSBA) unit sued the MF…
-
Crony Capitalism
View larger image
-
Victorian Mill Town Growing ALL its Own Vegetables
By Vincent Graff
Admittedly, it sounds like the most foolhardy of criminal capers, and one of the cheekiest, too.
Outside the police station in the small Victorian mill town of Todmorden, West Yor…
-
Bernanke’s Obfuscation Continues
The Fed’s $29 Trillion Bail-out of Wall Street
By L. Randall Wray
Table 1- Cumulative facility totals, in billions
Continue reading the article . . .
-
Cameron Negotiates U.K.’s Isolation in EU
U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron
By Gonzalo Vina and Rebecca Christie
Prime Minister David Cameron said Britain refused to sacrifice sovereignty to save the euro, remaining outside an agreement by …
-
A C.E.O.’s Moral Stand
By D. Michael Lindsay
It seems that every week we hear of a C.E.O. who earned millions from a golden parachute after demonstrating poor business judgment or cutting thousands of jobs with no financ…
-
Bernie Sanders F***** Up Big Time
[arve url=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/G9qZZVqSQdo” frameborder=”0″ width=”325″ height=”242″>
YouTubeNOTE:
CAF Note: Open up the constitution in this environment and you will create a process that…
-
MF Global and The Great Wall St Re-hypothecation Scandal
By Christopher Elias (UK)
(Business Law Currents) A legal loophole in international brokerage regulations means that few, if any, clients of MF Global are likely to get their money back. Although…
-
MF Global Woes Ripple Into Heartland
CEO Jon Corzine, center, at MF Global last year: A Senate panel Thursday grilled regulators about how loopholes let farmers’ commodity trades end up in risky bonds.
More than 100 Minnesota farmers…
-
More Than Just Digital Quilting
Technology and society: The “maker” movement could change how science is taught and boost innovation. It may even herald a new industrial revolution
By The Economist
The scene in the park sur…
-
Black Friday 2011 Set Gun Sales Record
By Herald Online
Thousands of Americans will be finding guns in their Christmas stockings this year, after the biggest one-day buy-up on record.
Black Friday set the biggest one-day record of back…
-
BP Says Halliburton ‘Intentionally Destroyed Evidence’ After Gulf Oil Spill
Fire boats battle a fire at the off shore oil rig Deepwater Horizon on April 21, 2010, in the Gulf of Mexico.
By Vivian Kuo
BP is accusing Halliburton of having “intentionally destroyed evidence” re…
-
$2 trillion Sunstorm Coming, NASA Warns
From Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin
The U.S. is becoming increasingly aware and concerned about the possibility within a few years of an electromagnetic pulse attack from an enemy’s high-altitude nuclea…
-
Claim: Clinton Collected $50K Per Month From MF Global
William J. Clinton (left) and Jon S. Corzine
By Neil W. McCabe
A former MF Global employee accused former president William J. Clinton of collecting $50,000 per month through his Teneo advisory fi…
-
A Banker Speaks, With Regret
By Nicholas D. Kristopf
If you want to understand why the Occupy movement has found such traction, it helps to listen to a former banker like James Theckston. He fully acknowledges that he and othe…
-
Shock Waves From MF Global Collapse Felt on Farms
By Steve Karnowski Associated Press
MINNEAPOLIS—The shock waves from the collapse of commodities trading firm MF Global Inc. are hitting hard across rural America, where farmers, ranchers and ag…
-
Who Owns This Mess?
Hernando de Soto is a Peruvian economist who made enough money in Europe to retire before he was 40. Instead he began studying what makes some countries rich and keeps others poor. His advocacy for f…
-
The Spirit of Enterprise
By David Brooks
Why are nations like Germany and the U.S. rich? It’s not primarily because they possess natural resources — many nations have those. It’s primarily because of habits, values a…
-
Radiation From Cell Phones and WiFi Are Making People Sick — Are We All at Risk?
Photo Credit: Image by pfig via Flickr
By Christopher Ketcham
We are now exposed to electromagnetic radio frequencies 24 hours a day. Welcome to the largest human experiment ever.
Consider this sto…
-
The Theory of Everything (else)
Continue reading the article . . .
-
Assange: Using iPhone, Gmail, BlackBerry? You’re screwed!
By RT News
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange speaks at a press conference at City University London in central London December 1, 2011
(AFP Photo / LEON NEAL)Continue reading the article . . .
…
-
On The World’s Reserve Currency: What’s Past Is Epilogue
By Tyler Durden
Simply put, “it does not last for ever” should be ringing in the ears of every investor in the world with more than a few millisecond return horizon. And neither do any and all charta…
-
Central Banks Cut Cost of Borrowing Dollars to Inflate
By Scott Lanman and Jeff Black
Six central banks led by the Federal Reserve made it cheaper for banks to borrow dollars in emergencies in a global effort to ease Europe’s sovereign-debt crisis.
…
-
American Airlines’ DB Plans Up In Air After Bankruptcy Filing
By Barry B. Burr
AMR Corp.’s filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection leaves the future uncertain for American Airlines’ defined benefit pension plans, which have a combined $8.3 billion in asse…
-
Chris Martenson on Exponentially Rising Debt and Rapid Depletion of Resources
By Chris Powell
Dear Friend of GATA and Gold:
Market analyst Chris Martenson made an absolutely brilliant and eloquent presentation to the Spanish Precious Metals Association’s conference in Madrid …
-
Locking Up Profits
Private prison companies strive to keep millions behind bars to keep their profits up. (photo: Gallo/Getty images)
rsn editors comment:
“Despite a falling crime rate and widespread overcrowdi… -
Food Retailing Industry Joins Fellow Merchants to File Lawsuit against U.S. Federal Reserve
Contact: Heather Garlich
hgarlich@fmi.org
202-220-0616ARLINGTON VA – November 22, 2011 – Today, the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) has joined with the National Association of Convenience Store…
-
Tripwires to a Market Crash
By Cam Hui
The title, which refers to a possible “market crash”, may seem untimely on an occasion when ES futures are deeply in the green, but the newsflow from Europe is getting more and more conf…
-
The Economist on the Euro: Is this the end?
Unless Germany and the ECB move quickly, the single currency’s collapse is looming
EVEN as the euro zone hurtles towards a crash, most people are assuming that, in the end, European leaders will …
-
Secret Fed Loans Helped Banks Net $13B
By Bob Ivry, Bradley Keoun and Phil Kuntz
The Federal Reserve and the big banks fought for more than two years to keep details of the largest bailout in U.S. history a secret. Now, the rest of the wo…
-
The Elite Plan for a New World Social Order
By Richard K Moore
This article is Part 1 of a series.
Was first published in New Dawn Magazine
When the Industrial Revolution began in Britain, in the late 1700s, there was lots of money to …
-
Michael Pritchard’s Water Filter Turns Filthy Water Drinkable
Clean drinking water can be provided to the world for just $20 billion.
YouTube
(13 Oct 2009) -
Scare Tactics in Greece
By Gretchen Morgenson
AS the debt mess in Europe deepens, bankers are pressing Greece’s bond holders to swallow big losses.
Leading the charge is BNP Paribas, the big French bank, which has b…
-
Senators to Vote on Bill “Battlefield” Defined as Being Right Outside Your Window
By Chris Anders
While nearly all Americans head to family and friends to celebrate Thanksgiving, the Senate is gearing up for a vote on Monday or Tuesday that goes to the very heart of who we are a…
-
Fannie, Freddie Tentacles Embraced Many in Washington
* Freddie and Fannie had deep political connections
* Rahm Emanuel, Tom Donilon were on payrollBy Tim Reid, Margaret Chadbourn and Mark Hosenball
While presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich was forc…
-
Happy Thanksgiving! – Alice’s Restaurant
YouTube
(24 Nov 2009)YouTube
(24 Nov 2009) -
Euro Zone Unlikely to Survive Intact: Reuters Poll
By Andy Bruce
The euro zone is unlikely to survive its sovereign debt crisis in current form, according to a majority of leading economists and former policymakers polled by Reuters.
Fourteen out …
-
Occupy Wall Street’s Message For Lawyers
Behind every credit default swap or short of subprime mortgage-backed assets sit legal counsel sanctioning these practices; their hands are no cleaner than those of their clients.
By Katherine Fran…
-
More Moral Hazard on The Way
By cleg
Brought to us courtesy of senators Kay Hagan of North Carolina and one of the banking lobby’s most obedient lap dogs, Bob Corker of Tennessee; The United States Covered Bond Act of 2011 is de…
-
Deja Vu All Over Again?
By Chuck Gibson
Almost a year ago I said that the current tussle in the market was an epic battle. Back then we had an overbought, overvalued, and overly bullish market that was built on a poor f…